Servants of Darkness (Thirteen Creepy Tales)

by Mark Edward Hall

  I had concealed a flask in my boot upon departing Boston and chose that moment to extract it and partake of a healthy swallow of its contents, a fine amber brandy. And I did so with great relish. It succeeded in warming my bones but did nothing to quell the terrible dread I felt deep in my soul.

  The coach cleared the darkness of forest once again and this time instead of village I saw a green sloping land filled with pastures and distant woods, and farmhouses.

  I looked and beheld in the distance a wide expanse of ocean whose waters were being whipped into a hideous frenzy. To the right and left as far as the eye could see, the water was ink-black and bubbling as if it was some vile brine boiling in a massive caldron. And yet that spinning vortex continued to whirl crazily around that barren crag as dark, elongated clouds spun away from it like the tattered remnants of ruined curtains.

  The driver lashed the team unmercifully and at the foot of the hill he pulled back on the reins and brought them up short, swung them about, entering onto a road to the right that was nary a road at all, but merely a wide path with two wheel-ruts at its center. And once again, this time with dismay, I found myself shrouded in shadowy forest. We were all but hemmed in with trees, which in places arched over the roadway till we passed, as through a tunnel. Every now and then the horses would throw their heads up and sniff the air suspiciously, and looking through the window I saw that the driver was having difficulty holding them on course, for they were trying to break pace in their panic and turn back. Their whinnying was filled with the unmistakable sound of terror.

  The sun had now fallen behind that lofty crag and darkness was encroaching upon the land. The trail ahead was rugged but still we flew over it at a feverish pace.

  Presently we passed near the foot of the crag in question. The coach rocked and swayed as a ship in rough seas, the horses whinnied and reared, threatening to break stride and bolt away in panic. The driver held them fast, however, despite their insane antics, shouting terse commands, his whip cracking fiercely down on their seemingly impervious flesh.

  Presently the muttering in the heavens turned to a loud and ferocious booming, and the terrible wind roared like a mighty demon, stealing away the whinnying of the horses.

  “It is too near nightfall,” the driver cried, and his voice was nearly stolen by the horrendous cacophony around us. “Dear God, we must make Ellis Manor before they are upon us.”

  “Before they are upon us?” I shot back in reply, my voice filled with trepidation. “Who are they?” I did not want to think about the children he’d mentioned; little demons with blood sucking mouths and terrible intentions. For an answer I was rewarded with nothing but the shrieking of wind. “Driver!” I railed, and again received no reply from the box. The coach was careening at great speed by then, rocking and shuddering. I leaned out of the window and saw, to my utter and complete dread that the driver was no longer on his box and the reins were whipping about freely in the wind. A terrible fear went into my heart, for the team was now racing out of control, their heads lolling to and fro in delirium, their bulbous eyes insane with utter terror. At that moment I saw fit to cross myself, believing that my last breath was most certainly about to be taken. I could do nothing in those last few precious seconds of my life but stare out of the window and shudder as the maelstrom encompassed the summit of that hideous crag and settle on it like a roiling dervish.

  Then, an all-pervading darkness blanketed the land. It was as if some strange and wicked power had suddenly extinguished all light from the earth, plunging us helpless pilgrims into a hideous endless night. In my moment of absolute blindness I could feel the coach trembling unmercifully beneath me, then suddenly, the vibration ceased, and with it, all sound and all sensation. Now I was not merely blind, but deaf as well. Sensation suddenly returned, and with it, disorientation. I felt the coach keeling forward at a frightening angle. I was powerless in my terror for I knew that I was falling. My stomach lurched up into my mouth. My mind conjured some hellish abyss without end, a bottomless pit of purgatory where I would most assuredly descend forever without the benefit of sight or sound. I grasped the side rails with both hands and stopped breathing. The carriage tumbled suddenly out of control; end over end, slamming me dreadfully and painfully into the forward seat. There was a horrendous crash. I screamed. All sensation ceased suddenly and this time it did not return. Darkness enveloped me and I was grateful.

  Sometime later, perhaps hours, perhaps only minutes, I woke face down, sick with pain, disoriented. Total darkness prevailed. There was a pervading stillness as well. The storm had passed and perhaps in sympathy with nature’s silence my heart seemed to have stopped as well. I could not find my breath. I groped about me blindly, wanting very badly to grasp hold of something substantial which would confirm the fact of my continued existence, but I was rewarded only with hand-full after hand-full of wet, pebbly soil. The darkness was so pervasive that for a short moment I believed I had been blinded. But this was short-lived, for suddenly moonlight broke through scudding clouds, showing me that I was lying at the base of what at first appeared to be a large stone tomb. I struggled weakly to my feet, staring at the monolith. I stood there on shaky legs scrutinizing the strange-looking phenomenon. It might very well have been a tomb of sorts, I suppose, for it was dull gray in color and appeared very smooth like polished marble. But I did not think it was marble, for the cast was perhaps too smooth. It appeared more metallic in construction, like pewter or unpolished silver. It seemed to glow dully, however, with some strange inner light, and there was a slight pulsing on its surface as if a heart were beating at its center. I closed my eyes and opened them again but the light and the pulsing persisted. From my vantage the object at first appeared to have only three sides narrowing as it pointed skyward like a miniature version of one of the Giza pyramids. A moment’s scrutiny, however, dispelled that illusion, for now it appeared to have many sides, then the object seemed to shift shapes again. I closed my eyes not wishing to look upon the wretched thing a moment longer. But unwittingly my eyes again opened and I saw that the land around it was desolate and barren, as if scorched by some ferocious and titanic forest fire. There seemed to be some sort of energy force coming from the thing, for along with the light and the slight pulsing I felt a kind of vibration in my head accompanied by a low frequency humming. I took a step in its direction. Unwittingly I was being drawn toward the wretched thing even as I tried to ignore it. My heart filled with dread at the prospect.

  Suddenly my head snapped around to the left for there came a series of soft mewing sounds, and in their midst a terrible cacophony of moaning and wailing, like tortured children. I squinted into the darkness trying to identify the source of those sounds and suddenly my blood turned to ice, for there on the ground, not ten rods distant, I beheld what at first looked to be a mound of gray, writhing flesh. I crossed myself, then closed my eyes and opened them again quickly, hoping to dispel the illusion. I was to be disappointed, however, for still the vision persisted, and beneath those other terrible noises my ears picked up the unmistakable sound of slurping, like hogs gulping swill. I shambled several tentative steps closer to the illusion, wanting to dispel the image as quickly as possible, for I felt strongly that my very sanity was in grave jeopardy. I froze solid in the silence-shattered darkness, for there, beneath a bevy of small, malformed, human-like bodies, lay the coach’s driver, arms and legs splayed out as in death, blank, lifeless eyes staring toward the heavens, as those terrible little inhuman things fed upon him. I backed away slowly, an unwitting moan of revulsion wrenching from my throat, and I continued to moan for the horror that I was witnessing.

  I have no clear memory of all the events that followed, for something in my mind must surely have given way. The next several minutes were like a waking nightmare. My moans of terror and revulsion drew the attention of those small, hideous feeders for they all turned their terrible gazes upon me. Their eyes were glowing yellow orbs that seemed to burn with some terrible alien
life, each a small sulfurous fire. Their tiny mouths—filled with small, incisive teeth—were clogged with torn flesh and covered in the blood of their victim. I stumbled back several steps, suddenly aware of the screams that were convulsively exciting me as those hideous little monsters deserted their feast and began slinking in my direction, moaning and writhing as they did so. I could not find my legs, frozen as I was with abject terror.

  The rest of what happened comes back to me now as if in a dream.

  From the corner of my eye I saw movement. I whirled and to my great and utter astonishment, up from the very bowels of the earth not twenty rods away from the cursed monolith, a man appeared, tall, thin, and white of hair and smooth of complexion. The pupils of his eyes, which I could see quite clearly, were slit like those of a cat and they seemed to burn with a cold, green fire. He stood for a moment on the topmost of what appeared to be a smooth, pewter-like step watching the moaning and writhing advance of those hideous little yellow-eyed monsters before shouting some sort of terse command with a deep, masterful voice in a language I did not recognize. Although they seemed reluctant to do so, the little monsters stopped their advance not two rods from my quaking body. They stood for a moment writhing as if in agony, then slowly turned and began to retreat.

  My legs suddenly gave way beneath me and the last sight I remember seeing is a sort of black streaking mass; and then hands were groping me, and my head was filled with the sounds of suffering and anguish, like tormented souls burning in the fires of some unspeakable hell.

  For another spell of time I remembered nothing. Then gradually there came the vague beginnings of consciousness. I found myself again lying face down—this time on an unyielding surface—and I remember trying to turn my body over. Everything inside of me ached. I heard what sounded like water dripping in a great hollow place. I finally managed to struggle onto my back and open my eyes. The light was very dim, like a room with the shades drawn. At first I could not be sure of what I was seeing. Then, as my eyes slowly adjusted to the dim light I noted that high above me, suspended in the midst of some titanic stone well-like structure there was a vast nest of sorts. The webbing that made up the nest was akin to a giant spider web, only much more dense and complex in its configuration. There were literally hundreds, perhaps thousands of strands of webbing going away from its epicenter, which attached themselves to the walls of the vertical cavern in large clots. At the center of the nest rested a worm-like thing of massive proportions, wrapped as if in a giant cocoon. And the cocoon was writhing as if it contained some huge, bloated creature of unnamable origin caught in the throes of some ghastly metamorphic transition. From the body of the thing there dripped large clots of repugnant smelling fluid, viscous in consistency, which splashed the cavern floor all around me. And to add to my utter horror, with each splatter of fluid, a hideous transparent creature of sorts was born—the likes of which I could never in my wildest nightmares have imagined. The creatures closest to my position eyed me balefully with hideous glass-like eyes before scuttling off into darkness on clickety-clackety claw-like appendages.

  The sensation of heat suddenly turned my attention away from those terrible things, and over near the cavern wall, not six feet from where I lay, some sort of alien-like vessel the size of a small coffin pulsed as though it contained—or perhaps more fittingly, was—a beating heart. And with each beat it would swell to perhaps half again its size and its color would turn from midnight-black to the most repulsive crimson I have ever imagined. In retrospect I now believe that its colors were not of any known spectrum on this earth. And the heat coming from it was like the heat of fever and sickness, of despair, of something far worse than death. I was reminded suddenly of the story I’d read in the Boston Herald by the ship Witchcraft’s first mate and of the vessel he had described the stranger carrying aboard on that ill-fated night. Could it be the same object? I will probably never know the answer to that question.

  At that moment, however, I honestly believed I had died and that this place was most assuredly Hell. I tried to stand but was unable to find my legs. I began to scream in abject terror as the mass above me began to descend on creaking filaments, and I screamed as the vessel near me began pulsing frenetically like a stressed heart that might burst at any moment. I screamed and screamed, until finally my mind shut down completely.

  An all-encompassing pit of darkness swallowed me for what seemed a very long time.

  When finally I awoke I felt drowsy, lethargic, disoriented. I found myself in a large bed covered in fine linens, the room around me lofty with tall arched windows and draperies the color of ox-blood. A quick moment of panic seized my heart for my first thought was of that wretched vertical cavern and the horrors it had contained. But I forced myself to stay calm. This place was quiet and serene, very much unlike that well of terrors.

  I was startled to see that there was a man standing above the bed, watching me with sharp, intelligent eyes. He said nothing; just watched me without expression. He was tall and thin and handsome. Could this be the same man I had seen exit the ground near that strange monolith prior to witnessing the hell of all hells? I watched him carefully. No, I concluded finally, it could not be, for the eyes, although sharp and intense were brown in color, not green slits like those of a cat. I stared into those eyes, and in them I saw a cast of something terrible and tragic, as though through life’s journeys, this young man had been hardened beyond his years.

  And suddenly I knew who this person must be. “Captain Ellis?” I cried out, my voice hoarse and uncharacteristically week in my own ears. “Are you not Captain Nathaniel Ellis? What is happening to me? Please, I beg of you.”

  A general pause ensued and I began to wonder if my summons had fallen on deaf ears. The gentleman wiped his brow thoughtfully then turned and without giving me the courtesy of a reply walked purposefully from the room.

  I know not who the gentleman was, but other than the marked difference in the eyes, I suppose he could very well have been the man who’d exited the earth near that strange looking monolith. But I am not completely certain of anything anymore. I have seen too many horrors to be sure that any of them are real. In this place dreams and reality have become too closely linked and it is becoming increasingly difficult to differentiate between them.

  I have seen the same man from time to time over the past several days. It is usually when I awake in delirium, the vestiges of those terrible dreams of the suffering, cannibalistic children, the loathsome pulsing vessel and the horrible metamorphic worm still in my head. There he will be, standing over my bed staring worriedly down at me. I do not understand why he refuses to communicate with me. I am here, after all, by his invitation.

  “Where is Captain Ellis?” I keep insisting. “If you are he, please speak to me.” Alas, I receive the same answer of silence from both the strange gentleman and the Negro servant, Williams.

  There is something else that I should mention. Upon awakening, I find my arms dull and aching from numerous small pinpricks, and do not understand where they are coming from. As time passes I am becoming more and more resigned, however, and have begun to believe that I will never be allowed to leave this place.

  I am weary with this writing. I do not wish the fever’s return. I believe it is well into the night by now, although in this place, it is sometimes hard to differentiate between night and day. The two seem to run together as one all-encompassing void. Now the strange and terrifying noises that have become synonymous with this draughty old mansion have resumed. I shall hide my journal beneath the feather tick once again and try as best I can to find a few moments of precious rest amongst the cacophonous bursts of hair-raising shrieks and the delicate, almost hypnotic allure of that soft, silvery laughter. I have been thinking that I might try and break out of this stone prison, eventually, but it seems the longer I am here the more those kinds of thoughts desert me. Ah, well, perhaps when I am stronger. Right now I am finding it quite difficult just keeping my eyes open. Sleep becko
ns and I will not keep it waiting, for with it comes that awesomely dark void that allows me to forget—if even for a short time—where I am and what I am becoming.

  John J. Tittleman

  July, 1897

  My Leona

  Leona: miraculously young again, curvy, soft; blue eyes glistening; hovering above me, magically naked, like a gossamer goddess suspended on invisible marionette wires. My lovely Leona; rose-colored lips slightly parted, drifting slowly into my open arms. I am yanked suddenly out of the dream by a sound I cannot at first identify. Left gasping for breath, grasping for the Leona that no longer exists.

  “What the . . .?” I start to rise.

  “Rats,” Leona mutters sleepily beside me.

  “What?”

  “In the cellar. I think we’ve got rats.”

  “Christ!” I squeeze my eyes closed trying to reconcile what I had heard with what I had been dreaming. I lie back down and listen. The noise is gone. It hadn’t sounded like rats to me. But what do I know? In those dreams anything is possible. Perversely I believe in the dreams which are far more realistic to me now than the sterile, bickering world in which Leona and I have grown to occupy. I don’t tell that to Leona, though. And I never tell her about the dreams.

  “Go back to sleep,” she says, her voice softly muffled against the pillow, strangely comforting. “You can find out in the morning.”

  I do not argue, but neither am I able to recapture sleep, not to mention the vision of my young Leona, the way she once was, the light in her eyes, the parted lips, the soft swell of her breasts; instead I spend the rest of the night tossing, waiting for dawn to lighten the room, and praying that the sound of metal scraping against dry, pebbly soil will not return.

  “You’re a crazy, paranoid old man, Harold,” Leona says, when in the morning I tell her what the noise had reminded me of. “What the hell is that supposed to mean? Metal scraping on soil? She glares at me through those hideous glasses that she wears and suddenly I feel as mute as a mannequin. Nuts! That’s what she calls me these days, but if I am nuts, it’s Leona that’s making me that way.