Locust, Arne's confused mind suggested as he abruptly stopped in his tracks, all strategic thoughts of balancing the books, paying off the contacts, ordering the next break-ins and stabbing the competition vanished instantly from his mind at the sight of the enormous, dark, uneven thing taking up all the space in the corner of the airy living room beyond the office, from floor to high ceiling.

The thing was wrapped in threadbare brown strips of cloth, and odd elongated limbs stretched in lopsided directions. The skin was brown and flaked like it had lain dead in the sun for eons and at places, the skin had cracked like torn, dried tobacco leaves, exposing hideous sinewy muscles underneath.

And then it moved.

A partially bandaged head, easily twice as big as his own and looking like it had melted into an unnatural elongated oval, tilted back from the dark mass of too long limbs bending all wrong. The bright noon sunlight streaming in from the tall window shone in a predator-yellow eye glinting in a deep socket and a dark maw opened silently, and then kept opening.

All this took just a few seconds, and Arne reacted as quickly as his disbelief would let him, drawing his knife and running for the bookshelf in the office that hid the secret room. If he could just get there, it would give him a few moments to set the traps, arm himself better, grab the magic items–

During the few paces of running, he heard, felt, knew, that the dark thing was now skittering almost silently on the ceiling, its massive brown bulk just above him. He tried to twist out of the way and not lose momentum, but the thing hit him from above, musty stench and threadbare rags enveloping him as a clawed hand grabbed the side of his face and quickly slammed his head to the floor before he could react.

Dazed, Arne struggled to struggle as the dark thing turned him over on his back and placed a series of vicious punches to his ribs, his nose, his eyebrow. Blinding dots swam in his field of vision but through it, Arne kept a grip on the knife, letting that anchor him to the waking reality that had the hideous invading creature in it.

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The blood from his broken nose streamed into his mouth where he lay with his head tilted back and he sputtered back to full, awful consciousness after the punches, pinned down on the floor by the thing whose terrible golden eyes filled his field of vision.

“Noooon,” it said. Despite the dried, cracked skin, the voice was a bubbling, gurgling, wet experience and the thing’s breath carried a stench like vomited up overripe fruit and spoiled meat. Stomach acid and rotten sweetness. Arne stopped trying to move and concentrated on breathing and not throwing up. The hand holding the knife relaxed involuntarily.

“Tomorrrrow. Alone.” The thing growled wetly and tightened its grip on Arne’s throat, long claws digging into his skin. “The Victimmm Tavern.”

Arne lay still a few seconds, trying not to breathe. Then his hand holding the long knife moved quickly and the blade acquainted itself intimately with the monstrous thing’s ribcage, sliced through dry skin unhindered and scraped on bone when he twisted the weapon viciously in the wound. The creature opened its maw wide enough that it could easily have bitten his face off, double rows of yellow-brown crooked teeth visible, and screamed silently, overwhelming him in the hideous reek of its breath, and before he could move, the creature closed its hand around his wrist and snapped it audibly in one forceful motion.

Arne howled in agony, dropped the knife and fought to stay conscious when the thing pinned him down harder. “Queeeeen wants you,” it gurgled. “Or you die!” It tightened its grip on his wrist for a moment, shaking him painfully. “Repeat!” it demanded when no reply seemed forthcoming.

“Noon. Tomorrow. Victim tavern, alone,” Arne gasped slowly, each agonised word brought blood to his lips which threatened to make the nausea keel over.

The creature gave him a long, yellow stare and then slowly arched its back above him and reached a far too long arm upwards to reach the ceiling. Its free hand drew the knife from its ribs and threw it disdainfully on the floor. Then it jumped, connected with the ceiling and sped off quickly, crawling in complete defiance of gravity.

The creature’s stench still clung to him and the blood still flowed freely from his nose into his mouth as he lay on the floor of his office. A few moments later, they finally decided to actively conspire against him, and Arne only just managed to roll around before throwing up. Then he picked the knife up and got painfully to his feet to make sure he was alone again, but the weapon brought him no sense of security.