Silver

It is an easy thing to lose one’s parents.

The priest certainly needed no reminders. It had been over thirty-five years and still the memory haunted him, his mother and father crying out in anguish while trying to protect him from the demon Cilius. They died with their efforts. The evil scourge was now his unwelcome companion and showed its twisted form whenever he dared to have a peaceful moment. The bloody stench of that day so long ago, still fresh in his heart, made his hand instinctively clutch at the worn book hidden within his cassock. At long last in his possession, the Diabolis Ordo was his chance to change his fate.

Now he could change everything.

He stepped quickly through the unkempt greenery of the forest, looking for the little boy. Mea Paulo salvator, (My little savior) he murmured to himself. Cito veni ad me. (Come to me quickly)

He could hear the screams of the child’s mother, desperately looking for her son in the distance of the woods. Cilius began to dig into the flesh of his back, whispering obscenities in his ear, attempting to keep him from his mission. “Remember that you are damned,” the demon chanted. “The boy will not save you.”

And yet he must go on. The sun was dropping rapidly and the cries of the mother rang out on the wind. I must find him first.

He turned into a deep copse of overgrown, entangled weeds, an indentation in the earth where the roots of the large trees jutted up boldly out of the ground. Hidden and dangerous looking, it was the perfect enticement for a three-year old boy. The priest swept aside the lower branches to look down into the deepest part of the furrow. There lay the child, sleeping, oblivious to the chaos he was causing.

The priest’s face eased into a look of relief and immediately he began his prayer, first to his God for protection and mercy, and then to Saint Michael. He knew it might be meaningless, but his need for a warrior bade him his transgressions.

St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle; be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the devil…

And now his quarry...and his guilt. The boy would be tossed into a firestorm so violent it threatened to consume all it touched. He would be responsible, just as he was tainted, and it was Cilius, he thought, that made him such. It was the way of all who were marked, hurdling headlong towards their master in the darkness. If he was not careful he would be unable to save himself from the same fate, unable to claim his place in the light. Perhaps it was already too late.

The priest immediately stepped down into the brush and knelt next to the young boy. The child’s unkempt dark locks had tumbled upon his serene face. He was curled onto the side of a large tree bark, his cheeks streamed with tears; he had been lost.

“David,” the priest said quietly, not wanting to startle him. “David Young…wake up.”

Slowly the child’s eyes fluttered and then opened, blinking away the fogginess of sleep. He sat up.

“Hello, David,” the priest said, still whispering in hurried tones. There was no time for delay. “My name is Father Triton.”

David looked up at the priest with the dark, luminous eyes of a distraught child. “I lost my Mommy.”

Father Triton smiled. “Yes...I’m going to help you find her, but first I need you to do something for me.”

“Mommy told me not to talk to strangers,” David whispered.

“She’s right…but I think in this case you might make an exception.” Father Triton tried to control the shaking of his hands. His entire future—and the future of many others—depended on the next two minutes with this small boy. “I promise I will help you find your Mommy, okay?”

David nodded. “You can’t touch me or give me any candy.”

“Of course not,” Father Triton said, smiling again. “I need you to hold this…” he said retrieving his personal seal from the folds of his robes, “…and repeat what I say. Can you do that for me David?”

“What is that?” the boy asked, his eyes lighting up at the sight of the glowing, black, flat medallion. Father Triton swung the dark relic by its chain until the boy could not resist and grabbed onto it with his hands.

“It is…a bit of magic,” the priest replied, adding to the deficit on his soul. In any case, the boy would not understand the truth. “Hold onto it with both hands and repeat what I say…do you understand?”

David nodded, looking at the strange item clutched between his small fingers. It was surprisingly warm. Father Triton continued, his eyes fixated excitedly on David’s face as he recited the damning words and listened to David repeat them.

Both shared the finality of an intertwined fate. Afterwards, David beamed as the priest praised him.

“I chose well,” Father Triton said, returning David’s smile. “You are like your father, a born philosopher.”

David lost his smile. “What’s a filos fur?”

“Never mind. You will forget me,” Father Triton said seriously, deep lines etched in his brow. “But we will see each other again in much darker times.”

David nodded his head passionately. “Will you help me find Mommy?”

“A promise is a promise,” Father Triton replied.

Suddenly the voice of David’s mother filled the air.

“There she is now,” the priest said to David. “I need you to close your eyes and count to three and when you open them your mom will be here.”

“Okay,” David agreed, closing his eyes.

Father Triton stood and slipped the medallion from its chain, and, looking down to see if the boy was still sightless, placed the glowing ember into his mouth. Immediately he felt the familiar swell, the cleaving of Cilius—who could not bear the Light—then he fell backwards and into the wind, breaking into pieces and leaving nothing behind.

David did as he was told and when he opened his eyes, the priest was gone. He did not have time to feel betrayed, however, because suddenly his mother was there, hugging and scolding him.

“I got lost,” David began, his lip trembling.

“I thought you were gone forever!” his mother said harshly. “How many times have I told you not to wander off?” She hugged David tightly to her.

The priest had kept his promise after all.

In the coming days his parents noticed the small circular mark between his shoulder blades. They quickly dismissed it as just an interesting mole, or some other benign skin deformity, but had they known what it was they still would not have believed.

How can I explain something that defies explanation?

“Do not waste your time on reason,” the old monk snaps when I try to reach for answers. “Stick to the task at hand.”

This is an easy thing to say.

Find someone else, I suggest. Someone better suited for this mission; a steady, reliable warrior who has discipline and an ethical soul. Someone well-versed in this holy war between mortals, angels and demons.

Anyone but me.

He does not listen, or chooses not to hear. “You are the one,” he only repeats in a litany. “And the one will find a way.”

When I am alone I spend precious time looking at the bane of my new existence, the mark of the unforgiven placed upon my back, of those lost to eternal damnation. Most times I am a winged, twisted thing. The old monk did this to me. He took my family and my soul, and still I must obey for my own survival and for the survival of the few that remain behind in my former life.

The wicked text—the Diabolis Ordo—written to entice the evil of the world to create unrest, to aid the darkness during this age of rebellion, it must be extinguished. The Six Swords, then, are my mantra; the book can only be destroyed by the collection of these relics, which must be plunged into its pages. I have reluctantly been charged with this task.

You might think I was born a man of extraordinary talents to be burdened with such an undertaking. To the contrary; I was the epitome of the mundane, an executive living just outside of the Philadelphia metropolis. Before that just an average child, or so I thought, living as any other child, going to school and trying to stay out of trouble. The old monk says the plan for my life is rooted in the ancient annals of destiny, but memory tells me my first brush with this new life began as a simple childhood injustice.

“I told you to stop moving you stupid little jerk!” Tom Deming snarled in my face as he held me to the ground. He and four of his hoodlum friends were systematically beating me to a pulp in the middle of Grover’s Woods.

“Fight…fight…fight!” the chanting echoed as the other children from the lunchroom noticed the commotion and began to crowd out around us. They had no idea how wrong they were; it was not a fight, which would imply that either side had an equal chance of winning.

It was an ambush.

The blows were devoid of creativity; one juvenile monstrosity repeatedly stomped on my right arm while another boy kicked me in the ribs. The entire time Tom hovered over me, littering the air with words of hatred and scorn.

“The next time you pull a stunt like that, I’m going to slit your throat and throw you in the river!” he garbled, his spittle reaching my eyes.

Tom, at thirteen years of age, had already earned the nickname ‘The Brick’ for his ability to throw a punch, his flaming red hair, and his favorite pastime of smashing the teachers’ car windows if they dared to go against his inflated ego.

We lived lives of contrast; I was at the top of my class while Tom struggled academically. My family was well off and his was poor. My dad was respected and liked throughout the community—he was the founder of Young Pharmaceuticals, the largest employer in Latchley—and Tom’s dad was the type of man that hardly left his home but his entire family used up their prayers in wishing he would.

The Demings, but especially their children—Tom and his little brother, Derrick—were known by everyone in Latchley for their ignorant behaviors, and who, despite every indication to the contrary, kept up the belief that they were somehow better than everyone around them. They were all hot-tempered (Tom’s father had passed down that fitting shock of red hair to his son) and greedy, and these traits ultimately led to their downfall. Mr. Deming worked briefly for my dad at Young Pharmaceuticals a few years before, but was soon fired when he tried unsuccessfully to carry out company information to our greatest competitor, Biocreed. After losing his job in a firestorm of disgrace, Mr. Deming became an angry and abusive man who made his family pay for his inadequacies.

It would not be unlikely, then, that every time The Brick watched me walk up the pathway of Latchley Junior High in my pressed blue blazer without any bruises or black eyes, he had the overwhelming urge to knock me around as well. I was a constant target for his jealousy. My apparent bravery only made things worse as Tom preferred simpering casualties to those who challenged him. I knew beneath his bluster beat the heart of a coward, as it is with most bullies, and at all costs I was going to bring his cowardice to light.

I could not wait to splice that red-headed chicken.

But not this time. His friends were insurmountable and the odds were stacked too far against me.

At long last the lunch aides caught up with us and began following the trail of loitering students into the woods. I could hear the crunch of the leaves and the exclamations of the children as they ran away. Tom gave me a final devastating punch and then he, too, was gone.

“David!” Mrs. Trebold, our history teacher, yelled out among the trees. She ran over to me and knelt down, concern etched on her wrinkled face. “David Young! What happened?”

I sat up slowly, a numbness hindering the movements of my right arm.

“I think the buffalos got loose again,” I said. I tried to smile but my face would not allow such a frivolous action.

My mother had warned about my passive aggressive tendencies in the face of a challenge. “You’re just like your father,” she’d remind me whenever my temper flared. “Complete calm and then boom!”

She was right. As we battled our way through the eighth grade, Tom was always the instigator, but not the sole aggressor. Shortly before my humiliation in the woods, another clash had transpired with a much different outcome.

“You think you’re hot shit, don’t you?” Tom asked, cornering me in the cafeteria after striking the books out of my arms to the floor. A push against the wall followed. He liked ambushes, anything that gave him the upper hand. It was enough.

“What’s your problem?” I asked.

“My problem is you,” he replied. “You’re nothing…do you know that?” He pointed a finger in my face. “You’re nothing!” The cafeteria aides were about to intercede, so in place of violence Tom decided to stick to verbal assault. “No amount of your dad’s money will keep you from being a pussy!”

The other children went wild with sympathy and awe.

I began my descent into rage. Temper and reason battled behind my eyes and the birthmark between my shoulders tickled as it always did whenever I felt intense emotional discomfort. Temper was winning.

“Everyone settle down,” the aides crooned pathetically.

I retrieved my books from the ground and rejoined the lunch line. All eyes were on me as I took my lunch and placed it on a tray. The woman behind the counter found amusement in giving me extra milk. “Looks like you’re gonna need it if you’re gonna make it to high school,” she said chuckling.

I walked the long route around the room, inching outside the crowded perimeters of the cafeteria, slowly edging past future nerds, cheerleaders, jocks and nobodies.

“He’s not going to do anything,” a voice from the crowd chimed. “Tom would have to beat that ass!”

Laughter followed, but I ignored them all. Somehow, slowly, eventually, I found myself standing next to Tom’s table, looking down at his smirking face. My milk cartons trembled; anger made my hands shake. My face grew hot.

“What the hell do you want?” Tom asked menacingly before I could act. “You want some more?”

I slid the serving plate and milk from my tray onto the table in front of them and enjoyed the look of confusion spreading over their faces.

“Is this a bribe?” one of Tom’s cronies volunteered, his fat hand grasping greedily at the extra food. The tickled nerve in my back spread and twitched, reaching my jawline. My mind went blank.

I swung the tray as far back as my arms would allow and let it ride straight through to Tom’s forehead. Once and then twice. His cronies stood up in surprise and the exultations of the children surrounded us as Tom fell backwards and hit the floor.

Boom.

“He has no business in that God forsaken place,” Mom said from the doorway of Dad’s personal laboratory, a large and open space hidden away in the depths of our basement. “Stacy Brummel enrolled both of her children in private school and they don’t have to put up with this kind of thing.”

After the ambush in Grover’s Woods, which resulted in both Tom and I being suspended, the true battle began at home. Mom was against my attending public school and the incident gave her the arsenal she needed to defend her position.

I sat perfectly still on the smooth countertop, closely watching Dad’s expression for signs of paternal rejection as he examined the bruises on my jawbones. I was mortified to face my father after losing to the likes of Tom Deming. Dad was a giant among men in both my mind and in the community and it was a disgrace his son could not make it through the eighth grade.

“I’ll have to put something on that,” Dad muttered to me with a grimace. His eyes met my own. “Does it hurt?”

“Not really,” I lied.

He walked over to the double ply steel cabinets in the far corner of the room and pulled out a small jar. “There is absolutely nothing wrong with public school,” he said to Mom. “I went to public school and I turned out fine.”

Mom snorted. “That is highly debatable.”

“And Stacy?” Dad said. “You’re comparing David to that idiot boy of hers? They could send that imbecile to the Royal Academy of Egypt and he still wouldn’t have enough brain cells to occupy every digit on two hands.” He tilted my chin and looked at me. “This may sting a bit.”

He underestimated. It took considerable effort not to wince.

“You are such an intellectual snob,” Mom said, crossing her arms, her small figure leaning up against the door frame.

Everyone I knew was scared of Mom. We all respected her, no less, and she loved her family without question, but there was something else lurking under her capable exterior. It was difficult to judge where you stood with Clara Young. Sometimes it seemed she was just as likely to cut you down as build you up. Dad and I were included in that fickle boat, perhaps more than everyone else.

“I am not the one who wants to send him off to some overrated social club,” Dad replied. “The boy has to grow up somewhere…not everybody out there in the real world is going to like him. Better he learns that now. It will build his character, which is much more useful than…”

“Useful Harry? Useful!” Mom said, her voice rising, reverberating off of the low ceiling. “They almost broke his arm! Are you going to wait until they really hurt him? Those kids hate him…what he has. Do you think that one day they’ll just change their minds?”

I waited anxiously for Dad’s reply. As young as I was, I knew the outcome of this conversation would change my whole life. I also knew that Mom hardly ever lost an argument.

“Okay then Clare,” Dad said, exasperated. “Let’s ask him. No reason to talk around the boy as if he’s invisible.” He turned and looked me square in the face. “Do you want to go to another school?”

“No,” I lied.

“There!” Dad chimed, beaming. “You have it straight from him.”

“Oh-ho!” Mom screeched, her finger pointed accusingly at Dad. “Yes, with only your approval hanging over his head.” She swept into the room and stood in front of me, her dark ringlets bouncing around her face. “Now David,” she said soothingly. “If you want to go to another school, somewhere more…dignified…then it’s okay. No one here,” she pinned a look on Dad, who was pretending to wipe down his countertops, “will judge you. You just tell us and we’ll find you somewhere else to go.”

I looked over in Dad’s direction, searching for his eyes, which remained averted. “No,” I heard myself say again, louder than before.

Dad immediately turned. “There now Clare…leave the boy alone. He’s tougher than you think. He has heart, which is more than I can say for most people. Hey…” he said to me in a quiet voice, “I heard you almost knocked his block off this morning. Good for you.” We shared a grin.

“Well…for heaven’s sake,” Mom huffed, throwing her hands up. “I see there is no reason to try and discuss something as big as logic with the two of you.” She walked back to the stairwell and then swung around suddenly to point a damning finger at Dad. “Just remember…whatever happens, it’s on your head.” Seconds later she was gone, the door at the top of the stairs slamming with enough force the basement windows rattled.

Dad sighed. “I guess if we don’t have some type of talk we’ll never see daylight again, so…”

I braced myself. Dad leaned up against the counter next to where I sat. “I’m sure you know I don’t approve of violence and what happened today at school is completely unacceptable,” he began. “That being said, I know the Demings and I know they’re bullies. You’re going to meet a lot of people in your lifetime just like them…angry, bitter people who will do anything to get a reaction from you. What you have to be careful about is making sure you don’t sink down to their level. It’s much easier than you think.”

Prophetic words; I would suffer greatly before I learned them. I stared down at my hands.

“As for today, well…you stuck up for yourself. Just between the two of us,” he took a cautious look at the stairwell, “I’m proud of you.”

I had gotten off easy, but it was the type of man Dad was: demanding but fair. His scientific need for equality, for everyone to have a chance to start from the same point was very important to him and it showed in everything he did.

“Hey,” he said, tapping me on the shoulder and raising his fists. “Show me what you did.”

For the next several moments I pretended to strike him in the head with an imaginary lunch tray as he cried out in distress. I have no doubt if Mom had been able to see our antics, she would have come downstairs and put us both out of our misery.

“You know, it’s all just a conspiracy anyway,” Elliot said as he reached the library table, his suspicious eyes staring down frantically at the book laid out in front of me.

If Tom could be labeled a bully, then Elliot was a phenomenon onto himself: an intelligent and moody introvert with never-ending curiosity and a mind built for exploring the paranormal. Not a day passed where he did not suspect we would both be carried to the netherworld by one demon or another. He trusted no one. A visit with Elliot always led to some form of interrogation, including questions only the both of us could answer, simply to be sure I was true to my identity and not some otherworldly imposter masquerading as his best friend.

In truth he was my only real friend, and his random thoughts about the realm of darkness, so amusing to me at the time, kept me from dwelling on Tom, my inability to speak to girls, and those moments of rage when I could not seem to control my anger.

We were misfits and we accepted each other’s tendencies, good or bad.

I gave him a questioning glance.

“That book you’re reading…about ghosts,” he continued, nervously rubbing his hand over his temple. This was a common occurrence before one of his breakthroughs. “I read it last summer. It’s not the real story.”

“I didn’t know there was a real story when it came to ghosts,” I said smirking up at him. “I’m going to be really worried about your head if you start again about this ghost and goblin crap. Please tell me you don’t believe this stuff.”

Elliot sighed and slid down into the seat beside me. “Have I taught you nothing?” he said. “The stuff in those books…the ghosts knocking things off of the shelves and howling in the attic…that’s just what they want us to believe.”

“Get the hell out of here,” I said, laughing.

He continued as though I had never spoken, still rubbing his temple. “But the ghosts are real. They don’t go around doing stupid things like you see in the movies…they have a purpose.”

“And what is that?” I asked. “To make you a bigger nerd than you already are?”

“Non-believer,” he said accusingly. “Let me show you something.” He reached into his backpack and retrieved a large brown book, sliding across the table in my direction. It looked ancient and worn.

“Let me guess,” I said. “The Necronomicon?”

Elliot’s face lit up in excitement. “I wish!” he said with such exuberance that Mrs. Kinley, the school librarian, shushed us. “This is from my grandfather’s bookstore. It’s…it’s…”

His expression went blank and the book was suddenly pulled back into his grasp before I could touch it. “What is my mother’s married name?” he asked.

“Your mom never married,” I replied quickly.

“How many golden rings are left in the last level of Legion of Few?” he asked.

“Three,” I replied, scenes from our video game of choice reeling through my mind.

He stared intensely into my face for a few moments more before sliding the book within my reach again. “This,” he said, “is the Diabolis Ordo. It means Devil’s Order. It’s all in Latin. Touch it…the cover feels funny.”

I reached across to place my palm on the brown leather and was surprised at the truth of Elliot’s statement; the book was warm to the touch, as if it were alive. It also felt…familiar. I knew it was an impossibility—I had never seen the book before—but my senses told me otherwise.

“You really need help,” I said slowly to cover up my confusion. My heart rate began to increase, and the mole on my back was burning and crackling as if it were on fire. I couldn’t stop rubbing my fingers across the cover. “It has to be old,” I whispered.

“Doesn’t it feel old?” Elliot replied. “It’s a reject…you know how my Grandpa is about this kind of material in his store. He thinks that I threw it out, but I just couldn’t do it. You think it’s something?”

I mumbled an inaudible sound under my breath. It was the kind of text that any adult would confiscate. And still…still I had to see what was between the pages.

“I’ll translate it for you,” I said.

Elliot rolled his eyes. “You don’t know Latin,” he reminded me, reaching his hand out for the book.

“I’ll figure it out,” I snapped, grabbing after the book and holding it to my chest.

“Fine,” he said, obviously shocked at my behavior. “You don’t have to be a jerk about it,” he huffed. “Just don’t lose it.”

I agreed, trying desperately to reach for that spot between my shoulder blades after shoving the Diabolis into my backpack.

The Diabolis Ordo, without so much as a word beyond the title being translated, began changing my world. In the beginning it was subtle; I was much more irritable and paranoid, although most of my antics could be blamed on predictable adolescent behavior. The usual things occurred: my grades began to suffer and I withdrew, even from Elliot. Touching the book had a profound effect on my mind; I would suddenly be catapulted into scenes of distress, although I could not tell who was in distress or why. My heart would thud and I would perspire until I could not move or breath. Once the Diabolis Ordo slipped from my fingers my mind and body stabilized once again.

The mole on my back began to get larger. It took some time for me to notice it, but when it did the evidence was undeniable. To most, this would be a reason to get a physician’s opinion, but that felt impossible. I did not want to alarm my parents, not only because my own strange behavior was noticeable, but also because they had plunged into strange behaviors of their own.

Dad was lost in his own sullenness and paranoia. He had always held the eccentricities of a scientist, but his new attitude bordered on the delusional.

“I absolutely forbid anyone in this house to go out alone after dark,” he said one night as Mom headed towards the front door.

“Are you talking to me?” Mom asked, incredulously. It was obvious she had never been forbidden to do anything.

The windows at both our home and Young’s main building were fitted with new locks, and Dad insisted on using our security system at the house, a new practice. Any innocent moment of surprise would make him jump out of his skin.

“Don’t do that!” he would say crossly before hurrying from the room.

Four days into my possession of the Diabolis Ordo it disappeared. I did not consider it misplaced; I knew where I had left it. It vanished. Despite this, I began looking in all the rudimentary places I knew it had not been, but felt compelled to look anyway.

“Have you seen an old, brown book?” I asked Mom every time she was in view.

“For heaven’s sake, David…no,” she would reply. “How many times are you going to ask?”

I did not dare ask Dad; my greatest fear was that it would show up in his laboratory. His attitude was sharp, and although he may have ignored my rare displays of aggression at school, he would not have tolerated any of Elliot’s hocus pocus. Dad was in the business of fact, not fiction.

Confused by the level of inexplicable tension in the house, Mom felt it would be best to expose Dad and I to the social experiment of dinner guests in the forms of John and Stacy Brummel and their daughter, Michelle. Perhaps, she mentioned more than once, we would benefit from the exposure to a normal family.

It was the first night I would witness the connection between myself and the book, and also my first glimpse of the secrets hidden within the walls of my home.

“John…Stacy! It’s been so long!” Mom said as soon as the Brummels arrived.

John and Stacy Brummel were, if nothing else, normal. Mr. Brummel had an unremarkable mustache, ordinary glasses, and a perfectly mediocre hat to cover his balding head. Mrs. Brummel was a great addition to blandness, a pale big-eyed woman that had the habit of talking so fast she repeated the ends of her sentences to stomp out any confusion by the listener.

Michelle, in contrast, was extraordinarily beautiful. Her hair shown in the light as if made of liquid gold, the truest color hidden between strands of copper, red, and blonde. Her eyes were the color of emeralds and were set deep on a face that made any observer an admirer. If there is anything as maddeningly gorgeous as Michelle Brummel entering my universe for the first time, I have certainly never laid eyes on it.

“Michelle!” Mom beamed as she always did when there was company in the house. “I haven’t seen you since you were a little bitty thing. They sure grow up don’t they?” She pushed me in Michelle’s direction. “David…you don’t remember Michelle, do you? You used to play together as babies.”

I was devoid of speech or understanding, and shifted nervously from one foot to another.

“Let’s all have a seat…dinner is already served,” Mom chimed. She ushered us into the dining room, and I noticed immediately that Michelle was wearing her Saint Catherine uniform, an obvious dig at my frivolous father who had allowed his only son to waste away in the barbaric land of public school. With silent cues from Mom, Mr. Brummel wasted no time broaching the subject.

“So Harry,” he began, wiping the sweat from his bald head, “I heard about David’s little accident.”

Dad gave Mom a sinister look before responding. “Yes…it seems there was some commotion there at the school.”

“Well…I see no reason why David should be subjected to that sort of treatment when it is a simple matter to enroll him somewhere…decent,” Mr. Brummel said, sighing and shaking his head in mock disgust.

Michelle rolled her lovely eyes and gave me a luminous smile, which I returned in spades.

“Scott graduated in the top ten percent of his class…the top ten percent…and is already into his first courses at the University…the University,” Mrs. Brummel said, falling into the dangerous conversation. “I’m sure it was the Academy that did it for him…the Academy. We’re so proud. Proud, proud. Proud!”

Michelle’s fine hair began to fall from the intricate knot she had configured, and the loose strands had descended like fairy dust onto her shoulders. I wondered how they felt. Her shoulders…her hair. Both her shoulders and her hair. Suddenly she spoke.

“I’m in the ballet program. We practice at your school—Latchley—in the evenings because our gym is being remodeled.” A ballerina. Even her voice was beautiful.

“They have an excellent pre-business program at the Academy,” Mr. Brummel continued. “I’m sure that would be beneficial if you want him to take over someday. There are many different programs that would be wonderful for David…” he gave me a derogatory glance over his glasses, “…maybe even vital.”

Dad, who had borne all of the indirect jabs without so much as looking up from his plate, was suddenly at full attention. He resolutely put down his fork.

“What…exactly…do you mean by vital?” he said quietly.

There were many people, mostly outsiders, who believed Harry Young was a pushover. His actions continuously disproved it, but his good nature, his ability to laugh in the face of a crisis made some doubt his will. Having a fiery wife did not help, but Mom and I both knew better. Dad’s temper, once aroused, was atrocious and final with those who overstepped their boundaries.

“Who wants some apple pie?” Mom interjected, suddenly aware that her planned evening of persuasion was taking a turn for the worse. “Still warm from the oven!”

Mrs. Brummel, Michelle and I all responded at once in a cheerful burst. The two men seemed too preoccupied to notice. Mom did not move a muscle; no one was getting any pie.

“Well…Harry…” Mr. Brummel chuckled. “It’s obvious the poor boy can’t handle the rigors of public school. Look at him,” he said, pointing to my fading bruises. “He’s just not cut out for that kind of world. Perhaps it would be better if you enrolled him somewhere…safer.”

The sound of shattering glass came from the basement. There was no conversation for several, long moments of confusion, and then the light above the dinner table blew out with an electric snap, leaving us all in darkness.

“What…” Mr. Brummel began.

“I want everyone under the table now! Right now!” Dad said in a tone that warranted obedience from all parties, even a sputtering Mr. Brummel. “No one moves or says a word.”

In most circumstances I would have been thrilled to sit so close to Michelle—under a table no less—but images of our impending doom was singular in my mind. In the back of my psyche I was certain that Elliot and I, in entertaining the notions of an evil book, had brought forth some kind of demon straight to the source of its inspiration.

The noises I began to hear through the floor only confirmed the nightmare my imagination created; animal like grunts filled the air, along with several loud crashes. We all watched Dad’s legs as he walked slowly around the table and then to the cabinet where he kept his rifle. We heard him load and lock the sliding pump. His legs moved out of sight in the direction of the basement door.

The floor beneath us suddenly vibrated with violent force, as if someone—or something—was pounding on the basement ceiling. There was another roar.

“What the hell is that?” Mr. Brummel half-whispered to his wife. “I told you this was a bad…”

“Shhhh!” Mom hushed. The sounds downstairs became more damning, and the terror on Mom’s face unfolded and bloomed, helpless. Dad’s voice rang out before the walls shook with more growls, and then several shots. In the following silence, Mom shouted Dad’s name in a litany of fear and agony until he shouted back.

“It’s okay,” he finally bellowed from below. “They’re gone!”

“Let’s get the hell out of here!” Mr. Brummel grumbled, dragging his family from underneath the table.

As I rose I noticed an object lying beneath me. I felt for it in the dark—it was a black medallion of stretched leather. I stuffed it into my pocket and stood.

Dad appeared from around the corner with a flashlight in one hand and the rifle over his shoulder. “Sorry, but I have to ask you to stay,” he told our guests. Mom hugged him and held on. “We’ll have to call the police. They’ll want a statement from all of us.”

The intruders had escaped.

After the routine chaos that follows the inexplicable, and long after the Brummels had gone, I watched from the basement steps as Dad walked around his laboratory staring pensively at the damage. For the first time in my life I was able to see lines of worry on his brow. I had thought him invincible. Reality was another thing entirely.

“Where’s your mother?” he said without looking at me. He had seemed unaware of my presence.

I ignored his question. “Dad…do you know what they wanted?” I asked instead. “Were they after anything you know of?”

He hesitated so long I began to doubt he would answer.

“No,” he finally said. He turned towards me. His face was ashen and etched with something akin to fear. “Don’t worry about any of this, okay? Just focus on school…I’ll handle this.”

Through the broken window panes, I could feel the cold autumn air rushing in, sucking out the heat and taking with it the lulling comfort of my innocence.

Soon after I began to work; each weekday at five o’clock I went to the Young Pharmaceuticals building, a large, white, sprawling structure on the east end of town. For three hours I jitneyed messages between the offices and the labs, straining my ears to hear the latest in scientific breakthroughs. Balancing out the turmoil at home and school, Young supplied me with the feeling that I belonged. I walked through the gray, florescent lit hallways, talking to important people who had much better things to do than speak with me, and I knew this was a place that would tolerate me without exception. It would have been easy to fall into a pattern of self-destruction. Instead, I rode home with Dad every night felling a sense of stability I could not achieve at school or home.

I did not think about or notice the black medallion had disappeared as quickly as it came, as the Diabolis Ordo had returned, and I put all of my efforts into translation. Two days later I read the lines I translated from the first page to Elliot.

Within this book lie the devouring hands

It is written the way of those who decide

Where the dark and piteous become

With he, known as the one of light…