Necronomicon: The Wanderings of Alhazred (43 page)

The swords of Damascus are made in Damascus, but the steel comes from a source unguessed by those who wield them in battle. If the traveler to this city strikes up an acquaintance with a weaponsmith, and gains his trust, eventually he will see the smith meet with a pair of strangers who come from the Lebanon in an ox-drawn cart heavily laden with steel ingots. They take no pains to protect their load, precious though it is, since it would be of no use to any other city, for just as it is true that no fire of man can smelt Damascus steel, it is equally so that only the forges of this city are hot enough to soften it to be shaped by the hammer. It would be valueless to the smiths of any other land, save perhaps those of the distant land of Cathay, who are fabled to be cunning in the making of steel.

These traders from the Lebanon are uncouth in appearance and vulgar of speech, but fond of wine, though reluctant to pay for it from their own purses. They allow any man in the tavern to buy for them and never buy for others in return of the courtesy, so that they are unpopular with the men of the city. Perhaps it is because they are strange of aspect, having broad heads and unnaturally wide mouths that resemble the mouths of frogs, and bulging eyes that protrude from their flattened skulls. Their hands are moist to the touch, and their cheeks and necks always wet with the sweat from their bodies; yet notwithstanding this continual exuding of moisture, their skin is cool. They must drink prodigiously to replace the moisture they lose by day and by night, and for this reason haunt the taverns after their business has been transacted.

It is difficult though not impossible to intoxicate these strange traders, if the wine purchased for them is fortified and the strongest that may be had in Damascus, and then they will begin to speak of their home with longing to return to it, and express their discomfort at being so far from the sea, which they love as their mother. The story of the steel cannot be drawn out in one night, and is never given in all its details, but a patient man who has knowledge of arcane matters is able, after several nights of excess in the taverns, to gather the pieces of the tale, which is not long to write.

The village of the traders is known as Shaalon, and is inhabited by some twelve score of families who are all related by blood. They have made their livelihoods from the sea since before the memory of history, and none knows when their village was founded, but since before the recollection of the eldest man they have been traders and fishermen. Both trades flourish to an astonishing degree that is the envy of other villages on the coast, and those not native to Shaalon set this down to good luck, but the real cause is the association of the villagers with the Deep Ones, the children of Dagon, who dwell in the sea not many leagues from the shore.

The inhabitants of Shaalon trade not only with men but with the Deep Ones, who have formed bonds of marriage and blood with the villagers. This is not strange when it is known that the Deep Ones admire the beauty of our women more than the beauty of their own kind. In this way the blood of the Deep Ones and the blood of the villagers has mingled for a thousand years or more. The Deep Ones trade with them the riches of the sea and drive fish into their nets to insure for them abundant catches, and in return the villagers trade with them all the objects and substances of the dry lands that the Deep Ones desire, such as fine and brightly colored silks; for they love adornment and decorate their bodies with jewelry and such cloths as are able to resist the effects of sea water.

It is from the Deep Ones that the villagers obtain the ingots of steel that are shaped in Damascus into weapons of war. They have revealed to the men of Shaalon the manner of their making, having no secrets from those on the land they regard as their blood relations, and in drunkenness the traders may be induced to tell the way of it. The Deep Ones say that into the sea fall many stones from the stars having hearts of metal, some as small as an olive and others as large as a wagon. Upon the floor of the ocean they lie. The Deep Ones gather them, having the ability to recognize them by a kind of sound which they emit; so the traders report, though it can scarcely be a sound heard by the ears. Having brought them together, they take them to vents in the bottom of the sea where the fires of the earth are hotter than the hottest forge, and in these vents smelt them into ingots.

So say the Deep Ones to the men of Shaalon, and it is well-known to scholars that they excel all others in this world in the making of fine works in metals; for the women of the Deep Ones adorn themselves with jewelry in cunningly elaborated curls and delicate scales of gold, set with numerous precious stones, and these they wear upon their heads, and sometimes on their wrists. This vanity is affected alike both by those women wholly of the pure blood of the Deep Ones and by those of mixed blood. In return for the ingots of steel, the villagers trade colored stones to be set in their adornments, which are also enhanced by the presence of many fine pearls of surpassing luster.

Such is the secret of Damascus steel, kept close by the sword makers of that city as much in shame and in ignorance as in greed, for they cannot bear to admit that the smelting of the steel is beyond their talents, and they never question the traders from Shaalon closely for fear that they may lose access to their precious wagonload of ingots. Hence the men who shape the steel know nothing of its fashioning beneath the waves or its origin amongst the stars. Should the single wagon that brings it from the Lebanon fail to come to Damascus, the entire trade in the steel would cease, so tenuous is the basis for this famed industry.

ife in Damascus is filled with luxury and variety of every imaginable kind. No diversion is too obscure or too decadent, provided there is wealth to compensate the procurer who provides it. Those who seek a more refined entertainment will discover it at the university, where stimulating conversation is to be had daily on any matter of philosophy or mathematics or history. Attractive servants and fine furnishings are easily acquired, the stalls in the book markets groan under the weight of rare works on alchemy, necromancy, and other arcane topics, and witty acquaintances flock to the banquet table of a householder able to provide lavish feasts and diverting entertainment.

One precious commodity alone is difficult to obtain in this wonder of cities: the blessing of solitude. Locked behind the gate of the house at night, alone in a chamber of contemplation, the bark of dogs, the grunts of camels, the drunken songs of men, the beckoning cries of whores, all drift to the ear from beyond the windows, borne on the coolness of the night breeze. It is impossible to completely shut out an awareness of the great multitude of souls that press on every side like the waters of a rising tide.

On nights when the air scarcely stirs, and the heat suffocates the breath, the traveler who has wandered the wilderness of the Empty Space in his youth may feel a restlessness that compels him, as in a waking dream, to cast his cloak and cowl around his limbs and seek the silence of the dark that can only be found beyond the walls of the city. Perhaps it is a similar restless urge that compels Nyarlathotep to walk up and down upon the sands beneath the moon.

The best place for contemplation is the burial ground of the commoners of the city, which lies some distance beyond the northern gate. The shades of the dead are congenial companions to the necromancer, and they never speak, unless given the power to express themselves by the spilling of fresh blood. There is little reason for a necromancer to evoke their voices, for what could they speak that would be of value? The nobles of Damascus place their honored dead in elaborate and costly tombs that are difficult to force, but the common laborers and vagabonds content themselves with a shallow grave in a stony field.

A necromancer who had taken upon himself the duties and responsibilities of a householder in the Lane of Scholars one night heeded the call of the Empty Space and left the city to wander among the dead beyond the north gate, far from the lights of the watchtowers. As he left the noises and smells of Damascus behind, he felt the keenness of his senses reawaken and the stealthiness of his step return. The skills so dearly bought with pain and blood in the desert of his youth were not dead but had only been sleeping.

A clan of ghouls of the number of a score or more silently surrounded him as he stood, lost in silent contemplation of the stars. He paid them little attention. They were fat city ghouls, less dangerous than the lean and hungry ghouls of the desert. He seemed to them a man of the city, slow and weak, and they intended to slay him for intruding upon their territory and interrupting their nightly feeding upon the dead. The necromancer made no sign that he knew of their approach as they ringed him with their claws raised. The desert had made his eyesight keen, and he saw the stars reflected in the eyes in their upturned faces, and the gleam of their teeth.

When they rushed upon him, he killed several without emotion, merely to teach the rest a fitting respect. It gratified him to learn that he still possessed the old skills with a knife that had served him so well for so many years. There is little need for a man of wealth to kill with a knife, for he can hire others to do the killing in his stead; yet even when the need is gone, the pleasure in such killing does not vanish. The ghouls fell to their hands and knees and fawned upon the hem of his black cloak like dogs, as they made apology in their rough voices for their error.

It amused the traveler to cast off his cloak and cowl so that the ghouls could see by starlight the tattoos of power on his limbs and back, and the scares and mutilations of the torturers of Yemen. They danced and howled about his feet, proclaiming him their new lord. To this he said nothing, neither accepting nor denying the rank, for who can know when a clan of ghouls may prove useful? With his knife he helped them dig the earth from a recent grave and raise the corpse. The cutting away of the shroud revealed it to be the body of a fat matron of some fifty years, dead no more than three days. The ghouls honored him by withdrawing and allowing him the first strip of flesh.

How can the savor of human flesh be described to those who have never tasted it upon their tongues? It is like color to the blind, or music to the deaf. Ibn Schacabao writes that the taste is like the flesh of the barnyard fowl, but with this absurdity he shows that he has never eaten of man, for the flavor is more akin to that of the pig. Only with the first succulent bit in his mouth, and after he began to chew, did the traveler who was now a householder realize how dearly he had missed the taste. The flesh of a man newly slain is tough, but the flesh of a corpse that has rested in the grave for several days becomes tender and easy to cut with the teeth.

In an instant of awareness the necromancer realized that this was his true home: the grave, the night, the wilderness, the stars, the harsh stones, the scent of freshly turned earth, the softly laughing breeze, the chittering of insects, the grunts of the ghouls and the sound of their dry, sliding skin as they fed. The house in the Lane of Scholars was no more than a passing dream, a thing without permanence or importance, a diversion in which to spend the years of old age in comfort. When it was fallen to dust, the desert would remain unchanged and eternal, awaiting his return. The
Roba el Kbaliyeh
is a patient lover who never betrays the trust of those who adore her.