Pagan Exorcist
Matthew Sawyer
Published by Matthew Sawyer at Smashwords
Copyright 2010 Matthew Sawyer
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“Pagan Exorcist” is a fictional story. All characters, names and locations are the creations of Matthew Sawyer. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is unintentional and coincidental.
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Pagan Exorcist
Matthew Sawyer
As the sun rose, Annie crawled into bed - where she intended to stay. The bed had finally warmed when someone knocked on the front door. Annie wanted the visitor to have wasted his or her time, but the rapid rap on the front door continued. Summoned, Annie clawed from beneath the comfortable blankets. The demand of the noise persisted while she stomped out of her bedroom and down the stairs, to the front hall. Whoever knocked would just not go away.
Annie saw the shape of a teenage boy through the frosted glass window set in the door. The bright morning sun lit the porch, spilling illumination through the glass. Annie noted the boy had a pale face and wore a yellow T-shirt before she opened the door. The boy was a redhead. Although, the color of his hair was thickened with brown.
Upon opening the door, Annie admitted the boy's hair was auburn, only darker. Annie could not be picky, regarding her uncommon visitors, but happily, this one looked cute. He made going to sleep late worth the inconvenient interruption. The disturbance might also turn out fun. Annie anticipated she could wait through his sales pitch before frightening the lad.
The high school always sent kids around, selling candy bars for college or something. Annie had a sweet tooth, but preferred cookies or even crackers. If the kid was selling cookies, she will buy a box. But, Annie really rather have the boy. She then remembered only girls sold cookies. Whether teenage visitors were boys or girls never really matter, Annie found either delicious.
Alas, Annie had gotten old, ancient actually, but not immortal. Annie no longer had the strength to snatch children that came to her door. Well, not enough energy to seize a kid and conjure confusion, to escape notice of her with a special dinner.
“Hello, tasty,” Annie sneered at the boy and cackled. She still had energy for the chase. Annie was not worried about discovery of her mischievous hobbies. Nobody will believe a feeble old woman pursued a healthy-looking teenage boy.
“Witch,” the boy stated. Evidently, the little rascals now called names straight to Annie face, a genuine surprise. The kids were usually safe across the street before they screamed accusations. This boy is oddly brave, as if he did not fear for his own mortality. The foolishness and folly of youth always came as such a tragic shock to kids such as him.
“We know each other from the Wilderness of Zin, over three millennium years ago,” said the boy.
Annie stepped backwards, allowing the teenage boy to follow her partway into the house. Whatever spoke was not a teenage boy. The pair stopped, near the open entry. The old woman and boy stared at each other, speechless as the sun rose and traffic on the street outside grew busy.
“You're a demon then,” Annie said, carefully studying the teenager. “What's yer name? And no legion shit, I know only one soul drives that lovely body.”
“You'll only know my name if you agree to help me. That is reward enough, for a witch,” the possessed boy stated.
“Aye, and can get me killed,” Annie countered. “I don't want such power. I'm ready to pass away.”
“For your soul then, great old mother,” the unidentified demon suggested.
Annie thought a moment about her answer. The demon used every fragment of the time to guess what Annie may try. Witches weren't defenseless.
Still, while the demon infested a teenage boy, it could wield the body as a weapon. The boy could easily break her bones and leave Annie suffering and dying on the floor. But that is not what the demon threatened. The primordial entity played with the biggest stake possible, the only one that mattered.
“Aye, there's that,” Annie cautiously affirmed. The demon could not possibly know what she thought. Annie emptied and hardened her mind. “What d'ya want me to do for ya'?”
“This body is to be returned without harm,” the demon told Annie.
“And the old way won't work?” Annie conjectured. “Why don't ya' get a priest to exorcise you? The bruises and scratches will heal.”
“The Creator is gone. There is no Hell in which to be cast, only the belly of Ithadow.”
“What, no Hell?” Annie asked surprised. “Where has God gone and who is Ithadow?”
“He's abandoned humankind to its sin,” the demon answered with the boy's voice. “Ithadow has come in His absence. It has brought its own hell and demons.”
“And it's tougher to escape the new hell,” concluded the witch. New gods presented opportunities, but Annie no longer cared. She was finished, scrapping for power. This century will see the end of her tired and ragged ages. The new gods might complicate her obliteration. Annie needed to know a little more. “So I take it, you don't have a pact with the new gods.”
“This boy helps me fight Ithadow and the pantheon that follows it,” the demon replied. “I still need him, once I am incorporeal again. That and I promised his body will be returned whole.”
“How did ya' wind up inside of him in the first place?” Annie asked. Demons usually possessed living creatures to indulge corporeal hedonisms. The details can be titillating.
“Is that your price, knowledge?” returned the demon.
“I'm still thinking about it. I'm just askin' to satisfy my curiosity.”
All demons and elemental were liars, with exceptions. Occasionally, the supernatural malcontents told the truth. If the entity inside the boy is honest, and God is gone, the Devil and demons went with him. The whole Judeo-Christian faith is a sort of package deal. Muslims were a part of package. The dominate religions were scourges to pagan sorcery.
If God is gone, that meant the entity revealed itself an elemental; older, and strangely enough, more impulsive than demons. Both demons and elementals never bothered to clarify what sort of fiend they were. The confusion made their expulsion much more difficult, depending what path the exorcist pursued.
Whether the demon, or elemental, lied did not matter to Annie. Vanity and lust drove her desires until the American Industrial revolution. Living got easier, after the new system of voluntary slavery was introduced. Life became idle and lazy. This age is a good time to die in peace.
“The body of this boy served my purposes,” the elemental stated. The oblique answer was designed to discourage learning details.
Annie did not push the elemental for an explanation. The response is typical of fiends. This one is more eloquent, and even personable, although the delightful shape of the boy lent to the latter perception. Annie decided her price.
“Give me the boy, once you're gone.”
“I still need him. He is my acolyte.”
“Not permanently,” Annie corrected. “Just long enough ta' shake the dust from my bones.”
The elemental gazed at the witch with suspicion.
“C'mon, I bet you haven't even used that thing.” Annie said, wiggling her bony finger at the boy's crouch. “Ya' know ya' want to. The boy's in the prime of his life, if ya' know what I mean.”
“All right, I'll give him to you, four hours,” the elemental agreed. “But when I return, pretend I came to rescue the boy.”
“A little charade?” Annie asked, just as suspicious of her vagrant guest as it is of her. “Okay, but don't ya' hurt me, lest I kill the boy.”
“Your charms and talismans protect you, great old mother.”
“Don't play yer games,” Annie said. “I know what the likes of you can do. My spells can't touch ya', and ya' know it.”
“Yes, they barely conceal you,” the demon replied. “But I invoke the Compact of Dawn. You will not be touched.”
“You give me great strength,” Annie said feeling giddy. The relevance and mystical power granted by the invocation is largely symbolic, but citing the compact was a gesture of genuine honesty. “You will know, my mother was a witness of its genesis.”
“Then that makes you the last of long-lived tribes,” the demon stated, sounding impressed.
“Power and long life for the unborn souls of generations,” Annie recounted in the shadow of age and regret. “Once I'm gone, the compact, and contracts it fathered, are void. Is that why yer here, to rush me off to oblivion? Ya' gotta know, I'm goin' soon, anyway. What makes an immortal such as yerself care if I die today or inna hundred years?”
“Agreements and contracts are not my concern. They are the stuff of my sleeping brethren. I only seek your aid, returning this body to the boy. He is still inside,” the demon answered.
“Uncomfortable and mad,” Annie said of the sorry soul the elemental had pushed into the body's groin. “You'd be kind if ya' just sent 'em to Hell or oblivion.”
“He is fine, great old mother. Please, help me.”
The polite humility was a rare treat, coming from a fiend. Annie kept in mind that those manners, too, were tools of deceit. Believing the fiend, no matter how inconsequential, made it stronger. Annie needed to remedy the situation. The demon, or elemental, may betray itself again, giving her the upper hand.
“I've had dealings with a lot of demons and elemental. You sound familiar. Have we spoken since Zin?”
“Witch, I am in urgent need. I am not playing games with you, mine or yours,” the demon said in calculated haste.
“All right,” Annie agreed. “Then let's make a contract. I'll remove ya' from this body. In payment, I will have it for a time, for my carnal pleasures.”
“Agreed,” the demon anxiously stated.
“I'll need your name,” Annie told the demon once the contract was made, without anything further done or said.
“Pazuzu.”
“You are an old elemental,” the witch said amazed. “Nearly pure elemental, shadow. How many of your iterations are awake?”
“I believed I woke alone, upon the arrival of the new gods, but I've been ignorant. I think now, I am the only elemental that fights them. The power of Creation does not belong to alien gods. It is the right, and realm, of the elementals of this world. I will claim it.”
“You, God, new gods, I don't care,” Annie stated. “My soul is going to oblivion soon. Now that you've said God is gone, then, at least, I don't need to worry about finding myself in Heaven or Hell.”
“Oh, but you will,” Pazuzu told the witch. “Ithadow has brought his own hell and has ensnared the world. That is what awoke me. When you die, witch, you will be eaten by an alien god, for all eternity. The myth of Prometheus is the reality of mankind.”
“What about magics, to transport my soul?” Annie asked, broaching a topic in which she strategically wished to appear helpless.
“They will work for your soul, but mankind will still perish,” Pazuzu answered.
“I'm all I care about,” Annie said and cackled again. “Good luck with your schemes. Now, lets get you outta my plaything.”
The demon stripped the shirt off the teenage boy. His flat white belly glowed in the shadowy entranceway. The exorcism will be performed right then and there. Annie is a witch so powerful that she did not need minerals, flowers, blood or whatnot. With centuries of age came mastery of her mind. Few witches ever achieved the level of her tiresome domination. Most of her sisters and peers perished in weakness and madness long ago.
The only thing Annie needed was her favorite dagger; kept sheathed on her wrinkled but wiry and strong leg. Annie untied her thick bathrobe and lifted her flannel night gown. The old woman wore nothing underneath. The demon stood watching, in the sunlight of the open door. Annie pulled the curved knife from a black leather sheath strapped on her bare, gray thigh.
“You must not harm this body!” Pazuzu commanded nervously.
“How are ya' gonna get out, then?” Annie asked. The night gown had again fallen around her knobby knees but the bathrobe hung open. “I can cut somewhere that can't be seen, like the roof of his mouth or in his nose. Ya' think ya' can get out through a severed capillary?
The elemental considered the location of its exit. The question concerning harm to the boy's body seemed partially answered. The boy could not escape the possession without some damage. Pazuzu needed a way out. The witch suggested the exit from the body can be cut small. The demon's restriction on time forced him to believe the woman.
“Cut on the top of his mouth,” Pazuzu stated, opening the jaws of the body he possessed.
“You're gonna have ta' kneel. I can't do careful work, if I gotta look up,” Annie instructed. The boy stood a head taller than the ancient woman.
Pazuzu dropped the body on one knee and opened his mouth again. The boy's head leaned backwards. Annie spotted the freckles she expected to see on the boy. They started on the top of his shoulders. They looked like ornamental cinnamon candies melting in cream. Annie felt herself become moist between her thighs. She would not allow herself distraction at this crucial moment.
Annie carefully lifted the blade of the curved dagger into the boy's mouth. She then shoved with all her overbearing weight. The blade cut through snotty nasal cavities and curved deep into the brain of the boy. Blood trickled from the nose of the teenager as his eyes rolled over to white. Annie let the body fall on her porch. Vehicles that moved both directions filled the street, their drivers only paid attention to the road before them. Pedestrians walked past, but never glanced at the house, let alone Annie, who stood over a body on the front porch.
“Off to hell, with you,” Annie stated as she dragged the body into her house.
The bullshit about new gods was too obvious. Demons and elementals will not trap Annie in Hell, no matter what story they invented. The fiends must have known she had no intention to fulfill the minutia of contracts and agreements made with their foul kind throughout the centuries. They'll have no recourse, once the witch escapes to oblivion. The thought made Annie laugh. Pazuzu will just have to start all over again with whatever he had planned to do.
In the meantime, Annie had a body to play with. It no longer had life of its own, but she can make it work. She only wants what sprouts below the waist while it is fresh. When the fiends did show up again, Annie will deal with them as decidedly as she had with Pazuzu. She fulfilled her side of the contract. The fiend is free. Annie hoped all fiends rode teenagers. Once Annie was done playing with them, she can eat 'em. She will stay fed until the day she died.