3.04
The steady ‘tock, tock, tock’ of the diagram was joined by confident voices, speaking in time with the ritual. Each jerking movement of the ‘hand’ of the diagram was accompanied by a ‘tock’. Less a sound, I realized, than a vibration, reaching through the floor and house.
I needed to know more. What was the ritual, what was the goal, and how the hell was I supposed to disrupt this without revealing myself or getting them to hunt for a culprit?
I searched the room. All eyes were riveted to the scene. As I circled around, pretending to be in search of a better look at what was going on, I looked at tables, cabinets and shelves.
One glass case had an assortment of trinkets, wands, a staff and a spike-studded scepter. Primarily, though, there were watches, hourglasses, and other timepieces within.
“Al mamlakah,” Sandra Duchamp spoke, startling me a bit. A loud, clear woman’s voice in the midst of the more baritone chanting.
“Al mamlakah,” the other Duchamps inside the circle replied, in unison.
Past the gaps in between people and in between legs, I could see the diagram shifting, as if it were an intricate device, tumblers falling into place, gears turning, components interlocking. A ‘tick’ joined the ‘tock’. Higher, faster, jarring my concentration. I could see the connection Sandra Duchamp had made. One word, an agreement or affirmation, leveraging some tie she already had to the grand scheme of things. She’d been the ‘crown’.
If each of the Duchamps had a part to play, that meant they were one fifth of the way through already. If I was lucky, there would be more tacked on at the end, or the Behaims might have their pieces to add.
If I was lucky. I didn’t want to stretch my luck. Not with this much on the line. My well being, the family…
How to deal with this? Priorities were information, tools I could employ, and getting out with my skin intact.
I looked up at all of the adults who held the pads of paper outlining the ritual.
The simplest solution was often the most effective.
I selected my position carefully, so I could be sure to be out of sight of anyone who saw the two kids playing under the foosball table, and I walked up to one of the Behaims. I tugged on her sleeve, insistent. She looked down at me.
“I wanna see the paper,” I said, loud enough to be annoying. One of the Behaims and two of the Duchamps in the circle gave me a dirty look. Apparently they didn’t appreciate the interruption.
The woman shushed me, simultaneously dropping down to a crouching position. She held out the paper so I could see. It was already turned to the second page. Words were written out like a sermon, written out in what I presumed was Arabic, with a phonetic transcription.
Being a child, I was allowed to be a little graceless. I moved the first page, very deliberately rustling it, and held it straight up so I could read it with my head tilted to one side.
An illustration of the diagram, minus the clutter in between the key parts, with lines drawn out from each section to the respective labels. Crown, coin, tome, sword, and cup. There were points of power on the outer rim, where the Behaims stood. Other labels marked the diagram as sectors and rings.
Further down, there was elaboration. The rings were marked with terms like ‘clockwise’, ‘counterclockwise’, ‘influx’, and ‘corridor’.
I could get the gist of it. Power of a particular type, directed inward, given direction by the inner circle. Astrological symbols on the outer rim, and then, as Laird had said, the realm, the space. Community at the center.
The picture of the circle didn’t have all of the details. When I looked, however, I could see a grid of lines, each with words running along them.
Sydenham. Glade. McArthur Crescent.
Street names. The ones around the house.
Temporal distortion, centered on the house? No. Not the house, exactly.
The rings alternated from clockwise to counterclockwise, counterclockwise again, then clockwise. Feeding into other diagrams, with the endpoint forming a ring-
“Where’s Leanne?” the woman whispered in my ear, interrupting my thoughts.
Leanne?
Oh. ‘My’ cousin?
I couldn’t lie, but I was pretty sure there weren’t any rules about gestures. I shrugged and pointed at the far side of the circle.
She turned the page, and in the doing, pulled the page I was holding up out of my grasp. I couldn’t read the page with the details and the opening of the ritual without looking strange. At my age, I wasn’t even supposed to be able to read it.
“Husam,” one of the Duchamps spoke. The first word at the top of the new page.
“Husam,” came the chorus, from the other four.
The vibrations that were emanating from the circle took on a harder, harsher quality. Where I’d felt it against my body before, like a speaker with the bass turned up, I could feel it running through me, now, resonating in my bones.
Laird’s chant continued, a background noise, intense and constant.
The lights above us were more intense, but that light didn’t reach nearly so far. The room grew dimmer, but the lines of the circle remained as bright as they had been, effectively standing out.
The ticks and tocks continued incessantly, shuddering their way through me, resonating in my bones for the one and a half seconds it took before the next one hit me. I was left just a bit breathless. The woman next to me had to shift her position to keep from falling. I had the advantage of a lower center of gravity.
But, at the same time, I was smaller, and that informed my perspective.
Okay. More than a little unnerved, now.
I played the part, wringing my hands in front of me. I was a little boy, insecure, and without filters or guile. It seemed like the thing to do.
A hand settled over mine. The woman next to me. She leaned closer, whispering. “Go and stay with Leanne, okay?”
She shifted the paper to one hand and started to rise to her feet.
I acted without thinking. An opportunity sighted, a weak point I could target.
“But I’m scared!” I cried out. Loud, again, to distract. To justify the other thing I was doing.
I threw myself bodily at one of her knees, wrapping my arms around her thigh.
She teetered, struggling to catch her balance or stand upright, center of gravity thrown.
I released my hold, just as she tipped toward the circle’s perimeter.
A Duchamp woman standing next to her caught her by the upper arm, holding it high. They very nearly fell into the circle together, but the Duchamp woman was taller, strong, and managed to plant one foot in front of her, not a half-inch from the edge of the animated circle. Swinging from her rescuer’s grip, the Behaim woman very deliberately pulled her hand back and away from the circle, avoiding contact.