Some would cower in the presence of a spirit. Not I. I came here for this very purpose. For her. For this ghost lying upon a shelf of rock at the center of a seaside cave.
The roar of surf striking stone rises and ebbs behind me, the spray tinging the air briny. Something about salt air awakens the senses, brings everything into crisp focus. My nostrils flare, inviting the bite of tangy sea scent and I breathe deeply, attempting to settle myself.
Aeons ago some tremendous force had shaped strange formations in this seaside grotto. To one side a natural spring slowly burbles to the surface, only to trickle lightly down the rock face. At the back of the cavernous space a large throne-like formation juts from the very stone, no chisel or other tool marks belying a man-made creation. Carved inscriptions in strange tongues cover the walls, these certainly etched by hand, though how long ago none could say. In many places spray-painted graffiti glares in garish color, blasphemies against this hall of forgotten gods. At the center rises a roughly rectangular rock shelf with the spirit prone upon it. An altar before the throne.
Her story is well known along this thorny coast. Various versions have spread far and wide, bringing notoriety and ghoulish visitors to a coastal village with little else to recommend it. She is “The White Lady”, a vision appearing to some standing upon the distant cliffs or in the caves below. Three hundred years ago she had been wrongly persecuted, tortured, and executed. Cursed to roam these shores reliving her ordeal each and every night, her sobs of sadness and pain riding upon the sound of the wind and the waves.
I know her story better than any. The aging book I hold records the horrific tale. Written by the long dead master of the stone manor house that still stands upon the cliff high above this cave, he detailed how he and his coven sacrificed this pure girl, this innocent. A ritual paean to the echoes of primordial gods in hopes of divine favor.
My colleagues and I have come from the university to finally release her, the instructions to do so clearly detailed within this same grimoire. While she cannot speak — spirits often suffer dumbness as part of their cursed existence — she understands what I say. I explain our intentions, our need for her cooperation if we are to be successful in our endeavor.
Her translucent face expresses relief and readiness for her unending suffering to cease. She willingly submits to the binding of her limbs with the spelled shackles we have carefully prepared. She lays supine upon the raised rock platform at the center of the cave.
Her piteous eyes implore me, expressing thanks and desire for an end, finally. Her expression turns horrified, however, as I produce the ornate dagger from a pocket of my coat. Understandable, since it is the same knife used to kill her centuries ago, lovingly preserved along with the book that lies open before me.
She casts her gaze about and her struggles against the bindings grow more desperate, but the shackles’ enchantment holds her tight. Ranged around us are my colleagues, my cohorts, my coven, each repeating a chant in low tones. Again, she would recognize the same conditions of the ritual in which her body was sacrificed.
Summoning a god, one of the Great Old Ones, requires much more than a sacrifice of blood. It requires something infinitely more potent: time and a tortured soul.
On this night, precisely three hundred years following the initial offering of her body and blood by our forebears, we now offer her shredded soul to the Primal Chaos. In this time and in this place, the honor falls to me. Mankind repeatedly proves itself unworthy of this magnificent world. When the Mindless One rises, all will fall to gibbering lunacy.
I raise the dagger slowly as the words my fellows echo spill from my mouth. “Sph’nagh ekk-ankh fl’hurr Azathoth.”
Her eyes beg for reprieve. There shall be none.
I strike. The gate opens. The blind Idiot God manifests upon his black throne, and madness descends upon the world.
Glorious.
