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  Above the kitchen island, a scene opened before them. It hovered above the granite surface and fanned out into a three dimensional image of a large stone room. From the far side of the scene emerged a tall man in a dark cloak. He skulked menacingly toward a circle of symbols sketched in blood on a raised dais. Thirteen candles spluttered to life with the violent motion of his arm. They flickered with a somber greenish glow. In the center of the circle, hastily scratched in blood like the others, was the demonic symbol given by the dark one himself. It was an overlay of three sixes all branching out from the same circle with a cross through the center and a dark spot where the cross intersected. It was the sign of Baal, the Signum Infectus.

  The warlock extracted a dove from within his cloak. The bird’s feathers were an incandescent white that fairly shone against the gloominess of the dungeon chamber. The fearsome figure stretched out his arms and hefted from his side-belt a large sharp blade resembling a machete. With his other hand, he tossed the dove high into the air. The bird fluttered to escape, but the dark man struck with the speed of death, bringing down the short sword and slicing the bird in two. The bird’s body fell in a heap at his feet. The head spun in the air, spraying a spiral of blood in an arc. A skein of blood fell across the satanic symbol in the midst of the candles.

  The dark warlock’s fractured teeth formed an evil grin. The left side of his face was briefly viewed from beneath its hood, revealing a red mass of scars where his right eye had been burned out. Gracefully, he moved into the forms of demonic conjuration handed down from the first witches. The first gestures indicated plague in an ancient hand language of the antediluvian people. The next set of symbolic movements indicated death by fire. Finally, he enacted the forms and patterns that indicated death by fear, actions so vile his jaws tightened in revulsion as he recreated the movements.

  Having performed these dark rites, he touched the blood within the satanic sign and backed away from the ring of candles. He gazed at the center of the circle of greenish flames, extended his blood stained hand, and loudly repeated the words of the spell. “Imperium natus sum larua auctoratus sum meum.”

  Immediately the circle of candles flew across the floor as if they had been flung. None lost its flame nor toppled over, merely fanned themselves out to make room for the vile creature that was summoned. A red-stained cloud swirled up from the symbol at the center of the candles and grew until it was a ten-foot high swirling mass of smoke.

  Though safe in her kitchen, this scene floating above the island caused Samantha’s heart to race. Conjuring a demon always filled her with dread and a foreboding of evil. She had seen this very scene once before shortly after she and Clara had escaped from the Appensus, and it had caused her to shiver then as it did now.

  She kept her eyes glued on the billowing smoke in the scene above the kitchen island, but she still missed the actual moment when the demon appeared. She simply became aware of its movement from within the vile red cloud. It groaned and wailed loudly as if it were in pain and fury; the sound filled the house, rattling dishes and windows. The dark wizard in the scene didn’t speak, but waited for the satanic creature to utter its words.

  “Why summon me?” it groaned. “Leave me to my world, and I will spare your life!”

  “I am your master now!” The warlock spoke in a tone of complete authority.

  “No!” screamed the demon.

  “You are Mahon’s Child, Ulkobach, are you not?”

  The demon howled an unearthly ululation, then nodded his head and hissed, “Yes!”

  “Listen to me, and do my bidding,” the sorcerer commanded.

  “Speak, my master,” Ulkobach spat. “But I will destroy you!”

  “Tell me of the Magnitus Grimoire of Moloch.” Boldly, the warlock pushed his blood stained hand forward, and the demon recoiled.

  “It contains the spells of Baal, the epistles of Samyaza, the journals of Grigori, and the history of the Niphilm, Cain’s birthright.” The beast glared at his master from the haze of red that swirled about him.

  “Then it does exist outside of the Appensus in the world of men?”

  The beast swayed and glared at him, unwilling to answer.

  “Answer me!” demanded the warlock.

  “Yes,” the demon spat. “Yes, Moloch’s Grimoire exists in the world of men.”

  The dark wizard grinned eerily at this information. “Do you know the world of men?” he demanded of the creature.

  “No,” it replied. “I will skin you with the sharpened edges of your femur. Then I will hang you in a tree and glut myself on your blood!”

  “You’ll do no such thing. I am your master. Now tell me where to find the Magnitus Grimoire of Moloch.”

  The creature snarled. “In the world of men!”

  “Where in the world of men?” the warlock bellowed.

  The demon shook its gigantic head as if seeking the answer from deep inside and not finding it. At length it growled, “Moloch hid the Grimoire in the Valley of Hidden Skins.”

  At these words, Samantha nodded at Clara. They had found the right location. There was no doubt about that.

  “What does that mean?” barked the warlock.

  The demon, bound to answer his master, twisted in agony. He had no answer and was now tortured for his reluctance to relay the information.

  “Release me!” it roared. “I have told you what I know.”

  “Where is this Valley of Hidden Skins? What is the meaning of this riddle?”

  “Moloch hid his book in the Valley of Hidden Skins! It lies deep in a cavern,” the demon screamed in fury and pain.

  “You are not answering my questions!” The warlock approached the circle that held the demon and pushed his bloody palm at it. The demon fell to its knees, screaming and weeping.

  Moments passed as the demon snuffled and wailed. It struggled back to its feet. A face of terror stared back at the scarred wizard who now controlled it.

  Having accepted the demon could tell him no more about the Grimoire’s location, the dark sorcerer tried a different tack. “Tell me, Mahon’s child, what guards the Grimoire?”

  “A Catadromus Chamber Lock.”

  Samantha watched as the warlock considered this information. She could tell he was weighing the implications of this knowledge. No one was certain what a Catadromus Chamber Lock was, but Samantha was fairly sure it meant the book had been placed just outside the world in an inter-dimensional moment of frozen time, not too unlike the Catadromus spell her mother placed her in when she was a baby. But, to find an object enchanted with this spell would require a gholom or an Utor Uti.

  The warlock asked, “Is that all? Once I find it, if I use a counter spell, can I bring it back, or is there more to it?”

  The demon’s red eyes gazed at the ground to avoid the question. Then, it muttered something.

  “Louder demon!” barked the cloaked man.

  “Only the Key of Endor can access the book.”

  The warlock seemed to understand this, but Samantha looked quizzically at Clara. The old woman shook her head. They knew it referenced her; she was the Key. But neither had the slightest clue how, or by what power, she was to open or retrieve the book.

  “The Key of Endor,” muttered the cloaked man.

  “The Key of Endor will come in search of the Grimoire. Her prophecy is to have her mother seek her life as she seeks to destroy the witch’s kingdom. Only one will prevail.”

  The warlock turned on the demon who seemed perplexed that it had offered more information. But before the scarred wizard could follow up with another question, the demon continued. “The Northern Coven will find the valley and seek her out. Any who destroys the Key by the power of Baal shall cease to exist. Endor will seek to destroy the Key, and Ghohol will come to save the kingdom from destruction by the Warder at the window.”

  “There is no Northern Coven! And who is this Warder?”

  But the bloody smoke sucked in on itself, forming an internal spira
ling tornado. The cyclone and the demon sank into the earth. The torn and scarred warlock stood alone in the dank dungeon.

  Without warning the image above the kitchen island winked out.

  In the darkened room Samantha and Clara shared a blank expression. They wondered the same thing as the warlock. Who was this Warder?

  ***

  Darren dropped from the window onto his rear, a faint feeling of shock spreading through his body. The Warder at the window? Had he heard that right? Warder was what witches called the Pessum Ire. He was a Warder, and he was at the window! When the demon had spoken those words, he’d expected Samantha and the old woman to turn and look directly at him. Goosebumps sprang up along his arms, and he shivered.

  A snapping sound to his right among the low lying branches suddenly caught his attention. A lithe black cat sprang so quickly from between the fronds of a bush that it seemed to have appeared out of thin air. It stopped and looked quizzically at Darren. He almost laughed because the cat looked as surprised to find him as he was to see the cat. They stared at each other for a moment, neither one moving. The cat’s eyes darted quickly up to the open window, no doubt how it came and went from the house. It glared at Darren and suddenly arched its back and hissed.

  “Calm down, cat.” This was unreal. As Darren began to get to his feet, the cat launched itself at him, claws first. Using the momentum he’d built up to get to his feet, Darren launched himself farther away from the cat. Missing his face, the cat caught a hold of his arm, and in quick succession, clawed repeatedly at his skin. He yelped and shook the cat off. It rolled across the ground, quickly regained its feet, and hissed at him again, this time clawing at the air.

  Darren jerked himself into a standing position and glared down at the foul little beast. He rubbed his arm, now covered with long bloody scratches from elbow to wrist. The scene through the window had gone from creepy to terrifying, and now this contest with the cat was bordering on ridiculous. A black cat—come on! The cat continued to glare at him, then turned and bounded into the house through the open window.

  CHAPTER 8

  The Ostendo Sum

  A year ago last May, Darren had had a near miss while driving in Salt Lake City. It had been raining lightly, but steadily, that day. He’d been traveling too fast along Seventh East, and while approaching a traffic light, the car in front of him stopped; the light was red. Darren hit his brakes hard, hoping to skid to a stop right behind the car. However, the slick surface, combined with the velocity at which he’d been traveling, caused him to hydroplane. His speed increased. He was in the far left lane, and oncoming traffic to his left meant he couldn’t switch lanes in that direction. To his right, a car was pacing him at the same speed. His mind, making all the computations faster than light told him it would be better to bash into the car at his right than to run head-on at sixty miles-an-hour into the car stopped in front of him. Letting off the brake and pulling hard on the wheel, he swerved into the right lane at the exact time the car he expected to crash into moved to the lane to its right. They moved together like they were connected by an invisible cable in a single orchestrated movement.

  Darren had slowed down, but not enough to stop. Miraculously, the light turned green as he sailed through it at thirty-five miles an hour. He never found out if the man on his right had simply changed lanes at that precise moment because he’d wanted to, or because he’d seen Darren’s situation and realized Darren needed the room. All assumptions aside, his heart had raced like a small animal in flight for its life, and adrenaline had pumped through his system so heavily, his hands shook. He’d had to pull over and calm down before he could continue.

  Now, driving to Andrea’s, the same sensation flooded through Darren. His hands shook, and he couldn’t breathe regularly. He was tired of seeing things that couldn’t happen. His grandfather and Samantha had turned his ordinary life upside down.

  And why had the voice called Samantha, Sahwin? What was with the other name? And that whole demon scene, that had been the scariest thing he’d ever laid eyes on. The tingling down his back had never stopped as he’d watched events unfold on the other side of the window. It had been like having Benjamin Franklin’s key attached directly to his spine during a thunderstorm; especially when the old lady had finished her potion and lit that stone on fire—or whatever it was she had done that made that 3D movie appear above the kitchen island.

  But the demon, oh...It wasn’t just the impossibility of what he’d seen; it was the sheer malevolence of that horrible being. That thing, that whole experience, was evil. The warlock that called forth the demon was sinister and exuded some sort of frightening evil as well. The disgusting, misshapen demon presence was so wholly wrong and malignant. If fear gave birth to death, that demon would have been the result.

  Part of him wondered if Samantha and the old lady were evil just for watching the unnatural scene. He was certain he had been tainted from witnessing it through the window. Even now a cold icy ball writhed in his stomach, launching liquid nitrogen up into his chest, causing him to shake with what he was beginning to believe might be shock. There would be no escaping nightmares; that face would run through his mind again and again followed by fear right on its heels.

  At some point, he’d arrived at Andrea’s house and parked, but he hadn’t realized he should get out of his car. He remained behind the wheel, replaying the unbelievable scene. He’d been telling himself for the last several days that what he’d been seeing around Samantha couldn’t be true—they weren’t rational events; they were not ordinary things that happened in real life. He wanted to continue thinking this way, refusing to admit any of this was real. But, that was no longer possible. He’d tried waking up, but he couldn’t because he was already awake. He’d crossed some line now, and there was no going back. This was reality, and he had to deal with it.

  It was clear to him how a person’s brain rejected the unbelievable for something silly or ridiculous or even horrific, believing they experienced a stroke or something equally horrible simply because the realities of life were things that could be dealt with by experience or tradition or common sense, but the unbelievable left you powerless, vulnerable, and really scared.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  Darren jumped and glanced out the passenger-side window where Andrea was rapping a knuckle against the glass. He smiled weakly, though it must have been hard to see in the dark car. He opened the door and climbed out.

  “You’ve been out here for a while. Are you okay?” Andrea said from across the top of the Dodge.

  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Yeah, just a lot on my mind.” What was he going to tell Andrea? Part of him wanted to open up and spill the whole thing from beginning to end. Then there was the part that told him she’d think he’d lost his mind and would never believe it. And there was a third, rather persuasive part of his mind, warning him that if he told Andrea everything, he would be putting her in danger, very real danger. Now that demons had entered the picture, it was a whole new ballgame, where the balls were flaming and the refs wore dark cloaks and carried sickles.

  “The state game must have you freaked out, you poor thing.” Andrea crossed to his side of the car and slipped her arms around his neck. Soon they were kissing.

  Just the act of giving in to this simple pleasure, enjoying her lips, the smell of her hair, and the feel of her body was a tonic of sorts. While they kissed, he was able to let go of everything. No thoughts about witches or demons; no thoughts whatsoever beyond the immediate moment and the sensations that accompanied it.

  “Better?” she asked gently.

  “Yeah,” he replied breathily, “a lot better.”

  “Good!” She jumped away from him and grabbed his hand. “Let’s go inside. I want to show you what I’ve been working on.”

  She took him through the front door and into her kitchen. Her parents weren’t home. They never were; apparently, they traveled quite a bit. But there in the kitchen, lying across the table, wer
e the life-sized cardboard cutouts of him and the other basketball players stacked on top of each other.

  Andrea took one of the life-sized cutouts off the top of the pile and laid it aside. The one underneath was him. She stood it up on the floor, pulling out the cardboard support flap in the back. It was an image of him looking off in one direction while firing a perfect pass to another player.

  “That’s pretty good!” he said, surprised he could switch gears to something like this so readily. “How did you do it?”

  “After we got permission from Julander,” she started.

  “Julander gave you permission?”

  “Yeah, go figure. Anyway, we were able to get the negatives from the yearbook department. We sent them to a printing company in Brigham City where they make these kinds of things for different companies and their promotional departments. The real trick was getting it done so quickly. Now, all we have to do is come up with funny comments for the cardboard thought bubbles that will advertise the State Tournament.”

  She drifted over to a side table where a small white mouse ran on an exercise wheel. “Come here, sweetie.” The small white rodent climbed happily onto her hand. Andrea stroked its soft head; its pink eyes stared with interest at Darren while it twitched its whiskers.

  “Hello, Lili.” Darren greeted the little mouse by gently tickling it under the chin. Turning back to the life-sized posters he said, “Andrea, this is really terrific. These are going to be a big hit!”

  “Thank you.” She set Lili down on the table and took Darren’s hand. “Of course, Shelley and Lindsey helped, too. But I accept your gratitude, gallant sir.” She kissed him on the cheek.

  “What do you want to do?” he asked. “Where are your folks this time?”