by Zack Kullis:
Solitude grants volume to even the faintest of noises. The wind breaking against the old building hummed and moaned until it whistled in through cracks and broken windows. Rotten floorboards creaked and sighed. Bones, shells, enchanted pottery and coins tumbled slowly at the witching hour. It was time to ask.
Alex rolled the contents in the basket as he whispered his question and then tossed the tupele into the air. The relatively silent divination was obscenely loud in the quiet of the abandoned farm-house. Bone fell, carved chunks of coconut shell clattered, pottery scattered, and coins tapped and flipped on the warped floor. The tupele had all fallen within the boundaries of the vévé.
It would be tonight. Alex leaned over, careful not to disturb anything, and smiled at the results. The moaning and humming of the wind stopped abruptly. His eyes widened with apprehension.
“Are they close?” His voice questioned the vacant room. Each candle dimmed in response. Alex breathed excitedly. “Then I have little time…”
The wind started anew and he hustled over to a dirty table. Alex picked up a large container of powder from the top of the table and walked by a second symbol he had drawn on the floor. Slow chanting filled the room as he started to create the final piece.
If their righteous fervor could have been bottled and pumped into the gas tanks, they would have been washing the putrid filth out of the old farm-house at this very moment. Mark was sure of it. The truck bounced around a sharp turn in the woods and the undercarriage crunched against the rocky ground they traveled over.
“Mercy be-uh,” Mark exclaimed with his practiced podium cadence. “Guide this truck on this-uh HOLY night of RETRIBUTION!”
For months they had heard about a devilish man who communed with Beelzebub at the old house in the woods. Mark and his group of decent folk had even watched the young man do his witchcraft. It was their duty to purge the unclean with fire. They would be blessed in their righteous indignation.
The small parade of vehicles made its way down the old forest road. It was midnight work, dark work, but it was surely the work of the Almighty. Sometimes foul deeds needed to be taken care of by foul means. Penance. Mark smirked. This wasn’t his first witch hunt, nor would it be the first time he had put a sinner to the stake.
The procession wound around the last turn and the old homestead came into view. They stopped about 20 feet from the house and got out of their vehicles. “Gatha’ round,” rumbled Mark, motioning to the others with his large arms. The five men and two women stood around the bulky form of the outspoken preacher.
“We stand-uh at the gates of hell. The boy inside,” Mark waved his meaty hand towards the house with the flare of his Sunday theatrics, “is in the clutches of the demon. We’ll redeem him through pain and fire.”
Mark pulled out a pistol and walked towards the house. The others followed with an array of bibles, hymnals, rope and material for torches. As they neared the porch, they could hear chanting from inside the house. The crusaders rushed noisily up the old steps and kicked the rotting door off its frame.
The young man stood off to the side of an intricate symbol on the floor where a hen clucked noisily. Fluttering candlelight spooked the shadows and made them dance across the decrepit walls, and accentuated the symbols drawn all over the floor.
“Don’t move,” Mark bellowed as he stepped across the threshold. He moved to the side of the doorway and let the rest of his group in. They filed in apprehensively until they realized that they were alone in the house with the boy. Their bravery and taste for violence grew when they saw the odds were in their favor.
Alex chuckled as he stepped into the middle of the large triangle he had almost finished. “Courageous group you have there,” he cooed. “I’d bet my chicken has more gumption than your sorry lot. Is this a social call, Mark, or are you here to save my soul?”
Mark scoffed as he tried to decide whether to thrust the bible or the pistol forward. He opted to go with his prodigious gut and walked confidently into the room. “I demand, in the mighty name of the Lawd, in whose-uh mighty favor we act, that you give us your name!”
The young man bent down, and with the remaining powder in his hand, finished the last inscription around the triangle. He spoke as he worked. “My given name is Alex, but you can call me Judas if you’d like.” Alex laughed as he saw the outrage on the faces of his visitors. He loved screwing with the pious – they were so easy to offend.
“Hey,” continued Alex as he turned and stood in the middle of the newly completed triangle, “would you mind giving me the hen? I need its blood.”
“And let you kill it for your dark rites?” Mark aimed his gun at the chicken and fired a single round. The bird flopped around, feathers flying, blood splattering, and it twitched until it stopped moving in the middle of the large symbol. “Now you can’t complete your wicked rite,” Mark taunted.
Alex chuckled and pointed at the symbol. “No, I don’t need to because you have spilled the blood for me.”
A noisome wind buffeted the house, yet not even a breeze came in through the doorway. Candles flickered sporadically in the completely still air. The group behind Mark cowered closely together and inched closer to their leader. Mark, visibly worried, pointed the gun at Alex. “Your God has no power, nor do you.”
“Okay. Want to test your theory?” Alex pointed at his feet. “This triangle is special, Mark. It’s protected. You can’t do anything to me while I stand in here, and you can’t do anything to the triangle.”
Infuriated, Mark barreled towards the young man. He stopped short of the triangle and glared at the boy. With as much disdain as he could muster, Mark reached out with his boot and broke one of the lines of powder that made the triangle. Nothing happened. A smile spread across his smug face as he backed up slowly and raised the gun. “Yeah, let’s test my theory.”
The gun bucked in Mark’s hands. Echoes of the shot bounced off the walls, nearly deafening everybody in the room. Heavy silence followed. A dark blotch started to spread out from the dark hole in the young man’s shirt. The young man looked down at the hole, watched as the blood darkened his shirt, and then looked up at Mark. The boy’s eyes held no surprise. In fact, he looked as if this was what he had expected. His lungs began to gurgle. Dark froth bubbled from the sides of his mouth when he exhaled. He looked pleased.
Alex collapsed to his knees and lifted a heavy hand towards his wound. He pushed his finger into the bullet hole, then pulled it out and started to write in strange letters on the inside of the triangle. Barely audible chanting spilled from his bloody lips.
Mark backed up a step, then two. What in the hell was this kid doing? Wasn’t he supposed to be crying or cursing his maker? An odd pressure began to build inside the farm-house. There was an overwhelming feeling of standing on the edge of a precipice. Mark was about to turn and say something to his group when the young man’s weak voice spoke up.
“Don’t go anywhere, Mark. The show is about to start…”
“Don’t go anywhere, Mark. The show is about to start…”
The preacher turned his attention back to Alex. He took a step forward and squatted down to make sure the young man could hear him. ”You’re brave, boy, I’ll give you that. But I reckon a good part of that pluck you have is nothin’ but stupidity.” Mark stuck his pistol under the dying man’s jaw and forced Alex to look him in the face.
“See? What has your God done for you?” Mark’s voice was loud in the quiet room.
Frothy blood dribbled from the young man’s mouth as he replied between ragged breaths. “An – open – mind…” Alex coughed violently, spraying Mark’s face with blood. ”And revenge…”
Mark stood up and wiped the blood of his face. His jowls shook with rage. Open minds bred questions and fed insurrection, he thought. There was only his way, which of course was God’s way, and anything else was heresy. ”No,” Mark said as he kicked Alex onto his back, “you will only die.”
Alex opened his eyes wide, asphyxiating on the blood pooling in his throat and lungs, and slowly relaxed as his body succumbed. Mark turned triumphantly to his posse and started to speak with his best podium-voice. ”Behold-uh, the righteous will always conquer the -”
An impossibly deep laughter rumbled through the farm-house. Mark spun on his heels and looked at the prostrate form of the young man. It was slumped lifelessly across the broken triangle. The group behind Mark huddled around him quickly and bombarded him with worries questions. A few in the group stole furtive glances at the dead body, sure that it was the source of the laughter. One of the women pointed at the triangle as she cried out.
“Mark, I think that’s the Triangle of Solomon. It, it,” she was frantic with understanding, “it shouldn’t have been broken. I’ve read something about them.”
Mark grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and spun her around to face him. ”What in the hell do you know about these things? Do I have one of Satan’s whores in my midst?” Mark pushed her onto the ground as he shouted. ”Do I have to purge the devil out of my own assembly? I will-”
Smoke from the candles caught Mark’s attention and stopped him mid-sentence. Dark swirls of smoke twisted through the air, moved around Alex, and then began to gather above the young man’s body. Shock and awe kept the fanatical group from moving. Shadows fled from every corner of the room and solidified around the form growing in the smoke above the triangle.
The broken door was lifted off the ground and thrown violently against the open doorway. Wood from the door and its frame began to squirm, buckle, and then knit itself together. The wood around the broken windows folded, twitched, and morphed until the large room of the farm-house was completely closed in. Hymnals and bibles were dropped as the group began to scream and pound uselessly on solid walls. Mark alone was silent. His face was a mask of fear and fury.
Candles dimmed briefly and the form that was gathering above the triangle quickly took shape. A tall man stood inside the triangle. He wore a black tuxedo, no shoes, and the ebony skin of his face was painted like a skull. His strong, dark hands were covered with silver and precious metal and made his fingers look like talons. The man took off a large top hat to reveal coils of thick dreads that fell down his broad back. Bright blue eyes looked around the room before they settled on Mark and his group.
The man spoke in a timbre that was powerful and unnerving, yet beguiling with its strong Haitian accent. ”Mark, you been up to some’ting dread.”
Mark’s group was petrified. The woman he had pushed to the ground slowly stood up. ”W-w-what is that,” she asked in a horrified whisper.
Mark was about to reply when the tall man raised a finger and pointed it at him. ”Don’t speak. You had enough time. Now it’s mine.” The man looked at the woman as he answered her question. ”I am the Loa of the Dead. I stand at the crossroads between this world and the next. I am Baron Samedi.”
The Baron pulled a large cigar out of his tuxedo. He placed the cigar in his mouth and looked at the group. ”Who will bring me some flame?” One of the men in the group started to move towards one of the candles when Mark’s hand shot out and stopped him.
“Get your own fire. Release us from this building, for God demands it!”
Sonorous laughter filled the building. Baron Samedi pulled the cigar out of his mouth. He held out a hand, palm up, and lit his cigar with a flame that danced in the middle of his hand. The end of the cigar glowed brightly as Samedi pulled the smoke into his lungs. Sweet smoke erupted from his nose and mouth as he spoke. ”I did not hear it, Mark. Maybe you should ask the Dark Father. It is He that you pray to in your heart.”
Mark turned to his followers, his obvious fear feeding their own. ”Hurry, light your torches and burn this place. We just get out, but the Loa cannot escape the confines of the triangle.” The men in the group quickly lit their torches.
Baron Samedi’s voice charged the air with authority and power. ”Expungo lumen, nillus lux, vis levis, luciens nux.”
Each torch died. The only remaining light in the room came from the enchanted candles. The Baron repeated himself, his voice accentuated by plumes of cigar smoke. ”We extinguish the light, we render its death, violent light, light is dead.” Samedi put the cigar out and slipped it back into his jacket as he stepped over the broken line of the triangle. The Baron addressed Mark’s flock as he moved.
“Blind followers are not devout, just stupid. He has chained you to a small part of reality, and made you believe all else is wrong. For this his soul is the most bitter of all. There are many paths, roads of light and roads of night, but they all lead to the same place. I have known many like him over thousands of years. They bring hate and death for their own cause, seeking only power, dominion and blood.”
Baron Samedi walked closer to the group. He continued to talk to them, but kept his eyes firmly on Mark.
“I am what I am. I don’t pretend to be what I’m not. In this is your salvation. You,” his finger pointed at the rest of the group, “will leave this place tonight, having forgotten what you’ve seen. I give you one more chance to find harmony with more than just this path. One more chance, but then I come for you.”
The front door of the farm-house appeared and opened. Each member of the group looked briefly at Mark before they fled. Within seconds it was just Mark and the Baron Samedi. Mark was unable to move. His lips quivered, his eyes filled, and he realized he would not escape. ”Let me go,” pleaded Mark. Tears fell down his face. His chest heaved with barely restrained sobs.
“No. You killed the boy, for no other reason than his path wasn’t your path. You finished the rites to bring me here when you shed his blood. You even broke the triangle, the only thing that could have protected you. No. You will die.”
Mark tried to object, but it was far too late. Baron Samedi looked into Mark’s eyes and spoke in profane whispers. Mark’s lips blended into his skin until there was no sign of a mouth. ”To keep you from screaming. Or preaching. This is how you will walk through the next world.”
Baron Samedi adjusted his dreads, put on his hat, and smiled at Mark.
“Now, stick your hand into your chest. Pull out your own heart and give it to me. That is the price of your ticket.”
Mark was unable to speak, unable to scream, and unable to control his own body. He watched as his hand plunged beneath his rib cage. The pain was exquisite. He felt the pressure, the tearing, the moving and pushing of organs, and finally felt the rampaging beats of his flailing heart. Mark’s mind screamed ‘no’ as he hand ripped out his own heart. The muscles still moved with a lifetime of memorized beats.
Warmth spread across his chest and stomach. The room grew darker. His head became light and his thoughts disconnected. Baron Samedi laughed as he took Mark’s heart. There was no malice in the laughter, only the true nature of the Loa of Death, he who stands at the crossroads.
Darkness opened up in front of Mark. His final path, unlike the path he preached, and more similar to the path he actually walked, stood before him in cold perfection.
About the Author: Zack Kullis loves to write dark fiction. He is employed by the FBI, and uses his writing as a way to express some of the horror that he experiences. Zack has a blog at http://zkullis.wordpress.com/ , but he usually saves his darker stuff for http://www.zackkullis.com/ . His debut novel Smite the Damned is available atBarnes & Noble as well as Amazon. He can often be found lurking around Twitter.
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