DOMINION Bentley Little (accelerated reader books .TXT) 📖

had been tacked up next to photographs of Greek ruins and historical sights, and everywhere were piles of books and papers.

Against the far wall was what looked like a Greek shrine, or a high school drama department’s conception of a Greek shrine. It was rough and amateurish, its pillars made of grey papier mâché, and appeared to be only half finished.

Holbrook walked over to a desk on which a battered computer terminal was flanked by two giant stacks of notebooks. He picked up the top notebook, fished a pen out from under the papers that covered the rest of the desk, and turned toward Penelope, opening the notebook to a blank page.

“It’s Dion, isn’t it? Dion Semele?”

She nodded. “Tell me how it happened. Tell me everything you know. Start from the beginning.”

She did.

Kevin had heard it before, but the story was just as horrifying and unbelievable the second time. Holbrook listened silently, intently, scribbling furiously in his notebook.

“Fascinating.” The teacher continued to write after Penelope had finished talking. “So the gods hid inside genes and chromosomes. In DNA.” He shook his head, smiled to himself. “This could be the origin of Jung’s conception of the universal archetype, the collective unconscious. Perhaps this is where the concept that God is to be found within us got started—”

“Write a paper later,” Kevin said. “Jesus, there are people dying out there. We don’t have time to sit around playing little mind games.”

“These ‘little mind games’ are what’s going to save your ass.” Holbrook turned back toward Penelope. “You don’t know what they were chanting when they were anointing Dion with the blood?”

She shook her head. “Not really.”

“That’s too bad. If you did, we might be able to reverse the process. As it is…” He trailed off.

“Can he be killed?” Kevin asked.

Penelope looked from Holbrook to Kevin. “Killed?” she said, her voice rising.

Kevin could not meet her eyes. “Can he?”

The teacher nodded slowly. “I think so. But I don’t know for sure. I suppose we should be thankful that the first god to come back is a god of flesh. It increases our odds greatly. Dionysus is also a cyclical god. Like the other agricultural gods which sprang up in his wake, his life parallels the cycle of nature, in his case, the grape, the vine. He lives and blooms, withers and dies, is reborn again next season.”

“Then he should be dying pretty soon,” Kevin said. “The season’s over for this year, I think.” He glanced toward Penelope for confirmation, but she would not look at him.

“Perhaps not.” Holbrook walked to the other side of the basement and from between two piles of books produced a McDonald’s cup in which a twig was half immersed in water. He brought the cup over, pointed at a sprout of green on the side of the otherwise brown twig. “Look at that,” he said. “What do you see?”

Kevin shrugged. “A bud.”

“Yes. A grape vine. Blooming. In the late fall. Do you know what that means?”

Kevin shook his head.

“The cycles have changed, to coincide with Dionysus’ rebirth.” He put the cup down on the desk. “I don’t know how far this phenomenon extends, whether it’s only here in the valley, whether it’s everywhere, but the vine is supposed to be dying now, to be reborn in spring.” He stopped, staring into space for a moment, then began writing in his notebook again. “I never thought of that before. Dionysus and Siva.”

“What?”

“Siva, or Shiva, the Hindu god of destruction and regeneration. Siva has many parallels with Dionysus. Maybe they’re the same god, different name.”

“Who gives a shit?” Kevin said. “Jesus. We came to you for some help.”

Penelope cleared her throat. When she spoke, her voice was quieter than it had been before. “How will he die?” she asked.

Holbrook looked at her. “He’ll be torn apart.”

“Oh, God.”

“Maybe we can speed up the season somehow,” Kevin suggested. “Once he’s dead, maybe the rest of them’ll—”

“What are you talking about?” Penelope demanded. “That’s Dion! Your friend!”

“It’s not Dion,” Kevin said. “Dion’s dead.”

“No, he’s not. He’s in there. Trying to get out.”

Kevin shook his head, resigned. “It doesn’t really matter anyway, does it? Even if we kill him, he’ll only be reborn again next season.”

“Then he’ll be dead. Dionysus might be reborn, but Dion won’t. If we kill him now, we’ll be killing Dion.”

Holbrook closed his notebook. “You’re right. You’re both right. It’s possible that Dionysus can’t be permanently killed. But the form he has taken can be. And if he was driven into dormancy for thousands of years, he can be driven so again.”

“How?” Kevin asked.

“I don’t know yet. But for all these centuries Dionysus has been like a seed waiting for the right soil. And that soil was Dion. If we can destroy this incarnation, it might be centuries before another compatible host can be found again.”

Kevin took a deep breath. He realized that his hands were shaking, and he slipped them into the front pockets of his jeans to steady them.

“What about God? Our God? What’s He doing? Why doesn’t He do something about this? Have we been worshiping the wrong god all this time? Was He something we just made up?”

Mr. Holbrook shook his head. “God’s real. At least, I think He’s real. But I also think that we can’t and shouldn’t count on Him for help. He doesn’t intervene in wars, He doesn’t stop natural disasters, He doesn’t halt the spread of disease. These are all problems we must deal with ourselves. And I think this is the same way. You know, we refer to Dionysus and the other Old World deities as ‘gods,’ and perhaps to us they are. But I don’t think they’re gods in the true sense of the word. I don’t think they’re omnipotent. The myths, in fact, tell us that they’re not. I think they’re beings or creatures with powers greater than our own, but I do not think that their power can be measured against that of a true god, against… well,