The Kingdom
Page 1
The Kingdom
Berkeley Blackfriars • Book One
J. R. Mabry
Apocryphile Press
1700 Shattuck Ave #81
Berkeley, CA 94709
www.apocryphilepress.com
© 2010 by J. R. Mabry. Revised and corrected edition 2018.
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN 978-1-944769-99-4
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Cover graphics by Milo at www.derangeddoctordesign.com
Contents
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Reviews
Other Books by J.R. Mabry
Dedication
Acknowledgements & Caveats
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
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Untitled
Prelude 1
Prelude 2
Prelude 3
Prelude 4
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To find out more about the Berkeley Blackfriar’s universe, download your free copy of The Berkeley Blackfriar’s Companion. Includes short stories set in the Blackfriars’ universe, photos of main characters, a complete glossary, a walking tour of the Blackfriars’ Berkeley, recipes from Brian’s kitchen, a short history of Old Catholicism, a Q & A session with author J.R. Mabry, links to music and videos associated with the books and more!
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Reviews
If you enjoy the Blackfriars books, please help other people find them by leaving an honest review on amazon or kobo or wherever you buy books. Thank you!
Other Books by J.R. Mabry
The Berkeley Blackfriars Series:
The Kingdom
The Power
The Glory
The Christmas at Bremmer’s Series:
What Child is This?
The Temple of All Worlds Series:
The Worship of Mystery
Dedication
This book is offered with gratitude
to the memory of
FRATER QUI SITIT VENIAT
“Under the Mercy”
Acknowledgements & Caveats
Grateful thanks to all of my friends who encouraged me in the writing of this novel. Special thanks are due to those who read the first draft carefully and made invaluable suggestions, especially B.J. West, Lola McCrary, Dan and Kathie McClellan, Ric Reed, Liza Lee Miller, Bill Armstrong, Kittredge Cherry, Audrey Lockwood, Lizzy Hull Barnes, Liz Stout, and others who prefer to remain anonymous. Thanks also to my editor Jason Whited for making the second edition sparkle. I wish to acknowledge my debt to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the best show in the history of TV), the novels of Charles Williams (oh, when will people discover him?), Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s Preacher, and James Blish’s The Devil’s Day (the demonic processions it depicts inspired the one in Chapter 65). Liturgical rites were adapted from the Roman Catholic Ritual for Exorcism, the Liturgy of the Liberal Catholic Church, and the UCC Book of Worship. To shield myself from possible litigation, I have changed the names of some institutions, especially in the Gourmet Ghetto neighborhood of Berkeley in which the friars live and work. Those familiar with the area will no doubt sort out what is what fairly easily.
For your face turns toward all faces
that gaze upon it.
Therefore, those who look upon you
with a loving face will find your face
looking on them with love…
Those who look upon you in hate
will similarly find your face hateful.
Those who gaze at you in joy
will find your face joyfully reflected back at them.
—Nicholas of Cusa
THURSDAY
Prologue
When the demon appeared, Randall Webber nearly jumped out of his skin. He was an experienced magickian, but the appearance of an infernal dignitary is never a commonplace event, and it shook him every time. He knew that if he stepped even momentarily outside the circle he had painstakingly burned onto his hardwood floor the demon would be at his throat, and in an instant would separate his soul from his body and devour it—or worse.
Webber mustered his courage and put on his best poker face. He was in control here, he told himself. He was the magickian. He called the shots. He commanded the hosts of Hell. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and upper lip and then put his hand in his back pocket to stop it from shaking.
The demon did not speak but appeared in the form of a dragon. It hovered as an image cast upon a small paper triangle about the size of Webber’s fist, set safely outside the circle on an end table. The dragon uncoiled its tail in slow motion, gold-flecked pupils staring straight into Webber’s own. Webber gulped and willed his voice not to waver as he spoke.
“Greetings, noble Articiphus, commander of many mighty hosts, Duke of Hell. I acknowledge thee and bid thee welcome. I command thee by the holy Tetragrammaton to assume thy human form and speak with me!”
So far, so good, Webber thought. He was still in one piece; the demon was still constrained within the folded paper triangle, and he thought he had just given a flawless performance of a man in command of himself. He fought the urge to run through his mental checklist to make sure he had not forgotten anything. One missing link and the whole house of cards would come tumbling down and he would be demon chow. He fought the urge. He had been careful, and if he ha
d missed anything it was too late now to do anything about it. Right now, he needed to focus.
The triangle shimmered, and a regal-looking gentleman hovered in it dressed in ermine and satin. One half of his face was serene, the other horribly scarred. A diadem sat upon his head, and his face bore a resentful scowl. Nobody likes to be told what to do, Randall thought, least of all a man of power—or a being of power. “Hail, Articiphus, Duke of—”
The demon interrupted him impatiently. “Cut the shit, Magickian. What do you want?”
Randall’s eyes widened. He pushed a lock of long brown hair out of his eyes and consciously straightened his perpetually stooped shoulders. He was expecting the typical exchange of ritual pleasantries, a ping-pong volley of testy manners conducted in Elizabethan English, but he had never summoned this particular spirit before. This one, apparently, had no time—or patience—for small talk. Very well, Randall thought, let’s just cut to the chase. “Is it true, noble Duke, that you have the power to remove souls and put them in other bodies?”
Whether the demon’s voice was audible or whether it merely resonated in his mind, Randall couldn’t tell. It had an odd quality about it as if Randall were wearing headphones. There was no resonance in the room, so it was hard to tell. He dismissed the thought as irrelevant and willed himself once more to focus. The words were clear, regardless of their source. The big question had just been asked. And for a demon in a hurry to be rid of this pest of a human, Articiphus was certainly taking his time replying.
The demon’s eyes narrowed, and he looked like he was trying to stare past the magickian. Randall stole a glance behind him, but there was nothing. Out the window he could see drizzle swirling around a streetlamp, forming wispy ghosts that, he prayed, were neither conscious nor malevolent. In this business, however, one could never be sure.
Randall shifted nervously, noting that the meat of his thigh seemed to have gone numb. He slapped it with the flat of his hand. “What say you, noble Duke?” he called, with a note of impatience.
“I. Can.” The demon let the two words drop like ice. He squinted at the magickian. “You want to share a body with another soul.” He spoke it as a statement, but a raised eyebrow indicated that it was more of a question of clarification.
“No. I want to trade bodies.”
Randall saw the demon nodding, understanding. “Man or woman?” he asked.
“Neither one,” Randall said. He forced all the air he could into his lungs, expanding them as far as they would go given the acrid sting of the incense that hung as thick in the air of the apartment as the fog outside. “The being I want to swap bodies with is…not human.”
The demon opened his mouth to speak but then closed it again, furrowing his brows instead.
“Oh yeah,” Randall added. “When I go, I need to take this with me.” And he held forth a purplish-green fruit.
“What are you going to do with an avocado?” asked the demon, now truly curious.
Suddenly, Webber was not nervous at all. He knew what he had to do, and he knew he had the means at hand to do it. He didn’t answer the demon but only smiled.
FRIDAY
1
Fr. Richard Kinney didn’t mind the rain. It was turning out to be Berkeley’s wettest winter in decades, but he smiled as he turned his nose to the sky, quietly relishing the tiny splashes on his nose and cheeks.
It was a cold midmorning, though, and he thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans as he walked. He cut through to Spruce Street and turned right at All Saints’ Episcopal.
He was a middle-aged friar habited in a black Anglican cassock, yet no one seemed to think his attire out of place—there were plenty of people in the vicinity of the Graduate Theological Union in religious dress. His hair was tonsured—a round bowl of skin poked through his already thinning hair on the very top of his head—and though his frame carried a few extra pounds, he carried them well.
The wind seemed to pick up when he reached busy Shattuck Avenue. So did the rain, and he suddenly wished he’d brought his hat. He didn’t dwell on it, though. The Old Catholic Order of Saint Raphael, of which he was the prior, had just finished a very successful series of exorcisms for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Oakland. Not only had they succeeded in banishing a whole host of demons from a Lafayette orphanage, but they had been well paid for their efforts. Good pay—or even adequate recognition—was a rarity in the exorcism business, and Richard gave himself permission to enjoy the success—for a little while at least. Beware undue pride, he reminded himself, but he smiled as he did it.
He felt relieved as he darted in the door of the Gallic Hotel’s café. The smell of coffee wafted over him like a pleasurable veil, and he paused to savor it, filling his lungs.
The line was unusually short, no doubt due to the weather, and he ordered a cappuccino. Passing his hands through the slits in his cassock, he unzipped his fanny pack and felt around for some change. He paid, and, picking up a discarded newspaper, he found a table and waited for Philip to arrive.
He liked Philip. They had met online about a year ago and had had an on-again-off-again relationship that was both promising and maddening in equal measure.
They seemed, at least to Richard, to be well matched. Philip was a seminary student, embarking on a second career as an Episcopal priest. They had a lot in common, and where Richard was an extroverted, charge-ahead kind of guy, Philip was quiet, reserved, and cautious. A little too cautious, Richard sometimes thought, but he also realized that Philip’s reserve provided a useful balance.
They were different in other ways, too. Richard was tall, standing a good six feet, with broad, though somewhat stooped shoulders, while Philip was a smaller man, five foot five, with delicate features that often looked pained when he was concentrating on something.
Philip appeared in the doorway, and Richard waved at him. Philip flashed a grimacing smile and sat down without ordering. “I can’t stay,” he said, brushing rain from his coat.
Richard had been expecting a kiss, and Philip’s brusque demeanor caught him off guard. “Hey, Baby. You look worried. What’s up?” He reached out and took Philip’s hand. Philip withdrew his hand from the table and sighed. “Dicky, we need to talk.”
As if mirroring the weather, dark clouds gathered on Richard’s interior horizon, and he didn’t like it at all. “That’s never a good thing to hear,” he said, almost as an aside. “What’s wrong?”
“How can I put this?” Philip softened a bit. He leaned forward and squeezed Richard’s hand. “You’re driving me crazy.”
“Innnn…a good way?” Richard asked hopefully. “Like crazy with lust, or an obsessive fascination with my winning personality?”
The levity didn’t help. Philip blew air through his cheeks and lowered his head. Richard took that moment to admire the full head of hair his lover sported. Some guys have all the luck, he thought. His thoughts returned to what seemed to be inevitably coming. Some guys that are not me.
“Dicky, for the past month you’ve been playing Batman and Robin, scurrying all over the Bay Area chasing bad guys and…doing your thing.”
“Yeah,” Richard said, realizing his parade, his success, was about to get rained on as well. “My thing. It’s what I do.”
“I know that. I’ve always known that. But in the past month, I’ve seen you exactly twice, and one of those times, I spent the whole evening trying to comfort you while you were having one of your inferiority attacks or whatever they are—insecurity, existential anxiety—whatever it was, it was all about you.”
“I–I’ve been busy,” Richard stammered. “We had a gig, a paying gig. And I had a rough spot. You were wonderful, you helped me through it. You gave me exactly what I needed—”
“Yeah, but at no time during this whole month did I get what I needed—and that’s the thing.” Philip raised his voice but then lowered it when he realized he was attracting the attention of other patrons. “I need this to work for me, too. And it isn’t.
I have crises too. I have times I need to be carried, and held, and…loved. And you’re never there when I need you. So, I’m done. We’ve had some lovely times, Dicky, but it’s over. I’m sorry. I really am, but I can’t continue like this.” He rose from the table and kissed Richard on the cheek. “I’ll miss you,” he said, and he was gone.
Richard sat frozen—activity went on in the coffee shop around him, but he did not notice. “Sweet Jesus,” he finally said out loud and then lowered his head to the table, a bit more quickly than he’d anticipated. His forehead smacked with unexpected force on the wood, and, in his present state, the sensation seemed appropriate, even pleasurable.