by Rex Baron
“Nothing just yet. When the time comes, and I say so, take the medallion from the water and hold it out, offering it. Use your left hand. You will be told what to do. Just stay calm and remain in the protection of the circle. It will go just fine if you remember that.”
A chill ran up her back at the menacing instruction. She had often tried love spells of one variety or another, but nothing that invoked the high holy forces on the level that she was attempting now. She found it at once terrifying and exhilarating.
“There are several ways to do this, to summon them,” Claxton said, rubbing salt on his hands and sprinkling it around the circle’s edge. “I'd like to say that we could call on the spirits of the sun or wind, because they come as lovely beings, golden and pretty. But unfortunately, we must call on the angels of water, rulers of emotions and love, the elemental forces of the North.”
“And what do they come as?” Helen asked with an anxious swallow.
Claxton ignored her question.
“Face the northern point of the compass,” he called to her, as he gently waved a wand of sweet smelling incense around the edges of the circle.
She realized at once that he was shouting. The sound of the wind had come up suddenly, a gale force within the pool that crashed against the walls and reverberated around the empty space, a visible tempest of angry sound.
Helen leaned close to his ear.
“What's happening?” she asked.
“It's starting. Hang on, here we go.”
Claxton raised his arms, angling his palms out flat at his sides, positioning himself as a human cross and shouted against the wind.
“I conjure ye, all ye rebellious spirits, by the most holy name of the God Adonai Melekh, which Joshua invoked and stayed the course of the sun in his presence, through the virtue of Metatron, the prince of countenances, and by the troops of angels who cease not to cry day and night: QADOSH, QADOSH, QADOSH, ADONAI ELOHIM TZABAOTH. AND BY THE TEN SEPHIROTH, BY WHOM GOD COMMUNICATETH AND EXTENDETH HIS INFLUENCE OVER LOWER THINGS WHICH ARE KETHER, BINAH, CHOKHMAH, GEDULAH, GEBURAH, TIPHERETH, NETZACH, HOD, YESOD AND MALKUTH.
I command ye, spirit Monachiel to appear in fair form and countenance, to fulfill our will. O demons of water, in whatever part of the world, I command you to assist. I conjure you by the two tables of the law, by the five books of Moses, by the seven burning lamps on the candlestick of gold before the throne of the Mighty of Mighties.”
“Hand me the black-handled knife,” Claxton called to Helen.
Pushing her wind torn hair back from her face, she gingerly knelt down and retrieved the knife from the white cloth at their feet. Claxton took it from her in his right hand and struck the air as if in combat.
“I command ye most urgently, by the mighty and powerful name, the name of names, the sacred Tetragrammaton.”
Suddenly, ten yards away, halfway to the far wall of the pool, it came… a beautiful, iridescent being, like an angel in a child's vision, radiating warmth and wisdom.
“It's beautiful,” Helen said, not taking her eyes from the developing shape.
“That's just the receiving line, a courtesy,” Claxton replied. “We ask permission of the Archangel to enter the realm of spirits. Hang on, we're about to meet the father of the bride.”
The angel turned, as if reading the written request held up by Claxton, scripted in dove’s blood on virgin parchment. Then, it waved a lifeless hand, inviting them to step forward. Helen lurched forward, obeying the command, but Claxton grasped her tightly at the shoulder and pulled her back within the safety of the circle.
“Are you mad?” he hissed. “That's what they want, for you to step outside the protection, then you're lost, you're theirs.”
Helen swallowed hard and tried to catch her breath.
Without warning, the iridescent glow of the angel gave way to a phosphorescent green, not occupying the same space, but layered over the previous form, as if the two shapes existed in different dimensions at the same time.
What appeared in place of the angel was hideous and foul-smelling, a hunched figure of a being, possessing the limbs and appendages of a man but with the head of a crocodile. It flapped its jaw menacingly, as likely to attack and devour them as speak to them. The creature turned its head to the side, in order to fold back a leathery eyelid and appraise its summoners. It let out a horrible cry, equal to its prehistoric origins, freezing Helen in horror.
“Hold out the medallion,” Claxton said firmly, galvanizing her into action.
She opened her palm and extended the copper disk for the beast to see.
“I command that this medallion be empowered as required, in earth, air, water, and fire. It's power fixed, the brain be stilled. Whoever wears it shall do my will.”
The demon writhed in agony, unwilling to carry out the request, spitting a vile black liquid from between its dark teeth.
“Shout what I told you to say,” Claxton instructed Helen.
She held the medallion higher, her hand trembling and called out.
“Agla Agla Agla, O Adonai most powerful, El most strong, Agla most holy and Tau the beginning and the end. I command that this pentacle be consecrated by thy power and prepared in such manner that it may obtain strength against all spirits, through thee whose kingdom endureth without end.”
The demon twisted its head on its neck and let out a bellowing cry, as frightening as it was mournful. It directed its attention to the medallion in Helen's hand.
A beam of orange light radiated from the creatures forehead, through the air, illuminating and surrounding the copper disk, causing it to vibrate and grow hot.
She wanted to drop it but Claxton steadied her hand with his, holding it fast in his grip. Helen closed her eyes to escape the intensity of the ghastly scene. The air reverberated with a ringing sound, an eerie music, like that imagined when the wind plays through dead tree limbs on a winter’s night.
When Helen looked back to the place where the demon had been, it was gone. She looked to Claxton to see what would happen next. His eyes remained focused on the spot in the center of the pool. Loudly he called the banishing names.
“Lofaham, Solomon, Iyouel, Iyosenaoui.”
Helen's abdominal muscles were trembling with uncontrollable violence, jerking spasmodically, making it painful to breathe.
“Is it gone?” she gasped.
Claxton scanned a full panorama of the dry pool with his eyes, watching for signs that the presences were still with them.
At last, he answered. “They're gone, at least in physical form, but they will feed on the energy of the union of the two worlds for some time, perhaps hours.”
He patted her arm with his free hand, and wrapping her in an embrace, tried to kiss her.
“What are you doing?” she said, pushing his bare chest away from her.
“It's the final part of the spell I told you about,” he said. “To make love in the presence of the newly-made spell imbues it with power a hundredfold. It's called the hieros garnos, or sacred marriage. It is sex, not for love, but for the electrical charge created when two people join on physical, mental, and emotional levels simultaneously.”
“But why must we do it?” Helen asked, still resisting his tightening arms. “We've called up that thing, isn't that enough?”
“No,” Claxton whispered in her ear, as he drew her head close to his and then lowered his hands to unbutton her skirt. “It was promised to them. They will feed on the energy like a feast. When someone makes love in this conscious way, thinking only of the request made of the demons, a spark of energy, a cosmic fire explodes on the astral plane, which is the realm of some of these demons, as well as the gods. When the spark is ignited, it gets their attention and causes them to turn their efforts to helping bring about the attached request.”
“There must be some other way to get their attention,” Helen replied, struggling in his grip.
“The only other way for such fires to be lighted is through sacrifice and
death. Why do you think the ancients practiced blood sacrifices? Not because they were more ruthless and blood-thirsty than we, but because they communicated with the gods and understood their needs. Your request has been put to them. It has been promised. We dare not deny the gods their feast.”
Helen stopped resisting. She quietly slipped out of her clothes and slowly slid to the floor with Claxton's powerful embrace still upon her. They dared not leave the protection of the circle until it was finished.
Clinging to his back, she let it happen. She felt the eyes of unseen observers all around them. She felt the occasional poking of unseen fingers, taunting her in her humiliation, sharing in the blasphemous, loveless act, making strange otherworldly grunts of lust inside her ear.
She focused her attention on the row of artificial moons orbiting the edge of the pool and clutched her prize, the charmed medallion, in her fist. She had asked for Paulo in her bargain with those ungodly beings, but she had also asked for Lucy's career. She would be without equal, she thought, as Claxton pushed hungrily toward a conclusion. She would have everything she ever wanted.
CHAPTER TWO
Lucy’s villa, Los Angeles
Mr. Lasky's office telephoned early in the morning, waking Lucy from her first peaceful sleep in California. His secretary requested a meeting at two o'clock and offered to send a car to collect her. Lucy agreed with a stifled yawn, and placing the telephone back on its stand, dropped back onto the starched sheets for a luxurious moment.
The sky outside the window was the same vibrant blue it had been since she arrived. It was exactly Prussian blue, an eighteenth century concoction, placed somewhere between the dark rich blue of the Madonna’s robe in Flemish altar pieces and the pale pastel color of cornflowers, or the small linen envelopes that arrived from the Prince. It was exactly Prussian blue, and yet, it was a color that the sky had never been in all the years she had lived in Germany.
The moment of luxury was shattered by the intrusion of the Prince into her thoughts. He had somehow become unimportant, a father figure and nothing more. His presence had been totally eclipsed by Paulo, his influence diminished to nothing more than a glamorous anecdote to be hinted at in press releases, as advance publicity for her first film. His letters had been answered briefly and politely, returned in a shameful ratio in relation to their frequency. And yet, he continued to write, offering his cheerful accounts of small everyday things that gave the impression they shared a lifelong, uninterrupted intimacy.
Lucy sighed and threw back the bedclothes. She ran her fingers through her cropped hair and dangled her pale legs over the edge of the bed.
“I don't want an old man,” she said aloud.
It had been all right before she came to this place. She had been a child, nothing more than an ambitious and talented girl who looked to others for assistance and direction, surely an acceptable role to be played by any gifted young person. But now, it had all changed. She was no longer the wunderkind of the opera who had come so far for one so young. She had begun to build a life outside the opera, a new Lucy, entirely separate from her voice and her success. She wanted Paulo to be a part of that life. But he had grown distant of late. He seemed troubled. He had lost that impetuous intensity that had won her over and led her to jump into this adventure in the first place.
She felt bewildered by it, at a loss as to what to do, untrained in the ways of powerful women. She remembered her grandmother, Christina, sitting under a parasol, swathed in white gauze cascading over the brim of an imposing summer straw hat. She sat there looking down dispassionately as Lucy lay in the grass sobbing. She had been pushed to the ground by her cousin Rudyard during an Easter egg hunt on the lawn. She lay there tearing at the grass in her anger, crying uncontrollably.
“You are a little fool,” her grandmother had said to her. “You are indecisive. You want to get up and kick him to the ground, and yet you want the sympathy that you feel you deserve for falling. You are paralyzed by your emotions. Your mind has stopped. You are unable to do anything but lie there and cry.”
She stopped crying and stared at the old woman with hatred.
“That's better,” Christina smiled with satisfaction, “You must always decide. Once you decide, even if you are wrong, you have a chance. Whole lives are wasted thinking, and then unthinking the future in and out of existence. You must never let the emotions confuse you. Emotions are like a deep well. You see yourself reflected in them, but you must, at all cost, avoid falling in.”
Lucy climbed to her feet and wiped at the grass smear on her new white stockings. Without a word, she ran to the opposite side of the lawn and slapped Rudyard hard across the face. She raced back to her grandmother, joyful with her triumph. She planted herself in front of her elder, expecting a word of praise, some accolade for her newfound decisiveness.
The old woman's eyes penetrated the child but showed no inkling of approval. After a time, Lucy took a step forward and kicked her in the shin as hard as she could, before running toward the house. Her grandmother started wailing, which Lucy recognized, before she reached the unnecessary safety of the front porch, as uncontrollable laughter.
•••
Lasky’s office, Los Angeles
When Lucy arrived at Lasky's office, the stout little man jumped to his feet the moment she appeared at the door. He took her by the hand and escorted her to a comfortable leather chair, where she sat peering out at him from under the brim of a pale blue straw hat.
She refused first a cigarette, then a cup of coffee, before she interpreted his nervous attentions to signify that he wanted something.
“Your secretary said that you wanted to see me,” Lucy reminded him, as he filled a glass with water and handed it to her. “I assume there was something specific you wanted to talk about.”
Lasky picked up his cigar from the ashtray on his desk and toyed with it between his thick fingers.
“Yes,” he answered, adopting an air of frankness. “I hear that you finished your picture, and I'm told it looks pretty good.... that's great.”
Lucy smiled with a measure of relief.
“But that is only half the battle,” Lasky continued. “The real selling tool is the premiere. I think we're going to have to bring out the big guns.”
Lucy's smile dropped into a suspicious stare.
“Publicity, is that what we're talking about here?” she asked.
Lasky perched himself on the edge of his desk and folded his arms across his chest, without ever taking his eyes from Lucy.
“You see that photo over there on the wall?” he asked, pointing with the cold ash of his cigar.
Lucy diverted her eyes, with surprise, toward a framed glamour photograph of Paulo Cordoba.
“Our Paulo there is really something,” the studio’s owner said with a nod of his head. “Never seen a man with such pep. It's the only word for it, just plain old pep.”
“Dashing is the word I would use,” Lucy replied.
Lasky poked the air between them with the dead cigar.
“There, you see, it's just as I always say. You women see something in this boy. You have instincts for these things... and that's why I want him with you tomorrow night at your premiere.”
Lucy's lack of response was mistaken for stunned resistance.
The little man jumped in with prepared arguments before she could speak.
“I know this is supposed to be your big night and all, and I don't want you to think that I want to steal your thunder. I know you're a big star and everyone wants to come out and see you, but this Faust thing is too high-brow to have any staying power without a gimmick.”
Lucy stared at him coolly from under her hat.
“Sorry little lady, no offense to you, but if Paulo is there with you at the opening, we can count on a sellout. And as we all know, we're out here in the middle of nowhere to make money... am I right?”
Lucy's mouth slowly curled up into a smile of approval, until she heard the second part of
his request.
“And since this is such a big night,” Lasky said, lighting his cigar and drawing in the smoke with new confidence, “there is a new player who I would like to place in your party to give her career a boost. It's this girl Helen Liluth. I've been told she has something, and I want to give her a run around the block to see how she does.”
Lucy's face drained of color. She could not bear the idea that Helen would be there, once again intruding into her life, stealing the breath from her and spoiling her thrilling moment in the spotlight with Paulo.
She brushed the billowing smoke away from her face with an annoyed wave of her hand.
“We had a contract Mr. Lasky,” she replied emphatically, “and that contract brought me out here to make these picture plays on specific terms. It never said anything about boosting the career of some ambitious little extra who you want to test drive.”
“Paulo helps your picture and you help this girl. What's the harm in that?” Lasky asked, shrugging his shoulders in bewilderment at Lucy's reaction.
Lucy rose to her feet. “I do not want that girl around me at the premiere,” Lucy stated firmly.
“But she's in the picture already. I just thought a little extra attention...”
Lucy cut his reasoning short as she walked toward the door.
“Give her any attention you like. Put her in a car with Claxton. That should be enough to show off her talents. But keep her away from me.”
CHAPTER THREE
Lucy’s villa, Los Angeles
When Lucy arrived home, Celia was packing her cases. The downstairs hallway already contained a large trunk and two leather suitcases. She climbed the stairs and knocked on her impresario’s wife's bedroom door. Celia called for her to enter.
“It's a mess isn't it,” she said, indicating the piles of clothes arranged by color on the bed and over the chairs and the dressing table. “It never ceases to amaze me how one can accumulate so much in such a short period of time.”