..::Now when the outer heavens had been consolidated along with their forces and all their administration, the Demiurge became insolent. And he was honored by an army of angels who gave blessing and honor to him. And for his part he was delighted and boasted to them, "Lo, I have no need of anyone else, no other gods." He said, "It is I who am god, and no others exist apart from me." ::..
On the Origin of the World, 103.1-15
. . . .
..:: The country we know today as Iran might not at first seem the most likely source for angels, but it is a fact that the exiled Jews were heavily exposed to its religious faiths after the Persian king Cyrus the Great took Babylon in 539 BC.
These included not only Zoroastrianism, after the prophet Zoroaster or Zarathustra, but also the much older religion of the Magi, the elite priestly caste of Media in north-west Iran. They believed in a whole pantheon of supernatural beings called ahuras, or ’shining ones’, and daevas - ahuras who had fallen from grace because of their corruption of mankind.
Although eventually outlawed by Persia, the influence of the Magi ran deep within the beliefs, customs and rituals of Zoroastrianism::..
. . . .
Both Christians and Jews took it as the supreme insult when Gnostics informed them that their Creator was a demented alien named Yaldabaoth.
James Lamb Lash
Not In His Image
* * * *
Daryl eventually slunk upstairs to his own lair, with a head full of possibilities and a mind to put them to the test...
Cognac hadn't dulled his senses; indeed, he was only more inflamed by the evening's surprises which now infiltrated his psyche with dubious purpose.
He began to build a fire in the bedroom fireplace...really this great house was like keeping a castle; it was especially trying to efficiently heat the blasted pile in these recurring timestorms.
The blasted place was a holdover from his former life...when he was at the height of his career and bethought himself a minor demiurge; he had decided to build a great retreat from the world and to offer a refuge for those cultural lights of the era; the artists, writers, and especially musicians seeking a safe haven wherein to create, find respite, to repose and reflect. His own salon and private performing arts center-cum-gallery and archives.
--That was then.
This was now, and the reality of Now, was a cold one. He stood, holding his frigid hands under his armpits as he watched the hungry flames catch wood.
Oh, he had money, as well as ubertech, true. But he preferred to heat with wood. The acres of forest about the estate provided plenty of windfall and deadwood for himself and Athena. He cut no living wood. He did plant trees.
Living as he had in the 19th century for so long, he had become accustomed to heating with wood, and bearing the cold when he could not. Penance, perhaps,(the sin of gluttony? Pride?), when he had built this great monstrosity.
Well, he sighed, he was stuck with it now. No offloading the thing after he'd been forced to make it not only his refuge but an island, an oasis of sanity and life-as-it-was-meant-to-be-lived, in a world gone to hell...
And so it was here that he hunkered in as one of the last free survivors of the human race, attempting to find where in history humanity had gone wrong; in short, where they lost their 'humaneness'; how they became so eager to exchange the natural world and their innate body wisdom and connection to the earth, for an artificial life lived as bio-bots attached by wireless umbilicus to the virtual 'reality' of a glaring screen...deus ex machina, ultima.
Daryl touched a wall panel and the soft notes of Bach's Brandenberg Concertos wafted from unseen speakers while mellow amber light bloomed into being from glowing wall sconces about the room.
He disappeared into an adjoining room and reappeared with a mug of hot tea. Plopping himself down on the sofa before the hearth, he reached into the great wooden chest before him; (a sister to Athena's pirate chest, it seemed) and brought forth the shrouded Cup.
This he set upon the chest, and unsheathed the velvet cloth cover.
Sitting back against the sofa, he stretched his long legs upon the length of it, and sipped his tea, eyeing the Cup with a gentle curiosity.
Shannon here now. That was all to the good, really.
He was sure that, after priming Shannon first with tasty innuendos, he would be able to incite within her the necessary gusto to convince Emlyn of the need for another foray into the Otherworld.
Where that was, and it's purpose, was still very much an enigma. And so, must be explored. Mining empirical knowledge from a chimera? Daryl smiled his lopsided grin to himself as he ran a finger along his lips...only in my world...
Well, it worked for Schliemann. He found Troy, after all...
Daryl rolled onto one hip and thrust a pillow under his left leg. He may be Out Of Time, but he was not totally immune to the ravages of Cronos. Gods, but he felt old... Old wounds, and new, some never healing properly, were a legacy of an adventurous life of travel, exploration and sometimes, when needed, revolution.
He needed chiropractic badly. When had he last been adjusted? Gods only knew...he certainly had no idea of Real Time.
Hm. October, Shannon reported. Athena could perform some adjustments, in the meantime.
Perhaps he'd head back with Emlyn when she returned points west.
We'll see...his eyes went to the windows, blinds open. He watched the silhouettes of trees sway in the tempest against an indigo sky. Timestorm still in effect.
His gaze wandered from the Cup, glancing at the titles of books in his library. A large illustrated volume of Lovecraft caught his eye.
Not for the first time, Daryl pondered on old HPL...how much did he know, and how the devil, one might say, did he come by his gnosis? Surely he was familiar with Gnosticism, and the Kabbalah, at least; Sufism, possibly.
With a soft groan, Daryl shifted his position trying for the long-lost comfortable spot. He rubbed his forehead as he recalled his misspent youth; the mad experiments with time travel and magick which he'd undertook with such callow enthusiasm; he and John, and Morgana...thinking themselves latter-day Druids and alchemists; architects of the New Temple. The Night School.
He recalled the ancient Roger Corman film based on Lovecraft's writings, 'The Dunwich Horror', and Dean Stockwell's portrayal of Wilbur Whately at his invocation of 'Yog Sothoth'--the Elder Gods, the Deep Ones.
Not so different from the real Mad God of the Material World, Yaldabaoth.
(And, he mused, although he and Athena enjoyed her print, that was one old movie that he knew Em must never see...she would flee from him like a wee bat from Hades; and so she should)...
Strange here, the Right Coast...which had spawned so many writers of strange imaginings; Poe and Lovecraft, Maine's Stephen King.
Daryl recalled then our English cousin Clive Barker and his references to 'Media' and the 'Cenobites'...the ancient kingdom of Media in northwestern Iraq? And what of the Coptic cenobitic order which persecuted the gnostics who had taken refuge in the Temple of Hathor at Dendera?...
Close, very.
'"What IS real? How do you define REAL?"', asked Morpheus of Neo, in the Matrix; Daryl recalled the dialog. Indeed. Had Daryl taken the Red Pill? He certainly hoped so. That had been his intention: Truth.
'"The truth is out there, Scully,"' he intoned to himself, quoting Agent Mulder in the old X Files program. Daryl shook his head; incredibly the show had simply disclosed the entire charade perpetrated upon the world by the Others, and the American people in particular.
But no one cared.
No one believed it...
'"I want to believe,"' Daryl echoed Mulder once more.
What was reality...what was the nature of it?
What was real, what was not?
Diosa, Daryl didn't know. He simply did his best with what he had. His aspirations and intentions were always of the highest; despite the old adage about paving the highway to hell with them.
He had come to a sort of peace with himself regarding Anara and her ilk. (Aeon or Archon? Angel or Alien?)
He knew that whatever the circumstance, he could trust his gut feelings always, and decidedly more so than the fevered thoughts generated by the mind. And Anara felt right. And true. She was all that was good and real to him. To hell with the rest...
'S'all just moondust...,' he told himself; mind droppings. What mattered was that he trusted her, and Yeats and Thelene. Probably Axelis, also, although that worthy seemed to have not just an agenda, but perhaps many...
Daryl paused. He wondered again, if some of the Archons perhaps, rather like Sabaoth, 'the Repentant Sun', wished to evolve out of their inorganic stasis...some may have wearied of endlessly tormenting and playing with humankind and, after long ages, desired cohesion.
Was that why they, our lost cousins, were abducting humans, extracting DNA for cross-breeding? That they may become more organic, humanlike, and able to evolve?
Curious. Perhaps he would put it to Axelis, were they to meet again...perhaps that was part of their long-term plan involving close monitoring of generations of certain family DNA; monitoring and tinkering...
Perhaps this involved Emlyn, Jack and himself more than he had allowed himself to realize. This winding pathway required more study: Knowledge is Power.
Once Daryl rediscovered the writings of the Gnostics, he also felt he had come home to the truth. Suddenly, the madness of the world made an awful sense: it was mad, because the Demiurge was mad. Gods gone wild...
Just imagine actually living about the fertile crescent at that time; the old gods of Rome dying, mix it all up with Mithraism, and then there's Christianity on the ascendant...it must have seemed like a world come unglued.
And the writings, reports from the front!--
of the mad god Jehovah, ordering entire cities massacred! No wonder the gnostics were appalled to find others worshipping the monster!
Daryl knew himself to be gnostic in his bones, (yes: there had been just himself and the Great Organic White Light, the hand of Sophia upon him); and when he, Yeats and Em had traveled back to the time of the Cathar purges via the Cup, it was proven to him then. No wonder it had all fit like a glove...
And Emlyn had been there, too. Naturally, the old misogynist Jehovah held nothing of value for women like her who could think for themselves. The passionate wisdom of Sophia would appeal much more... Truly a healthier outlook for a sound mind and spirit.
Daryl leaned his head back on the pillows. His gaze focused on the Cup, flames gleamed against it's polished sides as firelight danced about the room.
Tomorrow, he thought. Tomorrow we shall see what new insights Shannon may bring...
. . . .
'Did you forget we were coming today?' Rosa inquired, smiling, as Daryl rounded the corner into the kitchen the next morning to find his house full of visitors.
Rosa and Manuel, Shannon and Emlyn, all grinned at him as they moved about the kitchen, baking gingerbread, he divined by the smell.
'Ah. Actually, perhaps I had forgotten...' Daryl poured himself tea. 'So. I needn't introduce everyone, I presume...'
'Rosa and Shannon actually have met before at the Leek's...' Emlyn informed him. 'And, guess what? Rosa tells me that Sophie is now studying the Kabbalah!'
Daryl sat, and tried to wrap his head about all this novelty so early in the morning. He took a tangerine and began to peel, yawning.
'Bread is nearly done...' Rosa nodded to Em who opened the oven door allowing the succulent warmth of gingerbread to waft through the room as she took it out and cut pieces for all.
'Good stuff, Em,' Shannon remarked. 'I especially like the raw bits of ginger...'
'So, Sophie is studying the Kabbalah...with friends of the Leek's I assume?' Daryl cut himself a second slice.
'Yes,' Rosa answered. 'She is also studying the teachings of rabbi Hillel. There is a study group that gets together at the Leek's.
She is becoming quite fond of debate.' Rosa smiled at Emlyn.
'That's wonderful! I'm so glad I got to know Sophie. I miss her at times...' Em looked wistful. Debate, eh? Should she introduce her young friend to Marx and Engels, perhaps...?
'Rabbi Hillel. One of my favorite teachers,' Daryl remarked. 'He was asked the same question which was put to Jesus: 'Which is the first commandment of all?' And Hillel replied, 'Do not do unto others that which is hateful unto thee. That is the essence of the Torah. All the rest is commentary.'--Brilliant, is it not?! So simple and so true. And, so ignored by so many, alas.' Daryl brooded.
All sat quietly for a moment. At last Daryl stood, stretching. 'Well! Let's to business! Manuel, did you bring the receipts for the final sales from the shop?' Manuel and Daryl sauntered off down the hall into the library, to discuss 'business'.
The three women relaxed amongst themselves and caught up on news of back home in California whilst the winds howled about the windows of the Massachusetts manse.
'I should have known, Rosa, that you and Manuel knew of Daryl's place here...and ah, everything about it...' Em gazed up at Rosa, seeing her friend with new eyes.
'Of course, Em! How else would we get here?' She laughed as if it was the most natural thing in the world; timewalking. 'You know the old sorcerers of Mexico and South America have been doing this for centuries...'
'--As have the Kelts!' Shannon added, 'And no doubt folk in every country who knew a thing or two! 'The craft of the wise...'' Shannon frowned. 'It was driven underground though, you know. They tried to kill us, but magic will out. It is simply knowledge, long denied..."Don't eat that fruit! Bad kitties!"' She smiled.
Emlyn thought then of the Cup. She wondered how many such artefacts there were in the wide world, and what sort of uses were they being put to? What might have been the purpose of the Holy Grail? And what of Daryl's intents and purposes?
'That's true...' she mused. 'So-called 'magic' is simply knowledge. The Church tried to stamp out humanitys' thirst for knowledge but, not everyone is so complacent as to bow their heads and do what Big Daddy wants, whether it makes sense or no.' She sighed.
'Whether it wipes out life on earth and destroys the entire planet; according to Daryl--this clinging to complacency and ignorance is what killed the earth and humanity, in his time. Setting people apart from nature and seeing the natural world, and women, of course, as evil, WAS evil in itself! And so...alas, poor Gaia, I hardly knew ye...'
'Be glad that we know better, Em,' Shannon nodded. 'But, tell us more, Rosa. What else is going on with the Druids on the Hill, then?'
'Ah, well, they're planning their big Samhain party of course! That will be soon...'
'Soon?!' Emlyn's head jerked round. 'It can't be! Surely, Shannon, you said it was just now the beginning of October!'
'It was when I got here...' Shannon frowned.
Rosa was shaking her head, looking serious.
'Ah, no; Samhain is next week!' She sighed, 'And after today, who knows? Hopefully, I haven't missed it already!'
A low rumble of thunder punctuated her revelations, and wind buffeted the trees against the windowpanes...obviously temporal distortion weather out.
To Rosa's relief, Daryl and Manuel re-entered the kitchen at last. 'Time to go?' she asked hopefully, having now recalled just how tricky timeslips can be. She did not want to miss Samhain and Dia de los Muertos after.
'All set.' He turned to Daryl, bowing like a courtier. 'Gracias, Diego! We will see you soon, perhaps? And you, as well, Emlyn! The place is not the same without you...'
Farewells and promises of visits to come were made, and then, with the next crack of thunder, the two visitors from Nob Hill were present no longer.
Shannon sat staring at the empty space which they had just occupied, rather in a mild state of benign bewilderment, having witnessed what she, herself had done, when riding other timelines.
'...Just all in a day's work for you folk, eh?' She blinked and turned to Em.
Daryl smoothly poured more tea all round.
'It's nothing, really. It becomes as normal as passing from one room to another, eventually.' His features reflected a thoughtful mien as he sipped. 'One becomes used to it. It is, for Rosa and Manuel, simply part of the household routine; funds for a few months to come, taking care of old business, catching up on things.'
Em rather doubted the 'becoming used to it' part. But she let Daryl smooth over the high strangeness of it all whilst Shannon was here.
'Let us take tea in the library, shall we?' He set the tea service on a tray and motioned the ladies down the hallway. 'I've something there that Shannon may find of interest.'
Emlyn did not doubt that he did. She went along with it anyway...
. . . .
Em noticed that Daryl, or Manuel, perhaps, had taken pains to have a fire in the library already. He set the tea tray upon the low table before the sofa and chairs gathered round about the hearth side, then when all were comfortably settled, he brought forth two large volumes of picture books.
Atypically, he sat himself on the sofa, between Em and Shannon, nudging Emlyn over as he stepped about her legs.
'Right. Here is what I thought Shannon may find intriguing...' Daryl opened the first book to a color photo of a clear, sharp image, taken from above, of a curious pictogram etched in a green field. The White Horse of Uffington could be viewed nearby.
'Daryl, I recognize these pictograms! They are crop circles, are they not?' Em also knew these were the images that Gwydion had conjured up to dance upon, during that last Midwinter Ball whilst she was still enspelled within the faeryland of the Twyleth Teg.
Diosa, had that really been nearly a year ago, already?
Shannon looked at the photos with a puzzled frown. 'What...exactly am I seeing here? How was this picture taken? Not from a tall tree, or tower; there are none this high about.'
Daryl turned the pages before them. 'It is, as Em said, a crop circle--or a pictogram etched into the crops; grains usually.'
'They're beautiful! So intricate and precise! Like cut with a razor...' Shannon breathed, as she leaned over the pages, eyes alight.
'Yes, but no crops are actually harmed, not if it's a real circle. The stalks are only bent, never broken,' Daryl informed her.
'So, how is it done, then?' Shannon's hand smoothed out the page near her, a light finger tracing the design.
Daryl smiled his sideways grin at her, catching her eye. 'That, my dear, is the question. No one knows how it was created. Or who was the artist.'
Shannon stared at him with wide emerald eyes.
'No one knows? ALL these, are a mystery, even to the folk of your own time?!'
Daryl nodded. 'And, that's not all. Some of the largest and most detailed appear within minutes. And no footprints left, no wheel tracks. Nothing left as evidence of the crafter.'
Shannon pulled the book closer and began turning the pages, whilst Daryl smiled and arose, giving it over to her. He added fuel to the fire, and stood hearthside with one arm over the mantlepiece. He glanced their way...
'An intriguing mystery, indeed. These would show up every year, becoming more intricate and detailed over time.'
'Such a blessing of the goddess!' Shannon exclaimed softly, reverently. 'Folk must be celebrating madly whenever such gifts are so magnificently bestowed!'
Daryl said nothing for a time, as Em and Shannon paged through the pictures. Then,
'Actually, not many people pay them any mind whatsoever. Those who do, are detractors and nay-sayers who scoff and call them a mere joke.'
Em had expected this, having heard something of it before. Shannon sat stunned, however.
'You, you can't be serious, Daryl! How could something so...beyond all human possibility, be a joke?! The goddess does not jest!'
'Oh, but I am quite serious, my dear.' Daryl drummed his fingers on the mantle. 'When any attention was given the circles, wags and pundits would blithely explain that these were merely created by a pair of old local barstool warmers, Doug and Dave, who produced boards strapped to their feet and 'confessed' to going round about the fields in circles...of course this doesn't take into account the bent, not broken stems, or microwave radiation found in the real circles.'
Shannon snorted. 'A couple of old rummies made these? Within scant minutes? Are people of your time absolutely without any sense whatsoever?'
She caught herself then. 'Eh, sorry...'
Daryl sighed long, head hanging down, a dark forelock over his eye, a match for Jack just then, thought Em. He began his panther's pacing...
'Alas, folk of my time, as you put it, were ever ready to accept any reason for anything that defied scientific explanation. That is; the science of the time. Which was, admittedly, hide-bound and blinkered. As Newtonian physics gave way to Einsteinian; quantum mechanics at last came close to seeing the world as it really was, and could be, if people just gave up their preconceived notions...'
Daryl frowned as he strode the room, stopping to gaze out the windows occasionally at the storm clouds massing once more.
'I often wondered myself; why is the human race so determined to remain ignorant? It is certainly not to their betterment in any way, and is, in fact, "highly illogical".' He smiled at some private joke, as he put his hands in his pockets and turned to them.
Em started, aware suddenly he was addressing her. 'Indeed, Daryl. It would seem that this insistence by people of your time, to not see what would seem to be glaring right before their eyes, is the reason for their ultimate downfall.'
Daryl's smile widened. 'Touche', Em! Exactement!
That is why I wondered...is it in the water, perhaps? Some chemical agent making people passive and cow-like? --Willing to go along with any crackpot explanation versus the evidence before their very eyes?'
'It would have to be...' Shannon shook her head, as she reached for the other picture book. 'These are certainly not made by human hand. The incredible beauty of these pieces! For indeed, they are art! Like sculptures of the gods, carved into the very earth herself!'
Shannon tsked as she turned the pages, becoming more astounded with every new photo. She glanced up at Daryl.
'Had people lost their ability to feel, then?'
Daryl sauntered back to his wing chair and poured more tea. 'Yes, ultimately, I believe that was it, really. All the decades of city life, knowing only concrete and computer screens, the constant onslaught of loud, incessant noise...people simply folded in upon themselves, desperately trying to isolate themselves from the ugliness and continual harshness of the world. They became like moles, not wanting to see anything, feel anything, or know anything...we were beaten into becoming null and void, finally.'
Shannon sat up straight. 'Well. Curiosity, and being open to mystery, is a healthy attribute, I have always believed, isn't it so, Em?'
'Ah, yes, indeed,' Em deigned to answer, wondering now where Daryl was leading...
She hadn't long to wonder.
'So very true, my dears...' Daryl leaned forward, gazing at them intently. 'And, now, I think Shannon has earned, by virtue of her wonderful faculty for curiosity and adventure, another glimpse into the Mysteries of the Unknown...'
Taking the first book, and setting it up on the table by the spine, he folded the covers open towards him, and biting his lip in concentration, he appeared to reach inside, into the book!
--And drew forth--The Cup.
'Ooh!' Shannon gasped; her green eyes brightened like jewels in sunlight as she blinked at the solidity of the rather large and obviously real, no doubt heavy silver cup, which had suddenly appeared before her, as if brought forth from the pages of the book by Daryl's art.
Emlyn frowned at Daryl, wondering how he had maneuvered this particular trick into being...he had played his part perfectly, she had to admit, and certainly had Shannon in the palm of his mendacious hand.
Any objections made by Em now, she knew, would only make her appear to be, like the unfortunate folk of Daryl's time, unwilling to participate in a munificent chance for exploration.
'It is...simply stunning!' Shannon seemed entirely absorbed by the Cup's power and beauty.
Her hand reached out and hovered over it.
'I feel a great force, an energy surrounding it!' She glanced at Daryl, astonished.
'What does it do?'
Daryl smiled a small smile.
. . . .
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