Ramsey Campbell - The Inhabitant of the Lake and Less Welcome Tenants

'After I read in the Revelations of Glaaki about the way to prove this idea of mine, I determined to see for myself what I would be invoking. It was mostly trial and error; but finally, one night, I found myself materialising in a place I'd never been before. There were walls and columns so high I couldn't even see where they ended, and in the middle of the floor was a great fissure running from wall to wall, jagged as if from an earthquake. As I watched, the outlines of the crack seemed to dim and blur, and something rose up out of it. I told you that image looks very different in its own dimension — well, I saw the living counterpart, and you'll understand if I don't try to describe it. It stood there swaying for a moment and then began to expand. It would have engulfed me in a few minutes, but I didn't wait for that. I ran off between the columns.

'I didn't get far before a group of men stepped out in front of me. They were dressed in metallic robes and hoods, and carried small images of what I'd seen, so that I knew they were its priests. The foremost asked me why I had come into their world, and I explained that I hoped to call on Daoloth's aid in seeing beyond the veils. They glanced at each other, and then one of them passed me the image he was carrying. "You'll need this," he told me. "It serves as a link, and you won't come across any on your world." Then the whole scene vanished, and I found myself lying in bed — but I was holding that image you see there.'

'But you haven't really told me—' began Gillson.

'I'm coming to that now. You know now where I got that image. However, you're wondering what it has to do with tonight's experiment, and what Daoloth is anyway?

'Daoloth is a god — an alien god. He was worshipped in Atlantis, where he was the god of the astrologers. I presume it was there that his mode of worship on Earth was set up: he must never be seen, for the eye tries to follow the convolutions of his shape, and that causes insanity. That's why there must be no light when he is invoked — when we call on him later tonight, we'll have to switch out all the lights. Even that there is a deliberately inaccurate replica of him; it has to be.

'As for why we're invoking Daoloth, on Yuggoth and Tond he's known as the Render of the Veils, and that title has a lot of meaning. There his priests cannot only see the past and future — they can see how objects extend into the last dimension. That's why if we invoke him and hold him by the Pentacle of Planes, we can get his aid in cutting out the distortion. And that's about all the explanation I can give you now. It's almost 2:30 already and we must be ready by 2:45; that's when the openings will align… Of course, if you don't feel like going ahead, please tell me now. But I don't want to get everything into place for nothing.'

'I'll stay,' Gillson told him, but he glanced at the image of Daoloth a little uneasily.

'All right. Give me a hand here, will you?'

Fisher opened a cupboard door next to the bookcase. Gillson saw several large crates, set in neat order and marked with painted symbols. He held one up as Fisher slid another from beneath it. As he closed the door, Gillson heard the other lifting the lid; and when he turned, Fisher was already laying the contents out on the floor. An assortment of plastic surfaces came to light, which were assembled into a distorted semi-solid pentagram; and it was followed by two black candles formed into vaguely obscene shapes, a metal rod carrying an icon, and a skull. That skull disturbed Gillson; holes had been bored in its cranium to hold the candles, but even so he could tell from its shape and lack of mouth that it had not been human.

Fisher now began to arrange the objects. First he pushed chairs and tables against the walls, then shoved the pentagram into the centre of the floor. As he placed the skull, now carrying the candles, inside the pentagram, and lit the candles, Gillson asked behind him:

'I thought you said we mustn't have any light — what about those, then?'

'Don't worry — they won't illuminate anything,' Fisher explained. 'When Daoloth comes, he'll draw the light from them — it makes the alignment of the openings easier.'

As he turned to switch the lights out, he remarked over his shoulder: 'He'll appear in the pentacle, and his solid three-dimensional materialization will remain in there all the time. However, he'll put forth two-dimensional extensions into the room, and you may feel these — so don't be afraid. You see, he'll take a little blood from both of us.' His hand moved closer to the switch.

'What? You never said anything—'

'It's all right,' Fisher assured him. 'He takes blood from any that call him; it seems to be his way of testing their intentions. But it won't be much. He'll take more from me, because I'm the priest — you're only here so I can draw on your vitality to open the path through for him. Certainly it won't hurt.' And without waiting for further protests, he switched off the lights.

There was a little light from the neon sign of the garage outside the window, but hardly any filtered through the curtains. The black candles were very dim, too, and Gillson could make out nothing beyond the pentagram, from his position by the bookcase. He was startled when his host slammed the icon-bearing rod on the floor and began to shout hysterically. 'Uthgos plam'f Daoloth asgu'i — come, o Thou who sweepest the veils of sight aside, and showest the realities beyond.' There was much more, but Gillson did not notice it specially. He was watching the luminous mist which appeared to arch from both him and Fisher, and enter the misshapen cranium of the skull in the pentacle. By the end of the incantation there was a definite aura around the two men and the skull. He watched it in fascination; and then Fisher ceased speaking.

For a minute nothing happened. Then the arcs of mist vanished, and there was only the light of the candles; but they glowed brighter now, and a misty aura surrounded them. As Gillson looked at them, the twin flames began to dim, and suddenly winked out. For a moment a black flame seemed to replace each — a sort of negative fire — and as quickly it was gone. At the same moment Gillson knew that he and Fisher were not alone in the room.

He heard a dry rustling from the pentacle, and sensed a shape moving there. At once he was surrounded. Dry, impossibly light things touched his face, and something slid between his lips. No spot on his body was touched for long enough for him to snatch at what felt at him; so quickly did they pass that he remembered rather than sensed the touching feelers. But when the rustling returned to the centre of the room, there was a salt taste in his mouth — and he knew that the feeler entering his mouth had tapped his blood.

Above the rustling, Fisher called: 'Now Thou hast tasted of our blood, Thou knowest our intentions. The Pentagram of Planes shall hold Thee until Thou shalt do what we desire — to rend the veil of belief and show us the realities of unveiled existence. Wilt Thou show it, and thus release Thyself?'

The rustling increased. Gillson wished the ritual would end; his eyes were becoming accustomed to the glow from the garage sign, and even now he could almost see a faint writhing in the darkness within the figure.

Suddenly there was a violent outburst of discordant metal scraping, and the entire building shook. The sound whirred into silence, and Gillson knew that the pentacle's tenant had gone. The room was still dark; the candlelight had not returned, and his sight could not yet penetrate the blackness.

Fisher said from his position by the door: 'Well, he's gone — and that figure is constructed so he couldn't go back without doing what I asked. So when I turn on the light you'll see everything as it really is. Now if you feel your way, you'll find a pair of eyepatches on top of the bookcase. Put them on and you won't be able to see anything — that's if you don't want to go through with it. Then I can turn the light on and see all I want to see, and then use the icon to nullify the effect. Would you rather do it that way?'