Chapter 3: Family Inheritance

Flickers and shadows is how they manifest themselves in the physical world, or as some impossible reflection or a sudden variation in the environment – of temperature, humidity, etc. It is their hunting technique, what they use to attract attention of those with "a sixth sense", be it sensitivity to magic or something else.

The family living on the estate would had been a real feast were it not for the fact the entire area was in the centre of gigantic magical vortex created by the meeting of the major magical rivers and winds of Great Britain. This created a zone with zero ambient magic and the place where the surface magical flows fell into enormous magical chasm to join the flows under the Earth's crust. Thus, nothing supernatural could manifest and majority of magically sensitive humans avoided the place as it was considered the place where magic died, in contrast with the places where magic from the underground was emerging on the surface. This was the place baron Ifans had been looking for.

…

Very, very long time ago, an extremely bright and promising young Greek mathematician and engineer from Syracuse (the one in Sicily, not the city in the state of New York), and because of that an important asset to the Brotherhood, got initiated in a special ceremony presided by the Grand Master himself, who had come from Croton.

The Brotherhood taught the young Greek of the mystic power hidden in the numbers. With the knowledge he discovered of the ways that even the most ordinary of mortals could command secret forces in nature.

Now, this young fellow was interested in a girl, and the girl liked him back. Unfortunately, the girl was from a very old family of those naturally gifted to command the secret forces, and it was deemed by the head of the family that only someone with the ability to command the forces would be worthy of the girl.

He used his knowledge to create an object, a wooden dodecahedron which would hold twelve brass pentagon plates engraved with symbols and flow lines. When assembled in the right way on the dodecahedron, the plates would create the special flow of magic which transported the fellow into the realm of spirits and there he was able to move between reflective surfaces and enter the girl's chambers, and trigger the security wards.

As it was still the age when ridiculous notion of magic theft had not been invented, the young Greek was warmly welcomed, because in the family there had been those born without the gift and the invention meant that even they were able to use the family treasure and the family would be able to pretend in front of other magical families as not having at all non-magically gifted members. Also, the head of the family had deemed that the fellow's mind was a magic of its own kind and thus great quality to be introduced in the family heritage.

Many years later (precisely during Roman invasion of Syracuse), this Greek fellow was working on engraved brass balls which replicated the effects of some powerful, but difficult to master, battle spells, when a Roman soldier named Vernus Dursleus entered the house. Deeply concentrated on the work, the Greek fellow demanded from the soldier not to touch his balls, which the soldier understood as though this person had maybe thought he was a fag. The soldier got angry and killed this unknown fellow who dared question his inclinations, even though his superiors had ordered before the invasion that this Greek fellow should not be harmed. From here also originates the expression "to have brass balls".

…

Some centuries later, king Richard I was riding through Sicilian countryside with his closest companions, and they had the extreme misfortune to pass in the vicinity of the long forgotten grave of Archimedes, where also the particular dodecahedron (in fully operational configuration) had been buried.

Over the time various species of spirit predators had started to use the dodecahedron to trap and phase away unsuspecting travellers to feast on their souls and garmonbozia, or to enter the physical realm.

The king managed to survive only because the efforts of baron Ifans gave them long enough time to follow the instructions of the old spirit who had remained bound until someone was able to defuse the trap which he had unknowingly left.

After recovering from the effects, the king ordered sir Ifans that he should return immediately to England and follow the last instructions of the old man – to find the special place, which according to the knowledge of the ancient Greek magicals was located somewhere in Albion, and make a fortress to guard this dangerous object.

Later, other dangerous relics had found their resting place in sir Ifans' safe-house.

…

The civil war had brought destruction to the estate. Lord-guardian Evans had remained to the very end loyal to the king. As a result, Cromwell's forces had besieged the castle, and the lord had died in his burning home.

The title and the land were later restored to a cadet branch of the Evans family. Unfortunately, the restored king ignored all about the task of the lord-guardian and the late lord had not managed to entrust the secret to other branches of the family.

…

At the beginning of 19. century, the last son of lord Evans had developed a savant syndrome. The child showed great interest in the puzzle of twelve metal pentagons.

After at first flipping around the pieces in his hands, the boy started making sketches of pentagons with symbols and flow-lines, and after finishing fell into a complete catatonic state.

In order to provoke some reaction, the father decided to gather the sketches and have the pieces made. This resulted in creation of 7200 pieces grouped into five sets of 12 x 120 pieces. It is said that the boy had started to play with the new pieces when they were placed in front of him.

The savant son of lord Evans had managed to create a very much improved version of Archimedes' initial design. 12 x 120 pieces corresponded to a hyper-dodecahedron and five sets symbolised the five elementary (though some were unknown at the time) forces: the four forces of the physical world and magic the fifth. It gave possibility to open passageways to great number of very, very dangerous places. And the denizens of those places, having sensed the possibility of entering new territories had gathered in their parallel worlds around the Evans estate, waiting.

…

As a child, it had been the most enchanting room of the house to her – the family library. It also served as Grand Pa's working room and the place where he had put his collection and other family possessions on the exhibit.

He had told her that when he had been younger sometimes he would get goosebumps being in the library even in the summer.

Now, the red-haired woman was sitting there alone – it had been some years that old colonel and lady Evans had passed away, and uncle George had inherited the title, but he and his family preferred to spend their time in London where things were in constant movement.

It was the day of winter solstice and she had come here to spend a few days, after learning that she was pregnant, wanting to gather necessary strength and courage to bring her child into the very dangerous world. Watching the sun go down, the woman slowly fell asleep.

All sorts of entities were gathered in that room, watching the woman and that very special child in her womb, waiting for the beginning of the longest night.