Kthaahthikha

XII - 2300

I began to wonder if, perhaps, it was all a simple flight of fancy carried to far. It was not difficult to imagine Alim, passing throgh the region in the course of his travels, garnering a number of details - perhaps filching the icon himself - and even now sitting chuckling away in Africa at the fool's errand to which he had consigned this willing rube.

But then, the phantom in the chasm refused to fall on the side of fantasy. The further and further I pierced into the heart of that shadowed forest, the more I was certain that what I had seen was in fact reality. Some strange reality, no doubt, and one that until now I had been less than eager to give credence to, but the possibility remained. And it was far more appealing than the alternative - that I had stumbled into the midst of the Caucasus on the trail of pure mythology, and found it crystalised in the form of a game trail and a geological peculiarity.

I kept on, questioning, my eyes and ears open at all times. And what it it were true? Then what should I be searching for? Some deep, light-suffused cavern with uncanny masonry at its heart? A city of tumbled, conflicting architectures from all across the globe and every moment in time? Such a thing had the villagers only alluded to, and it made me wonder upon what the Moor had founded this particular gem of information.

The brook emptied, aftrer a while, in broad lake. The lake gave me cause to stop in wonder - for it was of a beautiful turquoise shade, so clouded with minerals that it seemed a pool of purest enamel, or a liquid jewel. It was a gorgeous thing, and I laughed at it - the man who went to Africa to study nomads and instead found a Russian lake. But it was a beautiful thing, shimmering in the sunlight. I decided to stay beside it, and had a meal on the pebbles that formed its shore.

These pebbles I took to skipping, and sent them slying away across th water. The patterns they left behind were truly marvelous to behold. Several of the larger ones land with heavy crashes, and I grimaced at my lack of dexterity.

It was as I skipped stones that I wondered if anything could survive in water such as this. I thought not, but was uncertain - for I am not a master at biology and have always relied more on the abilities of others to examine my discoveries. perhaps I might have achieved more lasting fame had I catalogued Zathagar as well as unearthing the pillars that were once its gates.

I skipped a few more pebbles, and noted unusual ripples moving back and forth beneath the surface. This raised interested in me, and I paused in mys skipping, thinking perhaps that my questions were about to be answered.

The waters grew placid once more. I cursed, and dismissed it as the wind. The breeze was cutting down through the hills to my left, a pair that framed the lake between them as I looked along it from where I stood. I picked-up another stone and returned to my sport.

I had succeeded, much to my delight, in skipping a pebble all the way across to the other side, when the ripples began once more. This time I ignored them, for it was clear now that they were being caused by the wind, and I was far too busy working my mind through the various problems that continued to present themselves.

Another stone shot away over the lake, and I watched it as a great, bloated mouth shot from beneath the surface and swallowed the inoffensive pebble whole.

I shot-up, stunned, and watched as the creature twisted about on the water, a long, grey-blue thing like an enormous cat-fish with plates like a crocdile all down its back. It had a host of gleaming fangs, and it was these that it bared at me as it pivoted like a whale and dlipped, almost noiseless, back beneath.

I was astonished. In one single moments all of my doubts had been dashed, or at the very least my fears of infamy. The brute must have been at the least thirty feet long, and as thick across as a small row-boat. And such scales. And the eyes! Twin points of watery yellow that seemed to glow internally, infernally. It was enough to chill me at the very thought of it. But fears soon departed before a waves of absolute and utter relief.

This monster, it seemed to stand for everything that I had hoped for. Was it not possible, if the place that I had sought contained such creatures, it might not also contain other wqonders. Some might argue to the contrary, and would probably be correct. What relationship does a hideous reptilian catfish bear to a rumoured city of immortal spectres? I could see none. Yet, much as one seemingly-impossible discovery will spur-on all those others who are hunting dreams laughed at as unattainable, the unearthing of this creature gave a sense of incredible optimism to the entire affair.

I skipped a dozen more stones across the water, but only managed to coax the creature out once more. It seemed to have discovered the stoney nature of the lures, and would have none of it. I cursed, and resigned myself to being at its mercy. A number of unanswered questions were running through my head one after another, such as how the thing breathed in what was no doubt a cloying mixture, and how many were living in that enigmatic lake.

No answers being forthcoming, I decided to go for a brief walk to calm myself. Aterwards, decided to establish a camp of some form, and so erected a lean-to of sorts from branches and sticks torn from the lower parts of trees. These served me well, and I was quite proud of the thing. I then decided to aquire for myself some game, for I recalled having seen signs of animals about the place. I cleaned my rifle and loaded carefully, then set-out into the forests to find something to shoot.

I came in due course to signs of some animal, perhaps a small species of deer, and followed the trail carefully, discovering it to lead against the wind. I was not surprised to find that it ran to the brook, where I saw the animal drinking steadily. It was, as I had supposed, a species of deer, its coat dappled beautifully and of a predominantly deep-russet colour.

Yes, monsters. I wrote this, so it was bound to happen eventually. Just be glad I haven't pulled the old 'lost world' trick like I contemplated doing.

In other news - HALFWAY DONE AND I AM STILL COMPARATIVELY-SPRY!

::jigs.