Devil Entendre Read online

  The sanatorium is a city in miniature—replete with crumbling incinerator, overgrown shipping and receiving, shattered laundry facility, wild greenhouse and mansion—all circling the massive hospital complex. The sound of traffic and people at work do not penetrate the barrier of undergrowth and outbuildings, and Marquel finds something calming about nature gradually reclaiming the pavement. There are no ghosts summoned to mind by these shadows, only the thirst for knowledge seeding in the observer a desire to plunge into the darkness.

  Bits of brick and roofing strewn about the exterior leave Marquel amazed that neither he nor the doctor are killed by falling masonry on their tour of the facility. There are no indications of trespass or habitation such as empty bottles, used condoms, or food wrappers. The accumulation of deteriorated ceiling tile scattered on the floor dispels any notions that trash is cleared from these buildings. All evidence suggests people only venture here on a dare, and even the homeless cannot be compelled to take shelter within these walls.

  Now that they are inside the hospital proper, in the “special room,” Marquel fidgets, paces back and forth. “Did you like the picnic?” Lizbeth asks him.

  “Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”

  Entering a new room, Lizbeth turns on rows of work lights. The room is spacious, possibly a cafeteria or some other multipurpose area. Unlike the rest of the building this chamber has been repainted stone gray at some point within the last twenty years.

  Marquel looks her in the eye. “This isn’t where you told them you’d take me, is it?”

  “No. It’s okay, don’t worry. I did it to keep you safe.”

  “Safe from what?”

  “There are evil influences,” Lizbeth says. “Some of them could be in your family. I don’t know them and can’t say for sure they all check out, or everyone working with them, or everyone working for them.”

  “My tummy hurts. I don’t want to do this anymore.”

  “There’s a worldwide network of Satan worshipers, Marquel, hunting day and night for young boys like you to use for…well, they have lots of uses for boys and girls, don’t they?”

  “I don’t know. I said my tummy hurts.”

  Lizbeth places a hand on his shoulder, feels the tense muscle relax at her touch. “That’s because this is the place, isn’t it?”

  “The…place.”

  “Yes, the place.”

  Marquel contemplates this for long moments. “I don’t get it.”

  “It took a lot of effort, but I was able to track down the epicenter of Satanic activity in our region. It’s here. This building. This is where they hurt you. The Satanists. Correct? It’s okay now, it’s safe. None of them are here, and none of them are coming. No one is.”

  Marquel takes a look around. All the exits are bolted, chained, and padlocked. “Nope. Don’t look like nobody’s getting in or out or anything.”

  “Exactly! So. Feel free. Free to say anything that comes to you. There’s food over here, at that table? Right over here. And I’ve got a comfy room for you to stay in. We can take as long as you need.”

  He explores this well-kept portion of the sanatorium. “So this is where grown-ups hurt kids.”

  “Your class took a field trip here, when you were supposed to be at camp the week before winter break.”

  “We went to camp Glenkirk.”

  “That’s exactly what they wanted you to tell people. It’s not your fault. You understand that, right? They did things to make you say that.”

  The sound of animals interrupts them: a growl, several growls, all close by. In the building. At the far end of the room, under a tarp. Marquel positions himself so that Lizbeth stands between him and the source of the noise. “What is that?!”

  “Don’t worry,” she says, turning to him. “They’re just here to help us. Anyway, nothing’s more terrifying than Satan, and that’s what we’re up against today. I want to hear you say that name.”

  “Why?”

  “Say his name.”

  “Can I have some candy if I say it?”

  “No.”

  “You don’t have M&Ms?”

  “I do, but they’re not some kind of reward for jumping through hoops. The reward is the salvation of your eternal soul and the punishment of the people hurting you and all the other boys and girls.”

  Marquel sighs, looks at his feet. “Satan.”

  Lizbeth smiles. “That’s good. Now say it again, but this time really find yourself. Breathe in nice and deep and just let it all out.”

  “Satan.”

  “Again!”

  “Satan!”

  Something paces nervously, click-clacking its nails along the floor of its cage. It pants. Marquel is too distracted by the sounds to notice Lizbeth has even gone until she returns carrying a medical bag.

  “Grown-ups can be scary, taking you to awful places and telling you horrible things and making you commit the worst possible acts. I understand that. But we’re Christians, you and me, right? And Isaiah 65:16 tells us we serve the God of truth. That means we will use the truth to get victory over the forces of darkness. From now on there can only be truth between us. Okay?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “I felt like you were holding back just now. As though you had trouble speaking the name of the Archfiend.”

  “Well…” he begins, hesitant.

  “You were rebirthed by the Satanists, weren’t you?”

  “I don’t even know what you’re talking about anymore, lady.”

  “The Satanists have infiltrated every level of international government, every organization you can think of. There is nowhere else for you to turn other than me. I’m going to ask you again—”

  “I already told you!”

  She unzips her bag and produces from it a metal device roughly the size of a hand. It is constructed of smooth steel, rounded along its entire length, with one side bulbous and the other tapered. Attached to the tapered end is a handle not unlike those built into corkscrews.

  Marquel makes a face. “What the heck is that thing?”

  “It’s called the pear of anguish. It was used during something called the Inquisition. Did you ever learn about the Inquisition in school?”

  He pauses before replying. “No.”

  “Brave men fought against the influence of Satan hundreds of years ago. There was a vicious battle, and mankind had to use every tool at its disposal. That meant using things such as this to hurt people.”

  “Hurt people? How?”

  She twists the handle again and again, slowly forcing the device to blossom in three separate metallic petals. “First you put it in somebody’s mouth, or in another part of their body like their behind. You can open it just a little to hurt them, or you can rip them apart by opening it all the way.”

  The boy recoils, massages his face and eyes. “Why would anybody do that? Why are you telling me all this?”

  “Satan has strong influence over certain individuals, if they’re willing to walk the left-hand path with him. Sometimes pain is stronger than Satan, and you have to hurt people to help them. To help them tell the truth and shame the Devil.”

  Marquel lowers his eyes, then sits in quiet contemplation for long minutes. “I don’t understand.”

  “You will.”

  Lizbeth enters the small, windowless room, and Marquel retracts from the sudden influx of light, crossing his hands over his eyes. The shackles on his wrists and ankles make movement difficult. Although it has only been less than a week he already has difficulty filling out his tattered, stained clothes. Lizbeth makes a note to allow him more food today.

  She observes the pallor of his complexion, the peeling skin of his lips, and the pungent stench of his soiled undergarments competing with that of rancid animal bloo
d. She does not smile when noticing the trembling of his lips, uncontrollable convulsing of his cheek muscles, chattering of his teeth, fluids escaping from his eyes and nose.

  Or the blood on the mattress.

  Lizbeth pops some chocolates in her mouth, takes her time chewing them as Marquel watches her watching him. “Why don’t you tell me about the rebirthing. You’re ready to talk now? Tell me how it happened. Start with what it was like inside. Was it dark? How did it smell? Could you even breathe?”

  For long moments there is no sound. Marquel allows his hands to fall away from his face, then focuses his gaze on her feet. “I was trapped in a sticky place,” he begins. The constant hitching of his chest interrupts every syllable, but he forces himself through the words. “It didn’t smell like anything I ever smelled before, and it was so strong even if I held my nose I could still smell it. I puked all over myself. I started trying to push and kick out and move all around and it stopped being so dark because the meat was ripping open and when I got some fingers out somebody grabbed my hand. They helped pull me through.”

  “Through what?”

  “It was like a dead cow or something. A horse or a pig. I don’t know.”

  “Then what?”

  “I fell out in a cage. I wasn’t alone in there. The door was closed and whoever helped me wasn’t around anymore. But there was a wolf kind of close, or a big dog, or I don’t know what. And there was another one all the way in the other corner. And I think I was crying or yelling because I couldn’t hear nothing and then I jumped and bounced all around. Something was making me do that. It was like burning all over. I think it was electricity. Electricity in the cage. The wolves bounced all around too. They had white stuff coming out from their mouths. There was a buzzing sound and then it stopped, and we stopped bouncing. Just when I started feeling a little better the buzzing started again and I shook around. One of the wolves flipped over and bashed his head on the cage. All these teeth came out. Blood gushed out.”

  Lizbeth waits for him to embellish further, but he does not. Rubbing her hands together she asks, “And do you have a wolf personality now? Do you hear some part of you howling deep inside?” He shakes his head. “I can’t hear you. In court you have to answer with yes or no. Otherwise how can the judge put the bad guys in prison?”

  “I’m not a wolf. I’m a b-b-b-boy.”

  Her brow furrows as her eyebrows draw together. “Well, can you at least describe the people who did these things to you?”

  “It was you!”

  “Lies are ugly, Marquel. I told you God is a God of truth. God disdains ugly.” He does not reply. “If you’re going to take that attitude I suppose there’s nothing else I can do for you. Come with me.”

  She pulls on his shackles until he is forced to rise from the mattress. They leave the room; it is the first time he has been permitted out of that dark space for days. Despite his walking impediment she manages to lead him past the cage. One of the wolves whimpers as it lies in the corner with its face hidden. Its companion has perished, with spine and muscles horribly contorted, its tongue dried out to the point it has adhered to the cage and will have to be scraped off with a blade. The animal carcass Marquel was birthed from is too badly mauled and decayed to make out what it was originally. One fact clear to Marquel in observing the cage: the missing legs and head of the animal carcass are the work of humans, not the gnawing of wolves, as the cuts are too clean.

  Against the outer wall of the main chamber a crude alter has been constructed. Black candles have been lit, six of them. They are surrounded by sandalwood incense. The fragrance is deep and hypnotic, and Marquel becomes visibly less agitated. Scrawled in something that looks like drying blood there is a stylized X on the wall, with three of its quadrants occupied by what appear to be three phases of the moon, and in the fourth quadrant a German cross. Below is the word Abraxas.

  “It’s estimated the Satanists kill between twenty and forty thousand people every year in this nation. Children, mostly, used in ritual sacrifices. You were one of the lucky ones who got to walk away.”

  Lizbeth removes the cloth from the alter. Beneath it is something that at first appears to be a toy of some sort, or a morbid decoration or perhaps even a movie prop. The object’s coloration is all wrong, taken from a palette of blues and purples, and its skin is waxen.

  Marquel crinkles his nose. “What is that?”

  “It belonged to a couple I just had deported. It was supposed to be alive so this would all be exactly right; we’re trying to accurately trigger your memories here. I guess the kid had some medical issues or something.”

  Weakness in Marquel’s thighs overpowers him and he slouches forward suddenly, threatening to topple. For a moment he is close enough to take in the dead infant’s stench.

  “Oh God!” he cries. “Oh God help me, help, sweet Lord Jesus help me…somebody help me!” He continues in a tirade obscured by its mucous-drenched nature, punctuated by similar pleas to the Almighty.

  “Only you can help yourself now,” Lizbeth says. “Only you can release yourself from this hell you’ve created. Prove to God you are worthy of His love and forgiveness. Pick up the knife.”

  “Why?!”

  “You are damaged, permanently damaged. The only thing that can help is to unlock the memories of what the Satanists did to you. They made you cut open an infant and eat its heart, didn’t they?”

  “No! No they didn’t!”

  “Know your scripture, Marquel? How about 2 Thessalonians 5:21-22, when Paul tells us we need to test everything and only keep what turns out to be good. You’re being tested now. Are you a good boy, or a bad boy?”

  Marquel tries to run, but Lizbeth stabs her foot down onto the shackles around his ankles. After careening into the floor he writhes in silent agony for over a minute, clutching his arm. Eventually he straightens it, dispelling thoughts that it might be broken. She hauls him upright.

  “Powerful forces exist in our world and the next, forces we’re powerless against. You understand me? There is nothing we can do to stop them! The world, our world, it is filled to bursting with evil, pure evil.”

  “No!”

  “Accept that, Marquel. All we can do is try to stop the pawns of Satan, and try not to become one of his pawns ourselves. Why are you a pawn of Satan?”

  “I’m not! I’m not!”

  “You are helping him right this very instant. You’re blocking the light of righteousness trying to shine on the evildoers, trying to expose them.”

  “I’m not!”

  “When you start helping Satan you stop being a victim. That makes you a fair target for retribution.”

  “Stop saying that!” Marquel sobs. “I’m not!”

  “Do you understand when I say retribution? I’m talking your final judgment.”

  “Hurting some baby isn’t what good people do!”

  “You can’t hurt what’s dead.”

  “You’re the one who should be dead!” He snatches the knife, holds it wavering before him. “You’re the one I’m gonna stab!”

  “Job 19:29 says ‘you should fear the sword yourselves; for wrath will bring punishment by the sword, and then you will know that there is judgment.’ See? You’re going to face your judgment one way or another.”

  The boy stares long and hard at the blade. Slowly the tip turns in toward his own belly.

  “I can summon demons, Marquel. I know how.”

  “Oh God!” He almost drops the knife.

  “I’ll summon one right now.”

  “Please…I just…what…”

  “I got the information from Satanists who were my guests. Right where you are. Only, they didn’t get to leave. You want to leave, don’t you?”

  “Yes. Yes, please.”

  “Good! So do I. That’s
great news. This will be so easy then, if that’s what you want.”

  “There’s some other way?”

  “No. The way is still the same.”

  “No!”

  “So you really do want me to summon a demon more than you want to go home.” The boy loses his ability to withhold the wails any longer, succumbing to fear and anger and pain. Lizbeth waits patiently until the noise diminishes enough that she is sure he will hear her next words. “Okay, I won’t summon a demon. I don’t have to. The demon is already here with us.”

  Something shifts in the darkness. When it moves a second time Marquel discerns a humanoid outline. Whatever it is stands larger than a man, with dark hair, pale skin, and wide, unblinking eyes. The red bars behind it shift organically; they are stripes on its wings.

  “If you don’t put that knife into the baby’s chest you are choosing to put it in the chest of Jesus Christ Himself. Why are you trying to kill our Lord and Savior?”

  Without a scream Marquel plunges the knife into inert flesh. The sounds that escape when he releases his breath are those of a confused animal. He unclenches his eyelids, his gaze wandering to Lizbeth.

  “Very good. Does it remind you of anything? Can you feel it now? Do you see them doing all this with you before?”

  He shakes his head in the negative.

  “Then do it again.”

  Although hundreds turned out for the arrests and arraignment, only a handful witness the quiet moments after the media storm moves along. With Marquel under heavy if not permanent sedation at a mental health facility, his parents fighting charges of child endangerment, abuse, and so forth—and even the extended family under suspicion—the fate of Marquel’s younger sister Sondra is undecided.

  That is, until Lizbeth offers to function as the child’s ward. Who is better qualified than she? After all, they will need extensive one-on-one time after her brother’s revelations…Black Mass, human sacrifice, cannibalism, demons summoned to prey on the living, and other horrors too lurid for newsprint, but not too appalling for the Internet.