Абрахам Меррит - Creep, Shadow!

I made no answer; I could not. Nor could I go to her. And more ravenous grew the hunger, more maddening the thirst.

She said: "Alan, think only that. Think only that we love. That none can keep us from each other. Think only that. Do you understand me?"

I whispered: "Yes." And tried to think only that while the hunger and the thirst for her… for the life of her… were two starved hounds straining at the leash.

She said: "Darling, can you see me? See me clearly?"

I whispered: "Yes."

She said: "Then look… and come to me."

She raised her arms again, and slipped from her dress; drew off slippers and stockings. She let fall from her the silken sheath that remained. She stood facing me, all lovely, all desirable, wholly human. She threw back her hair uncovering her white breasts… her eyes were golden pools of love that held no shame…

"Take me, beloved! Eat and drink of me!"

I strained against the fetters that held me – strained against them as a soul led up from Hell to the gates of Paradise would strain to break its bonds and enter.

"She has no power over you. None can keep us apart… come to me, beloved."

The fetters broke… I was in her arms…

Shadow that I was, I could feel her soft arms around me… feel the warmth of her breast pressing me closer, closer… feel her kisses on my shadowy lips. I merged with her. I ate and drank of her… of her life… and felt her life streaming through me… melting the icy venom of the shadow hounds…

Releasing me from the shadow bondage…

Releasing me from Dahut!

I stood beside the bed looking down on Helen. She lay, white and drained of life, half covered by her red-gold hair… and was she dead? Had Dahut conquered?

I bent shadowy head to her heart and listened and could hear no beat. Love and tenderness such as I had never known throbbed from me and covered her. And I thought: This love must surely be stronger than death… must give back to her the life I have taken…

And still I could not hear her heart…

Then despair followed the pulse of that love. And on its wake a hate colder than the venom of the shadow hounds.

Hate against Dahut.

Hate against the warlock who called himself her father.

Hate implacable, relentless, remorseless against both.

That hate grew. It merged with the life I had stolen from Helen. It lifted me. Upon its wings I was rushed away… away from Helen… back through the shadow-land…

And awakened… shadow no more.

I lay upon a wide low bed in a tapestried room where an ancient lamp burned with a dim rose light. It was Dahut's room from which she had sent me forth as shadow. My hands were crossed upon my breast, and something bound my wrists. I raised them and saw twined tight around them the witch-fetters – a twisted thread of pale-gold hair, the hair of Dahut. I broke them. My ankles were crossed and bound with the same fetters, and these I broke. I swung from the bed. Around me was a robe of the soft white cotton, a robe like that I had worn to the sacrifices. I tore it from me with loathing. There was a mirror over the dressing table – on my face were the three marks of Dahut's whip-branding, no longer crimson but livid.

How long had I been in the shadowy land? Long enough to allow Ricori to return – but how much longer? More important, what time had elapsed since Helen? A clock showed close to eleven. But was this still the same night? It might not be – shadow time and shadow space were alien. I had seemed to cover immense distances, and yet I had found Helen just outside de Keradel's gates. For I was sure that that old room had been in the house McCann had taken.

And clearly, this return of mine had not been expected by Dahut – at least not so soon. I reflected grimly that I always seemed to be a little ahead of schedule so far as Dahut and her father were concerned… I reflected much more grimly that it had never advantaged me greatly. Nevertheless, it must mean that her dark wisdom had its limits – that there had been no shadowy spies to whisper to her my escape… that she believed me still under her sorceries; still obedient to her will; still held back by her command until my lust for Helen had grown strong enough to kill when loosed…

Might that not also mean her purpose had failed… that loosed too soon I had not killed… that Helen was alive?

The thought was like strong wine. I walked to the door and saw that the heavy inside bars were down. How could they have been dropped, since only I was in the room? Of course… I was Dahut's prisoner, and she wanted no tampering with my body when she was not beside it. She had barred the door and made use of the secret opening into my room to come and go. Quite evidently she had considered the bars safe from my helpless hands. I lifted them cautiously, and tried the door. It was unlocked. I opened it as cautiously, slowly, and stood peering out into the hall, listening.

It was then I first felt the unease, the trouble, the fear, of the old house. It was filled with fear. And with wrath. It came to me not only from the shadowed hall, but from all of the house. And suddenly it seemed to be aware of me, and to focus itself upon me, frantically… as though it were trying to tell me why it was troubled and raging and afraid.

So sharp was the impression that I closed the door, let one of the bars fall, and stood with my back to it. The room was unhaunted, unafraid, and shadowless, the faint rose light penetrating to every corner…

The house invaded the room, striving to make coherent to me what it was that troubled it. It was as though the ghosts of all those who had lived and loved and died there were in revolt… appalled by something about to happen… something execrable, abhorrent… an evil something that had been conceived in the old house while its ghosts had watched, impotent to prevent… and now were appealing to me to abort.

The house trembled. It was a tremor that began far beneath it and throbbed up through every timber and stone. Instantly that which had feared and had appealed to me withdrew; sweeping down to the source of the trembling – or so it seemed to me. Again the house trembled. Trembled in actuality, for the door at my back quivered. The trembling increased and became a shuddering under which the solid old hand-hewn joists creaked and groaned. There followed a distant, rhythmic thudding.

It ceased, and the old house quivered, then seemed to settle, and again the joists cracked and groaned. Then a stunned silence… and again the ghosts of the old house were around me, outrage in their wrath, panic in their fear, crying, crying to me to hear them… to understand them.

I could not understand them… I walked to the window, and crouched there, peering out. It was a dark night, sultry and oppressive. There was a flashing of lightning from far beneath the horizon and faint distant rumbling of thunder. I went quickly about the room looking for some weapon, but could find none. My intention was to get into my room, clothe myself and then hunt down Dahut and de Keradel. Precisely what I was going to do after I found them I did not know – except to end their sorceries. All confusion as to whether these were sorceries or super-illusions was gone. They were evil realities belonging to a dark wisdom evilly used… none should be allowed to live to wield this evil power… and they were swiftly mounting to some dreadful climax which must be thwarted at any cost…

The ghosts of the old house were silent – I had gotten their message at last. They were silent, but they had lost none of their fear, and they were watching me. I went to the door. Some obscure impulse made me pick up the white robe and throw it around me. I stepped out into the hall. It was filled with shadows but I gave them no heed. Why should I, who myself had been a shadow. As I passed, they clustered and crept behind me. And now I knew that the shadows too were afraid, like the old house… were cringing before some imminent and dreadful doom… like the ghosts were beseeching me to avert it…