Fri., the 21st. Last night, meditating on the Sign of Koth, I obtained a vision of Deep Dendo. It is unfortunate that Those who reside there either cannot or will not assist me in my search.
The Chian Pentagram has proved useless to my purposes, as have the Xao games. My correspondent in Paris has transcribed certain material from Eibon which he thought might have considerable bearing upon the situation, and I am translating the old Norman French—a slow and laborious job. And, I suspect, one ultimately futile. Lacking the relevant passage from the Necronomicon I feel frustratingly helpless. My knowledge of tile Elder Lore is so dreadfully incomplete ... I do not even know the name of the Entity to whom I am opposed, nor the place where He abideth. Lacking these vital terms, I am without adequate means of defense: With them, I might be able to hurl the Zoan chant against Him, or to erect barriers of mental force in the manner taught me by the Nug-Soth.
Later: I used the Sign of Koth again, receiving transient glimpses of the inner city at the two magnetic poles, but to no avail. Have asked—entreated!—young Doctor Curtis to help me obtain the passages I need from Alhazred. The amiable fool thinks me mad, but may take pity on me and have the material copied. Mad, am I? When They come down again to reconquer Their ancient empire—when the earth is cleared off and the Eternal Reign begins—"madmen” like me will be mightier than emperors!
5. From the Statement of Charles Winslow Curtis
HORBY has asked me to help him with his work by securing the text of certain key passages from Alhazred to which he has not been able to gain access. Seems like a smart thing to do, gain his confidence by harmless favors such as this. I have sent a telegram to one of my professors back at Miskatonic: expect he will be able to get the material to me.
Horby has not been sleeping well of late. He complains about "the frogs", and it's true that in this marshy area behind the sanitarium they have been raising a hellish chorus of night. I declined to prescribe sleeping pills or tranquilizers for him, however, on Dr. Colby’s advice. Horby’s increasing agitation seems due to his conviction that some crucial time period is almost here when the "defenses" he has built up against his dreaded lunar enemy will fall. Exactly what he fears will happen then I cannot say, nor will he tell me.
I have learned the cause of the danger he believes himself to be in. His nameless enemy, the force behind the demon Bokrug, supposedly became aware of his existence when he rashly published as a scholarly monograph his conjectural translation of the Ilarnek Papyrus to which he has often referred, and therein speculated on Sarnarh and its legendary doom. The town, by the way, seems completely mythical, for I can find nothing about it in history or in archaeology. But the cult to whom these matters are sacred—and, to his way of thinking, the dark divinities behind that cult—took sinister umbrage at the publication of the ancient text, which seems to have revealed more about their religion than they wished made part of public record.
At any rate, Horby’s monograph discussed a means of employing another demon called “Cthugha” against the "dragon in the moon." According to his account, this Cthugha is a fire elemental and is, by his essential nature, in direct opposition to such water elementals as the devilgod of whom Bokrug and the Ib things are merely the minions and servitors. The Alhazredic demonology, I infer, argues that the Old Ones are divided into four groups of elementals, all opposed to one another.
Horby also explained to me that all of these ancient and evil gods have their secret cults of quasi-human or nonhuman worshipers which linger yet in certain remote backwoods and far places. His monograph came to the attention of the cult which worships the force behind Bokrug, which is why they and their god are "after" him.
Somehow, there is something irresistibly plausible about his fixation. I find myself unable to refute either it or his logic. He is a most extraordinary man.
6. Extract from the Notes of Uriah Horby
Mon., the 28th. It is horribly close now to the Time when the power of the moon waxeth to its height, and That which resides therein will beat the peak of His strength. Not even Cthugha and the Flame Creatures can aid me then: Curtis is my only hope.
The material from Eibon proved worthless; I believe that the information I so desperately need was most probably to be found in Eibon's third book, "Papyrus of the Dark Wisdom", which von Junzt only paraphrases. But it is too late now to write to my Parisian friend ...
The D’horna-ahn Energies will no longer protect me when the fatal night arrives. Through the use of the Ritual of the Silver Key I have been in communion with the fungoid intelligences of Nzoorl and obtained precious glimpses of S'glhuo and Ymar, But nothing avails me ... They on Ktynga warn that I will not be able co call upon their strength when the time comes, but this I already know. Mighty Yhtill could stand between me and It, but I have never been to Carcosa or taken the Vow before the Elder Throne.
It is written: There are forty-eight Akio unveilings known to mortal men, and a forty-ninth, whereof men knoweth naught, nor shall they know, until such time as Glaaki taketh them. If l could travel through the reversed angles of Tagh-Clatur, or employ the enormous energies of the Pnakotic Pentagram, I might survive. But there is little hope left to me, unless that procrastinating fool Curtis comes through.
7. From the Statement of Charles Winslow Curtis
THOMPSON at Miskatonic sent me a long letter today, including with it the material which Horby has asked me to help him obtain. I have read it through and see nothing in it that could conceivably be harmful—merely the ravings of a deranged and superstitious demonologist. Just for the sake of completeness, I shall copy it out for my notes on the case.
The passage occurs in Book III, Chapter xvii of the Necronomicon, and is quoted from the Elizabethan translation of Dr. John Dee, the notorious occultist. It reads as follows:
But of the Great Old Ones begotten by Azathoth in the Prime, not all came down to this Earth, for Him Who is Not lo Be Named lurketh ever on that dark world near Aldebaran in the Hyades, and it was His Sons who descended hither in His stead. Likewise, Cthugha chose for His abode the star Fomalhaut, and the Fire-Vampires that serve Him, but, as for Aphum Zhah, He descended to this Earth and dwelled yet in His frozen lair. And terrible Vultboom, that be brother to Black Tsathoggua, He descended upon dying Mars, which world he chose for His dominion; and He slumbers yet in the Deep of Ravormos ‘neath aeon-crumbled Ignarh-Varh; and it is written that a day or a night to Vultboom is as a thousand years to mortal men. And, as for great Мnomquah, He took for the place of His abiding those cavernous spaces which yawn beneath the Moon's crust; and there He abideth yet, wallowing amidst the slimy waves of the Black Lake of Ubboth in the Stygian darknesses of Nug-yaa; and it was them that serve Him, even the Thunn’ha whose leader is that came hither to this world and dwelt betimes in the grey stone city Ib in the land of Mnar.
That was all the passage Thompson quoted; the further piece Horby had wished to see—something called "the Zoan chant" from Book VII—he failed to include in his letter, saying the pages are utterly illegible.