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| committer | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-13 10:21:04 -0800 |
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diff --git a/75363-h/75363-h.htm b/75363-h/75363-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9ccf0b5 --- /dev/null +++ b/75363-h/75363-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,225 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <title> + The Eater of Souls | Project Gutenberg + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> + <style> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .51em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .49em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: 33.5%; + margin-right: 33.5%; + clear: both; +} + +hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} +hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} +@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } +hr.full {width: 95%; margin-left: 2.5%; margin-right: 2.5%;} +div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} +h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} + +x-ebookmaker-drop {display: none;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.right {text-align: right;} + +.smcap { font-variant:small-caps; } + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; + page-break-inside: avoid; + max-width: 100%; +} + +div.titlepage { + text-align: center; + page-break-before: always; + page-break-after: always; +} + +div.titlepage p { + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; + font-weight: bold; + line-height: 1.5; + margin-top: 3em; +} + +.ph1 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; } +.ph1 { font-size: x-large; margin: .83em auto; } + + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75363 ***</div> + +<div class="titlepage"> + +<h1>The Eater of Souls</h1> + +<p class="ph1">By HENRY KUTTNER</p> + +<p><i>A five-minute tale of a strange entity on a distant world.</i></p> + +<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br> +Weird Tales January 1937.<br> +Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br> +the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> + +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p>They tell it in Bel Yarnak, in a language not of Earth, that a +malignant and terrible being once dwelt in that incredible abyss +named the Gray Gulf of Yarnak. Not on earth, nor on any planet that +spins about any star in the skies we know, is Bel Yarnak; but beyond +Betelgeuse, beyond the Giant Stars, on a green and joyous world still +in its lusty youth are the towers and silver minarets of this city. +Nor are the dwellers in Bel Yarnak anthropoid nor in any way man-like; +yet there are fires during the long warm nights in curious hearths, +and wherever in this universe there are fires there will be tales told +about them, and breathless listeners to bring contentment to the heart +of the teller of tales. The Sindara rules benignantly over Bel Yarnak; +yet in the old days fear and doom lay like a shroud over the land, and +in the Gray Gulf of Yarnak a brooding horror dwelt loathsomely. And a +strange enchantment chilled the skies and hid the triple moons behind a +darkened pall.</p> + +<p>For a being had come to glut its evil hunger in the land, and those +who dwelt in Bel Yarnak called it the Eater of Souls. In nowise could +this being be described, for none had seen it save under circumstances +which precluded the possibility of return. Yet in the gulf it brooded, +and when its hunger stirred it would send forth a soundless summons, +so that in tavern and temple, by fireside and in the blackness of +the night some would rise slowly, with a passionless look of death +upon their features, and would depart from Bel Yarnak toward the Gray +Gulf. Nor would they ever return. It was said that the thing in the +gulf was half a demon and half a god, and that the souls of those whom +it slew served it eternally, fulfilling strange missions in the icy +wastes between the stars. This being had come from the dark sun, the +hydromancers said, where it had been conceived by an unholy alliance +between those timeless Ancients who filter strangely between the +universes and a Black Shining One of unknown origin. The necromancers +said other things, but they hated the hydromancers, who were powerful +then, and their rune-casting was generally discredited. Yet the Sindara +listened to both schools of mages, and pondered upon his throne of +chalcedony, and presently determined to set forth voluntarily to the +Great Gulf of Yarnak, which was reputed to be bottomless.</p> + +<p>The necromancers gave the Sindara curious implements made of the +bones of the dead, and the hydromancers gave him intricately twisted +transparent tubes of crystal, which would be useful in battling the +Eater of Souls. Thereafter the necromancers and the hydromancers +squatted on their haunches in the city gate and howled dismally as +the Sindara rode westward on his gorlak, that fleet but repugnantly +shaped reptile. After a time the Sindara discarded both the weapons +of the hydromancers and the necromancers, for he was a worshipper of +Vorvadoss, as had been each Sindara in his time. None might worship +Vorvadoss save the Sindara of Bel Yarnak, for such is the god's +command; and presently the Sindara dismounted from his gorlak and +prayed fervently to Vorvadoss. For a time there was no response.</p> + +<p>Then the sands were troubled, and a whirling and dancing of mist-motes +blinded the Sindara. Out of the maelstrom the god spoke thinly, and his +voice was like the tinkling of countless tiny crystal goblets.</p> + +<p>"Thou goest to doom," Vorvadoss said ominously. "But thy son sleeps in +Bel Yarnak, and I shall have a worshipper when thou art vanished. Go +therefore fearlessly, since god cannot conquer god, but only man who +created him."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Speaking thus cryptically Vorvadoss withdrew, and the Sindara, after +pondering, continued his journey. In time he came to that incredible +abyss from which men say the nearer moon was born, and at its edge he +fell prone and lay sick and shuddering, peering down into mist-shrouded +emptiness. For a cold wind blew up from the gulf, and it seemed to +have no bottom. Looming far in the distance he could just discern the +further brink.</p> + +<p>Clambering up the rough stones came he whom the Sindara had set out +to find; he came swiftly, making use of his multiple appendages to +lift himself. He was white and hairy and appallingly hideous, but his +misshapen head came only to the Sindara's waist, although in girth +his spidery limbs rendered a shocking illusion of hugeness. In his +wake came the souls he had taken for his own; they were a plaintive +whispering and stirring in the air, swooping and moaning and sighing +for lost Nirvana. The Sindara drew his blade and struck at his enemy.</p> + +<p>Of that battle sagas are still sung, for it raged along the brink for +a timeless interval of eternity. In the end the Sindara was hacked +and bleeding and spent, and his opponent was untouched and chuckling +loathsomely. Then the demon prepared for his meal.</p> + +<p>Into the Sindara's mind came a whisper, the thin calling of Vorvadoss. +He said: "There are many kinds of flesh in the universes, and other +compounds which are not flesh. Thus doth the Eater of Souls feed." +And he told the Sindara of the incredible manner of that feeding, of +the fusing of two beings, of the absorption of the lesser, and of the +emergence therefrom of an augmented half-god, while the uncaged soul +flew moaning in the train of those who served the being. Into the +Sindara's mind came knowledge and with it a grim resolve. He flung +wide his arms and welcomed the ghastly embrace, for Vorvadoss had also +spoken of the manner in which the doom might be lifted.</p> + +<p>The thing sprang to meet him, and an intolerable agony ground +frightfully within the Sindara's bone and flesh; the citadel of his +being rocked, and his soul cowered shrieking in its chamber. There on +the edge of the Gray Gulf of Yarnak a monstrous fusion took place, +a metamorphosis and a commingling that was blasphemous and horrible +beyond all imagining. As a thing disappears in quicksand, so the being +and the Sindara melted into each other's body.</p> + +<p>Yet even in that blinding agony a sharper pain came to the Sindara +as he saw across the plain the beauty of this land over which he had +ruled. He thought he had never seen anything so beautiful as this +green and joyous land of his, and a pain was in his heart, a sense of +empty loss and an aching void which could not ever be filled. And he +looked away to the black evil eyes of the Eater of Souls that were but +inches away from his own, and he looked beyond the being to where cold +emptiness lay gray and horrible. There were tears in his eyes and a +gnawing ache in his heart for the silver minarets and towers of Bel +Yarnak, that had lain naked and beautiful beneath the glowing light of +the triple moons, for he should never see that place any more.</p> + +<p>He turned his head again, and for the last time, blinded with his tears +and with his doom upon him. As he leaped forward he heard a frightful +despairing shriek, and then half-god and man were spinning dizzily +downward, seeing the precipice rushing up past them. For Vorvadoss had +said that thus, and only thus, could the spell be lifted.</p> + +<p>And the cliff wall curved inward as it swept down, so presently it +receded into the dim gray haze, and the Sindara fell in empty mist and +into final unstirring darkness. +</p> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75363 ***</div> +</body> +</html> + diff --git a/75363-h/images/cover.jpg b/75363-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..91d08c5 --- /dev/null +++ b/75363-h/images/cover.jpg |
