Necronomicon: The Wanderings of Alhazred (20 page)

prevent the passage of the Old Ones or their children when placed upon any threshold. A householder who rightly inscribes it upon his door may sleep securely from the incursion of these unnatural creatures, for it not only prevents the spawn of the Old Ones from entering the house but also fortifies its windows and walls from their malice, so that the interior is preserved against all designs to breech its unseen barrier.

The seal was cut into the dais in the starlit chamber to prevent the entrance of the Old Ones, and for aeons it has fulfilled its function, for deep dwellers in the lower chambers assert that no spawn of that space-crossing race has ever passed through the soul portals. To common man and other creatures it offers no barrier, but only against the passage of the Old Ones or those things engendered of the Old Ones.

It is somewhat effective against the human worshippers of the seven lords, for these men are in constant awe of its power and fly from the very sight of it, though they could cross it if they dared.

No man understands the working of the Elder Seal. It may be that in its proportions and angles, it concentrates the same baneful influence shining down from the stars that ages ago drove the Old Ones from the surface of our world, in the same way that cunningly polished crystals and curved mirrors capture and concentrate the heat of the sun and cause fires to spring forth from wood and other combustible things.

When drawn upon the ring of the ritual circle, it serves as an effective protection against Nyarlathotep, who cannot perceive even with his arcane wisdom what transpires within the circle or hinder the progress of the work. Worn about the neck as a charm, it protects the traveler against the voracious children of Shub-Niggurath created from human seed who haunt the wilderness places and wait for prey. Even the doorways of dreams are sealed, and no spawn of the Old Ones can enter the mind of one who wears the charm. Those who invoke the seven lords shun it, for it renders all their preparations void and frustrates all their arts.

It is written that after peace was made between the Elder Things and the spawn of Cthulhu, and he had withdrawn from the poison of the stars to his tomb on R’lyeh, which was then still above the waves, three members of the Elder Race came to R’lyeh in secret and placed the seal upon the entrance to his tomb, so that after waking he would be trapped for unnumbered ages, for they foresaw the sinking of the city with their astronomical arts and placed the seal on the eve of the cataclysm. In this way they thought to frustrate Cthulhu, for he cannot wake from his sleep of death until the door is opened, and the seal cannot be breeched by either he or his spawn. Yet with all their wisdom they did not consider the rise of our race, still uncreated by them, and it may prove that at some future time the ingenuity of man can unlock the gate that holds impotent the might of the god.

fter exhausting the resources in the city beneath Irem and all that can he gleaned by travel through its soul portals, and communion with the deep dwellers who haunt its vaulted chambers and vast, many-pillared halls, the traveler must descend more deeply into the earth, for there is no escape upward past the witch I’thakuah who ever waits and listens. In the lowest reaches of the western halls, beyond a stone stairway bathed in blinding radiance that shines out from the walls with the brightness of beaten gold, is to be found a great door of cast bronze that swings easily and without sound on its hinge although it has received no grease for countless ages. Past it lies a passageway, and farther beyond a channel cut through the solid rock by the waters of an ancient river that ran dry long ago, although to one who stands and holds his breath, the distant echo of its thundering waters may still be heard. The river was called A’zani by the reptilian race, or so it is reported by their descendents, who still crawl through darkness across the dusty gravel bed of that watercourse.

In antediluvian times the course of the A’zani was impassible, for its surging flood completely filled the cavernous spaces that twist and writhe ever westward deep beneath the sands of the desert toward the Red Sea. It served as the outlet for the mighty fountains that rose beneath Irem, which in the distant past were much more powerful than in the days when men inhabited the place. Over the passage of ages its flood dwindled to a trickle and at last ceased altogether, leaving only the convoluted passage, like the hollow, sloughed skin of some great serpent. Where the rushing stream forced its way into caverns that already existed in the depths, the way is high and broad, and the sound of wings may be heard in the darkness overhead, like the soft sound of bats, but these creatures are not bats; in other places the gravel carried along by the waters has been thrown in sloping piles, so that the way is narrow enough that a man must lower his head.

The visitor to the nameless city fortunate enough to possess flint and tinder, and able to find wood to burn, should prepare torches from the fat of rats, to light the dry riverbed nearest to the city; for it is close to their ancestral home that the degenerated descendents of the reptilian race scurry and dart about on their four clawed feet, their heads lowered near to the ground smelling out their prey, which consists of rats, snakes, and an abundant kind of white spider not found elsewhere. These spiders are the size of a man’s hand with the fingers outspread; they cling in thick masses to the walls and ceilings of the passage, and dart across the gravel bed seeking their own food in the form of worms and beetles. Difficult to avoid without the illumination of a flame, they run about everywhere, and make the sound of a dry stick cracking when stepped upon; their fangs are not venomous, but their bites are painful due to their largeness.

A man without a torch who has consumed his dried store of the white fungus-dwelling spiders of second sight will have scant signs to guide him along the riverway, only the slight general descent of the bed, for it both rises and falls, but falls more often than rises, and the faint breath of salt air that enters the channel from its mouth near the sea; the stirring of the air is only perceptible in the final part of the journey along the river. He will find himself mired in darkness, crawling on all his limbs as do the reptilian beings, forever annoyed by the furry bodies and intermittent bites of the spiders, which however serve as a convenient source of food and moisture, for their bodies are fat with water.

The reptilian beings go naked, and most have lost the ability to speak, either in their own language or in the dialect of ancient Irem. They fear to enter their city, but remain near the bronze doors that open on the passage leading to the river, and worship or adore the doors themselves as gods. A few who are older than the rest are able to converse in the strange accent of Irem, having learned it by observation; for this race resembled the crocodiles of the Nile in being long in years, and among those dwelling in the darkness of A’zani are a small number who remember the tongue of man. Little is to be learned by conversing with these elders, who have suffered the dulling of the mind common to extreme age, but they can speak the name of the river, and will describe with relish how our race was tricked into building Irem above their hidden city.

Near the bronze gates are arrayed in family groups the wooden caskets of their honored dead. Some few are still to be found in the chambers of the city itself, but most have been moved beyond the gates. The deep dwellers say that it was the custom of this race to preserve the bodies of their dead as do the Egyptians, dress them in finest adornments and clothes, and place them within sepulchers that have lids of glass through which the corpses might be viewed by successive generations of blood relations. When the race in its final decadence fled the city and went to dwell in the dry river channel, they could not bear to part with their ancestors and carried their caskets beyond the doors. Only the bodies of the dead who possessed no living family were left behind.

Many of these tombs will be found to be broken, their contents stolen for nourishment. The reptilian beings have fallen to the practice of consuming the dried flesh of the dead of other bloodlines, though they will not defile their own direct ancestors in this way. The social life of the race consists in attempts by family groups to despoil the tombs of other families, who guard them with their very lives, for when all the tombs of a family are broken and the corpses stolen, it is the stated belief of the elders that the unfortunate family will inevitably perish. Even though this can be no more than a fable, belief makes it so, and in this way the numbers of this race ever diminish.

A recent traveler passing along the riverbed happened to witness by torchlight a battle between two rival clans, each a score or more in number. One great family had taken a defensive position before their honored dead, but because of the constant need to hunt for food, their numbers were weakened. The other clan overwhelmed the defenders in a rush of dry scrabbling limbs and snapping jaws, and managed to bear off several of the caskets of their rivals while the battle raged, but before they could despoil their contents, the hunters returned and their fresh strength enabled the defenders to recover their precious desiccated corpses. An observer would think it was a victory of nations, so clamorous were the guttural ululations of the victors, who seemed to lose the power of articulate speech in their excitement. Such is the pathetic existence of this once-magnificent race of builders and scholars.

In the greater caverns the batlike creatures, forever unseen, may be heard to swoop down from the heights on softly brushing wings and snatch up squealing their prey to carry it beyond the torchlight to the ceilings where it is consumed. The sounds of their chewing are plainly heard, enhanced by the echoing rocks, and so too the sounds of the bones and skulls of their prey striking the gravel and boulders below. They are not large enough to carry up a member of the reptilian race or a human being, but in their attempts their claws leave deep gashes, for they are sharp as daggers and cut through the tough hides of the reptiles as easily as through unprotected skin. When they attack they may be killed, having thin bones and frail wings, but their blood is poisonous and causes sickness, making them useless for food. Enough are killed that they only attack in numbers of two or three at a time, never singly, and their attacks are infrequent.

The reptilian creatures will also attempt to slay the traveler for nourishment, as there is never sufficient food in the caverns and passageway for all that dwell there; the utterance of the cry
Ië! Nyarlathotep!
will keep them at bay. All quake in terror at the name in the way a dog will flinch when a man makes a gesture of throwing a stone, even though no stone is in his hand; and so it may be concluded that it was the lord of the Old Ones known as the Chaos That Creeps who drove them from the chambers of their underground city and into the river caverns.

After a day of progress the reptilian race is left behind, and after many more the breeze of the sea is felt on the cheeks and the scent of salt is detected. It is an easier matter to progress by following this breeze, which leads to a pit in the stones on the desolate shore of the Red Sea. Follow the shore north, and you will come upon a small sea port, where rough passage may be had for a reasonable sum or a few traveler’s tales to the ancient canal cut by the Egyptians at the head of the Red Sea, and from thence journey may be undertaken overland to Memphis.