The Beast of Averoigne

Old age, like amoth in some fading arras, will gnaw my memories oversoon, as it
gnaws the memories of all men. Therefore I, Luc le Chaudronnier,sometime known
as astrologer and sorcerer, write this account of the true originand slaying of
the Beast of Averoigne. And when I have ended, the writing shallbe sealed in a
brazen box, and the box be set in a secret chamber of my house atXimes, so that
no man shall learn the verity of this matter till many years anddecades have
gone by. Indeed, it were not well for such evil prodigies to bedivulged while
any who took part in them are still on the earthward side ofPurgatory. And at
present the truth is known only to me and to certain others whoare sworn to
maintain secrecy.

As all men know, the advent of the Beast was coeval with thecoming of that red
comet which rose behind the Dragon in the early summer of 1369.Like Satan's
rutilant hair, trailing on the wind of Gehenna as he hastensworldward, the
comet streamed nightly above Averoigne, bringing the fear of baleand pestilence
in its train. And soon the rumor of a strange evil, a foulnessunheard of in any
legend, passed among the people.

To Brother Gerome of the Benedictine Abbey of Perigon it wasgiven to behold
this evil ere the horror thereof became manifest to others.Returning late to
the monastery from an errand in Ste. Zenobie, Gerome wasovertaken by darkness.
No moon arose to lantern his way through the forest; but, betweenthe gnarled
boughs of antic oaks, he saw the vengefully streaming fire of thecomet, which
seemed to pursue him as he went. And Gerome felt an eery fear ofthe pit-deep
shadows, and he made haste toward the abbey postern.

Passing among the ancient trees that towered thickly behindPerigon, he thought
that he discerned a light from the windows, and was much cheeredthereby. But,
going on, he saw that the light was near at hand, beneath alowering bough. It
moved as with the flitting of a fen-fire, and was of changeablecolor, being
pale as a corposant, or ruddy as new-spilled blood, or green asthe poisonous
distillation that surrounds the moon.

Then, with terror ineffable, Gerome beheld the thing to which thelight clung
like a hellish nimbus, moving as it moved, and revealing dimlythe black
abomination of head and limbs that were not those of any creaturewrought by
God. The horror stood erect, rising to more than the height of atall man; and
it swayed like a great serpent, and its members undulated,bending like heated
wax. The flat black head was thrust forward on a snakish neck.The eyes, small
and lidless, glowing like coals from a wizard's brazier, were setlow and near
together in a noseless face above the serrate gleaming of suchteeth as might
belong to a giant bat.

This much, and no more, Gerome saw, ere the thing went past himwith its nimbus
flaring from venomous green to a wrathful red. Of its actualshape, and the
number of its limbs, he could form no just notion. Running andslithering
rapidly, it disappeared among the antique oaks, and he saw thehellish light no
more.

Nigh dead with fear, Gerome reached the abbey postern and soughtadmittance. And
the porter, hearing the tale of that which he had met in themoonless wood,
forbore to chide him for his tardiness.

Before nones, on the morrow, a dead stag was found in the forestbehind Perigon.
It had been slain in some ungodly fashion, not by wolf or poacheror hunter. It
was unmarked by any wound, other than a wide gash that had laidopen the spine
from neck to tail. The spine itself had been shattered and thewhite marrow
sucked therefrom; but no other portion had been devoured. Nonecould surmise the
nature of the beast that slew and ravened in such fashion. Butthe good
Brothers, heedful of the story told by Gerome, believed that somecreature from
the Pit was abroad in Averoigne. And Gerome marveled at the mercyof God, which
had permitted him to escape the doom of the stag.

Now, night by night, the comet greatened, burning like an evilmist of blood and
fire, while the stars blenched before it. And day by day, frompeasants,
priests, woodcutters and others who came to the abbey, theBenedictines heard
tales of fearsome and mysterious depredations. Dead wolves werefound with their
chines laid open and the white marrow gone; and an ox and a horsewere treated
in like fashion. Then, it seemed, the unknown beast grew bolder-- or else it
wearied of such humble prey as the creatures of farm and forest.

At first, it did not strike at living men, but assailed the deadlike some foul
eater of carrion. Two freshly buried corpses were found lying inthe cemetery at
Ste. Zenobie, where the thing had dug them from their graves andhad bared their
vertebrae. In each case, only a little of the marrow had beeneaten; but, as if
in rage or disappointment, the cadavers had been torn asunder,and tatters of
their flesh were mixed with the rags of their cerements. Fromthis, it would
seem that only the spinal marrow of creatures newly killed waspleasing to the
monster.

Thereafterward, the dead were not again molested. But on thenight following the
desecration of the graves, two charcoal-burners who plied theirtrade in the
forest not far from Perigon, were slain in their hut. Othercharcoal-burners,
dwelling near by, heard the shrill screams that fell to suddensilence; and
peering fearfully through the chinks of their bolted doors, theysaw anon in the
starlight the departure of a black, obscenely glowing shape thatissued from the
hut. Not till dawn did they dare to verify the fate of theirfellows, who had
been served in the same manner as the stags, the wolves, and thecorpses.

Theophile, the abbot of Perigon, was much exercised over thisevil that had
chosen to manifest itself in the neighborhood and whosedepredations were all
committed within a few hours' journey of the abbey. Pale fromoverstrict
austerities and vigils, he called the monks before him inassembly; and a
martial ardor against the minions of Asmodai blazed in hishollowed eyes as he
spoke.

"Truly," he said, "there is a great devil among usthat has risen with the comet
from Malebolge. We, the Brothers of Perigon, must go forth withcross and holy
water to hunt the devil in its hidden lair, which lies haply atour very
portals."

So, on the forenoon of that same day, Theophile, together withGerome and six
others chosen for their hardihood, sallied forth and made searchof the forest
for miles around. They entered with torches and lifted crossesthe deep caves to
which they came, but found no fiercer thing than wolf or badger.Also, they
searched the crumbling vaults of the deserted castle ofFaussesflammes, which
was said to be haunted by vampires. But nowhere could they tracethe monster or
find any sign of its lairing.

With nightly deeds of terror, beneath the comet's blasting, themiddle summer
went by. Men, women, children, to the number of more than forty,were done to
death by the Beast, which, though seeming to haunt mainly theenvirons of the
abbey, ranged afield at times even to the shores of the riverIsoile and the
gates of La Frenaie and Ximes. There were those who beheld it bynight, a black
and slithering foulness clad in changeable luminescence; but noman saw it by
day. And always the thing was silent, uttering no sound: and wasswifter in its
motion than the weaving viper.

Once, it was seen by moonlight in the abbey garden, as it glidedtoward the
forest between rows of peas and turnips. Then, coming indarkness, it struck
within the walls. Without waking the others, on whom it must havecast a Lethean
spell, it took Brother Gerome, slumbering on his pallet at theend of the row,
in the dormitory. And the fell deed was not discovered tilldaybreak, when the
monk who slept nearest to Gerome awakened and saw his body, whichlay face
downward with the back of the robe and the flesh beneath inbloody tatters.

A week later, it came and dealt likewise with Brother Augustin.And in spite of
exorcisms and the sprinkling of holy water at all doors andwindows, it was seen
afterward gliding along the monastery halls; and it left anunspeakably
blasphemous sign of its presence in the chapel. Many believedthat it menaced
the abbot himself; for Brother Constantin the cellarer, returninglate from a
visit to Vyones, saw it by starlight as it climbed the outer walltoward that
window of Theophile's cell which faced the great forest. Andseeing Constantin,
the thing dropped to the ground like a huge ape and vanishedamong the trees.

Great was the scandal of these happenings, and the consternationof the monks.
Sorely, it was said, the matter preyed on the abbot, who kept hiscell in
unremitting prayer and vigil. Pale and meager as a dying saint hegrew,
mortifying the flesh till he tottered with weakness; and afeverish illness
devoured him visibly.

More and more, apart from this haunting of the monastery, thehorror fared
afield, even invading walled towns. Toward the middle of August,when the comet
was beginning to decline a little, there occurred the grievousdeath of Sister
Therese, the young and beloved niece of Theophile, killed by thehellish Beast
in her cell at the Benedictine convent of Ximes. On this occasionthe monster
was met by late passers in the streets, and others watched itclimb the city
ramparts, running like some enormous beetle or spider on thesheer stone as it
fled from Ximes to regain its hidden lair.

In her dead hands, it was told, the pious Therese held tightlyclasped a letter
from Theophile in which he had spoken at some length of the direhappening at
the monastery, and had confessed his grief and despair at beingunable to cope
with the Satanic horror.

All this, in the course of the summer, came to me in my house atXimes. From the
beginning, because of my commerce with occult things and thepowers of darkness,
the unknown Beast was the subject of my concern. I knew that itwas no creature
of earth or of the terrene hells; but regarding its actualcharacter and genesis
I could learn no more at first than any other. VainlyI consultedthe stars and
made use of geomancy and necromancy; and the familiars whom Iinterrogated
professed themselves ignorant, saying that the Beast wasaltogether alien and
beyond the ken of sublunar spirits.

Then I bethought me of that strange, oracular ring which I hadinherited from my
fathers, who were also wizards. The ring had come down fromancient Hyperborea,
and had once been the property of the sorcerer Eibon. It was madeof a redder
gold than any that the Earth had yielded in latter cycles, andwas set with a
large purple gem, somber and smoldering, whose like is no longerto be found. In
the gem an antique demon was held captive, a spirit from prehumanworlds, which
would answer the interrogation of sorcerers.

So, from a rarely opened casket, I brought out the ring and madesuch
preparations as were needful for the questioning. And when thepurple stone was
held inverted above a small brazier filled with hotly burningamber, the demon
made answer, speaking in a shrill voice that was like the singingof fire. It
told me the origin of the Beast, which had come from the redcomet, and belonged
to a race of stellar devils that had not visited the Earth sincethe foundering
of Atlantis; and it told me the attributes of the Beast, which,in its own
proper form, was invisible and intangible to men, and couldmanifest itself only
in a fashion supremely abominable. Moreover, it informed me ofthe one method by
which the Beast could be vanquished, if overtaken in a tangibleshape. Even to
me, the student of darkness, these revelations were a source ofhorror and
surprise. And for many reasons, I deemed the mode of exorcism adoubtful and
perilous thing. But the demon had sworn that there was no otherway.

Musing on that which I had learned, I waited among my books andalembics; for
the stars had warned me that my intervention would be required ingood time.

To me, following the death of Sister Therese, there came privilythe marshal of
Ximes, together with the abbot Theophile, in whose worn featuresand bowed form
I descried the ravages of mortal sorrow and horror andhumiliation. And the two,
albeit with palpable hesitancy, asked my advice and assistance inthe laying of
the beast.

"You, Messire le Chaudronnier," said the marshal,"are reputed to know the
arcanic arts of sorcery, and the spells which summon and dismissdemons.
Therefore, in dealing with this devil, it may be that you shallsucceed where
all others have failed. Not willingly do we employ you in thematter, since it
is not seemly for the church and the law to ally themselves withwizardry. But
the need is desperate, lest the demon should take other victims.In return for
your aid we can promise you a goodly reward of gold and aguarantee of lifelong
immunity from all inquisition which your doings might otherwiseinvite. The
Bishop of Ximes, and the Archbishop of Vyones, are privy to thisoffer, which
must be kept secret."

"I ask no reward," I replied, "if it be in mypower to rid Averoigne of this
scourge. But you have set me a difficult task, and one that ishaply attended by
strange perils."

"All assistance that can be given you shall be yours tocommand," said the
marshal. "Men-at-arms shall attend you, if need be."

Then Theophile, speaking in a low, broken voice, assured me thatall doors,
including those of the abbey of Perigon, would be opened at myrequest, and that
everything possible would be done to further the laying of thefiend.

I reflected briefly, and said:

"Go now, but send to me, an hour before sunset, two men-at-arms,mounted, and
with a third steed. And let the men be chosen for their valor anddiscretion:
for this very night I shall visit Perigon, where the horror seemsto center."

Remembering the advice of the gem-imprisoned demon, I made nopreparation for
the journey, except to place upon my index finger the ring ofEibon, and to arm
myself with a small hammer, which I placed at my girdle in lieuof a sword. Then
I awaited the set hour, when the men and the horses came to myhouse, as had
been stipulated.

The men were stout and tested warriors, clad in chainmail, andcarrying swords
and halberds. I mounted the third horse, a black and spiritedmare, and we rode
forth from Ximes toward Perigon, taking a direct and little-usedway which ran
through the werewolf-haunted forest.

My companions were taciturn, speaking only in answer to somequestion, and then
briefly. This pleased me; for I knew they would maintain adiscreet silence
regarding that which might occur before dawn. Swiftly we rode,while the sun
sank in a redness as of welling blood among the tall trees; andsoon the
darkness wove its thickening webs from bough to bough, closingupon us like some
inexorable net of evil. Deeper we went, into the brooding woods;and even I, the
master of sorceries, trembled a little at the knowledge of allthat was abroad
in the darkness.

Undelayed and unmolested, however, we came to the abbey at latemoonrise, when
all the monks, except the aged porter, had retired to theirdormitory. The abbot
returning at sunset from Ximes, had given word to the porter ofour coming, and
he would have admitted us; but this, as it happened, was no partof my plan.
Saying I had reason to believe the Beast would re-enter the abbeythat very
night, I told the porter of my intention of waiting outside thewalls to
intercept it, and merely asked him to accompany us in a tour ofthe building's
exterior, so that he could point out the various rooms. This hedid, and during
the tour, he indicated a certain window in the second story asbeing that of
Theophile's cell. The window faced the forest, and I remarked onthe abbot's
rashness in leaving it open. This, the porter told me, was hisinvariable
custom, in spite of the oftrepeated demoniac invasions of themonastery. Behind
the window we saw the glimmering of a taper, as if the abbot werekeeping late
vigil.

We had committed our horses to the porter's care. After he hadconducted us
around the building and had left us, we returned to the spacebefore Theophile's
window and began our long watch.

Pale and hollow as the face of a corpse, the moon rose higher,swimming above
the somber oaks, and pouring a spectral silver on the gray stoneof the abbey
walls. In the west the comet flamed among the lusterless signs,veiling the
lifted sting of the Scorpion as it sank.

We waited hour by hour in the shortening shadow of a tall oak,where none could
see us from the windows. When the moon had passed over, slopingwestward, the
shadow began to lengthen toward the wall. All was mortally still,and we saw no
movement, apart from the slow shifting of the light and shade.Half-way between
midnight and dawn the taper went out in Theophile's cell, as ifit had burned to
the socket; and thereafter the room remained dark.

Unquestioning, with ready weapons, the men-at-arms companioned mein that vigil.
Well they knew the demonian terror which they might face beforedawn; but there
was no trepidation in their bearing. And knowing much that theycould not know,
I drew the ring of Eibon from my finger, and made ready for thatwhich the demon
had directed me to do.

The men stood nearer than I to the forest, facing it perpetuallyaccording to a
strict order that I had given. But nothing stirred in the frettedgloom; and the
slow night ebbed; and the skies grew paler, as if with morningtwilight. Then,
an hour before sunrise, when the shadow of the great oak hadreached the wall
and was climbing toward Theophile's window, there came the thingI had
anticipated. Very suddenly it came, and without forewarning ofits nearness, a
horror of hellish red light, swift as a kindling, wind-blownflame, that leapt
from the forest gloom and sprang upon us where we stood, stilland weary from
our night-long vigil.

One of the men-at-arms was borne to the ground, and I saw abovehim, in a
floating redness as of ghostly blood, the black and semi-serpentineform of the
Beast. A flat and snakish head, without ears or nose, was tearingat the man's
armor with sharp, serrate teeth, and I heard the teeth clash andgrate on the
linked iron. Swiftly I laid the ring of Eibon on a stone I hadplaced in
readiness, and broke the dark jewel with a blow of the hammerthat I carried.

>From the pieces of the lightly shattered gem, thedisemprisoned demon rose in
the form of a smoky fire, small as a candle-flame at first, andgreatening like
the conflagration of piled fagots. And, hissing softly with thevoice of fire,
and brightening to a wrathful, terrible gold, the demon leaptforward to do
battle with the Beast, even as it had promised me, in return forits freedom
after cycles of captivity.

It closed upon the Beast with a vengeful flaring, tall as theflame of an
auto-da-fe, and the Beast relinquished the man-at-arms on theground beneath it,
and writhed back like a burnt serpent. The body and members ofthe Beast were
loathfully convulsed, and they seemed to melt in the manner ofwax and to change
dimly and horribly beneath the flame, undergoing an incrediblemetamorphosis.
Moment by moment, like a werewolf that returns from itsbeasthood, the thing
took on the wavering similitude of man. The unclean blacknessflowed and
swirled, assuming the weft of cloth amid its changes, andbecoming the folds of
a dark robe and cowl such as are worn by the Benedictines. Then,from the cowl,
a face began to peer, and the face, though shadowy and distorted,was that of
the abbot Theophile.

This prodigy I beheld for an instant; and the men also beheld it.But still the
fire-shaped demon assailed the abhorrently transfigured thing,and the face
melted again into waxy blackness, and a great column of sootysmoke arose,
followed by an odor as of burning flesh commingled with somemight foulness. And
out of the volumed smoke, above the hissing of the demon, therecame a single
cry in the voice of Theophile. But the smoke thickened, hidingboth the
assailant and that which it assailed; and there was no sound,other than the
singing of fed fire.

At last, the sable fumes began to lift, ascending anddisappearing amid the
boughs, and a dancing golden light; in the shape of a will-o'-the-wisp,went
soaring over the dark trees toward the stars. And I knew that thedemon of the
ring had fulfilled its promise, and had now gone back to thoseremote and
ultramundane deeps from which the sorcerer Eibon had drawn itdown in Hyperborea
to become the captive of the purple gem.

The stench of burning passed from the air, together with themighty foulness;
and of that which had been the Beast there was no longer anytrace. So I knew
that the horror born of the red comet had been driven away by thefiery demon,
The fallen man-at-arms had risen, unharmed beneath his mail, andhe and his
fellow stood beside me, saying naught. But I knew that they hadseen the changes
of the Beast, and had divined something of the truth. So, whilethe moon grew
gray with the nearness of dawn, I made them swear an awful oathof secrecy, and
enjoined them to bear witness to the statement I must make beforethe monks of
Perigon.

Then, having settled this matter, so that the good renown of theholy Theophile
should suffer no calumny, we aroused the porter. We averred thatthe Beast had
come upon us unaware, and had gained the abbot's cell before wecould prevent
it, and had come forth again, carrying Theophile with its snakishmembers as if
to bear him away to the sunken comet. I had exorcised the uncleandevil, which
had vanished in a cloud of sulfurous fire and vapor; and, mostunluckily, the
abbot had been consumed by the fire.

His death, I said, was a true martyrdom, and would not be in vain:the Beast
would no longer plague the country or bedevil Perigon, since theexorcism I had
used was infallible.

This tale was accepted without question by the Brothers, whogrieved mightily
for their good abbot. Indeed, the tale was true enough, forTheophile had been
innocent, and was wholly ignorant of the foul change that cameupon him nightly
in his cell, and the deeds that were done by the Beast throughhis loathfully
transfigured body. Each night the thing had come down from thepassing comet to
assuage its hellish hunger; and being otherwise impalpable andpowerless, it had
used the abbot for its energumen, molding his flesh to the imageof some obscene
monster from beyond the stars.

It had slain a peasant girl in Ste. Zenobie on that night whilewe waited behind
the abbey. But thereafter the Beast was seen no more inAveroigne; and its
murderous deeds were not repeated.

In time the comet passed to other heavens, fading slowly; and theblack terror
it had wrought became a varying legend, even as all other bygonethings. The
abbot Theophile was canonized for his strange martyrdom; and theywho read this
record in future ages will believe it not, saying that no demonor malign spirit
could have prevailed thus upon true holiness. Indeed, it werewell that none
should believe the story: for thin is the veil betwixt man andthe godless deep.
The skies are haunted by that which it were madness to know; andstrange
abominations pass evermore between earth and moon and athwart thegalaxies.
Unnamable things have come to us in alien horror and will comeagain. And the
evil of the stars is not as the evil of Earth.