Editors Note: It is not the policy of the Fortean Bureau to publish works authored by editoral staff. This piece was selected for publication prior to our editorial relationship with Mr. Sanders.

Al Azif written circa A.D. 730 at Damascus by Abdul Alhazred. Translated into Greek as Necronomicon, A.D. 950 by Theodorus Philetas.
-- Howard Phillips Lovecraft, 1936

It is said that the five cardinal elements of nature constitute the foundation of the universe. When air, fire, earth, water, and aether are in balance, the structure of eternity rests easy -- but when one element seeks ascendancy, chaos and devastation follow. Of the five, it is the mystery of fire that holds the greatest fascination. Its value is beyond estimation, and Man has always fancied himself its master; yet like an ill-tamed beast straining against its leash, fire has always sought to wreak havoc where it can. It obliterated the glory of old Rome at the behest of the mad emperor, Nero, and played a part in the rise of another great city of antiquity.

For more than a thousand years, mighty Constantinople commanded the Bosporus Strait separating the Mediterranean and Black Seas, and controlled the rich trade between Africa, Asia, and Europe. Colossal structures like the Hippodrome, and the great domed Church of Holy Wisdom stood behind her towering walls for centuries. At the height of her power, Constantinople held sway over a domain that stretched from Iberia to Persia. The bravery of her legions was feared, as was the cunning of her generals -- and they alone were masters of an awesome weapon known to history as Greek fire.

Its formula was a closely guarded secret, and death by slow torture awaited anyone who betrayed it, or even wrote it down. Invented in A.D. 673, it was used the same year to break an Arab siege. The true extent of its power would not be displayed until the Great War of 941, when it was used to destroy an invading fleet of ten-thousand vessels. The precise nature of Greek fire has remained a mystery for fourteen-centuries. Nevertheless, a disturbing reference to it is said to exist within the archives of an obscure fraternal society.

The founders of the millennium-old brotherhood were knights of the Fourth Crusade, and were among those who sacked Constantinople while enroute to the Middle East. In addition to a wealth of gems, gold, silks, and spices, arcane knowledge was also looted. Although the formula for Greek fire was not found, a secret history that makes considerable mention of it was discovered. According to rumors, the ancient document is read aloud every year in a ceremony commemorating the fall of Constantinople on May 29, 1453. The bizarre chronicle of blasphemy and utter madness deals primarily with a physician named Theodorus Philetas who -- according to savants of the obscure -- translated a book of sorcery known as the Necronomicon. If the secret history is true, the doomed man's contact with an ancient lore of fire sealed his fate in the year 950.

Soon after completing his hidden work of translation, Philetas found a dusty scroll near the Gate of Rhegium in Constantinople. In the spirit of civic cleanliness, he picked it up and placed it in his satchel. Upon arriving home his curiosity got the better of him, and he unsealed the scroll and began reading it. The anonymously written text offered a strange account of several clay tablets discovered at the Library of Alexandria during the Great War of 941. The fifteen-hundred-year old relics were the work of a priest named Zorbagga, who served at the Temple of Ishum, the Babylonian Fire God. Strangely, they had been inscribed in Hebrew rather than the cuneiform language of Babylon, and alchemists serving the Byzantine emperor enlisted a Kabbalistic rabbi to help with the translation.

The tablets told of a hooded traveler, newly arrived from beyond the river Oxus, who visited the Temple of Ishum during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar. He called himself Thoth Taran-Ish, and claimed as ancestor the first High Priest of Sarnath; a legendary city that once stood beside a vast lake in the land of Mnar. The name of that fabled metropolis was familiar to the priests, for rumors about it had been whispered through countless generations. Among other things, the stranger spoke of Sarnath's destruction thousands of years earlier. He told how strange, non-human creatures had taken their revenge against the men of the doomed city. The vengeful beings had summoned a great firestorm to consume Sarnath, he said, and then drowned the scorched ruins beneath the still waters of the lake. Furthermore, such power was within the grasp of any mortal man with the courage to seize it.

The Arch Priest of the temple demanded some manner of proof. The stranger seemed to smile at the absurdity of such a request, then extended his left hand. At once, a juniper bush more than twenty-paces away burst into brilliant flame. The astonished onlookers offered a fortune in exchange for all his knowledge, but the hooded traveler would only agree to divulge the secret of the firestorm. He was promptly invited to accept the hospitality of the temple.

That evening, the inner council gathered to examine an ancient papyrus their guest had given them. After several days and nights of feverish study, they were certain it contained a secret of enormous power. Unlike the others, young Zorbagga was horrified by the so-called Rite of the Fire Demon -- which depended upon human sacrifice for its success -- and spoke out against it.

"O Wise One, I beg you to remember the fates of Atlantis and Lemuria. Their rulers also sought the power of the gods and in the process, unleashed evils that destroyed those empires."

The Arch Priest was not swayed and ended further debate. It was his sworn duty, he proclaimed, to inform the king of such a discovery. A deputation then proceeded to the visitor's chamber with sacks full of gold as a reward but, much to their surprise, Thoth Taran-Ish had disappeared from the heavily guarded temple precincts.

The crisis came to an abrupt end that night when Zorbagga had the sorcerer's papyrus stolen and delivered to him in secret. Although the young priest was convinced of the rightness of his action, his conscience still troubled him. As a compromise, he would burn the original record after inscribing the secret anew on clay tablets, along with his own account of the strange incident. To further obscure the unholy knowledge, he used the complex language of his Hebrew house steward; who had been sold into slavery after the conquest of Jerusalem. Zorbagga then hid the tablets in a secret crypt known only to him, and offered a prayer to Ishum that they never be discovered.

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