We decided to form a new acting troupe once we reached our destination. Our hard-won skills would not go to waste. We were Sala North’s legacy. We would never become Beatifics, but we were still actors. We would never be Rude Mechanicals, but we were free to be ourselves. We would entertain our fellow Organics in the noble tradition to which we had pledged our lives.
Sala North had taught us how to act.
The Surgeon would teach us how to live.
SHADES OF LOVECRAFT
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Anno Domini Azathoth
Late in the Year of Our Lord 1781 word reached the King of Spain that an uprising of Quechan Indians had destroyed two respected missions in the Arizona territory. Many priests and colonists were slaughtered. The loss of these missions closed the Anza Trail where it crossed the Colorado River, isolating the region from New Spain for years. Yet in truth it was not the wholesome Quechan Indians who assaulted the people of these missions — who marched their captives into the scorching desert toward torture and death.
To King Charles III, lost in the treacherous maze of his European ambitions, this tiny sliver of the New World was no great loss. The Crown of Spain had lost its interest in Spanish territories north of the Rio Grande, despite the numbers of settlements, soldiers, and missions that lay scattered across those untamed lands. Another power was rising in the Arizona territory, one far more ancient and vast than any earthly monarch. It came like a raging tide of blood and fire to drown both the Mission Puerto de Purísima Concepción and the Mission San Pedro y San Pablo de Bicuñer.
I, Father Francisco Gonzalez y Rivera, know the truth behind those three terrible days of slaughter. It haunts me like the ghosts who wail in the night outside my little cave. In order to pacify the restless spirits of my missionary brothers, and to rid myself of the awful secrets I have kept across lonely years, I will set down on these pages the truth of what occurred in the sweltering month of July in the Year of Our Lord 1781.
Having done this, I will carry this manuscript to the nearest mission and place it in the hands of a Holy Father who yet retains his faith in the Jesu Christi. It was this all-consuming faith that drew me across the world to spread its light in the dark places. Yet the darkness itself — and the dreadful reality which lies at the heart of it — has stolen that faith from me, as it has stolen my health, and the greater part of my mind.
I will not die a hermit confined in this squalid cave, beholden to the crippling terror of my revelations. Instead I must do as the Revelator of old: I will inscribe the truth in black ink on yellow parchment. And when I have entrusted this knowledge to one who carries the strength of the Nazarene in his heart — for he will need such strength to endure these revelations — I will free myself from this frail body with blade, or pistol, or the swift tug of a hempen rope about my neck.
I do not expect that my words will reach Charles III, or that he would deign to read them if they should be carried across the great sea to his throne. No, I need only one living mind, one soul, one fellow human being to share this terrible truth with me. I cannot die until someone else knows what I have discovered.
I am aware that this makes me a selfish man. Perhaps a wicked man.
Nevertheless, I must write as John the Apostle did before me.
I know that I am damned by what I reveal, as you who read this account must also be.
Read on then, if you fear not damnation. Or pass these pages to someone more brave — or more foolhardy — than yourself.
The first time I saw Walking Ghost, I thought he was about to kill me.
It was early evening and a purple twilight crept out of the desert with an army of night-colored clouds behind it. Walking across the courtyard between blossoming cacti, I fancied that the World of Man stood on the threshold of a great and abiding darkness. The deep night and its unseen terrors have always made me uneasy.
I was kindling the tall candles in the chapel of the Mission Puerto de Purísima Concepción when the heavy wooden door banged open. Walking Ghost stood in the doorway, dark against the dying sunlight. He looked so very different from the humble Quechan folk who lived in the vicinity of the mission and attended its daily services, that I did not recognize him as one of their own.
Taller than most men he stood, a tuft of white feathers dangling from his braids of black hair. His skin was brown as the desert, his face painted in striped crimson with coal-dark pigments about the eyes and lips. I had never seen such a display as this among the Quechan, but I later learned that these were the colors of war. Beneath its war paint the face of Walking Ghost was grim, his eyes tightened by a strange mixture of anger and remorse.
About his neck hung several bead necklaces, and his only garb was a traditional loincloth of woven bark fibers. His muscled chest, legs, and arms were bare, streaked here and there with more paint in obscure sigils. A long metal knife hung at his waist, and his right fist clutched an axe with a head of sharpened stone. The sight of this ready weapon made me clutch the crucifix at my throat and prepare for a death that might be either swift or lingering. I whispered a quick prayer that it be the former.
Beyond Walking Ghost a band of anxious braves stood in the courtyard, painted and armed as he was. At once I knew they were waiting for him, their chosen war chief.
I greeted Walking Ghost with my open palms raised and trembling.
“Welcome, friend, to the Mission Puerto de Purísima Concepción.” My throat was dry, my words unsteady. “I am Father Rivera. Have you come to learn the Word of Christ?”
Walking Ghost entered the chapel. When he shook his head, I saw that he understood my words. To my surprise he sank to one knee before me and reached to take my hand. Afraid to deny him, I let him do so.
“I am called Walking Ghost,” he said. “I speak your Spanish. Father Gonzalez taught me when I was a boy.”
Father Octavio Gonzalez had died two years ago, victim of a nameless disease caught among the northern villages. He had gone forth to spread the Word and returned with the spite of the Devil in his blood. He had run the mission for many years before I was summoned to replace him, arriving just in time to witness his death. Several of his followers had abandoned the mission when he passed. Now there was only myself and five lesser priests, all of whom were absent from the place on this day. We had enjoyed great success in converting the Quechan people along the river valley.
“Father Gonzalez was a good man,” I said, making the sign of the cross.
“I learned of your Jesus in this place,” said Walking Ghost. “I learned the stories of his great wisdom and strong magic. This is why I have returned.”
“I do not understand,” I said. “Do you wish to make a confession?”
Walking Ghost shook his head, white feathers and black braids bobbing. I sensed a great urgency about him, something I had not noticed until now. My fear had subsided, allowing my perception to increase. He was troubled. Grieving. And his grief had turned to rage.
“Three nights ago a Maricopa war party raided my village,” said Walking Ghost. “Many men were killed, and two women.” He paused, drawing a deep breath. His eyes turned from my own to regard the tomahawk in his clenching fist. “Several children were stolen. One of them was my daughter Laughing Rain. Another was Bright Star, the son of my brother.”