A dark feeling crept over Alena. This was the ancient vendetta that Isis had warned her about and Benjamin was the Shetani’s bait, the sacrificial lamb to begin the final battle.
“Tacky’s mother is gone and all I know of is a grandmother in Guyana and a few girlfriends from the around this way. We’re all this girl has got right now,” Gloria said.
“Oh God. Oh my God, I can’t believe this is happening. I… I just saw BJ yesterday, Gloria. And Takeah. She was just so proud, so proud of her son. How is this happening?” A frantic edge crept into Alena’s voice.
“The Plan,” Gloria said sadly and quietly.
“What?”
“The Divine Plan, Alena. The Cosmic Door opens tonight, once the Grand Gross forms. Keep your third eye open. Keep your heart open. Be on guard.”
“Michael,” Alena whispered, suddenly remembering that he had been waiting for her. “You know, my… boyfriend. He was supposed to help me move the last of my things tonight. God, he must be worried sick by now.”
“Why don’t you give him a call? And maybe you should think about going with him. It’s not safe here and it’s only going to get worse.”
“Gloria, I’m not going to leave you here, you know that. Or Takeah. No. You stay, I stay.” She held Gloria’s hand tightly. “I’ve got my sword ready.”
On the other side of the wall the city filled with the wailing of sirens and shouting and chaos mounting by the minute.
“I’m not going,” Alena said defiantly. A faint smile crossed Gloria’s lips and then quickly faded. She scanned the apartment for any sight of a shadow and sniffed the air for any scent of the beasts.
“I’m going to call Mike. I’ll be right back, okay?” She said as she headed for the hallway.
“Be careful. Do you hear me? They want you, Alena. Badly.”
“I’ll only be a few minutes, just letting him know I’m all right.”
Gloria nodded. “I’ll see to Takeah.”
“Babe!” Michael answered on the first ring. “Are you okay? The roads are closed off, there are barricades, and the cops won’t let anybody in or out. Cameras everywhere. Are you all right? I’ve been calling you like crazy!”
“I’m fine, honey, I’m all right. My friend Takeah, it was her son they killed. Shot him in cold blood for nothing. He was just a baby, Mike.” Alena started to cry.
“I’m getting you out of there, okay? Go to the barricade on the top of East Church and meet me there in five.”
“I can’t Mike. I can’t leave. My friend is here with me and she doesn’t have anyone else except for my neighbor and me. She’s not doing well either, I can’t just leave her like this. Mike, please listen. I’ll be okay. We’re locked in tight. No one is going to attack the buildings, the worse thing they’ll do is loot the stores. Please go home. It’s not safe for you out here. The cops just need a half of a reason to put a bullet through another black man. Please. Turn around. I’ll stay on the phone with you while you do.”
“Leen, are you crazy? I’m not leaving you alone in that zoo! Brothers are out here talking about an all out war. They don’t give a damn about looting. They want blood for what the police did to that kid. They’re talking bodies, Alena. The boy’s dad is apparently a heavy hitter out here. If his mother is in that apartment, what makes you think they won’t carry their war right up there where you are? Come on, Babe, you can bring them with you.”
“Takeah’s not in any shape to go back through that crowd.”
“Look, just please meet me at the top of East Church, okay?”
“Michael, I’m sorry but…”
“Alena, please don’t argue. Five minutes.”
“All right,” she answered, knowing there was no convincing Michael otherwise. She would show him that she was fine so he’d go home, then she could rush back to Gloria and Takeah.
“Five minutes.”
Alena was breathing heavily as she made her way down the stairs and pushed the front door open slowly. Beyond it was a swarm of angry people. The scarlet spot where Benjamin’s slain body had laid was already bordered with candles. And then she saw guns. Guns. Men from the neighborhood had guns. The police had guns. Their faces were hard and cold. Fearful. Alena’s breath sped up and her pulsed raced.
Oh my God. How the hell was she going to push through all of that to get to Michael? There was no way she was going to put Takeah through the trauma of that crowd and no way she could she leave her and Gloria in all of this mess. She couldn’t. She closed the door and ran back up the steps before calling Michael back.
“Baby, I can’t do it. I… I’m sorry I can’t. They have guns out here. They’re ready to die. The police. These kids. They’re ready to kill, Mike.”
“Alena, baby, please. You have to get out of there. Do this for me, Alena. Do it for Maya. Leen please, listen to me,” Michael pleaded.
“I am. I’m doing this for you and for Maya. Michael, I love you. I love you so much. But I feel this in my bones, this is where Isis wants me to be, right here. No running. No hiding. I’m staying, baby. I’m sorry if you’re upset with me. Go home. Please, Mike, go home now. Something is happening here… something that has been waiting for a long time. I’m going to check on Gloria and Takeah now, okay? I’ll be just fine, I promise you. Call me right away… when you get in your car okay?”
Alena went back inside Gloria’s apartment. “How is she doing?”
“She’s awake, going in and out. I gave her some herbal tea that’ll keep her calm at least through half the night. She’s talking some. She said she’d sent him to the store for a pack of cigarettes, the same as she had any other day. The boys said the police mixed him up with some older kids that robbed the place. They say they thought those Marlboros was a gun.” Gloria beat her fist against the table.
“My Lord! My Lord!” she cried, clutching her heart. Her breathing had become labored and she looked physically pained as if she was responsible for Benjamin’s death. Alena had never seen or imagined this depth of despair in Gloria. “Innocent! He was just an innocent little boy! He’s got nothing to do with this!” She hissed into nothingness before collapsing onto the sofa chair.
Alena rushed to her side and clasped her forearms.
“Gloria!” Gloria was deflated, her face buried in her hands, shoulders bobbing with sobs. “Gloria, stay with me. Are you okay?”
Tears covered her face. It was the first time Alena had ever seen Gloria cry. Alena squeezed her hand. Gloria was silent. Weak.
“You need some rest yourself. Why don’t you lay back on the sofa? I’m going to put some tea on for you.”
Without lifting her head, Gloria said, “Now isn’t the time for rest,” she said with a hardness that startled Alena. “They are coming, Alena. Me, I’ve got too much fear in me to conquer them. That was the breech in my heart that let that beast in. That’s why it was able to scrape my arm. But you’re strong now. It’s your time.”
“How can you of all people be fearful, Gloria? You are a rock.”
“Because I love you honey. I love you like my own. I still have a mama’s fear for her child. Get my Bible out of the bedroom. It’s on top of the dresser nearest the window.” Alena obeyed and returned with the large book as quickly as she could.
“Read me The Lord’s Prayer.”
Alena hurried through the aged pages to the Book of Matthew and began in the most soothing tone she could muster for Gloria.
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come, your will be done,
on earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.”
“Psalms. 23:4,” Gloria commanded flatly with her eyes closed, tears flowing, and head still cupped in her hands.
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the
shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me,” Alena read.
“Yea though I walk through the valley,” Gloria repeated. Alena lifted her head from the passage and stared at her.
“Yea though I walk through the valley.” Her voice was gaining strength.
“Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil!” she screamed. Takeah stirred in the bedroom.
“For God is with me!” The power in her voice alarmed Alena. Had Gloria lost it?
“God is with me. God is with me! God is with us. God.Is.With.Us. God is with you, Alena.” She finally lifted her tear-stained face to Alena’s. “Blessed are they who are pure in heart, for they can see God. Do not let the Beasts blind you.” Tears welled in Alena’s own eyes as she felt the magnitude of what was coming to pass.
“Come,” Gloria said. Alena’s eyes were wide as she walked to Gloria and knelt in front of her. Gloria cupped her hands around Alena’s face. Her eyes were ravaged with exhaustion, yet hopeful.
“Go. It is time. Go out there. You will know what to do.” She planted a soft motherly kiss on Alena’s forehead. “Go and fear no evil.” She touched her fingers to Alena’s heart.
“There is one last thing you must know Alena,” A somber look clouded her expression. “Maya is the Oracle. She is the one. If the Darkness enters that door tonight…if they get past you…they won’t stop until they destroy her. I’m so sorry.” Gloria collapsed into deep sleep.
Alena slipped out of the apartment quietly and pushed the building’s door open once again.
“Mike!” He was standing on the stoop ready to turn the handle. “How did you make it past the barricade?”
“I told you I wasn’t leaving you here by yourself.” He kissed her gently. “This is my battle too, just as much as it’s yours. We are going to stop all of this, together, Come on. It’s insane out there, let’s go in and get your friends.
Alena curled her fingers around her amulet resting against her skin. Something of smile tugged at Michael’s mouth. They walked into the courtyard where the moon was crouched low onto the horizon. It was nightfall and the same corner shop where young Benjamin Jr. had been gunned downed was ablaze just as Gloria had said. Suddenly the dismal night sky broke open and mourned with them, heaving sheets of cold rain that pelted the earth.
Despite the rain, the streets were still clogged with hundreds of people of every race demanding justice, by any means. A fleet of police cars had descended on their block, their red and blue lights pulsed through the darkness. Armored in riot gear and shields like soldiers on a battle field, a wall of police officers stood ready to charge against the crowd.
“GO BACK TO YOUR HOMES! GO BACK TO YOUR HOMES NOW OR WE WILL DEPLOY TEAR GAS,” an officer screamed into a megaphone.
And then with one act, the chaos began. “Fuck the police!” a man yelled and hurled a glass bottle toward the officers. The moment its green glass shattered loud, raucous cries rang through the night as both walls of people surged forward toward each other. The Shetani began to uncoil from their hosts and show themselves to those with the power to see. Wide streaks of the darkness seeped from the hearts of the protestors, and from the hearts of the police officers, swelling with the power of their anger, bitterness, and wrath until their evil presence completely coursed through the city. The Shetani’s deathly black void then shifted into its beastly shapes. Alena glimpsed each of them in terrifying clarity.
“God, give me the strength to do what you’ve asked me to do. Please, protect my child,” she prayed.
More were coming. One by one the torrent of demons swarmed in like a rolling sea of bats in their wretched forms; Fear, Dissention, Bondage, Jealousy, Malice, Murder, Rage, Spite, Cruelty, Bitterness, Greed, Poverty, Torment, and Cowardice. The creature’s demonic screeching and howling carried on the winds, battle cries from the pit of evil. Their wicked stench clogged the air. The Beasts all concentrated on Alena through the menacing red orbs of their eyes, waiting to devour her when the time was right. Their gaping mouths snapped at her with razor sharp fangs as they spit fires onto the buildings.
Alena refused to allow any fear to infiltrate her, and she knew this was the Shetani’s intent with Michael. She moved to help the constraints off of him but just then the black formless shapes merged into one another and materialized as one gargantuan beast looming before her. Her eyes swept up to the creature’s impossible height. It loped toward her until suddenly it was upon her, looping her hair around its claws to pin her gaze into its terrible face hovering above.
“Do you think you can defeat us? We are infinite. We are legions.” It was reading her heart and intuiting her every thought. “You will die now, Fool! Now, should we crush you or shall we have them pierce your heart with a bullet as we commanded they do to the boy?”
It laughed evilly before bearing its teeth and snapping its jaws before her face.
“Leave her alone!” Michael bellowed, standing in front of Alena with his hands shaking with fury. “Get back! Move!” Michael warned her.
He tried to hold up his arms to defend her, but one of the police officers seized him by his throat. “Get over here boy. Ha! Lover boy is it? You think you can save her? You think you can save them, Nigger?” The whites of the officer’s eyes had gone black. The Shetani behind those eyes howled with haunting laughter.
“Never boy! Never!” It left its host and transformed into dark wisps of smoke that had coiled around his wrists and legs.
“I can’t move! In the name of Chr—” A final dark wisp wrapped itself around his mouth, muting him.
“You cannot fear it, Michael! You must believe! Fear no evil. You are the truth, you are the light!” Alena urged.
Rooted to the spot in which she stood, Alena gazed defiantly back into the boiling viscous red of its eyes. They were void of any life. Absolute nothingness. Alena refused to give the beast any of her power—none of her fear, none of her heart would it ever have again.
“Hail! Hail in the name of Christ!” she screamed.
In one swoop it grabbed her throat, claws digging mercilessly. Alena felt the scathing pressure and then the warm scarlet trails of blood spurting from each point of her skin the creature had pierced. The beast threw her several feet to the ground. Before she could get up it grasped her by the arm and ripped its fangs through her flesh, searing through the tendons and leaving gnashed skin flapped open to the white shell of her bone.
None of this is real! But how was she feeling every agonizing sensation? The beast growled and smiled its evil smile at her.
“I fear no evil. I fear no evil,” Alena chanted in her mind, willing her emotion to stay centered on what was true. She groaned in pain as rainwater battered her face, trying not to look at the grisly wound the beast had torn into her arm. It stung like hellfire. Despite it, her face was transcendent with a fiery boldness. The beast lunged on her and snapped again, this time the clench of its powerful jaws threatened to snap her arm and tear it from her shoulder. She closed her eyes and pushed its fearsome image from her mind.
“This is not happening. They cannot kill me.” Despite the searing pain in her arm, she would not submit to the illusion. “No! It’s not real!” she panted through clenched teeth.
At that, the beast wrapped its hand around her throat. No matter how vivid, no matter the pain, she steadied her thoughts and her feelings on truth. Yet behind the dark pall of the beast’s unrelenting hand, Alena was running out of breath. The scene before her was fading to black and she felt the panic of her last breath leaving her body.
Alena blinked the rain out of her bleary eyes and glimpsed Gloria a few yards away, walking toward her to help her from the beast’s grip. She was determined yet still weak as a sapling tree. She’d fought her exhaustion to make her way to the courtyard, not able to bear to leave Alena and Michael to fight alone. The beast brought its monstrous fist down on her as she approached, hitting her with enough
power to send her flailing until she lay motionless on the asphalt.
“The Darkness is passing.” Gloria winced. “Gather your strength, Alena. See only God.” In the dreamy chasm between life and death, Alena remembered. Her father’s gift.
“Daddy. Daddy…” she tried to squeeze from her throat . In the next moment, a blazing hand holding a sword of gold pierced the beast between its eyes and instantly it released Alena. She closed her eyes against the incoming of bright light. The hand belonged to a mighty warrior, his breastplate like a fortress of sunlight. The warrior then touched her arm where the beast had nearly torn it asunder. Alena kept her eyes on the beauty of his ethereal form. It was shining illustriously against the black void like a guardian angel. Though she had never seen the entity before, her soul and heart recognized its presence. The holy warrior was her father. As she felt the warmth of his loving light wash over her, she felt her own power rising. Her father, her real father, had come to help her.
An orb of roaring orange flames set in the South of the sky, a searing, brilliant white star perched at the North. The planets were settling into their heavenly stations. The Grand Cross was almost formed.
“The door! They’re going for the Cosmic Door!” Gloria cried with all she had left.
And then came the sound that froze everyone into their stances. What began as a low grumble of thunder broke into a terrible cracking that pierced the air and drew all eyes upward to the rainy sky. It had turned an almost impenetrable black as the Shetani’s army descended with fury. A new beast formed from the mass of demon servants, rushing in to besiege Alena and infiltrate the Cosmic Door. It was even more monstrous than the first. With her renewed faith Alena raised her hand to the beast and her true strength was revealed. A glow pulsed around her entire body like the sun’s corona.
As Alena reclaimed her power so did Michael and the restraints of darkness dropped from his wrists and ankles. A flash of intuition hit them both in the same moment. Join together as one. “Take my hand!” Alena shouted to Michael, who had already begun running toward her. The earth began to quake and the winds became almost unbearable, whipping up earth and debris into a wall of haze before them. Hand in hand they rushed through it to Gloria’s side and Alena took her weak hand into hers. A jolt of synergy surged through each of them. The instant they embraced bars of light emitted from each of their amulets, one traversing the other and then soaring miles into the cosmos until it formed an arch of protective light with the force of their synergy. She could see now that she, Gloria, and Michael were not alone.
A Fistful of Honey Page 23