Brent circled the parking lot a third time. He was going to be late now, but there was nothing that he could do about it. He refused to get another ticket.
Parking Nazis. That’s what everybody on campus called those who funded the college’s coffers by way of little yellow pieces of paper slipped under windshield wipers. Faced with being late yet again, he was beginning to agree. Why couldn’t he have gotten a pass for a lot that was closer to his classes? The question often asked and never answered.
He peered down each row of cars praying for someone to leave. Wait, was that movement? He backed his car up just a few feet to see better down the parking aisle. Yes!
Giving the steering wheel a hard turn to the left, he pulled down the narrow lane. Backing lights lit up as a car began pulling out of its spot.
Brent parked his car, a blue 1985 Pontiac Grand Am and, upon exiting, threw his black book bag over his shoulder and ran toward the campus quad area to get to Hallis Hall.
It was a warm day. He’d misjudged the temperature again, and the sweatshirt he was wearing was starting to live up to its name. Sweat began to trail down his back, causing the t-shirt underneath to stick to his skin. He ignored it.
Summit State College was a small liberal arts school located about an hour away from Millsville. Brent had battled back and forth in his mind about staying on campus for the semester. He’d opted for the long commute rather than missing out on his mom’s home cooking. Besides, it also got him out of the party-oriented dorms. He’d been required to spend his freshman year in the dormitories, but despite the benefit of not having to drive to class, he couldn’t tolerate the din that was so pervasive in dorm life.
Now approaching the end of his junior year, he was beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. One more year. Only one more year, Brent consoled himself.
He reached Hallis Hall and approached the closed door of his classroom in the hallway of the second floor. Brent paused before pulling the door open. He knew what was coming and gave a slight shake of his head.
Opening the door, he was greeted with the friendly, albeit sarcastic, voice of his professor.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Lawton! Nice of you to join us,” voiced Professor Bauer.
Brent took his embarrassment in stride. It wasn’t the first time, and probably wouldn’t be the last.
“Sorry, Professor.”
“Have a seat, Mr. Lawton. You’re still first on the agenda. Get prepared. You had better dazzle me.”
A chorus of laughs rolled through the class of thirty-plus students. Brent took a seat near the back of the classroom, put his bag on the floor, opened it, and grabbed his outline. He was to present his argument that the U.S. Constitution was not a living, breathing document, but rather one that said what it meant and meant what it said.
With the maturing of his Christian walk, he’d come to see the wisdom of America’s founding fathers. They had created a nation based on unyielding truths, to which the majority of them held dear; chief among them, that the Bible was indispensable for proper governance of the new nation, a belief that Brent also shared.
That belief had become the source of ridicule by many, from his classmates in high school to his dad, who still refused to take his faith seriously. He’d been faced many times with the argument that the Bible was out of date and that God wouldn’t confine people living today with such archaic rules as no sex outside of marriage. The liberal mindset had tried to take the truth out of the Bible and replace it with pure grace—no consequences for one’s actions.
He had found that the same thing happened all the time in politics.
Brent’s fascination with political debate was tied to his love for God’s Word. If the U.S. started as a God-fearing nation founded by godly men—men who wanted the nation to remain that way—then what had happened to allow such ungodly laws to reshape the country?
To figure out the answer—or maybe to inject one—he had decided to take on a double major in college. Initially it had been just one: English. But in his freshman year he had taken an American Government class that made him both angry and determined to speak openly to a classroom full of listening ears. He was rewarded by his instructor with the opportunity to speak his opinions freely. Very unexpected.
He found that he enjoyed debate and that he could do it passionately and with well-put-together, cogent arguments. He didn’t always win—in some people’s opinions—but he had a voice that was getting heard.
Now he would present an argument showing that the same watering down that was happening to the teachings of the Bible was happening to the Constitution of the United States.
“Mr. Lawton.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Dazzle.”
1:25 P.M.
TARA BAKER LEFT her dorm room, walked down the hallway, and entered the elevator that would carry her down five stories to the lobby below. She pressed “L” and watched the door close before her. She stared passively as the numbers changed, indicating each floor. With a soft ‘ding’ the doors opened and she walked out.
She paid no attention to the people mingling in the lobby as she proceeded to the glass doors to exit the dormitory. Pushing the doors open, she felt the heat of the unusually warm day envelop her. Confronted by the daylight, she pulled down the brim of her hat to block out as much of the sunlight as possible.
She hated the day.
Once upon a time, though, she would have jumped at the chance to be outside amongst the blue sky, the flowers, the trees. It seemed a lifetime ago. Now she enjoyed the darkness.
Thinking about it now, she corrected herself. She didn’t really enjoy the darkness. The darkness was more … comfortable. More known. It was where she belonged, where she could concentrate, where she could cultivate her powers.
Walking briskly, her long, strawberry-blonde hair trailing in the breeze, she entered the quad area. She needed food. Not having enough time before her next class to find a healthy alternative meant that she had to ingest more greasy fast food. She hated that, too.
She walked up the steps to the student union and plowed through a crowd of people with barely a notice. She even took a little pleasure in throwing a slight elbow into the ribs of an obvious goodie-two-shoes academic. The looks of surprise on his face, and that of his prissy-looking friend, were sure to have been priceless. She opened the door and exited the sunlight.
1:31 P.M.
“OUCH!” BRENT KEPT his voice down, but conveyed his annoyance toward the girl in black who rushed past him and into the student union. “Did you see that?”
Marta Rosales, a friend and classmate of Brent, dropped her mouth open as she, too, viewed the audacity of the girl. “Not even a word of apology! You all right?”
“Yeah,” he said with a smirk, “I’m okay. Trust me; I’m no stranger to being elbowed.”
“Oh, that’s right. Basketball.”
“Yep. No biggie.” He turned back to fully face Marta, her olive skin and long, thick, almost-black hair dropping below her shoulders. The two of them had met freshman year at an off-campus Christian event and quickly became friends, though periodically he had wondered if more than a friendship could evolve. Lately, though, the idea faded from his thoughts, regardless of how attractive she was. “You were saying?”
“I was saying,” she began again, her faint Guatemalan accent paving the way, “that I wouldn’t have thought to draw a parallel between how the Bible is being ‘modernized’ and taken out of context by atheists and anti-Christian religious sects, and how the same thing is happening to the U.S. Constitution.”
“It’s a beautiful world, isn’t it?” joked Brent, shaking his head. “Christians, and conservatives in general, are losing strategic ground to the demonic realm—the Enemy—in the name of tolerance. We’re supposed to ‘tolerate’ shacking up, same-sex lifestyles, and abortion. We’re supposed to tolerate atheistic attacks on our beliefs.” Brent motioned for Marta to follow him down the steps. “Well, I, for one, am sick of it, and I fully intend to let people know, especially other Christians, that we’ve got to stand our ground. There is nothing wrong with intolerance. We’ve been lied to! Intolerance is not anti-American. Intolerance is not anti-biblical, and intolerance is not mean...” He stopped and turned again to look Marta in the eyes. “…as long as there is either a constitutional or biblical mandate for the stand one takes and it’s done without hate.”
“I think that you gave a convincing argument in class today, Brent. I fully expected a revolt by half the class, but only that one guy … What’s his name?”
“Jim.”
“Yeah, Jim. He was the only one with the guts to go up against you. Though, I’m not sure I’d call it guts. Stupid, maybe.”
Brent laughed. “Well, at least he’s not wishy-washy in what he believes. He may not have been able to form a very good argument against mine, but he’s firm. Half the class believes, or believed, what he argued. It’s just that they were either scared or found that they—and their ideologies—don’t have very solid foundations.
“Marta, a Christian who knows the why behind what he or she believes is a dangerous human being, not to mention a danger, to the Enemy. A studied-up Christian can topple any argument mounted against him. It’s just a matter of choosing to know what the Word of God says and to learn the supporting evidence.”
Marta looked down. “You shame me.”
Brent paused, not knowing what to say. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…”
“No. Don’t you dare apologize. God chastises those He loves, right? I’ve just been chastised.” She looked back up into Brent’s eyes. “I’m learning that I need to change the way I handle things. I need to start turning back the darkness, too.”
Brent crossed his arms and stared into Marta’s eyes. “There’ll be forces that’ll come against you if you do.”
“Bring ‘em on!” she exclaimed with a wink and a smirk.
9:37 P.M.
TARA SAT IN her dorm room and brooded, one question perpetually playing on her mind. Why in hell am I here? She was nineteen years old, and had asked herself the same question every day for what seemed like years. Sometimes it was directed toward her involvement at the college. At other times it was directed at life in general; at life on this speck of cosmic dust hurtling through what seemed a cold, uninviting, and indifferent universe.
The low light and incense burning in the room—against dorm regulations—played on her emotions. The darkness may have been more comfortable for her, but it also had a tendency to usher in mild depression. Tonight was no exception, except that it was a bit more than mild this time.
She walked to the mirror above the sink in her room and stared. Eyeliner was starting to smudge around her right eye. She stared hard and long at the way she looked. Where had she gone? Tara Darlene Baker, the naïve, strawberry-blonde girl from Branson, Missouri, was nowhere to be found in the reflection.
Why in hell am I here? Where am I? Who am I?
She turned away from the mirror and walked to her window. Looking down at the courtyard, she could see that the lamps along the sidewalks had come on. The students below her were casually passing the evening by. Two guys laughed and pushed each other as they strode; a threesome of girls walked arm-in-arm. A guy sat with his arm around a girl on a bench underneath the huge oak tree in the center of the courtyard.
Without time to ward it off, a twinge of longing sprang up in her soul. What would it be like to be normal again? The question hung in her mind for a moment.
What?!
She pushed back from the window, hardly able to contain the rage that surged from her core. Like them?! I’ll die first! She paced back and forth in her small room. Irritation fueled her. Through clenched teeth she forced out, “To hell with them. To hell with all of them.”
Approaching the mirror again, she stared into her own eyes and seethed. “You are not one of them! You never will be. They are weak. You have power. Real power.” After a long moment, she decided on a course of action. “I think it’s time to tap into that power once again.”
She felt a tingle creep up her spine. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled. She hadn’t even summoned one of the dark ones yet, but she could already feel her spirit guide’s presence. She walked back to the window and picked out her target. It would be that pathetic lovey-dovey couple on the bench.
She knelt down before the small table in front of her window. Opening a drawer, she pulled out a rolled-up piece of black felt and spread it across the table to display her pentagram casting cloth. Two freshly-painted, concentric red circles looked like rings of blood at the center of the fabric. The center of the two circles contained a star—a pentagram—that touched the inner ring with all five points. Between the two circles and within the five points of the upside down star were symbols that very few people would recognize and, of which, even fewer could know the relevance. Next she pulled out four small black candles, set them outside the circles, creating a square, and lit them.
She was already beginning to feel the darkness swirl around her. This is what she knew. This is what she understood. This was her environment, and this is where she thrived.
She reached again into the drawer and pulled out a hag stone—her amulet. It was a stone that she found that had a naturally-made hole through it. Many people searched for decades for a hag stone, never to find one. The day she found hers, she knew it was a sign that she had received the blessings of the gods and goddesses. She also withdrew a chromed pentagram necklace and clasped the chain around her neck. It rested midway down her chest and reflected candlelight onto the walls. Lastly, she pulled out her personal grimoire1, her personal ‘book of shadows.’
She fingered through the book, looking for a nefarious spell to cast upon the young lovers, knowing that a dark one would enter into the room with her to take on the assignment and carry it out … if she could just find the right incantation.
A chill of fear coursed through her as she realized how close she came to a mortal mistake. She ran to her closet and pulled out another piece of black fabric and unrolled it on the floor in front of her small altar. On it were two more concentric circles of red, big enough to allow her to sit fully within their confines. Between the crimson rings were more magick symbols and the names of the spirits and gods she most often conjured.
How could she have forgotten her own protection? Several years ago she had remembered too late, and she had paid a price for it. A brutal price.
Before sitting, Tara looked at every inch of the circle to make sure that there were no breaks in it, breaks that, if penetrated all the way through, would create a hairline entryway from the outside into the protecting area. She centered herself in the blood-red circle, making sure that not a single part of her body or clothing lay outside its boundary. Grabbing her grimoire she turned a couple more pages before landing on the invocation she found suitable.
She laughed as she pictured the end result. Oh, she thought, this ought to be good. Real good.
Before beginning her spirit summons, she first spoke the spell of protection that was needed to create a barrier between her and whatever being came forth to answer the call.
“On this May night
By the dragon’s light
I call to thee
Give me your might.
I conjure thee
By the power of three
Protect all
That surrounds me.
So mote it be.
So mote it be!”
Comfortable with her environment, she looked down at the handwritten words in her book of shadows and spoke forth the words that would throw a fear-filled disruption into the lives of the young lovebirds sitting, oblivious, five stories below.
1 Go to Appendix B for a description of Tara’s items for ritual spellcasting