‘There was a positively feral light in those glorious eyes, now; and that seductive mouth had ceased to be such. With lips drawn back from her teeth (queer that I had not before noticed how sharp and cruelly pointed they seemed—like fangs!)’—Kirk Mashburn (Placide’s Wife)
‘Yes, after fifty years of law enforcement I know how hideous, cruel, and evil, people can be. Whether the Devil made them do it, who knows? How many times did I face true evil in my career? It’s hard to really say, and I have certainly lost count. And to be honest, I often do my damnedest to try and forget. I’ve heard you can only stare into darkness for so long before it stains you. Or–as in my case–it locks its claws into you, never to let go.’
—Thomas Swafford (Skinwalker)
Have you ever felt the tread of little feet walking across the top of your skull? Footsteps on your skull, back and forth, back and forth? —Robert Bloch (Enoch)
Apparently disembodied, or set in a face too vast for human cognizance, they burned before him in chaotic murk; Then, by degrees, he saw the other features of the sorcerer, and the details of a lurid scene; and became aware of his own situation.’
—Clark Ashton Smith (The Colossus of Ylourgne)
The Sea Witch
Part One
I
The night winds were a torrent of darkness amongst the sea and foam,
The coppery moon heaved as a haunted galleon upon golden waves to roam,
The beach trail weaved as a moonlit strand over the skull-white dunes,
And the Sea Witch came gliding—
Gliding—gliding—
The Sea Witch came gliding, up to the druid runes.—Jeffrey LeBlanc (The Sea Witch)
Black Lord of bale and fear, master of all confusion!
By thee, thy prophet saith,
New power is given to wizards after death,
And witches in corruption draw forbidden breath
And weave such wild enchantment and illusion
As none but lamiae may use;
And through thy grace the charneled corpses lose
Their horror, and nefandous loves are lighted
In noisome vaults long nighted;
And vampires make their sacrifice to thee —
Disgorging blood as if great urns had poured
Their bright vermilion hoard
About the washed and weltering sarcophagi.
— Ludar’s Litany to Thasaidon.
“Ah! little ken’d thy reverend grannie,
That sark she coft for her wee Nannie,
Wi’ twa pund Scots (’twas a’ her riches),
Wad ever grac’d a dance of witches!”
— Robert Burns (Tam O’ Shanter)
“Into a patch of moonlight passed the figure of a young girl, looked at them as though about to stop yet thinking better of it, smiled softly, and moved on out of sight into the surrounding darkness. The moon just caught her eyes and teeth, so that they shone; the rest of her body stood in shadow; the effect was striking — almost as though head and shoulders hung alone in mid air, watching them with this shining smile, then fading away.”—Algernon Blackwood (The Singular Death of Morton)
And human heads, many of them, scattered about like an assembly of mocking, dead-alive faces, leering at him, watching him with hellish anticipation. The place was a morgue—a charnel house!”–Hugh B. Cave (Stragella)
“They were rotted human eyes—the stare of a corpse, looking back at him.”
— Thomas Swafford (The Pumpkin Patch)
“I know always that I am an outsider; a stranger in this century and among those who are still men.”— H.P. Lovecraft (The Survivor)
“Be silent in that solitude,
Which is not loneliness—for then
The spirits of the dead who stood
In life before thee are again
In death around thee—and their will
Shall overshadow thee: be still.”— Edgar Allan Poe (Spirits of the Dead)
“I don’t think you were wise to do that,” he said reflectively. “I’ve heard it said that the Wood Gods are rather horrible to those who molest them.”
“Horrible perhaps to those that believe in them, but you see I don’t,” retorted Sylvia.
— Saki (The Music on the Hill)
“Rip and claw flesh and hair,
Gnaw the bones, lap the blood without care,
Moonlight in the cold dark gloom,
Illuminates the black stones of tombs,
Down in the hollow, night winds howl,
Stalk bestial in darkness with the owl,—Jeffrey LeBlanc (Cry of the Werewolf)
s he turned, with his back to the Frenchman, he felt the touch of cold steel against his neck and knew that a pistol muzzle was pressed close beneath the base of his brain.”
— Robert E. Howard (Rattle of Bones)
Jeffrey LeBlanc 