modus operandi
Nov 13, 2015 11:00:22 GMT -5
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Sadistic, Nathan Saniti, and 1 more like this
Post by Grimm on Nov 13, 2015 11:00:22 GMT -5
Rhapsodomancy: divination by reading a random passage from a poem
As I was standing in the street,
As quiet as could be,
A great big ugly man came up
And tied his horse to me.
“I fail to see the relevancy in any of this.”
Granfa’ Grig had a pig,
In a field of clover;
Piggie died, Granfa’ cried,
And all the fun was over.
“That’s just silly.”
Fee, Fie, Fo, Fum!
I smell the blood of an Englishman.
Be he alive or be he dead,
I’ll grind his bones to make my bread.
“That sounds like a threat someone would make at the end of a backstage rant, but as far as the Lord of Misrule is concerned…”
“Then ignore the book, Phinehas. Just do what you always have.”
Phinehas tossed the book down. Or rather, Phinehas laid the book on an end table. He did not toss books, even those full of nonsense verse.
Especially not those.
“I can predict what this Desmond Knight is going to do, or at least what he’s going to say, without the benefit of random snippets of poetry or tea leaves or animal entrails.”
“And what’s that?”
“Minor variations on a well-worn theme. He’s here to shake up the federation. To overthrow the old guard. He enjoys pain, loves it, even, and he can’t wait to inflict the same upon all of us. We’ve never seen the likes of him. Just wait until PCW gets a real champion. Et cetera, et cetera.”
Not even 7:00 and the sun had dropped behind the hills. Only the last vestige of a red sky at night clung to the ridgeline. As had been the routine the last several days, Ruth did cross-stitch by the light of the fire. She paused every so often, holding it close to her face to inspect her work. Cotton floss stitched in intricate knots and swirls, with hidden patterns. A myriad of colors shifting, either by firelight or under some manner of spellbinding known only to her.
“Back to your role as one-man welcoming committee, it seems. What are you going to do?”
Phinehas walked across the poplar floorboards, steps echoing beyond the doorway and throughout the house. After all, the horse skulls buried just below their feet really amplified the acoustics in the room. Phinehas took up an iron poker and bent to look at the tiles at the back of the fireplace. They’d been engraved with vines and celestial bodies, running deer and mad hares. He knew without a doubt they did creep and orbit and run and leap between the shadows of the firelight. In the center of it all, the Holly and Oak battled over the seasons.
“Don’t forget, there was a while when I was the first person many people saw when they first stepped into the arena. It’s interesting work. I don’t mind it.”
He stabbed the poker into the midst of the logs. They sparked and embers rose up the chimney. The fire flared.
“As for what I’m going to do…I’ll do what I always have, just like you said. I’ll wait in the wings while that dandy minces down to the ring like a royal fop in his silk slippers. Then I’ll wait some more as he takes his time pretending to soak up all the hate from the crowd…”
“Because of course they already despise him even though this is his first appearance.”
“Of course. And then I’ll walk down the ramp, climb into the ring myself with my head up, shoulders back, and ruin on my mind. I’ll wait for the bell to ring, and then, well…you can probably imagine.”
“I can. I’d rather not, but I can.” An eyebrow raised behind the linen stretched in the wood frame. The needle did not stop in its Leviathan stitching. “Another Snap Crackle Pop, perhaps?”
“Probably not. I know you don’t approve of those, but Billy and I picked up on the front office’s unspoken request. They’d deny it, of course, but it was thick in the air backstage at Trauma. And they could have stopped it at any time. No one should be surprised when the Dillinger boys come out unbidden like that, particularly with that manner of rabble in the ring. Everyone knew what was going to happen as soon as we stepped through that curtain.”
Another mindless jab into the flames.
“So no, I don’t expect anything as drastic as that. Likely nothing more than the public crumbling of his façade over the course of the match.”
Ruth turned the linen one way, then another. She read the patterns for some time before switching her thread from red to black then looked at her brother.
“I don’t suppose I have to tell you I don’t like what I’m seeing here.”
Phinehas closed his eyes and rested his head on the mantle.
“As soon as the Deadly Rumble ended, this impending match with Billy cast a pall over all else. The whispers and the glances started that very night.”
“And you’ve been focusing your energies on him. Haven’t you?”
Phinehas opened his eyes and turned his head toward Ruth.
“I don’t know what you’re insinuating, but maybe. It sounds like a passive aggressive excuse as a way to pretend that tag team loss doesn’t sting, but there it is. It played out as it did, for all to see. I don’t blame Justin. I was the legal man, after all. If anything, I should have known better than to count a man out without seeing him down. That was a bush league move on my part. Yet dwelling on that doesn’t do anyone any good. Least of all me.”
Ruth raised the cross-stitching and shook it at Phinehas. Shadows flickered across her face.
“I know what this says. How do you see this ending?”
Phinehas walked to the window. A smattering of stars looked down on All Souls Hollow but did little to dissipate the dark that had crept over the hills.
“Billy had a handful of brutal fights and received legitimately life-threatening wounds over a matter of weeks. Me? I got drilled by a right smart spear.” Phinehas rubbed his side. He pressed a finger between two ribs and winced. “And yet he won each one. I know he’d just as soon keep that title. He knows I’d just as soon take it from him. So we’ll fight like we always do.”
“Meaning you’ll nigh on kill each other. “
Phinehas turned his pale blue eyes on his sister. Those bone-chilling eyes, raw and biting and bitter. The fire died a little and cold seeped through the stones and timbers. The Hangtown Horror’s breath plumed into the ether.
“That’s right.”
The needle paused but Ruth did not look up from her stitching. Phinehas heard her sigh long and deep before she resumed her work. The fire blazed back to life but could not drive the cold night away.
As I was standing in the street,
As quiet as could be,
A great big ugly man came up
And tied his horse to me.
“I fail to see the relevancy in any of this.”
Granfa’ Grig had a pig,
In a field of clover;
Piggie died, Granfa’ cried,
And all the fun was over.
“That’s just silly.”
Fee, Fie, Fo, Fum!
I smell the blood of an Englishman.
Be he alive or be he dead,
I’ll grind his bones to make my bread.
“That sounds like a threat someone would make at the end of a backstage rant, but as far as the Lord of Misrule is concerned…”
“Then ignore the book, Phinehas. Just do what you always have.”
Phinehas tossed the book down. Or rather, Phinehas laid the book on an end table. He did not toss books, even those full of nonsense verse.
Especially not those.
“I can predict what this Desmond Knight is going to do, or at least what he’s going to say, without the benefit of random snippets of poetry or tea leaves or animal entrails.”
“And what’s that?”
“Minor variations on a well-worn theme. He’s here to shake up the federation. To overthrow the old guard. He enjoys pain, loves it, even, and he can’t wait to inflict the same upon all of us. We’ve never seen the likes of him. Just wait until PCW gets a real champion. Et cetera, et cetera.”
Not even 7:00 and the sun had dropped behind the hills. Only the last vestige of a red sky at night clung to the ridgeline. As had been the routine the last several days, Ruth did cross-stitch by the light of the fire. She paused every so often, holding it close to her face to inspect her work. Cotton floss stitched in intricate knots and swirls, with hidden patterns. A myriad of colors shifting, either by firelight or under some manner of spellbinding known only to her.
“Back to your role as one-man welcoming committee, it seems. What are you going to do?”
Phinehas walked across the poplar floorboards, steps echoing beyond the doorway and throughout the house. After all, the horse skulls buried just below their feet really amplified the acoustics in the room. Phinehas took up an iron poker and bent to look at the tiles at the back of the fireplace. They’d been engraved with vines and celestial bodies, running deer and mad hares. He knew without a doubt they did creep and orbit and run and leap between the shadows of the firelight. In the center of it all, the Holly and Oak battled over the seasons.
“Don’t forget, there was a while when I was the first person many people saw when they first stepped into the arena. It’s interesting work. I don’t mind it.”
He stabbed the poker into the midst of the logs. They sparked and embers rose up the chimney. The fire flared.
“As for what I’m going to do…I’ll do what I always have, just like you said. I’ll wait in the wings while that dandy minces down to the ring like a royal fop in his silk slippers. Then I’ll wait some more as he takes his time pretending to soak up all the hate from the crowd…”
“Because of course they already despise him even though this is his first appearance.”
“Of course. And then I’ll walk down the ramp, climb into the ring myself with my head up, shoulders back, and ruin on my mind. I’ll wait for the bell to ring, and then, well…you can probably imagine.”
“I can. I’d rather not, but I can.” An eyebrow raised behind the linen stretched in the wood frame. The needle did not stop in its Leviathan stitching. “Another Snap Crackle Pop, perhaps?”
“Probably not. I know you don’t approve of those, but Billy and I picked up on the front office’s unspoken request. They’d deny it, of course, but it was thick in the air backstage at Trauma. And they could have stopped it at any time. No one should be surprised when the Dillinger boys come out unbidden like that, particularly with that manner of rabble in the ring. Everyone knew what was going to happen as soon as we stepped through that curtain.”
Another mindless jab into the flames.
“So no, I don’t expect anything as drastic as that. Likely nothing more than the public crumbling of his façade over the course of the match.”
Ruth turned the linen one way, then another. She read the patterns for some time before switching her thread from red to black then looked at her brother.
“I don’t suppose I have to tell you I don’t like what I’m seeing here.”
Phinehas closed his eyes and rested his head on the mantle.
“As soon as the Deadly Rumble ended, this impending match with Billy cast a pall over all else. The whispers and the glances started that very night.”
“And you’ve been focusing your energies on him. Haven’t you?”
Phinehas opened his eyes and turned his head toward Ruth.
“I don’t know what you’re insinuating, but maybe. It sounds like a passive aggressive excuse as a way to pretend that tag team loss doesn’t sting, but there it is. It played out as it did, for all to see. I don’t blame Justin. I was the legal man, after all. If anything, I should have known better than to count a man out without seeing him down. That was a bush league move on my part. Yet dwelling on that doesn’t do anyone any good. Least of all me.”
Ruth raised the cross-stitching and shook it at Phinehas. Shadows flickered across her face.
“I know what this says. How do you see this ending?”
Phinehas walked to the window. A smattering of stars looked down on All Souls Hollow but did little to dissipate the dark that had crept over the hills.
“Billy had a handful of brutal fights and received legitimately life-threatening wounds over a matter of weeks. Me? I got drilled by a right smart spear.” Phinehas rubbed his side. He pressed a finger between two ribs and winced. “And yet he won each one. I know he’d just as soon keep that title. He knows I’d just as soon take it from him. So we’ll fight like we always do.”
“Meaning you’ll nigh on kill each other. “
Phinehas turned his pale blue eyes on his sister. Those bone-chilling eyes, raw and biting and bitter. The fire died a little and cold seeped through the stones and timbers. The Hangtown Horror’s breath plumed into the ether.
“That’s right.”
The needle paused but Ruth did not look up from her stitching. Phinehas heard her sigh long and deep before she resumed her work. The fire blazed back to life but could not drive the cold night away.
