Ghouls of the Miskatonic (The Dark Waters Trilogy) (30 page)

The two surviving beasts fell upon their dead brothers, clawing and biting in a frenzy of hunger. Raw chunks of meat were torn from chests and thighs, lifted to bloodied jaws, and devoured whole. They attacked the corpses with tooth and claw, ripping flesh, snapping bones, and sucking the marrow as if they’d been starved for weeks.

Amanda buried her head in Rita’s shoulder as the butchery continued, the slurping, smacking, chewing, and tearing noises too terrible to contemplate. This was no genteel feast, but a frenzy of diabolical appetite. Snapped off limbs were hurled aside, bones gnawed clean of meat were discarded like trash and scooped out skulls were tossed into the water.

At last it was over, and Amanda looked up to see the red robed priest standing before her. She tried to see past the shadows clinging to his face beneath his hood, but the fuliginous darkness was impenetrable and she could see nothing.

“Amanda,” he said, his voice sounding almost reasonable. “You see now that my ghouls are none too tender in their mercies. Do you really want to see Rita thrown to them? Their hunger has been sated for a moment, so they probably wouldn’t kill her quickly. I imagine they might gnaw her leg to the bone for a day. Then perhaps they would move on to the arms, taking a finger at a time as a snack. And after that they might kill her as they look for sweeter morsels in the belly or skull. Can you imagine listening to your friend as she screams for death? Think of hearing Rita beg for mercy that you can give her as she is slowly eaten alive over a period of days.”

“Don’t you tell him nothing, Amanda!” spat Rita.

The priest loomed over Rita and backhanded her across the face. Her head snapped back and she spat a mouthful of blood.

“Please! Don’t hurt her!” cried Amanda.

“I won’t,” said the priest. “But I can make no such promise for Latimer and his brothers. You can end this now by telling me everything I want to know. I gave you time to consider your position and to understand the seriousness of this matter, but now I require an answer.”

“Don’t you say nothing,” hissed Rita. “Keep your mouth shut!”

“We’ll see how brave you are when you see your body being eaten in front of you,” said the priest, gesturing toward where the ghouls swallowed whole handfuls of raw, bloodied meat. “Time is now of the essence, so I will return again this evening. If you are still of a mind to resist, then that is when Rita will die. The choice is yours, Amanda.”

Amanda blinked back tears and said, “I’m not telling you anything.”

The man shook his head, as though disappointed.

“You will change your mind, I promise.”

“No,” said Amanda. “I won’t.”

“We’ll see,” said the priest, as his robed acolytes herded the flesh-sated ghouls back into their cave cells. With a final shake of his head, the priest turned and ascended the stairs, his acolytes in tow, leaving Amanda and Rita in the familiar twilight of their prison. The occasional grunt and smack of lips from within the monsters’ cells echoed as the ghouls ate the last mouthfuls of their ghastly meal.

“Oh! Rita, what are we going to do?” said Amanda when she was sure they were alone. “He’s going to kill you. I can’t let him hurt you. I can’t let that happen! I’m sorry. I’m going to tell him everything I’ve been dreaming.”

“I told you already, you ain’t saying nothing!” said Rita, lying on the ground and stretching her chain as long as it would go. She reached out with her free hand toward something wet and glistening on the floor. Amanda couldn’t see what it was, but Rita grunted as she stretched to the farthest extent of her reach.

Rita scrabbled on the ground. “Come on, damn you…,” she muttered.

“What are you doing?” hissed Amanda.

“Getting armed,” said Rita triumphantly as she snagged the object. Rita rolled back and sat up in front of Amanda.

“What is that?”

“This, Amanda,” said Rita, holding up her prize, “is our way out of here.”

She held up a pale white object dripping, red, and coated with gobbets of chewed flesh. It was a splintered thighbone, one end like a clenched fist, the other sharp and jagged where it had been snapped below the trochanter.

“Anyone comes near me and I stick this in their throat,” said Rita.

“And then what?” cried Amanda. “There’s no way out of here.”

“Weren’t you watching?” said Rita with a feral grin. “I thought you were the smart one.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Didn’t you see? The bits of meat those ghouls threw into the pool? They got pulled into the grate by a current. That means the water is tidal. I’d stake my life that pool connects to the Miskatonic.”

Rita tucked her makeshift weapon behind her and stared at the black waters of the pool.

“It’s not much, I know,” she said, “but it’s a way out, and that’s good enough for me.”

* * *

Oliver woke to the sound of a telephone ringing. His head hurt and his eyes had trouble focusing. His mouth felt dry and sticky, and it took him a moment to remember the numerous shots of whiskey he’d had with Gabriel Stone at the nameless speakeasy. How much had he had to drink? He didn’t take much in the way of booze, and it had hit him pretty hard. The ringing of the telephone was insistent and wasn’t going away, so he swung himself out of bed and threw on a bathrobe before making his way downstairs.

The telephone sat on a table beside the door and Oliver rubbed his eyes as he picked it up.

A voice in the earpiece said, “Putting your call through now,” and after the requisite buzzing crackle, a woman’s hesitant voice sounded in his ear.

“Professor Grayson, is that you?”

“Yes,” he said. “Who is this?”

“It’s Kate Winthrop, Professor Grayson.”

“Miss Winthrop, thank God you’re safe!” exclaimed Oliver. “I feared the worst when I saw what had happened to the laboratory. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine, thank you. I got out of the laboratory before the sound pulse went off.”

“I’m so glad to hear it,” said Oliver. “And please accept my apology. I am so dreadfully sorry for putting you in danger. I had no idea that device would prove to be so dangerous.”

“No, no, not at all, I’m glad you did.”

“You are?”

“Of course,” said Kate, and Oliver could hear her excitement through the miles of copper wiring that connected them. “This is an incredible device, and it only caused that damage because it believed it was under attack.”

“I’m sorry,” said Oliver. “I don’t understand.”

“I was drilling into the device when it unleashed that sonic pulse,” explained Kate. “It interpreted that as an attack and defended itself. Now listen carefully, Professor, I’m in the library just now. In fact I’ve been here all night looking into the symbols etched into its surface, and…and I think I know what this was built for.”

“You do? Excellent. What is it?”

“Well, I think it’s part of another device—a component of a similar, but much larger object. The different configurations of the device alter the local electromagnetic fields, breaking down the molecular bonds in the walls between worlds. Essentially, this is a key that can be used to unlock gateways between worlds. If you know the right sequence of movements of its surface lattice you could travel between two impossibly distant points in a single step.”

“Miss Winthrop, that’s incredible! How did you come to such conclusions?”

“I know it sounds ludicrous, but the readings I took from the lab after the accident go a long way to proving it. And I’ve looked into some of the books Professor Armitage keeps in the restricted section, and…well, I think that it might not be of…of…
human
manufacture. I mean, it’s made of an alloy that I can’t identify, and the diamond-tipped drill in the lab didn’t even scratch the surface.”

“Not human?” said Oliver, realizing how natural that sounded to his ears now.

“Yes,” said Kate, as if daring him to contradict her.

“And you say you’re in the library just now?”

“I am, yes.”

“Then stay there until I come and find you,” said Oliver. His coat was hanging by the front door, and he fished in the pocket for his watch. “It’s…damn, it’s almost ten o’clock already, and I have a rather important meeting that may have a bearing on your findings. But I will come to the library directly afterward and we will track down Mr. Edwards. It’s about time we made him tell us how he came upon this device once and for all.”

* * *

The door to Oliver’s office looked like someone had taken an axe to it. By the time he reached the university, his headache had begun to abate, though his mouth was still gummy and tasted of sour bile. A number of the faculty staff gathered around the entrance to his office as the building’s custodians took it from its hinges and lifted it away. Oliver brushed aside inquisitive looks and questions, spinning a number of lies about frat boy pranks or drunks looking for a place to sleep. He didn’t care whether his explanations sounded convincing or not. He just wanted people to leave him alone.

The interior of his office appeared to be untouched, a fact for which he was profoundly grateful. The notes he had made from the wax cylinders of Henry’s ravings were still lying on his desk.

He gathered up the notes and swiftly penned a letter on university-headed notepaper to Professor Drouet of the Department of Modern Languages. This he folded and placed in an envelope, together with a carbon copy of the words Henry had spoken in French. Marking the envelope urgent, he popped the letter in the interdepartmental mail slot fixed to the wall outside his office.

It felt strange transitioning between his office and the hallway without recourse to a door, but the smashed remnants could hardly be left hanging in splinters. He returned to his seat behind the desk and checked his watch. Twenty-five to eleven. Time enough. Alexander would be here soon—Oliver had called him before heading to the campus—and then they could make their way to Aunt Lucy’s in time for the meeting with Stone and his reporter friends.

Oliver gathered up the wax cylinders and placed them back in the box in which he had transported them from Arkham Asylum. Hardstrom had been explicit in his desire for the cylinders to be returned to him, and Oliver saw no need not to comply with the doctor’s wishes. As he filled the box, the cold wax and linear grooves were a reminder of how easily a mind could crumble. Last night’s clarity of purpose might be short-lived, and Oliver closed his eyes as he tried to reorder his thoughts.

“I’m not interrupting am I?” said Alexander from the doorway.

Oliver looked up and gave a weak smile.

“No, of course not. Come in.”

“It isn’t like I need an invitation now, is it?” said Alexander, moving through the unbarred portal to Oliver’s office. “What the devil happened here?”

Oliver ushered Alexander into his office, waving him to silence. As Alexander took a seat in front of the desk, Oliver quickly outlined the events of the previous evening, the transcription of Henry’s madness, the attack of the beasts, his rescue by Stone, and the subsequent laying of plans to meet.

“And you trust this man?” asked Alexander.

“I do,” said Oliver. “If he wanted me dead, he could have just left me to those creatures.”

“I suppose,” mused Alexander. “Though it does seem rather convenient his being there just as you needed help. Perhaps he has an ulterior motive in mind.”

“I don’t think so. The man seemed genuine, Alexander. For heaven’s sake, his daughter was murdered. Hardly makes him a candidate for suspicion, now does it?”

“True, but we are engaged in a perilous game here, Oliver,” said Alexander. “We must suspect everyone and trust nothing. Stone could have set those creatures on you and then driven them off to earn your trust, which he seems to have done admirably.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Oliver.

“You have no idea how devious our enemies can be, my friend,” warned Alexander. “But we shall give this man the benefit of the doubt for now. And these transcriptions, you still have them?”

Oliver nodded and passed over his notebook. Alexander scanned the words with interest, and Oliver saw him recoil in horror from the lurid and grisly details recounted upon the pages. “Dear Heavens!” said Alexander. “This is dreadful stuff, Oliver. And you say this is all from Henry Cartwright?”

“I’m afraid so,” nodded Oliver. “The poor man’s mind has unraveled beyond the pale. Do you recognize or understand any of the text? I thought it sounded somewhat old, though I confess I have no understanding of French.”

“Yes, it’s old right enough,” agreed Alexander, tracing his finger along certain portions of the text. “The verb form and some of the sentence structure is quite archaic, a form not used much now except by some very old-fashioned scholars. Like you, my expertise is more in the Arabic and proto-Aramaic languages, so I can’t help with the translation.”

“Not to worry, I’ve sent a copy to Julien Drouet in modern languages,” said Oliver. “He should be able to translate it. And once I have that, I plan to send it to an old colleague of mine from my days at Brown. Morley Dean, do you know him?”

“By reputation only,” said Alexander. “Are you sure it’s wise to disseminate these words so freely? After all, Dean’s mind snapped once already under the pressure of such horrors. This might cause him to experience another breakdown.”

“I thought about that, but there’s no one better qualified to get to the bottom of where this text came from and what it might mean.”

Alexander spread his hands wide and gave a short bow of the head. “Very well, Oliver. I bow to your greater familiarity with Mr. Dean. I look forward to hearing what he has to say.”

Oliver checked his watch again and stood to retrieve his coat.

“It’s ten minutes to eleven,” he said. “We should probably be on our way.”

Alexander rose from his seat. “And again I have to ask if you are sure this is a good idea? Not everyone is equipped to understand or comprehend the foes ranged against us. In such dealings I find it is always best to proceed with caution.”

“Then let caution be our watchword,” said Oliver.

* * *

Oliver hadn’t seen Gabriel Stone through the window of Aunt Lucy’s, an eatery in which he’d never taken a meal. It was mostly empty, too late for the breakfast crowd and too early for the lunchtime rush. The décor was faintly rustic, reminiscent of his grandmother’s parlor back in Fell’s Point in Baltimore. A pair of waitresses toured the tables, dispensing coffee and taking orders, but there was little for them to do.