Chapter 6: Sornoth
When Neal was once more aware of his surroundings, it didn't take long to realize he wasn't really awake. Mozzie's cat Betelgeuse couldn't be there. That wasn't his warm raspy tongue on his face. But it was a good dream.
Betelgeuse was giving him a thorough grooming, and he didn't attempt to open his eyes. The last thing he remembered was being tossed onto the ground by a ghast. This was paradise in comparison. Absolutely no need to return to reality.
Betelgeuse felt different. A tiny ribbon of a tongue. Had Betelgeuse shrunk in his dream? Gradually he became aware that Betelgeuse had brought kittens along and they were all licking him.
He attempted to lift a hand to stroke one of them, but he couldn't lift it. What kind of lousy dream includes ropes cutting into your wrists? This was just a dream, he reminded himself firmly. He should be able to will those bounds to disappear.
But after a couple of minutes of focused concentration, they were as tight as ever. His dream was turning into a nightmare. A leaden ache in his stomach also showed no signs of disappearing.
He slowly pieced together the fragments of his memory. The interminable trek through the rainforest. Had Peter managed to elude the ghasts? Maybe he'd found a wormhole and was able to escape. He was already back in Arkham, safe with El. Neal let his mind rest on that thought. What happened to him didn't seem so important.
The gash on his forehead didn't hurt as much. That was a positive. He supposed eventually he should wake up. If he opened his eyes, Betelgeuse and the kittens would vanish and he'd be left with a pack of ghasts. Not the most pleasant sight, but it had to be done. He roused his sluggish eyelids and cracked them open.
He blinked again. On the ground next to his head was a mouse-sized creature staring at him with enormous eyes. It looked more like a lemur than a rodent with ginger-colored fur and a minuscule button nose. It jumped onto his face and began licking industriously at a cut under his eye. He could feel the paws of a second one on his forehead, also licking a wound. He decided to relax and enjoy the moment. It could be worse. He could be having nightmares about nightgaunts. The tongue action of the lemurs was incredibly soothing.
He counted five animals but there might be more. They weren't just licking his head. He could see others working on his other injuries. He let his eyes drift over his surroundings. He was lying on his right side, still trussed. No windows but the stone walls were covered in a green slimy substance that gave off a faint glow. The stone floor was littered with bones, all picked clean.
"Those are ghast bones. The remains of Sornoth's feasts."
"Who said that?" He scanned his cell as much as he was able. He appeared to be alone except for the lemurs.
One of them jumped down onto the floor and peered into his eyes. "I did."
He didn't think it was polite to argue, but the lemur's lips weren't moving. Somehow the words just formed inside his mind. Was he dreaming or hallucinating? He felt like he'd landed inside a Walt Disney movie. The lemurs resembled Cinderella's mice. Maybe he was in a campy version of The Jungle Book where he was Mowgli and Cinderella had sent her mice to help him. The lemurs were scampering about but instead of making a dress, they were working on him. He must be in worse shape than he thought to be comforted by that.
"You're going too fast." The lemur licked his nose in an apparent bid for attention. "I can't follow your thoughts."
Neal started to drift away but the lemur wouldn't stop licking his nose. "Are you inside my head?" he asked.
"That's right!" The lemur rubbed its nose against his cheek. "We can read each other's thoughts."
That proved it. He was definitely hallucinating. Still, the lemurs were a lot better than the terrifying visions of the abyss he used to dream about or the grim reality of ghasts. He decided to play along for as long as his hallucination would let him. "Where am I?"
The lemur told him he was on Merope and had been taken to the ancient city of H'nir. He'd been reading about Merope in the vault. That must have been the inspiration for his dream. The lemur called itself a shilka. The bushbabies he'd seen in the jungle were known as chittaks. The chittaks had contacted the shilkas to help him. Since his nose-licking friend seemed to know so much, he asked him about Peter. The shilka informed him that Peter was with Phineas, and they were coming to get him. Phineas, of course. He would dream of Phineas. He'd seen the poster about him on the bulletin board.
He tried to picture his loft, but couldn't. It was on a distant world that no longer existed. The pain in his stomach was lessening. It too was hollow. Without meaning. Like his head. He no longer felt anxious. Just sleepy. The shilka was telling him about how Peter and Phineas were coming to rescue him.
"Good. 'Cause you know . . . I insist on a . . . happy ending."
When next he awoke, he was dumbfounded to see the shilkas still there. Only now there were fewer of them. A recurring hallucination? Was this how his mind coped? He no longer ached as much but he had no energy, not even to flex his wrists.
The shilkas continued their ministrations. As hallucinations go, they were the most soothing he'd had in quite a while.
"Where's Peter? I thought you said he and Phineas would rescue me. I don't want to complain, but I'm ready. Any time now would be good."
One of them peered anxiously at him. "Soon. You mustn't give up hope."
"You don't seem scared of me. Don't you think I'm awfully big?"
"You're not the first of your kind we've seen."
"You're referring to Phineas?"
The shilka gave a series of high-pitched squeaks. Was that laughter? "He doesn't look like you at all." It flashed an image into his mind.
"Thaddeus?" he blurted incredulously. "You know Thaddeus?"
"Is that what you call him? He didn't seem to understand us, but he was here for three sunrises before Phineas rescued him. Did he tell you about us?"
He shook his head. "Thaddeus is dead now," he whispered.
"Did Sornoth kill him?"
"Who is Sornoth?" Another image flashed into his mind. A huge black leopard. It was gnawing on a ghast in between low rumbles. When it lifted his head, he saw vicious curved fangs. Was there such a thing as a saber-toothed leopard? In his dream world, there was. The leopard opened his mouth and let out a roar. It was the same roar that he'd heard in the forest, but now deafeningly loud. He shook with fear, overwhelmed by the urge to flee.
"You understand now. That is Sornoth. The evil that haunts Merope. From him no one is safe."
"But this can't be right. I'm dreaming of The Jungle Book. In the movie, the leopard is my friend. He's my protector, my mentor. He wouldn't hurt me. You must be referring to the tiger, Shere Khan, not Bagheera."
The shilka approached closer, its dark eyes boring into his. "I see your images. My thoughts are being translated into something you can understand. You're not dreaming. This isn't a fantasy. It's real and Sornoth will come for you. We wish we could keep him away but we cannot. You'll have to face him alone."
He heard another roar, much louder than ever before. Its rumbling aftershocks reverberated off the walls of the cell. Frantic to muffle the sound, he struggled to shield his ears with his hands, but he was still bound. The frightened squeaks of the shilkas were an alarm call. They scurried off to dart into a chink in the stone wall.
One lingered at the crack and turned back to look at him. "Don't give up. We'll be back!" Then it too vanished.
This was bad if even your hallucinations fled. The cell had grown quiet. Too quiet. Was this to be his fate? Dinner for a leopard? He could hear Mozzie's voice in his head. "Take careful notes of all your experiences."
Sorry, Mozz, you don't want to know.
His heart hammering, he attempted to twist his head. A dark opening led into a narrow corridor. He tried to flop onto his other side to face the entrance, but he was too weak.
A low rumble in the corridor. Two incandescent golden eyes shone in the darkness. Soft thuds of massive paws.
Sornoth.
His shaggy black fur was streaked with gray. As he stalked into the cell, he emitted a roar so guttural, it hurt his ears. His fangs glinted in the obscurity of the cell.
Sornoth slunk toward him, his ears flattened against his head. The heavy dark sound of his breathing robbed him of any will to resist. Nightmare, hallucination, delirium? He was beyond terror with a fear that previously he'd only experienced in the abyss.
Sornoth approached within inches of him, sniffing his head and then his back. The beast smelled of decay.
With a snarl, he leaped over him and crouched directly in front of him. Pausing only for an instant, he seized his left side in his jaws and clamped down.
His breathing slowed as he stared into the face of Sornoth. An icy paralysis froze his limbs. It couldn't end like this. Not with Sornoth.
The shilkas said Peter and Phineas were coming. Into Sornoth's trap? He fought to stay awake. Peter wouldn't be able to hear them, but it was all he could do. Peter . . . Stay away.
#
"Do you believe Lavinia?" Sara asked. Elizabeth and Mozzie knew Lavinia better than her. She was willing to rely on their judgment.
She had no basis to contradict Lavinia's claim that Neal and Peter had been stranded on the planet Merope. Apparently the only person who could save them was a shapeshifter named Phineas Dittlesworth. El knew who he was—an ornithologist from Oxford. He was scheduled to give a lecture next week at Miskatonic University. First a librarian, now an Oxford professor. Just how many shapeshifters were walking among them? Did Meropians have a particular fondness for academic settings? Should a test be given to all faculty members to determine their genetic makeup? What test would work?
She'd just had her brain probed, then been told her friends had been abducted to an alien planet, all the while sipping emerald-colored wine. She prided herself on maintaining her cool no matter what, but this was testing her fortitude to the limit.
El was plainly shaken. She tried to put a positive spin to Lavinia's incredible tale, saying it was better than hearing Peter and Neal had been run over by a truck.
"I've never known Lavinia to be wrong," Mozzie declared. "Cryptic as quantum field theory? Of course. Mysterious as a black hole? Obviously. But to my knowledge, she's never lied. And what little she divulges has invariably been proven correct."
"But she didn't say Professor Dittlesworth would be able to rescue them," El pointed out. "Simply that he was their best hope. When we grilled her for more information, her uncertainty became apparent. She kept referring to Thaddeus and what happened to him. That doesn't inspire me with any sense of confidence."
"Did anyone else find it curious that she referred to Neal's former advisor?" Sara asked. "Lavinia seemed to imply that there are similarities in their cases. Does that mean Thaddeus was spirited away to Merope too?"
"I hadn't considered that," El said. "There are rumors that Thaddeus succumbed to vault madness. Peter told me Lavinia had also mentioned that as the probable cause."
"Do you believe in vault madness?" Mozzie asked.
"No," said El firmly. "I examined the evidence and studied the autopsy results for all the suspected cases. There has to be a physiological cause. We simply haven't uncovered it yet. In Thaddeus's case, I'm concerned about what role algolnium may have had in his coma."
Thaddeus, like Neal and Peter, was a carrier of the rare element. No one brought up the possibility that Neal and Peter might fall into a similar state, but the possibility was real. Sara thought about all the hours they'd spent in the vault.
"Lavinia was probably using vault madness as a smokescreen," Mozzie said, taking off his glasses to polish the lenses with his handkerchief. "She has no intention of disclosing anything more than what she views to be absolutely essential. It's what we've all grown to expect from her." He sighed heavily. Was there a touch of the would-be Romeo in his expression? Neal told her that Mozzie was attempting to date Lavinia. Now that he knew she was a shapeshifting alien, she must be more alluring than ever.
"Still, we should be buoyed by the amount of information she bestowed upon us," he said, rousing himself. "Neal and Peter aren't facing the challenges alone. The forces at work are not all evil. We've been privileged to become the confidants of a species from another world. Let us pause for a moment and reflect on that. How can we help but feel confident this will end well?"
Hyperbole aside, Mozzie did provide Sara with a measure of optimism. Even El was smiling wistfully at his words. But Sara was not the sort to sit quietly and let others assume command. She had work to do.
"I have a meeting scheduled with Diana later this morning," she told them. "Originally I'd planned to discuss the circumstances surrounding Laban Shrewsbury's death. How much, if any, of this should I tell her? Shouldn't we let her know what we suspect? She's been told about the previous wormholes. I realize I can't mention anything about Lavinia or Merope, but should I inform her we suspect Neal and Peter were sucked into a wormhole?"
"Diana doesn't know anything about the algolnium Neal and Peter have," El reminded her. "Even if you told her about Lavinia, I doubt she'd believe you. I saw her turn into my colleague in front of my eyes and still doubt it really happened. You should consider your career. You don't want to lose your standing with the police department." She chuckled wearily. "I sound exactly like Neal did a couple of months ago when he was seeing ghasts but no one else was. He feared he was schizophrenic. I now have much more sympathy for why he was so reticent to share his experiences."
Sara nodded sympathetically. She hadn't given Neal enough credit for opening up to her. He must have been concerned she'd brand him a lunatic.
"In any case, what help can the police provide?" Mozzie asked. "It's not like they can fly off to Merope."
"No, but they can keep searching for them," El said sharply. "I'm doing my best to believe that Lavinia's right. Dittlesworth will somehow manage to bring them home. But what condition will they be in? Where will they arrive? When we asked Lavinia, she'd only say that she expected it to be soon. Don't we want the police to be actively searching for them? They could rematerialize on a highway or in the Miskatonic River." When her voice began to quiver, she stopped to swallow and take a breath.
Sara reached out and clasped her hand. "Leave it to me. I'll make sure Diana gets the message."
#
Diana was in a meeting with Captain Hughes when Sara arrived at the police station. By now everyone knew her. The sympathetic desk sergeant allowed her to sit by Diana's desk to wait.
There weren't many detectives around. Jones was out on patrol. With no one to talk to, her thoughts kept returning to Neal and Peter. She longed to be with them, no matter how dangerous it was. She and Mozzie should form a club. Fate was squeezing them out of the action and it needed to stop now.
It was so unfair. She was the adventurer, not Neal. He was no Clint Eastwood or Bruce Lee. He might charm a princess with his good lucks and understated wit, but he'd never star in a western or take down the bad guys with rapid karate chops. He needed her.
Which raised the question, what kind of movie would Neal be in? She looked around. The captain's door was still closed. No telling how much longer Diana would be. To distract herself, Sara began to sort through appropriate movies for him to star in. She was an expert on movies, after all. She often filled in for the movie critic at the paper when he was on vacation.
Neal was a natural for Dustin Hoffman's role in The Graduate or perhaps Jimmy Stewart in Arsenic and Old Lace. A romantic lead? Definitely. With those blue eyes and disarming smile, he'd have the women lined up just like his students. Let's see . . . Ryan O'Neal in Love Story. Neal would have been so much better in that part. Robert Redford's role in The Great Gatsby? Neal could have played either Gatsby or Nick Carraway. Perhaps James Bond. The female spies would find him irresistible. Of course, he'd have to let her dispatch all the villains.
Because clearly they were meant to be together. He was the cerebral John Steed. She was Emma Peel. He wasn't supposed to be off on a distant planet with her grounded on Earth.
She sniffed and reached into her bag for a tissue. Diana couldn't see her like this. She'd misunderstand. She was the tough investigator who'd been aced out of an assignment, not an emotional wreck worrying about her—
"Sorry to keep you waiting," Diana said, striding over.
She quickly stashed her tissue in her bag and composed herself. Sara Pabodie, hard-nosed journalist, was once more present and in control of the situation. "I assume there's no news to report?"
"That's right. Have you discovered anything?"
She fed her the agreed-upon account that Mozzie and El feared the men had been sucked into another wormhole.
Diana wasn't surprised. She must have already suspected as much. She didn't reveal where the wormhole formed and before Diana could question her further, diverted the discussion onto the Shrewsburys.
Diana had been true to her word. She'd researched the circumstances surrounding Laban Shrewsbury's death in June of 1931. "The fire was believed to have been deliberately set because the blaze took hold so quickly. Shrewsbury was the only one at home. His son Thaddeus was a graduate student at Harvard. The investigating team believed that Laban may have set the blaze himself as an act of suicide."
"Why would he have killed himself?" The possibility added a new wrinkle to the line Sara was pursuing.
"Laban's wife died in 1929 from pneumonia when he was away on an expedition. Thaddeus admitted that at the time of Laban's death he was estranged from his father. The investigator made a note that Thaddeus faulted Laban for having neglected his wife. The police interviewed several of Laban's colleagues who corroborated that the deceased had minimal contact with his wife for several years. A couple of them expressed the opinion that Laban might have been overwhelmed with remorse and decided to end his life."
"Who identified the body?" Sara asked.
"A fellow archaeologist at the university."
"Was there anything unusual in the personal effects?"
Diana checked the file in front of her. "There was a note that his journals had been transferred to the university library vault in 1929 when he returned from his last expedition. Laban was wearing a pendant at the time of the fire. That proved helpful to the colleague who identified him. Laban had been so badly burned, his features were almost unrecognizable. The colleague remembered having seen the pendant on him."
Sara's breath quickened. "Do you have a photo of it?"
"Documentation back then was not up to our standards." Diana frowned as she scanned the file. "There's no photo. The pendant was described as a small bronze disk. One of the detectives questioned the colleague about it because it looked ancient. He thought it might be valuable and wondered if a botched robbery had been the cause of the fire."
"It sounds a little like the pendant that Neal was wearing when he was found on the streets of Arkham," Sara said, musing aloud. "I wonder if it was Thaddeus who gave it to him."
"It's possible," Diana agreed. "All of Laban's personal effects were turned over to Thaddeus. Do you know if he ever commented about the pendant to Neal?"
"I'm sure he didn't, but there is one link. Neal gave me a photograph to research. Thaddeus had left it to him in his will. In the photograph, a young man is shown wearing Neal's pendant. I was able to identify him. He's Andrew Phelan. He'd served as Laban's assistant for several years. The photograph was taken in the early 1930s. It shows Andrew with a little girl who is probably his daughter. We've speculated that Andrew could be Neal's grandfather and the little girl his mother."
Diana was rapidly jotting down notes. "Thaddeus could have given Andrew the pendant . . . perhaps as a memento of Laban. With so many of the people now deceased, discovering the truth about Neal's parents will be difficult. He's lucky to have your help."
"I wish I could give him better news. You mentioned you were digging through old records too. Did you have any luck in finding other starfish-related cases?"
Diana nodded, looking pleased with the question. "I found records of a similar crime wave. In 1931, Boston experienced a rash of murders. A serial killer was suspected to be present, with carved starfish left at the crime scenes."
"That sounds just like what happened in Arkham!"
"It's almost an exact parallel, including the disappearance of the starfish from the evidence room. The police tried to cover up the mysterious circumstances. In our case, we were able to use surveillance cameras to prove the starfish simply vanished. Back then, they didn't have that capability. The Boston chief of police believed that the killer might have an accomplice within the police ranks who was stealing the starfish. The killer was never found but after a string of seven murders, there were no more incidents."
Sara pondered for a moment. "1931 was the year Laban died. If an open wormhole was letting ghasts enter Boston, there may have been one in Arkham as well. Could ghasts be involved with the fire which killed Laban?"
"It's tempting to think there is a link," Diana agreed. "How does this square with what you're finding out about Andrew Phelan?"
"His wife gave birth in March of that year. In June, Laban was killed. That same month Andrew quit his job at Harvard, and vanished from public records."
She and Diana spun possibilities for a few minutes, but they would have to remain mere speculation until there was more evidence unearthed. Sara hadn't asked Lavinia about the Shrewsburys. Now that she'd submitted to her bizarre test, Lavinia might be more receptive.
She decided to visit her in the library. She had to keep busy doing something. Were there ghasts on Merope? Lavinia hadn't specified what dangers they faced. The high priest at Leng had told Neal he'd call for him. Was that what had happened? Still more questions for Lavinia.
"He's tougher than he looks." She looked up to see Diana watching her, sympathy in her eyes.
"He's an academic, not a warrior," she pointed out. It was disconcerting to see that El's stress was rubbing off on her. Neal was a friend and a colleague, but there was no need to become emotional.
"Don't sell him short," Diana retorted.
"That wasn't my—" she said, dismayed she'd been misunderstood.
"I've seen him overpower ghasts," Diana said, cutting short her fumbled response. "Peter served in the Navy. Call it luck, call it skill—hell, call it Neal's psychic powers—but they'll be okay. They've gone through two wormholes that I know of and returned unscathed."
She wished she had Diana's confidence. Hers was evaporating by the moment.
Diana glanced at her watch. "It's almost lunchtime. I could use a break. You free?"
"How about the coffeehouse?" she asked, grateful for the suggestion. "It's close. Jack's added some new sandwiches to the menu." Maybe something positive could come out of the day. She had yet to speak to Diana about Jack. This would give her the opening she needed.
Neal and Peter were beyond her help. They were forced to confront whatever dangers existed on Merope with only an unproven shapeshifter to assist them. Lavinia had transformed herself into one of El's colleagues. Sara hoped Phineas had a more useful trick up his sleeve. Neal and Peter needed someone the size of King Kong with the heart and skill of Superman.