The Gathering

I. Wilds sisters

The bell above the door gave a flat clatter like tin on concrete. Two girls stepped from the July heat into cool air. Coffee. Butter from the pastries. Grease from the griddle. The shorter one moved quick. Her eyes went to the chrome machine. To the ceiling fan. To the chalkboard menu. The taller one walked with her weight forward, chin lifted, shoulders set.

Both wore cotton dresses, same floral print, hems at mid-calf. The seams were hand-stitched. You could see it at the shoulders. The hum of voices paused. Most patrons glanced once and returned to their cups. At the far table a couple stared. The woman held an iPod. The man had an iPhone. The woman's mouth twisted.

"This is not possible," the shorter one said. Her voice was high but her feet were planted. "We believed it."

Everything happens for the first time." The taller one stepped toward the counter. "Sir. Where are we?"

Laughter moved through the room. Some of it carried warmth. The man behind the counter set down his dishcloth and smiled. His eyes moved from their dresses to their faces and back.

"Well, from what exactly one-horse town—" The woman with the iPod stopped. She was standing now, her chair pushed back. Her gaze had found the wall. A large poster hung there: two singers in matching dresses, faces identical to the girls at the door.

The twins looked at each other. Something passed between them—a lift of eyebrows, a slight nod. The shorter one breathed in. Then they sang.

Her voice filled the room the way water fills a glass:

"Yon willow greets the nicht sae low,

Wi' birken breath an' lantern glint.

She hums a tune nae bairn should know—

A sang that curls like cinder flint..."

The chorus rose from both together, harmonies locking:

"Lie laigh, lie laigh, the leaves shall sigh,

Her branch will rock ye in her cry.

But dinnae blink or gaze sae lang—

For dreams are whaur the shades belong."

The room went silent. The fan turned. No one touched their cups. Then applause. Chairs scraped. Someone whistled.

The girls curtsied, mouths bent with irony, and turned toward the door. Three storefronts down Main Street footsteps came fast behind them.

"Please stop!" The café owner stopped. He bent forward catching his breath. His hands were empty at his sides. "Are you real? Meaning, absolutely really real?"

"You tell us, sir." The shorter one—Mia—giggled. The sound was bright and sharp.

"Then you must be sixty years old. Both of you."

"Rude," the taller one said. She smiled. They giggled together, a paired sound. "We are real. We are not joking. We do not know this place. The taxi driver would not answer questions."

"You are in Arkham, ladies." The owner pressed his palm flat against his chest. "Philip Tindell, at your service. Please return. Everything on the house for you two, in all my cafés. How can I help you?"

"We are looking for this place." Mia held out a paper. Yellow at the edges. Old. "Arkham. Like in Lovecraft."

"Yes. Howard Lovecraft wrote about this town. We are proud of that. Please return. Both me and my wife have been your fans for forty years. My granddaughter will drive you to that place when necessary."

The twins looked at each other. Something softened. Their shoulders dropped. They turned back. At the threshold the coffee smell was stronger.

II. Alice Payne

The antique shop on Pickman Street had been closed eleven years. The CLOSED sign was grey. Unreadable. The window display—a Victorian vanity with a tarnished mirror—had gathered dust until the dust itself seemed permanent.

The mirror rippled. Not the frame. The glass itself. Its surface moved like water touched by wind. A hand came through. Pale. Gloved in white cotton. The fingers gripped the frame. A young woman pulled herself through. Like climbing through a window. Her knee came first. Then her other hand. She wore a blue pinafore over a white blouse. A black ribbon in her blonde hair. She looked like a book illustration.

She stood in the shop. Dust moved in the grey light. She brushed her skirt with small precise movements and surveyed the room. Her expression stayed level.

"Curious." Her eyes focused on something distant. Not in the room. She counted three breaths. "This one."

The front door was locked from inside. The key hung on a rabbit-shaped hook. Cold metal. Tarnished green. She turned the lock and stepped onto Pickman Street.

The light was wrong. Not threatening. Different. July sun on old brick. The angle was new. A man with a terrier stared. A teenager on a skateboard hit a lamppost.

Three blocks. Her shoes clicked on the pavement. A shop window. Electronics. Phones. Tablets. She recognized them from other phases. She studied her reflection in the glass.

Behind her own image, faint: the vanity mirror. Still rippling.

"Excuse me." A woman came out of the shop, shopping bag in hand. Alice turned. "What year is this, please?"

The woman laughed. It came out wrong. "Uh... 2026? Are you okay?"

"Perfectly well, thank you. And the city?"

"Arkham. Massachusetts. Are you sure you're—"

"Yes. Thank you." The woman stepped back. Alice continued walking.

Near Miskatonic she found a bench. The wood was warm. She sat. Closed her eyes. Her breathing slowed. Information came in fragments. Contradictory but threaded: something was gathering them. All of them. The ones who had crossed thresholds and stayed too long.

She opened her eyes. A student stood three feet away. Backpack on one shoulder.

"Cool cosplay," he said. "Alice in Wonderland, right?"

"Alice. Just Alice. Wonderland is beside the point."

She reached into her pocket. Paper. She had not put it there. Another phase had. The address was written in her own handwriting: a café called Tindaloo.

Her mouth bent at one corner. Too obvious to say it. She stood. The bench's warmth faded from her skirt as she walked toward Main Street.

III. Kash Myra

The 3 AM street should have been familiar. Kash knew cities at night. She had rebuilt herself in their sodium glow. In the spaces between clubs closing and dawn deliveries. In the rhythm of heels on wet pavement. Cities at night were her native habitat.

This city was wrong.

She stepped out of the Uber. The app said West 14th Street, Manhattan. The driver pulled away. Then she registered the buildings. Too old. Brick and stone, not glass. Streetlights too sparse. And the stars—she could see the Milky Way.

She pulled out her phone. No signal. The time showed 3:17 AM. July 23rd, 2026. The map was blank.

She stood still. Her heels pressed into cracked pavement. She breathed and extended outward.

The city was not hostile. It was watching. The buildings seemed to lean. In a third-floor window, a curtain drew closed.

Kash walked. Silk blouse. Designer jeans. Heels scraping on uneven stone. Shoulders back. Chin up. This was how she moved.

A neon sign flickered. PHOTO DEVELOPING — 24 HOURS.

Film developing. In 2026. But the sign hummed and the door hung open, and something in her—the part that still needed pressure valves—pulled her inside.

The shop smelled of fixer and old paper. An elderly man sat behind the counter. Paperback in his hands. He looked up.

"You're one of them," he said.

"One of whom?"

"The ones who arrive wrong. The city collects you. Has for years. You're in Arkham. Massachusetts."

"Arkham. Like Lovecraft."

"He was local. Got a lot of it right." He reached under the counter. A Polaroid camera. He set it on the glass. "On the house. You'll want to document this."

"Document what?"

"What happens. You find the others." He slid a business card across. An address: Tindaloo café. "The owner knows to expect you."

Kash took the card. The paper was crisp between her fingers. She picked up the camera. Its weight settled in her palm—solid, mechanical, controllable.

"Thank you," she said. "I don't understand any of this."

"Neither do they." He returned to his paperback. "Good luck. You'll need it less than you think."

Kash stepped outside. Dawn grayed the sky. She straightened her spine. Forward.

She raised the Polaroid and framed the shop in the viewfinder. The shutter clicked. The motor whirred. A white square slid out.

Evidence. Documentation. The first frame of whoever she was about to become.

IV. Emma Kraft

The radio station had been abandoned since 1987. WARK-FM. The Voice of Arkham. Concrete bunker at the edge of town. Funding collapsed. The equipment rusted. Teenagers broke in to drink. Dead consoles. Broken glass. Urban explorers posted photographs of the decay. No one had transmitted from the frequency in thirty-nine years.

The signal was impossible.

Three amateur radio enthusiasts detected it at 2:34 AM. A clean sine wave. The old WARK frequency. Then a voice. Vocoded. German. The words came methodical and precise. Like reading a technical manual.

Two of them reached the bunker in twenty minutes. The door stood open. Lights burned inside.

A woman stood at the main console. Fifty, maybe. Maybe older. Silver hair cut short. Clothing that was neither vintage nor contemporary. Neutral. She adjusted the ancient equipment with the confidence of someone who had built it.

"Inefficient." She did not turn. "The capacitors have degraded. I will replace them."

"Ma'am, this station—"

"Has been closed thirty-nine years. Yes." She turned. Her face held no expression. Her eyes moved over them. Like a scanner. "The current date."

"July 23rd, 2026."

Two seconds. Her head tilted one degree. "Acceptable. The offset is within parameters."

"Offset from what?"

She stopped listening. Her attention turned inward. Her fingers twitched. Counting. Calculating. When she refocused something had shifted. Her posture softened. Her voice changed.

"Forgive me. I was calibrating. You have been helpful. I will not damage your equipment further."

"It's not our equipment, we just—"

"Enthusiasts. I was also an enthusiast." She smiled. The smile lasted one breath. "My name is Emma Kraft. I need to find Tindaloo. Probability point-nine-seven that I am expected."

"The café? Main Street. Won't be open until—"

"Opening time is irrelevant. The proprietor will be present." She moved toward the door. The concrete floor was cold under her feet. She paused at the threshold. "Document this. For your records. I was here. The signal was real. What happens next will be difficult to verify."

She walked out. Pre-dawn. The air smelled of wet grass and exhaust.

One enthusiast raised his phone to take a photo. The screen showed static. By the time it cleared, the woman was gone.

"What the hell was that?" his companion whispered.

"I don't know. But I'm going to that café when it opens."

"Why?"

"Because probability point-nine-seven is basically certainty. And she knew it."

V. Kamaskera Kamadan

The reading room closed at midnight. Marcus Webb worked night security. Twenty-three years in the building. He knew every creak. Every rattle of the heating. He did not know the sound at 3 AM.

Four voices. Male. Close harmony. African. Southern African, maybe. The sound came from everywhere. The stacks amplified it. The books vibrated.

He found the singer in Whateley Reading Room. One man at a table. Open volumes spread before him. Eyes closed. Mouth moving. Four voices from one throat. Marcus could see the throat working. The breath moving. One body. A choir.

The singing stopped. The man opened his eyes.

"Mr. Webb." One voice now. Measured. "I apologize for the disturbance. I was orienting myself."

"How do you know my name?"

"Your badge. Also your employment file. University archive." The man stood. Tall. His clothing might have been academic casual. Might have been vestment. The ambiguity held. "Kamaskera Kamadan. Graduate of this institution. Class of 1998. Historical Faculty."

"Almost thirty years ago."

"Yes. I have not visited since." He gestured at the books. "I was reviewing certain materials I remembered. My memory is photographic. I wished to confirm that the physical volumes matched my recollection."

Marcus approached. Old paper. Leather binding. The open books were from the restricted collection. The Necronomicon. Pnakotic Manuscripts. De Vermis Mysteriis.

"How did you get in?" Marcus asked. "Doors are locked. Windows sealed."

"I arrived." Kamadan's hands stayed at rest. "The method is difficult to explain." He closed the books. One at a time. His fingers moved with care. "I have been receiving premonitions. Warnings about others. People I have never met. Lives I am obligated to protect. Tonight, the premonitions stopped. Instead, I received a location. This library. This room. This hour."

"You're saying you were summoned?"

"I was expected." Kamadan smiled. Warm. Brief. "The university has always been a threshold. Armitage knew. Wilmarth knew. I knew it, even as a student. I simply did not expect the threshold to open for me."

He pulled out a paper. Old. Yellow. Handwriting Marcus did not recognize.

"Do you know a café called Tindaloo?"

"On Main Street. Phil Tindell's place. Good coffee."

"Yes. I believe the coffee will be incidental." Kamadan tucked the paper away. "Mr. Webb, I am going to leave now. You may report this incident or not, as you choose. If you report it, you will be disbelieved. If you do not report it, you will wonder for the rest of your life what you witnessed."

"What did I witness?"

Kamadan considered the question. His hands stayed still.

"A gathering. The beginning of one. There are others like me—others who crossed thresholds, who stayed too long, who returned changed. We are being collected. I do not yet know by whom, or for what purpose. But I intend to find out."

He walked toward the door. Paused.

"The singing. The four voices. I am the last of a lineage of Keepers. The voices are my predecessors. They have always been with me. Tonight, they were louder. I think they are as curious as I am."

He left. The smell of old books lingered. Marcus Webb did not report the incident.

Three weeks later, he saw a newspaper article about unexplained phenomena in downtown Arkham. He recognized the photo of the café called Tindaloo. In the background: four figures at a corner table. Two young women who looked like twins. A blonde in Victorian dress. A woman with a Polaroid camera. A silver-haired figure who might have been anyone.

Kamaskera Kamadan was not in the photo.

But Marcus knew, with absolute certainty, that he had taken it.