Виктор Пахомов – Sherlock Holmes: The Gate of Oblivion. Volume 1 (страница 8)
In front of them was a heavy door made of black obsidian.There was no lock on it. Only a smooth surface and a small hole in the center – perfectly round. «Magic won’t help here, Elian,» Holmes went to the door. – Mechanics are needed here.
He took out the Book of Euclid and placed its spine against the hole.There was a quiet click, and then the hum of hundreds of gears hidden inside the rock.The obsidian parted to the sides, opening the way inside.
The interior of the Third Tower was frighteningly familiar to Holmes.There were no magical lamps here.Copper gas pipes ran along the walls, and real horns burned in the niches, filling the room with the yellowish, cozy light of London. On the shelves were flasks, chemistry reference books, and even – Holmes shuddered involuntarily – a porcelain figurine of a dog, an exact copy of the one that stood on Baker Street.
«He recreated our past,» Elian whispered, looking around.«But it seems… dead.»
«It’s static,» Holmes walked slowly along the carpet, which muffled the sounds of footsteps. – Moriarty loves collections.And now he collects worlds.
They climbed the spiral staircase to the top tier.The sound of the metronome grew louder, turning into hammer blows in my head.In the center of the room, at a massive mahogany table, sat a man. His back was perfectly straight, and his pale fingers were fingering some papers. *** CARD LETTER «T» ***
The tyranny of your «ideal society» is only a natural consequence of boredom, Professor,» said Holmes, entering the office. James Moriarty slowly turned around. He looked impeccable – a black frock coat, not a single wrinkle.
«Emptiness is just a matter of perception, Sherlock.«I just added structure to this world.Now Aetor works like my watch.And soon I will launch this mechanism at full capacity.
– At the cost of destroying all living things? – Holmes pointed with his cane at the window, beyond which the Lower Ring flickered with poisonous lights below.
– Progress always requires sacrifices. You know that yourself.Give me the Orb, Sherlock.She is the heart of this world.The ancients created it as a stabilizer.She is the only thing that can resist my logic.
Holmes straightened up.The sphere in his chest responded with a powerful shock.
«I’m afraid, Professor, I have other plans for this evening.»Moriarty froze for a moment, and a shadow flashed across his pale face – either annoyance or sincere admiration. He slowly approached the huge window, behind which the Silver Moon floated majestically in the inky sky of Eldria.Its cold, deathly pale light fell on his thin fingers, making them look like the phalanges of a skeleton.
– Cemetery, Sherlock? – Moriarty turned around, and his eyes in the light of the moon seemed like two empty mirrors.«You have always been too attached to biological sentimentality.«What you call a cemetery, I call ideal order.Silence is the absence of error.
Holmes didn’t answer. He slowly took out the Book of Euclid from under his cloak.The heavy binding made of dark wood gleamed mattely in the glow of the Silver Moon.The detective placed the book on the table between himself and the Professor, covering it with his palm.
«You left this for me in the Library, James.«Geometry as a framework for your new world. But you made the classic mistake of a dictator: you forgot that axioms do not need protection, and your laws need violence against the very nature of this world.
«The axioms are undeniable,» Moriarty retorted softly, nodding at the book.«I just cleared this world of magical garbage using your favorite tools.«Look at Elian. He is scared because his world is quicksand. I offer him a granite rock.
Elian, standing behind Holmes, involuntarily clenched his fists.The light of the Silver Moon highlighted the pallor of his face, but his eyes no longer held that paralyzing fear. «Your rock is a tombstone,» Elian’s voice sounded unexpectedly firm.«Eldria’s magic may be chaotic, but it is alive.It flows like blood. What you are doing is turning blood into ice.
Moriarty looked at the young man for the first time with the interest that a scientist shows in an unusual type of mold.
«Living blood tends to be shed, young man.«Ice is stable.
He turned his gaze back to Holmes.
– The sphere is in your chest, Sherlock.It vibrates. I can hear its roar even from here.It resonates with the Silver Moon, doesn’t it? The ancients knew that magic needed a stabilizer.Silver extinguishes, Blood excites. Your Sphere is the perfect balancer. With its help, I can close the chain of Aetor Reactors and eliminate the «chaos» variable forever.
Holmes felt the Sphere in his chest actually become heavier, responding to the cold light pouring from the window.
«You want to turn this world into a giant clockwork, Professor.«But watches tend to break if even one grain of sand gets into it and refuses to be part of the gear.
«And you hope to become this grain of sand?» – Moriarty chuckled. – In a world where I control the very geometry of space? Sherlock, you’ve always been a master of detail, but now you’re missing the big picture. I have already begun the process of Transmutation.The Silver Moon will reach its apogee in three hours, and then the Sphere itself will leave your body, obeying the laws of gravity, which I… corrected. Holmes slowly opened the Book of Euclid to a page with a drawing of a perfect circle. His fingers touched the Latin marks made by Moriarty’s hand.
«You always loved perfection, James.«But you forgot a simple thing that Reichenbach taught us.Gravity doesn’t choose between a genius and a villain.She’s just pulling down.
Holmes looked up. His gray eyes were colder than the Silver Moon.
«Your Transmutation is based on the assumption that the Sphere obeys your calculations. But you studied it as a magical object. I studied it as a logical paradox.
– Paradox? – Moriarty narrowed his eyes. – This is just a highly organized structure of the ether.
«No,» Holmes shook his head. – This is the «Ship of Theseus» in miniature.It changes its essence depending on who carries it.In your hands she will become death.In my… she became a memory. A memory of a world where people died of pneumonia, not magical exhaustion.And this memory does not obey your Reactors.
Moriarty lost his cool for a moment. His face distorted.
– Memory is noise! Useless, irrational noise! You brought with you the smell of London gateways into my pure temple!
He waved his hand, and black geometric lines suddenly wove into the air of the tower.They tightened around Holmes, turning into a cage of pure, structured darkness.
«If you don’t give it up voluntarily, I will cut it out along with your stubborn heart.»The cage of black lines began to shrink.The air inside became dry and lifeless, like in a tomb. Elyan screamed, trying to hit the lines with a magical discharge, but his energy only absorbed into the black edges, making them even stronger.
Holmes remained motionless. He didn’t look at the cage. He looked at the Book of Euclid.
– Elian, remember the Salt Fiddler? – he asked calmly, although his voice began to hoarse from lack of oxygen. – Magic is a system.And the system breaks down where the symmetry is broken.
Holmes sharply pressed the binding of the book at a certain point, which he had calculated back in the Library.There was a dry click. A small crystal fell out of a secret compartment in the spine – not a magical one, but a simple piece of faceted quartz that he had picked up in the technical tier.
«Moriarty, you built your cell according to the laws of Euclidean geometry,» Holmes tossed the quartz in his palm.«But the light of the Silver Moon, passing through the windows of this tower, is refracted at an angle that you did not take into account. Your «ideal» structure has a blind spot.
Holmes threw a piece of quartz into the corner of the cage, where three black lines converged.Something impossible for the magical world happened: instead of an explosion, the sound of a tuning fork was heard.The quartz came into resonance with the Silver Moon, and a ray of light, passing through it, hit exactly the node of Moriarty’s structure.
The black lines trembled and began to crumble, turning into ordinary soot.
«Geometry does not tolerate errors, Professor,» Holmes left the disintegrating cage.«And your pride just created one.»Moriarty stumbled back towards his desk, his breathing coming in short gasps.Perspiration appeared on his forehead. He looked at the crumbling cage with the expression of a man who saw how two and two suddenly became five.
«How…» he hissed.«This calculation… the refraction of light through natural quartz… it should not have worked in a magical vacuum!»
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «Литрес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на Литрес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.