Magda: A Darkly Disturbing Occult Horror Trilogy - Book 3

by Sarah England

  So intense is the dark silence, it is as if he is alone, staring into flames that are slowly scorching his retinas.

  From deep within the forest a bell now tolls: a sonorous tone that resonates through the night with funereal sobriety; a fading echo that falls once more to silence.

  Clearly what the crowd have been waiting for is now imminent. They know what it is. He does not. Fear catches in his stomach.

  What the fuck’s coming?

  Several more minutes pass, with the collective presence finely and attentively attuned.

  Then he hears it. They all do. A low, ominous growl – something that sounds inhuman - possessing many voices - and which grips his insides in a terror such as he has never known. Desperately he tries to avert his eyes, to not see whatever horror is about to emerge from the blackness of those woods; while the crowd behind gasps, some with their hands clasped gleefully, excitedly.

  The growling becomes louder, emanating from every direction; a surround sound in conjunction with a gale force wind now thrashing its way through the forest, flattening branches and snuffing out the flames.

  His burning eyes stream. Impossible as it is to blink, he has the misfortune of being able to see someone, or something, begin to materialise from out of the smoke. And as it speeds into its diabolical existence, both pillars of flame re-ignite. Unable to look away, unable to not see - this is the image, which will forever haunt him, appearing in every nightmare, recurring dream and waking thought he will ever have from hereon in.

  Before them stands a man wearing a pointed black hood and robe, the shaded face one of such malignant loathing it makes him physically and mentally buck with revulsion – the impact so shocking he can barely comprehend it.

  What in hell’s name…?

  The man placates the crowd with long-fingered hands, a black-toothed grin cracking open a deformed skull much larger than that of a normal human being. There is something else horribly unnatural too – an overpowering smell of a wet dog. The jaw seems to jut out and sideways, his movements oddly jerky, as with a multi-throated roar he lunges for the long, silver sword lying on the altar.

  Raising it to the sky the demonic choir of voices roars, “In the name of Satan, ruler of the earth, I command the dark forces to bestow their gifts. Open up the gates of hell. Come forth from the abyss and grant us our indulgences. We have taken thy name rejoicing in fleshly life. Come forth and answer to your names… Baphomet… Mephistopheles…”

  With each demon named, the crowd echoes his commands; until finally every demon has been called and the thing on stage summons forth its henchmen, who stand by like executioners. The crowd now breaks out of its obedient reverence with fervent shrieks, as the next set of entertainment is brought forth. A wide-eyed drunk is being led in by scantily clad women dressed in leather bondage. Toothless, unkempt, and afflicted with a red, blotchy complexion, the guy, Toby assumes, is most likely a vagrant.

  The thing on stage is breathing so heavily its chest rattles like a bubbling sewer, drool running down reptilian skin to the thick, sprouting hair on its neck. With revulsion Toby notices the hand holding the sword resembles a long claw coated in thick dark fur – just as the hapless victim is flung in front of it.

  No, this wasn’t going to happen… it couldn’t…

  The menacing voice rises theatrically into the darkened sky. “Behold…the gates are open!”

  A gladiatorial roar goes up from the crowd.

  The sacrificial victim appears bemused, half-laughing as if he’s a star turn in a comedy, and then he looks up and sees the sword, the masked men either side of him, and at the same time as Toby - the cameras zooming in for a close-up. Realisation sweeps across his face. His entire body bucks and kicks as he squeals in the dirt like a stuck boar, his cries pitiful and painful to the soul.

  Vomit gags in Toby’s throat, the ropes lacerating his flesh as he fights to save the man. But there is nothing he can do. Absolutely nothing. As the man is tied and hoisted upside down by the ankles onto the large, wooden cross. As his throat is slit and his jugular spurts out pints of ruby-red blood that sprays out in a fountain. And the chosen few dart forwards to fill their cups, guzzling fresh arterial blood like greedy vampires, before holding aloft the dripping goblets, gashes of red seeping down their chins.

  “Joy to the flesh forever!”

  “Hail, Satan!”

  “And let the black slithering shapes of the underworld spew forth slime from hell and delight in this victim I have chosen.”

  Suddenly the focus switches to Toby. And the henchmen begin to walk towards him with slow, ceremonial purpose.

  Is it his turn now? Oh my God. Was this what Amy meant when she said it was all for him? He tries to pray, to think of the words…

  They pick him up by the elbows and haul him up the steps to face the vile thing on stage. “Dear God, please help me, Our Father who art–”

  It is impossible to avert his taped eyes from the creature’s hypnotic stare, and his prayer falters, failing in a brain that will no longer work. The cold metal of a sword is rammed into his hand and for the briefest moment his skin makes contact with those claws. An electric charge bolts into his heart. Then one of the executioners kicks him in the back and he stumbles forwards - eye-to-eye with the dead tramp.

  The man’s face still stares in bulbous-eyed terror at his unexpected fate.

  “Pierce his flesh and cut out his heart. You will start the feast. I command you.”

  The shaking starts in his knees and works its way up, racking his whole body. “I..I..can’t…”

  “Or we will cut out yours.”

  His raw, burning eyes focus miserably on the corpse, the stench of defaecation and fear overwhelming; cameras whirring in closer.

  “We will feast on flesh this night and then you are bound to us. Your mind will be opened to the power that awaits you beyond this life, beyond this universe. After which you will never leave the path of adversity – the greatest power ever known. Now, I command you in the name of Satan – cut out this man’s heart!”

  Someone shoves him in the back again; then another grips a hand over Toby’s on the sword, forcing it to pull back high into the air, before plunging it into the muscle and bone of another human being.

  Immediately the cry went up. “Hail, Satan!”

  “Cut out his heart. I command you.”

  The knife now hacks through the skin - gristle and bone splintering apart as it cleaves into the blood-soaked flesh.

  “Now eat.”

  The flesh shoved into his mouth is warm, chewy and sickening. It sticks in his teeth, lodges in his throat and oozes down his chin.

  “Swallow.”

  Retching, gasping and spitting out globules of human flesh, he is glad of the dark hood then rammed over his head - the rope being tied round his neck, a relief.

  “Now take him to the basement and get him ready.”

  ***

  Toby lay in the dark. He’d missed dinner. How could you eat when you’d been force-fed a human corpse? How could you watch television like you were normal, listen to music or read… or be interested in anything ever again?

  His mobile beeped. He stretched out to see who it was, surprised to see how many calls he’d missed in the last few hours. Maybe he’d slept? That was the thing, it was hard to know if he was dreaming, recalling reality, or making it all up.

  Scrolling down the list of missed calls, he frowned. There had been a sudden surge of activity as if his life had just been plugged back in. Becky. Noel. Callum. Sid Hall. Any number of his mates. Becky again. Noel. Urgent. Urgent. Urgent. He tossed it aside. Not that he could reply to any of them; that had been made abundantly clear.

  In the first few days following his arrest, he hadn’t quite understood that the world as he knew it was finished. But he did now. During those days in the basement he’d been assured there were eyes everywhere on the outside, but he would never know who or where they were. The police. The hospital. The cour
ts. The media. TV personalities. They looked after their own and he could be a part of it. That was his call. He could be a part of it or he could be dead.

  For now he would be allowed home to his parents on the clear understanding he would not be writing up any reports and would not be contacting anyone.

  He looked again at his mobile. At all the calls from Becky, Callum and Noel, and his heart reached out to them. These were the best people in the world yet he couldn’t speak to them or see them ever again. He had to let them go.

  The phone lit up and beeped once more but he ignored it, turning away onto his side.

  Later he would see it. Much later, in the quiet, blue-grey hours of dawn. That’s when he would read the single line that would propel him from suicidal depression into action.

  ‘ENJOYING THE RIDE?

  Sender: Ernest Scutts’.

  ***

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  October, 1583

  At three am Magda woke from a feverish sleep to find herself lying in a pool of moonlight on the hard oak floor. Shivering, she swallowed another dose of the pungent liquid she had concocted the previous evening. Both the ingredients and the knowledge had been instinctive; and now as she stood in front of the ornate mirror that hung over the fireplace, she knew without doubt she had been here before. These were not her eyes. Her body yes…but that was merely a vessel now for the power that would come - the power needed. Her fever raged, the pink spots on her cheeks burning a hot, bright fuchsia.

  “Show yourself, Witch. Come to me.”

  Her pupils were tiny, black pinpricks in the moonshine.

  “Come to me. I command you – come to me. I do not fear you.”

  The silence of the empty house seemed to mock her childish voice. She clenched her fists. “Show yourself! Show yourself!”

  Still there was nothing. Hushed whispers taunted her from the darkened corners of the room as moonlight moved across the window; and a peal of mocking laughter tinkled on the icy air.

  She’s going to die…she’s going to die…

  Glaring into the pits of her own eyes, she shouted, “Where are you?” This had to happen. It must. “Do not forsake me now!”

  Images flashed into her mind – of William coiling his fingers through the red curls of Lisbet’s hair, of Ambrose complacent by the warm fire…of praying to God with tears streaming down her face, but with no help and no response. He didn’t even exist. It was all a big joke. From deep within her a volcanic rage erupted. Picking up the glass vial she had just imbibed from, she broke it over the hearth, slashed her wrist and daubed the blood across the mirror. Then with her forefinger smeared in the name, ‘Lilith.’

  She stood back. Looking at the unknown name. Her lips flickered into a smile. Then the smile broadened. The words. She knew them now.

  They spewed from her mouth, “Ad ligandum eos pariter eos coram me…”

  Now… now she would come.

  “Ad ligandum eos pariter eos coram me…”

  Staring through the blood-smeared glass she kept her eyes focused. Her face had begun to change shape, another one sliding in. A slither of apprehension crept under her skin….She was coming… It was real. This would happen. Witchcraft…delicious, wonderful ancient witchcraft…This existed. Oh, those fools. This was all…everything…Without taking her eyes away for a second, the vision now began to alter by degrees…. lips twitching, pupils shifting shape, glittering now with an alien energy sparked with red and silver. Fear licked alongside the excitement.

  “Come to me, give me what I need. I see you now. Come to me.”

  Her stomach quivered, fingertips tingling.

  Then suddenly the pupils flooded to limpid pools, rippling outwards to swell the whole eye like black ink spreading over the surface of a well. A surge of power thumped into her heart, sending waves of pure hate charging through her veins.”

  “Who are you? What is your name?”

  As if in answer, a light breeze brushed the hair from her face, pulling her gaze from the mirror, before a violent shove threw her physical body aside.

  Slumping to the floor in a pile of sodden rags, Magda’s conscious mind was instantly erased. And another world began.

  The cottage door inched open to reveal a shaded garden crammed with foxgloves, hollyhocks and lavender. The feet beneath her were lifted from the ground, carrying her out of the door and down the path towards the oak trees at the far end; floating over the style and through the wood in a re-enactment of that evening’s steps.

  This time it was not, however, to the abundant garden at the abbey. This time she was to climb over the side of a stone wall into a cold chamber that echoed and swilled; the air dank and putrid. Lowered on a creaking winch by invisible hands, she watched the stones become increasingly dark, the surface slimy with moss, until the winch lurched to an abrupt halt and the small pail swung alarmingly into the side. Her long, gnarled fingers were working quickly now, knew what they were doing, blackened nails scrabbling at a crack just large enough for a small vial to be pushed inside; to where no living soul would ever find it.

  This is my will… this is my will… so mote it be.

  When the dream broke, it left her body twitching on the freezing floorboards; and her soul weighted down with a feeling of endless doom.

  She lay blinking in the ethereal dawn, aware in the deepest part of her that the thought was cast and the deed was done. The price though… Ah, the price…

  ***

  A sharp rap on the door roused her. Daylight. Deep blue light shone through the burnt crimson of the sparse leaves still clinging to branches; a blinding sun radiating through the forest.

  Magda pushed herself to kneeling position and stared at the door. It was shut and bolted. She tried to think. It must be late afternoon. Stretching out limbs rigid with cold she immediately felt at her forehead. It was cool. She lived.

  The rap on the door came again; insistent this time – the person on the other side clearly determined to get an answer.

  She frowned. Who could it be? No one had lived here for years and no one knew she was here. Had she been seen?

  Crawling on her hands and knees to the wall separating the living room from the kitchen, she peeped round the corner. A face was pressed to the kitchen window and her eyes widened in disbelief. Oh no - her mother.

  Another pounding on the door and a rattle at the bolt, “I knew it. Magda, I can see you. I know you’re there. There’s only you mad enough to stay here on your own at night. Magda, I have to speak to you – it’s for your own good and it’s urgent.”

  For a moment she sat motionless. Waiting. For what? For the voice inside her to tell her what to do? Nothing came. In the distance, the far distance, the sound of melancholy church bells pealed through the air, plunging the swelling feeling of doom inside her to greater depths. Her mother’s voice reached out to a girl she used to know - to a child who had once run home with a bowl full of plump blackberries, the juice smeared all over her face; then later, with the mouth-watering aroma of hot pastry wafting from the range, had sat at the kitchen table with her sister, pressing leaves - Cicely with her tongue out in concentration…laughing at her…

  “Magda! You have to know. Magda!”

  The door inside her snapped shut and a peevish sneer slid across her features. What did that infernal woman want?

  Hauling herself to her feet she lifted the bar across the door and faced the woman who had brought her up: the woman whose eyes used to shine whenever she looked at her; but who now reeled back in revulsion.

  “Oh my God.” She crossed herself.

  What the hell did she do that for? “What is it? Where did you expect me to go?”

  “Oh Magda, you look awful. I didn’t think that… I mean I thought you’d go to the next village and find work or–”

  Magda glared.

  “I heard you’d been seen in the woods… Look, there’s no time – you have to know – Lisbet Miller was found dead this morning and the
y’re coming for you. She’d been hiding in a wardrobe but they say her eyes were almost clean out of her skull with terror. They’re saying it was witchcraft – someone who took a handful of her hair; some of her nails had been pulled out too. Covered in scratches she was, like the beast himself had been at her. Magda, some say they saw you.”

  Magda laughed, about to shut the door.

  “No.” Her mother rammed it back against the wall. “Listen to me, you foolish girl, it’s important. There are things I didn’t tell you but you have to know, I see that now.”

  “You can’t help me. You have no power.”

  “You want to know who you are, don’t you? It would do you well to listen, my girl.” With an almighty shove the bigger woman muscled into the cottage kicking the door shut behind her. “I’m going to tell you now what happened here, to the witch who lived here all those years ago. You knew it was haunted here, you knew that? I didn’t think you’d do this…” Her gaze travelled to the oaks at the bottom of the garden. “They hanged her. The mob hanged her right there, Magda, and all she did was try to help folk with healing.”

  Lisbet was dead…

  “Magda, what’s wrong with your face?”

  Her hands felt at her features. “What do you mean?”

  Her mother’s eyes mirrored the horror of what she saw. “You seem to have aged, lost all your colour, your eyes are red raw, and you’ve got sores… It’s only been a few days and yet–”

  “Why do they say it’s me?”

  “Ambrose and William are telling folk this is witchcraft. The crops are blackened. Lily Moorcroft’s child fell from his crib and broke his neck after she walked along the river the other day. The cattle have fallen sick and now this. They’re saying it’s you – that you are the one who should have been the May Queen; and now the whole village has been cursed.”

  “And I’m supposed to have killed Lisbet? On what grounds? What evidence do they have?”