Reign of Evil

Preeti was busy trying to find the radio beacon they’d placed in the golem’s head, but with no luck at all. She also pointed out to them something they’d completely forgotten. Tomorrow was Christmas. Not only was it one of the pinnacle Christian holidays, but it was also a well-known pagan holiday, predating the determination that the twenty-fifth of December was the birthday of Jesus Christ.

Holmes made it clear that this was not a time to celebrate. They were neck deep in pagan mythology and needed to be aware of its dangers.

Laws, ever the encyclopedic mind, shared that more than four hundred years before the birth of Christ early Romans celebrated the birth date of the deity Saturnus. It originally began as a simple banquet on December 17 but then grew to a five-day affair, highlighted by gambling, gift giving, and a general bacchanal celebration. It eventually became something different as Saturnus’s darker aspects were celebrated. In addition to everything they’d done previously, Romans introduced the Lord of Misrule as part of the holiday. Every Roman community selected a man or woman to become the Lord of Misrule, who would represent the enemy of their people. Beginning on the seventeenth of December, they’d feed and treat this person as if he or she were an actual lord, denying him or her nothing. But then on December 25 they’d come together and kill the Lord of Misrule. Ancient Greek poet, Lucian, mentioned in his texts that revelers would also travel from home to home naked, singing the songs of the day; performing deviant sexual public acts, including rape; and eating human-shaped biscuits to symbolize the eating of your enemy.

Walker found the information creepy, especially when he thought of the similarities to the Christmas he and every other American kid normally celebrated. To think that the gingerbread man had a violent and terrible past was stunning.

Holly, ivy, the giving of gifts, the use of an evergreen tree, and many more symbols of modern Christmas were derived from ancient Roman pagan customs. Laws and Preeti weren’t sure how December 25 would affect the power of the Red Grove or other neo-pagan groups but had to be aware that it might have an incongruous effect on the success or failure of any mission they might be conducting. Just as the Winter Solstice was a special day for the Red Grove, Triple Six had to consider that Christmas might be as well.

The house they needed to surveil was a two-story Tudor with four chimneys and seven dormers. Records showed it to belong to Jason Belair, who ran an import-export business specializing in North European antiques and collectibles. He’d been referred to in a Financial Times of London article as being the kitschy king of secondhand Ikea. Although the description was unflattering, his net worth was upwards of 100 million pounds.

The home was less than two hundred meters from Glastonbury Tor, which held an interesting place in British history and mythology. No one exactly knew how it was formed, but because the hill rises 150 meters above the surrounding plain it had been used since at least 400 BC as a place to defend from.

“Tor” was an English word referring to a high rock or hill. But the name used by the Celts for the hill was Yns yr Afalon, which translated meant “The Isle of Avalon,” linking it directly to King Arthur.

When this piece of information had been discovered, it had set off a murmur of excitement among them in the chapel basement. But what they found next was even more intriguing. According to the twelfth-century poet Gerald of Wales, monks from the nearby Glastonbury Abbey discovered a coffin buried in the side of the Tor. It bore an inscription identifying it as Queen Guinevere’s. Although this presented an exciting prospect, experts now believe that the monks, who’d recently lost their abbey to a fire, might have had a more commercial reason for finding and selling the artifact. Gerald of Wales also indicates that Glastonbury Tor was one of the possible locations of the Holy Grail, especially because of the discovery of the Nanteos Cup at the same abbey. The cup was allegedly brought to Briton by Joseph of Arimathea, who was believed to have founded the Christian settlement at Glastonbury Tor.

Finally, what was arguably most interesting was the connection of the Tor in Celtic mythology to Gwyn ap Nudd, also known as Annwn, and later called King of the Faeries. The hill became known as the entrance to Avalon, the land of the faeries. Yet even with all that history, the Tor usually wasn’t considered a mound but rather a fortification. Those gathered in the basement were coming to believe something a little bit different.

“I always wanted the legend of King Arthur to be real,” Walker said when they were still twenty minutes out. “The whole Knights of the Round Table and the quest for the Holy Grail seemed so spiritual.”