Cthulhu Mythos Writers Sampler 2013

by Various Writers

  The Portuguese cheered when the second man’s remains vanished beneath the foaming red waters, and then when everything settled down they did it again. It lasted all through the day, and Bunseki thought the Portuguese all mad. Perhaps they were attempting to appease Nzambi Mpungu with their own sacrifices, but did they not understand that the creature they faced was a protector only of his own people, the Bakongo?

  With dozens of cruel deaths behind them, the Portuguese looked tired and pale. They filled themselves with strong-smelling liquid called rum until they could barely walk. Meanwhile, under orders, Bunseki and his brothers removed body parts and gore from the chains and threw them into the water, but nothing could remove the stench of death from the ship.

  Bunseki understood the Portuguese were savages. They deserved the same kind of death. He didn’t care what Mukunzo thought; it had been Nzambi Mpungu. Their god tried to save them, and he would return and destroy these filthy Portuguese traitors. What did Mukunzo know? He was soft from all his wives, and he had taken Kimpa — the girl Bunseki loved — as his sixth, when he could have left her untouched for him to take. It would not have done his brother any harm to show his younger sibling compassion. And now Kimpa was probably dead at the hands of these Portuguese, or, worse, she had been turned into a breeding machine for the half-castes who would become the Mundele’s prostitutes.

  Until the arrival of Nzambi Mpungu as a giant, shapeless, black bird, Bunseki had believed there was little hope left. But now there was salvation for every Bakongo on the ship. They would be able to return to land soon enough, even if they had to pull the vessel back to shore, walking on the bodies of Portuguese sailors who would soon be dead.

  He needed to talk to the Bakongo warriors, rally them, convince them of the true way ahead — they did not need this ‘New World’, and the Vumbi would be ready when they were called. He turned to his brother, noticing the wasted muscles, realising that his power over the other men would have reduced too. And yet he needed his brother one more time for a task that would save them all. He needed to unite the Bakongo so that, together, they could lead a revolution against the Portuguese and kill them once and for all. Waiting until they arrived at Brazil was no longer the right choice.

  “Mukunzo,” he whispered, “we need to trust in Nzambi’s winged creature.”

  “No,” demanded Mukunzo, with a light in his eyes that surprised Bunseki.

  “Mukunzo, are you soft in the head? This is a sign. We will soon be freed.”

  “It makes no difference, brother. We are already dead. Have you not seen? We will either die at the hands of the Portuguese, as food for the bull sharks, or as food for that monstrous winged creature.”

  “I disagree,” said Bunseki with a fire that burned in his stomach. “Nzambi will come if we ask. He serves us.” Ignoring the disbelief in his brother, he closed his eyes and banged out a slow chant on the wooden floor. “Naaa-zammm-biii … Naaa-zammm-biii …” He would have his way. He would lead his people as the new chief, even if his brother would not. Finally, he had found his own moment. He had so long dreamed of commanding.

  “You are a fool, brother,” said Mukunzo.

  Bunseki refused to listen and continued chanting. Soon a fever grew among the people. The mantra developed a life of its own, and it rippled through the ship. Like a pledge, it was picked up by every Bakongo, passing from one chained warrior to another, to every corner of the ship. The Portuguese yelled at them to stop but they were unable to carry through with their threats, sickened as they were by their rum.

  As day became night the chanting continued, and a call to the soul of the founder, Nzambi, he who would rescue them all. Bunseki grew confident in his newfound courage because all the Bakongo would see it was he who had first called out to their god. He felt his power grow when the Portuguese retreated to their own area of the ship and left them alone. He realised that it was a refreshing change, that the balance of power was shifting. They needed wind to move, he had seen that much in the way the Portuguese commanded their caravel, but Nzambi had taken that gift from them. This was a night where the Bakongo ruled supreme, powered by Nzambi’s gift of courage.

  The smile on Bunseki’s face became one of vexed anticipation, and he ignored Mukunzo’s indifference. As brothers they were so close. Yet, even chained, they could not have been so far apart.

  In the still hour before dawn, Bunseki, his voice hoarse from chanting, felt certain that Nzambi would come and save them, and an ever-growing sense of confidence flowed though him.

  The water lapping against the side of their vessel stilled, went quiet. Then it churned and became a torrent in reply. “Mukunzo come,” he demanded as he stood and pulled insistently at his brother’s chains. “It is time.” He was filled with excitement, but he had to all but drag Mukunzo up onto the top deck.

  He heard the Portuguese cry out as the shape approached, black like a shadow, yet shimmering like an animal through the invisible heat of a crackling fire. The thick, ropy tendrils that thrashed from its underbelly had grown, as if the dead Portuguese had fed its size. Skimming across the water, flying silently towards their caravel, it beat at the hot, stifled air. The creature approached, sent by their god, and Bunseki breathed deep with contentment.

  There was no breeze to carry the ship forward. Exhausted from lack of sleep after a full night of listening to the Bakongo chanting, Bunseki noticed many Portuguese out on the top deck. They stood at one end, looking on in disbelief, against the backdrop of sunrise. Nzambi Mpungu approached, and Bunseki raised his hand in greeting.

  Nzambi flew high above the ship, and Bunseki opened himself up to his god, waiting for his shackles to vanish, longing to be free once more.

  Only Nzambi’s wind remained, hot like the parched sun on his face and devoid of any sense of life. It left him bewildered. Surely the god would sense his intentions and do something worthy, something godlike, so that Bunseki could fight the Portuguese Mundele?

  “Satisfied, brother?’ asked Mukunzo. “Get down before you are next to die.”

  Confused, Bunseki joined his brother on the deck. A musket shot rang out, and then another, and another, until the volley was deafening. But there was only one thought on his mind: How was it that Nzambi had ignored him?

  #

  Mukunzo glanced behind and saw the giant monster of a bird turn slowly against a cloudless blood-red sky, as it had done before. It aligned itself with the ship. He pulled at their shackles. “Move towards the edge, Bunseki.”

  More Portuguese clambered onto the deck, each with a loaded musket. They raised their weapons and fired into the sky.

  “Get below, my fellow Bakongo,” Mukunzo cried to the warriors, remembering that he had once been a chief of warriors in his homeland and it had always been his destiny to lead, despite their hopeless predicament. “If you can’t get below, lay upon the deck.”

  Yet many of his people ignored him and instead turned to Bunseki, who did nothing but stare, bewildered at his god’s false messenger.

  The bird-like creature circled in tighter and tighter arcs, descending a little more each time until it hopped onto the deck. From what might have been one of its many heads, a tangle of grotesque black eyes, like seedpods amid a mesh of thrashing tongues, glared at them. Then, with the swooping motion of its wings, its razor-sharp talons, like the branches of a dying tree, caught up two sailors, ripping the huddled men into clumps of flesh. Blood and chunks of organs and flesh spilled over the deck. A warrior was next to fall.

  The Portuguese retaliated by firing repeatedly. Bullets penetrated the creature’s black skin; some passing straight through, others tearing flesh, but it had no discernible effect and it kept coming. One giant black eye took in crew and men, stopping at Mukunzo. A cold glare passed him over and he broke into a sweat as it snatched another sailor next to him, ripping open his head to display the pink grey matter inside. It stood so close to Mukunzo that he could smell its foul oily breath as it gorged on the man’s decapita
tion, sucking on the organ within. It tossed the remains at Mukunzo’s feet and he held his breath from the stench.

  Bunseki grabbed Mukunzo’s arm but couldn’t look away from the creature.

  It raised its main head high, threw it back with an upward stare and cried out, a sweet lilting caress. It was compelling. Mukunzo’s feet took on life, and he stood. He shuffled towards the blood-soaked bird, Bunseki at his side.

  Mukunzo covered his ears, the pain too great, and the compulsion stopped. Seeing the wild expression still in his brother’s face, he moved to protect him. “Bunseki, cover your ears.” He turned to his warriors. “Cover your ears, men.”

  Bunseki ignored him. The Portuguese couldn’t understand their native Kikongo.

  More Portuguese climbed out onto the top deck and walked towards the creature.

  “Come, brother.” Then Bunseki gestured to a sailor who fell to the ground in front of them, as if they were friends. The sailor did as he was bid, and together they all shuffled over to the man whose brains had been eaten. A Bakongo warrior then fell and joined the dead, and Mukunzo’s heart sank. A reminder that the creature did not just favour Bakongo after all.

  Mukunzo wrapped cloth torn from the dead sailor’s uniform over his ears and held Bunseki back. The creature’s calls were muffled, and his voice sounded hollow as he yelled, “Bunseki, wait. You are under a spell!’ He pulled at his brother’s shackles until he stopped. Mukunzo then searched for a key to their shackles and found one on the fallen sailor’s belt. The cloth only offered partial protection and he felt himself drawn to the creature again, so he called out to Bunseki. “Hold me,” he yelled, letting go of his ears. He fought the creature’s compulsive call as he struggled with Bunseki’s shackles, and his brother held him as best he could with his ears covered.

  The creature swept across the deck, grabbing sailors and gutting them with its sharp claws. Others it decapitated, slurping on the marrow of their brain.

  When Bunseki was free, Mukunzo covered his own ears. “Brother, we must warn our people. Pass the word: cover your ears, find the keys and escape our shackles.” Seeing a group of sailors walking to the creature, he said, “Look: destroy the filthy Portuguese Mundele while we have a chance.”

  “Can’t you see, brother, Nzambi is already doing that.”

  Before Mukunzo could respond, Bunseki ran off, and Mukunzo struggled with his shackles. Then he stood and retrieved a musket. He fired on as many Portuguese as he could, stopping only to reload after each shot and unshackle his men.

  Slaves grabbed muskets and joined him.

  Then the lilting song ceased. Satiated, the creature hopped over to the side of the boat. Spreading its wings, it launched off the bow, climbing into the air with a half-chewed body that fell into the water. The sea below bubbled with rage as the giant-toothed bull sharks feasted.

  Mukunzo took hope as he examined the bloodied mess of bodies strewn over the deck. Most of the dead were of their captors, but not all. If the creature was truly Nzambi, it would not have slaughtered their own. “Brother,” he yelled when he reached Bunseki, “go down and gather the remaining pale-skinned sailors. We will need them to return us home.”

  Encouraged, Bunseki led the proud warriors, now armed with muskets and knives, below deck. But, as it turned out, there was little resistance from the Portuguese, and what few there were were killed quickly or thrown overboard. Later, when the rage of his people had been satisfied with bloodletting, alone, Mukunzo searched the ship for survivors. But it was futile. Bunseki had ignored his request. Numb, he was unsure what to do.

  Returning to the deck where the air was fresh, Mukunzo saw that the slaves rushed out and rejoiced. Mukunzo stood back and watched them drink the white men’s potions of rum. They gorged on salted pork and hard yellow blocks the Portuguese called cheese. Mukunzo tried some. It might have been made of Bakongo brains, but still tasted delicious after such a prolonged period of near-starvation.

  Later, when Bunseki stopped dancing in victory, he walked over to Mukunzo, who stood away from the celebrations, and smiled. “Not happy with your new freedom, brother?”

  Mukunzo shook his head and glanced around at the still air. “The creature killed Bakongo as often as it killed our enemy.”

  Bunseki snorted as he puffed his chest proudly, as if it were he who was chief of the people now. Perhaps he was. All eyes seemed to turn to him now when direction was sought. “And yet we are victorious, my brother. Soon the edge of the Congo River will reveal itself, and we can swim to shore and be free warriors again.”

  Mukunzo scanned the horizon and saw nothing. The water was still, not flowing as it should. Mukunzo took a bucket and tied a rope to it, dropped it into the water and pulled it out again quickly. When he tried to drink its contents he spat out the corrupted taste just as quickly.

  “What is wrong, Mukunzo?”

  “Taste it, the water carries sickness.” He couldn’t get the taste of salt from his mouth. “I do not think we are on the Congo anymore.”

  “Then where are we?”

  Mukunzo laughed, but without humour, and threw down the bucket, spilling the corrupted water across the wooden deck. “We are lost, brother. Utterly and totally lost. We cannot get home.”

  “You are wrong, and I was right to believe in Nzambi. It was my faith that allowed us to do this. We are free men again. There are women on board, perhaps not our tribe, but a wife is a wife, however she be taken. With warriors and women, we can build our village again, and rule free men.”

  “Perhaps you are right, brother,” replied Mukunzo, who carried no strength in his conviction. For the briefest of moments he wanted to believe his brother’s impossible dream, “But how do we escape this place? How do we make this caravel move? Do you, or any one of us, know how to sail as these Portuguese once did?”

  “I hear your spite. You think I should have kept them alive?’ He paused. “They deserved to die.”

  “Who is going to turn the ship around now? How do we get home without wind in our sails? We are no less dead unshackled than we were before the creature found us.”

  “I would rather die proud and free than rotting in a prison.”

  Mukunzo nodded. In that, Bunseki was correct, but hope of returning to their homelands seemed lost. They would die out here, when the stored water ran out and the food spent, but Mukunzo didn’t think it would come to that. The winged creature — the foe Bunseki so desperately wished to believe was their saviour — would come for them again, before they could hope for an ordinary death.

  While the Bakongo danced and celebrated, he watched the empty blue skies. They were devoid of the winged creature, for the moment. He knew it would return when it was hungry again, and take them all.

  #

  In the days that followed, Bunseki watched in disbelief as his control over the newly forged tribe of warriors and childbearing women deteriorated. They ate what food the Portuguese had kept in their hull, but they had been few compared to the chained Bakongo. The men drank the rum until they too fell down with the same illness that inflicted their captors. Many became sick.

  No-one return below decks to the stench and memories of imprisonment. Despite Mukunzo’s protests, his tribesman ripped down the sails for shelter above deck. Against his wishes, men still able took women, filling them with their seed. He was powerless to stop them, supported as they were by some of the stronger men. And when the barrelled water was nearly empty, they turned against each other, first with fists, and then blades, and finally muskets. Several died, their corpses thrown overboard to appease the bull sharks but also to remove the ever-lingering stench of death. And still the listless sea and sky offered no wind or means to carry them to the banks of the impossibly large river.

  Late in the hot, humid day, Bunseki found his brother collapsed towards the rear of the caravel. Gone were the proud muscles, the life in his eyes. He looked a man whose soul was ready to depart this world.

  “Mukunzo, no-one will li
sten to me.”

  His brother grunted.

  Bunseki sat, feeling pain inside. His love, Kimpa, had not been among the freed women. “Nzambi will save us!’ he said eventually, with less conviction.

  “Keep saying that, brother. Eventually you might believe it.”

  “But I have saved us. We are free.”

  Though Mukunzo barely moved, bitter laughter filled the air. It hurt Bunseki. He had belittled and disrespected his chief. Bunseki took a step towards his pitiful brother. Willpower alone stopped him from beating obedience into him.

  “Is this freedom?’ Mukunzo snarled. “I would rather have remained a Portuguese slave than endure this.”

  “You will not speak to your chief in such a tone.”

  “So you are chief now?”

  “You won’t do it.”

  “You always wanted power, brother, but you never understood the responsibilities of a chief.”

  “How dare you speak that way to me!”

  “I’ll speak however I choose. A chief would save us, can you?”

  Bunseki went to say more, but noticed Mukunzo’s expression change as he looked behind Bunseki. Could Nzambi have returned?

  Bunseki turned and faced a gathering of the largest and strongest of the men. Ones he had been unable to control. Their stares were like the coals of fire, and gritted teeth showed between blistered, snarling lips.

  “There is no food,” said one.

  “Nzambi will save us,” Bunseki said loudly, standing and taking a step back from their approaches.

  “The water is all but gone.”

  “Nzambi has shown us once that we are chosen. He will do so again.”

  “Many of us are sick, with witchcraft upon our bellies,” said one man.

  “And there is no wind to power the belly of this wooden beast,” shouted another.

  Bunseki shuddered. For the first time since their escape, he was afraid, a fear stemming from the slow, threatening advances of the Bakongo. Many brandished machetes, broken rum flagons and Portuguese knives. “As chief, and speaker to the Winds of Nzambi, you know we will be saved.” But there was less conviction in his words.