Goetic Justice 2

Ryan watched as she stood still, her eyes closed, seeming to concentrate intently. Movement near her feet drew his gaze, and he noticed that the blades of grass around her hooves were growing. They sprouted from the soil like video footage playing in fast forward, colorful flowers blooming on the nearby weeds as if the forest was flexing like a living organism. Flying insects seemed to be drawn to her, the bright glow of a swarm of fireflies hovering around her like a tiny field of stars. Moths flitted about on the breeze, as well as large beetles whose iridescent shells reflected the light in shades of blue and green.

He heard a loud droning coming from somewhere in the forest, growing louder and louder as if it was getting closer. The droning became a distinct buzzing, and then Ryan's eyes widened as he saw a gigantic mass of bees fly over the protective wall of plant matter. There was a solid mass of insects hovering a few feet off the ground, probably the size of a football. Nahash held out her hand to them as they drew nearer, swaying erratically, before landing at her feet. The bees scattered, forming a vague cloud, the sound of it alarmingly loud now that they were close. He watched as the insects retreated towards the forest, leaving a roughly spherical mass behind that looked like it was made of wet tissue paper.

"Is that..."

Nahash knelt to pick it up, showing it to Ryan as he gawked.

"It's a beehive, wax for the candles."

"What are you, a Disney princess? I didn't know that you could take control of animals like that."

"We Seirim are deities of the wilds," she explained, setting the hive down on the grass and beginning to break it open with her clawed fingers. "We hold dominion over all creatures of the forest."

"Makes sense I suppose," he muttered as she cracked open the beehive like an egg. The interior was lined with honeycombs, the syrup seeping out of them like yolk. Using the forest to procure what she needed...it gave Ryan an idea.

"You take care of the candles," he said, walking towards the edge of the clearing. "I think I have some idea of how we can draw the triangles."

***

The officer marched into the inner court of the lodge, one arm suspended in a sling across his chest, his police jacket draped over his shoulders. He had bandages around his head too, and he was walking with a noticeable limp.

The court was empty save for the Grand Master, who was seated in a golden throne at the far end of the lavishly decorated room. The officer took a moment to admire the purple carpeting, along with the paintings that lined the walls. The ceiling was adorned with a blazing star that seemed to be made from solid gold, held up by Romanesque pillars that were as thick around as stout trees.

The Grand Master waved the man forward, stroking his greying beard, the elaborate pendants and medallions that hung around his neck reflecting the light. They were symbols of his high rank within the organization, inscribed with Masonic symbols and runes, as were the cuffs and the apron that he wore.

The officer walked up to the foot of the bench behind which his superior was seated, the oak carved with elaborate reliefs that were inlaid with gold and purple. It was more than a little imposing. The bench before him and the rows of seats to his left and right were all raised off the ground, the Grand Master peering down from above like a preacher in his pulpit, or a judge ready to slam down the gavel and pass sentence on him. It made him feel like he was shrinking into the carpet.

"I am glad to see that you're up and about, Corporal."

"Thank you, most worshipful Grand Master."

"I'm going to assume that you know why I have summoned you here," the Grand Master continued, straightening his spectacles as he examined the wounded policeman. "I wanted the report on what happened on your mission to be delivered to me in person. Usually I would be speaking to your Sergeant, but it appears that he was...trampled to death, I believe."

"Of course, Grand Master."

"Why don't you give me a play by play of what happened? Start when you arrived at the target's apartment."

The Corporal took a moment to compose himself, remembering how it had all gone down. It had only been a few hours prior, but it had all happened so quickly, it was like trying to remember a dream.

"We were stacked up outside his apartment," he began, "and the Sergeant had taken point. He knocked on the door, and a few moments later a tall, blonde woman opened it. We had orders to leave no witnesses, and so he hit her with the shotgun at point blank range."

"But it wasn't a woman," the Grand Master volunteered, "it was the target's familiar?"

"Yes, Grand Master. We had been expecting to face off against a familiar, and so when she didn't go down, it wasn't a surprise. The Sarge hit her again, in the head this time, and her physical form dissipated. We moved into the apartment, and the target was just sitting on his couch. He was an average looking guy, in his mid-twenties maybe, nothing remarkable about him. He seemed surprised, he didn't react very fast, so we moved into the apartment and prepared to execute."

"And that was when the familiar manifested again?"

"Yes, Grand Master. Based on the available information she shouldn't have been able to recover so quickly. Before anyone could pull the trigger on the target, she had manifested again, with a physical form that was cohesive enough to block our bullets."

"Investigators found a summoning circle drawn on the floor of his apartment," the Grand Master said, "it must have been collecting ambient energy there for a long time. It's possible that he was prepared and that he had planned for a situation where his familiar might be in urgent need of energy. That would suggest that he is far better informed and more dangerous than we could have anticipated. It seems unlikely that he simply left an open circle in the middle of his living room, anything could have made its way through."

"That's not all, honorable Grand Master," the Corporal added. "It was like his familiar was drawn to him, even after her form had been dissipated. She was juiced up on energy for sure, which made her far more powerful than we had expected, but she must have been bound too. There's no other way to explain it."

"You think the Seirim was bound to an object in the apartment?" the Grand Master asked skeptically. "Someone of his level couldn't possibly be a knowledgeable or skilled enough magician to accomplish that feat on his own. Am I to understand that your Sergeant could not contain the Seirim?"

"The familiar was strong, but the incantation and the wards were doing their job. A little longer and he would have managed it. The target interfered, however, caused enough of a distraction that she broke loose. Once she was on us, we didn't have time to do much besides try to fight her off."

The Grand Master sighed in exasperation, rubbing his wrinkled forehead, the officer waiting nervously for him to continue his interrogation.

"The moment that it broke loose, the mission was over. How many times must it be explained to field operatives that if you interrupt the damned incantation, the demon will break free and come straight for you? They'll take advantage of any opening that they can get, you're trying to seal them in a brazen vessel for Solomon's sake, of course they're going to fight tooth and nail to prevent that."

"I-I'm not a skilled magician, worshipful Grand Master, I just-"

The Grand Master put up a gloved hand to silence him.

"It wasn't your responsibility, I know. Please continue."

"The Seirim was strong. Like I said, it was juicing. Our bullets weren't even slowing it down at that point, and it just knocked the seal out of the Sarge's hand. In the space of maybe a minute, it had taken everyone out. Mike- I mean the Sergeant, I saw him get back up and try to resume the incantation. He was fucked up bad, the Seirim had brought a wall down on him."

"And what were you doing at this point?"

"I was in the far corner, the familiar had thrown me against the wall." He gestured to his bandaged arm and the gauze that was wrapped around his head. "I got a broken arm and a concussion, the doc said it was amazing that I stayed conscious for as long as I did."

"Very well, proceed."

"The target got his hands on a gun. He shot one of the guys, and he gave the Sarge enough trouble that he couldn't keep his focus on the familiar. When his concentration was broken she..." He hesitated, recalling the grisly scene. "She curb stomped him. Not something I needed to see. It was about then that I passed out."

"This should have been a routine cleanup operation," the Grand Master said as he opened a folder that was on his bench. He flipped through it, the contents were out of sight to the officer, but it looked like some kind of field report to him. "The target got his information from an internet forum, he was no expert. There's nothing to indicate that he knew you were coming, and the evidence to suggest that he was prepared for such an eventuality is circumstantial at best."

"With respect, Grand Master, we were told that Haures would be serving as our backup."

The Grand Master looked up from his folder, scowling at the officer as the man shuffled uncomfortably under his harsh gaze.

"Haures was not there to protect you, only to clean up the mess if you should fail. Do you know how difficult and time consuming it is to contract a demon that powerful? It's more than your life is worth...literally."

The officer opened his mouth to apologize, but the Grand Master cut him off with another wave of his hand.

"Haures was defeated too, which is...surprising to say the least. It appears that Azazel has some kind of contract with this Ryan Cutter. I believe that was his name. He has bound familiars serving him, he has a Watcher who will appear to rescue him from a Great Duke of Hell, he exhibits magickal skills far beyond what he should reasonably have access to. A few weeks ago he was unemployed, and now he's showing up our grand wizards."

The officer watched as the Grand Master deliberated, poring over the documents and mumbling to himself occasionally.

"I don't see that we have a choice but to bump this up to priority one," he said finally. "We need to allocate all of our resources to making this problem go away. Thank you for your report Corporal, your services will no longer be required."

"...Grand Master? Am I to return to the police station?"

A sudden cold overcame the Corporal, as if the temperature in the room had just plummeted to zero. He began to shiver almost immediately, his breath condensating as it left his mouth. The lights in the ceiling flickered, plunging the expansive room into darkness for brief moments before flaring to life again. A sense of foreboding came over him, and he turned to look behind him, certain that he was being watched. He could feel eyes on his back, the sensation rousing a primal fear in him, a gut-wrenching dread that made the hairs on his arms and neck stand on end.

A few feet behind him was a burning cinder, resting upon the purple carpet as it glowed a dull orange. There were no fireplaces in the hall, where had the ember come from? There was a puff of flame, like someone had squirted lighter fluid onto an unseen fire, startling the Corporal and knocking him on his ass. He winced, the impact exacerbating his injuries, then looked up to see a roaring blaze rising before him. It seemed as if the carpet had caught fire, the inferno spewing dark smoke as it licked at the air, its heat somehow unfelt as he continued to shiver in the pervasive cold.

A massive, black paw stepped through the flames, its curved claws digging into the carpet. A gigantic feline head emerged after it, that of a tiger or a panther, its fur blacker than night. Its eyes glowed like burning coals, strands of what looked like magma or molten metal dripping from its jaws in place of saliva. It should have burned a hole in the floor, but where the burning droplets fell, they seemed to vanish into thin air.

The rest of its body soon followed, a giant feline that must have been four or five hundred pounds birthing from the dancing flames to stand before him. It began to pace back and forth, prowling like a hungry lion, its burning eyes fixed on him intently.

"I see you've met Haures," the Grand Master said, watching the scene from his bench with a bored expression on his grizzled features. "He had to expend a great deal of energy during his bout with the familiar, and reforming after his encounter with Azazel was rather costly. A cost that would not have been incurred if your team had done their job properly and put a bullet between Cutter's eyes."

"G-Grand master, please. I didn't- we couldn't have-"

"I think the least that you can do is reimburse him. Besides, it's easier than marching homeless people in here, the place is starting to look like a damned soup kitchen."

The Grand Master turned his attention back to the documents, indifferent to the blood-curdling screams and the smell of burning flesh that ensued. Haures was particularly cruel, prolonging the suffering of those offered to him as sacrifices for as long as he could in order to glean as much energy as possible. It was brutal, but it was quicker and more efficient than other methods. It was far easier to find a witless vagrant to be served up as an offering than to disseminate sigils, or to find someone that could tolerate the kind of sexual encounters that some demons required. All they had to do was get someone into the same room as Haures, and he would do the rest. No body, no mess, no evidence.

He lifted one of the laminated photographs, holding it up to the light as he examined it, adjusting his spectacles to bring it into better focus. It was a picture Cutter's apartment, he could make out the chalk summoning circle that had been drawn on the living room floor beneath the couch, crude and barely passable. Investigators had scoured that apartment, and besides a few very makeshift summoning tools like a linen bathrobe and scented candles they hadn't found anything that might go some way to explaining his miraculous escape.

Whatever his secret was, and wherever he had fled, the Freemasons would find a way to bring him to heel. As direct descendants of King Solomon and the inheritors of his temple, they had the divine right to the powers afforded by the Goetia and they alone. It was Solomon who had first dealt with demons, it was he who had first harnessed their powers for practical use, and it was crucial that their existence be kept hidden from the general public. Rogue summoners like this Ryan Cutter who happened across such information and decided to meddle in the occult put all of their carefully laid plans in jeopardy.

***

"Is everything ready?" Ryan asked, looking over the summoning rite that had been prepared. It was even more makeshift than the time that he had summoned Orobas. Was this really going to work? He had been bending the rules a bit the first time, but now they were outright ignoring many of them. As a substitute for proper equipment, they had elected to focus on incantations instead, something that Ryan had neglected during his earlier attempts. It was his opinion that the droning and complicated chants served only to get the summoner into the right mindset, creating a trance-like state and bolstering their confidence. The author of the Illustrated Goetia had shared his sentiment, but after seeing how the Aramaic incantations uttered by the police officer in his apartment had paralyzed Nahash, he was willing to give it a try.

They had stripped bark from the trees, drawing on it with chalk and arranging it in a pattern to construct the two triangles, one to protect Ryan and the other to contain the demon if things should go awry. They looked very temperamental, but in theory, they should work as long as he didn't accidentally step on one and break up the lines. This time Ryan had high quality, professionally made wards that he had recovered from the dead SWAT team along with the printouts and scrawlings that he had drawn on card, which should provide considerable protection.

If he had to guess, it seemed that the higher ranked the demon was, the more precautions had to be taken. Summoning a demon like Orobas who was ranked fifty-fifth, or Vapula who was ranked sixtieth required far less preparation and caution than summoning something of a higher grade. Summoning an entity like Bael or Agreas would require careful planning, going as far as to time the summoning with the alignment of planets and the position of the constellations. They required very specific offerings and even a single mistake in the transcribing of runes and sigils might result in disaster.

Of course, such precautions were advisable when dealing with even the lower ranked demons, but time was a valuable resource that was rapidly dwindling.

He went over the steps in his head, trying to gauge what kind of chance this had of working.

The first step was cleanliness. Demons apparently didn't like magicians with poor hygiene. Under normal circumstances Ryan would have taken a long bath, employing soaps and salts to ensure that he was as presentable as possible. Unfortunately, there were no bathtubs in the forest, he would have to do without.

Next were the candles and incense. Thanks to Nahash and her Disney princess powers, there was a ring of beeswax candles burning around the circle, the Seirim having used locks of her own wool to serve as wicks. They had no incense, however, and while Nahash could have influenced Ryan's senses to make him smell anything that he desired, she could not do the same for a fellow demon.

The linen robe was an important component of a successful summoning, but Ryan didn't have one on hand. He had used a bathrobe made from the same material when he had summoned Orobas, which was technically in-line with the rules and had worked just as well. There was nothing to be done about that, he would have to do without.

The wards and sigils were one thing that he had been able to get right. He had the metal pendant that he had recovered after the gunfight in the apartment hanging around his neck. The Pentagonal Figure of Solomon was etched expertly into one face, its runes as clear as day, while he had drawn Vapula's sigil on the rear in chalk. The ward was intended both to protect him from harm and to compel the demon to obey his commands. He also had the old wards that he had recovered from his summoning table shortly before fleeing the city. There was the Ring of Solomon, drawn on a piece of card and stapled to a sweatband that he would wear around his head, the purpose of which was to shield him from the foul odors that demons often produced. He also had the Sexangle, a ward that would hang from his belt whose purpose was to compel the demon to be cooperative and to take human form upon request. He had the Secret Seal of Solomon too, which might be useful for intimidating the demon if it became necessary.

Together the wards made up the core of any summoner's toolbox. Along with the summoning circle, it was the most important thing to get right. You might get away with some dodgy transcription of Hebrew runes and some poor pronunciation in your Aramaic incantations, but if your wards weren't reproduced properly, a demon wouldn't hesitate to take advantage of the opening.

He retrieved a vial from his pocket, dabbing the liquid on his index finger, and anointing himself. He placed drops of it on the top of his head, between his eyes and on his throat, then his navel and his groin. It was Oil of Abramelin made from one part myrrh, half a part of cinnamon, one part cassia, and one part galangal root. It was all topped off with a good measure of olive oil. He grimaced, the concoction burning his skin.