Line #18 Literature/LammasNight


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3	''Lammas Night'' is a HistoricalFantasy novel by Creator/KatherineKurtz.
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5	Paralleling the Battle of Britain is another battle, one fought on the Second Road by mystics of both Britain and Germany. The ''Thule Geselleschaft'', led by archmage Adolf Hitler, is working dark magics to boost the effectiveness of the ''Wehrmacht''. Colonel Sir John Graham of British intelligence, temporary high priest of a British coven, is attempting to organize the mystics of Britain to defend their country, but the going is slow until he gets the unexpected aid of Prince William, George VI's youngest brother.
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7	----
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9	!!This book contains examples of:
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11	* AstralProjection: Work on the "Second Road" involves this. Gray literally starts the novel in the middle of an astral projection to check on one of his agents.
12	* BittersweetEnding: Operation Sealion is cancelled, but [[spoiler:William, Richard, and Geoffrey]] are dead.
13	* CrownOfHorns: One is worn by Gray during rituals of the Oakwood Manor coven, symbolizing the Horned God.
14	* FaceHeelTurn: For most of the novel, the coven is worried that Dieter may have pulled one of these. As part of going undercover with the Thulists, he engages in ''all'' their horrific rituals, and even Gray, who has the most faith in him, is unsure that he's still on their side after all that. [[spoiler: He is.]]
15	* {{Foreshadowing}}: William mentions several times that he feels utterly useless--he can't even die for his country like anyone else. [[spoiler: So when he discovers that he's been sacrificed for England's good in a past life, and England currently needs such a sacrifice to survive, he offers up himself.]]
16	* FunctionalMagic: The Oakwood coven, the Thulists, and pretty much everyone else who is mentioned belonging to an esoteric organization.
17	* {{Ghostapo}}: Most of the higher-ups in the Nazi party are occultists, and their magic works.
18	* HedgeMaze: An elaborate one at Oakwood Manor. Apparently an ordinary if simplistic example, moving some of the gates turns walking it into a centering ritual that prepares the walkers for whatever ritual is taking place in the center area.
19	* HeroicSacrifice: Gray is determined that if a death is what's needed for Britain to survive the Battle of Britain, ''he'' will be the sacrifice. [[spoiler: In the end, however, the sacrifice he has to make is emotional--he must give up his dearest friend, at William's own request.]]
20	* HumanSacrifice:
21	** Thulist rituals, from what we see, routinely involve this.
22	** On the British side, Gray is locked in to the ancient cycle of the sacred king dying for the good of the land. It's explained that a ''willing'' sacrifice, killed by someone who loves them, is actually a good thing, and in fact necessary for England.
23	---> ''Slayer of kings and slain for kings am I ....''
24	* KingInTheMountain: Alluded to, with a twist. Gray points out to William that Britain is currently being defended by planes with '''Myth/{{Merlin}}''' engines.
25	* LastNameBasis: Almost everyone in the novel refers to Colonel Graham as Gray.
26	* MagiciansAreWizards: Or in Gray's case, a spy who knows slight of hand and hypnosis is also a witch. He often uses the stage magic excuse to cover up any 'weird' happenings.
27	* MakeItLookLikeAnAccident: After [[spoiler:Wells]] is killed (with a sedative overdose), his body is loaded into a car and a wreck arranged. Misses TheCoronerDothProtestTooMuch because there was no autopsy and they claimed he wished for burial at sea -- convenient, being able to pull Intelligence strings. All they were really going for was a plausible cause of death that wouldn't make things too much harder for his parents.
28	* TheMole:
29	** [[spoiler:Wells]].
30	** Dieter.
31	* MutuallyExclusiveMagic: The Thulists sacrifice unwilling victims, the Oakwood group (and others) only allow willing victims.
32	* PastLifeMemories: At one point, Gray is put into a hypnotic past-life regression to find out how Sir Francis Drake managed to get England's mystics working together at the time of the Spanish Armada. He also has memories from several other incarnations connected to the "sacred king" cycle [[spoiler:as does William, who was sacrificed by Gray in at least one previous lifetime]].
33	* PowerStrainBlackout: Michael and Gray during the psychic battle against Sturm.
34	* RedemptionEqualsDeath: [[spoiler: Dieter is actively gunning for this, and gets it. He redeems himself by blowing his cover at the last minute during an important Thulist ritual, letting Michael and Gray channel their power through him to fight Sturm while going after Hitler himself. This gets him shot, but they do kill Sturm, which is a huge blow for the Nazis.]]
35	* SpareToTheThrone: William commonly dismisses himself as a "fifth wheel" -- no chance of taking the throne himself since his brother and King has children, but nothing else he ''can'' do thanks to a pre-novel emotional breakdown that got his security clearance revoked.
36	* UnequalRites: The Oakwood group versus the Thulists.
37	** Part of the reason why none of the other occult groups in Britain want to work with the Oakwood group. None of them want to feel like any of the others are in charge. What finally changes this is William's intercession--if he's asking them to do it, then they're not bowing to each other, they're bowing to a ''prince'', which makes all the difference.
38	* VehicularSabotage: When Thulist agents try to murder [[spoiler:William]], they do so by running a hose from his car's exhaust system into the passenger compartment.

Context Literature / LammasNight