Demonologist (36 page)

“Jesus is weeping, dear father.”

Thornton’s lungs gasped for air. He felt his consciousness slipping away, falling down, down, down, his very soul plummeting into the depths of his bowels.

In his boyhood voice, Allieb began to sing a Latin-phrased hymn.

And as Thornton fell into Hell, he could hear the distant tune of the demons singing along.

Deep in the entrails of Hell, Bev
Mathers
finally slept. In his dreams, he saw Julianne. She stood beside the lake at
Alondra
Park, waving to him, telling him in an ethereal voice to come over to her. Kristin was there too, as an adult, sitting on the bench alongside her mother, petting a white swan. They were both smiling, offering mountains of reassurance to Bev that everything was going to be all right. Bev approached them, tears of joy filling his eyes. He stood before Julianne, his wife, looked into her adoring eyes. He took her hands. They felt…rough. With trepidation, he looked down at them and saw that he held two lizard claws. Repulsed, he threw them down, then looked at her with fear and disgust. She smiled. “What’s wrong, dear?” she asked, her voice carrying a gentle, comforting lilt. From the corner of her mouth, a swan’s feather appeared, its downy white tainted with a thin streak of blood. It
tremored
in the gentle breeze, then swept away over the lake. “Honey? What’s wrong?” she again asked. Bev jerked his gaze away from the fluttering feather, then pulled back from her, his feet squelching in a puddle of acid. He looked over at Kristin. The swan in her lap was now dead, its gut shredded open, the innards dangling like streamers. She was petting it soothingly. “Daddy, come to us,” she requested, the generous smile on her face cloaking something sinister. “No,” he muttered, shrinking back. “No.” A deep rumble emerged from Julianne’s mouth. When he looked at her, her eyes were yellow and glaring, the pupils shaped like diamonds. “
Allieb’s
attempt at Legion has begun,” she said, her voice deep, monstrous. “You are about to experience agonies you never thought imaginable. Be strong, and you shall be spared.” At the finish of her words, Julianne collapsed to the floor in a dead heap, as did Kristin. The serene environment melted away, its illusion giving way to the fiery acids of Hell. Bev, once again imbued with unendurable pain, screamed and screamed until unconsciousness trounced him and he crumpled back down onto the burning floors of Hell
.
 

~ * ~

Silence filled the cathedral, the circle having remained at a standstill since
Allieb’s
concealed roar put an end to the congregation’s perambulatory chant. Through the tops of his eyes, Danto chanced a forward glance toward the altar. The candles burned brightly, the hooded participants on the opposite side keeping their shrouded gazes down. His grasp on the hand of Rebecca, and that of the faceless woman’s to his left, had gone numb. His feet ached, his knees quivered. He fought to simply stand.

Suddenly, a low
monotonal
hum pervaded the room. Deep; seemingly amplified; musical in its delivery. The six second vocalizations repeated six times at the same even pitch, and were immediately followed by a series of loud,
echoey
poundings that sent vibrations deep into the framework of the house. Danto could feel the tremors racing painfully from his feet straight up through his body into his throbbing head. After the poundings, the hum returned; this time the pitch waxed and waned, composing a dark, droning melody. The flames on the candles rose nearly six inches, flickering like ghosts. The hum stopped, and the poundings ensued, the entire house shaking under their authority. Amazingly, everyone in the circle remained stoic, despite the looming danger. Danto squeezed Rebecca’s hand. Gently, she squeezed back, soothing Danto’s fear of being left alone amid this chaos.

Alone.

Where is Thornton?

As the trade-off of
hummings
and poundings continued, Danto noticed a rimmed serving plate being passed along the circle of partakers to his left. He watched as a male member retrieved the plate, bowed gently toward the altar, then removed something from it and placed it in his mouth. The act lasted not ten seconds before being repeated by the next individual. Danto swallowed hard, remembering what Thornton had told him before coming here:
Do not react to the unfolding events. Just follow along with the ceremony, quietly and obediently, do not draw attention to yourself, and speak to no one
.

The plate eventually reached the woman next to Danto. She disconnected her cold grasp from his, removed what appeared to be a host, bowed to the altar, and placed it in her mouth. She then handed the offering to Danto.

Danto took it from her. He peered down at the contents.

It was half-filled with irregularly shaped hosts.

They were brownish-red in color.

It was at this moment that he realized what he was about to put into his body, and he shuddered with repulsion. These hosts were made with flour…and blood. Who’s blood, or
what’s
blood, he had no guess; he
did
know that this act indicated a “beginning phase” of
Allieb’s
black mass.

The drawing, it was near.

He removed one of the hosts from the plate. It was misshapen, thicker and heavier than one of God’s usual offerings: a thin tasteless wafer composed of flour and blessed water. He trembled, did his damnedest to erase his mind of the offense that was about to be committed.

He placed the host in his mouth.

His head rushed. His tongue
twinged
from the sharp coppery hint. Nausea purled in his gut, and despite the lack of saliva in his mouth, he swallowed the pasty wafer down before his stomach could shove it back up.

Eyes closed, he stood there momentarily, gripping the plate tightly, trying to rid his mouth of the lingering aftertaste. A restless murmur rose amongst the participants. He soon realized his hesitation, and quickly passed it to Rebecca.

She performed the ritual like a pro, accepting the host with no noticeable uncertainty, then promptly handed the offering to the participant on her right. In minutes, everyone attending the congregation had taken part in the communion, the near-empty plate returned by a cloaked member to the foot of the altar.

Time passed sluggishly. A harsh burning ball carved a hole in Danto’s gut. He swallowed hard, stifling the acids crawling up his esophagus.
 

 
Moments later, a faint red light formed at the center of the altar, seeping up along the edges of what appeared to be a trap door in the platform. At this point many of the people, despite the veil of their hoods, closely monitored the light as it grew brighter, its beams reaching out along the edges of the rectangular-shaped access.

The door jostled, then gradually creaked open, an inch at first, releasing the crimson radiance in a lustrous surge. The door opened further. The shafts of light expanded, spilling out brightly. From within its brilliant and oddly silent depths, a callous bleating could be heard: anxious, animalistic. A dark figure soon appeared, staggering from the access, the door bobbing up and down now as the form climbed its way out onto the altar. In the face of the light, it was hard for Danto to distinguish what was emerging from beneath the altar, other than it might be some kind of animal. Once it was completely out of the hole, the door slammed back down to the floor of the altar, shutting out the light, thus revealing the animal to be a large black
sow.

The animal, although unleashed and free to run riot, staggered irregularly about the platform until deciding upon the support of the altar to nestle itself protectively against. Here Danto could see the pig’s injuries: a bloody snout, seemingly knifed or bitten; deep claw-like slashes across its hide; blood-covered hooves; a broken leg that dangled behind it like a storm-damaged branch. It remained still and shivering, huffing noisily.

Danto’s breathing increased, Thornton’s words haunting his fears:
You are going to see some very unpleasant things
… Amazingly, the circle remained still, and wholly silent; Danto hadn’t realized until now that he was once again holding hands with Rebecca and the hooded woman. The labored huffing and puffing of the swine echoed about the room, sending harsh shivers down his spine. He listened to the pig’s discordant suffering until the room was once again shocked into attention with the deafening slam of the trap door flinging open against the platform.

The red light shot up from the access like a geyser, shafts reaching vigorously to the ceiling, crooked beams splaying out across the entire congregation, igniting
Allieb’s
startling entrance into the cathedral.

Allieb climbed out of the hole onto the altar, sinewy arms rippling, eyes glimmering ferociously. In a daunting display, he opened his mouth staggeringly wide, revealing dark brown stumps for teeth, weathered black tongue lolling out, lapping saliva across his lips and chin. Facing the circle of worshippers, he shook his body like a wet dog, then released a series of menacing barks, causing some of the participants to visibly flinch. He turned, gazed down at the cowering pig, then leaped to his feet and raised his hands high, eyes facing the black heavens.

In a deep, lustful, dominating voice, Allieb roared, “Legion…is…here!”

The congregation replied in unison: “Hail Allieb. Hail Belial.”

The possessed demonologist climbed atop the altar, hands and feet gripping the edges like talons. He stared into a rising flame, then removed the candle and held it out before his face; the flickering glow ignited his reptilian eyes, as though they were electric. He recited to the congregation: “
Magnus
es
,
domine
, et
laudabilis
valde
.” The worshippers, Danto and Rebecca included, repeated the phrase. Danto had no clue as its translation, relying on ignorance as his only protection against the dark prayer. Allieb, staring into the flame, spent the next few minutes swaying and mumbling inaudible prayers to himself. Upon finishing, he licked the flame, drawing it into his rough, skeletal body, then threw the candle to the platform. It rolled alongside the cowering sow, which snorted in fear and pain.

Allieb stepped down from the altar, turned to face the pig. He recited a
latin
phrase, to which the congregation replied, “Release the demons from Jesus’
sow.
”

Allieb delivered a series of low mumbling phrases, many of which were in Latin, some, however, in a tongue Danto could not recognize. After each, the congregation responded in prayer: “Release the demons from Jesus’
sow.
”

Finally, Allieb recited in his deep, hoarse voice: ”Unto earth the demons shall walk within my body, amidst my very soul.” He pressed his chest out, from which the eight ulcerated teats wriggled erectly from his chest. The sow, seemingly entranced, staggered from its hiding spot beneath the altar. It nestled up against the demonologist’s chest, and began to suckle one of the nipples.

A time passed where nothing but the sound suckling pig could be heard. Danto waited in uneasy silence, wondering,
Dear God, where is Thornton?
, and then,
What of Bev
Mathers
? Where is he?

Suddenly, a siren-like squeal filled the room. Danto shook away his anxious thoughts and brought his sights back to the altar, where Allieb had drilled his pointed fingernails deep into the abdomen of the
sow.
The pig thrashed and buckled maniacally beneath
Allieb’s
unyielding grasp, hooves slamming determinedly against the wooden platform, snout biting at the air, horrid bleats escaping from within. With a show of silent strength and power, Allieb split the pig’s stomach open; bones cracked; muscles tore; the gaping cavity pumped its innards onto the platform.

A nauseating odor saturated the room, that of excrement and blood. Allieb leaned down before the twitching sow, rumbled, “Come to me my demons. I have released you from Jesus’ pig.”

And then something incredible happened, nearly causing Danto to scream out in disbelief, and disgust. Beetles the size of mice wriggled out of the pig’s ragged wound, black chitinous exoskeletons staggering aimlessly amidst the spilled innards. Allieb reached down and one by one gathered up thirteen insects in total, gingerly placing them atop the black cloth of the altar. There they remained nearly motionless, side by side, antennae swaying hypnotically, tasting the air.