Hours dreadful & things strange
Dec 12, 2016 12:05:45 GMT -5
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Eira, Nathan Saniti, and 1 more like this
Post by Grimm on Dec 12, 2016 12:05:45 GMT -5
You walk into the room, as one does, on the Longest Night of the Year. Tonight it looks as though you’ve stepped into the Holly King’s own parlor. Festoons of garland around the door frame and mantle, sprigs of greenery - holly and juniper and ivy and whatnot - poking out of bottles and stoneware and this and that. Candles thick and thin and tall and squat flicker. Puddles of wax mark where such candles guttered themselves into oblivion. Walnut flares away in the fireplace, and is that frankincense and myrrh you smell?
Phinehas Dillinger sits before the fire with a book in his lap. The shelves throughout the room are empty, because the Book of the Black Hand is all things to all people. It offers whatever you require. And so why clutter up the house with un-necessities? He motions for you to sit, and so you fold your legs beneath you and settle in on the rug at his feet. He opens the book and begins.
There was once a conjuror who fancied an exuberant young lass, a lass who was so energetic and full of joy that no one could look upon her without liking her. The trickster eventually grew to worship her above everything in the world – in any world. Now it just so happened that the lady suddenly became ill, and God took her. For this the conjuror could not be comforted, and wept both day and night. But soon afterwards, when his love had been buried, she appeared by night in the places where she had flounced and pranced during her life. And if the conjuror wept, she wept also. As, however, the conjuror would not stop crying, she came one night in the obnoxiously pink shroud in which she had been laid in her coffin, and with her wreath of candy round her head, and stood on the bed at his feet, and said, “Oh, my love, do stop crying, or I shall never fall asleep in my coffin, for my shroud will not dry because of all your tears which fall upon it.” The conjuror was shocked and slightly embarrassed when he heard that, and so he muscled through and wept no more. The next night the lady came again, holding a little light in her hand, and said, “Look, love, my shroud is nearly dry, and I can rest in my grave.” Then the conjuror gave his sorrow into God’s keeping, and bore it quietly and patiently. The lass came no more, but slept in her little bed beneath the earth.
Phinehas looks up from the book and toward you, his pale blue eyes a frozen yardarm splintered and burrowing through your marrow and on into your very soul. And so you, of course, look away. You take in the gee-gaws spread out on a table in the corner, a table you had managed to miss when you first arrived. Gee Haw Whimmy Diddles in various stages of whittling. A jigging doll with its idiot grin sitting on its jigging board. A handful of clay and glass marbles scattered within a circle of chalk. The fireplace pops and you hear the book spine crack as he turns pages.
Once upon a time there was a child with the very face of a doll, yet who was quite stubborn and did not do what her elders wanted. Not her parents, not her business associates, not her lovers…no one. For this reason God was displeased with her and caused her to become ill. No doctor could help her, and in a short time she lay on her deathbed. Not even her general sense of enthusiasm for life could save her, and so she died.
She was lowered into a grave and covered with earth, but her little arm suddenly came forth and reached up. It didn't help when they put it back in and put fresh dirt over it, for the little arm always came out again. So her loving conjuror himself had to go to the grave and beat the little arm with a switch. As soon as he had done that, it withdrew, and the girl finally came to rest beneath the earth.
With the story finished the room grows quiet. You sense the snow falling outside, silencing the hills around All Souls Hollow and covering the cobblestone streets of Hangtown. You understand that it will not be an easy journey home tonight. In a flash of silver Phinehas pulls out a pocket watch and checks the hour.
“Those were pretty short. I think we have time for one more.”
He licks a black leather index finger and flips back towards the end of the book. He leans towards the fireplace so as to afford himself a little more reading light.
Once in the wintertime when the snow was very deep, a poor girl had to go out and fetch wood on a sled. After she had gathered it together and loaded it, she did not want to go straight home, because she was so frozen, but instead to first make a fire and warm herself. So she scraped the snow away, and while she was thus clearing the ground she found a small golden key. Using her limited logic, she believed that where there was a key, there must also be a lock, so she dug deeper into the ground and found a little iron chest. "If only the key fits!" she thought. "Certainly there are treasures in the chest." She looked, but there was no keyhole. After some searching she found one, but one so small that it could scarcely be seen. She tried the key, and fortunately it fit. Hallelujah! Then she turned it once, and now we must wait until she has finished unlocking it and has opened the lid. Then we shall find out what kind of wonderful things there are in the little chest.
Phinehas closes the book ever so gently. After all, it must be treated as the fragile tome it no doubt is.
Phinehas looks at you once again. Those eyes have somehow grown colder – those are Grimm eyes.
“Now, Ms. Starr, you know as well as anyone that these stories were told and eventually recorded to relay lessons to the children of a certain era. Lessons about how life is brutal, harsh, and short, and that it can be made much shorter if one is not too careful. I don’t flatter myself that my reading is so captivating that it would capture your attention for the time necessary to give these stories the critical thought they require. There is something fundamental lacking, or broken, in the parts that allow you to focus, to concentrate long enough to work such things out for yourself. And I don’t know if the drugs and the sparkles and the dalliances with a figment of a man who may not even be real are the reason behind all of that or are an attempt at filling that gaping hole in your being. But…there you have it.”
Phinehas runs his finger in a knot of his own design across the cover of the Book.
“If beating me is the only pre-requisite for a title shot, then you need to get in line. I have more losses to my name than many people currently in this federation will ever have matches. And I mean in total. It doesn’t make you a unique little snowflake or the darling of the PCW. It makes you an employee who stuck around long enough for the right set of circumstances.”
A breath.
“Congratulations.”
He shifts. The chair protests.
“We may not have as deep a history as some people, but we know each other well enough for there to be little-to-no chance of any surprises at the pay per view. This should, and I emphasize should, be a straightforward match with only two possible outcomes. And if I lose, I’ll just go after somebody else for a change. Somebody new.”
“But if I win…”
Phinehas stands and moves to the fireplace. He reaches with his gloved hand and pinches the wick of a candle on the mantle. All candles, and even the fireplace itself, snuff out. You can now see the ghost of the snow’s gleam through the sudden plunge into night.
“Oh, if I win…”
Phinehas Dillinger sits before the fire with a book in his lap. The shelves throughout the room are empty, because the Book of the Black Hand is all things to all people. It offers whatever you require. And so why clutter up the house with un-necessities? He motions for you to sit, and so you fold your legs beneath you and settle in on the rug at his feet. He opens the book and begins.
There was once a conjuror who fancied an exuberant young lass, a lass who was so energetic and full of joy that no one could look upon her without liking her. The trickster eventually grew to worship her above everything in the world – in any world. Now it just so happened that the lady suddenly became ill, and God took her. For this the conjuror could not be comforted, and wept both day and night. But soon afterwards, when his love had been buried, she appeared by night in the places where she had flounced and pranced during her life. And if the conjuror wept, she wept also. As, however, the conjuror would not stop crying, she came one night in the obnoxiously pink shroud in which she had been laid in her coffin, and with her wreath of candy round her head, and stood on the bed at his feet, and said, “Oh, my love, do stop crying, or I shall never fall asleep in my coffin, for my shroud will not dry because of all your tears which fall upon it.” The conjuror was shocked and slightly embarrassed when he heard that, and so he muscled through and wept no more. The next night the lady came again, holding a little light in her hand, and said, “Look, love, my shroud is nearly dry, and I can rest in my grave.” Then the conjuror gave his sorrow into God’s keeping, and bore it quietly and patiently. The lass came no more, but slept in her little bed beneath the earth.
Phinehas looks up from the book and toward you, his pale blue eyes a frozen yardarm splintered and burrowing through your marrow and on into your very soul. And so you, of course, look away. You take in the gee-gaws spread out on a table in the corner, a table you had managed to miss when you first arrived. Gee Haw Whimmy Diddles in various stages of whittling. A jigging doll with its idiot grin sitting on its jigging board. A handful of clay and glass marbles scattered within a circle of chalk. The fireplace pops and you hear the book spine crack as he turns pages.
Once upon a time there was a child with the very face of a doll, yet who was quite stubborn and did not do what her elders wanted. Not her parents, not her business associates, not her lovers…no one. For this reason God was displeased with her and caused her to become ill. No doctor could help her, and in a short time she lay on her deathbed. Not even her general sense of enthusiasm for life could save her, and so she died.
She was lowered into a grave and covered with earth, but her little arm suddenly came forth and reached up. It didn't help when they put it back in and put fresh dirt over it, for the little arm always came out again. So her loving conjuror himself had to go to the grave and beat the little arm with a switch. As soon as he had done that, it withdrew, and the girl finally came to rest beneath the earth.
With the story finished the room grows quiet. You sense the snow falling outside, silencing the hills around All Souls Hollow and covering the cobblestone streets of Hangtown. You understand that it will not be an easy journey home tonight. In a flash of silver Phinehas pulls out a pocket watch and checks the hour.
“Those were pretty short. I think we have time for one more.”
He licks a black leather index finger and flips back towards the end of the book. He leans towards the fireplace so as to afford himself a little more reading light.
Once in the wintertime when the snow was very deep, a poor girl had to go out and fetch wood on a sled. After she had gathered it together and loaded it, she did not want to go straight home, because she was so frozen, but instead to first make a fire and warm herself. So she scraped the snow away, and while she was thus clearing the ground she found a small golden key. Using her limited logic, she believed that where there was a key, there must also be a lock, so she dug deeper into the ground and found a little iron chest. "If only the key fits!" she thought. "Certainly there are treasures in the chest." She looked, but there was no keyhole. After some searching she found one, but one so small that it could scarcely be seen. She tried the key, and fortunately it fit. Hallelujah! Then she turned it once, and now we must wait until she has finished unlocking it and has opened the lid. Then we shall find out what kind of wonderful things there are in the little chest.
Phinehas closes the book ever so gently. After all, it must be treated as the fragile tome it no doubt is.
Phinehas looks at you once again. Those eyes have somehow grown colder – those are Grimm eyes.
“Now, Ms. Starr, you know as well as anyone that these stories were told and eventually recorded to relay lessons to the children of a certain era. Lessons about how life is brutal, harsh, and short, and that it can be made much shorter if one is not too careful. I don’t flatter myself that my reading is so captivating that it would capture your attention for the time necessary to give these stories the critical thought they require. There is something fundamental lacking, or broken, in the parts that allow you to focus, to concentrate long enough to work such things out for yourself. And I don’t know if the drugs and the sparkles and the dalliances with a figment of a man who may not even be real are the reason behind all of that or are an attempt at filling that gaping hole in your being. But…there you have it.”
Phinehas runs his finger in a knot of his own design across the cover of the Book.
“If beating me is the only pre-requisite for a title shot, then you need to get in line. I have more losses to my name than many people currently in this federation will ever have matches. And I mean in total. It doesn’t make you a unique little snowflake or the darling of the PCW. It makes you an employee who stuck around long enough for the right set of circumstances.”
A breath.
“Congratulations.”
He shifts. The chair protests.
“We may not have as deep a history as some people, but we know each other well enough for there to be little-to-no chance of any surprises at the pay per view. This should, and I emphasize should, be a straightforward match with only two possible outcomes. And if I lose, I’ll just go after somebody else for a change. Somebody new.”
“But if I win…”
Phinehas stands and moves to the fireplace. He reaches with his gloved hand and pinches the wick of a candle on the mantle. All candles, and even the fireplace itself, snuff out. You can now see the ghost of the snow’s gleam through the sudden plunge into night.
“Oh, if I win…”
