The Devil's Touch

And far away, in his nether region at the far north, Satan screamed his outrage.

'No! You dumb bitch. That is exactly what He wants. You're playing right into Balon's hands. You stupid fucking cunt. You useless daughter of a whore!'

Satan pointed his dark evil face to the heavens and screamed his fury at the Almighty, wrongly blaming Him for what was occurring on Earth.

But the Almighty had grown weary of Satan's tirades, and had blocked the Dark One from His ears.

But the warrior heard. And the mighty warrior could not conceal his victorious smile.

'Kick ass time,' the warrior muttered.

An old ragged piece of red silk, attached to the inside of the lid, flapped in the sudden rush of air following the opening of the crate's lid.

But the crate itself was empty.

When their hearts had settled down into a slower pulsing, and jangled nerves ceased ringing, Sam was the first to speak.

'What the hell? I know the knocking was coming from this empty crate.'

Noah shone the beam from his flashlight into the dark reaches of the crate. 'Not entirely empty,' he said. 'Put your light in here, Sam.'

The twin beams of light played off the interior of the crate, piercing the gloom, settling on the bottom of the huge rectangular box.

'It's a book of some sort,' Nydia said.

Noah rose to his tiptoes and reached into the crate, almost falling in. Sam grabbed the smaller man by the seat of his pants and hauled him back.

'It's a journal of some kind,' Noah said, carefully opening the old manuscript, bound in leather and worn leather strips. 'When was it written?' he muttered. 'Ah! Here it is—1666. Three sixes,' he said. 'How apropos.' He visibly paled when he saw the name of the author on the inside of the leather covering.

'What's wrong, Noah?' Nydia asked, looking at the man's sudden loss of composure.

'Samuel Balon,' the man said softly. 'Samuel Balon wrote this. He started the journal in France, in 1659.' He carefully turned the old pages. They were in remarkably good condition for a journal written more than three hundred years before. 'This entry was written in a place called Ville Marie.'

'Montreal,' Nydia said. 'Ville Marie was the original name of the city.'

'Listen to this,' Noah said. 'I think this might have some bearing on our predicament. Le cog s'oyt par fois es sabbats sonnat le retraicte aux Sorciers.'

'Translate it, please,' Sam said.

Father Le Moyne's voice startled them all. The priest stood in black, framed in light in the shattered doorway to the attic. He said, 'the cock crows; the Sabbat ends; the Sorcerers scatter and flee away.'

'But what message does it contain for us?' Noah threw the question to anyone who might have an answer.

'I think,' Sam said, 'that it goes along with what my father said. It's telling us to hold out until Sunday. If we can make it until then, we're safe.'

'But Sam,' Nydia said. 'I—what about the town? Even if we do make it—when we make it,' she amended that. 'All the dead people; the destruction, everything. What do we do? How do we explain it? Are we going to have to run again? Are we always going to be looking over our shoulder, living in fear?'

The young man was silent for a moment, very conscious of Father Le Moyne's eyes upon him. It was as if the priest could see something about him; knew something about him that Sam did not know.

'I can't answer that, Nydia. Maybe—maybe I— we—have been—picked for this job; maybe this is what we were put here to do. Wherever there is a coven, perhaps it's our job to seek it out, destroy it. I don't know. I hope with all my heart that is not the case, but if it is, then we have to obey. I think when this is over, here in Logandale, then we will know for sure. One way or the other.'

Her dark eyes searched his strong face. 'All right, Sam. If that is the case, where you go, I go.'

Father Le Moyne smiled. It was working out well. Michael was going to see his dream become reality. The mighty warrior would have a man on Earth to do His work.

But the heavens would roar when the Almighty discovered what His warrior had done. But, Le Moyne thought, the firmament has shook from the rage of God before—and probably would again.

Nydia tapped the journal Noah held. 'But who, or what, was this Samuel Balon?'

Father Le Moyne decided he could no longer hide the truth from the group. He could continue to hide his true identity for a while longer, but even that, in time, would have to be revealed.

'He was a priest,' Le Moyne said. He sighed. 'Close the crate and come downstairs. I'll tell you what I know about Father Balon.' Or what I am allowed to tell you, that is, he thought.

'Curiouser and curiouser,' Sam muttered.

FIVE

'Samuel was not the priest's name. His name was Yves. The Church gave him the name of Father Sam. From —what I have been able to gather through the years, Father Sam was a huge bear of a man, and rather a maverick as far as the Church was concerned. One of the reasons he was sent to the New World, I should imagine. I know all this because—well, let's just say I did a paper on the man in college.