Arcane Tales

The Strange Orchid
By H.G. Wells

The buying of orchids always has in it a certain speculative flavour. You
have before you the brown shrivelled lump of tissue, and for the rest you
must trust your judgment, or the auctioneer, or your good luck, as your
taste may incline. The plant may be moribund or dead, or it may [...]

The Vampire Cat of Nabéshima
By A.B. Mitford, Lord Redesdale

The Masque of the Red Death
By Edgar Allen Poe
THE “Red Death” had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal — the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, [...]