Angel of Ruin
Authors: Kim Wilkins
for Selwa
who understands everything about
the magic of words
1 Daughters Grow About the Mother Tree
5 So Spake the False Dissembler
9 Like a Black Mist Low Creeping
11 Foul Distrust and Breach Disloyal
14 Discord, First Daughter of Sin
16 Sweet Reluctant Amorous Delay
18 To Lose Thee Were to Lose Myself
19 Thy Choice of Flaming Warriors
20 At Our Heels All Hell Should Rise
22 This Horror Will Grow Mild, this Darkness Light
23 Devising Death to Them Who Lived
25 This Continent of Spacious Heaven
26 Our Circuit Meets Full West
… what in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support;
That to the highth of this great argument
I may assert Eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to men.
John Milton,
Paradise Lost
The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he
wrote of Angels & God, and at liberty when of
Devils & Hell,
is because he was a true Poet and of the Devils
party without knowing it.
William Blake,
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
I
came to London to write and found myself practising magic instead. I suppose they’re not so very dissimilar if you think about it — there are words in magic, just as there is magic in words. So be warned. There are a lot of words in this book.
I’m a journalist. I don’t make things up, I write things down. You may have seen my by-line, Sophie Black, on any number of mindless articles in glossy, perfumed magazines. Writing one of those articles initiated my involvement with the Lodge of the Seven Stars. I liked to stock up on seasonal pieces; articles which I could sell to a few different publications at specific times of the year — Valentine’s Day, spring, the anniversary of Diana’s death — and I’d decided to do a Hallowe’en piece on the occult in London.
Hallowe’en was still five months away at the time, but my financial situation was dire and I was desperate to make an early sale. I was desperate to make any sale, really. My rent was crippling me, I’d already given up cigarettes and, if things didn’t look up, coffee would be the next vice to go.
So I wandered in and out of every new age shop in London, fighting my way through hanging crystals and bangle-jangling customers, to ask the staff if they knew
of a ritual magic group. I was answered by a lot of shaking heads, a few offers to take my phone number, and one recommendation to visit a bookshop called Seventh Star just off Camden High Street. “Ask for Neal,” I was told. That is how, on a fine May morning, I met Neal Gardiner.
Seventh Star smelled good: the combined scent of citrus candles and crisp new books. I browsed for five minutes, astonished at the range of volumes. Jung bumped spines with Crowley, ufology lined up with urology, Hegel gazed across the aisle at the Koran. From behind a bookstand, I assessed the man at the counter. Early thirties; dark hair; a little goatee beard; pale eyes — maybe green or grey; a studied casualness, probably developed over the years to cover an innate awkwardness. I would have found him attractive under other circumstances, but my heart had just been freshly broken. No member of the male species had the power to interest me. I found a book on the Golden Dawn tradition and approached the counter.
“Hello,” I said. “Is this a good introduction to ritual magic?”
He considered the book. “It’s not particularly comprehensive. What information are you looking for?”
“I’d like to learn a little about the history, with a view to maybe finding a ritual magic group to practise in.”
“The best way to learn is within a Lodge,” he said. “What’s your name?”
“Sophie,” I said, “Sophie Cabrel.” My
real
surname. I try not to let on to too many people that I’m a journalist. Letting on that I’m a journalist is simply the most effective way to shut them up.
“I’m Neal Gardiner. My wife and I are founding members of the Lodge of the Seven Stars.”
“Do you recruit new members?”
“Not usually. I mean, no, we don’t. But we’ve
always had seven members and one of them just relocated to Edinburgh …”
“So you’re one short?” I asked.
“Yes. Exactly.”
“I’d be very interested to attend a meeting.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“I didn’t think it would be.”
“I don’t know you. I know nothing about you.”
“What do you need to know?”
He looked around. Only a few customers browsed at the shelves. “If you’ll wait here a moment, I’ll see what I can do,” he said.
I waited at the counter, hoping he wouldn’t make me buy the book. I had barely enough money to pay my phone bill. I watched him go to the back of the store, disappear through a staff door, then re-emerge a few minutes later with a younger man.
Neal met me once again at the counter. “Joe can watch the shop for an hour or so. We could get a coffee.”
The magic words. “I’d like that,” I said.
We left the store and walked two blocks in silence. Neal was a fraction shorter than me, and he wore a blue zip-up anorak even though it was warm. His affected casualness seemed even more pronounced now that he was walking beside me, striding mock-confidently, hands thrust mock-nonchalantly in his pockets.
“I quite like that place,” he said, indicating a cafeteria on our left.
“Fine.”
We crossed the road and found a table inside. Two women, wearing spades of make-up, smoked in a corner. The grey haze curled around their heads. I rubbed my tongue on the roof of my mouth, imagined the cylindrical smoothness, the easy breathe-in, the
warm tingly taste. I added up the days: it had been six weeks since I quit smoking, which meant it had been ten weeks since Martin had said that he was sorry, so sorry, but he needed to be by himself. The thought of Martin reminded me why I felt a permanent dull ache inside, like someone’s thumb had jabbed me in the heart and left a bruise.
I slid into a vinyl seat. Neal asked me what I wanted.
“Long black,” I said, hoping he would offer to pay. I made a show of reaching for my purse.
“No, no,” he said, “I’ll get it.”
“Thank you.”
He walked stiff-elbowed to the counter and ordered our coffees. I envied the composure with which he pulled out his wallet, and offered the waitress a five pound note. If I hadn’t chosen to live two streets from Euston station I might possess the same ease with my money, but even my sad, stuffy bedsit came at an immoderate price in that location.
Neal returned with our coffees. I let mine cool a moment.
“So, perhaps you should tell me a little about yourself,” he said.
“What would you like to know?”
“Let’s start with that accent. I can’t place it.”
I nodded. “It’s a bit of a mixture.”
“Go on.”
“I was born here but my mother was Scottish, my father French. I spent my childhood in Paris until my father decided he preferred his secretary to his wife, and then I moved with my mother to Glasgow.” I sipped my coffee to allow him to interject if he wished. It was too hot and I burned my tongue. Neal nodded to indicate I should continue. “I went to boarding school in Manchester, and did four months of a degree in journalism at university there, before I fell
in love with one of my tutors and ran away with him to Los Angeles.”
“Ah, I thought I heard California in there,” he said, smiling as though I might be a movie star.
“Just faint, I’m sure. Anyway, Martin and I spent the last seven years there while he did a doctorate in economics. About nine months ago he got a position at the University of Sussex, so we came back to the UK to live in our dream cottage in East Grinstead.”
“And?”
“And now I’m in London because he needed ‘more space’.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
I shrugged lightly, as though it didn’t matter.
“You really have lived all over the place,” Neal said, spooning the foam off the top of his cappuccino.
“And left a piece of myself in every location,” I said. “So I’m nowhere near whole.”
“But very exotic.”
“Thank you,” I said. He liked me, I could tell. I can read people like road signs. “What else do you need to know?”
“Um … what do you do for a living?”
“I’m between jobs at the moment. I’m usually a waitress. I also study part-time.”
“I see. And how old are you?”
“Twenty-eight.”
“Why are you interested in magic?”
A crucial question: Neal wouldn’t let me anywhere near his Lodge if I sounded too rehearsed or insincere — even though my reply was both rehearsed and insincere. “Purification of the self. Something’s been lacking from my life for a long time, some aspect of the spiritual which I have been unable to find through any of the traditional channels.”
“So you’re looking for enlightenment?”
“We all are, aren’t we?”
“I don’t think so. I think many, many people have no interest in enlightenment.”
This was the arrogance of the new-age disciple; as if football hooligans and hairdressers never wonder why they’re here. “Perhaps you’re right,” I said.
“Let me speak to the others,” he said. “I’m a good judge of character. I have a distinct feeling about you, and it seems fateful that you should show up and ask just a fortnight after Andy left. I’ll okay it with the rest of the group, then I’ll phone you and you can come along to a meeting.”
“I’d like that.” I suspected his “distinct feeling” about me was at least partially erotic interest: his gaze held mine too keenly, his body leaned forward too eagerly. As always, I was surprised. I saw myself only as a generic adult woman. Nothing about me stood out: medium blonde hair of a medium length, a medium complexion, medium hazel eyes, and a medium-sized body. Whatever it was that attracted the stolen glances on the Tube, or the sloppy leers in the Bishop’s Gate on a Friday night, I could not see it.
I scribbled down my phone number for him and we chatted while we finished our coffees. He and his wife — she was reluctantly offered into evidence — owned the shop I had visited, and another one at Greenwich. Both stores did very well and they had just moved to a flat on Baker Street. His wife’s name was Chloe and she didn’t work because she was often ill. Unfortunately, he said, they were yet to have children because of Chloe’s health. I liked him. I like people who are always willing to talk. I sincerely hoped he would call and that I could come along to the Lodge of the Seven Stars very soon. We said goodbye and I walked home.
Mrs Henderson greeted me as the security door slammed shut behind me.
“Have you got the rent?” she asked. Mrs Henderson was always direct.
I picked up my mail, leafed through it quickly. Found the envelope with the
Foxy
logo on the front. Relief. “Yes,” I said, holding up the envelope. “The rent is right here.”
“You’re two days late.”
“I’ll bring a cheque down in a minute.”
“May as well make it tomorrow. I already banked this morning.”
“Sure.”
“And I’d prefer cash.”
“Sure. No problem.” I was retreating from the lobby, up the creaky stairs. Hartley Manors sounded like a far more prestigious address than it actually was. It was damp and stuffy, the bathrooms were never quite clean, the heating was hit-and-miss. It had once been a bed and breakfast hotel, but Mrs Henderson now rented out the rooms on a monthly basis as bedsits. Mine was on the first floor, overlooking the street. Even with the double glazing the traffic noise was unbearable, and now summer was approaching I would have to start leaving the window open for fresh air.
I threw my bag on the bed and pulled up a chair at my tiny desk, knocking my left knee as I did every time I tried to work in the cramped space; the skin was permanently blue with bruising. I began the business of opening my mail. A lorry roared past outside, making the window rattle.
I suppose I should admit why I chose to live in a crap bedsit with a good address rather than find something cheaper and less central. I could tell you that it was crucial for my research that I be so close to the British Library: St Pancras was barely a ten minute walk away. I could tell you that it was important to have a central London address in order to impress the
publishing companies buying my work: freelancing is competitive, and if you look like you’re doing well the magazines have more confidence in you. I could even tell you that there is a sports centre two doors down from me, and that I’m obsessed with squash (I am). But none of these reasons are the
real
reasons.
No. I just wanted to make sure Martin knew I was doing fine without him. When I first moved in I wrote him a brief note, enclosing my business card with the new address if he needed to get in touch about anything. Nonchalant. Independent. It was the most important thing in the world to me that Martin not find out how badly shaken I was by our break-up. He hated desperate and he hated weak, and if I behaved desperately or weakly he would never ask me to come back. I occasionally phoned our mutual friends, lying extravagantly about how well I was getting on, knowing that all the stories would find their way back to him.
And eventually, if I waited, he would call and ask me to return. I knew this for a certainty because I always win. Nothing ever beats me and that may sound immodest, but I assure you it’s true.
The mail that day proved bountiful. I had two cheques, including the large one from
Foxy
for a piece I’d written called “Spring-Clean Your Life”. I had three invitations to submit articles I’d queried about, and a commission for a seven-hundred word piece about airline food, preferably funny. I figured that, in a month or two, when payments started to roll in and the commissions became more frequent, my money troubles would be over.
I didn’t know then that, in a month or two, money would be the least of my concerns.
It poured with rain the night I attended my first meeting of the Lodge. I came up from Baker Street Station and
my cheap umbrella instantly blew inside-out. Although it was the first day of June, summer looked to be the last thing on the sky’s mind. I had to walk several blocks in the foul weather until I found the right address.
An attractive, plump woman met me at the bottom of the stairs.
“You must be Sophie,” she said, as I hung up my umbrella and slipped out of my raincoat.
“And you must be Chloe.” I liked Chloe immediately. She was pretty in the way only plump women can be, cherubic and clear-skinned, with a pleasant smile. She slipped her soft hand into mine to shake it, then led me up the stairs.
“We’re very happy to have you here,” she said, unlocking the front door to her flat.
“I’m happy to be here.”
We walked directly into a warm candle-lit lounge room. Shelves swollen with books lined all four walls. There was no other furniture. Five people dressed in black robes stood talking with each other. They looked round as I came in.
“Sophie. Good to see you.” This was Neal, advancing across the room and giving me a firm handshake. “Come and meet the others.”
Chloe intercepted us and handed me a towel, and I dried off my hair as Neal introduced me to the Lodge members. I committed their names and one or two notable characteristics about each of them to memory: Art, John Lennon specs; Deirdre, pale, blinking redhead; Marcus, heavy-jawed grin; Mandy, anorexic, pink-faced blonde. Then there were Neal and Chloe. All of them were somewhere between thirty and forty. Chloe was shrugging into a black robe over her powder-blue house dress. Nobody was naked under their robes. Unfortunate. It would have been a good angle.