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intelligent races of the multiverse and the prime Forces of Evil, those- prisoned beings of the Cthulhu cycle:
    Yog-Sothoth, 'the all-in-one and one-in-all' - a slime-thing frothing forever behind his shielding congeries of iridescent power-globes, co-existent with all time and conterminous in all space stood high in their ranks; likewise
    Ithaqua the Wind-Walker, stalker between the stars; and Hastur the Unspeakable, half-brother and bitter rival to Cthulhu, dweller in the ill-omened Lake of Hall in the Hyades. Crow knew and had had dealings with all of them, so that Kthanid's sendings merely reinforced his knowledge of them.
    He knew the others of this vile pantheon, too, some of them standing on a par with the prime powers, others lower in the scheme of things or subservient to the principal beings and forces. There was Yibb-Tstll: gigantic, grotesquely manlike lord of an alien dimension beyond the borders of sanity; and Shudde-M'ell, nest-master of the subterranean Cthonians of primal Earth; and Cthugha, whose thermal flux had reversed itself and so deranged the once ordered working of his radioactive mind. There was Darn, fish-god of the Philistines and the Phoenicians and ruler over the Deep Ones, degenerate subaqueous (and sub-human, or once-human) servants of Cthulhu and his ilk. Nyogtha, too, and Thar, Lloigor, Tsathoggua and Bugg-Shash
    The list went on, menacing and monstrous, but central and towering over all, always there was Cthulhu, 'an utter contradiction of all matter, force, and cosmic order,' whose lunatic telepathic sendings from R'lyeh in the deep Pacific were of such morbid potency that they were responsible for much of Earth's madness, and almost all of men's nightmares in the land of Earth's dreams.
    Basically the legend or history of this ancient order of near-immortal beings was this: that at a time so remote in the past as to defy comparison or definition, they had risen up in a body and rebelled against Order, invoking Chaos as the natural condition. After committing an act so heinous that even they themselves were shocked, they fled and hid in various places and on many parallel planes of existence. Outraged, the Elder Gods regrouped, followed on and tracked them down each and every one, 'chaining' them wherever they were found and placing 'spells' to hold them in their prisons or in selected regions of space-time: Hastur in the Lake of Hall in Carcosa, Cthulhu in sunken R'lyeh, Ithaqua to dwell in frozen interstellar winds and above the ice-wastes of Earth's Arctic, Yog-Sothoth and Yibb-Tstll to chaotic continua outside any known design of science or nature, Tsathoggua to black Hyperborean burrows, and likewise Shudde-M'ell and many of his Cthonians to other buried labyrinths in primal Africa.
    All commerce was lost between them except for the contact of disembodied thought. In their infinite wisdom and mercy, the Elder Gods had not taken away the mind-powers of the Great Old Ones, but had merely set up barriers to keep the evil potency of such telepathic wave-bands down to a bearable level. Thus, in the loneliness of their punishment, the Great Old Ones could still `talk' to one another, even if the power of such communications was much reduced ...
    The flow from Kthanid's mind lessened, finally ceased. And still Crow was puzzled. Why had the great Being shown him these things he already knew so well? Why refresh his memory in these morbid areas? Unless —
    `Is de Marigny threatened by the CCD?' he asked. 'Is that what this is all about? Frankly, I don't see how it can be. We've always been under threat, de Marigny and I. No, it must be worse, far worse than that. And how is Henri involved?'
    `We are all threatened, Titus,' Kthanid's thoughts were utterly grave now. 'Your Earth, all other worlds of the three-dimensional universe's intelligent races, the parallel places and subconscious planes — even Elysia!'
    Crow's eyes widened. 'They've risen again,' he whispered. 'Is that what you're trying