He related to me a curious anecdote not unlike many others in which an estate sale, in this case that of a deceased 94-year old veteran of the Second World War, upturns antiquities or objects of particular value or unexpected rarity. How Branham managed to practically stumble across the absolute rarest of games- and here in our own town of Arkham at that- is a question that causes me to shudder in realization of the black providence which might have brought it to his too-eager hands. I must admit a strange, almost preternatural attraction that the rotten old thing had even among favorite games but it is perhaps my own good fortune that Branham had yet to translate the rules, written in a cryptic cipher, just as popular speculation had suspected during its many years lost to history.

I could not help but sate my curiosity by examining the black box leafed in a long-worn gold that gave the package an irresistible aura of decaying grandeur, almost imparting a sense of tarnished, moribund decadence. A faint sigil, a sort of depraved and impure insignia which remains burned into my memory despite its vagary, adorned the top of the box but perhaps even more disturbing was that upon opening it I realized that it contained far more components than could possibly fit into a box of its size.

With the board, a crudely illustrated tableau of sinister images of strange and perverse things certainly gleaned from the mind of a blasphemous and uncouth artist, open before us we examined the pieces contained within. A wet, greasy soot seemed to cover everything inside and I was not unjustified in fearing that the mold might make is ill. Branham assured me that it was normal to come across antique games in dire need of rehabilitation and this one was certainly a candidate for such treatment. What was perhaps most surprising is that after years of imagining the damned thing it was shockingly normal despite the hellish artwork and overall atmosphere that seemed to emanate from it like a palpable energy. Yet despite that devilish attraction I reel in remembrance of the experience, recalling unspeakable images now what my humanity bade me ignore at the time.

I must confess that despite my morbid curiosity, driven not only by my own ludographic interests but also the dark attraction of things sinister and occult, I was relieved when Branham put the game away and we progressed to our more typical activities such as the tilting of snifters and the playing of games with much more mundane themes. I can not remember what was played that evening and certainly Branham couldn’t at this point either but I do know that both of our thoughts were never far from the secret, abandoned game lying monolithic among more common fare. This night was the last during which I considered Branham a sane, logical man possessed of any reason.

Over the next several weeks, Branham set himself to the task of deciphering the tattered, moldering rules pamphlet contained within the strange box. I had only taken a perfunctory look at them but they appeared to be written in a strange, angular language without any reference to the expected German. He took to this project like a heroin addict to the needle; perhaps an inept comparison as it forecloses on the sheer religiosity with which he pursued his interpretation.

Branham’s translation of the rules, according to his weekly report over our traditional brandy and game, involved a considerable amount of research including cross-referencing several other cryptic games that were written in cipher, consultation of the symbologies contained in several occult volumes including Miskatonic’s copy of The Necronomicon, and careful interpretation of the various markings and other identifiers on the pieces of the game itself. Branham had become convinced that the game had no actual rules, that its play was a subtle, discreet interchange between the players’ minds and the game itself. What’s more, he began to suggest that the game was actually a sort of coded invocation to dread Azathoth, the Blind Idiot God referenced with shuddering reluctance by the mad Arab Abdul Alhazred.

At first, his commentary was fascinating and I hung on every word—even taking brief notes when he would leave. But over the weeks, discourse became fevered monologue and fevered monologue gave way to frenetic raving. “The flutes, Barnes! The flutes! Can’t you hear them?” he would shout. And indeed, sometimes, during his ranting I thought I could hear the dizzying, discordant notes of some unseen flute swirling outside the windows. As Branham would describe the fragments of rules he had deciphered I began to piece together a sense of how the game, or ritual as the case may be, would have been played. And the horror of it was that there was a sense of forbidden coherency in the lunatic logic of what Branham was relating to me. It was a game without rules but with the strictest of parameters. An invocation of chaos completely bound in a structure and form that had no hope of containing its writhing, whirling insanity. I reflected on our first encounter with the game and how I had observed that it contained more matter than it possibly could have.

Madness is an infection, and as Branham continued to relay to me his findings I found myself hearing his damned flutes. I convinced myself that it was merely suggestion and when I hear them every night when I lay down to sleep I continue to convince myself as such. But Branham’s infection was far worse, far more insidious. The inside of his flat had become covered almost completely with scribbled notes, diagrams, and other bits of information he had gathered about the game. Regular maintenance and cleanliness were forgotten in favor of his project and upon my last visit there I was quite alarmed to find that practically every surface in the house was covered with spots of mold not unlike the sooty residue I felt on the contents of the game. A rotten, burning odor of a peculiar acridity hung about the house and proved impossible to remove from clothing or memory.

I was notified as a trusted friend the day Branham was taken away to the Arkham sanatorium following a number of incidents and situations reported by neighbors, peers, classmates, and instructors and I must say it was quite distressing to see him hauled off, trembling and shouting over and over again the epithets “Ia! Ia! Dhau Phg’na Azathoth! Ia Ia! Ghat Hngu’th Azathoth!”

Following the news of his indefinite internment, I became suddenly alarmed that his personal effects would be gathered up and returned to his family—including the very game that had driven him to insanity. Whether it was out of concern that an object so dangerous might fall into unsuspecting hands or my own craven desire to possess it for myself, I must confess to the latter. Under cover of night I stole into his former residence and finally, after quietly and secretly coveting this most rare of rare games from the moment I laid eyes on it, made it mine along with the thousands of papers upon which Branham scribbled his translation notes and research.