Greatest Sea Horror Tales: Robert E. Howard’s “Restless Waters”
It’s Dick Hansen, calling to me through the wind and the night and the black waters! Alive or dead, I’m his till I die! —Robert E. Howard (Restless Waters)
It’s Dick Hansen, calling to me through the wind and the night and the black waters! Alive or dead, I’m his till I die! —Robert E. Howard (Restless Waters)
The surviving members of the family came severally every few minutes to the casket and wept above the placid features beneath the glass. This did them no good; it did no good to John Mortonson; but in the presence of death reason and philosophy are silent.–Ambrose Bierce (John Mortonson’s Funeral)
“Her voice was the voice that women have,
Who plead for their heart’s desire.
She came—she came—and the quivering flame
Sunk and died in the fire.
It never was lit again on my hearth
Since I hurried across the floor,
To lift her over the threshold, and let her in at the door.”–Mary Elizabeth Coleridge (The Witch)
“Nimuk came closer. Noni saw fear in the animal’s gaze. He could see hunger and suffering in the animal’s labored breathing and awkward movements. Noni’s heart wept. He hated himself and fought against it.”—Hugh B. Cave (Two Were Left)
“The sun had set Blood Mountain ablaze with evening light. Long shadows stretched across the landscape of the forest. Ancient and mysterious was this mountain in the twilight. Dwindling shimmers of light illuminated briefly a rugged path that winded further and further up into the vastness of hardwoods and hemlock. Oh, how I shivered and glanced uneasily over my shoulder. Growing fear knocked at my chamber door in the growing quiet of this place. Miles behind me lay the nearest ranger’s outpost—thousands of miles ahead of me lay the expanse of the Appalachian Trail.”–Jeffrey LeBlanc
Curious hands desecrated the graves of the undead;
(Antoine Valterre became the Devil’s king.)
Till they found a silver coffin to their dread.
Fascination became terror when they opened the lid,
Eyes fluorescent and fangs sanguine that box had hid.
(A vampire’s thirst is a deadly thing.)–JL