“The Hand isn't what you're looking for,” said Meredith. The first 
thing she'd said since they left. “Most of it would be useless to you. 
They're not a bad group, but they're not up to going against 
something like the Foundation. They still hide from them, whisper in 
secret, use their nonsense names. They're scholars, and that has its 
place.” 


Meredith opened the door and motioned for Alison to enter. “But 
we're the fighters.” 


Inside was a large room, lined with chairs, pillows, and bookshelves. 
In the center was a fireplace. A flame flickered, the only source of 
light, casting twisting shadows across the walls. It smiled like old 
books and expensive liquor. The only other person, kneeling by the 
fire, was the woman in the green cap. 


“What the hell!” said Alison. She looked from Meredith to the 
woman. “Who the fuck is this?” 


Meredith didn't say anything. 
“Of course,” said Alison. “Now we're playing this game. Lovely.” 
The woman smiled. “I said almost the exact same thing.” 


Alison scowled and stepped towards her. “Did you? Is that supposed 
to be some grand, revealing comment? Should | fall to my knees 
and forgive you for leaving me to fucking die?” 


“| wouldn't have let that happen,” said the woman. She stared into 
the fire. “But if I'd had to step in, we wouldn't be talking now.” 


“What a shame that would be,” said Alison. “I'd suggest you start 
saying something meaningful.” 


The woman stood. “It's not often | meet someone like this. But it's 
not often someone like you comes to us either. I'm sorry that things 
went the way they did back there, but you were never in any real 
danger.” She stared into Alison's eyes. Alison looked away. 
Something about her gaze felt wrong. “You're lucky. L.S doesn't 
often accept people so soon. My name is Amanda. I'd like to 
welcome you to the Serpent's Tooth.” 


Queen's Gambit 


On the night of the winter solstice, if the stars are right, Ullllllu the 
Warlock emerges from his cave and curses the moon. Life and 
death become inverted in a twisted exhibition of the decadent souls 
who would possess the audacity of character to appear. Naturally 
the Blood Moon Ball is the social event of the season. 


Admirers gathered in the corner of the withering heath, like offal 
sloshing down the sloughs of an abattoir, with the same sickening 
insistence and helpless gravitation: mistresses of the damned, 
keepers of the crypt, debutantes of the unhallowed alike, hanging as 
would a victim from a meathook in the back of that same abattoir 
upon every word of Lorenzo, the captivating temptster in the 
buccaneer shirt, the youngest Dreadlord anti-anointed in undead 
generations (which are very long indeed). 


Lorenzo paid the entourage little notice, for he was fascinated by his 
charming conversation partner, the death blossom in the crushed- 
velvet gown. He was wrapped around her like a toe tag. The name 
on that toe tag: 


The Black Queen. 


The guests had asked her, following her introduction: The Black 
Queen of the Carcass Altar, did you say? The Black Queen of the 
Trifold Trepanation? The Black Queen of the Trembling Coffins, 
perhaps? 


Simply The Black Queen, she had said, and all in attendance were 
breathless. Many of the breathless were quite impressed, as well. 


"That's such a coincidence," the Black Queen laughed. "I grew up in 
the desert, too! Of course, Arizona was much more boring. We had 
tumbleweeds, for one, instead of tumbleflesh." 


As Lorenzo rambled on about his childhood and the various 


03/13/ : 

- ceased screaming at 12:04 today. Subject was sedated and 
examined. Examination showed the subject's vocal cords completely 
shredded. 15 minutes after sedation wore off, subject began 
screaming again. Further examination showed the vocal cords 
completely healed. This healing effect gives new promise to 
SCP-596. 

03/14/ : 

Tested limits of SCP-596 healing effect. Sedated subject and 
severed left toe. No regeneration displayed until subject regained 
consciousness, whereupon toe regenerated in 26 minutes. Severed 
right foot without sedation. Regeneration began immediately and 
concluded in 83 minutes. Severed both legs, regenerated 
simultaneously in 297 minutes. It appears that the regeneration in 
one area is not slowed by injuries in other locations. 

03/15/ : 

Severedarms -  wasusing to hold SCP below the elbow. 
Subject's body immediately died. Autopsy showed no identifiable 
cause of death. Regeneration of attached forearms began. 

03/16/ : 

Subject began writhing as motor and nervous systems developed. 
Screaming began again at 07:36 as soon as respiratory system was 
capable. Full regeneration complete at 21:05. 

03/17/ : 

Subject sedated and restrained, hypodermic inserted into median 
cubital vein. Several pints of blood drawn before drop in blood 
pressure prevented further collection. Upon regaining 
consciousness, blood pressure improved and the drawing of blood 
could resume. 

03/18/ : 

Subject produced 72 pints of blood in the last 24 hours. Clearly, the 
regenerative power of SCP-596 also accelerates blood production. 
Request class D subject with type O-negative blood. 

03/19/ : 

Restrained Class D applied to SCP-596. - immediately releases 
SCP-596 and expires. With multiple draw points, Class D subject 
should be able to provide the Foundation with a constant supply of 
universal O-negative blood for transfusions and experimentation. 
Recommend Class D of blood type AB be kept on hand if universal 
blood plasma is required. 


muscular growths therein, the Black Queen tongued awkwardly at 
her fangs. She reminded herself that the vampirism would fade 
when she left the light of the blood moon. It was essentially just a 
masquerade ball, something she had experienced in Venice, LA, 
and Ibiza. Admittedly, it was a masquerade ball that murders your 
soul, but so does LA and that turned out alright. 


A waiter approached with a bottle and offered the Black Queen a 
glass. 


"No, thank you. | don't drink..." she said, ready to milk the situation 
for all the fun she could get from it, "... wine." 


"This is blood," said the waiter. 
"...Oh. Then by all means." 


The Black Queen turned to Lorenzo. "So, do we have an 
agreement?" 


"You're a shrewd negotiator, my little amanita." Lorenzo took a sip. 
"You provide to me this Grimoire of Gran Noir, and | promise to 
bring forth the fullness of its necromantic power in an attack on the 
Foundation at the prescribed day and hour. | will find the information 
you need, and | will tear it from their chest like a beating heart." 


"Horrorshow."” 

"Shall we make this a blood oath?" 

"| don't see why not." 

They clinked glasses. 

"| hope you'll understand if | can't stay to dance, Lorenzo." 


"Black Queen, you should know better." Lorenzo was so mock-sad 
that he was almost pouting. It was subtler than it sounds, since he 
was rather pouty by default. "All who enter here abandon hope." 


"Then just live with it." 


"Well" 


"You know what | mean." With a smile, she threw on her cloak, dyed 
as is the custom among the Chaos Insurgents in the blood of 
Catholics.1 She picked up a present that had been granted by a 
gracious infernal lich lord, slid through the crowd, found a quiet 
place, and opened a Way. 


She realized, as she stepped through, that part of her actually did 
wish she could linger for a while. Lorenzo was smarter than he 
looked, and he was a pleasant person, if you didn't mind that his 
eyeballs were spiders. 


Alison found a seat in the private chamber of the Serpent's Fang 
and untensed herself. A week had passed since she'd been initiated 
into an inner echelon of the Hand. The Serpent's Fang was a tight 
circle of those who had earned the trust of L.S. 


In an organization which made its mission the spread of knowledge 
to all those who honestly seek it, L.S. was one of the few true 
secrets that remained. No record existed of witnessing L.S., or 
speaking to them, or hearing such information secondhand. (Lying, 
in the Hand, is an even greater taboo than hiding information.) 


The Serpent's Fang received its information from L.S. indirectly: 
letters that fade with the sunset, whispers of the wind, the subtle 
wisdom of synchronicity. Alison had been given a mission by letter: 
go to the Blood Moon Ball and arrange the exchange of a spellbook 
with a Dreadlord. This she had accomplished. 


The letter had an inscription upon it: "Around and back, in the wind 
and the rain." Alison had asked what it meant; Amanda, her ‘handler’ 
of sorts, told her that it was an invocation of protection, and any of 
the Fang who was in danger could recite it, and harm would just 
tumble around them. It was a bit of good luck that one could keep in 
one's pocket. Alison didn't share her initial thought, which was that 
she didn't know that that little nursery rhyme she liked as a kid was 
from something. She always thought her dad had made it up. 


Now that the musk of the grave had lifted, Alison felt comfortable 


opening the gift from her pyroclastic admirer. The box was soot- 
black and felt like the material those astronaut blankets were made 
from. She pulled off the bow and lifted the lid. A dim orange glow 
issued forth, and a grumbling. 


Alison felt warmth from deep inside the box. It grew too hot for her to 
hold near her face, so she drew it back. The source of the light and 
sound and heat was an amorphous slimy shape that began to shift 
within the box. It raised up and began to slither out. Alison dropped 
the box before the glowing-hot tendril scorched her hand. 


The mass that was her present oozed forth, dripping molten matter. 
The grumbling grew louder, and Alison could discern words. 


"canfuckrightoffandsocanhissisteranddon'tgetmestartedonzeushe'ssuchasill 
horsingaroundwithmortalslutsandImeanliteralhorsing" 


Alison picked up the box before it was melted in the creature's path. 
There was a label inside. "Enjoy the blasphemy slug! Happy 
Holidays!" 


"Who would give this to someone!?" The blasphemy slug left a 
charred path of bubbling rock as it scaled the door. So much for the 
means of exit. 


Alison surveyed her options. The docents would eventually dispose 
of the blasphemy slug in the usual manner, whatever that might be. 
After all, there was no way that the Library wouldn't have a 
procedure for fire elementals who stumble inside. What mattered, in 
the meantime, was personal safety. So Alison used the tool at her 
immediate disposal. 


"Around and back, in the wind and the rain..." Alison felt invisible 
wards surround her. She'd warded herself in ritual settings before, 
but those were bars of stone, and these were bars of steel. Alison 
thought of the last time she had felt this safe. She'd been a child, 
playing with her toy steam engine, reciting that little rhyme... 


"...clickety-clack go the wheels on the train." Without thinking about 
it, she muttered the rest of the couplet. Everything spun without 
moving until Alison was somewhere else. 


The chamber had been precision-engineered. It had no doors or 
windows leading out, but a soft breeze flowed in, apparently through 
a fine golden mesh. The air smelled of fresh sheets and baking 
bread, although no linens could be— no, wait, there was a bedroom 
hidden on the other side of a closet. And the bread in the box had 
clearly been there for a while. Still, the chamber had been precision- 
engineered to feel like home. 


Alison explored. There was a lighted mirror above a set of drawers, 
a hat rack, a lot of shelves. Alison opened a cupboard to find various 
tools, neatly arranged, each one labeled. And they were the serious, 
can't-fall-into-the-wrong-hands sort of tools. It was more than a little 
disconcerting to see relics of fallen god-kings alphebetized in a row 
like spices. 


Alison scanned the shelves and picked up something that seemed 
like it would come in handy. She glanced at the hat rack. An arrow 
hung on the wall that pointed to it, so clearly it was important. It held 
a variety of different styles of headwear hung from it. Alison checked 
a porkpie hat and found an inscription. "The Garden is the Serpent's 
place.” She put it on and checked the mirror. 


A stranger looked back at her. Alison was startled and afraid she 
was being watched, so she tossed the hat away, then looked back 
up and saw anormal mirror. Alison added two and two. 


She closely examined how her features looked in the hat. Her nose 
was indistinct, her mouth was... a mouth, her eyes could be best 
described as... there. Yes, this would come in handy. Alison spoke 
the magic words again. Success—she was back where she'd left, 
and it seemed like no time had passed. The slug hadn't changed 
positions, and the wooden door was still mostly a door. 


Alison grasped the object she'd retrieved from the secret room. It 
was a doll made from a thick, translucent, tan material, sort of like 
rice paper. The label had called it "My First Hungry Ghost". It taught 
kids about mythology and fed upon their lifeforce for endless fun. 
She pulled the string and set it on the ground. 


The doll began a jerking mechanical walk toward the blasohemy 


slug. A canned recording played. "Give me a big hug!" As it talked, 
the toy's gaping mouth moved up and down, and its stringy neck 
craned forward and back. 


The hungry ghost doll climbed up the door's paneling toward the 
slug. 


“andiflevergotmyhandsonareslseriouslythinklcouldtakehimhe'ssofuckingove 
seriousnessthoughhecansuckmyfiery" 


"Give me a big hug!" My First Hungry Ghost latched onto the 
blasphemy slug. The lever controlling its mouth went into spasm as 
the slug's light dimmed... and finally went out, with a meager 


"andfuckalltheirmotherstoooo" 


A face with ten arms cracked the door open and swept away the 
formerly-heretical pile of ash. It pulled something from somewhere 
and sprayed a cooling jet of air onto the hungry ghost doll, which 
itself was glowing with heat from the neck up. Then it withdrew with 
utmost discretion. 


Now, Alison was back where she was two realtime minutes ago — 
trying to relax and take inventory of the situation on a comfortable 
chair. The sole difference was that she'd gotten a hat, a toy, and an 
escape device, and traded away her party favor and the condition of 
the room. She'd made worse bargains before. 


In a moment of consideration, Alison decided she should take back 
the borrowed artifact. It had lost all its stored energy, and a gap in 
one's collection is usually the easiest possible thing to notice. So 
she vanished into the secret chamber once more. 


Alison tucked My Little Hungry Ghost back into its resting spot. The 
hat... she hesitated. There were six to eight hats here, all near as 
identical, except for color and shape and probably function, she 
wasn't going to check. How would the owner miss one? 


The owner. Alison had a guess who the room belonged to, but she 
needed confirmation. So she rooted in drawers a bit until she found 
it, underneath a desk. Sunset paper. Blank. Watermarked with a 


little motto and the initials L.S. 


Alison was going to like it here. 


There's a major axiom in the ways of magicians (one might call it a 
gilded rule) which covers an endless variety of situations and which, 
if properly understood, is a major revelation about the nature of 
magic itself. That rule is: fake it 'til you make it. 


Normally, the bounds of this concept stop, clearly marked, at the 
border between the magical community at large and the Serpent's 
Hand, because self-deception is still deception. Honest and 
communicative is the way of the Hand.