Johannes Cabal: The Fear Institute

occurred to him that there was a speck around which his deductions had been built, a few words of forewarning that had given him a head start on the truth. He thought of a whispering inhuman voice beneath a temple to a forgotten god in a city with no name: ‘Remember Captain Lochery.’

He had focused purely on wondering how the ghoul had even known of the captain and that Cabal was acquainted with him. He had concluded that the ghouls’ unnerving ability to go almost anywhere and anywhen that amused them had been the cause of it, and that the ghoul was merely using the captain as an example of their wide-spanning intelligence, and as a warning to be careful. Now that he paused to consider his memories of the ensuing ratiocinations, however, he realised that the unusual nature of the captain’s leg had flickered through his mind. This, truly, had been the seed from which his deductions pertaining to the true nature of the mysterious wamp-killer had sprung, the moment he had clapped eyes upon the evidence of Ercusides’ exercises in arcane woodwork.

This was a disturbing revelation in itself, and Cabal hushed Corde’s simmering outrage with an impatient flutter of his fingers and a pneumatic pffft of the type used for shooing off cats. Cabal needed to think, and he didn’t need a histrionic solicitor distracting him while he did it.

The truly disturbing element, however, was the nature of the hint. It had been cryptic to the point of abstruseness, and not a reasonable bet for a hint to most people. For Cabal, and Cabal’s thought processes, however, it had been precise and exact. How could some cadaver-chewer have known that? Unless, and he did not enjoy the thought, the ghoul had not been a ghoul at all. Nyarlothotep famously had a thousand avatars, a thousand faces to present, a thousand masks to wear. This was only a figurative figure, however: Nyarlothotep in reality had far, far more. It did not stretch credibility in the slightest to suggest that the ghoul was one of them. If anyone could gauge a clue with such terrifying meticulousness, surely it had to be a god.

Once one accepted in principle that their expedition was being protected by the Crawling Chaos (one of Nyarlothotep’s many names, along with others such as the Black Pharaoh, Ahtu, the Grey Man, Loki, the Child of Eyes, the Bloated Woman, Anansi, the Dweller in Darkness, the Smiling Killer, Tezcatlipoca, and Dave in Accounts), abandoning it became problematical. Nyarlothotep might just shrug and leave them to it, or he might take offence and then revenge. Given that Nyarlothotep’s revenge would likely be biblical in scale, Dadaist in commission, and cruel enough to make de Sade wince, not offending the god seemed very sensible.

Cabal had many faults, several of which were also capital crimes, but he was in no wise indecisive. He shouldered the baldrick to which his Gladstone was attached, and started walking again. ‘Come along,’ he said. ‘I am not abandoning our quest, and therefore will not be finding a reciprocal gateway for the Silver Key. Without it, you are trapped here, Herr Corde, so I suggest you have little option but to accompany us.’

Corde was furious, but still he did not reach for his sword. ‘Don’t I have any say in the matter?’

Cabal stopped to look at him. ‘You have no say, but perhaps you do have a choice. Come or stay.’ He considered. ‘Yes, that covers all the possibilities.’ Cabal made to start walking again.

‘One day, Cabal, you will have your comeuppance.’

‘Is comeuppance some mealy-mouthed way of saying die? One day I shall die, yes, and given my profession, it will likely be sooner than later. But it will also likely be random and stupid and pointless. It is to war against the very irreversibility of such deaths that I do what I do. In all your days as a solicitor, Herr Corde, I doubt you even once pressed the war against death with a minute of your time or an iota of your energy. In real humanitarian terms, your campaign against the Phobic Animus is the most selfless and noble thing you have ever done or will ever do. Do not miss your chance to be useful.’

If the logic convinced him, he did not nod. If the sentiments mollified him, he did not smile but, none the less, Corde followed, and the remaining 75 per cent of the Great Phobic Animus Hunt walked on.

Just over two weeks later, Corde died. It was random and stupid and pointless.

The icy atmosphere within the party had thawed a little, at least on Corde’s part. Cabal was capable of only glacial coldness and incandescent fury; convivial warmness was well beyond him except as an exercise in play- acting. They had made good progress to the Karthian Hills, and the ease of their passage via the kindness of passing caravans, both commercial and military, had given them the easiest leg of their adventures to date. They had bought supplies at cost from the rearguard baggage wagons of a column of huskarlar accompanying a king on royal progress around his lands before saying their goodbyes and climbing into the hills.

The Karthian Hills were painfully bucolic and picturesque, as if planned by John Constable. Every view was striking, every weather condition heart-stopping, the light never anything less than blooming. It was like walking through an art gallery that contained only one piece, but one that surrounded the viewer and altered from one moment to the next, from one masterpiece to the next. As is usually the way in art galleries, they soon settled into a routine of largely ignoring it, but the transcendent beauty of their surroundings could not help but have a mellowing effect on them. Even Cabal found less to be sarcastic about, and so sank into a somewhat resentful quiescence, like a dormant volcano fondly remembering its last pyroclastic flow in which it had buried several hundred people, and now rather looking forward to its next.

There were farms and orchards in the hills, and the people were friendly, refusing as often as not to take payment for the food they gave the travellers. Bose was able to shake off the recent horrors they had witnessed as easily as a young child might, and took to chattering to Corde, or to himself, or to Cabal, which was much the same as chattering to himself. Corde bore the empty conversation well, ignoring much of it, and responding briefly and thoughtfully when the subject touched upon something that interested him. They did not speak of Shadrach. He was gone, and they did not care to consider how that had happened, or the consequences in the waking world when they returned. It would indeed have been easier if only his spirit had entered the Dreamlands, for then his body would have simply died in its sleep and there would have been a coroner’s report of natural causes. Explaining a disappearance would probably turn out to be trickier.

Instead, they liked to consider what the world would be like when the Phobic Animus was finally destroyed. Strangely, despite all their preparations beforehand, they had never truly been examined the actual results of a successful expedition in anything but the vaguest terms of a ‘golden future’. Now that they applied themselves to it, they were pleased and somewhat relieved that they could perceive no deleterious ramifications. Well, almost none.

‘Nobody will care to read ghost stories again,’ said Bose, as they walked. ‘Perhaps just for reasons of literary enjoyment, but certainly not to get the shivers because no one will believe in ghosts any more.’

‘That,’ said Cabal, in one of his rare utterances, ‘would be foolish. One should be cautious of ghosts, for they certainly exist.’ He flexed his shoulder and winced slightly as he said it.

Typically, he would not expand upon the subject having dropped such a boulder into the pool of their conversation, so Corde and Bose had to content themselves with telling one another ghost stories, both ‘true’ and fictional. Cabal sniffed disdainfully during some of these tales, and not during others, by which standard they came to understand which were most likely, given their taciturn companion’s experiences. By this method, they amused