The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis

"The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis" is a sci-fi horror story by Clark Ashton Smith, first published in the May 1932 issue of Weird Tales. It is set on the planet Mars and introduces the Aihai species, which would appear again in "The Dweller in the Gulf" and "Vulthoom". Together, these three tales form a loose trilogy, sometimes referred to as Smith's "Mars Cycle", which has since been incorporated into the Cthulhu Mythos.
==Synopsis==
On the planet Mars, a team of eight human archaeologists and two native Aihai guides arrive at the ruins of Yoh-Vombis, a city built over forty thousand years ago by the extinct Yorhi civlisation that predated the Aihais. There are rumours that the Yorhis might have been wiped out by a mysterious plague, but the expedition's leader, Allan Octave, assures the others that there is no danger, as not even bacteria could remain alive inside the lifeless catacombs for so long.
At night, while the others are asleep, one of the archaeologists, Rodney Severn (who is the story's narrator), sees something crawling in the nearby shadows. On the next day, as the humans venture into the ruins to start their work, the Aihais refuse to accompany them, claiming simply that no Aihai goes into Yoh-Vombis.
The explorers descend into a chamber with hieroglyphs covering the floor. These depict the Yorhis, invariably nude, except for two, which seem to be wearing a kind of turban wrapped around their heads. Strangely, these two are depicted in a contorted posture, with their hands reaching for the turban, as if to remove or adjust it. Further into the catacombs, there are enormous urns filled with the ashes of the dead. At the end of a corridor, they come across a wall with a Yorhi mummy, its head covered by a strange dark cowl.
The mummy crumbles apart as soon as Octave touches it, and the "cowl" reveals itself as a leech-like creature that attacks Octave and wraps itself around his head. Octave screams in agony, but the parasite assumes control of his body and makes him run away, to the dismay of the others who try to seize him. After searching through several rooms and corridors, they return to find Octave, still controlled by the leech, back on the spot where the mummy was found, using a metal bar to destroy the wall and open up a passage.
Severn stabs the leech with his knife and removes it from Octave's head, but is horrified to see that the top of Octave's skull and brain has already been eaten. Without the leech to control him, Octave's body instantly falls lifeless.
From the door that Octave opened emerge a swarm of crawling leeches. The terrified men flee through the labyrinthine corridors, some falling victim to their pursuers. Severn evades his zombified colleagues and finds a way outside, but as soon as he steps out of Yoh-Vombis, one of the leeches falls from the roof and seizes his head, piercing through his skull with needle-like teeth. Still holding the knife, Severn stabs the leech repeatedly and kills it, but injures his own head in the process and passes out.
When he regains consciousness, Severn finds that the Aihais have saved him, and that the leeches won't venture beyond the ruins, as they can't stand sunlight. However, he also realizes that from the moment the leech's teeth had pierced his brain, he has been in telepathic contact with them, and now feels an uncontrollable urge to return to the catacombs. The Aihais carry him to the city of Ignarth, where he is interned in a hospital, but the story's postscript reveals that he escaped and ran out into the desert back to Yoh-Vombis.
Category:Lovecraft Circle Works
Category:Clark Ashton Smith works