"The Beast of Averoigne"

By Clark Ashton Smith

Originally published Weird Tales May 1933

Brother Gerome, "the humblest monk of the Benedictine Abbey of Pergion" happens upon an unusual sight late one evening - a red comet dropping off an unpleasant extraterrestrial passenger in the medieval French province of Averoigne.  It stands man-height, moves like a great snake, with glowing red eyes and bat-like teeth.  

Well this sets the abbey into a tizzy, but lots of praying and sprinkling of holy water avails them not, as first forest animals, then cattle, then people start turning up mutilated and drained of marrow.  Brother Theophile picks up the narrative, telling us of the extreme methods the monks go to (exorcism, mortification, taking their cell phones away) to stave off the monster - all to no avail either, as pretty soon its killing monks in their sleep right in the abbey!

Having no other viable options, the abbey turns to Luc le Chaudronnier, a sorcerer, who narrates the final third of the story.  Luc has a plan - to invoke the aid of demon that is imprisoned in a ring once the property of Eibon of Hyperborea -which among Smith-ian sorcerers would be the equivalent of bed sheets stolen from the Beatles hotel rooms.  He makes a deal with the demon that he'll free it, if it'll get out of Earth and take the Beast with it.  So the big night comes, the Beast creeps into the abbey, Luc smashes the ring, and out pops the demon which promptly hauls the snaky beast off to parts unknown - like real unknown.  Oh - but it leaves behind the body of Brother Theophile, who, it seems, it had possessed and was hiding in this whole time.  Poor Theo!

Woo this was a ride!  Very much a bit of Weird Tales fodder, it's Smith's purple prose that takes this pretty straightforward monster romp to a higher level, loading it with real atmosphere and dread, and Smith's trademark weird imagination.