She was shot sitting here. In his mind’s eye, he could see her, still crying, looking up as the attacker stormed in the house and leveled the gun. How long after I left? If I had been here, would they have killed me too? Were they waiting for me to leave?
Sam let his fingers run over the dried blood. “I’m sorry, Mom,” he whispered. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I never imagined that…that I wouldn’t get to apologize.” Tears dripped from his face, turning crimson as they hit Mary’s last legacy. Sam wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, followed the bloodstains with them. Then turned.
Turned toward the wood-burning stove. The one with the angel figurine on it.
The figurine with a trumpet. Gabriel. Streaked bloody red, as if by fingers grasping him, holding onto him for strength…or leverage.
“May God light your way when you are lost.” In his ears, the words had echoed with prophetic truth, with more meaning than their own. “And how does one light their way…?” He reached over, turned the handle on the stove’s door, inhaled, and opened it. His heart sank.
There was nothing but ash inside. Soft and white, remnants of cheery fires once upon a time, never again to be lit by the two who had lived here, loved here, raised a son here. Sam shook his head, growling as he did so, shoving those thoughts from his mind.
“It has to be here.” Anger swelled in his heart. “I know it is, something, something HAS to be here!”
Heedless of the mess he was causing, he dug his hands into the ash, scooping huge chunks of it, piles of it, out of the way, imagining his mother doing the same. Burns on her hands. Burns from the fire that was lit.
His hands hit metal. Smooth metal, with raised bumps. He wrapped his hands around its edges and pulled it out, dusting it off as he did so.
There it was. The book his mother had wanted to show him; the book that she had, perhaps, died for. What had she called it, again?
“The Seals of Solomon.” He flipped some of the pages; they were not paper, as one would normally expect, but instead a soft, white cloth, with the writing and drawings painted on.
“Why, Mom?” His voice was a whisper, soft, subdued. “What was so important about this book? Why would someone want to kill you for it?”
Sam sat down on the couch, the very spot where his mother had sat with this book in the first place, and opened it to the first page. He looked on the inside of the front cover.
More of that fabric had been attached to the inside of the metal, and, upon it, there was a series of names. Each name had a birthdate next to it, and some were circled, about every fourth or fifth name. The inside cover was full of them, and, as Sam glanced over them, he saw something interesting near the end.
The fourth name from the end was Emily Buckland. His great-grandmother. Her name was circled. Then came his grandmother’s name, and then his mother’s, Mary. Neither of those were circled.
Then, in Mary’s delicate hand, was Sam’s full name, Samuel Laurence Buckland, January 20, 1990. Twenty-three years ago, his mother had written his name in this book, knowing it would one day go to him.
Without thinking about it, Sam reached over into the duck-shaped writing tray on the table beside the couch and retrieved a pen. Shaking, he put the pen to the inside cover.
And circled his own name.
Oh, God. Whatever this is, I guess I’m in it. I guess I’ve been in it all along.
Sam didn’t know what he was expecting - a fountain of light, angels in a chorus, some sort of recognition from the Powers That Be that he had just taken a giant leap away from his good senses into the world of magic madness - but there was none. Instead, he felt a great calm, a peace fill his mind, as if what he had done was the right and proper thing, indeed, the only thing, that one could do in these circumstances.
The feeling was so strong that Sam could feel his eyes drooping, his consciousness drifting away into sleep. He tried to fight it, tried not to succumb to the dreams again…
And then he was gone.
~~~
“What do you mean, ‘going crazy’?”
“Well, sir.” Francis licked his lips, wiped his glasses on his shirt and replaced them on his face. “She’s just started repeating the same thing over and over and it has nothing to do with any of our queries.”
Gregory shook his head, rubbed his temples. “What is she saying, then?”
“Just…hold on.” He consulted his notes again. “Her exact words are ‘Solomon’s heir stands.’ That’s all she’s said for the last twelve hours.”
Gregory stopped, looked up, eyes widening. “But…they’re all…unless…”
“Dr. Goldman?” came a voice over the intercom. “We’re back to normal responses; everything leveled off all at once and data is nominal.”
Francis stepped to the intercom switch and toggled it. “All right; I want detailed analysis of the hour before the event and I want us to keep close watch for at least the next twelve hours; I want to know what caused this and how we can keep it from happening again.”
“Yes, Doctor.” Click.
Francis rubbed the balding spot on his head, wiping sweat. “I don’t know, sir…it seems like, maybe, things are falling apart…maybe we should think about shutting down. Just for a while, you know? Just to check everything out?”
Gregory shook his head. “I can’t afford that, Francis. There are too many things going on and I need her insight, I need her vision. She’s helping me make a better world for everyone, Dr. Goldman, and I don’t plan to sacrifice that. Not for anyone. Make it work; keep her online. That’s what I’m paying you for, isn’t it?”
Francis nodded, retreating back into the safety of his work station. “Yes, Mr. Caitlin. It’s no problem. I should have an update for you in the next 6 hours.”
“Good.”
CHAPTER SIX
Sam opened his eyes as he regained consciousness. The world swam before him for a few moments before falling back into cohesiveness, the blurry outlines of his parents’ furniture hardening into solid figures again.
Sam stretched, a smile that had not been there for weeks playing on his face. He felt like he had just awakened from a nice long nap. Best of all, there had been no nightmares for the first time since the dream fire had burned him. It was wonderful.
Then his outstretched hand bumped into something on the couch next to him. It was warm and pliable. His head snapped to the left, looking for the unexpected object.
It was not an object at all, but a person. She smiled at him, her gleaming teeth matching the shimmering white dress and wrap she wore. Her face was gently lined, smile marks of a thousand thousand joys and just as many worries clearly mapped across her brow, her cheeks, and at the corners of her loving grey eyes.
“Great-grandma.” Sam brought his hand up to touch her cheek. It was warm. “Is it you? Am…am I dead?”
Emily laughed, the sound ringing through the room. “No, Sam.” Her voice was clear, without the scratching of age that it had held before. “You’re not dead; far from it, in fact. I know that you have questions, and, unfortunately, I can’t answer all of them.”
“Why, Gramma?” He found himself reverting to the term he had called her in his youth. “I don’t understand…what’s going on here? Is…was Mom…telling the truth?” His eyes searched hers. She nodded.
“Yes, Sam; our family are the descendants of King Solomon’s legacy, if not the man himself. We serve God as he did so long ago…with the same magic he used.” She nodded toward the book. “All of which is in that text.”
“But, why wasn’t I told? Why did you, Grandma, my mom, keep this from me? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Emily laughed. “You weren’t ready. You weren’t ready when we did tell you, Sam; it took over two weeks to get you to the point where you were even able to consider the possibility. If you hadn’t been called, Sammy, your mother would have told you on your twenty-fifth birthday; there would have been a demonstration, where Mary would have done a few conju
rations, summonings, proven what this is about, then given you the history, and you would have passed it down to your children, and so on.”
“If I hadn’t been called? What do you mean, ‘called’?” He turned in his seat to better face this vision of his great-grandmother.
“God has called you, Sam. He has sent messages which the learned,” and here she winked at Sam, “meaning ‘us,’ recognized. He sent them to you, Sam, showing that it was meant to be you that fought for him this time.” She laughed again, but this time the sound was tinged with sadness. “I would congratulate you, but you’re going to be put through Hell before you can come out the other side, and, for that, I’m sorry, Sam.”
“Do…do I get a choice?”
Emily leaned forward and covered Sam’s hand with her own.
“You already did, Sam. You circled your name, you agreed to be God’s agent.” Sam began to protest, but Emily cut him off. “And don’t say you didn’t know what you were getting into, young man. You knew very well that you were handing this over to God.”
Sam sputtered a bit, nodded. “But what if I walk away?”
She sighed. “You could do that. That would break the chain of succession, allow the forces of evil to take control of matters. Lead to…well, bad things, Sam. Bad things.”
Sam shivered, despite the warm weather. “Gramma, I just…I just…”
“Shh...I know, Sam. I know. I can’t tell you much more, except that everything you need in order to do this is in that book, and that you need to help Mikey.”
Sam’s head shot back up. “Mikey? The little kid?”
“He’s not just any ‘little kid,’ Sam. He’s…special. Keep him safe. Pay attention to what he says. Okay?”
Sam nodded. “Is this goodbye again, Gramma? Because if it is, I wanted to say that..I…I’m sorry.” His eyes clouded with tears. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you…”
“When I died?” Emily smiled. “What’re you worrying about, silly? As you can see, I’m fine. Dying doesn’t end anything, not really.” She leaned over and kissed Sam on the forehead. “Goodbye, Sam. I’ll see you again, I promise.”
“Good…” Sam’s eyes snapped open again as he awoke. There was no sign of his great-grandmother, or that anyone at all had been there, but the Seals were still on the table; the silver color now gleamed as if it had been freshly polished, the embossing upon the surface new and ornate. Sam reached out to pick up the book, surprised at how light it was, and started to head out of the building.
The door opened, not into the front lawn he was so familiar with, but onto a landscape of Hell. The ground was fissured and cracked, lava boiled out of the earth alongside steam hissing from vents nearby. The sun was a fat, pregnant red orb low in the sky, casting long shadows of beaten, weathered buildings and vehicles. Creatures
(My God what are those things how do they move like that)
crawled over the splintered ground, some with four legs, some with eight, flesh hanging from their mouths as they pursued each other, screaming and wailing. One of the creatures looked toward Sam and he saw that the monster had no eyes, only barren sockets where eyes may have been, once upon a time.
Those sockets kept looking at him, and Sam knew that he had been seen. The creature loped toward Sam, snapping a tatter of flesh into its mouth as its six arms clambered over a chain-link fence about 200 feet out.
Sam shook his head, closed his eyes. Despite everything that had happened, his mind couldn’t wrap himself around the idea of…this thing, this monster, this place. Couldn’t be.
He cracked his eyelids open again. Hell was gone. The front yard he had grown up in, played in, was back.
The demon was still there, though, and the ground around its feet boiled.
Sam’s heart raced as he watched the monster. He would have died there if the shock had not caused him to drop the book onto his foot.
“Ow!” The tome fell open, revealing sigils, pages with instructions.
And, before Sam’s eyes, the pages decoded themselves into perfect English. Incantations, gestures, a ritual to bind a demon and send it back to the Abyss. His mind absorbed the information before him, and he cast his gaze upward for a moment.
If you are up there, God, thanks.
The thing began charging at him, faster and faster, monstrous teeth bared and spittle dribbling on the earth, searing grass and stone alike. It grew claws and screamed at Sam like a thousand damned souls would scream in the pits of fire spoken of by the Bible.
Sam looked up, gauged the distance. There wasn’t time to finish the spell he was thinking of; maybe if he knew more, was more practiced - really believed that this would work, even - he could have made it on time.
What now? He looked back toward the book, hoping for another bout of divine inspiration. He received none, or, if he did, it drowned in his fear. He could hear the ragged breath of the demon as it neared him.
As the demon jumped, claws tearing up chunks of dirt, Sam threw his hands up in the air.
“Get thee behind me, Satan!” A circle, forged from white-gold light, appeared in the air before the demon, searing its flesh as it slammed into the diagram protecting Sam, a commanding circle, a warding spell. The creature screamed, its essence boiling away under the power of the Divine channeled through the Seal, God’s will manifest, the force thrumming through Sam’s heart, his arms, his eyes, until he felt it would destroy him before it destroyed the monster.
The demon’s skin flaked like burnt paper in a harsh desert wind, blasted apart in the wake of God’s might, flesh and bone alike peeling away. One last scream crawled from the creature’s throat, assaulting Sam’s ears as the monster that made it shattered into a thousand pieces and fell apart.
The grass browned, withered, died where the pieces of demon fell upon it. The sun dissolved the few fragments that were left, and within seconds, there was nothing but the evidence of the monster in the dirt, the tracks on the ground where it had run and the blast zone where it had perished. Sam looked at his hands, the hands which had channeled the smallest amount of God’s power, and saw that there were symbols written upon them, circling the knuckles, the fingers, like ornamentation. The symbols were sharp and angular, like some sort of ancient writing, perhaps.
Just like those on his great-grandmother’s fingers that he had noticed that day so long ago.
Sam looked up again, his eyes wide. What had just happened? He knew that everything his mother and great-grandmother had said was true; this book, his heritage, God, everything. And if that was true, then…
What was that demon doing here? He stared at the spot the creature had occupied before vanishing. Maybe opening the book, accepting this...burden…had drawn some sort of attention, kind of like a road flare or a beacon, and now the creatures of Hell
(You didn’t even believe in Hell two weeks ago)
would be looking for him, coming for him. What…
“Hey, Sam!” A balding man with a soft belly and an equally soft voice waved to Sam as he headed to his car to go to work. “How’s your day going?”
“Fine so far.” Sam waved back. Yeah, demons chasing after me. Great start to the day.
“Glad to hear it. Damn shame about your folks. I’m sorry, Sam.” He glanced at Sam’s feet. “I’ll get you the number for a good lawn care specialist, if you want. Don’t need the grounds going to Hell just because the folks have passed, am I right?”
Sam nodded. “Thank you, Lewis. You take care, all right?”
Lewis smiled. “Can do.” He ducked his head into his car and turned the engine over.
Sam glanced down, leaned down, grabbed the book. It was still very light, warm in his hands. He flipped through the pages, eyes moving over diagrams, instructions, symbols and sigils. He smiled.
Maybe this won’t be so bad after all. Studying was, after all, something he was good at. Then the smile dropped off his face and his brow furrowed. Gramma had said something…what was it…right! Mikey.
Last place I saw him…hell, only place I saw him, down in LA. He slammed the covers back together and tucked the book under his arm. Guess I’m heading that way.
Sam headed toward his car, and as he stuck his leg in through the door, he looked back up at the house. He paused, wet his lips.
Then he looked heavenward.
“…God?” His voice was that of a small child who had misbehaved. “Could…could you make sure that my mother and father are okay? And tell my mom that I’m sorry…and thanks for everything.” He bowed his head for a moment, a tear falling down his face, and then got behind the wheel and drove off.
~~~
Gregory Caitlin paced up and down in his office. His face was tight, and sweat beaded on his brow.
“No, no.” He put a knuckle to his mouth, almost chewing on it. “I won’t let it happen. No.” He wiped his face, stared at the liquid on his hand. There was a knock at his door.
“What?!” One of his aides peeked his head in.
“Mr. Caitlin? You’re scheduled to give a speech at UCLA today in three hours; we’re ready to go if you are.”
For a moment, Gregory couldn’t remember what the aide was talking about; his mind was too clouded, too angry. Things were unraveling too fast, and he would not…could not…let them go any farther. He shook his head to clear it.
“Sir? Is something wrong?”
“No, no, Jeremy, nothing’s wrong.” Gregory put on a false smile. “I’m fine. Just a little stress, you know?”
Jeremy’s face lit up with relief. “Sure! Sure, Mr. Caitlin, I understand that, why, just last week…”
“Tell me about it another time.” Caitlin’s eyes were unfocused, his mind somewhere else. “We have to get to UCLA, don’t we? Let’s hurry, then; don’t want to be late.”
The aide nodded and hurried out the door. As Gregory went to follow him, he looked toward the safe, where the ancient words were hidden.
The spells of summoning. Demon control. The spells Solomon used.
The secret of his success.
“No, Samuel Buckland.” His voice echoed in the empty room. “You will not undo me. God has a mission for me, and I will not fail Him. Deus vult.” He closed the door as he left, and darkness fell upon the office.
Chains of Prophecy: A Tale of Mythic Discovery Page 7