by David Clark
It was at that one moment, for the briefest of seconds, that the beast came into view. It towered as tall as the three-story buildings that lined the street. Hooves the size of an entire horse, a body larger than William’s farmhouse. Sitting on top of the shoulders was the head of a sneering and snorting man. The beast disappeared from sight again, but the sound of it coming to a stop further down the road and turning around was clear.
The two lantern-holding monks moved to help the man in red, but he waved them off as he stood and steadied himself in the center of the road. He turned toward the beast and began reciting something, this time louder. There was great passion in his voice as he spoke. From across the road, Cristobal translated for William
“Morax, the Great Earl, and President of Hell. You are in our world. We, under the power of Almighty God, have sole responsibility of the souls here, both living and dead. You are hereby ordered to leave this world, by the power of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”
The great beast charged again, but the man in red did not run. He steadied himself for this pass, once again holding a small object in his right hand, ready for the collision. The collision never came, not for the man in red. The beast veered off the road and gored one of the two lantern-holding monks, flinging him high into the air. The man in red leapt toward that side, not to aid the monk, but to make contact with the beast. When he did, it was visible again, as was the pain and agony it wailed about.
The man began reciting again, as the great beast was frozen in pain. The spot he touched with the object in his right hand seared its flesh.
Cristobal once again translated, this time missing parts, as much of what the man in red said was overpowered by the screams of the beast, “When Jesus had stepped out on land, there met him a man from the city who had demons. For a long time, he had worn no clothes, and he had not lived in a house but among the tombs.…. He commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man….” Cristobal stopped the translation once he recognized enough of it. “He is reciting verses from the book of Luke, chapter 8, verses 26, 27, and 28… he is continuing from the same book.”
Cristobal was no longer translating, but reciting from memory, but William was no longer paying attention. The sight of the great beast engulfed in flames had taken that. It broke loose and barreled down the road, flames trailing behind it. The beast was no longer visible, but the flames that engulfed it were. It turned and charged the man again but, again, he didn’t move. He waited, and as the great beast dipped its flaming head to deliver a blow to the man, he punched his right hand forward. A crack of thunder echoed through the clear sky. The beast didn’t make it another inch. It dropped right there and moaned and wailed. Flames grew all over it. As the flames reached the head of a man on top of the great body, the wailing increased. A bluish smoke rose above the beast before it, the flames, and the smoke, disappeared into the darkness of the night.
The monk that had been thrown high in the air pushed himself up off the ground and retrieved his lantern before rejoining the other monk, behind the man in red. The three walked back in the direction they came from. When they reached William, Cristobal was standing in the road. He bowed and said something too silently for William to hear. The man turned toward William and walked in his direction.
When the four men reached him, Cristobal introduced him, “William, I want you to meet Cardinal Depeche. He is our most senior paranormal advocate.”
The man in red held out his hand and William took it, bowed, and said. “It is a pleasure to meet you.” The bow was out of respect, and a necessity in order to reach the man’s hand at his height. William was still not sure what he had just witnessed. The ghosts he had seen had never looked or reacted like that. Question after question spun around in his mind.
It was obvious the cardinal didn’t understand English, as Cristobal had to translate the simple greeting to him. William knew Cristobal would undoubtedly be the source, or at least the bridge, to the answers he searched for.
“What was that?”
The old man’s voice cracked, “Morax.”
“Morax, the Earl of Hell. He commands a legion of demons that try to enslave those souls stuck in our world. Occasionally they also make promises to those in the living world, in exchange for their souls. The cardinal has been battling those demons for years,” Cristobal explained.
“So, is it over?”
“For now. He will be back. Think about it like this. We won the skirmish.”
At that moment the image of a great battle of fire, on some mountaintop high above the clouds, leapt into his mind. Both the cardinal and the demon were chained to their spot. Neither able to leave. Destined to fight for all eternity. “That reading didn’t get rid of him?”
“Oh, no. The reading was just that, a reading,” explained Cristobal.
It was at that moment that the cardinal stepped forward and reached up to place his left hand on William’s chest. In broken English he said in a voice so weak it appeared painful to talk, “The words… they provide you focus. The power comes from here.” He took his hand off his chest, and returned to the road. The two globes of light caused by the lanterns carried by the two monks soon joined him as they headed back down the road toward the dark stairs they had descended earlier. Cristobal fell in line behind them.
William joined the parade and asked Cristobal, “What is that in his right hand?”
“It’s a relic. We will cover that in a few days. I understand one of Morax’s legions has been visiting you.”
21
The walk back to the Vatican provided Cristobal another opportunity to teach, and expose William to a world that was even more complicated then he knew. Ghosts, or spirits as his teachings called them, were one thing, they were simple. Before now, he though demons were just a creation of scripture and fear, to drive a message to the congregation. The possibility that the creatures Cristobal was describing existed in their world was hard to fathom. Creatures, here, that worked with and manipulated people to do their bidding, all for the promise of knowledge, profit, love, or any other desired possession or achievement.
Cristobal explained that William was being targeted by one such demon. Sister Francine had sensed it in his residence and reported back. She was also sensitive to such creatures, but was not able to see or interact with them. William explained how it first appeared to him, the night before he left Scotland, and then again, here. He told him of the promise it had made. The lifetime of perfect crops, and the perfect healthy family. He nodded as he listened and then asked, “Were you tempted?”
“No. The first time I thought it was just a weird dream.”
That response made his teacher chuckle. He then asked, “How did you feel when it made you the promises?”
William had to think about that for a moment. Both times there was a sense of contentment and pride, as the images replayed in his head. It was the life he longed and hoped for. Seeing it there, in imagery that felt as real as life itself, made it all feel possible. The first time it happened, he wasn’t aware of what it was, though, and dismissed it as a wild dream, fueled by all the time he spent over the previous few days thinking of his experiences with spirits, and Bishop Emmanuel’s offer to train him. The lack of any additional details provided by the bishop about his offer left a lot of gaps for his brain to fill in. William had always had a vivid imagination as a child, something he once chalked up as the explanation for the spirits he saw. If you give that kind of imagination enough gaps to fill, of course it could create that type of imagery and sensations. Now that he knows what he knows, the encounter becomes a little more chilling. The second time, he was aware it was real, but didn’t know it was a demon, or even that they were real, yet. Now that he does, it changes everything, and he confessed, “It frightens me now. Why is he coming to me?”
“We will get to that. First, were you frightened at the time?”
“No,” said William.
“Why not?”
�
�I didn’t think the first time was real.”
Cristobal then asked, “And the second?”
“A little, when he first appeared.”
“So, let me ask you this. A demon with the bottom half of an animal, the top half of a man, surrounded in fire, appeared to you, why were you not scared out of your skin?” Cristobal turned to look at his student and walked backwards down the road, his eyes trained on him for his response.
That was a question William hadn’t considered, and it showed on his face, producing another chuckle from his teacher.
“You don’t know, do you?”, he asked.
William shook his head as he continued to think about it. Why wasn’t he?
Cristobal explained, “Nobody does. The archives are full of interviews taken of those that have seen demons, and not a single person was afraid. There is a reason. Demons are master manipulators.” Cristobal smacked his hands together to emphasize that point. He turned and walked side by side with William. The tone of his voice contained a weight that it hadn’t had through any of their studies, nor at any time earlier in the night. “That is something you must remember. Spirits don’t manipulate you. They are what you see, and that is it. Never trust what you feel, hear, or see when a demon is present.” His left hand slapped William on the chest as they walked. “Tell me you understand that.”
“I understand,” William said. His voice trailed off a bit and had a question mark hanging at the end. That question mark was attached to the question he asked before Cristobal continued, “Then h…how do you deal with demons?”
“First, you will not deal with demons. That is a priest’s job, but that is not to say you will never encounter them. You will, and when you do, you go with what we are teaching you. It will never fail you. The challenge is in forcing your mind to ignore everything else, to not be taken in by them. The images it showed you, how did you feel when it showed them to you?”
“Happy.”
“I bet you felt the warm sun on your face. A beautiful scent of some type wafting through the air around you, and images of your loved ones all smiling. Does that about cover it?”
As they mounted the steps to the Vatican, William nodded his head to answer his teacher.
“Of course, and let me tell you why. If someone is afraid, they won’t listen to what it has to say. They need you to feel comfortable, or whatever emotion they need you to feel, to believe what they are trying to tell you.”
Cristobal stopped at the top of the steps and continued, his voice a little lighter, warmer, than before. The hard edges that were present in his words of the last few minutes were gone, as he recalled his story. “A demon once came to me. It basically promised me the world. I was dressed in a black robe, with a crucifix around my neck, standing at the rose-line of a great church. Thousands were seated in the pews, repeating the prayer that I was leading. There, seated among my flock, was my father.” His voice grew quieter, and dripped with remorse, “He smiled at me.” Cristobal paused and looked out at St. Peter’s obelisk before he took a large prolonged breath. “The demon showed me two things that would never be. My father never approved of my choice to be here. I was to follow him as a blacksmith. He would never be sitting there smiling, and there would never be a flock for him to sit among.”
William knew Cristobal was not a priest. Instead, he was some sort of scholar, but he assumed he was training and learning to become one, based on the respect and how involved he was with his own training. “I don’t understand. Are you not training to be a priest?”
“Let’s have a seat here on the steps. It is a nice night out and sometimes I come to sit here and gaze at the plaza and ponder. My form of meditation, I guess.”
The two sat, and William understood why this was his favorite spot. The great plaza was illuminated by the flickering gas lanterns that lined its borders under a clear star-filled night sky was a sight that matched, if not exceeded, in its own way, a clear cool spring night in the highlands around his home. The glow of the lights danced on the mighty stone obelisk that appeared to be standing guard overall.
“William, I cannot be a priest. The church would never allow it. I was married and a father. I was also not a very religious man. My focus was my family.” He emphasized the word family in a way that made his accent stronger than at any other time William had heard. “They were taken from me, by something I didn’t understand. The search for the truth brought me here. You see, my son became ill and what I now know was a demon, approached my wife with the promise of saving our son, in return he wanted her to be his agent of mischief in our realm. First, she ransacked the community crops one night. Then she released all the livestock from our neighbor’s farm. Each time, she was found where these things happened and gave the excuse that she saw what happened and was trying to stop it. She gave wild descriptions of those she had seen running through the crops, or opening the doors, but no one was ever found. One night she was caught standing with a flaming torch next to a large pile of harvested grain, at a farm on the other side of town. I wasn’t even aware she had left the house. When the farmer approached her, she screamed something at him in a language he didn’t know and tried to touch the torch to the grain. He tackled her to the ground and, with the help of others in the area, dragged her in to town, to the constable. What he told me later was that when he laid eyes on her, her own eyes had gone solid black, and a green liquid spewed from her mouth. Every word she screamed was not one they recognized. He ordered the mob to take her to the priest, and he came to get me. By the time I arrived, Father Perez was trying to cleanse her soul, but she was fighting back. She had bent over in half, backwards, and screamed. I still hear that scream in my nightmares. It was full of woe and pain. There were multiple voices in it, screaming, but I could hear hers. I knew she was in pain, and suffering. I begged the priest to stop it, and I meant to stop both what he was doing, and what was happening to her. He continued and her legs and arms contorted around at unnatural angles until the bones snapped. She fell, lifeless, to the ground at the feet of the priest, in the middle of the mob that had brought her. Her body was twisted in so many ways, I couldn’t even recognize her. When I returned home, I went to hold our son. His body was cold, death had come for him.” A single tear rolled down Cristobal’s cheek as he took several broken breaths.
“In the following days, Father Perez explained this world to me, and it made sense. I, like you, can see and sense ghosts. Always could. When I thought back on the days before Josefina started acting peculiar, I remembered I had felt something, but had dismissed it. I was blinded from seeing the truth, because of my lack of knowledge of this side of it, and my feelings for her. When I realized that, I committed my life to finding the truth, and came here to learn and help others learn.”
21
Ainslee laid across the bed, asleep, when William returned back to their residence. It looked like she had made an attempt to stay awake and wait for him, but had given in to the late hour and her exhaustion. Neither surprised William. It sounded like she had had a pretty exhilarating day walking around the city, he was sure that had exhausted her. His night out had exhausted him.
He studied the bed for a moment, and considered waking her up or trying to move her over himself, to make some room. She looked so serene and almost angel-like sleeping there, he couldn’t bring himself to do either. Not to mention, William didn’t see how he could move her without waking her, as he would have to pick her up. Instead, he surveyed the room for another area for him to lay down and get some sleep. There was a long chair, covered in what appeared to be red velvet, against the wall under the windows. It looked long enough for him to stretch out on. What he was questioning, though, was its width. If he laid on his side, it might work. If he rolled at all, he might wake up to a momentary weightless feeling before his body thudded to the floor. There was always the floor, but the tiles looked hard and cold. With all the blankets on the bed, under his wife, that was the least attractive of all options. So, the
red chair it was.
To try to prevent rolling off the chair, William pressed his back against the back of the chair. That left only a few inches between his body and the edge of the seat. It was unsettling, but he was tired, and his eyelids were growing heavy. He wasn’t in the mood to search for another location. His world was going dark as a delicate voice asked, “What are you doing? Get over here in bed.”
With a groan, he lifted his head and opened his eyes. Ainslee was sitting up in bed and patting her hand on the side he slept on last night. His body was tired and settled, but the pain in his back from the lack of comfort in the chair spoke louder. She pulled the covers back to welcome him to bed, and wrapped her arms around him as he laid down. The warm breath he felt on his neck, now, was more welcome than what he felt earlier.
“Late studying?”, she whispered into his ear.
William yawned and said through a second yawn, “Training. Forty foot demon that looked like a bull running up and down the road. An old five foot tall man took care of it.”
He heard her say, “What?”, but after that his eyelids won and the room went dark.
23
The morning began the same way the previous morning had. Sister Francine knocked with a polite rap on their door. William heard it, but waited a moment before he stirred. His body argued with his brain about whether it was ready to wake up. The wait must have been longer than he thought, or that Ainslee would tolerate, as she got out of bed and proceeded to the door. When she opened it, the sister brought in the tray like she had yesterday, but there was a difference. Her eyes weren’t down at the floor like before. Instead, they were locked on the location William’s demonic visitor stood.