To Kill a Witch

by Christopher Patterson

  Chapter 26

  BELLS RANG OUT all over the town of Richmond. Shouting joined the ringing and the three men—Thaddeus, Gunnar, and Alden—had to duck into a short side street and hide in the shadows to avoid Norman soldiers rushing by.

  “Do you think all of those soldiers serve the witch?” Alden asked in a whisper.

  “Some,” Thaddeus replied.

  “It never ceases to amaze me how some men would willingly serve the Devil,” Gunnar added.

  “Some men will, unfortunately, be caught in the web that evil creates,” Thaddeus said.

  “So, what happens to their souls?” Alden asked.

  “If they are right with God,” Thaddeus said, “then they will be with the Lord.”

  “I feel bad, in a way,” Alden said.

  “It is because you have a compassionate heart,” Gunnar said. “We all feel bad about it. Evil corrupts and hurts and ruins, even those that aren’t naturally evil.”

  They made their way back to Chandler Street. The buildings in this area of Richmond were untouched by fire. The blaze spread in the other direction. If Thaddeus squinted, he could see the blue hew of the Lord’s blessing. They found Hugh’s house and knocked. Anson answered the door. Thaddeus breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Where is Asaf?” Thaddeus asked.

  “In there,” Anson replied, pointing to their one bedroom.

  As Thaddeus asked about the defrocked priest, rain began to fall, at first very light, but then heavy.

  “Get him, Gunnar. We have to get to the castle,” Thaddeus said. He looked at Jarvis, visibly uncomfortable but ready for a fight with his sword already in his hand. “Are you ready?” The Saxon nodded.

  Asaf walked through the doorway, eyes droopy, and sweat beading along his face. His curly, dark hair was matted to the side of his face and, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, it shook.

  “Are you ready?” Thaddeus asked.

  “As I’ll ever be,” Asaf replied.

  Thaddeus turned to Hugh and Hilda and said, “Once again, I thank you for your help. I pray that the Lord blesses you and makes his face shine on you.”

  Before either Hugh or Hilda could say anything, the five men ran into the street.

  “My lord!” Anson called, and Thaddeus turned around. “Let me go with you.”

  “No,” Thaddeus said, walking back to the young man, the rain falling so hard it was already turning the dirt road into mud. “You will one day be a great man, a stalwart patriarch of a thriving family. Right now, you must stay with your parents. Help protect them, and your little sisters and brother. God be with you, Anson. You are the reason we are alive and why we are able to relieve this city from the grips of the Devil.”

  Thaddeus turned and joined his companions as they rushed towards Richmond Castle.

  As they approached the raised walkway of the castle’s gatehouse, Thaddeus could see the glow of a massive fire raging against the far wall of the city. The commotion had drawn many of the city’s soldiers away from the castle, but a score of guards still stood in front of the entrance, ready and visibly on edge.

  “Follow me,” Thaddeus said, as they ran under the shadow of the raised walkway and crouched next to the bottom of the castle’s curtain wall.

  As they slinked along the wall, making sure to stay in the shadows, Thaddeus could hear the soldiers along the tops of the wall talking. Some of them blamed the Saxons for the fire, and others blamed castle serfs, while others blamed ghosts. They eventually came to a thick, wooden door that led into the castle’s chapel—it was locked, and such a thick piece of wood would be impossible to break down without a battering ram. Thaddeus laid his hand, palm flat, against the door and immediately retracted it.

  “What’s wrong?” Gunnar asked.

  “It’s hot,” Thaddeus replied, watching several blisters rising on his palm.

  Asaf walked up to the door, putting his face close and careful not to touch it. He sniffed at the wood.

  “Evil,” Asaf said flatly.

  “It’s a chapel,” Jarvis said. “It’s a house of the Lord.”

  Asaf just shrugged. He leaned in close to the door again.

  “Great evil,” Asaf confirmed.

  “Is it locked?” Gunnar asked.

  “Of course it is,” Jarvis said, but when Asaf pushed on the door, it opened with ease.

  “She knows we’re here,” Asaf said.

  “Would you expect anything less?” Thaddeus asked.

  The chapel was dark and small. A dozen short pews formed two columns of seats. At the front was a wide dais and an altar stood at the back of the dais. Another thick door stood to the side of the altar. Thaddeus curled his nose.

  “Christ’s bones,” Asaf said, covering his nose with his arm.

  “What is it?” Jarvis asked.

  “The smell,” Asaf replied. “Don’t you bloody smell it?”

  “It’s demon stink,” Thaddeus said.

  “I think I smell it too,” Alden said.

  Then, as they stepped into the chapel, they all crossed themselves. Hanging above the altar was a large cross, upside down and with the body of a man who, with his tattered robes and tonsure, looked to once be a priest. Blood stained the carpet that ran in between the two columns of pews. Another body lay on the altar, eviscerated and opened, flesh clinging to exposed ribs. Thaddeus couldn’t quite see the face of whoever the victim was, but his hands were frozen in a position of clutching fists. One of the two stained glass windows in the chapel sat broken, high in the wall, and someone had vandalized the other one, painting a pentagram on it in what looked like blood, now dried and brown and flaky.

  Two candles, one on either side of the dais, held by iron sconces, lit as they entered the room, and at the same time, the body lying on the altar burst into flames, giving the room a little more light. Black smoke trailed underneath the pews and around the legs of each of the warriors, accompanied by the sound of sucking air. The smoked settled in front of the altar on the dais and rose up into a column. As the smoke dissipated, a woman stood there, naked and perfect … almost perfect.

  It had been many years since Thaddeus had seen a succubus, and her presence here in Richmond meant this was more than a simple witch—albeit one of the most powerful witches he had ever encountered—trying to control weak-minded men. Succubae, at times, just grew bored of the underworld and appeared to simply toy with men, or to lay with one in order to become pregnant, but this one, offering up human sacrifices to the Devil in a chapel of the Lord, meant something much more ominous. The enemy had a special interest in this place, and the revelation sent gooseflesh along Thaddeus’ arms.

  “Is that a …” Gunnar had begun to say.

  Thaddeus hadn’t known the Norseman had never seen a succubus, and then he realized that it had been over two hundred years since he had seen one. When was the last time? He and Asaf were in the lands now known as Rus, and she had enchanted a Byzantine monk, trying to get him to impregnate her.

  “She’s beautiful,” Jarvis said, stepping forward.

  “By Christ and all the angels, she stinks,” Asaf said at the same moment.

  It might have been impossible for Thaddeus, Gunnar, or Asaf to fall under a succubus’ enchantment, but Jarvis and Alden were simple men and young ones at that. They didn’t see the little horns poking through her dark hair, falling down the middle of her back, or silhouetting her perfect breasts. They didn’t see the long claws that should have been toes or fingers. And when she opened her mouth and licked her lips, they didn’t see her long, forked tongue. Jarvis, walking towards her, was under her spell, and Alden, swaying back and forth, eyes half closed and arms slack by his side, would soon follow.

  The succubus touched her sex and moaned and then caressed her breasts, moaning even louder. Jarvis unfastened his buckle, letting his sword drop to the ground.

  “Come to me,” the succubus said in a soft, erotically seductive voice, letting her head fall back slightly and clos
ing her eyes as if she was in the midst of sexual climax. “Be with me. I want you.”

  “Jarvis!” Thaddeus yelled. “No!”

  He ran to Jarvis and grabbed his shoulder. The man turned and swatted Thaddeus’ hand away with more strength than he should have had, but at the same moment, the succubus looked to Thaddeus, her eyes turning red and cat-like. Great, black, bat wings sprouted from her back, spreading the width of the small chapel, and she clutched her clawed hands in rage as she hissed and then screamed something in her infernal language. With one great flap of her wings, a wind pushed Thaddeus backward, throwing him to the ground and lifting her into the air at the same time. She hovered there, a long, spiked tail emerging from her lower back.

  Jarvis screamed as she hovered over him, looking down upon him like he was some insect. His trance had dissolved, her hold weak as she revealed her true self. But as he turned to run, her tail whipped out and caught him in his belly. Piercing him completely, her tail lifted him so that he was face to face with her.

  “Asaf,” Thaddeus said, getting to his feet, and Asaf retrieved his Bible, opened it, and began reading.

  The succubus screamed and slashed Jarvis’ throat with her claws. Blood poured from his wound and, with the simple flick of her tail, she threw him into a pew, the wood splitting, and Jarvis lay there, broken and dead. She began chanting again, and the burning body on the altar rolled over and fell to the ground. The flames flared, the heat so intense, Thaddeus could feel it against his face. In seconds, the fire died away, leaving only a mound of black ash. But the ash began to move and shift and rise until it formed the shape of a human. With a flash of bright light, the ash turned into a goat-man, with the head, legs, and hooves of a black-haired goat and the body and arms of a man. The creature’s black horns curled and shimmered in the dim candlelight. It wore a hauberk of black iron and carried a two-handed poleaxe, its blade long and wide in the shape of a half moon, its shaft tipped with a spike of the same black iron. The goat-man bleated, its voice that of a goat, but deeper and gruffer. It lifted its poleaxe and brought it down on a pew, splitting the bench in half.

  The Bible clenched so tightly in his hands the knuckles had turned white, Asaf read from the Book of Isaiah, speaking in Hebrew as the succubus swung her tail about, stabbing at the warriors and cracking pews in half, and as the goat-man attacked, Alden stepped forward first and was saved only by the Grace of God that the backhanded swing of the goat-man struck the Saxon with the broad side of the half-moon blade, sending Alden into the wall. Thaddeus couldn’t get close enough with his sword, first ducking under the succubus’ tail and then leaning back as the tip of the poleaxe’s spike almost caught his throat.

  As Asaf read the Word of God, the succubus hissed, and the goat-man screamed, leaping up onto the back of one pew. The succubus clapped her hands together and, when she separated them, a ball of fire appeared. She pushed it towards Asaf, but he didn’t even seem to notice, and when the fire should have consumed him, it broke up against an invisible force, splashing onto the carpet and surrounding pews, catching them ablaze. The demon hissed even louder. Her tail rattled, the tip opening as if it had its own mouth, and spitting forth a dozen, small barbs. Some of them bounced harmlessly off Asaf’s force field, Gunnar dodged several others, but two of them struck Thaddeus in the leg, lodging themselves deep in his flesh. He cried out, pulling them away, but where they had struck, he felt a stinging pain and burning sensation.

  Thaddeus tried to run underneath the succubus, but another swing from the goat-man’s poleaxe caused him to roll away and, as he came to his feet, the succubus tried to breathe fire down on him. He crawled underneath a pew, the wood above him aflame. He stood quickly, pushing the pew up and into the succubus. She floated backward, another flap of her bat wings pushing the warrior to his knees. At the same time, Gunnar threw his spear at the goat-man, striking the infernal creature square in the chest. It didn’t seem to harm it much, but it gave him enough time to draw his large long sword, step on the shaft of the poleaxe, and break it with his heavy blade.

  As if drawn from the air, the goat-man drew a curved blade—a khopesh—and attacked Gunnar. The big man easily swatted away the creature’s attacks, returning strikes with his own weapon, cutting deep into the minion’s flesh and drawing a black, sticky ichor for blood. The succubus swung her tail at Gunnar, the tip grazing his shoulder, but it wasn’t enough to stop the warrior’s assault. Alden got back to his feet and, sneaking behind the goat-man, plunged his sword into its back. It screamed and reached back at the Saxon, leaving its chest open to Gunnar. The Norseman cleaved the goat in two, from one shoulder to the opposite hip, and as the creature’s torso slid away, the goat-man turned back into ash.

  The demon clapped her hands together again, this time causing the floor underneath the warriors to roll. Everyone went to the ground, save for Asaf who stood firm and continued to read, now from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. She muttered a few words, and the candles flared into glaring torches. The altar burst into flames as did the cross bearing the crucified priest. The cross fell to the ground, and the dead priest turned to a pile of ash, which began to rise and take the shape of another goat minion. As that happened, lightning erupted from the succubus’ fingertips, cracking stone, igniting pews, and shattering the remaining stained-glass window.

  Gunnar stood to his feet, ducking a swinging demon tail, and retrieving his spear from the ashy remains of the first goat-man. He took aim, and the demon laughed. But Asaf finished his reading, shut his Bible hard, and closed his eyes.

  “The Lord is sovereign, even over the creatures of the deep,” Asaf prayed and then crossed himself before he calmly stood, ramrod straight, with his arms by his sides.

  As if the defrocked priest was, himself, a candle, a white light flared around him, and the succubus screamed, covering her eyes. At that moment, Gunnar threw his spear. The thick blade pierced the demon’s breast and drove straight to her heart. She screamed even louder and hissed, her spittle sizzling as it fell to the floor. The shaft of the spear exploded into a thousand pieces, and the blade slipped from the demon’s breast, but the damage had already been done. In another flash of blinding light, the succubus burst into a rain of slowly falling pieces of skin, and the minion that had been forming fell to the ground, again nothing more than a mound of ash.

  “I can’t see,” Alden cried.

  Gunnar helped the Saxon to his feet as the young man rubbed his eyes. Asaf put a hand—albeit shaky and clammy—to the man’s forehead.

  “It is only temporary,” Asaf said. “The flash from the dismissed demon blinded you, but your sight will return.”

  “Dismissed?” Gunnar asked.

  “A powerful demon like a succubus cannot be simply killed with human weapons,” Thaddeus explained. “You sent her back to hell, and it will be a while before that one will be able to infest our world again, but you did not kill her.”

  “Poor Jarvis,” Gunnar said.

  “He should’ve stayed with Hugh and Hilda,” Thaddeus said.

  “The Lord welcome him,” Asaf prayed, “for he died in service to our Lord and with a clean heart.”

  “What do we do about this place?” Gunnar asked. “A defiled church. I’ve never seen such a thing.”

  “I have,” Thaddeus replied, “several times. It makes the skin crawl. Pray for this place, Asaf, and then let it burn.”

  “And Alden?” Gunnar asked as the Saxon whimpered and rubbed his eyes.

  “If his sight will return,” Thaddeus said, “we simply watch him. We can’t send him back to Hugh’s. I pray his eyesight returns sooner than later.”

  The wooden pews and rug were already aflame, and it was spreading quickly while Asaf muttered a short prayer. When he had finished, the four made for the door behind what used to be the altar and found it led to a small enclosure within the castle. The voices they had heard talking along the tops of the wall were gone, and they walked through the dark enclosure to another door i
n a wall that opened into the main courtyard, the tall keep looming over them and an unnatural darkness consuming the space between them and the main keep of Castle Richmond.

  Chapter 27

  THADDEUS KNEW GETTING across the seemingly vacant and quiet courtyard would not be a simple task, and he was soon proved right. As they raced through the open and dark space, shapes rose up from the ground. Four goat-men, also armed with poleaxes, stood in their way. One swung its weapon and barely missed Thaddeus, the Greek rolling backward and coming up into a crouch, sword in hand. The faint, blue light of his blade illuminated the space around them, but barely.

  “I can’t see,” Gunnar said.

  “Asaf,” Thaddeus said.

  Asaf muttered something incomprehensible and what looked like three stars flashed in the sky and fell. Several cries and screams rose up from the tops of the castle walls as soldiers watched the falling stars. Some cursed, while others prayed. The falling light finally reached the earth, striking the ground inside the courtyard and, wherever they struck, a pillar of fire erupted, shedding bright light on the whole of the space. The goat minions screamed and stepped away from the warriors. Rain began to fall, but no amount of water could quench the Lord’s fire.

  “Bitch,” Asaf muttered.

  One goat-man attacked, swinging hard at Thaddeus. He easily stepped away from the unwieldy weapon, bringing his sword up and into the creature’s armpit. It screamed, releasing its poleaxe and drawing a khopesh while another one jabbed with the spike stop its poleaxe. Gunnar left Alden next to Asaf with a barked instruction not to move and jumped into the fight, back to back with Thaddeus.

  The goat-man wielding the curved blade came at Thaddeus, but these were mindless creatures of the abyss, formed from death and ash. Again, Thaddeus easily parried the creature’s attack while Gunnar engaged the other minion. With a heavy grunt, Thaddeus cleaved the goat head from the human body, and the thing fell away as ash. In the same moment, the Norseman chopped downwards, striking his goat-man atop the head and splitting the evil minion in two and, like its companion, it disappeared into ash.