Future Tense
(July 2018)
15-Festering Wounds
From The Sorcerer's Vade Mecum: A Compendium of Magical Doctrines, Beliefs, Superstitions, and Practices in Britain and the Continent, by Simiol Lenoir (pseudonym of Arthur Smedley). London: 1757.
From Chapter XLVII, Of the Infamous Magistri Mundi
. . . .Lastly, of these Sects or Scions of the Magistri Mundi order of Magicians, one hath in the Realm of Scotland done much mischief, and of that one now I must write. It hath been neglected because of the Smallness of its Numbers. True it is, however, that this trifling Congregation of rogue or runagate Sorcerers are most dark and secret of their Order and protective of its Mysteries, yea, even to Murder and great Acts of Violence. However insignificant its Number, yet it hath been the Fountainhead and Source of most grave Mischiefs. Read on, therefore, at thy Peril.
About the Time of the Glorious Revolution, when in Scotland the Dissenters from the Deposition of James II, or, as the Scotch were pleased to style him, James VII, there began the great Agitation for the restoration of the Stuart line; nor would these Adherents to King James be satisfied, if James or his Heir were merely restor'd to the title King of Scotland, no, they held that he should also rule over England, Wales, and Ireland.
Following the Death of the Exil'd James in 1701, a small Gathering of these unsatisfied Subjects of His Majesty, King William III, in Scotland turn'd not to Speeches in the Streets, nor to the Publication of Broadside Rantngs, but to the Dark Arts in hopes to win their Goal, viz., to put Charles Stuart, son of James II, upon the throne.
As we have seen in this Chapter, the chiefest Secret Magickal Society in Europe was the aforesaid Magistri Mundi, whose Acolytes cast diverse Spells and resorted to foul Poisons to do unto Death any who oppos'd or discover'd them. In Scotland, so few as perhaps a Score or Two of the adherents of the ways and means of the Magistri styled themselves the Trianguli Obumbratio, that is, Shadows of the Triangle, the three Sides of the Figure being conceived as REBELLION, FORCE, and WIZARDRY, working equally to force the Succession of Prince Charles to the throne and to bring the Wizards or Witches who practic'd the group's Rites great Wealth and Power.
One of those who Organised this Brotherhood of Shadows was Pierre Chambroun. His particular Infamy was, that he is said to have called a Demon of Hell to cast out the soul of Chambroun's own Infant Son, and to take its place within the Body; so that the Son grew to be a Man void of all human Feeling, implacable in his Drive for Power and for Money; and, withal, to become the Brotherhood secret and most evil Counsel and Advice, forwarding the Success of their wicked Schemes.
This son, Michael or Michel Chambroun, as we understand, in the middle Years of his Life, fled to the American Colonies when the Jacobites failed in their last Effort to overthrow King George II and replace him with Charles, the Stuart claimant. I have heard tell, that as of my writing this in the Year of Our Lord 1747, this Chambroun is still being sought, to be tried for Treason.
The Magic Spells and Charmes that Pierre Chambroun was said to have full mastery over include the following….
Dipper closed the antique book, one of his collection of works on paranormal subjects. It was in only fair condition—some foxing on the pages, a few bookworm holes—and a tedious read, but he liked the volume—oddly, because it had a dusty, faintly spicy scent. "I knew I remembered that name from someplace."
Wendy had been reading over his shoulder. "What are you thinking, Dip? This Chambron character who sold his kid to the Punts—maybe—was a descendant of Pierre?"
"Maybe," Dipper said. "But what really worries me is the name of the coven—Trianguli Obumbratio, 'Shadows of the Triangle.'"
"Bill Cipher," Wendy said.
"Could have been." Both Dipper and Wendy knew that Cipher tried for thousands of years to infiltrate the human world. He never could find any place where the humans had enough power to open a way for him, but he supposedly had dealings with everybody from the ancient Egyptians to George Washington. And somehow, at some time, he found Gravity Falls. Even before it got its name, Cipher was trying to persuade Native Americans to worship him.
"Sure," Wendy said gently. "And in the end, he got through because Gravity Falls is such a sinkhole of weirdness. So maybe Bill guided a magically-minded descendant of Chambroun to the Valley to practice his magic and grease the way so Cipher could come into our world?"
"It's a big maybe," Dipper said. "Just hypotheticals and possibilities. We need to know more. I got Grunkle Stan to tell me about this Haunted Hollow. Do you know where it is?"
"Never heard of the place," Wendy said. "But I know Deer Creek Road real well. Let's go see if we can find it. Maybe Chambron left something that could give us a clue."
"It's been nearly seventy years, and the place supposedly burned to the ground, so there's probably nothing left. But I guess we could try. I'll get our protective unicorn-hair necklaces. You get your axe."
Wendy turned and lifted her hair. "Way ahead of you, man."
"Your silver-edged axe, not the magic one?" Dipper asked.
"Yep. 'Cause this one's helped us out in the Valley before now."
"If you're sure."
She turned around again. "Positive, Dip. So—are we inviting Mabel along?"
Dipper hesitated only momentarily. "I don't think so. This is just a scouting trip. We'll be extra alert and extra careful. Seventy years . . . long time. And unless the old story about Michael Chambroun embodying a demon are true, and I'll bet they're not, surely the Chambron who lived there couldn't be, you know, the same guy."
"Great-great-great grandson, possibly," Wendy gave him an understanding smile. "One way to find out for sure."
"Yeah," Dipper agreed. "Only—well, Billy's not happy about himself right now. Puberty's hitting him, I guess, and—he's got a lot of ordinary human things to worry about. If I have to, I'll call him for advice, but—let's go snoop first, OK?"
"Stand up." He did, she put her arms over his shoulders, and she pulled him in for a kiss. "For luck," she said. Then she kissed him again. "And tonight, now that I'm feeling better, you just might get luckier!"
They left a note for Stan—they weren't complete idiots—but since he was out schmoozing voters, he probably wouldn't read it for at least a few hours. Wendy insisted on driving the Green Machine, so Dipper, in the passenger seat, kept a lookout. "Stan told me the place is on a slope about ten miles from town," he said. "Flat place on the right. Trees look funny there, he said."
"We're nine miles from the city limit now," Wendy said, "so look sharp. No traffic back in here, so let me know how slow you want me to go."
The road rose, the car tilted to a twenty-degree angle, and they crept along. Twice Dipper asked, "Think that might be it?"
And both times Wendy ad vetoed the possibility. "Trees look normal here."
Third time, though, might have been the charm. The road, still rising to the top of a ridge, leveled out almost completely for a twenty-yard stretch, and Dipper said, "Pull off, I think this might be it."
The right shoulder was narrow—erosion had cut a two-foot-deep gully along beside the asphalt—but Wendy made the most of it. Even so, Dipper had to hop down when he got out of the passenger side. "What do you think?"
The flat spot was roughly circular and about fifty feet across. The pines at the fringe around it did look sick—not the usual deep green, but an ugly, purple-blotted green, the branches corkscrewed. No trees grew in the clearing, but the grass sprouted in random splotches, some clumps with feathery tops, others with leaves that drooped and bent. "Foxtail and needlegrass," Wendy said. "Some ryegrass, too. Sometimes that's planted as lawns. Look like they've all been poisoned, though."
"I don't see anything that looks like a house."
"Maybe that hillock in the middle."
Only a hump of earth with some straggling tussocks of grass, it didn't seem promising—too small to be a house, Dipper thought. But they approached it and Wendy tugged some bunches of grass loose, and their tangled roots held small clods of earth and what looked like ancient, charred wood. "Might be it," she said. "I'm gonna get the camp shovel from the trunk."
The shovel was only two feet long—it folded for storage—and was more of an entrenching tool than a real shovel, but taking turns, Dipper and Wendy dug into the mound until they struck what was undeniably old burned wood, the ashes so crumbly they came out more like blackish clay. Mingled in the shovelfuls, though, they saw some extremely rusty nails.
"Bingo," Wendy said. "No sense in digging out this whole thing. We're not looking for archeology here. Check it with your anomaly detector, Dip."
He took the compact version of the device from his backpack. Ford had given it to him years ago, and in fact Fiddleford's constant tinkering had improved the larger official devices so they were much more accurate and sensitive. Still, Old Reliable would at least signal the presence of anything paranormal and would zero in on a source if the signal came strongly enough.
Like a prospector with a Geiger counter or a beachcomber with a metal detector, Dipper paced off a grid, beginning in the center, atop the mound and working out from there. "High background reading, general paranormal wavelength," he said. "It's about twelve to fifteen percent above what you'd expect. It's not centered on anything, though. Stronger near the mound, but no definite pings, like—wait a second. Something here."
The detector flashed a green light and on the small screen concentric yellow circles formed and shrank. Dipper put a toe on the ground. "Whatever it is, it's right here."
"Stand back," Wendy said.
Digging was easy in the mound—the decomposed ashes were soft and unconglomerated. The volcanic soil of the hillside lay far more dense and hard-packed. Wendy grunted a little as she forced the shovel into the earth and levered out chunks. Dipper said, "I'll take a turn. You watch the detector."
"OK, thanks," Wendy said. "Should've brought gloves. We're both gonna get blisters."
One spadeful, two, and then the blade grated on something hard. "This is pretty big," Dipper said. "Is that pottery?"
"Looks like it," Wendy said. A jug? Like one of the old-timey liquor jugs you see in cartoons?"
"I think it is!" Dipper said.
It took them a half-hour of digging and then some wiggling of it back and forth—it seemed to have been buried upside-down—but finally they pried up out. It was not a jug, but a cylindrical pot made from brown stoneware with white and black speckles.
"It's a butter crock, I guess," Wendy said. "The lid's been melted on or glued on or something."
They scanned it, and the anomaly detector didn't like it. The screen showed a row of nine lights. The rightmost one was green, the next three yellow, the last six ruby-red.
"Your device thinks it's like sixty per cent dangerous," Wendy said. "What do we do? Leave it?"
Dipper turned it over and over. "Feels like there's something inside, but it might just be heavy. The lid's really sealed tight, too. My guess is that whatever might be dangerous is shut inside. Let's take it to Grunkle Ford. I'm not about to try to open it."
"Come on, then."
Dipper lugged the crock to the car—it might only hold half a gallon, but it felt as if it had been filled with lead—and Wendy opened the trunk. "Let's wrap my sleeping bag around it," Wendy said. "Keep it from being busted if it jostles around."
They did, tying the improvised wrapping with cord.
Concentrating on that, they noticed nothing unusual. Heard nothing, either.
But when Wendy closed the trunk lid again, she stiffened. "Dude," she said in little more than a whisper, "look back at the mound."
By then the day had aged into late afternoon, and the sky was reddening toward sunset. It was too early for the newcomer to be out and about.
Dipper felt his arms prickling. Goosebumps.
A bird perched on the mound they had disturbed and stared at them with what seemed to be angry eyes.
"An owl," Dipper said.
"Great Gray Owl," Wendy said. "Really rare. I've only seen photos."
"Gray?" Dipper asked. The round-faced bird was so dark that its beak and great staring green eyes contrasted with the rest of it. "This one's jet-black."
Wendy had eased her camera out and took three quick photos. "Melanistic mutation, maybe," she said. "I don't like the way it's staring at us. Let's go."
They got in the car and she started the engine. When they drove uphill, away from town, the owl still perched there, its head turning to keep them in sight. When she had a chance, Wendy made a U-turn. In four minutes, they passed by the clearing again.
"Still there," Wendy said.
Dipper leaned to look out the driver's side window. "Yeah I see-whoa!
"What?"
"It's gone now."
"Flew away."
"No," Dipper said slowly. "It just faded."
