BLACK HOST (PART 4)

The interior of the church didn’t transform into something preposterous as the three prepare for the mass; No image of a naked man with a goat for his head. No inverted cross or pentacle on the walls. Not even a host of black-clad devotees.

But upon replacing the white candles with black, the air suddenly shifts from beatific to ominous in a span of second after they lit them one by one. The fire seems to magnetize the heavy shadow in all corners; skirting at the edge of the altar and waiting for the unholy mass to start.

Eddie found his knees buckling and his heart racing like a stampede of a thousand stallion. It was nostalgic and terrifying at the same time as the first invocation he had done with Alejandro as they conjure the spirit of Bartzabel.

All the hairs on his body are tingling wildly and the blood on his veins froze and prick his flesh. But he can’t help but feel a slight bliss; an elevated feeling that he feels guilty about it now that he is wearing a priest robe.

“It’s alright Ed. Just let it flow…”Behind Eddie is Alejandro who will serve as his assistant to aid him all throughout the mass. What made Eddie nervous to death is unlike before, Alejandro is the one who leads their ceremony and rituals.

But now he is the one who is steering the wheel that leads them at the gates of hell.

As Alejandro rings the bell, Salome who is sitting at the front bench stands up and begins to make an inverted sign of the cross.

Eddie closes his eyes and starts breathing slowly and steadily. He imagines the pages of a notepad where Eddie’s message was written floats all over the air; the reversed liturgy of the Mass of St. Secaire that echoes damnable phrases starting from his thoughts and then to his tongue that begins to loosen up as he utters the words from the mouth of inferno within the holy house of the lord.

The more the mass drags on the more the shadow gathers and beside the altar like a cluster of malignant tentacles threatening to wrapped its gross tendrils around the cross. The chilling wind that softly raping the silence with its groan and moans seems to utter the response to the readings done by Alejandro that even Salome, despite being an arcane practitioner for many years, shudder in horror.

During the consecration of the Black Host and the water taken from a Well where a dead body of a child was buried, a murder of crows suddenly appears out of thin air; they glide and circle above Eddie like a crown of darkness for him.

“Doolb ym si shit rof shit knird. Ydob ym si shit rof shit tea.” Eddie spoke as if every syllable follows a certain intonation akin to a chant and not the monotone utterance of a priest during the most sacred part of the mass.

“Eddie…it’s time.” The hand of the corpse that Alejandro possessed tap the shoulder of Eddie as he put down the chalice and communion wafer. The priest gave only a quizzical look but he finally understands what Alejandro is talking about when slowly the altar server starts to undress in front of him.

The Mass of St. Secaire’s holiest part is about to begin where the priest becomes one with her lover as their body becomes the altar of the cursed wherein the energy from the coitus shall serve as the fuel for the death magic they will cast.

“Come on, this body I used can not hold much longer.” Alejandro urges as he signals Eddie to feed him one of the Black Host and take a sip from the chalice that contains the water fro the well.

Afterward, he takes the hand of the priest as he lay down at the top of the altar table. The sentient shadows are now grasping all the holy implement and statues; smearing it with impregnable darkness as they blind the eye of the holy providence to let the soul commence the climax of the mass.

“Sorry Ed, I know using a corpse for this might be beyond your fetish but--.”

Alejandro’s words were halted for Eddie has already sealed his lips with his own. The sensation as expected is cold and clammy but both Eddie and Alejandro felt the searing touch of love within them as the duel of their tongue commences.

“I love you, Alejandro.”

“Of course you did.” Alejandro chuckled as he pulls further the body of Eddie towards him.

“I am sorry for everything. For leaving you and for being an insensitive bastard. I love you too Eddie. To hell and back.”

Salome doesn’t know what should she feel as he watches the two bodies intertwine and ride the wave of lust and longing with each other while the shadow around them starts to hail their accursed act. The crows keep on cawing in an odd tune that made the witch tremble with unknown fear and pleasure.

The sight and sound that bombarding her senses is the exact definition of beautiful blasphemy.

“Say it now Eddie! Say it!… I am starting to fade away!” Alejandro’s voice is an amalgam of moan and scream as he holds on tighter around Eddie’s body.

“No! Please stay…Please!” The priest plea with tears of both pleasure and loneliness as he saw the eyes of the altar serve flicker like a light bulb about to shed its last light before it expires.

“My time is already done, Ed. But I promise we will see each other again…whether it is in heaven or perhaps in hell.”

Eddie sob as his body moves faster and deeper; this will be the last time he and Eddie will become one though not under the sign of their favorite god. But this is enough for him. They share the same sin and this will be the unbreakable chain that binds their fate.

For now, they have to part their way. Painful it may seem but this is too is part of the price they pay to magic.

“Now they say her name!”

“Feliz Mcgillis!”

A column of impregnable darkness suddenly fell to both Eddie and Alejandro; leaving only the deafening scream that rattles Salome to the bone. She can’t move out of awe and dread that paralyze even her eyes from blinking as she watches the all the shadow raise its tentacles towards the sky and the crows to fall one by one with their piercing shrill cry that she can only describe as the death song for Feliz Mcgillis.

As the fire from the black candles died down so does the darkness finally pulls away from itself away from the altar and returns back to the corners of the church.

The wind reverts back to normal with its silent whisper. When Salome found herself freed from the shackle of the glamour brought by the mass, she rushes towards the altar and table.

There at the top of it, she found a naked corpse and a crying Eddie that embrace it tightly while mouthing the name ‘Alejandro’ over and over again. Around them are a group of dead crows with twitching eyes and wings.

“It’s over now Eddie. You are safe now.” Salome comforts the grieving priest as she realized that souls tainted by the dark arts are capable still of retaining one of the most human or rather divine qualities of man; to love.

The mass has finally served. Now they can go forth find peace afterward whether in light or in darkness.