Better ending this time. Possibly.

[koilungfish]

26/2/07 - Shloborogrof, pt 2

         The snores audible through the wall informed Harry that Jeff had, as usual, fallen asleep without the slightest hesitation. He had often envied his friend that capacity, and never-so more than now. Two servants carried off to hospital in an ambulance, Dr Enderby shaking his head and muttering about pest control, and the house still filled with the thick fug of Shloborogrof.
         In any case, Harry thought, once this mess is over I must have the refurbishments in the master bedroom finished. I can't go on sleeping in the guest room. Dammit, this is my house!
         He sighed and rolled over, folding his arms behind his head and looking up at the ceiling. The light of the half-moon was enough to show him the cracks and shapes in the rather damp plaster, like the plans of ruined cities seem from aeroplanes, or the craters of the Moon itself.
         My house needs replastering, Harry thought. Next door, Jeff snored loudly, muttered in his sleep and then was silent. And possibly thicker walls as well.
         He plucked at his blankets, the top one feeling damp in the cool air. Autumn was coming on; he could hear the rustling of the leaves as they embrittled, the creak of the branches as their sap thickened.
         On the ceiling, the ruined cities of the Moon were crossed and recrossed by the shadows of the withering branches. Harry watched as the biggest patch of damp, which he was coming to think of as a metropolis with a great brown wall around it, was cut in half by a shivering bough-shade, swinging across the city like a demented river. The moonlight dimmed.
         Clouds, Harry thought. Is it going to rain? At least it would clear the air of this awful smell!
         There was no further chill in the air, no breath of stirring breeze. Indeed, if anything the night seemed warmer. Below the blankets the blood returned to his half-frozen feet. Harry scratched his head and continued to watch the black rivers cross and re-crossed the cities of the Moon.
         The warming air, still heavy with autumn-damp, carried up the stench of Shloborogrof, the thick heavy reek of rotten flesh and filth. Harry coughed.
         Lord, let it rain!
         A great and shaggy torrent flowed out across the Moon's plain, a bristling limb-shadow that reached from one side of the ceiling to the other, shadow spilling down the wall like water from a blocked gutter. Harry's heart stumbled a beat and his blood went to ice.
         In through the window probed a shaggy claw, a crab-pincer on an arm covered in thick, wet, greyish bristles, a limb as thick as a grown man's thigh. Harry bolted upright in bed, the sweat of fear cold on his skin, conscious of his defenceless body beneath his nightshirt, of the choking lump in his throat where he couldn't scream, couldn't call for help, couldn't breathe. His fingers writhed on the damp blanket, wriggling like worms, trying to grip the sheets and pull them up over his head if only it would unmake that wet, stinking arm.
         The bristling limb reached towards the foot of the bed, nipping the blanket between horny claws. Harry managed a breath that came out as a gurgling cry of revulsion. His body was ice, immobile, trapped in his own defencelessness. The room dimmed and all turned to blackness as the great bulk of Shloborogrof blotted out the moon, his compound eyes peered in, glittering green as rancid meat.
         Harry was still trying to scream as the bristling limb slid under the blankets and touched his feet.

Part 3