On the closing thirty-second day of Indemetriuth’s season, at the early seventh year of the First Age, warm winds assailed the distressed Gogh’Arghat whose knees sunken deep into the warm sand, his hands stretched beyond his lean body while viscous ropes bound his wrists together unyieldingly, cutting into his sweat laden skin.

His grayish eyes pleaded to the towering dusky man whose body was draped by dark and silver garbs and plates, his rough face of angular contours garnished with scars, his eyes circled by dark circles painted on with glistening make up. Beyond him, the great walls of Khadrath rose high towards the cloudless skies while dark winged beasts kept watch over the legion of dunes ascending and descending around them.

Gogh tried his very best to prove his loyalty to the magnanimous Pharaoh’s servant, to prove that whatever they found did not belong to him, but instead were left there to placate him as the wicked spy of the Empire whose menacing shadow descended onto the once more peaceful sandscape of the south of great Vhalleryon.

He reasoned with the man that he was no spy, that he hated the Empire whose wretched legions took his dear father from him. A dear father who always stood by his side, taught him how to call forth water from the ground and from the nothingness of reality, how to tame wind and how to breath a mild storm or create warm air to hasten the stiffening of the muddy substance they used to stack sculpted sandstones on top of each other or together.

Or to how to regulate the air flowing within him, to cool it or warm it so that he could continue work even when the cruel rays of the Illius proved too much, or now when he had to remain calm not to prove their suspicion by acting like a fearful wrongdoer.

He argued that he was nothing more than a victim in a wicked play so that the true culprit could walk freely in the heavenly city of Khadrath where all was equal, where all who followed the tenets of the great Pharaoh in Black who united the warring kingdoms of the south after decades of warring could enjoy peace and prosperity.

All his life he followed His tenets, always kept away from the shady elements of the city whose greed proved to be their doom, always remained calm even when he spent too much on the sweetly sour drinks in the tavern after work, always remained kind to all whom he met on his long days of work.

Yet no matter what sweet words he used, how much they were laced in truth, the man watching at him silently uttered the simple dreadful words which sealed his fate on that day. The two figures in the same garments and armor as him walked to the terrified Gogh and grabbed him up by his armpits before they hurled him unceremoniously down into the bottomless abyss of the hole, his shriek carried away by the warm winds of the slowly approaching dusk.

**

Darkness swallowed his surroundings, the light slowly retreated like a miffed beast right in front of his eyes while the cold air braced against the back of his head as he approached the ground deep in the throat of the earth. Strange emotion confused Gogh’s mind as the sensation of weightlessness awakened old, but fond memories.

Namely a simple sight of his father’s face of deathly crude visage smiling back at him, his sharpened tusk protruding beneath his lower lip, parting from the upper as he laughed in joy while threw little Gogh in the air. A visage garnished by scars collected in series of battles long before his time, which many he regaled to him at his bedside just before the short visit to the land of Oneiron. How he wished he was there while swallowed by the darkness nestled within the aperture.

He remembered the hopes his father had for his future, pondered whether in that moment he was proving his worth to be a warrior, even though he wished for nothing more than a life in which he can live without the fear of imminent finality, spending time with mesmerizing maidens of Khadrath who spread bliss through bodily acts. Nothing more, nothing less.

Maybe he should have found a mate to settle down with, to have his own child with whom to he could continue to pass on the heroic tales told by his father. But the harsh ground reminded him that it was for the better he never settled for one, as they may have to leave with the shame of him swallowed by the dreaded Umbral Vaults branching beneath the sands and the wondrous city of Khadrath. Or worse, they may have been sentenced with him, to be devoured by the shadows and those who lurked within it.

These thoughts erased the previous fears of his, which was to die by falling. As he was an honest stonemason since his young adulthood, he witnessed many a fellow or friend meet their doom out of their carelessness of their surroundings while building the terraced towers of the city, or by extending the walls as more and more flocked to the promised city.

The one that came to his mind was the Changed-Folk whose parents out of some strange reason augmented themselves with the parts of large arachnoid beasts. A tall pale man with eight irises and hands and foot which could stick to any surface allowing him to work without the aid of complex contraptions, though one day when sleep evaded him the night before led to the call claiming him, sending him to the harsh embrace of the ground below.

Even though he was safe on the ground, the dread he thought his friend must have felt when his eyes opened amidst the fall lingered within, chilled him to his core. Or was it the darkness, he pondered as the ropes finally yielded in their tightness and released his wrists from their not so passionate embrace.

Gogh remained on his knees, his eyes constantly moved around as he waited for his doom to come in a horrific form, or to at least for his eyes to adjust to the dim interior which slowly came, revealing what appeared to be some kind of tomb of many, yet none laid on the finely hewn limestone beds of deep black with a mauve tint.

Further beyond them, serrated walls of hardened sand and earth elevated high towards the aperture, a warm disk where light was fearful to enter the Umbral Vaults as the vicious darkness devoured every singular particle which danced its way into the dark circle in the sand.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

In the promised city of Khadrath, death was only allowed to the faithful, to the diligent. Those who upended the peace and order imposed by the Pharaoh in Black and those who committed a heinous crime against their fellow citizens were sent into the Umbral Vaults, a labyrinthian system where the wrathful collaborators of the Pharaoh In Black lived and fed on the sentenced.

Gogh himself heard a myriad tales told by a friend of his who served in the army of the Pharaoh, talking about the formless horrors slithering in the shadows, emanating strange ravenous tones akin to hyenas’ mocking laughter as the sentenced were banished below into shadowy embrace of the Umbral Vaults. He also heard and believed that those who manage to evade these horrors usually never found a way and just wither away in the dim halls only to be denied entrance to the lands of Beyond.

As he kneeled into the rough and coarse sand, recalling these and many other tales, he contemplated whether it would be better to just end his own existence. Hope was a fools tool in these vaults, the only certainty was his impending doom by the hands of time and its plantation of needs into his body, or by the hands of some walking nightmare born out of fear in the distant realms of Urhggoth.

Though, as much as Gogh tried to force himself to be his own executioner, fools hope remained as he felt the gentle, tickling brace of the wind sweeping from behind and heading into the gaping oval maw of gloomy limestone garnished with strange hieroglyphs he deciphered as possible warnings of no return. He clutched his hands pressing against his numb thighs and forced life into his legs as he rushed into the utter dimness.

Stepping outside, Gogh entered into a long hall of pristine limestone walls reaching into unseen heights, their walls adorned with the same hieroglyphs he saw on the oval archway. Facing him were the foot of a giant hewn from a grayish black basalt with six toes on each naked foot, upper the skirt which seemed to be made with a cavity occupied by thick shadows.

As he walked further into the hallway, he noticed similar oval archways on both his left and right, seemingly in an uncountable quantity. Though as much as he would have liked to inspect each architectural piece, to ponder on who and when they were made, light footsteps approaching him from the black distance forced him to first rush back whence he came.

Though this endeavor proved futile as an unseen wall sent him tumbling into the cold floor where he sat for a few short moments as he looked at the pitch blackness in front of him where once the spacious and empty tomb existed. He swiftly rose back to his feet and as the footsteps reached closer and closer to his place, Gogh rushed to the gap between two of the gargantuan statues and hoped the shadows shrouding him shall prove good enough against who – or – whatever was nearing.

A strange curiosity overwhelmed his dread after minutes passed, yet the whoever or whatever treaded towards him still was out of sight. Gogh could only see till the fifteenth archway, beyond that only the thick abyss stared back at him. As he watched curiously, he began to ponder whether the source of the footsteps were a kindred soul who was sentenced to wander these vaults just like him.

Yet the answer to this question never arrived as he footsteps seemed to change their trajectory, revealing that beyond the darkness a turn may follow. For a while he crouched between the statues, amassing his courage seeping out as the coldness of fear spread like a wild plague.

Gogh gulped once and forced power into his legs, breaking the icy grip of fear wrapping around them, holding them to the numbing floor. As his heart pounded, he charged into the dark belly of the Vaults, deaf to his own echoed trembling.

**

Forward and forward he ran, his pace gradually harder to keep up as he reached the fiftieth statue while cold sweat cascaded down his whole lean body while he was filled with the strange mixture of fear and ecstatic joy as he regulated his breath through arkhaine means.

Yet even as hours passed by, there was no sign of the turn where the approaching steps diverted then became distant until they were swallowed by the dark vastness. With an ecstatic feeling tingling his whole body, he stopped and looked back and forth, pondering whether he heard the steps from the chosen trajectory. He stared back and toiled whether to move whence he came and head in to that distance.

Amidst these ponderings a horrific revelation came in two forms. One was bloodcurdling screams of pleading for help, the other a trembling which shook his still body followed by an awful stench of death he was familiar with thanks to witnessing the many accidents claiming the life of his fellow stonemasons.

He quickly darted into the shadows, where fear grew harder as a hand clamped over his mouth, pressing his soft lower lip onto his tusks while a shush stifled his quick yelp sent out thoughtlessly while the screams seemed to approach ever closer, the vibrations grew more intense.

In front of the two shrouded by dim shadows in the gap, a lightly dressed disheveled merkin collapsed wheezing and pleading to the horrific hunter brought forth nightmares of the haunting kind. A figure towering high into the shadows whose hulking form was wrapped in dark gauzes, fitted with queerly angular plates of a deep orchid hue including the pieces looping around its slim, forward leaning horns sprouting from the sides of its head akin to the minotaurs of the northern lands.

Its bulky foot pressed against the gilded and scaled abdomen of the merkin, its weight pressing out air as the slits on his neck ovulated while his high-pitched voice grew a husky tone. The horned head of the beast tilted left and right while its orchid eyes stared inquiringly at its prey, though in the next moment the nightmare beast lost all interest and slowly forced more and more of his weight onto the merkin.

His lips opened wide, yet no scream followed while his small fishy eyes popped out from their frame while the cracking of his bones echoed through the endless hall, followed by the tearing of his flesh by the very bones of his themselves, followed by the translucent azure blood of his flowing onto the pristine floor which quickly swallowed it up satiating its vampiric thirst, while shadowy veins grew under the torn skin of his, his head slanted towards the two as his small eyes finally fell out from the round borders while his jaws stretched into an unnatural length, the last of his breath escaping from it.

Yet before more harm could have come to the gilded cadaver, it released its foot and stepped back while thick orchid mist flowed out from under the dark gauzes and slithered into the orifices. Silent moments followed rich in creeping dread as the two stared at the two eyeless holes filled with the strange mist before a distorted scream, laughter escaped the agape mouth.

The animated cadaver sprung onto its legs and vomited what little blood and innards remained within the body, then rose and stared at the two. Tears formed in the corner’s of Gogh’s eyes as he closed them awaiting the gruesome doom of being torn apart by the animated cadaver standing silently in front of them. He wanted to scream the name of his father in vain, hoping that his once valiant form sprang forth the shadows, cleaving through the horrific beings.

Yet the doom never came as he opened his eyes, he watched as the two were swallowed by the dim shadows, heading where he arrived from. Moments passed as he sat motionless in the lap of his nameless and faceless savior, listening, feeling as the two reach further and further away.