The Forsaken: Part 2

Howling winds rustled the high tree tops where Lucas hid from the world. He spent two days with his nose in books, sipping scotch, and grasping the tasks before him. Archbishop Rogers insisted Lucas rest up and prepare for the coming fight. How the archbishop thought he’d get any sleep was beyond Lucas.

The cabin was a sanctuary. It served as a place for the church to host retreats, house foreign visitors interested in communing with nature, and act as a place for church members to escape when needed.

One of the things the church did with the cabin was use it as a place for cleansing the spirit. The lower level rooms were for ceremonies. Archbishop Rogers referred to the rooms as exorcism chambers. Lucas toured the lower levels. What Lucas saw was a place of evil.

It was late in the evening when Lucas started to feel the effects of having his nose in the books for so long. Learning about the seven princes of hell was a task. There was a mountain of folklore and legend to cover. After encountering Belfagor, he needed to know as much about them as possible.

Lying his head back, the warmth of the fireplace comforting him, Lucas gradually nodded off. It was the first time he’d slept in days.

There was darkness everywhere when Lucas opened his eyes. All around him, it was dark. He turned in every direction, looking through the endlessness of it all. He could only see during intermittent flashes.

It wasn’t lightning. The crackles of light overhead and the explosions weren’t from storms. With the ominous explosions came thunderous sounds echoing in the void, mixed with screams from all directions.

Fear bubbled inside his gut, making him look around in all directions, only to be blinded by the bright flashes. The depth of the void stretched forever. Lucas screamed, echoing from every direction. He couldn’t see where he was or what was happening around him.

Lucas began to walk, unsure where he was going. He moved a few feet at a time, holding his hands up and focusing when the flashes above struck and showed where he was standing. Occasionally bouncing off solid walls, Lucas began to feel his way around.

The walls were like granite, each damp and jagged. Lucas kept looking for evidence of where he was. His heart raced, his pulse pounded, and he followed the flashes. Lucas began focusing on the screams. He listened for the different voices, discerning their cries.

Amid the flashes, Lucas saw a face in the abyss. It hovered in front of him, taunting him. The evil face haunted Lucas, beckoning him to keep going. Against his better judgment, Lucas continued to wander toward the evil before him.

“That’s it, boy!”

The voice was familiar. So familiar that anxiety and fear turned to anger. How? How was it possible?

“Come on, boy! You know what you have to do!” screamed the man’s voice.

It was deep, filled with bass and gravel. Lucas could never forget hearing that voice. After fourteen years, it still haunted him. That voice had haunted Lucas longer than he’d been one of the inquisitors.

“What are you!” demanded Lucas.

He continued to feel his way along a dark path, using the only structure he found as a guide.

Lucas thought about Jenna and Michael. He heard this thing the night they died. Knowing this thing was there drove Lucas. It was why he’d become an inquisitor, to learn how to defeat the things he didn’t understand.

Lucas pushed too hard against the jagged wall as he followed it toward the sound of the beastly voice. Blood trickled down his hand and forearm. The scent of blood filled his nostrils, but not his alone.

The sound of hounds in the distance alerted him that they were there and likely smelled the odor. Hounds were on his trail, and a beast awaited him. All Lucas knew was to keep going. He needed answers. Lucas needed to learn how the man with that voice was alive.

Lucas failed to save his family. As a cop, he knew how to hunt killers.

“Come on! Show yourself!” screamed Lucas. “Show yourself, you coward!”

Lucas used the skills amassed over a decade on the force. He knew how to follow leads, access information, and blend in at crime scenes. Conducting hunts was something he practiced many times.

When he found the man responsible, Lucas watched him for days. There was no way he could let things go wrong. He watched, waited, and planned until one night in Chicago, he seized upon the opportunity.

Lucas took the man by surprise. Stuffing his unconscious body into the back of a stolen van, Lucas took him to a remote location. Lucas dragged the man into his pre-chosen hideaway.

It was there that Lucas avenged his family. He took his time, however, and that was the act that took him to the inquisitors. They were following him and watched as Lucas took his pound of flesh.

Lucas knew the man responsible for his family’s murder was gone. There was no way he could be alive.

A door slammed, startling Lucas. He woke up with his Colt in his hand, the barrel aimed at Archbishop Rogers. He froze in that position, causing the archbishop to freeze nervously in the doorway. The two men exchanged nervous glances while Lucas realized he’d been dreaming.

“Are you alright, Lucas?” asked the archbishop.

Lucas’s hands were shaking, and sweat rolled down his jawline. He still smelled the rotting odor of death and despair around him.

“My son, put the gun down,” suggested the archbishop. “Please?”

Lucas looked at the gun in his hand, slowly lowering the barrel to the ground. As much as he didn’t like Archbishop Rogers, shooting him was off the table. The entirety of the inquisitors would turn on him and hunt him down for the crime.

“I’m sorry,” said Lucas, still shook up.

Archbishop Rogers walked into the room with two coffees and breakfast. He looked over his shoulder as he walked toward the table, catching Lucas’s eye.

“I’m not going to shoot you in the back. You’re a dick, but not that big of a dick,” Lucas told him, reassuring his safety.

“Have the nightmares returned?”

“Yes, and no.”

Archbishop Rogers asked, “Do you want to talk about them?’

“Hell no. I’m not the shrinky, share your feelings, sing campfire songs type. Besides, it wouldn’t help,” Lucas admitted.

“Was it about them?”

Lucas could tell the old priest wouldn’t let it rest. He nodded his head. Lucas looked away from Archbishop Rogers, focusing on the history books before him. There was still much to learn.

“Why are you here?” asked Lucas.

“I brought you a few things,” answered the archbishop. “New wheels, supplies, and a fully restocked kit. Plus, I thought you could use some food after a few days up here. It looks like you’ve gotten lost in your steadies.”

He wasn’t wrong. Lucas focused on finding out everything he could about Belfagor and his threat. If more of his kind was coming, he wanted to know as much as there was to learn.

“If this is legit, Belfagor had six brothers. It’s been two thousand years or more since they last appeared. Why now?” wondered Lucas.

Archbishop Rogers sat across from Lucas. The scholarly type that he was, the man had his theories. In all of recorded history, there were times of great struggle. During those times, the most evil of men rose to power. Recent times were no exception.

Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, things changed. The church brought back the inquisitors to supplement the influx of investigations into the supernatural. It also, at times, covered up for the inquisitors and their ways.

The Pope himself now performed exorcisms. That was a practice that died a few hundred years ago. The church had authorized training civilian men of faith in the rituals because of the volume of requests. In over a thousand years of recorded history, the church had not experienced such a demand for services.

“Perhaps it’s not just now that they have been showing their faces,” suggested Archbishop Rogers.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Are you familiar with Mother Teresa?” he asked Lucas.

“Of course,” Lucas replied.

“How about Archbishop D’Souza?”

Lucas didn’t know many of the Archbishops. Besides Rogers, Lucas only knew a few others.

“The sainted mother was troubled before her passing. While in the hospital, he frequently visited Mother Teresa. It seemed she was excessively restless. So, with much reflection on her life, he called for a priest trained in the exorcism rituals.”

“What became of the ritual?”

The archbishop set a recorder on the table between them. He poured a glass of scotch and filled Lucas’s empty.

“That was the last time I heard the name Belfagor. It was in the official report, the one not given to D’Souza. D’Souza was permitted to acknowledge the ritual, but only to protect Mother Teresa’s reputation,” explained the archbishop.

Lucas couldn’t believe that they’d performed a ritual on a saint. More so, he was shocked.

“Belfagor took over Mother Teresa’s body?” asked Lucas.

“It was early in the process, so we may never know. But a voice echoed in the hospital room during the ritual. When pushed to identify itself, even the nurses outside the room heard something bellow, ‘Belfagor,’ and it scared the wits out of them. The file reports that one of the nurses, a younger brunette, wound up with a permanent streak of white hair because of the incident,” explained Archbishop Rogers.

Lucas looked at the pictures and examined the file. He shuddered to think that the entity had returned. Rogers appeared shaken up by Belfagor’s involvement in the Ben Garza case. By all accounts, Belfagor was the weakest of the seven princes.

“Thanks, you’ve given me plenty to consider,” Lucas told the archbishop.

“Actually,” Archbishop Rogers admitted, “I have something else for you. “There’s a case in Iowa we are assigning to you.”

“What kind of case?”

Archbishop Rogers pushed a different file across the coffee table, hesitant to send Lucas out so soon after his last encounter. The case had a particular feel to it, one that he couldn’t shake. What was going on in LeClaire felt like another attack. He feared one of the others was already on Earth.

“My son,” he sighed. “Tread cautiously with this one. I fear that the message Belfagor left means we’re already two steps behind.”

Archbishop Rogers finished his drink and disappeared into the night. Taillights lit up at the end of the driveway. Lucas decided he would leave in the morning. It would take him more than half a day to reach Iowa. He needed a good night’s sleep first.

Lucas grabbed a hotel room eight miles from LeClaire and changed clothes. The Suburban was a gas hog, but he’d fit more gear into the backend than his Explorer. Checking into his room, Lucas set up shop and began working. He was still studying the books the archbishop gave him.

When morning arrived, Lucas dressed in a blue polo shirt, jacket, and khakis. He drove to the LeClaire Police Station and asked to see Chief Jones. Lucas waited nearly an hour to see the local chief. He could tell that the station was abuzz with something.

“Come back to my office,” Chief Jones instructed when he finally was free.

Lucas walked behind Chief Jones as they entered the chief’s office, the only one with privacy.

“So you’re Shaw?” the chief reaffirmed.

“Yes sir,” answered Lucas.

“And you know why you’re here?”

Lucas was confused. There wasn’t any reason he would be there without knowing why.

“Do you?”

Chief Jones explained that he’d received a call from Cardinal Montoya. The cardinal requested that he cooperate with a church investigation.

“That’s correct. Is there a problem?” asked Lucas.

“I’ve been Catholic since shortly before marrying my wife. I’ve been chief nearly that entire time. I’ve never received a request like this,” explained Chief Jones.

“I’m sorry. Nevertheless, I’m here,” Lucas replied.

“What’s your interest in the three missing women?”

“I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to divulge that just yet,” answered Lucas. “I’m simply sent to investigate peculiar events and report back to his holiness.”

“And I’m expected to give you full cooperation,” sighed the chief. “Well, at the risk of being excommunicated, I’m afraid I’m going to need a bit more than that.”

Lucas pulled out his phone and dialed a number. He waited for a voice to answer, then spoke.

“We have hesitance on this end,” he announced, paused, and said, “I understand.”

Lucas paused, looking at the old cop. He then admitted who he really was and why he was there.

“I’m from the office of the Inquisitors, which gives me a lot of latitude in how I respond to things getting in my way. Do you understand what I’m saying?” asked Lucas.

“Jesus,” sighed Chief Jones.

“Sir, if Jesus were here, I wouldn’t be. I would like the case files, any surveillance videos or footage you might have pulled, and dossiers on the three missing women.”

“Yes sir,” replied Chief Jones.

When the chief returned with all the files, Lucas gathered the case information and took it all with him. He rushed out of the local station, something shaking him to his core. Getting in the Suburban, Lucas sped away from LeClaire.

Lucas didn’t stop until he reached the outskirts of town. He sat in the driver’s seat, nervous he was followed.

Chief Jones’s face changed in front of Lucas. The distortion was horrid, and he swore he smelled a rancid odor.

Alex called Archbishop Rogers.

“Hello,” answered the archbishop over the speaker.

“I just watched the face of our local contact change in his office and a rancid odor fill the room,” he announced.

“Be careful, Lucas. There’s something powerful in that city, and it knows you’re there,” advised the archbishop.