Most Imaginative: Elijah Pannozzo

Most Imaginative

written by Elijah Pannozzo (Year 12)

Arcana Fundorum

Illum imum aedificii, quod in mediis nostrae seniorum scolae ibi stat, occupant officinae istae cubiculosque illos quos manu tenet ferri munus linguae Latini, et residentes sui, nominibus ‘grammatistae Latini sermonis et sui scholastici’, prava scientiis verba legere infernibus dicuntur, disperguntur susurru invocare diro inhumanos, nefasque sub praesidio summatim solitudinis celebrare putantur.

Has famas, sane, vera se includunt.

Eis istis magis de Hesperiae terrae bello virisque et atrocitatibus inter se conlocutis Mars hastam terrae lactis ac mellis coruscabat, eaque se convertit in terram cruoris ac violentiae sine ratione. Verbis de remedio pestilentiae antiquae in examine pristino ad linguam ingeniam translatis Spes mox remedii aetatis eius pestilentiae invasit. Multae tales res etiam ab grammatistis, in aetate ante aetatem, effectae sunt: exemplis de hastis trans homines perforantibus lectis caput ducis liberi mundi satis iuvenis acri glante perforatum; centum abhinc annis lapide trans lacus quam procul iactante, fax caelestis ab caelo ad Rutheniam cecidit; saxis iam dudum compulsantibus cultus aetatis aeris ab occultis perditi marium gentibus: latinistae semper fuerunt clades orbis.

Olim, in tempore recentius, celebrabant nonnulli latinistae suusque grammatista, dira susurrantes verba et deos venerantes alienos, ritus scelestos in quodam cubiculo, ducens ceteros globi dominus qui dicebat clamabatque fortissimus. At nescio qui, istum praeteriens cubiculum, illa visa congressione se constituit. Conspecto conticuere omnes intentique ora tenebant. Nullo agente, cultores virum spectabant et is illos. In oculos viri magister immobiles inhiabat, et vir oculos rehiabat magistri perterritos.

Tandem verso pollice vir surrisit, magistro quoque surridente. Illo cuncti momento sciebant eum quae gerentes intellegere. Ab cubiculo gresso magister ritum cum latinistarum ope persecutus est.

Dicam quod erat ritum exsequebantur: per nexum aetherium principem consulabant examinatorum de examine futuro: nemo scilicet scit quo modo examines censeantur, sed constat artes infernas subvenire potere.

Hoc erat propositum hoc die, diebus autem aliis cum longe peioribus entibus consuluerunt de longe peioribus qui iam ignoramus…

(English) The Secrets of the Lower Levels

Occupying the lowest level of the building which stands in the middle of our senior school are the offices and classrooms which the Latin department holds in an iron grip; its residents, going by the name ‘Latin teachers and their students’, are said to read foul texts with their infernal knowledge, are rumoured to invoke unworldly things with their strange mutterings, and are generally thought to be up to no good within the protection of their solitude.

— b —

These stories, of course, are true.

— b —

When those wizards spoke amongst themselves about the war in the land of Hesperia, its characters and the atrocities they committed, war broke out in the land of milk and honey, turning it into the land of blood and mindless violence. When they translated a text in their last exam about the solution to an ancient plague, hope came to them soon after in the form of a solution to the plague of their own time. Many such events were brought about by their teachers (in the time before time): when they were reading extracts about spears piercing through men, the still-young leader of the free world’s head was pierced by a swift bullet; when a hundred years ago they were throwing a stone as far as they could across a lake, a meteor fell from the sky down into Russia; whilst long ago they banged rocks together, the civilisations of the bronze age were destroyed by the mysterious sea-peoples: latinists have always been the scourge of the earth.

— b —

Once, in more recent history, some Latin students were performing wicked rituals in a classroom, whispering foul-meaning words, worshipping foreign gods; their teacher was leading the coven, speaking and shouting the loudest out of all those present.

But someone who happened to be walking past that same classroom saw the group and halted in his tread. Upon seeing the man, all fell silent and stood transfixed. No one acted: the cultists simply watched the man and he them. The teacher stared into the man’s unmoving eyes, and the man stared back into the teacher’s terrified eyes. At last the man gave a thumbs up and smiled, and then the teacher also smiled. At that moment all those gathered knew that the man understood what was going on.

After the man had walked off away from the room, the teacher continued on the ritual alongside his students.

I should say what that ritual was that they were performing: they were consulting the chief examiner via an ethereal connection about the exam to come: of course, no one really knows how the exams are made (not even the chief examiner), but it is known that the infernal arts can be of help.

That’s what they were up to on that day, but on other days they’ve asked far worse entities about far more sinister things which to this very day we still don’t know... —•