Stealing Sacred Fire by Storm Constantine

greedy relish for the words. ‘Even now, they speak their
blasphemies and call upon He Who Walks the Deserts. The Scapegoat
shall come forth from the bowels of the earth, shaking curses from
his hair. His breath shall be poisonous fire, his words the foul
stink of hell!’
    Fox uttered a shuddering sigh.
‘Prepare us, oh Lord, for what is to come. Arm us with your
spiritual weapons.’ He reached out blindly and placed his hand
heavily on Melandra’s head. Her neck jerked. ‘Bless your
bond-woman, and protect her from the ancient, blaspheming memories
of the weaker sex. It is by your will that the Scapegoat shall be
purged by the hand of a woman, one of the creatures whom he
corrupted in sin. Amen.’
    ‘Amen,’ echoed the
assembly.
    Nathaniel took his hand from
Melandra’s head and she felt dizzy from the sudden lifting of the
weight.
    Fox laced his hands before him
on the table. ‘Shall we begin, gentlemen?’ He touched a pad on the
console beside him.
    The curtains that covered the
left hand wall glided open. Banks of television screens or monitors
were revealed. There must have been over a hundred of them. At
another command from Fox, the screens flickered into life; they
showed news reports from around the world: war, famine, political
summits.
    ‘What do you see, Melandra
Maynard?’ Fox enquired.
    Melandra shrugged. ‘Reality.
Not a pretty sight.’
    Fox sucked his upper lip,
nodding. ‘Yes. But reality as you see it is the work of devils.
This, if you like, is the entr’acte before their grand performance,
and the finale will be the end of the world.’
    ‘Devils,’ said Melandra. She
presumed he meant some rival cartel, who dealt in arms or
drugs.
    ‘That is one word for them.
Others are Nephilim, Watchers and Grigori. Fallen angels. Just look
upon their filthy work, my sister.’
    Melandra glanced at him
sharply, then back at the screens. She knew what Fox was talking
about. Once, when she was very young, she had found a book on her
Sunday school teacher’s desk. It had been old and frayed; well
thumbed. Her teacher had come into the room and had snatched the
book from her hands with a sharp rebuke. ‘You mustn’t look at
that,’ she had been told. ‘You are not old enough.’ Like any child,
Melandra had been curious about knowledge that was forbidden and
had asked awkward questions. Patiently, the teacher had explained
that the book contained stories about the Fallen Ones, the rebel
Sons of God, who in the distant past, before the Great Flood, had
come down from heaven and corrupted human women. Her teacher had
refrained from explaining in detail the fallen angels’ unholy
behaviour. Melandra had been told it was sinful even to think of
them now. They were God’s enemies, for they had disobeyed him and
revelled in sin. For that, they had been punished, utterly
destroyed, but their spirits might live on to tempt the weak. Good
girls would certainly not want to read about them.
    Over the years, in her isolated
boarding school and college, Melandra had learned to regard the
Grigori as a spiritual evil, like having bad thoughts about a
friend or a teacher. Now, the suspicion stirred within her that Fox
and his colleagues believed they might be something more.
    Fox turned in his seat. His
voice was laconic. ‘The ancient leader of the Grigori, Azazel,
walks the earth again, Melandra. He is the anti-Christ, the Satan,
the Adversary. He gathers his people beneath a banner of blood.
When the millennium turns, he plans to cast a pestilence of war and
ravagement upon the earth. Only his debased followers will survive
it, into the darkest centuries mankind will ever know. He must be
stopped. He must be destroyed. All your life, you, Melandra, have
been trained for this divine purpose. God has deemed it shall be
you who will destroy Azazel.’
    Melandra’s mouth dropped open
involuntarily, and she had to shut it again quickly. ‘Excuse me?
I... how?’
    Fox smiled. ‘You are horrified,
and no-one