by N. P. Martin
The evocation was almost done, and despite my focus and concentration on the task at hand, I still felt the cold fear well up from deep in my belly, more so when the air in front of me seemed to split in two all of a sudden, like something had sliced the very fabric of this world from another dimension. And as if seeping through that tear, there came the stench of utter filth and decay, so sickening that I turned my head and vomited onto the floor. But I barely even noticed that I had done that because my focus was still on finishing the evocation, even if I was inviting death to come get me.
My heart pounded against my chest and sweat ran over inch of my exposed skin.
Then just as a clawed hand shot through the tear in the Veil, I forced myself to swallow down my fear and all but screamed the last line of the evocation, which translated roughly into: Come forth in the name of all evil, in the name of all magick! I command thee!
Through the tear in the Veil Of Darkness, the burning eyes of Baal glared out at me.
20
Baal
THE DEMON'S EYES were the fiercest I'd ever seen. Bulging orange orbs with dark elliptical pupils surrounded by flecks of blood red. They were eyes that were full of wickedness and diabolical intent as they glared at me through the torn Veil Of Darkness like a monster peeking through the curtains at a scared kid, enjoying every second of the fear it was inducing. Then one of the demon's enormous clawed hands burst through the tear in the Veil, joining its other hand as it then began to force back the Veil further, exposing its face and the rest of its body. It was all I could do to keep myself together as that monster began to climb forth from the depths of the Underworld at the other side of the Veil. My whole body was tense with fear, every vein in me bulging, every pore sweating. The dark power that poured through the tear in the Veil was overwhelming as it flooded over and into me, tearing at my insides like a thousand tiny claws, turning my blood to acid so that it burned through my veins like liquid fire. The pain was so great, and so unexpected that I soon started screaming like a torture victim in some dark enclave of the Underworld.
While I was lying on my back outside the magick circle, screaming for my very life, the demon Baal was busy climbing all the way through the fabric of the Veil. And the more of the demon that stepped into this world, the more I felt its dark and brooding presence.
Then the pain stopped like the demon had clicked its fingers to end it all for me, cutting short my screams as I realized the agony had blessedly stopped. I caught my breath and sat bolt upright on the floor, my body now dumping adrenaline by the boatload. Even so, I had to force myself to look upon the wicked thing I had summoned forth from the unfathomably dark depths of the Underworld. It was a battle to stop myself from shutting my eyes so that I would never have to look upon anything as terrifying again. This thing was no spirit. Baal was flesh and blood. He also looked more unsettlingly human-like than I expected, given the monstrous, indescribable horror of the demon that had killed my family back in Ireland. The demon Baal had a human-shaped head if you discounted the pointed lumps of bone that pushed upward out of its skull like the tips of spears. He also had four sets of black horns, two smaller pairs near the center of his skull and a larger pair that curled up and back over his head. The demon also had two slits that flared in the center of its face where a nose should have been. His mouth had so many teeth of different lengths—all of them pointed in some way—that I couldn't even count.
Oh Jesus, what have I done, I thought as I stared in horror at the beast before me. It’s going to rip me apart just like that other demon did to my family.
Baal reared up to his full height of six and a half feet or so. His body was again human like, thickly muscled, the skin greenish-black with bright orange markings like tattoos running across his whole ghastly frame. Baal’s glowing amber eyes—set deep into hollow sockets—glowered down at me. "Who dares to summon me?" it roared in a voice so deep and resonant, and so full of absolute authority, that I felt my bowels loosen to the point where I almost shat myself, which would have been a fitting response to that question. Somehow or other, though, my sphincter retained more dignity than the rest of me and retained control.
I opened my mouth to speak, but all that came out were unintelligible croaks as my throat was so stricken by fear. This was mostly down to the fact that the demon hadn’t possessed the body of John Doe like I thought he would. Instead, he appeared in his true form, which made him a much bigger threat to me. Another fuck up, I thought. I didn’t have the time however, to ponder what went wrong.
"Speak!" the demon commanded as I felt the heat radiate off it, the smell of something foul and otherworldly creeping over me like a noxious gas, turning my stomach.
Come on. Get a grip of yourself, Creed. Take control of this thing before it fucking kills you!
"I am...August Creed," I said, somehow managing to stand up on shaky legs, the demon seeming even more fierce and frightening as I came face to face with it. "I…I summon you here to do my bidding, Baal.”
I put as much command and authority into my voice as I could, thinking it would be enough to take control of the demon, but it wasn’t. So I wasn’t expecting what happened next.
The demon stepped forth out of the magick circle like it wasn't even there and gripped me around the throat with one of his enormous hands, his skin like sandpaper around my neck, his grip crushing. Then he lifted me off the ground and held me up, turning my head this way and that like he was inspecting a half-dead animal found on the side of the road. When he pulled me close so my face was just inches from his own, his fetid breath—like the worst fart you've ever smelled in your life—blasted into my open mouth. I would have vomited if the demon's grip hadn't of been so constraining around my throat. I could barely look the demon in the eye as he continued to breathe his foul stench onto me.
"You think you have power over me, human?" Baal said, not as loud this time, but his voice still boomed in my ears. "You think you can command me?" I looked into the demon’s eyes long enough to see the black heart of evil in them before Baal casually tossed me against the nearest wall, slamming into a stack of shelves. When I crashed to the floor again, heavy books and glass jars rained down on top of me. It was as if a giant had casually swiped me aside and I could only lay there in shock as I struggled to breathe after being nearly choked to death. There was also pain, but my still dumping adrenaline masked most of it. Then the demon was on me again in a flash, his rough hand around my throat again, lifting me up and pinning me against the wall, holding me there as his eyes bored into me.
"Wait!" I managed to croak out before the pressure around my neck got too great. "I…left you…an offering."
The demon's huge maw stretched into some rictus grin, and it pressed me harder into the wall until I felt unconsciousness start to pull me under. “That rotten sack of dead meat? You insult me!”
Just as I started to black out, Baal let go of me so I crashed to the floor while it crossed the room in a blur of motion. Blood rushed into my head along with my returning consciousness, and I watched the demon pick up the body of John Doe like it was nothing and begin to rip it apart. In a matter of seconds, John Doe's body had been torn to pieces and thrown all over the basement. Hunks of flesh slapped into my naked body, splattering blood all over me. When the demon was finished, John Doe had been reduced to a thousand tiny pieces.
It's going to do that to me next if I don't do something, I thought in a panic.
The Sword Of Rashanti still lay inside the magick circle a few away. Quickly, I focused my magick and thrust out one hand as I concentrated on the sword, which rattled for a second and then skidded across the floor towards me. I grabbed it immediately and struggled to my feet, thinking what a stupid idea it was to fight a demon who could rip apart a body in seconds. But stupid or not, I knew it was necessary.
"Alright, motherfucker," I said, holding the sword high, sounding a hell of a lot more confident than I felt. "Let's fucking do this!"
Baal, cov
ered in blood and gore, laughed and came barreling toward me.
21
Fight
BEFORE THE SUMMONING, I dared have in my head a little movie featuring Baal and me, the two of us talking and working things out, not fighting. I know, it was foolish of me even to think in such far-fetched terms, but my optimism got the better of me sometimes.
Baal got to within three feet of me before I thrust my hand out and stopped him dead with my magick. To be honest, I was shocked my magick even worked against such a powerful demon. But then I realized that something was different. My magick was different. Due to all the dark energy in the room—what with the demon, the still open book on the floor, all the bad intent in the air—my magick had shifted into darker territory. It felt different inside me. Not cool and flowing the way it normally did, but hot and burning, like a hundred snakes slithering around inside me, their bodies covered in tiny razors that cut my flesh as they moved along. The pain was dreadful, I have to say, but it was also somehow sweet at the same time, maybe because I felt the increase in power I was getting in return for all that pain and darkness swirling around in me. As I held the surprised demon back, I added a bit of pain into the mix, and that’s when I really felt the difference in power, when my magick became fueled by sheer bad intent that seemed to materialize unbidden from within me, serving as explosive fuel for my magick.
Baal growled in anger at first as he felt the pain in his chest, then he smiled and stretched his arms out, as if to say, “Bring it on, motherfucker. Do your worst.”
So I did.
I channeled as much pain and murderous intent as I could muster into the demon (and I seemed to be able to muster a lot), driving the beast back towards the wall, my features twisted by effort and the sinister feel of the black magick I was wielding. Even the color of the magick itself, normally bright blue or white, sometimes green or yellow depending on the spell, had darkened into tones of purple, deep orange and red, even black. A perfect reflection of the intent that fueled it.
And I loved it. It was like I had been injected with a massive cocktail of drugs that were now taking me on the ride of my life, the rush as strong and impressionable as any heroin junkies first ever hit.
The force of the darker magick coursing through me had now driven the great demon down to his knees. Even so, there was a look of defiance on Baal’s face and something else that seemed to suggest he was somehow pleased that I was doing what I was doing. “Can you feel it, Warlock?” Baal asked me. “Can you feel the darkness coursing through you?” His laugh was deep and sinister.
The evil intent in me had built up to a point where all I wanted to do was destroy the very demon that I had went to so much trouble to summon in the first place. I wanted to wipe it out of existence, tear it into a million tiny pieces and incinerate each one. Through sheer force of will, I channeled more of the black magick through myself and into the demon. Baal roared at the increased intensity of the magickal assault on him, his roar one of genuine pain this time. I still gripped the Sword Of Rishanti tight in my hand, and I raised my arm back in preparation for a decapitation. Rage and a burning desire for vengeance against demonkind fueled my will to kill as I brought the sword down towards the demon’s neck in a wide arc.
Stop!
The swords killing arc was cut short by a tiny, far away voice coming from somewhere inside my head, telling me to stop what I was doing, and that if I killed the demon, I would be killing the power needed to break the curse on me. It took a monumental force of will for me to listen to that tiny voice. Other, far more sinister voices were begging me to carry on, to let the darkness take over and kill the demon.
With a scream of effort, I managed to cut my magickal assault short and stepped away from the still kneeling demon. "No!" I bellowed as I tried to fight against the darkness taking hold of me.
“Don’t fight it!” Baal shouted. “Accept it!”
Every muscle and sinew in me were twisting against the darkness as I tried to wring it out of my system, at the same time calling back up the lighter magick that I had spent decades cultivating. Closing my eyes, I compelled myself to relax and focus on drawing up my own magick again. It took a few moments, but I was able to flush most of the poisonous black magick out of my system. Then I turned and looked at the demon, who was back on his feet again. “You knew this would happen,” I said, aware that I was back in danger now that I didn’t have the darker magick to increase my powers. “You wanted this to happen.”
Baal reared up, looking down at the scorching hole that went halfway into his chest like he had just been hit by a burning meteor. Then he fixed his fierce gaze on me. "You are more powerful than I thought you were, human." It grunted. "You have proven yourself to me." Another grunt left its mouth, low and guttural as it took a few steps towards me. "That doesn't mean I am at your service."
“What does it mean then?” I asked, feeling like the games were just beginning.
“It means I will help you, but only if you do something in return.”
And there it is, I thought. Always a condition. Did I expect any less? Of course not. “What do you want?”
The demon came closer to me, and I tried not to step back away from him. The fighting was over, and strictly speaking there should have been no need to fear Baal anymore, but I would have been foolish not to. “You’ve been marked.”
I frowned, not understanding. “What?”
“Another demon has marked you.”
Another demon? Does he mean the one who killed my family? “You know the demon?”
“I know it.”
“What’s its name?”
“That isn’t why you summoned me here.”
“How do you know why I summoned you?”
“I see your retreating soul. I see the energy of the spell you are under. You want me to reverse it.”
"And can you?" I asked, really hoping the demon would say yes, otherwise the entire summoning would have been a waste of time.
Thankfully, Baal nodded. “I can help you reverse the spell.”
I exhaled in relief. “Alright. Tell me what you want. I don’t have much time left to fix this.”
Baal grinned hungrily, exposing his glistening, pointed teeth. "I want souls who will serve as my slaves. Get me one hundred souls, and I will lift your curse for you."
“One hundred souls?” I shook my head in disbelief. "How the hell am I going to get one hundred souls? That's too many." It would have been bloody near impossible to gather up so many souls. Plus, I wasn't in the business of stealing people's souls, especially a hundred of them.
Baal glowered at me for a moment, infernal fires seeming to burn deep in his amber eyes. Then he grunted dismissively. “Find another demon to summon.”
Panic rose in me as Baal’s body began to turn to smoke and fire before my eyes. He was about to vanish, and I would be back to square one again. Shit. What did I expect anyway? That Baal would be happy with a case of beer and a carton of Lucky Strikes as payment? “Alright!” I shouted as Baal began to fade from view. “I’ll get you your souls!”
“Summon me again when you are done,” Baal said, no more than a fiery outline in the dark of the basement now.
I watched for another moment as the demon finally disappeared, leaving only a trail of smoke behind as evidence he was ever there in the first place (and the scattered remains of John Doe, of course). My body dropped in relief when the demon was gone. I thought for sure I was going to lose myself earlier as all that black magick was flowing through me. So powerful. So addictive.
Sighing, I noticed Blaez standing on the stairs leading down from the kitchen, smoke rising out of his pelt, his dark yellow eyes smoldering at me. I had no doubt the Garra Wolf heard everything. I also knew he understood everything he no doubt heard from upstairs.
I looked back at Blaez and said nothing.
22
Sanaka's Sanctum
THE FIRST THING I did after I left the basement was take a long,
hot shower. I felt soiled by the infernally dark magick that had run through me, and I wanted to be cleansed of it, although I knew it would take more than a hot shower to do so. A Purification Ritual would have to be done to rid myself of all traces, but to be honest, I didn't see the point. Not yet anyway. A heavy feeling in my gut told me that I probably wasn't done with black magick just yet (or it wasn't done with me more like). And given what I now had to do to pay the demon I'd summoned, I would have been wasting my time with a Purification Ritual. A hot shower would have to do.
In the living room after the shower, I called Leona. “Hey,” I said when she answered. “It’s Creed.”
“Creed,” she said, sounding sleepy. “You know what time it is?”
“Three a.m.”
“Exactly.”
I smiled, despite her annoyance. “I thought you might want to know that I’m like, you know, still alive and all, so…”
“Alright. Thanks for letting me know, Creed. Now if you don’t mind, some us have to get up at dawn…”
"Sure," I said as if I was there with her (wishing I was). "Go back to sleep."
She had hung even before I finished speaking. Then as I stood holding the phone, a weird sort of cold feeling came over me, followed by an uncontrollable shaking in both my hands. Shivering, I made a fist with both hands in an effort to control the tremors, and after a moment, they subsided and my body returned to its normal temperature.
What the hell was that about? I wondered as I leaned against the wall.
Though I knew what it was about. It was my soul getting restless within me, wanting to leave the person it no longer recognized.
Ghoulship was getting closer all the time.