Beneath Strange Stars

by Ralph E. Vaughan

  Most people learned; some never did.

  Not far from where he walked, Phil could hear the sounds of the waves lapping against the breakwall, and he could smell the tangy odors of the sea. He thought for a moment that he heard the high cries of the Deep Ones as they capered in the low swells.

  Darby was not big; no town was. The Great Old Ones did not like large towns because large groups of people meant opposition. One could not let a herd of cattle grow too unruly. Phil gritted his teeth as he moved through the fog and thought forbidden thoughts.

  Some people never learned.

  And so it was that in a small seaport called Darby, in the latter portion of the year A.D. 2653, that a young man named Philip Howardson finally set himself against the order imposed by the Great Old Ones, even though he realized that his disaffection would probably result in the forfeiture of his life.

  Jon Lazarus’ house and farm were west of the main part of Darby, on the edge of the western wilderness. Beyond the fence marking the boundary of his land stretched endless tracts of woods and low rolling hills. Nobody ever ventured out of Darby by way of land – it was not allowed. Ocean trade with other small coastal ports was along certain set ancient routes, and ships which strayed too far out to sea were never seen again.

  When Jon Lazarus had inherited his house and land from his father, it was expected that he would take a wife and have children. He did neither, and the rumors started to fly. To everyone’s surprise, Jon was not taken by the Hounds. Then, ten years ago, Jon adopted Phil after his parents had died of fever. The good people of Darby expected the Hounds of Tindalos to take them both, and it was always a constant source of surprise when people saw them come into town. They were all sure it was a matter of time.

  As Phil approached, the large house appeared empty, not a candle burning in any of the windows, but Phil knew where he would find Jon. He doffed his cloak and hung it on a hook in the entryway. He passed into the darkness on the other side of the staircase and felt for the telling seam to the edge panel. He pushed the piece of wood in and the centuries-old door slid open, revealing a warren of secret rooms.

  Jon Lazarus sat at a desk, reading from a handwritten journal. The walls were lined with shelves of ancient and forbidden books. All books were ancient because they were no longer written, and all books were forbidden because books contained knowledge, and humans were dangerous when they knew too much. The books dated from a time before the coming of the Great Old Ones.

  Phil knew the journal Jon was reading from had to be ancient because writing on the whole was a lost art. Aside from ledgers and receipts which merchants and sea captains were forced to keep, reading and writing were forgotten and forbidden. Jon looked up from the book and smiled.

  “Anything new in town?” he asked.

  “They say that Simon Carlos was taken by the Hounds because he tried to clear some wooded land to expand his farm” Phil said.

  “Poor foolish Simon,” Jon murmured. “Even I advised him against such a blatant act. He should have been more subtle in his rebellion.” He indicated the books around him and the journal in his hand. “A man can transgress against the Great Old Ones just once publicly and be taken by them. Or, he can be like me and practice blasphemy and perversion all his life and not get caught. By the laws of the Great Old Ones, this house has always been the home of blasphemers, but secret blasphemers.”

  “What are you reading?” Phil asked.

  “Did you lock up?”

  “Naturally. Of course.”

  “It’s a very interesting chronicle written by a distant ancestor, started just before the advent of the Great Old Ones.” Jon said the words as calmly as if he were talking about a shipping list. “It covers a period of about ten years. I discovered it in a false drawer of this desk.”

  “That must be at least five hundred years old!” Phil gasped.

  “By the dates, it was started exactly five hundred and thirty-one years ago.”

  “Well, what does it say?” Phil asked breathlessly.

  “More than I could possibly tell you in the time I have left to me,” Jon said in a low even voice. He smiled thinly and distantly. “I’ll leave it here for you to read after I have left.”

  “What?” Phil blinked back his surprise. “Leaving? Where are you going?”

  “I’ve been trying to think of some way to break this to you gently,” Jon said, “but I guess the best way, the only way, is just to tell you outright. I’ve lived as much of my life in Darby as I’m going to live. I’m not going to be penned in any longer.”

  Phil stared into the face of his friend, the man who had been a father and mother to him since the death of his parents. The candles in the room cast harsh shadows over his face, making him seem much older than he really was.

  “But why?” Phil choked.

  Jon was silent in the gloom for a moment, then said, “I have had the feeling for some time that there are forces in the world closing in around me. I think that if I do not leave soon under my own will, I will be taken by the minions of the Great Old Ones. That there are human informers among us, I’m sure of. And I haven’t been as careful as most of my other ancestors about hiding what I do, keeping myself to myself.”

  “Where will you go?” Phil asked,

  “West.”

  “The Great Old Ones will stop you. You won’t make it.”

  “That may very well be,” Jon admitted, “but I have to try. I can either live the rest of my years in Darby, or I can take all that I have learned through this library and through my observations, and try to accomplish something. I choose the latter.”

  “I want to go with you,” Phil said quietly.

  “You cannot,” Jon said, putting his hand on Phil’s shoulder. “You’re needed here still. I don’t have a son by blood, but I have you, and in many ways you’ve been more than a son to me. When I am gone, people will assume I was taken by the Hounds. It will be no more than they’ve expected for the past many years. The fact that you will have been left behind will help clear any doubts they might harbor about you. You have to remain here to care and learn from this until you have someone you can entrust it to.” He indicated the secret library. “The books constantly need repairing and they always have to be protected from discovery until such time as men are free again and the Great Old Ones have been banished from the spaces of this earth.”

  “But I want to go with you,” Phil repeated, blinking back bitter tears. “I can’t do this by myself.”

  “I wish you could come with me,” Jon said, embracing the young man, “but you can’t. And you won’t be alone. You have Marcia Stephens, a woman who loves you, and, I think, a woman you can trust – that’s something I never had. I kept love out of my life. I don’t know how you got in. After I am gone, all this will be yours, and you will be free to marry her…when the time is right.”

  “How will you find your way in the wilderness?” Phil asked. “Where will you go? How will you keep from just wandering about aimlessly until you are taken?”

  “I don’t think that will be as much as a problem as it seems,” Jon explained,. “I’ve made copies of the old maps from books in the library, and if there are yet any traces of the old highways to be found, I expect I’ll be able to follow them without too much difficulty. If I live long enough, that’s if I can avoid the Great Old Ones, I hope to make it to one of the old cities, maybe Chicago or one of the cities in the far west like Los Angeles. Perhaps I can find some answers to my questions there.”

  He picked up the ancient handwritten journal and weighed it in his hand.

  “This, more than anything, has helped me to make up my mind about leaving at this time,”

  “How?”

  “There are certain items and events recorded here which make me think the Great Old Ones are not exactly what people believe them to be, that they are not quite as powerful as they would like us to think.” He laid the book down. “In fact, like my distant ancestor here, I begin to wonde
r if the Great Old Ones exist at all in the forms that we have been taught.”

  “But the disappearances.”

  “Granted, people have vanished,” Jon admitted, “seemingly when they go against the will of the Great Old Ones, and people have been found murdered in horrible ways. All of that reinforces belief and fear, and conditions people to act in a certain manner. But are the Great Old Ones the gods people believe them to be? I think not. They may be no more gods than we are.”

  “But everyone has seen traces of the Great Old Ones,” Phil pointed out.

  “But never the Great Old Ones themselves,” Jon said. “Nor any of their minions. Only traces, such as the baying of the Hounds.”

  “But the Hounds do bay, Jon,” Phil said quietly. “People hear them. They are real.”

  “Damn the Hounds!” Jon spat.

  The candle Jon was using to read by flickered for a moment, and they both looked about nervously. They almost expected to hear the sound of distant baying or the splat of the webbed feet of some undersea minion approaching. They had lived with the specter of the Great Old Ones too long for them to leave their fears behind.

  Jon laughed dryly. “Well, perhaps I don’t totally disbelieve in them, but I have to find out.”

  “When are you leaving?”

  “Tomorrow,” Jon said. “Just after it gets dark. I’ll have a better chance of getting clear of Darby under the cover of darkness.”

  “I’ll follow you,” Phil vowed.

  “Oh, I’m sure you will,” Jon laughed. “One day. You’ll have to leave this place, the same way I have to now. But not until you’ve found another custodian for the library. It’s lasted too long now to be destroyed. But you’ll follow me, even if I’m surely dead by that time, I know that. That’s why I’m leaving this journal and copies of the maps I made behind. Perhaps they’ll help you.”

  He picked up a heavy thick-walled metal box from nearby. Already in the box were several folded parchment maps he had copied by hand. To these, Jon added the handwritten journal. He attached the lid and set the box to the side of the desk.

  “That should preserve them until you are ready to look through them,” Jon said. “Between the metal walls is a kind of insulating material, to protect it from heat and water. Phil, after all these years, I couldn’t be more fond of you if you were my actual blood son.” He leaned over and kissed the young man on his cheek. “Stay out late tomorrow night. Come back after I have left. If you’re here when it comes time to leave, I might not be able to leave.”

  “I don’t want you to leave, Jon.” Phil fought back his tears, but they came anyway.

  Phil finally stood and went to his room, leaving Jon Lazarus alone in the secret and forbidden library which would become his responsibility after the next sunset.

  Phil Howardson crept away before the rising of the sun. He did not want to go through the pain of saying goodbye again.

  After spending the day idle in the tavern, Phil went calling on Marcia Stephens. He knew that when he finally returned home, he would find an empty house. On the morrow, he would have to announce to the people that crazy old Jon Lazarus had finally been taken by the Hounds of Tindalos, that their predictions had finally been fulfilled. Phil would become the master of the house and farm.

  He headed toward the Stephens place, intending to ask young Marcia a question.

  “Somebody’s coming up the road,” Josh Stephens, Marcia’s father said to his wife, Helen.

  “Must be Phil Howardson coming to call on Marcia,” she said.

  She and her husband were both sitting on the swing on the porch of their large house, enjoying the cool of the evening.

  “I wish Marcia wouldn’t see him,” Josh muttered. “I don’t like that faraway look in his eyes, and I don’t like Jon Lazarus.”

  “Well, the boy seems right enough to me,” Helen replied. “I admit Jon’s always been a strange one, but if the Hounds were going to take him for being strange, they would have done so a long time ago. Perhaps the rumors about him are nothing more than rumors. After all, the Great Old Ones know everything.”

  Josh glanced at his wife to see if she was mocking him or the Great Old Ones. Satisfied at her sincerity, he said, “That’s true. But I still think the boy’ll bring Marcia nothing but grief.”

  “Hello, Josh, Helen,” Phil greeted as he neared the bottom of the steps. “Is Marcia at home?”

  “She’s inside finishing up the dishes,” Helen said before her husband could say anything. “I’ll get her for you.”

  “Fine weather we’re having,” Phil commented, trying to break the uncomfortable silence which had fallen over him and Josh.

  “By the will of the Great Old Ones,” Josh said, turning the maxim into a challenge.

  Before the conversation could be carried any further, Marcia and her mother appeared at the door, Marcia, as always, looking beautiful. Her hair was chestnut colored and her eyes were a sparkling green. Her form was slender with still-developing curves, a girl blossoming into womanhood..

  “Josh,” Helen said, “I’m getting a little cool. Let’s go inside for the evening.”

  Josh grumbled something that no one could quite make out, but he followed his wife inside. As the screen door slammed, Marcia’s hand stole into Phil’s. They sat on the porch swing, the ropes supporting it groaning under their sudden weight.

  “Your father still doesn’t like me,” Phil said when he was sure they were alone.

  Marcia laughed, a lovely tinkling sound. “My father doesn’t like anyone. Sometimes I think he doesn’t even like himself. He especially doesn’t like anyone when he thinks they’re tempting the wrath of the Great Old Ones, such as Jon Lazarus and anyone connected with him. But, for that matter, he thinks everyone sins against the will of the Great Old Ones. Except himself that is.”

  Phil laughed, but the sound was weak and forced, not at all like his usual self. His face was white.

  “Phil,” she said softly, “is there something wrong? You don’t look too good.”

  Phil had not planned on telling anyone the truth about what was happening this evening, not even Marcia, whom he loved very much and who was closer to him than any person in Darby outside of Jon. He had not meant to tell her and share such dangerous knowledge until she was ready to make a lifelong commitment to him to he to her. He had not meant to burden her with his troubles, but the words seemed to slip out effortlessly, without any conscious effort on his part. In excited nervous whispers he told her everything that he had always kept from her – the library, his beliefs, his plans for the future. Somewhere along the way, he asked her to marry him.

  Marcia sat in stunned silence for what seemed like an eternity. Finally she whispered, “Yes, I’ll be your wife, if my parents will agree. My mother likes you, and she can talk my father into anything.”

  “What about the rest of what I told you?” he asked. “Aren’t you frightened?”

  “Yes. But I love you. I won’t tell anyone.”

  “I mean, what do you think about all that I told you?”

  “I’ve known you were different than anyone else from the first day I met you,” she said, squeezing his hand. “It doesn’t make any difference in the way I feel about you.”

  “Do you believe as I do?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “Don’t let Jon Lazarus beguile you into thinking the Great Old Ones are any less than what people say they are. I know I don’t have the learning that you do, but while I know things may not be what we think they are, I also know it’s healthier to act like they are just as true as everyone else believes.” She paused. “Did you mean what you said?”

  “About what?”

  “About following Jon Lazarus one day.”

  “It’s something I’ll have to do.”

  “When that day comes,” she said, “I’ll go with you.”

  “I couldn’t let you throw away your life like that,” he said. “I have an obligation to protect you. I can’t let you ri
sk your life for something that you don’t believe in.”

  “Phil Howardson,” she said evenly, holding his hands and looking into his eyes. “I believe in you.”

  They sat on the porch for a long time, holding hands, swinging and sharing whispered secrets. They felt closer now than they had ever felt before. The darkness became deeper and stars blazed across the sky.

  They were ready to go inside and make their announcement, to make their request really, when Phil noticed a light moving across the field of stars. Two more lights which he had thought to be stars began moving with the first. He pointed the lights out to Marcia.

  “The Great Old Ones!” she gasped in a whisper. “Let’s go inside, Phil. This is not something that we’re supposed to see.”

  “Look! They’re coming down.” He felt a coldness deep in his soul, and even though he knew the wisest thing he could do at that moment was to go inside, he stood rooted to the spot, ignoring Marcia tugging on his arm.

  The points of light dropped out of the star field and drew closer, becoming hazy purple and gold lights. A distant baying came over the night air.

  “The Hounds!” Marcia gasped, pulling violently on his arm. “Phil! Please! We were not meant to see this!”

  “Marcia!” her father called, appearing at the door. “You two get in here right now! This moment!” His face was drawn and a sickly white.

  Marcia grabbed Phil’s hand and attempted to pull him to the open door, but he shook her off. He moved to the railing of the porch. He watched with an increasing sense of dread.

  “They’re heading toward my house!” Phil yelled as the lights started to drop on the other side of the small grove of woods separating the two farms. He vanished into the night, running off across the fields.

  “Phil!”

  “Let him go, child!” Josh grabbed her. “The Hounds will take him too. We’ll never see him or Jon Lazarus again. Rightly so!”