Excerpts From The Upcoming Book 'the Asylum' Lyrics

Emilie Autumn Excerpts From The Upcoming Book 'the Asylum'

And when I looked out I saw that we were heading fast
upon a series of Iron gates set in stone, wickedly
arched, and crowned with tall spikes. But what unnerved
me completely was beyond the gates, a set of doors,
heavy and wooden, pointed arched towering higher than
any entrance to any building I had ever seen. Crossed
with iron bars, and studded with heavy bolts, the doors
were set in a great wall that appeared to be protecting
whatever waited inside.

So paralyzed was I by the sight before me, I did not
notice that we had already driven past the first of the
three spiked gates guarding access to the door, until I
heard it crashing to a close behind us. Where am I? A
short drive onward and we were at the second gate, I
turned to look behind me and saw the gates closing, one
after the other by power of unseen hands, or simply
through years of habit more accustomed were they to
being closed than opened. Were these gates erected for
the protection of this great establishment? For the
security of these admirable administers of magical
medicines? Were these prison bars meant to keep
intruders out, or to keep its inhabitants in?

With each turn of the wheels that brought me closer to
the last gate, I tried harder to drown out the answer
to my questions with whatever music I could conjure
into my head. Approaching the third, I began to lose my
grasp on reality. I imagined we were going in circles,
driving through the same gates over and over again,
endlessly circling. As though there were a certain
number of rotations that must be completed before
access to this unknown world was granted to us. I
thought of the lock on the cabinet in my music master’s
study, the one with four lettered plates that had to be
rotated a definite amount, and then aligned in a
perfect secret order before it would open. I had once
unlocked it.

I felt dizzy, and much too warm. The wind screamed
around the carriage, the wheels rattled, and though the
gate was close ahead, we seemed to be eternally racing
towards it, making no progress. A bird, something like
a Raven, but a great deal larger, soared overhead, and,
emitting a strange, metallic growl into the blackening
sky, circled above the ever-approaching gates. As it
did so, I caught sight of the sharp spikes gleaming in
the pummeling rain. Still galloping at full speed, I
heard the muffled squeals of what sounded like a swarm
of insects.

Looking out, I swore I saw, though I did not believe my
eyes at the time, a great pack of rodents, perhaps a
hundred, perhaps more, sleek furry bodies skimming the
Earth leaping over each other, black eyes sparkling. A
quivering mass, they swam over the cobblestones like
one creature, Squids ink, spilling into water, and
infecting it with deep black in seconds. How they were
able to keep up with the horses mystified me, and when
the swarm dispersed, and shot on ahead of us, they
darted in and out beneath the wheels of the carriage
and around the Horses hammering hooves, yet, were never
trampled. I followed them with my eyes as they melded
together again and slipped beneath the gate to the
other side like a gush of dark water, the tide coming
in.

It was all so ghastly, so intoxicating, my body
convulsed in a quivering wave, somewhere between
horror, and wild anticipation. And then, the final gate
having slammed closed behind us, we were at the
ultimate precipice at last. Three, two, one. The doors
began to open, there was an awful grinding of metal, a
clashing of loosened chains. And with the skies seeming
to come down around us, it appeared. The Asylum.