Haggopian and Other Stories

The torturers had not done their work well. They had been loath to touch the elder with anything but their hot swords; they would not—not even when threatened most direly—lay their hands upon him, or approach him more closely than absolutely necessary to the application of their agonising art. The two reavers responsible for tying the ancient down were dead, slain by former comrades upon whom they had inadvertently lain hands of friendship; and those they had touched, their slayers, they too were shunned by their companions and stood apart from the other reavers.

As the first grey light of dawn began to show beyond the eastern sea, Zar-thule finally lost all patience and turned upon the dying priest in a veritable fury. He took up his sword, raising it over his head in two hands…and then Hath Vehm spoke:

“Wait!” he whispered, his voice a low, tortured croak, “wait, O reaver—I will say The Words.”

“What?” cried Zar-thule, lowering his blade. “You will open the door?”

“Aye,” the cracked whisper came, “I will open the Gate. But first, tell me; did you truly sack Yaht-Haal, the Silver City? Did you truly raze it down with fire, and torture my brother-priest to death?”

“I did all that,” Zar-thule callously nodded.

“Then come you close,” Hath Vehm’s voice sank low. “Closer, O reaver king, that you may hear me in my final hour.”

Eagerly the Seeker of Treasures bent him down his ear to the lips of the ancient, kneeling down beside him where he lay—and Hath Vehm immediately lifted up his head from the earth and spat upon Zar-thule!

Then, before the Sacker of Cities could think or make a move to wipe the slimy spittle from his brow, Hath Vehm said The Words. Aye, even in a loud and clear voice he said them—words of terrible import and alien cadence that only an adept might repeat—and at once there came a great rumble from the door in the beetling wall of weird angles.

Forgetting for the moment the tainted insult of the ancient priest, Zar-thule turned to see the huge and evilly carven door tremble and waver and then, by some unknown power, move or slide away until only a great black hole yawned where it had been. And lo, in the early dawn light, the reaver horde pressed forward to seek them out the treasure with their eyes; even to seek out the treasure beyond the open door. Likewise Zar-thule made to enter the House of Cthulhu, but again the dying heirophant cried out to him:

“Hold! There are more words, O reaver king!”

“More words?” Zar-thule turned with a frown. The old priest, his life quickly ebbing, grinned mirthlessly at the sight of the furry grey blemish that crawled upon the barbarian’s forehead over his left eye.

“Aye, more words. Listen: long and long ago, when the world was very young, before Arlyeh and the House of Cthulhu were first sunken into the sea, wise elder gods devised a rune that should Cthulhu’s House ever rise and be opened by foolish men, it might be sent down again—even Arlyeh itself, sunken deep once more beneath the salt waters. Now I say those other words!”

Swiftly the king reaver leapt, his sword lifting, but ere that blade could fall Hath Vehm cried out those other strange and dreadful words and lo, the whole island shook in the grip of a great earthquake. Now in awful anger Zar-thule’s sword fell and hacked off the ancient’s whistling and spurting head from his ravened body; but even as the head rolled free, so the island shook itself again, and the ground rumbled and began to break open.

From the open door in the House of Cthulhu, whereinto the host of greedy reavers had rushed to discover the treasure, there now came loud and singularly hideous cries of fear and torment, and of a sudden an even more hideous stench. And now Zar-thule knew truly indeed that there was no treasure.

Great ebony clouds gathered swiftly and livid lightning crashed; winds rose up that blew Zar-thule’s long black hair over his face as he crouched in horror before the open door of the House of Cthulhu. Wide and wide were his eyes as he tried to peer beyond the reeking blackness of that nameless, ancient aperture—but a moment later he dropped his great sword to the ground and screamed; even the Reaver of Reavers, screamed most terribly.

For two of his wolves had appeared from out the darkness, more in the manner of whipped puppies than true wolves, shrieking and babbling and scrambling frantically over the queer angles of the orifice’s mouth…but they had emerged only to be snatched up and squashed like grapes by titanic tentacles that lashed after them from the dark depths beyond! And these rubbery appendages drew the crushed bodies back into the inky blackness, from which there instantly issued forth the most monstrously nauseating slobberings and suckings before the writhing members once more snaked forth into the dawn light. This time they caught at the edges of the opening, and from behind them pushed forward—a face!