Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos by Various

Author:Various
Language: eng
Format: epub

The Disciple

by David Barr Kirtley

Professor Carlton Brose was evil, and I adored him as only a freshman can. I spent the first miserable winter at college watching him, studying the way he darkly arched his eyebrow when he made a point, or how he could flick a smoking cigarette away into a murky puddle, forgotten the instant it left his touch. I mimicked these small things privately, mercilessly. I don't know why, because it wasn't the small things that drew me in at all. It was the big things, the stories people told as far away as dear old Carolina.

You heard the name Brose if you ran with any cults, and I ran with a couple. Society rejected us and so we rejected them. The more things you give up, the less there are to bind your will. There's power in that, we were sure of it, but it was damned elusive.

I knew the owner of an occult bookstore in Raleigh. He claimed he had actually met Brose. "These other guys you hang with," he said, "them I'm not so sure about. But this guy Brose, he's the real deal."

I studied the man carefully. "You believe that?"

He'd been shelving books, but then he dropped them into a pile on the floor and turned to me with a slightly crazed look in his eyes.

"I've seen it, man," he said, "personally seen it. Flies buzz up out of the rot and swirl in formation around him. He can make your eyes bleed just from looking at him. The guy's tapped into something huge."

I was skeptical. "And he teaches a class?"

"Not just a class, all right? It's this special program, only a dozen or so are admitted, and they get power. I've seen that too. Then they go away. Every spring."

"Go where?"

He shook his head. "Damned if I know. Places not of this world, that's what some people say."

"I don't buy it," I said. "If he's got so much going for him, why's he working a job at all? And what kind of school would let him teach it?"

He just shrugged. "I don't know about that. All I know is that Brose is for real. You can take my word on it."

"Then why aren't you in his class?"

He stared at me fixedly. "Brose wouldn't take me. He said I had no talent, no potential, said I was harmless and should go get a job. It hurt like hell, but that's another reason I know he's legit — what kind of fraud would turn people away like that?"

I had no answer for him, and I'd known a lot of frauds.

I traveled to Arkham, to Miskatonic University where Brose taught. I sought out his office in the deepest corner of the Anthropology building. I sat on a bench there, pretending to read, waiting for him to emerge.

The door opened and I caught just a glimpse of his shadowed chamber, of the brooding, crowded shapes that lurked in there. Then the door was closed again and Brose was walking past me down the hall.

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