The Language of Bees - Laurie R. King [136]
The statement was a direct quote, levelled at me some years before during the defence of a paper by none other than Professor Clarissa Ledger.
She remembered, and laughed. “I believe that was the only time I heard you apply volume over logic.”
“Around you, only the once. But I think the author of Testimony never had you as a teacher.”
“Pray God, no.” The idea was, clearly, repugnant.
“Does the book suggest anything else about the man?” I asked her.
“He has a particular fascination for Scandinavian mythology, which I should suppose ties in with his interest in light—how the soul craves sunlight in the depths of a northern winter! I don't suppose you found any of the bodies hanging from trees?”
I glanced involuntarily around, but for once, there were no innocents in earshot. “Sorry, no.”
“So he is not specifically fixed on Woden.”
“No, but Norse myth, yes. He served a gathering of his closest followers a drink based on mead, which I think of as very Norse.”
“Just mead?”
“It was drugged as well, with hashish and some kind of toadstool.”
“Oh! Oh dear, that is not at all good.”
“Er, why?”
She looked up, surprise battling the fatigue in her wrinkled features. “Ragnarok, of course. The final battle between chaos and order, the end of times and the beginning of a new age. I should say that, considering the impetus towards synthesis evinced by Testimony's author, the deluded soul that wrote these words sincerely believes that by committing sacrifice under the influence of the ‘Lights,’ he can bring about the end of the world.”
Great Work (2): The thrice-born man shapes the world
by learning to focus his will and the will of his community.
He uses the Tool to cut through empty pretence and loose
the contents of a vessel. He calculates the hour and
place to align the Universe with his act. This together
makes his Great Work.
Testimony, IV:1
ARMAGEDDON?” HOLMES STARED AS IF I WERE THE one about to initiate the events of Ragnarok.
“Not precisely, but essentially, yes.”
He had been at Mycroft's flat when I returned at five-thirty and found him disgruntled at failing to locate a seller of illicit drugs on a Sunday afternoon. My own return—glowing with sun, exercise, and information—did not make matters smoother.
“We're not after a gibbering idiot ripe for Bedlam, Russell.”
“No, we're after a very clever fanatic obsessed with dark religion. A man practical enough to use Millicent Dunworthy as a keystone to his church, and at the same time, mad enough to believe in human sacrifice. Holmes, the man makes careful annotations in his books with blood, he doesn't splash it across people in his meeting hall.”
“Not yet,” he retorted grimly.
Mycroft came in then from his daily perambulation, jauntily tipping his cane into the stand and tossing his hat onto the table. He rubbed his hands together, an anticipatory gesture, and went to survey the bottles of wine awaiting his attention.
Holmes glowered at the broad back of this second self-satisfied member of his immediate family, and demanded, “I don't suppose you made any progress in locating the so-called Reverend?”
Mycroft spoke over his shoulder, his hands pulling out one bottle, pushing it back, then sliding out the next. “My dear Sherlock, it is Sunday; my men may work, but the rest of the world is, I fear, enjoying what may be the last sunshine of the summer.”
With an oath, Holmes seized his hat and flung himself down the hallway towards the study's hidden exit. Mycroft looked around, then raised his eyebrows at me. “What did I say?”
Holmes returned late, radiating failure. The next morning found him staring gloomily into his coffee; when I left, he was heaping an armful of cushions into a corner of Mycroft's study, making himself a nest in which to smoke and think. I was just as happy to make my escape before the reek of tobacco settled in.
Yesterday's warmth was indeed looking