SKULL-FACE
BY ROBERT E HOWARD
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Weird Tales October, November, December 1929.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
1. The Face in the Mist
The horror first took concrete form amid that most unconcrete of allthings—a hashish dream. I was off on a timeless, spaceless journeythrough the strange lands that belong to this state of being, a millionmiles away from earth and all things earthly; yet I became cognizantthat something was reaching across the unknown voids—something thattore ruthlessly at the separating curtains of my illusions andintruded itself into my visions.
I did not exactly return to ordinary waking life, yet I was consciousof a seeing and a recognizing that was unpleasant and seemed out ofkeeping with the dream I was at that time enjoying. To one who hasnever known the delights of hashish, my explanation must seem chaoticand impossible. Still, I was aware of a rending of mists and then theFace intruded itself into my sight. I thought at first it was merelya skull; then I saw that it was a hideous yellow instead of white,and was endowed with some horrid form of life. Eyes glimmered deep inthe sockets and the jaws moved as if in speech. The body, except forthe high, thin shoulders, was vague and indistinct, but the hands,which floated in the mists before and below the skull, were horriblyvivid and filled me with crawling fears. They were like the hands ofa mummy, long, lean and yellow, with knobby joints and cruel curvingtalons.
Then, to complete the vague horror which was swiftly taking possessionof me, a voice spoke—imagine a man so long dead that his vocal organhad grown rusty and unaccustomed to speech. This was the thought whichstruck me and made my flesh crawl as I listened.
"A strong brute and one who might be useful somehow. See that he isgiven all the hashish he requires."
Then the face began to recede, even as I sensed that I was the subjectof conversation, and the mists billowed and began to close again.Yet for a single instant a scene stood out with startling clarity.I gasped—or sought to. For over the high, strange shoulder of theapparition another face stood out clearly for an instant, as if theowner peered at me. Red lips, half parted, long dark eyelashes, shadingvivid eyes, a shimmery cloud of hair. Over the shoulder of Horror,breath-taking beauty for an instant looked at me.
2. The Hashish Slave
My dream of the skull-face was borne over that usually uncrossablegap that lies between hashish enchantment and humdrum reality. I satcross-legged on a mat in Yun Shatu's Temple of Dreams and gathered thefading forces of my decaying brain to the