by David Mack
Adair white-knuckled the grip of his crutch and bit down on his regrets.
God forgive me … what if I’m sending that boy to his doom?
29
AUGUST
The moment had been weeks in the making. One step at a time, Cade had prepared the villa’s great room for the conjuring. Every sigil, every line, every totem of Goetic significance had been placed, adjusted, and perfected in accordance with the grimoires of old. Adair had vetted the details and found no cause for objection—except for the entirety of Cade’s plan, which Cade had decided wasn’t up for debate.
He had clothed himself in ceremonial garb and taken up his tools, which he had exorcised and consecrated as prescribed by Honorius and Solomon. Cedar and sandalwood kindled in his brazier, stoked by splashes of oil and camphor.
Hell spewed its expected clamor of protest before producing LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE, whose arrival was marked by thunder, fire, sulfuric smoke, and putrid vapors. The horned abomination twitched its caprine tail and clomped its black hooves against the villa’s parquet floor. Its yellow eyes fixed upon Cade with disdain and enmity.
The beast spoke in a roar like the sundering of mountains.
WHY HAST THOU DISTURBED ME?
“I come with a list of spirits subordinate to thee, and whom I mean to yoke into my service, in accordance with our pact. I command thee to compel those spirits I name to come forth when called and make themselves known to me, so that I might place them into bondage.”
The demon rolled its eyes. Everything about this, Cade surmised, must seem mundane to it: the same demands, the same names, over and over again, ad infinitum.
Again, its voice boomed. ENUMERATE THOSE WHOSE SERVICE YOU DESIRE. THOSE WHO ART MINE TO PLEDGE SHALL BE THINE TO COMMAND.
At last the test of Cade’s resolve had arrived. He recited the list from memory. “Great and powerful LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE, I command thee to call forth into my exclusive service AZAEL, ZOCAR, XAPHAN, VESTURIEL, ARIOSTO, MARCHOSIAS, SATHARIEL, VAELBOR, JEPHISTO, SABAOTH, SEIR, CASMIEL, MEUS CALMIRON, AOROTOS, and VERMAEL.”
The great spirit paused, as if taken aback by Cade’s demand. Its grandeur diminished, as did the majesty of its voice, though it still rumbled like a gathering storm. FIFTEEN SPIRITS? NEVER BEFORE HAST THOU ASKED TO YOKE SO MANY.
“Wilt thou deliver them as required by the Covenant? Or must I punish thee?”
LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE curtsied and held its pose in a parody of deference. I THINK ONLY OF THY SAFETY AND WELL-BEING. MORTAL FLESH IS NOT MEANT TO HOLD SO MANY OF MY KIND.
Cade lowered his wand toward the smoldering brazier in front of him. “Mine shall hold as many as I choose. And if I desire thy counsel, I shall ask for it. Now produce those spirits I have named, and command them appear instanter before me, lest thou feel my wrath.”
The spirit backed away and stood erect as it puffed its chest outward, projecting pride and haughty indifference. ALL THOSE SPIRITS THOU HAST NAMED CAN I PRODUCE, SAVE ZOCAR.
The tip of Cade’s wand grazed the glowing coals in the brazier, producing growls of discomfort from the demon. “Why are you not able to deliver ZOCAR?”
Hatred burned in the demon’s eyes. ZOCAR IS FOR THE MOMENT YOKED IN GOOD FAITH TO ANOTHER OF MY SERVANTS. IF A GIFT FOR LIGHTNING IS WHAT YOU DESIRE, I CAN SUMMON AZALETH TO THY SERVICE.
“To whom is ZOCAR yoked?” A long and sullen silence stretched on without a reply from the demon. Cade stabbed his wand into the reddish coals, kicking up a flurry of ash and unleashing a hideous noise from LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE. Its howls of unearthly suffering persisted while the wand remained in the embers. Cade felt no pity for the monster writhing and roaring before him. “Who has yoked ZOCAR? Tell me or I shall multiply thy pains a thousandfold!”
An anguished cry unlike any Cade had ever heard filled the villa. Then the spirit shook the rafters as it bellowed, STAY THY ROD AND I SHALL TELL THEE! MERCY!
Cade withdrew his wand from the brazier. “Speak quickly. My patience is spent.”
THY RIVAL, KEIN ENGEL—HE HOLDS THE REINS OF ZOCAR’S YOKE.
Cade hadn’t considered before then the role of the word “exclusive” in the demand for yoked spirits. It had just been one of so many words he had learned by rote. “So while Kein holds a spirit yoked, no one else can call it forth?”
LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE confirmed in a pained voice, VERILY, IT IS SO.
“Does the reverse apply, as well? When I yoke a spirit, does that bar Kein from calling it into his service?”
IT DOES. Brief as the answer was, it brimmed with contempt.
This was information Cade resolved to find a way to exploit—just as soon as he dealt with more exigent concerns. “I will accept AZALETH as a substitute for ZOCAR. Call forth AZALETH and all the others I have named, excepting ZOCAR, so that I may yoke them.”
Hell’s prime minister obeyed, just as the Covenant decreed he must, and summoned before Cade a parade of the unholy, each a unique abomination that filled the air with noxious fumes and horrid sounds. One by one, Cade called their names, and each appeared in turn, a procession of spectral forms that emerged from darkness to be absorbed inside Cade himself.
Every spirit he subdued brought new waves of pain, each multiplying the others, until he felt as if his body had become a gauze sack tasked to hold a pack of wolves.
As the last spirit disappeared inside Cade, yoked to his will, he felt a great sickness sweep through him, one more powerful than any he’d suffered before. His entire body was in revolt from the invasion he’d invited. His intestines churned; his stomach was racked by spasms. Bile crept up his esophagus. Pressure inside his skull made him wish he could crack open his head to let the pain fly out.
Warmth tickled his upper lip. He palmed smears of blood seeping from his nostrils, then felt a deep aching in his right eye.
Inhuman voices crowded his mind. They drowned out his own thoughts—a preview of the nightmare of demonic possession—until he forced them all into silence. It took all his concentration, and when it was done, his head swam and his gut begged to be purged.
When he looked up at LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE, he suspected the demon was chortling at his distress. He refused to give it any more free entertainment. “I thank thee for thy service, and I discharge thee by the terms of the Covenant, providing thou do harm to no person or beast in this place, nor to those I have named as my own. Depart in peace, and return when, and only when, I call for thee. Begone, spirit—in the name of ADONAY, ELOHIM, ARIEL, and JEHOVAM!”
A terrible boom rocked the villa. The interior of the circle that held LUCIFUGE ROFOCALE vanished, revealing a chasm of swirling clouds, darkness, and stars, into which the demon fell. As soon as it was gone from the room, the floor reappeared with a peal of thunder that nearly extinguished the ceremonial candles placed throughout the conjuring room.
The ritual was over. The room was once again secure.
Cade fell to his knees, sick and spent. “Amen.”
He had known that yoking so many demons at once would be dangerous, and that it would be painful, but until that moment, he hadn’t understood the full extent of the torture he had chosen to inflict on himself. Learning to think, to hide his discomfort, would be a Herculean labor by itself. Being able to wield magick while under such duress…? He had no idea how he would accomplish that. He only knew that he had no other choice.
In a matter of days, he was being sent alone into the land of the enemy. He had no desire to do so as a lamb to the slaughter. Cade was finished being the prey.
I’m done being afraid, he vowed. It’s time to make Kein fear me.
* * *
Even with the aid of a cane, Kein winced with each step he took. All his joints felt as if they had been pulled taut with rusty wire. Friction burned in his shoulders, hips, knees, and elbows. Turning his head more than a few degrees to either side provoked jabs of pain between his cervical vertebrae. And those were the least of his physical complaints.
His headache was chronic, as
were his diarrhea, blurred vision, and insomnia. Several days had passed since last he slept, but even that respite had lasted only a few hours, thanks to the plague of nightmares—endless visions of purgative fire and vengeful angels. Flagons of red wine and countless pipes packed with opiates had done nothing to assuage his ailments.
He had been trapped in this pitiful state for over two months, ever since Adair and his young female apprentice Anja had tracked him and his adepts to Wewelsburg—a feat Kein still couldn’t explain—and blasted their way in with Celestial magicks. For centuries Kein had heard of such feats, but until then he had never witnessed them.
I did not think Adair had it in him to take the gloves off. Now I know better.
Siegmar and Briet flanked Kein on his long walk from the Auschwitz commandant’s office to the camp’s execution chambers. Siegmar wore a patch over his right eye, which had been cooked like a hard-boiled egg by a blast the Russian girl had unleashed at Wewelsburg. Briet’s left arm was in a cast; an invisible blow from Adair had shattered her limb in three places, and there was no magick capable of fixing her humerus and tibia.
At least her arm will heal, given time. Siegmar will stay half blind unless we make this ritual work. Kein and his adepts passed the entrance to the cremation facility, a structure of cinder blocks and cement that housed ovens with cast-iron doors. Kein stole a look inside as they shuffled past. Only half its incinerators were active, but its blistering gusts tainted with human ashes were like the breath of Hell itself. Laboring inside, lit by the ovens’ glow, was a legion of emaciated Jewish prisoners; under the watch of a handful of Nazi guards, they were tasked with cremating their slain fellows.
“Nothing like German efficiency,” Briet said under her breath.
An evil snort of amusement from Siegmar. “Not on earth, at least.”
“Quiet,” Kein said, lurching forward, one awkward step after another. “We are almost there.” He led them to a smaller building, one with a handful of entrances and no windows. Its roof was dotted with chimneylike portals, but Kein knew they were designed not for expelling toxins but for delivering them.
Waiting outside the closest entrance were three German officers. The two subordinates were unknown to Kein, but he recognized the camp’s commandant, SS-Obersturmbannführer Rudolf Höss, whose uniform was as crisp as his greeting. “Herr Engel. We’ve been expecting—”
Kein interrupted the commandant with a raised hand, then said to his underlings, “This does not concern you.” When they hesitated and looked at each other, whether for direction or for courage, Kein added with the suggestive influence of ESIAS, “Leave us. Now.”
Before Höss could protest, his men hurried away. Alone with Kein and his adepts, Höss maintained his hauteur. “I object to this inspection, Herr Engel. This camp is under my command, and you have no authority to—”
“Silence.” Kein was reluctant to use magick on Höss. “I am not here to suffer your opinions or appease your ego. Return to your office and let us work in peace.”
His order turned Höss apoplectic. “How dare you! You have no right—!”
The commandant doubled over as Kein pointed his right index finger at him. Kein was tempted to take the man’s life out of spite, but he knew not to test the limits of the Führer’s indulgence. He restrained himself to making a point.
“First, Obersturmbannführer, I have dispensation from the Führer himself to use your camp, your men, your prisoners, and you, as I see fit. If you make any note of this visit in your camp’s logs … if you breathe a word of my presence to anyone, ever … I promise you an eternity of tortures worse than any you could ever imagine—even after lording over such a pit of despair as this.” Kein half closed his hand and grinned at Höss’s agonized expression. The Nazi officer fell to the ground, hunched into a fetal curl. “That pain in your chest? It is the invisible hand of a demon named ORNIAS. If I clench my fist, his hand will crush your heart like a rotten peach. When you die, he will devour your soul—and funnel your strength into me.” He leaned down to whisper with exquisite menace, “Do not force me to make a fist, Herr Höss. Tend to your own affairs, and leave me to mine. Do you understand?”
Tears fell from Höss’s eyes as he bobbed his head in a frantic nod. Kein relaxed his hand and pulled it to his side. Höss gasped, drew a few grateful breaths, then scrambled to his feet. He fled from the trio of strangers who had come without fanfare to inspect his camp’s gas chambers. Kein motioned his adepts toward the open doorway. “Let us head inside.”
The magicians entered the empty gassing structure. It was an ugly block of stained gray concrete, mostly open inside but punctuated by columns of wire mesh. A sickly sweet odor of chemicals leaked from every surface. Kein opened his senses to the reactions of his yoked demons. To the last, they reveled in the building’s grim aura. He nodded. “This will do.”
Siegmar wrinkled his brow. “For what?”
“We need new strength to destroy Adair and his apprentices. The Nazis are bent on genocide; it is time we turned their madness to our benefit. Camps like this will make the rites of blood sacrifice not just possible but more effective than they have ever been.” He pointed around the interior of the building. “Briet, mark this structure and all the others like it with the invisible seals of our patrons—yours, mine, and Siegmar’s. Consecrate each one as an altar to Hell. Siegmar, you’ll do the same inside the crematoria—I want every corpse the Nazis incinerate to become a burnt offering to our Lords Below.”
Briet seemed ill at ease with Kein’s new directives. “Master, these are gas chambers. Goetic rituals demand blood, not just death.”
For all her skill she was so young, so inexperienced. Kein traced the ragged stains on the walls with his fingertips. “Look closer, my dear. At the walls. The floors. The Nazis’ instrument of murder might be gas, but when this chamber floods with poison, the Jews rip the nails from their fingertips as they try to claw through the walls. When that fails, they rip at one another, then at their own burning eyes.” He scraped the toe of his boot across a dark patch on the floor. “In the end, most of them vomit blood as their lungs burn.” He looked up at his apprentices. “Trust me—these rooms will yield more than enough blood to slake Hell’s thirst.”
30
SEPTEMBER
Chimes from the wall clock in the villa’s second-floor hallway told Cade it was ten o’clock. He had spent the night with his nose buried in one of Adair’s dusty references on the tactics and techniques of magickal combat. Much of it had been written in languages long dead and unreadable without magick, a fact that had compelled Cade to add a sixteenth spirit, CAELBOR, to his already cumbersome roster of yoked demons.
He shut the book and stretched his arms above his head. His muscles had become stiff despite his attempts at regular exercise, which consisted primarily of lonesome hikes through the surrounding hills. A steady diet of whisky, wine, and laudanum-laced absinthe had made his chronic headaches almost manageable, but he had traded demonic diarrhea for chronic constipation. It had been several weeks since his mass-yoking ritual, and he couldn’t recall having enjoyed a decent night’s sleep since.
Self-conscious about his appearance—the strain of the yoking had ruptured the capillaries in the whites of his eyes, turning them bloodred—he had avoided both his reflection and his master, in the hope that his injury would heal before it was noticed. That afternoon Cade had awoken to a note from Adair asking him to come to his study at 10:00 P.M. Now the hour had come, and Cade put aside his research to answer the invitation. Along the way he caught his warped reflection on the large pot of a polished silver tea service. His eyes remained noticeably red.
Maybe he won’t ask.… And maybe I’ll flap my arms and fly to the moon.
Cade knocked on the door of Adair’s study. There was no answer. He tried the knob and found it unlocked, so he eased the door inward and peeked inside. The room beyond was dark as sin. Even late at night, its curtains were drawn; all its lights wer
e off, its candles unlit.
“Master?” He edged past the door and closed it behind himself. The room was quiet—and then he caught a distant clamor of voices, ringing phones, and chattering Teletypes. He followed the sound to the oval portal mirror. The glass inside its dark oaken frame swirled with bluish gray clouds whose depths flickered with unearthly light.
As the maelstrom parted, the sounds from the other side became clearer. Cade recognized a variety of British accents—London, Manchester, Liverpool—and some American voices. The master’s Glaswegian growl cut through them all. The mists dissipated to reveal Adair, perched on a pair of crutches. He stood close enough to the mirror’s threshold that he obstructed most of the view of the other side, but Cade saw enough to deduce the master was visiting a military strategy room, with its plotting tables and manned banks of telephones, probably in some well-fortified bunker, though where he couldn’t say.
One officer who wore a U.S. Army major’s insignia saluted Adair, who responded with a jaunty wave farewell before he sidestepped through the mirror into the study, awkwardly shifting his balance from one crutch to the other as he navigated the magickal portal. As he cleared the oval frame, the mirror’s surface reappeared behind him. He noted Cade’s presence, checked his pocket watch, and smiled. “Right on time. Well done, lad.”
Cade watched him hobble to his desk. “Nice to see you back on your foot.” A scathing glare from the master made it clear jokes about his infirmity were still out of bounds, so Cade shifted the topic. “New mirror?”
“One of them. Currently in Gibraltar, en route to its new home.” Anticipating Cade’s next question, he added, “A new hand mirror’s in the works for you, I promise.”
“Yeah, sure, and the check’s in the mail. How’d your meeting go?”
“Better than some.” Adair settled into his chair and set his crutches aside. “The Allies are a month or two from invading French North Africa. After that, Italy.”
“What about the Pacific?”