H.P. Lovecraft, the racist little muppet, has a famous saying that gets trotted out like a prancing pony every time Horror as a genre gets mentioned.

The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.

Most people, I think, get too wrapped up in this idea, and think that he was explaining his overall thesis statement: but consider, how much of Lovecraft’s horror is about the unknown? Most of his horror, I think, comes from the idea that exploring and discovery is dangerous. It’s an anti-intellectual sentiment, that the more you learn about the world, the more horrifying it becomes. A more accurate thesis statement might be “Ignorance is bliss.”

Now, do I have a long-winded yet articulate dissertation on Hit Points Lovecraft in the hopper for you? No. This is a half-baked idea at best, but it’s a fitting prostige(A portmanteu of prologue and prestige, used to define the practice of telling a seemingly unrelated story as an opener to a thesis; made famous by Rachel Maddow and lefty-Youtube video essays.) to what I want to talk about: Looking Behind the Scenes.

In the Hall of Record, the lights burned low.

The Librarian’s many eyes darted around the shadows, searching for signs of movement. There were none. The Quill-servants had all returned to their cells, the doors shut tightly. It was only the Librarian now, with their pile of scrolls, books, papers, letters, documents, rolls of pens, and stacks of ink vials.

Completing their circuit, the eyes of the Librarian landed once more on the single letter that had occupied their thoughts for the whole evening. A single letter, written and sealed with a special mark; the one mark the Librarian held in any kind of esteem.

In the distance, the Darklin’ Hour rang. The Fiveworlders called it Eve’nbell. Such a silly name for the coming of darkness.

For the first time in…was it years? Certainly not. Months at least, but years? Well, it was possible, but still…when was the last time the Librarian had crawled out from behind their desk? What had they done? That’s right, they had been looking for a lost Quill-servant, to administer punishment for his — or was it hers? — laxity in their duties. They had found the poor thing huddled in a ditch on the outskirts of the inner Palace, pressed against the Palace Walls and begging for mercy. Poor thing.

“You’re a cold-blooded bastard, you are,” Ronald tossed a thick sleeping-roll to Danial, grinning a sinister grin. “This must be twenty miles from town.”

“Or thirty at least,” Kenny sighed, lowering his body onto a large rock. “Seriously, Danial, why are we doing this? And don’t give us any of that macho ‘guy’s trip’ garbage, we could have gone to Vegas.”

“Hell, even L.A.” Ethan muttered darkly as he dropped his backpack to the ground. He had been quiet for most of the trip, opting to hike in silence through the dark forest. Danial opened his arms wide.

“Come on now, this is an adventure! I don’t want to spend all my time with you guys just getting drunk, gambling away my money, and masturbating myself to sleep in Vegas.”

I sit now at my desk, hand trembling to spite my dark intent. I have no recourse but to place in writing the terrible and ominous portents that have been visited to me this night, as I sat reclining in my grandfather’s chair, reading from one of the many ancient texts that line my library walls. Until now, I had thought these books were at worst a boast. A casual conciliatory gesture to my literary past, and a knowing wink and a nod to any guests I may once have invited to my home. Now I do detest the sight of them, these rusty tombs of crusty ink and decaying papyrus. I see them now for what they are — vile corpses of living plants, once full of seeds and spores, now skinned and drained of life, with acidic brackish ichor carving the feeble gibbering of children and mad men into their bones, all bound together with the dry skins of dead animals, long since past this mortal plane. Macabre collages of decay and madness.

For the thousands of citizens of the Empire of Ever and Always, the day ended the same way it had for over ten centuries.

In the tallest tower of the Palace of Ever and Always, there hung six bells. The pedigree and history of each was enough to fill whole volumes in the palaces archives, and they had a language all their own; ringing out not only the time, but important events throughout the long days of the Ever Empire. There was a ring for morning prayers, for midday mass, for the departure and arrival of the Ever Lord, and many more besides.

Now, the bells ring a warning, a caution to all that night had officially fallen on the First and greatest of the Five Worlds. The sound reached outwards, searching for every crack and corner, filling the ancient stone with its vibrations. It was said that the tolling of the Six Bells could reach across the Velvet. When the Six Bells rang, the whole Empire took notice.

At the bells’ reverberations, shadows which had for the better part of the evening crept across the stonework in a steady pace now filled the corners of the countless pathways and crosswalks that wound across the ground like eager snakes.

It was the first of two rings. The first was to alert the Empire that the second ring was soon to come. To many, it was the Empire’s way of stretching and yawning before blowing out the candle.

Screams and fire. A blinding heat that soothed the icy blood. Through all of it, a cackling laugh that was barely recognizable. Crackling wood and snapping stone punctuated the charnel house that filled the world, as the Pack hunted for fresh meat.

We’ll fight ’till we drop.

The bumper sticker sat proudly on the bumper of the car across the street, it’s bright yellow lettering glowing against the deep purple background. The car looked brand new, daring the viewer to believe that it had even been driven off the lot. The silver chrome glittered brightly in the shining sun, hurting Logan “Sparks” Serminski’s good eye. He took a sip from his beer as he sat in his chair, waiting for the coals to heat. The sounds of the summer filtered through the haze of his cloudy mind: children playing in the yard, his cousins chatting about work, his wife rushing about with drinks and small talk. Even his brother was here, swallowing his elitist pride and deigning to allow himself to be seen with his youngest sibling.

He opened his eyes.

At first, there was too much. Too much sound, light, movement — his senses were bombarded from every angle. The pain was immense, rippling through his body like a wave, tickling every nerve ending like sharp tacks. Slowly, the tidal wave receded, leaving him crushed and bruised, as shapes began to emerge. Dancing forms waved in front of him like flames, a harsh hissing skittering through him like flies. Gradually, he began to discern the frightful demons that cackled and roared about him, tongues of flame flipping in and out of their mouths like silverfish, their black claws clacking and clattering around him in the air.

He was dead. He was in Hell.

A Foreword by Lady Euphonia Winscort

This is the Eleventh volume of my dramatic retelling of the rise and fall of the Empire of Ever and Always, covering the first generation of the Era of Heiritance: the discovery of the Five Heirs and the events that resulted from their investiture.

I was enamored of the Empire of Ever and Always from a young age, specifically when first viewing “The Great Exodus” by the famous Uumphoun painter Koothoonu. Whether zey used three canvases because, as it is argued, zey were commanded by zer patron, or because zey could not capture the grandeur of the spectacle in one canvas alone, I do not care to speculate. What I can say is, as a young child, I was enraptured by both the size of the Imperial vessels depicted, and the remarkable scale of the enterprise.

I remember being fascinated by the prow of the lead ship. (Any who have seen the original painting in its place at the Garm Museum of Ancient Art will know which vessel I mean; Koothoonu’s masterful handling of color and shade make it perfectly clear which of the three largest ships is in the foreground) Whether Koothoonu painted a specific vessel or from memory is open to debate, but as a child I could not escape the horribly sad face of the foremost figurehead. Its gaze was steady, but offset, giving it the air of one who has seen everything they have ever cared about collapse into nothing, a face of unbearable sadness.

Something was wrong.

Nicholas K. Linkletter III, ‘Slick Nick’ to his friends and Mr. Linkletter to everyone else, had started slurring his speech five minutes into the board meeting. Then he put his head in his hands, muttering something about smelling lemon tea, and collapsed on the desk. His fellow board-members quickly turned him over, loosening his tie, and called the ambulance. Mrs. Jennings had checked his pulse and tried to administer CPR — a sensation that Nicholas found quite odd, as Mrs. Jennings was an avid smoker. The air tasted foul to his tongue, and he knew he should be coughing.

The medics arrived in only five minutes, having been out on another call. They took over for Mrs. Jennings, feeding a tube down his throat, and forcing air into his lungs with a blue plastic oval. This was much less comfortable at first for Nicholas, but his lungs were breathing cleaner now, not filled with leftover smoke that had settled in Mrs. Jennings’ lungs. He felt the sharp stabbing pain from a needle in his arm, and his body was lifted into the air by two strong arms, and onto a metal surface that clattered under his weight.

The fading sunlight seeped into the cell, past jagged iron grating that had long since turned reddish brown from rust. The birdsong of twilight began to dwindle, joining the sun in slowly sliding away from the grim event that was about to occur. Through the grating, Mary Harker watched as the random passers-by slowly faded from sight, returning to their cozy homes, loving families, and warm meals.

Mary turned from the window to her cell. Stone walls with an iron door was all that separated her from the world, but it was enough. There was little light, and only a small rat-hole in the corner that had long since been vacated. Even the rats would not stay in this cell for long — the stench of the dead reached all the way from the gallows. Mary nudged the small plate of bread that the jailer had given her. Perhaps it was Christian courtesy, or maybe some cruel joke, but the jailer had placed a small runny yellow glob of butter on the bread. She watched as the slimy fat slid its way down the stale wheat before she turned away. She wasn’t hungry at the moment.