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Post by Lorpius Prime on Apr 20, 2007 10:39:02 GMT -5
When Karl retired, he had expected it to be into a life of relative peace. There would be his wife, yes, but her company was pleasant and would still be an escape from the colorful and vulgar years of his employment. After sixty years, he believed he deserved a rest.
It occurred to Karl that his mistake was, most probably, in his choice of friends. He had been careless with his liquor and careless with his friends, and now he had acquired something of a reputation. Some men, it seemed, could not appreciate the elegance of a touch of embellishment, a dab of wit to make a story entertaining. That was the purpose of a story after all, to entertain; Karl was not a dry historian giving lectures.
He sat now, wrapped in his warm velvet robes and enjoying the orange warmth of his fire. The parlor windows looked out on a town now blanketed by only a few inches of snow; but for an old man, as Karl was, the chill was enough.
In his right hand he held one of his fine crystal glasses, half-filled with a cheap but passable red wine. The glass was a part of a set, a gift from his former employer before that man’s unfortunate arrest.
Karl’s left hand held open the book that was now the cause of so much trouble for him. Had it been only him, Karl thought he might have borne it without much complaint. But the shame it brought his wife, and Jacobine was so fragile these days… That he could not allow.
He brought the wine to his lips and considered his options. Some way or another, this would have to stop.
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Post by Lorpius Prime on Apr 27, 2007 2:23:47 GMT -5
Rudolf Erich Raspe, known to friends simply by his middle name, knew nothing of this, of course. His primary concern was making sure that the County Kerry constables did not discover that new resident Rudolf Raspe, librarian and hobby geologist, was the same Rudolf Raspe wanted in Scotland for fraud, embezzlement, and, potentially, High Treason. Or, for that matter, the same Rudolf Raspe wanted in Hesse-Kassel for gem theft. And treason.
Erich’s second concern was making enough money to sustain his fairly comfortable lifestyle. Working in a small print shop was respectable employment, but Erich lusted after a fortune that his boss simply could not offer.
He returned home one evening pleased with himself for having found a rather gullible member of the local gentry; a man named Duggan who, Erich had concluded, had entirely too much wealth for his own. Erich was so caught up in his scheming that he did not notice the darkness inside.
Erich’s house was always a little dim when he came back evenings, since he wasn’t one to pay for lighting he didn’t use. This evening, however, his house was quite dark. Erich first took notice of the phenomenon when the Argand oil lamp in his entry hall failed to light on the second attempt, and he looked around in confusion. Even without the lights, there should have at least been some illumination from the setting sun through his windows. Erich shut his front door.
Blackness. Complete and impenetrable.
He frowned and opened the door again so he could see what he was doing with the Argand lamp. It did catch at last. Considering the darkness, Erich decided to pick up the lamp and carry it with him rather than try to fumble his way through the rest of his ill-lit rooms. The lamp was made of heavy wrought-iron, and did not balance well in his hand. Erich tried to raise it up to examine the windows above the front door, but they were too high. It was strange; he didn’t even think there were curtains up there to block the sun; and if there were, he had certainly never climbed up there to shut them.
With a shrug, he walked deeper into the void, intending to inspect his parlor.
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Post by Lorpius Prime on Apr 28, 2007 3:10:23 GMT -5
He was in the middle of his hall and just lifting his left foot for another step when the wind caught him. It burst forth from inside the house and swept around Erich, chilling his skin and threatening to snuff out the flickering flame of the lamp. The front door slammed shut, and Erich was alone, a tiny island of light in the sea of darkness.
And he felt fear. His stomach tightened and all the veins of his body contracted against the cold, both real and imagined. Erich reversed himself and stepped backwards, responding to an instinctual need to flee the unknown. But as he turned he found that he could not remember the way back to the door. The darkness had swallowed up all his references, and it seemed as if all the walls had receded beyond sight or reach. He was lost in his own home.
His mouth opened in a whimper, a shuddering convulsion of the tongue and lungs.
Perhaps that was what the darkness had been waiting for, because then it spoke to Erich.
“I will let you keep your little light. It does not offend me as it once might.”
If this was supposed to give Erich comfort, he did not take any. Instead, he spun with the lamp all around, searching for the voice’s origin, but succeeding only in making himself dizzy and unbalanced.
“This way. I have taken one of your chairs.”
This time, Erich was able to fix on the direction from which the voice came. He flexed his fingers and lifted the lantern, prepared to use it as a club if needed.
“What is this?!” he demanded, though unable to keep his voice from breaking.
The darkness chuckled at him, “Perhaps it is an elaborate deception, a hoax, a ruse. These are all things with which you are familiar, Mr. Raspe?”
Erich screwed up his eyes as he moved slowly towards the voice. This certainly was elaborate for a hoax. He approached cautiously, though it certainly wasn’t like any burglary he’d ever heard about either.
“What is it that you… want…” his own power of speech failed him.
When he entered his parlor, it was as if the darkness became, somehow, thinner. The lamplight leapt forward to illuminate most of the room, albeit dimly. And within the boundaries of its light was the creature Erich knew had been speaking.
It had turned around one the chairs in front of Erich’s fireplace to face the front of the house, and Erich. He thought of it as a creature though it resembled a man. Long and unkempt hair hung in dark strings over its head. Its skin was pale with a horrible blue hue, and damp. If it was a man, he looked like he had recently drowned.
“For an editor and… librarian, you keep a paltry few books, Mr. Raspe,” its head was drooped towards its feet, but Erich could see its bloodshot eyes gazing straight at his own.
Erich didn’t know whether to turn back at once or step closer for a better look at its dreadful visage. His feet made the decision for him, moving forward as if by their own separate will.
It smiled and Erich felt his revulsion swell, “What are you doing here?” The last two words he tacked on almost as an afterthought.
“Fulfilling an oath, little as it may be worth now.”
Erich took a deep breath for confidence, “You are trespassing sir, and I must insist—“
“Trespassing,” it turned its head to face Erich’s and sneered. There didn’t seem to be any blood in its lips at all. “It has been a long time since I worried about such petty laws. And there is nothing you can do to me anymore.”
A raised eyebrow, “Do I know you?”
“No.”
The syllable went on unnaturally long and the voice which spoke it was decidedly less than human, but cold like a reptile’s hiss. Erich found himself profoundly affected by the word. His stomach, heart, and lungs all surged forward as if trying to escape from his chest. He could not breathe. He felt a yearning, a twisted desire to move forward toward the ungodly phantom. It took all of Erich’s sense and will to hold his ground, to keep his distance.
At last it released him, and Erich gasped, sucking in the air; he tasted blood. The creature’s eyes pulsed, pupils bulging black for a moment. Its face was less sickly now, and it smiled a little more pleasantly. A red tongue slid across pink lips.
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Post by Lorpius Prime on May 9, 2007 1:12:31 GMT -5
“But that didn’t stop you.”
Something landed with a plop at Erich’s feet. Still a little disoriented, he stooped to pick it up.
And he was surprised to discover that it was his. An old project, he was really only responsible for some editing and the translation. He had received a few hundred pounds from the publisher and moved on. Erich thumbed open the cover and squinted at the woodcut illustration on the first page.
He stared at the intruder, “That can’t be you?”
The man’s—it had to be a man—lips quivered and his eyebrows turned down in anger, “Only my name. But that’s all that matters in the eyes of others.” He stepped forward.
Erich stepped back. “Wait,” he protested, disturbed by the apparent intent in the other man’s motion. “I didn’t even write these! I just collect—“
“It doesn’t even matter anymore.” Its mouth opened.
Erich’s bowels lurched again and he was spun to the floor where he knelt, gasping and trying to contain the impulse to vomit. He seemed to be losing his strength, his legs wouldn’t respond to the command to stand, to run.
“What is this?” he choked out. Dimly, he noticed that he had dropped his lamp; tiny flames were starting to lick at the corner of his rug.
Erich felt a cold, moist hand rest itself on top of his head. “Your stories were about some rather fantastic adventures of mine, Mr. Raspe. Well, I have had some quite preternatural experiences these last few years. It is only to your misfortune that the fantastic elements of our world do not make for pleasant after-dinner conversations. My tale is a horror story, Mr. Raspe. And so is yours.”
The fire on the floor shrank and died with a cold wind and the darkness embraced them both.
Erich’s death was ruled a suicide, he had bled dry after cutting his own throat.
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