Night-Gaunts

[HPL Kadath (online text)]: Of the dreamlands. Thin, black, winged beings that dwell in caves near the peak of Mt. Ngranek. The night-gaunts sometimes kidnap the lava-gatherers on Mt. Ngranek's lower slopes, and those that were taken are never seen again. The people of Oriab are unsure that night-gaunts are altogether fabulous. The night-gaunts are most prone to haunt the dreams of those who think too often of them.

The night-gaunts have cold, damp, slippery, rubbery black skin. They have only a blank surface where a face should be. Lacking eyes, they see with the whole surface of their bodies. On their heads are two horns that curve inward toward each other. They have prehensile claws and two-pronged tails. Their membraneous bat-wings make no sound, neither do they ever speak or laugh. While carrying their kidnapped victims through the air, the night-gaunts tickle them with subtlety and deliberation. [Kadath; Fungi XX]

The duty of the night-gaunts is to capture any who venture too near the peak of Ngranek, and bear the interloper through the caves near the summit, to a dark inner realm. There they pass the fabled Peaks of Thok, and finally deposit their victim in the Vale of Pnath.

The night-gaunts also dwell in caves near the top of the peaks that divide Inganok from the plateau of Leng, where they cause great fear among the shantak-birds.

Even the Great Ones fear the night-gaunts, for the latter own not Nyarlathotep but only hoary Nodens as their lord. Nevertheless, the Other Gods are able to control the night-gaunts when they must.

The night-gaunts are bound by solemn treaties with the ghouls. The night-gaunts and ghouls communicate by means of ugly gestures.

The night-gaunts do not care to fly over water, but are able to overcome their fear when necessary.

Randolph Carter wondered if the night-gaunts were responsible for killing his zebra, whose blood was drained from a wound in its throat during the night. The beings responsible also stole Carter's shiny knick-knacks and left great webbed footprints.

Randolph Carter was kidnapped by the night-gaunts and left in the Vale of Pnath. Later, the ghoul Richard Upton Pickman taught Carter a password that would be recognized by the night-gaunts. The night-gaunts helped Carter to rescue three ghouls from the moon-things, then participated in an attack on the moon-beasts. They accompanied Carter to Kadath to confront the Great Ones, but vanished from Kadath due to the intervention of the Other Gods.

Rogers' Museum had a figure of a lean, rubbery night-gaunt [Museum (online text)].

Alexander Chaupin dreamed of night-gaunts in caverns or burrows beneath Misericorde Cemetery [RB Grinning].

Edgar Gordon wrote a book called Night-Gaunt [RB Demon].

Aka: Gaunts.

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