Goat Mother and Others: The Collected Mythos Fiction of Pierre Comtois (10 page)

“That is quite all right, Miss,” said Shuri, helping her to get up. “The law of Leng is much older. Much, much older and for those who transgress, the punishments is not a thing pleasant to contemplate. Much more frightfuls than the laws of humans. And so, you sees, to avoid punishments, the law of Leng must be observed and the agreements your uncles made with the Tcho Tcho must be fulfilled. You will come with me and you will see. You will be glorifieds and be a mother to our peoples. You will give birth to new younglings who will continue to serve our masters Nyarlathotep, may his name be praised.”

Darlene allowed herself to be led from the kitchen.

“Now, you will packs yourself a bag for travel,” continued Shuri. “We have long journeys ahead of us.”

From that point, Darlene could remember little but the occasional impression or snatch of conversation. To all outward appearances, she seemed normal and in possession of all her faculties, perfectly cognizant of what she was doing when she called Whitney to verify his commitment to oversee the property until the house could be sold, when she told Humberton to send all mail to her residence in New York and to transfer the proceeds from the sale of the house to her personal account, when she called the travel agent to arrange a flight schedule for Shuri and herself to Burma.

“…will be of great service to my peoples who have had many other Goat-Mothers who served us well in the past,” Shuri was saying as she drove the Saturn up Interstate 93 to Boston’s Logan Airport.

“…life of Tcho Tchos good and devoted to service of Nyarlathoteps in return for sharing his rule when Elder Gods return some day, but price to be paid for our faithfulness is our inability to procreates,” she heard Shuri saying while the flight attendant cleared away the remains of their meal.

“…Tcho Tcho folk not mens nor womens, not builts for reproduction, so we have our Goat-Mother, she who is consecrated to Shub-Niggurath, the goat of a thousand young, she who is Great-Goat-Mother to all…Tcho Tcho…Deep Ones…Dholes…Shantak…

“…of great service to Tcho Tcho People and whose bodies have provens to be oh so well suited to Shub-Niggurath’s purposes are those of humans women…” Shuri said as they made their way through the crowded streets of Rangoon.

“…have served Tcho Tcho People in past but more humans about Sung in these latter days and was determined by peoples to be too dangerous to continue to consecrate local candidates as Goat-Mother and so was decided to look in lands that not know of us…” Shuri said, tugging vigorously on the reins of his donkey as they picked their way up slope from the jungle that was left behind some days before.

“…when name of Silas Cobb came to us, we send cousins to see him…” said Shuri, holding a great, covered tray before him.

“…cousins in Innsmouth know of humans ways and speaks to Cobb of trade…” Darlene heard Shuri say as she lay sweating and naked upon a stone couch whose cold could still be felt even through the roughly woven blankets that covered it.

“…Cobb told cousins that he could get a Goat-Mother for Tcho Tcho in return for story of Elder Gods…” Shuri lifted the lid of the tray and when Darlene saw what was there, all shiny and squirming, her terror and horror was so acute that for an instant the power of the Black Lotus was not enough to restrain the screams that filled her throne room.

“…Cobb said plan would take much times but that was well, as it would be long before Tcho Tcho could complete book about Elder Gods…” But Darlene was long past hearing Shuri’s story as she felt the squirmings begin inside her.

“…but finally book finished and soon Shuri leave Sung to come to Cobb with book and find Cobb keep promise…” There were people, things, gathered around her, robed and grotesque, holding wooden bowls. Then one approached and held its bowl between Darlene’s legs and gathered the millions of fertilized eggs that spewed from inside her. One by one, figures came to her and did the same until, hours later, the nightmare ended.

“Now Miss is Tcho Tcho Goat-Mother, will spawn new younglings and Tcho Tcho able to continue duties and worship of Elder Gods…” Darlene lay supine on her throne, exhausted and sickened, wanting only to die.

“…only few younglings will live to adulthood but new Goat-Mother not to worry that not all her children will live…” Shuri said, replacing the handmaidens in Darlene’s distorted vision and approaching her with the covered tray again.
How long had she been in this place?
her mind screamed.
Was this Hell?
As the fog of the Black Lotus gradually lifted from her brain, she wasn’t sure of anything except that her most fervent wish was to die…

“…not all will live, but in thousand-years time, Goat-Mother will have gratification of seeing those of her children who do, grow and glorify her…”

on Schulter tossed an armful of kindling onto the ground then straightened, holding his back. He felt a distinct creak back there.
Must be getting old
, he thought. Throwing his arms forward, he gave them a good stretch. It had been a long day beginning with the drive west up I-90 from Boston then to the old Aylesbury Pike. The maps had made it look easy but after he took the turnoff onto the Pike, things became a bit more uncertain. It was all because of the reservoir of course. When the Winsor Dam was built in the 1930s, the rising waters of the Swift River not only drowned a number of small towns and scattered homesteads, but part of the Aylesbury Pike too. That necessitated alterations in the direction of the highway and it seemed that the state’s maps had not yet caught up with the changes. Why was he not surprised at that?

Schulter sighed, placed his hands on his hips and surveyed the scene around him.

It had been a hot autumn day and the sun was just setting behind the ridge on the far side of the Quabbin Reservoir in a brilliant, orange ball swollen to twice its normal size. The glow from the sun cast a reddish tinge on the surrounding woodland and accentuated the strange sight that lay before him.

At the moment, Massachusetts was in the midst of its second year of the longest drought anyone could remember. Streams and wetlands all across the state had run dry, and rivers and ponds were dangerously low. Restrictions were in-force in cities and towns everywhere, to the usual grumblings of homeowners, and meteorologists predicted more of the same until at least the new year. But the state’s misfortune also resulted in a boon for local archeologists and antiquarians who were able to explore streams and river bottoms for remnants of the state’s early history. In particular, the drought turned out to be quite convenient for Schulter, whose research into his family’s history had led him to the Quabbin, which at the moment held only about half its normal volume of water.

That was good, because as its waters receded, they began to reveal some of the old homes and buildings that had been covered over when the reservoir was first created in the 1930s. Even as he looked out over the shrunken body of water to the ghostly shapes that had once been homes, businesses, and even churches, he wondered what secrets lay behind those moldy walls? He wasn’t quite sure why he’d come, what he expected to find, but what had seemed fantastic in the light of day, didn’t seem so now as the shadows lengthened and darkness fell.

It all started when he began working on his master’s thesis for the University of Massachusetts. His paper was supposed to trace his family history, but what he soon realized was that what had begun as a purely academic exercise instead became something a little more personal.

And so, Schulter began following his family’s trail back through the twentieth century. There were blind alleys and false leads of course; Schulter was not too uncommon a name among people of German descent. But a title search at the registry of deeds based on his father’s purchase of a home in Salem enabled him to find the correct line of descent which led to a district courthouse in Arkham. There, he was able to confirm that his great-grandfather had once owned a farmstead in central Massachusetts.

Excited with his progress, Schulter was bitterly disappointed upon further research to learn that old Micah Schulter’s farmstead, as well as the entire Swift River Valley in which it was located, rested at the bottom of a man-made lake, the Quabbin Reservoir!

Having grown up in the more populous eastern part of the state, and the last several years in Boston, Schulter had never really given much thought about where his drinking water came from. But as he soon found out, the Quabbin Reservoir had been created in the 1930s to satisfy the state capital’s increasing demand for fresh water. With its steep sides and lightly populated bottom land, the Swift River Valley was judged ideal for the construction of a dam at nearby Belchertown, and soon the local population was bought out of their property and moved to other locations. With the dam and an accompanying tunnel to carry water all the way back to Boston finished by 1939, authorities began flooding the valley and by 1946, the reservoir was filled to its 412 billion gallon capacity. In the process, the rising waters had covered over a half dozen towns and countless homes that locals claimed they could sometimes see when the water was particular clear.

All of which hadn’t helped him learn any more about his family, but he hadn’t spent years in college without learning how to do research. What he couldn’t discover firsthand from possible relatives still living in the valley, he might be able to find in a local library.

Or historical society as things turned out.

A few telephone calls yielded the information that much of the official records and archives of the towns that had been abandoned to make way for the reservoir had been saved and moved to another town called Firthford, located on the opposite side of the north ridge of the Swift Valley. Hoping to find more information about his family history among those records, Schulter had driven out to Firthford earlier in the summer. The first thing he found out about the town was that it was named after somebody named Jonathan Huxley Firth. He knew that because the man’s name was everywhere: on the sign welcoming visitors into town, over the single bay of the town’s only fire station, the public elementary school, even the cemetery! So by the time Schulter arrived at the library, he wasn’t surprised to see “Jonathan Huxley Firth Memorial Public Library” carved over the main entrance.

“Just who is this Jonathan Huxley Firth?” he asked the librarian as he drew up to her desk. Inside, the library was tiny as most small town libraries are. Bookshelves were overloaded with books and competed for space with outdated computer terminals, CDs, videos, and DVDs. A huge painted portrait of a stern looking, middle aged man hung from the wall of a crowded reference area. Schulter could just make out the name “Jonathan Huxley Firth” on a darkened bronze plate affixed to its massive gilt frame.

The librarian looked at him, lowering her glasses, then up at the portrait.

“Firth was a very important man for our town,” she explained. “He was very rich and owned a lot of land around the county.” She leaned a little closer to Schulter and continued in almost a whisper. “They said he owned half the land in the Swift Valley before the Quabbin was built. It wasn’t a coincidence that he was the chairman of the committee charged with finding a location for a reservoir. He made a fortune when the Swift Valley was picked as the site and the state reimbursed residents living there for the land they had to give up. Anyway, he spread his wealth around at least, donating the funds to build this library, the town hall, fire station and the school. After that, people were glad to forget how he earned his money and renamed the town after him.”

“Nice guy,” said Schulter, giving the portrait one last look.

“But nature has a way of balancing things out,” continued the librarian. “His family suffered from some inherited ailment…no one’s really sure what it was…but he was in a constant sweat over it and if he didn’t bathe frequently, would kind of…you know…sme

“Hm,” grunted Schulter, having learned a little more than he really wanted to. “I’m here to try and do a little research on my family background. My great-grandfather lived in the Swift Valley.”

“Oh, then you need to go over to the historical society,” said the librarian. “All the records from the valley towns are kept over there.”

A brisk walk along the town’s main street, which was lined with spreading maple trees and beautifully restored 18th century homes, led him to the historical society offices. By that time, it didn’t surprise him to discover that the building had once been the home of Jonathan Huxley Firth, donated to the town on the death of his only daughter.

Inside, Schulter found that what had once been the living room was appointed much as it had when Firth had been alive except for the presence of a number of glass counters displaying important documents in the town’s history. Glancing idly over them, Schulter noticed many had been signed in the strong, forceful signature of Firth himself. Here was his last will and testament, there a donation of 20 acres of land for the elementary school, there a deed handing over the rights to a carriage house to be used for a fire station. It was when his eyes trailed over the fourth or fifth such document that he noticed something about Firth’s signature: he included a little design after his last name. A small circle with a little squiggle in the center. Going back to the other papers, Schulter saw that all of Firth’s signatures sported the same sigil. Did it have any meaning? And now that he thought about it, hadn’t it been on a circular plaque over the entrance to the house? And part of the town’s seal that he saw on the sign welcoming him to Firthford?