Forbidden Book:
The Time of the Great Crusade
There is only one copy of this book in existence,
and it is not in Yves' Library.
In point of fact, there is some indication that it was never in
Yves' Library - or any other's, including the texts that Kronos has managed to
assemble. This just by itself would be
enough to alarm a great number of individuals, but as always there's more.
The first oddity is in the book's composition. It is apparently a set of approximately 150
pages of various types of paper and parchment that have been crudely bound in a
badly cured leather cover. The pages
share no consistency in type, makeup or even size: at least five look like they
were hastily trimmed to roughly fit, obscuring three lines of text in the
process. Some of the pages are upside
down, or flipped around. The overall
effect is one of hasty compiling and sloppy binding coupled with poor
bookbinding technique, which makes the fact that it comes in a hand-carved
ebony carrying case with jade/amber inlay and a rich velvet lining to be even
more unusual.
Then there's the layout and format of the book: it
is, in a word, decidedly odd. The
language generally seems to be in a strange dialect of English that does not
use the letter 'j' but does retain the alternate version of 's' used in the
medieval period. There are numerous
sections of the work written in phonetic Angelic, Helltongue... and a large
section on what appears to be metaphysics that seems to be written in a dialect
that apparently draws on both languages.
The text is not a finished copy: the style switches from handwritten to
printing in both daisywheel and ink (assuming that ink jets used literally
golden ink) to typewritten (with a faded ribbon) and then back to handwritten,
with numerous crossing-outs, revisions, marginal notes and doodles. Needless to say, the ink used is equally
variable: there are at least three colors, two types of pencil, one type of
brightly-colored wax (purple), three substances that frankly defy all known
analysis and what appears to be dried demonic blood (the last section shows
signs of attempted removal with a rubber eraser).
But the really interesting (in the Chinese proverb
sense of the word) material is in the text itself; not so much in what it says,
but what it assumes. Some of the odder
ones:
·
Beelzebub
was the Demon Prince of Corruption, not Destruction - and he died in 455 AD,
not 935 AD.
·
The
titles Defender of the True Faith and Paramount of the Seraphim
Council were never Uriel's.
·
There
was only one major Crusade against the ethereal pantheons, which did not
include the Hindu Pantheon. Under no
circumstances could said be Crusade be described as taking place over the
course of centuries.
·
Blandine,
Novalis and Marc were never given the epithet of Heresiarch by the
Seraphim Council. Gabriel has never
adopted the epithet of Martyred.
·
There
is no recorded instance of a duel having taken place between Genubath and David
in 1008.
·
In
1056, Laurence could not accurately be described as "Angel of Faith and
Sword of Purity", Khalid could not be described as "Apostate of
Purity", Dominic would not have been referred to in the past tense, Mariel
would not have been referred to in the present tense, no list of Archangels
would have excluded Michael, referred to Jean and Eli as "Penitent"
and included Raphael at all.
·
Starting
in 1075 the phrase "Reconciled with our Lord" has a strong corollary
with the aforementioned title of Heresiarch in the text, and tended to be the
last time the name of any angel described by it occurs in said text.
·
The
Tsayadim have never engaged in organized activities against either the Grigori
or their descendents.
·
The
meaning and extent of the term "Oblivion Plague" is obscure. The population of Earth in 1550 was
considerably larger than 125,000.
·
There
was never a Second Rebellion, or anything that could be fairly described as an
Infernal Civil War. Mariel was never
titled the Nugatory of Hell, even briefly.
·
Lists
of Superiors after 1575 are full of unfamiliar names: only Eli, Janus, Jean and
Yves are recognizable on the list of the Seraphim Council and Alaemon, Lilith,
Kobal and Meserach on the list of Demon Princes. The Archangel of War has never been named Hermione. Alaemon is the Demon Prince of Secrets, not
the Game.
·
The
1589 Treaty of Reconciliation does not exist, and the terms that are enunciated
in the text are uniformly blasphemous.
·
No
Archangel and Demon Prince have ever entered into a marriage ceremony with each
other - particularly two whose names appear on no official lists of Superiors.
·
There
is also no indication that Heaven and Hell has ever collaborated on something
called the Chronomantic Reweaving Project.
·
The
names 'Kronos' and 'Valefor' do not appear anywhere in the text.
·
Janus
and Yves have never been granted the title of "Willing
Sacrificial". For that matter,
neither has Alaemon.
Needless to say, the book hums with Truth. Also needless to say, too public a
brandishing of this book will attract the interested attention of agents of
Judgement, the Game, Fate, Destiny, Secrets and (oddly enough) both the Wind
and Theft.
But you probably figured that out already.