Sherlock Holmes 01: The Breath of God (19 page)

I am particularly good at two things in life: being a soldier and being a doctor, taking lives and saving them. The irony doesn’t amuse me one bit.

“He must tire soon,” said Crowley, “this is leagues beyond his previous efforts.”

“He knows there are many of us,” responded Carnacki, reloading while I took my turn, “and this...” he gestured towards the creatures, “this is just cannon fodder, keeping us distracted before the next big threat.”

As if on cue, the ground shook. Karswell fell to the floor, cursing as some of his little pieces of paper fluttered around him.

“What was that?” asked Silence.

“At a guess,” I replied, taking my six shots quickly, “the next big threat.”

The ground shook again and we could hear the sound of breaking glass from somewhere along the corridor.

The creatures were coming in greater numbers now, more than Carnacki and I could manage with just the two guns.

Picking himself up, Karswell stepped alongside us, muttering under his breath, folding his little pieces of paper and pitching them towards the creatures. The paper pellets hit like small grenades, blowing holes in the creatures as surely as our bullets. Silence came to the fore also, not manifesting his animal spirits this time but instead sending percussive blasts of air from the tips of his fingers that had the same effect as both bullets and pellets.

Once more, the room shook as something large, something terrible, came our way.

“I need you to cover for me,” said Carnacki, as he reached for the glass tubes he had been connecting earlier. He looked to Crowley as he screwed them together. “You’re not being much help,” he said, “this is your battle, remember?”

I didn’t hear Crowley’s reply, I was too busy taking my turn at shooting the creatures that continued to flood towards us.

Boom
. The earth shook again. This time the candelabra actually left the ground, all jumping half a foot or so before dropping back with a resounding thud. The candles flickered, a couple extinguishing, dropping us into even greater darkness.

“Nearly ready,” said Carnacki behind me, “nearly ready.”

The tide of small creatures ceased, the last falling to one of Silence’s flicks of compressed air. “Wait for a target,” he said, hands extended, long fingers twitching.

Karswell took the opportunity to create more ammunition, scribbling sets of runes on more blank parchment. He set great stock by the effects of these “words of power”, and having seen them in action, I couldn’t help but agree.

Another tremor, and the dawning certainty that there was
something
out there in the dark. A warm gust of air passed over us, a breath I realised, that brought with it the sweet, straw stench of an animal cage in a zoo.

“It’s right here!” shouted Karswell.

“Not for long,” insisted Carnacki, flicking a switch on the large wooden box that sat by his feet. There was a brief whine that built into a solid, low hum. In his hands the glass tubes were now constructed as a mirror of the chalk shape we stood in. Surrounded by a fan of metal shutters, the tubes glowed brightly, powered by the acid battery in the wooden box, cables hanging between the two as he strode forward. “The Electric Pentacle,” he explained, his face bathed in the blue light the device cast. “A weapon of my own design, the gas in the tubes has mystical properties, the light it casts is hugely powerful.” He moved to the furthest point in the pentangle. “It burns,” he said finally, pointing the pentangle out towards the darkness and flipping a large brass switch that dangled from one of the wires hanging around him.

The light from the Electric Pentacle pulsed and Carnacki triggered a switch at the rear of the device that brought the shutters down, surrounding the tubes like the petals of a flower, focusing their light in a steady beam directly into the darkness.

For a brief second we all caught a glimpse of the creature that was out there as the light reflected off its many black eyes, and the quivering mass of ganglia it sported where its mouth should be. Then there was nothing but the blue light, and the ground shook once more as the creature returned to wherever it had come from.

Carnacki gave a short cry as the Electric Pentacle began to smoke in his hands. “The cables!” he shouted, getting tangled in them. “Disconnect!”

I yanked the two, heavy-duty wires from the top of the wooden box and the light immediately cut out.

Carnacki slowly lowered the whole device to the floor and stepped back, waving his burned hands in the air. “Needs a bit more work,” he admitted.

“Seems just fine to me,” I said, “it’s certainly effective.”

Carnacki nodded. “True, but if it had exploded, I’m not completely sure it wouldn’t have torn a hole in the fabric of reality and that wouldn’t have been good.”

“What’s wrong with Crowley?” asked Silence suddenly, dashing over to where the man had fallen flat on his back.

“He is possessed,” said Karswell, stepping back slightly as Crowley’s body began to shake. “What did you do to him?” he asked Carnacki.

“Me?” Carnacki was clearly affronted. “What makes you think I did anything?”

“You were the last to talk to him.”

“I merely asked him why he wasn’t taking a very active role – a fair comment!”

“Gentlemen,” I said, grabbing Crowley’s arm and feeling for a pulse, “now is hardly the time.”

Crowley appeared to be experiencing some form of seizure, his teeth clenched, his brow furrowed. Beads of sweat trickled down his face as he thrashed around on the floor.

“Dear Lord!” I moved back slightly, startled by the sight of his body beginning to swell beneath the purple robes.

“What is happening to him?” Karswell shouted. “He’s inflating like a damned balloon!”

Silence moved forward, pushing between Crowley and I. “Forgive me, Doctor,” he said, “but this may be a matter that requires more than medical knowledge.”

Feeling it was hardly constructive to fight the man over it, I stepped back and allowed him room.

He held Crowley down as the robes continued to swell, as if he were filling up from the inside.

“The Breath of God!” declared Karswell. “It must be!”

Crowley’s eyes flickered open and he roared at the ceiling. The experience was incredible, a wind that raged through the room, knocking over the candelabra, smashing the censers and extinguishing the fires.

“It’s here!” Crowley shouted. “Help me push it —”

There was a sudden silence. The darkness was empty for a few moments then a match was struck illuminating Carnacki’s face. I heard him elevating one of the toppled candelabra and then watched as he relit the candles.

“Gone,” whispered Crowley. “It’s gone.”

“You destroyed it?” I asked.

Crowley shook his head. “Just sent it elsewhere, released it...”

“Released it?” Carnacki was beside himself with rage. “You’ve let it loose?”

Crowley nodded and Carnacki looked as deflated as I had ever seen him. “Then who knows how many will die before we might contain it once more.”

E
XCERPT
F
ROM A
L
ETTER
W
RITTEN BY
D
R
J
OHN
W
ATSON TO
S
HERLOCK
H
OLMES

I begin to think that this letter will never be posted.

Holmes, for all my favourable talk of the country it must be remembered that they have no infrastructure here. If I want to send you a message, I have to commit to half an hour’s cart journey and a village post office that views opening times with the sort of loose informality that would have an urban business bankrupt within a week.

No matter, I can only hope that I will find the time when I arise later, for really, matters have come to a point and we need you here. I need you here. If only to tell me I’m dreaming.

I have explained to you, in as much detail as possible, the events of the night, our “battle” against whatever unbelievable forces they were that faced us across the dimensions. Oh dear Lord... I’m even beginning to talk like them. Holmes, you simply cannot imagine how terrifying it was. Worse, how quickly one stops questioning and just adapts. I was firing my service revolver at DEMONS, Holmes. My whole view of the world is in ruins.

And Mary. How can I not think of her? Now that I know that the veil between life and death is thinner than I imagined, now that I know that there are souls out there that are still
themselves
. I was somewhat ambivalent about the idea of an afterlife, Holmes, I think all soldiers are; have to be. But now I begin to wonder.

I miss her so very much.

Enough, forgive me, my friend, I know you find this sort of conversation awkward. Let’s stick to the facts shall we?

Where had I got to...? Ah yes, Carnacki’s concern that the Breath of God was now loose upon the world.

I cannot pretend I followed every aspect of their conversation. Once the battle was done – and it was, there were no more attacks after that – my adrenalin faded and I began to feel that same sense of disassociation I had experienced on the train. A dizziness and lethargy, nausea even. It was shock, I know, I am a medical man after all.

Still, despite my discomfort and confusion, I followed the generalities of their discussion. It seemed that Mathers’ final act had been to send the Breath of God directly into Crowley. How he was able to do that I cannot say, the words of explanation simply slip off the brain. No doubt I adopted that vacant look Mary always had once I started to discuss anatomy. All you had to do to send that woman to sleep was speak Latin.

Explanations aside, that is what had happened. And in order to defend himself, Crowley had vented it elsewhere. Where, he could not say. He suspects London (in which case you will likely know more about it than me) because he tried to send it right back to its source. But he could not be certain.

As dawn broke it shone its light on five exhausted men. The only plan we had was to use a “scrying” ritual (don’t ask) to try and locate the Breath of God, but apparently before that could even be considered all concerned needed to rest. Fighting psychically is – logically enough I suppose – extremely draining.

I confess that I was unsure as to whether I could possibly sleep after such an experience. In all honesty, though, as I write these words, I find I am struggling to stay awake. Perhaps it would be better were I to leave

I was shaken roughly awake by a hand on my shoulder.

“What?” I was extremely disorientated and despite the perfect brightness of the day that lit my room, it took me a few moments for my vision to clear. I rubbed at my face, aware that someone had awoken me, yet I could so easily have fallen back asleep, my mind was that sluggish.

“Have a drink of water,” said a familiar voice, “it may help.”

“Holmes?” I asked, my voice cracking, throat dry.

I looked over to find him sat beside me on the bed, propped up on my spare pillows. Scattered all over the bed and floor were pages of writing. My letter, I realised. I was about to remonstrate with him when he placed his finger to his lips and smiled.

“Keep your voice down, my friend,” he said, “I have no wish to disturb the rest of the household as yet.”

I took a drink of water as he had suggested, to clear my throat. “You mean they don’t know you’re here?”

“I entered via your window,” he gave a dry chuckle, “though I have left some of the most complex and absurd dance-patterns in the sand outside Crowley’s temple, I’m afraid I just couldn’t resist!”

“Oh Holmes...”

“Never mind that. I’ve read your letter and must say that I’m enthralled. What an adventure you’ve had.”

“Perhaps you wouldn’t have been so enthralled had you been forced to experience it. I have never been so...” Words failed me for a moment as a surge of emotion choked me. That was immediately replaced by a sense of extreme irritation. I knew my friend could hardly relate to such feelings and the last thing I wanted was to appear weak. I growled in anger and drank some more water, if only so as to engage myself with something that was neither speaking nor crying.

“I know,” Holmes said gently, proving that he can at least have some empathy, “forgive me, I should not joke. But you must see that all of this represents the most intriguing set of circumstances to cross my path for years.” He sparkled, as alive on the events he was mired in, glowing as bright as Carnacki’s Electric Pentacle had the night before. He had the same violent excitement that he used to seek from cocaine, that fizzy stimulation that was his preferred state. It is a wonder to me Holmes was ever able to grow old, he really didn’t have the hobbies for it.

“But do you believe it?” I asked, quietly, afraid of course of being made to feel foolish.

“I believe you saw every single thing you say you did,” he replied, picking up a few stray pages of the letter and flinging them to the floor. “And I believe we are close to a resolution in all this.”

“But the Breath of God...”

“Blows at the command of another,” Holmes interrupted, “and that is where we must concentrate our energies.”

He got to his feet. “I have observed from a distance for long enough. It’s time I re-entered the fray,” he announced, unlocking the window and swinging one wire-thin leg out of it. “But I shall do so via the front door, as a guest not a cat burglar.”

And before I could say another word, he had dropped entirely from my sight.

It occurred to me to check my watch and I was startled to see it was already half past three in the afternoon. I had certainly been tired to have slept so long. In fact, if Holmes hadn’t roused me, who knows how long I would have continued?

I rang McGillicuddy and asked for some hot water, also enquiring as to whether anyone else had arisen.

“No, sir,” he said, his disdain almost completely hidden, “but that is not unusual in this household,”