William H. Hallahan - (30 page)

He opened Paxton again. And translated the passage with infinite
care. It was true: The Magus was Satan's archenemy; he was to be
called upon whenever Satan's presence was suspected; he was truly
Champion of the Purple Aura.

Brendan now read the recipe for summoning the Magus.

The instructions were simple and detailed. The supplicant was to
build two fires. He or she would don a purple gown and stand outside
in the open between the two fires in full view with head bared. The
company of a white dog was suggested; if possible, a purebred
mastiff. Paxton gave the prayer that was to be read aloud:

"O Magus, hear my plea.

"I am sore beset by Satan and his works. I believe in the
forgiveness of sins, in the redemption of fallen souls, in the
ultimate destruction of Lucifer and his followers. Come help me in my
struggle with this Arch Fiend, and I will requite thee with my
gratitude and with my prayers for the forgiveness of your
transgressions and for your safe return to the bosom of the Lord.
Amen."

Brendan reread the instructions and the prayer with growing doubt.
Two fires? Head bared? In a purple gown? If he did that even at
night, he'd be easily visible to the creature.

It would be a hidden race--between the creature and the Magus. And
Brendan would have to bet his life on the Magus reaching him first.

He pictured himself standing out in the open with two fires, his
head bared in the freezing night air, uttering the prayer and
waiting. And waiting. In the warmth and relative safety of the
monastery library, he shrank from such a risk. There had to be an
easier way. He put Paxton back on the shelf and went off to supper.

The eight monks sat in the refectory, eating. Their faces were
ruddy in the soft light and steam rose serenely from their soup. It
seemed more appealing a life than ever. Better than Paxton's game.

Brendan took another walk after dinner, his feet crunching in the
snow, guided only by the moonlight. He had to take action soon. That
creature was preparing something spectacular, a catastrophe of great
magnitude. It had to be stopped. Also, he knew that eventually the
creature would detect his purple aura. His incredible luck couldn't
last much longer. In his dreams that night he saw Satan riding with
Death again. He woke in the morning with Anne's name on his lips.

When he got up, he went looking for two metal barrels that could
contain a blazing fire.
 
 

Getting the mastiff could prove to be difficult Any white dog
would do, but Brendan was not inclined to cut corners.

It took a forty-mile trip in the monastery's old four-wheel Jeep
to find a mastiff. Brendan thought it strange that no one challenged
him when he rousted out the two old metal barrels; they never cast a
glance at the purple fabric he'd fashioned into a loose gown; and
they never even asked him why he wanted to use the four-wheel Jeep.
In the monastery every man's business was his own alone.

The mastiff was quite the largest dog Brendan had ever seen, over
thirty inches at the shoulder, with rippling muscles, a deep chest
and a deep bass bark. It weighed over 150 pounds. The man who bred it
laughed when Brendan asked if he would have any difficulty handling
the dog.

"Difficulty? Well, let's see." He walked Brendan down
behind his home to the dog pens. He opened the gate to a runway and
led Brendan to a pen and opened the door.

"His name is Fury," the man said, and he laughed.

The dog lay with his head on his paws. Faintly he wagged his tail
at his owner without raising his eyes. He was inexpressibly bored.

"Up, you fearful monster," the man said.

Fury yawned and sat up.

"Doesn't he ever move?"

"Oh, yes. In breeding season, he dances around like Fred
Astaire. He dotes on his work then. And of course, the mere sight of
food--I think he lies about all day just thinking about food. I'll
show you what I mean." The breeder leaned over and said into the
dog's ear, "Steak!" The dog jumped up and ran in circles,
barking at the sky.

"Ah, sit down, you fiend," the breeder said. "A fat
chance you have of seeing real steak ever again... Prices--" He
looked at Brendan. "Just one thing you should remember. If this
breed ever closes its jaws on anything, it never lets go. Never."

Brother Zen made a place for the dog down behind the greenhouse in
an old tool shed, where it promptly went to sleep. And they fed him
from kitchen scraps, pounds of them. The dog loved to eat. Late at
night Brendan took it for a run on the ice. He threw a red ball and
the dog bounded after it. Fury conceived a great affection for
Brendan and would plant his front paws on Brendan's chest to lick his
face. Usually the movement was so quick Brendan was unprepared and
would fall backward with the huge dog on his chest.

Two nights later, he was ready. He pulled the purple gown over his
winter clothes. "Good grooming doesn't count," he said,
looking in the mirror.

It was a clear cold night. A full moon was to rise at 3 a.m. At 2
a.m., long after the monastery had gone to sleep, Brendan, as quietly
as he could, pulled the two barrels on a sled out on the ice a
distance from the monastery and set them up on a platform of bricks.
The holes around the base of the barrels acted as a draft and he soon
had a roaring fire in both barrels with hissing flames leaping at the
darkness.

The moon was just rising in the southeast quarter of the sky.
Brendan gazed up. Never in all the years in the city had he seen such
a gathering of stars. The sky was encrusted with them. He felt as
though an enormous cosmic audience had come to observe. He unrolled a
canvas tarpaulin to stand on.

Brendan looked critically at the arrangement. He was standing in
his purple gown before the lectern between the two barrels of fire.
The rising moon made everything a varying hue of silver. Details were
indistinct. On the lectern beside Paxton's book, in a hurricane
chimney, was a small candle that cast barely enough light to make the
prayer legible. At Brendan's side, the mastiff sat looking with
patient curiosity at him.

Last chance to back down. Brendan thought about the dead horse,
about the burned church, the dead minister, the lethal Walpurgisnacht
with the inmates of the madhouse, and the dead monk Beaupré with his
twisted neck. And he thought about Aunt Maeve and Jackie and his
family. But most of all he thought about Anne. Without her, his life
was a living entombment.

He pictured the creature growing ever stronger and leading legions
of adulators to sack and smash cities. He saw the creature attacking
his family, attacking Anne.

He gazed back at the walls of the monastery. An icy draft stirred
the skirts of his purple gown. Within minutes he could be dead, lying
on the ice with his head twisted almost off his shoulders.

Brendan stepped up to the lectern and prayed silently for strength
and deliverance, then addressed himself to Paxton's book.

Patience. The issue could soon be decided. He pushed back his cowl
and removed his wool cap, exposing his head to the wintery night. He
looked at the text. Drawing a breath, in a loud clear voice he began
to read: "O Magus, hear my plea." After he'd read it
through once, he paused to scan the lake. The creature could come
with violent speed, he knew, from any direction, full of rage,
murderously. But which way would the Magus come?

Fury looked fondly upon Brendan. Then he yawned and lay down.
Brendan read the prayer again. Nothing happened.

The fire eagerly consumed the wood and soon all that remained was
a red glow of coals. Deliberately Brendan gathered up more firewood
from his pile and thrust it into the two barrels. Soon he had a
whistling, snapping fire going again. Once more he read the prayer
aloud and waited. His head was growing numb in the subzero
temperature and he could feel the cold penetrating his pac boots.
Standing near one of the barrels, he let the rushing heat bathe his
chilled head and his hands.

Looking back at the monastery, set low on its island, he thought
about his warm bed. This was madness. It was after 4 a.m.

The constellations had slipped westward and new stars had
appeared, new throngs to stare down at him. He added more wood to the
fire and read the supplication again. And still nothing happened.

Out there in the darkness, somewhere under that large moon, the
creature must be prowling. Brendan was inviting instant death.

With the penetrating cold, and the fatigue of the nightlong vigil,
Brendan was losing his resolve. His courage was at low ebb. The
yearning to flee grew more insistent. Life in the monastery was more
acceptable than ever. His bed seemed so tempting.

Brendan closed the book and leaned over to warm his bare head once
more before putting his cap on. He yawned and the dog yawned.

As Brendan turned back to the lectern, the dog's ears pricked. It
stood and peered intently into the darkness. Brendan looked in the
same direction across the ice to the far shore. The night was still
quite clear under the moon but all Brendan saw was a whited-out
winter world. He looked down again at the dog. It stood staring
attentively at the far shore. Then Brendan felt a tremor on the ice.
The ice shook. The sound of cracking ice scurried across the frozen
surface. Then came a rhythmical pounding. Something was running on
the ice but Brendan could see nothing moving.

He could feel the steady pounding of running feet through the
soles of his boots. Brendan backed away a few feet from the fires. He
gauged the distance to the monastery. It was a very long run. He
looked again toward the noise. Far away in the moonlight, he made
out' a movement. The pounding was louder and the noise of crackling
ice closer.

The dog cocked his head in great curiosity. The figure was nearer
and moving at great speed directly toward him.

Then a shrill, angry titter carried through the darkness.
Brendan's heart quailed.

The creature loomed out of the darkness, huge, larger than ever,
an expression of indignant rage on its hideous face, its forelimbs
raised to strike. Abruptly it came to a sliding stop and backed away
a step. It snorted in surprise, its furious wild eye fixed on
Brendan. From its body rolled its dank sickening odor. Around its
neck was draped a wrist-thick gold chain from which depended a mirror
in an oval gold frame. The creature had lovingly discovered its own
face.

For a moment it seemed baffled. Then it raised itself to its full
height and in a rage beat its fists on its chest and stamped its
feet. Great cracks in the ice radiated from it. Cracking noises
sounded from all over the lake.

The creature craned its neck, staring at Brendan's face in the
moonlight, studying the hair and the robe, pacing in a semicircle
before him, trying to see better. The mastiff, straining at its
chain, watched with great curiosity.

"Purple," the creature said. "Purple!"

"Get thee to hell," Brendan answered.

The creature beat its breast in a rage and bellowed, raising its
forearm high in the air.

Brendan walked after it, holding up his right index finger. "Let
me touch you, monster! One touch!" He hurried toward it. The
creature slipped and leaped to its feet to run off across the ice.

"Down!" Brendan yelled after it. "Get thee to
hell."

Far out on the ice, the creature beat its arms hysterically on the
chest. "Purple," it shouted once more. It gathered itself
and charged toward Brendan.

Brendan looked about for a weapon. There was nothing. Fury was up
and barking wildly as Brendan threw up his arms to ward off the blow.
And suddenly there were two mastiffs barking and lunging. The
creature shrieked as the second mastiff bounded up and leaped at its
throat.

The creature tried to turn and run but the dog bore it down on the
ice and savagely slashed at its throat. A man's figure stepped past
Brendan, roaring at the creature, "Down! Chimere! Down! Get thee
to hell!"

The ice burst open. Huge cracks appeared. The creature fell into
the water, thrashing and shrieking. Then it sank.

The man turned and looked with great concern at Brendan. "Are
you hurt?"

Brendan shook his head.

The man stared at Brendan's head. "Dear God," he said.
"Your aura's like a bonfire." He smiled with ineffable joy.
"Call me Timothy," he said.

Timothy led Brendan inside the monastery. He had the kindest green
eyes Brendan had ever seen, and Brendan felt an immediate and
overwhelming affection for him.

"We have only a few minutes," Timothy said. "Satan's
hawk will be here any moment."

"Can you help me?" Brendan asked.

"Yes. I can. But first we have to get you somewhere safe.
There's a place forty miles south of here, through the mountains at
the Great Gap. An old ruin of a monastery. I'll take care of the hawk
as long as I can while you make your way there. Travel at night only.
Keep your head covered. And watch for the hawk. If you see her, hide
immediately."

"What if she sees me?" Brendan asked.

Timothy's eyes became bleak. "Pray."
 
 

It took only a few minutes to fit Brendan out with winter garments
and boots and a backpack. Timothy accompanied him to the edge of the
ice, giving him detailed advice. He finished by saying, "Cross
the lake that way. Keep your heading due south. And no matter what
you hear or see, don't stop. Run for your life."

Guided by the bright moonlight, Brendan trotted across the ice to
the shore and disappeared among the trees. There was a long climb
ahead of him in woods that were still deep with snow. He turned and
looked back. He was leaving a clear trail in the snow behind him.
Then he heard the hawk. "
Cree cree creel"
she
shrieked, circling the monastery. When she saw Timothy she filled the
night with her cries. Timothy and the mastiff walked across the ice
away from Brendan with the hawk darting after them.