Prophesy: The Immortal Witch (16)

Part 15 at: https://www.abctales.com/story/marandina/prophesy-immortal-witch-15

 

THE GRIMOIRE

 

 

 

Nadeem Potter loved nothing more than time spent in the hallowed halls of the campus library. As Professor of Archaeology at Bristol University for the last twenty years, life revolved around research, musty reference books along with discovering ancient artefacts at hitherto undiscovered sites. Like a real life Indiana Jones only considerably less exciting.

On a day where the sun had reluctantly poked through morning clouds threatening rain, she found herself at her favourite desk. Without further thought, she switched from absently drinking a coffee from a moulded plastic Starbucks-branded refillable cup (a cherished present from a student) to poring over her latest reading material.

Lightly holding the left lens of her glasses between thumb and finger like a pincer was a tell-tale sign of total immersion. Nadeem’s other hand was poised over a computer mouse plugged into the side of a laptop. She had never really come to terms with using an inbuilt alternative and was often called out for what was considered an old-fashioned habit.

The tome being studied was an academic treatise that examined the life of Israelites at the time of Christ, a period that held special interest. As well as being volatile as historical eras often were, events were bound together with seminal, seismic shifts in religious ideology that purportedly shape the world today. Not that she was particularly pious but the relationship between theology, politics and power needed to be understood to get a fuller picture or so Nadeem thought.

The aesthetics of the building invariably left her wanting to stay for hours. The stone arches of the entrance hall, the white marble tiled floor, the lights in lamp holders dangling from chandeliers. This was a place to escape to when she wasn’t giving lectures.

Today’s schedule would be different. A co-worker had referred a family to her who were bringing in a mystery manuscript of some kind for examination.

She watched dreamily as a tall thin man with curly blond hair sprouting from under a green beret shuffled past with a thick book held in his hand. A beige rain mac ran down to his ankles prompting a mental comparison with Frank Spencer from old repeats of Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em on Comedy Gold. It was an image that was probably unwarranted and inaccurate. Assumptions often were. Nevertheless, it made her smile.

As she returned to reading, a collection of voices echoed from down an aisle that separated cabinets and shelves housing all manner of printed volumes. Looking up, she spied a middle-aged woman flanked on either side by a young girl and boy. The sound of their footsteps was akin to a slow tap dance on the shiny marble floor as they neared.

She estimated the youths to be in their early teens. There was no sign of the folio. 

“You must be Nadeem” Tanya held out a hand in greeting.

“Oh hello. I take it you are the King delegation.”

Nadeem stood up to shake hands, her grip limp, half-hearted and fleeting. She instinctively pushed her glasses up onto the bridge of her nose.

When not in front of students, appearance was not high in terms of priorities. Wearing no make-up, Nadeem had a fresh-faced look, her bolt blue eyes glinting with intelligence. A cream-coloured top, greying tracksuit bottoms and casual flat shoes was a combination that was as chaotic as it was banal.

“I understand you have something for me to look at.”

Intellect comes at the expense of social airs and graces, pondered Tanya. She considered this an abrupt request having expected to be asked to outline the circumstances of its discovery first. Up until now, she was unaware of the full details herself and was keen to get the full story.

The directness was not lost on Billy and Danielle either, both of whom felt tense that their valued possession was now becoming known to more and more people.

They had taken it to Tanya to discuss what to do with it. The details of the bizarre events surrounding its discovery had been consciously omitted for now.

The text was incongruous, Internet searches revealing it to be Hebrew.

Making enquiries via colleagues at school, Danielle’s mum had validated the linguistic findings. The meeting with Nadeem Potter was to get the contents translated. Whilst online translation tools existed, it would take too long as well as being impractical. It wasn’t as though the pages could be reproduced as word documents to copy and paste into boxes on a website. They had decided that this was a job for a professional.

Besides, it seemed right and appropriate to show the book to someone responsible from academia; notwithstanding the possibility that the discovery might be worth a significant sum of money. The collective hope was that this would come up in conversation like a revelation made at the finale of a televised antiques roadshow. Perhaps a valuation would slip out prompting them all to gasp and stare at each other wide-eyed in amazement. Billy dreamt of a moment like this.

Rustling around in the bottom of a hessian tote bag, Tanya theatrically pulled out the ancient manuscript like a magician performing a hat trick involving a white rabbit and placed it in front of the archaeologist, scanning Nadeem’s face for a reaction.

Before anyone could take stock of the handover, lights blinked then flickered as though the power was about to fail. The group’s gaze swivelled to the ceiling.

Nadeem silently wondered what was going on; this hadn’t happened before. Time seemed to stop dead – no motion, no noise, pulsing luminosity emphasising shadows and silhouettes.

For a moment it felt like she was the only one there. The atmosphere was suddenly brooding, a menace in the air that was out of context. Sensing something off-kilter, the sensation was confirmed by the sight of a hazy outline behind the three visitors who were oblivious. It was the man wearing the rain mac. He was standing just a few feet away. Where his face had been, there was instead the visage of a skull, all skeletal bone, empty sockets and sporting a rictus grin.

Unable to do anything other than stare, fear rippled through her body.

It was an ephemeral terror that lasted mere seconds. The lighting was restored.

The professor frantically scanned the room searching for the thin man but he was no longer there. Vanished. She wordlessly questioned whether she had been watching too many horror movies or, worse still, had drunk too much wine last night. She wasn’t one for seeing things.

“That was weird”. Billy was reeling from what he imagined was about to turn into another supernatural episode.

“Wasn’t it?” The statement was rhetorical. Nadeem wondered whether anyone else had seen the apparition.

“Did anyone else see…?” The question faded away, foundering on the rocks of curious expressions and tilted heads.

Clearly she was on her own with this one. She shook her head, deciding to carry on as though nothing had happened.

“Ah so there it is then. Let’s have a good look shall we.”

Slipping on specialist powder-free nitrile gloves, the opus was carefully lifted from the table top. Nadeem leafed through the wafer thin pages using her thumb and forefinger to manipulate the sheaves. Slowly sitting down again, she motioned the others to do the same.

For the next few minutes, occasional murmurs and sighs punctured the silence whilst every ounce of knowledge of Hebrew was being utilised.

“What does it say?” Danielle was getting agitated at the lack of feedback.

“Oh I’m so sorry. I was getting carried away. This tract really is very old. I’ll need to do more research on it but, from scanning the first few pages, it seems to be a grimoire of some sort. Spells and incantations, that sort of thing. I think there’s also reference to a woman called Jezebel. From what I can see, she may have been a sorceress, an exponent of the rituals.”

The teens exchanged glances, memories of the island circling their heads like a stifled secret in an echo chamber.  

“Well that sounds….um….interesting.” Tanya looked quizzical. She now wondered whether this book had merely been found or was there more to this than she had been told. She suspected the latter.

“Look…why don’t you leave it with me for a few days? I’ll see how much of it I can translate into English. I have a colleague back at campus who would love to see it and can help me with the work. You have stumbled upon something very unique. Very unique indeed.”

The thought of losing sight of the hard won credo filled Billy with a keenly felt dread. He wasn’t sure why he had grown so possessive of it so quickly. It was as though it had a hold on him that was bordering on paranormal but then he knew he was different from other people and maybe it was this difference that was affecting him.

“What do you think then kids? It was you that found it. Only thing is that if we don’t let the kind lady take the book away to decipher the contents, we will be stuck with something that, to all intents and purposes, is gobbledegook.”

Tanya’s logic was sound.

There really was no other option. With reluctant stares and shoulders shrugged, oversight of the magical manual was passed on.

 

Part 17 at: https://www.abctales.com/story/marandina/prophesy-immortal-witch-17

 

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