Shakespeare Vs Cthulhu

by Jonathan Green

“I bite my thumb at thee, sir,” Melmoth said, laughing. “Indeed, I bite all of my fingers, and toes for good measure. This is a holy moment, and you seek to clutter it with your mumbling. No sir, I shall not have it!” He bounded forward, blade hissing from its sheath. Dee stumbled back, still chanting.

  And then Sly was there, sword in hand. Steel met steel with a screech, and Melmoth leapt back. “Fie sir, would you stand between the tiger and his prey?”

  “You have eyes,” Sly said. “Use them.”

  Melmoth gave a bark of laughter and slid forward, as Sly lunged to meet him. Dee gave little heed to their duel, hoping that Sly was as good with a blade as he claimed. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the scrivener, Shakespeare, ushering panicked actors off the stage and into the wings. Lord Strange was in the crowd, shouting and waving his cane. Dee could hear little save the thunder of that abominable tread.

  Dee lifted his hands and caught at the strangely malleable air. It was as if the world was but a stage, and reality a curtain, blocking them from the sight of an unforgiving, inhuman audience. Melmoth was seeking to jerk that curtain aside; to what end, Dee couldn’t say. Nor did he care. His fingers blistered, and his breath frosted the air. He felt cold inside, as if he’d drunk a bellyful of freezing water, though his fingers were burning.

  The air fought him, twisting in his grip. It was as if he held the latch of a door that something pawed at from the other side. A rank odour, foul and burning, filled his nose and mouth, choking him, causing his incantation to falter. By their smell could men sometimes know those from Outside were near, or so the Moors said. If that was the case, then this thing was surely too close for comfort. Still, he did not look up. Seeing it would do no good.

  The world shook. His muscles screamed and his mouth felt dry where it was not bloody. He caught a glimpse of something behemoth-like and yet shapeless, crouched just behind it all, despite his best efforts. It was all shapes and none, clad in shadow and dust. Iot-sot-ot. That was what Melmoth had called it, when he’d offered it Elizabeth’s throne. Dee knew it by another name, though he wished to Heaven that he did not.

  Tawil At-U’mr. The Dweller on the Threshold. An iridescent empire of one, roiling through unknown gulfs, as described in the Book of Dead Names. He felt as if he were weeping, and as if a canker had burst in him, and its bile burned in his gut. His limbs trembled as he fought to hold the door of the world shut. He could hear Melmoth’s voice. The creature was still reciting its corrupted lines.

  “Sly,” he croaked. “William! Melmoth is the key – he is the anchor...you must silence him.”

  “I’m trying, Master!” Sly called out. Dee risked a glance, and saw his worst fears realised. Melmoth was not human. Or else what was human in him had long since given over to something other. A shape within a shape, unnatural and indescribable.

  Sly’s words from earlier came back to him — tiger’s heart and player’s hide, Dee thought.

  Seemingly ogre-wide and giant-tall, Melmoth rained down blows on Sly, who gave ground, if unwillingly. Dee prayed that his apprentice could hold for but a moment longer. An instant, a heartbeat. Long enough for him to complete his incantation of banishing.

  A cosmic roar echoed through the timbers of The Rose, rattling Dee down to his bones. A wave of heat rolled over him. In the yard, the Afflicted began to spasm and topple, blood oozing from their pores. Melmoth slashed out, and Sly dropped his sword and stumbled back with a cry. Dee felt his heart stutter as his apprentice fell. He couldn’t help Sly, it was all he could do to hold the awful presence back.

  Melmoth’s incantation rose to become a howl. And from behind Dee, Shakespeare’s voice rose to meet it. “I here proclaim myself thy mortal foe; with resolution wheresoe’er I meet thee, as I will meet thee, if thou stir abroad, to plague thee for thy foul misleading me...”

  Melmoth’s voice stuttered to a halt, as the playwright shouted. Shakespeare stepped past Dee, hurling his words into the teeth of the rising storm. “And so, proud Warwick, I defy thee... I defy thee!”

  Melmoth started towards Shakespeare, blade raised, teeth bared. But before he took two steps, he cried out and toppled from the stage, Sly’s knife in his side. As he screamed, so too did that which he had summoned. Its cry was not born of pain, however, but frustration. A frustration as old as the stars. Dee roared out the final words to his incantation.

  The air tensed, tightened, and then dissipated. The hideous strength retreated, and Dee sank to his knees, exhausted. He touched his face and his fingers came away red. His heart thundered in his chest as he fought to catch his breath. “William,” he croaked. “How do you fare, apprentice?”

  “Tolerable, Master,” Sly said. He was pale, and had one hand pressed to his arm. He flexed his hand. “Quite a throw, if I do say so myself.”

  “Yes, indeed,” Dee said. He tried to rise, but could not. The world swum about him. Sly and Shakespeare were there a moment later, each holding an arm. He looked out over the yard and saw only bodies — the Afflicted. “So many...”

  “Lord Strange got most of the punters out,” Shakespeare said.

  “Not all, though.”

  “No. Not all,” Dee said. Whatever Melmoth had done to the Afflicted, it had claimed them all. Perhaps it was for the best. Even so, the thought sickened him. He would gladly turn the author of such tragedy over to the Queen’s justice. “Where is Melmoth?” Dee said.

  “He exited stage left, as if pursued by a bear,” Sly said. “Took my best knife with him, the poltroon.” There was blood on his hand when he pulled it away from his arm. “Should we pursue, Master?”

  “No. The play is done, and his power broken,” Dee said, after a moment’s consideration. He remembered what he’d glimpsed during Sly’s duel and shuddered. They were in no shape to run such a beast to ground. “Let him run. We shall give his name to Essex, or Burghley, and let them hound him until he prays for touch of the furies.” He felt every one of his sixty-odd years.

  He gestured to Sly’s arm. “You are wounded, sir.”

  “A bit of blood for the cause,” Sly said, wrapping his handkerchief around his arm. “I’ve shed more and worse, never fear, Master,” he added, grinning. Dee nodded. For a moment, he’d thought he’d lost another apprentice. But Sly was proving more than adept, Dee thought. Perhaps he need not fear for the future after all. Hesitantly, he clapped Sly on his unwounded arm.

  “You... Did well,” he said.

  “And built up quite a thirst in the doing,” Sly said. “Can we find an alehouse now, Master? I think we deserve it.”

  Dee snorted and turned away. Shakespeare stood nearby, staring out at the empty courtyard. He held the green book in his hands. “Will we be welcomed back, I wonder?” he said.

  “I should think so. Your verse shows promise,” Dee said. “But probably not for some time.” He looked at the playwright. “It was a brave thing, Master Shakespeare. To match words with him.”

  “They were my words before they were his,” Shakespeare said, not looking at him.

  “Yes. But even so, I shall be recommending that all playhouses be closed for the time being, just in case,” Dee said.

  “And what of us, then?”

  “What of you? Go, write, perform. There are worlds more than this, and stages too. Just be careful you find the right ones,” Dee said. He held out his hand. “The book, please.”

  “What happened, truly?” Shakespeare’s eyes were haunted, full of wonder and horror. Dee wondered which of the two would win out in the end.

  “Nothing,” Dee said, gently. “A tempest, now safely past. And one you will hopefully soon forget.” He crooked his fingers. “The book, playwright. Such words are not for the ears of your audience.”

  Shakespeare handed Dee the green book. “For here, I hope, begins our lasting joy,” he said. “The last line of the play. My play, not his.”

  Dee nodded. He looked down at the book, and traced its cracked bindings. Such a small thing, responsible for so
much evil, but then, that was always the way.

  He looked at Shakespeare. “That is my hope as well,” he said.

  What Dreams May Come

  Nimue Brown

  To sleep, perchance to dream, it is my fear,

  Accursed things shall reach into my mind.

  The gibbous moon sheds pallid light, too near,

  Unnamed and creeping dread comes close behind.

  Dare I to close my eyes, what may befall,

  My lips might taste another’s charnel breath,

  Myself I see as chilled, upon a pall,

  Laid low in fetid tomb, possessed by death.

  But my eternal nightmare shall not fade,

  Eldritch evil holds me in its power,

  Though deep in madness, deeper I must wade,

  With little hope of peace in future hour.

  If any man yet lives with eyes to see,

  My hope is fled, I’ve nought to offer thee.

  Act Two

  “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”

  The Tempest, Act I, Scene II.

  The ‘Iä’s of March

  Andrew Lane

  “Clock strikes

  BRUTUS: Peace! count the clock.

  CASSIUS: The clock hath stricken three.”

  Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene I

  The imposing pillars of the nearby public buildings loomed above Publius Servilius Casca Longus like rows of marble trees arranged geometrically by some modern day Roman Euclid. The heavy marble roofs supported by the pillars were like a sharp-edged, impenetrable canopy of closely packed white leaves. Or maybe heavy white clouds floating close to the ground; he wasn’t sure. Casca wasn’t a poet – he left that to people like Gaius Helvius Cinna. He did, however, have a way with words that had served him well in his political career. The tricks of rhetoric came easily to him, and the metaphors his mind was applying to the pillars made him wish – and not for the first time – that he was in the middle of a real forest instead of the centre of the most important city in the world. Despite the risk of bears and wolves and snakes it would have been a great deal safer for him, and at least he wouldn’t have to watch in silence the destruction of everything he held dear.

  From where he stood, half-way up the steps of the Temple of Saturn, he could see out over the entire Forum. The marketplace was filled with a milling throng of people so dense that it must have been impossible to move down there, let alone breathe properly. Some were talking, some calling to friends and others hailing the man they had come there to see, and the susurration of their voices blended into a general background drone punctuated by the occasional sharp burst of noise. Despite the crush, the general mood down there was good; maybe even euphoric. People were obviously happy to be there – small children had been hoisted onto their parents’ shoulders for a better view of proceedings and flasks of wine were being passed from hand to hand, along with loaves of bread and long strings of sausages from which people took bites before giving them up to the next person. A festival air hung over everything.

  At least the soldiers were keeping the steps of the temples and official buildings clear, which meant that Casca – one of the ten Tribunes of the People, and thus a relatively important man in Rome – could stand in some comfort and watch the victory procession of the man he hated most in the world.

  Gaius Julius Caesar was instantly recognisable in the centre of the Forum. He stood on a chariot pulled by two pure white stallions, which meant that he was significantly above the crowd, but his aquiline features and swept-back hair were easily recognisable. He had the kind of profile that looked good on a coin, Casca thought bitterly.

  He found his gaze moving from Caesar the man to Caesar the monument – to the imposing facades of the Basilica Julia and the Curia Julia that Caesar had ordered built. They fitted in well with the general architecture of the Forum, but they were larger of course. Everything that Caesar did was deliberately larger than the accomplishments of anyone else. That was his defining characteristic.

  Caesar’s procession – the chariot, the horses, the accompanying soldiers, members of his family and general hangers-on – stopped in front of the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus. The crowd made a space for them. Instead of stepping down from the chariot and showing deference to the several hundred senators who were lined up to welcome him, however, Caesar remained for a moment on the wheeled platform. He turned and raised his arms to the crowd, and the resulting roar of approval was like the thunder from an overhead storm. Caesar just nodded slightly. It was, he obviously thought, only what he was due.

  A wave of bitterness washed over Casca, leaving him trembling. Only a year ago Caesar had been a simple proconsul and Rome’s disobedient son, disregarding the orders of the Senate to stand down from his military command after his victories against the tribes of Gaul and instead advancing on Rome and precipitating a confrontation with his former ally Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus. That developed into a full-scale civil war. The same mob who had been calling for Caesar’s head when he went up against the popular Pompey were now throwing garlands of laurels at it. How fickle they were. How easily swayed by success and confidence.

  Pompey. Casca’s friend – now dead, assassinated in Egypt following his catastrophic losses at the Battle of Pharsalus, just as he thought he was taking refuge there. Caesar had ordered the assassins put to death, but then he had probably given them the order in the first place. There was an unpleasant symmetry about the process.

  Caesar was now dismounting from his chariot, but when he climbed the steps of the temple he made sure he ended up on the same step as the senators, not a lower one. A few of the senators deliberately went up a step to make a point, but Caesar did the same, leaving him on the same level as some of them and above the rest. And Casca knew that Caesar would have made a mental note of who had tried to get above him and who hadn’t. Caesar could bear a grudge for a long time – another defining characteristic.

  After a few moments of confusion, the Princeps Senatus, Marcus Tullius Cicero, stepped forward. He was carrying something, and it took a few moments for Casca to see what it was. When he finally recognised it he felt as if, for a few moments, he had become disconnected from reality, as though he was floating above himself, looking down.

  It was a crown.

  They were offering Caesar a crown. They were, for all intents and purposes, deliberately inviting him to take on the role of Emperor.

  He was already occupying the role of Extraordinary Magistrate, colloquially known as Dictator, but that was limited to a set period of time for a specific reason. To make a Roman into an Emperor – it had never been done!

  Cicero held the crown out towards Caesar. The crowd bayed, sounding as they did during the gladiatorial games. Caesar held up a theatrical hand, refusing the honour.

  Cicero again held the crown out. The crowd seemed to a person to be yelling, “Yes! Yes!”

  Again Caesar refused, shaking his head and turning his whole body away.

  The crowd were almost on the verge or rioting now. Casca – no stranger to the arts of the public speaker and the business negotiator – saw how the man was manipulating the populace through a few simple, overly dramatic gestures. Taking the crown at first blush would have seemed needy. Taking it at second blush would have seemed as though he wanted it but was just being polite, like a guest refusing an extra plate of larks’ tongues at dinner. Taking it at the third offering would make it look like he really had tried to refuse it, but was giving in under pressure. Very clever.

  Cicero turned to look at the representative senators, seemingly taking their advice. None of them dared shake their heads, but the nods weren’t particularly enthusiastic. After a moment he turned back and held the crown out for a third time.

  This time Caesar reached for it. The noise of the crowd was so loud it should have reached Olympus to offend the ears of the Gods. Just as Caesar’s hands were about to take the crown, however, he seemed to crumple. His hand went to the
back of his neck, and he fell to his knees.

  A collective gasp ran through the crowd. The forum went silent. Senators clustered around Caesar, trying to find out what was wrong, and his wife rushed up the stairs to his side. With the press of people it was difficult to see what was going on, and Casca decided it was time to leave. Caesar had been indisposed for long enough that he wasn’t playacting for the crowd – there was a rhythm in these things, Casca knew – and so the chances were that this was fatigue brought on by the relentless military campaigns he’d been on recently and his hasty rush back to Rome. There probably wasn’t going to be much to see for a while – certainly no coronation. That would have to be put off until a more auspicious occasion.

  Trying to stay on the cleared temple steps for as long as he could, he made his way out of the forum and towards home. Fortunately there were a lot of temples lining the forum, so he made good time. The crowd thinned rapidly once he was a little distance away, and he was wrapped in his own dark thoughts when he noticed, across the otherwise empty street, a citizen staring off into the distance, roughly in the direction of the forum. The man was tall and thin. He looked just like any other Roman, albeit he was bald and his skin was pale, as if he spent no time in the sunshine. The thing that attracted Casca’s attention, however, was his toga.

  Instead of being the standard white colour of most Romans, or the dark of mourners, or bearing the purple stripe of magistrates and freeborn male children, it was dyed a startling yellow. Some of the more… extreme… Romans were known to wear embroidered or painted togas, but usually only in the privacy of their own homes or at exclusive parties. Seeing a man out in the street wearing a yellow toga was surprising, almost shocking. Casca was surprised that the man hadn’t been set upon by members of the public and stripped. He was about to call out something critical and warning when the man turned to look at him, and Casca found the words catching in his throat.