A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, December 1949 — page 90: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

* -———' the oaks, and they were silent. The curi- _ ous numbness still held me, and I felt no horror of what I had seen—or of what I had done. The house was before me. It was _____ Strange how its outlines wavered .. . how misty and unsubstantial they seemed . . . _And now I was in my own room. The numbness that had deadened all emotional reactions during the evocation of the Gatherer was slowly giving way to some- thing else—not yet defined, not yet strong enough to be known. The exaltation which had followed the green drink ebbed and flowed in steadily decreasing waves. I had an overpowering sense of unreality—I moved, unreal, among unreal things. _ What had become of my robe of white? I remembered that de Keradel had Stripped it from me, but where and when I could not think. And my hands were clean—no longer red with blood. Dahut was with me. The violet fires still flickered faintly in her eyes. She put her arms around my neck, drew my face down to hers, set her mouth on mine. She whispered: “Alan ... I have forgotten Alain de Caranac . . . he has paid for what he did, and he is dying . . . it is you, Alan, that I love.” I held her in my arms, and within them I felt the Lord of Caranac die. But I, Alan Caranac, was not yet awake. My arms closed tighter around her... there was the fragrance of some secret _ flower of the sea about her .. . and there was the sweetness of new-learned or long forgotten evil in her kisses...’ = CHAPTER 18 The Bow! of Sacrifice AWAKENED as though escaping from some singularly unpleasant dream. I could not remember what the dream had been, but I knew it had been—rotten. It was a stormy day, the surges hammering against the rocky shores, the wind wailing, and the lights that came through the windows were gray. I raised my left arm to look at my watch, but it was not there. Nor was it on the table beside the bed. My mouth was dry, - and my skin was dry and hot. I felt as _ though I had been drunk for two days. ~ Worst of all was my fear that I would thy ti ~ ip A. MERRITT’S FANTASY po . “glee - ae 3 remember the dream. I sat up in bed. Something was missing besides my watch — —the gun under my arm-pit—McCann’s © gun. I lay back, and tried to remember, — There had been a green drink which had sparkled effervesced—after that, nothing. — There was a fog between the green drink — and now. The fog hid what I feared to — have uncovered. a Fog had been in the dream. The pistol ~ had been in the dream, too. When I had ~ taken the green drink I had still had the — gun. There was a flash of memory—after — the drink the gun had seemed absurd, in- — consequential, and I had thrown it into a corner. I jumped out of bed to look for | it— My foot struck against a black and: oval bowl. Not all black—there were stains along its sides, and inside it was a viscous ~ The bow! of sacrifice! a Abruptly the fog lifted ... and there ~ was the dream . . . if dream it had been — . stark and clear in such dread detail. I recoiled from it, not only sick of soul — but nauseated of body. a If it had been no dream, then was I ~ damned. If I had not killed, I had ac- — quiesced in killing. If I had not beaten in | the breasts of the sacrifices with my own — hands, I had not lifted a hand to save ~ them—and I had fed the fires that were — their funeral torches. a Equally with Dahut and de Keradel, I~ had summoned that black and evil Power —equally with them I was murderer, tor- turer, thrall of Hell. What was there to — prove it a dream? Illusion suggested by de Keradel and Dahut while my will lay quiescent under the spell of the green drink? Desperately out of the damning — memories I tried to sift some evidence that it had been only dream. There had been the flaring of the feral phosphorescence in their eyes—and in mine. A physiological peculiarity which man does not commonly possess, nor could any drink create the layer of cells which causes it. Nor does humanity bear within its breasts. over its — hearts, perceptible lumens, bright in vouth and dimmed and yellow in age. Yet they — had glowed in the breasts of the sacrifices! — Nor where except in dream do oaks — chant as though their leafed boughs had — Bo as se Sy iA tier Ag hg) es : fat vy is if voices? Be s 2 . -< ‘ee