Another key retrieved from a coat pocket grated in the lock; then the stout door swung noiselessly open, its hinges well oiled against the damp. His underground Tibor welcomed him home with a rush of dark, wet air and the baleful glow of perpetual fire from the gas jet he, himself, had installed, siphoning off the requisite fuel from an unsuspecting fuel company’s gas mains. Familiar sights loomed in the dim chamber: vaulted ceiling bricks stained with moss and patchy brown mold; the misshapen form of gnarled oak limbs from the great, dead trunk he’d sawn into sections, hauled down in pieces, and laboriously fitted back together with steel and iron; the eternal gas fire blazing at its feet from an altar-mounted nozzle; huddled cloaks and robes and painted symbols which crawled across the walls, speaking answers to riddles few in this city would have thought even to ask; a sturdy work table along one wall, and wooden cabinets filled with drawers and shelves which held the paraphernalia of his self-anointed mission.
The reek of harsh chemicals and the reverberations of long-faded incantations, words of power and dominion over the creatures he sought to control, spoken in all-but-forgotten ancient tongues, bade him welcome as he stepped once more across the threshold and re-entered his own very private Tibor. He dumped his burden carelessly onto the work table, heedless of the crack of his victim’s head against the wooden surface, and busied himself. There was much to do. He lit candles, placed them strategically about the room, stripped off his rough working clothes and donned the ceremonial robes he was always careful to leave behind in this sanctuary.