Wicked Game

Wicked Game

What a wicked game to play, to make me feel this way.
What a wicked thing to do, to let me dream of you.

                                           Chris Isaak

             
                                                                         (HIM)

Chapter One

Hazelle had never felt more of an idiot.

             
Oh, she should have felt silly while browsing the occult section in her favourite bookstore. She should have felt foolish handing over five dollars of her hard earned cash for a stained, second-hand spell book that smelt slightly of cat pee. She should have felt stupid when visiting the local pharmacy-come-new age-apothecary to purchase dry herbs, gemstones and candles.

             
But no, she hadn't. Something about it had been exciting, exhilarating, almost dangerous. Magic belonged to dorky fantasy novels and Hollywood, to the pagan princesses of Stonehenge and the modern-day Celts that worshipped the sun and moon as real, living deities. It was for dragon slayers and star gazers, witches and wizards, warlocks, wise women and enchantresses. It wasn't meant for single, twenty-somethings still living with their mothers, with no real career and little in the way of romance.

             
That was why she'd humoured the idea. Valentine’s Day was two days away and, feeling bitter and resentful to women in happy, loving, committed relationships, she had decided to provide her own entertainment, something different from the usual weepy chic flick, bottle of cheap wine and big box of chocolates meant for sharing.

             
But now that she was actually here, down in the basement, with white tallow candles arranged around her and a pentagram chalked on the concrete floor...she felt ridiculous. Like the whole world was laughing at how pathetic she was, at what she had been reduced to doing. She was half tempted to blow out the candles, flick on the light switch and search the room for hidden cameras, convinced there would be some hidden amongst the cobwebs like those used on prank TV shows.

             
Instead she remained where she was, crouched in the centre of the pentagram, fixated on a flickering flame. She'd repeated the mantra in her mind many times, trying to memorise it word for word. It had to be spoken out aloud, three times, clear and concise, without any hesitations, without any mistakes.

             
How far would she go for love?

             
Apparently far enough to experiment with black magic. It was lucky she had been born in the twentieth century and didn't believe in it, couldn't be burnt at the stake for practising it, and yet she still felt a slight stirring deep down in her stomach, a hint of fear tinged with trepidation, a random, absurd vision of what could happen, of what might be invoked that night.

             
The cackling shadow loomed over her like a dark portent, becoming corporeal through her energy, muscles rippling in candlelight, coated with green and silver scales, claws sharp and teeth glittering with all the promise of pain and bloodshed. She would be powerless, immobilised and vulnerable, with nothing more than a dagger stained with her own blood for defence against the creature.

             
Hazelle closed her eyes, shaking her head, banishing all dark and distracting thoughts from her mind. The book warned her that if there was a single doubt, a single fear, then the spell wouldn't work and she would spend another Valentine’s Day as she always had.

             
Alone.

             
“Okay,” she said firmly, more than familiar with giving herself pep talks, “You can do this. Don't be such a girl. Nothing will happen anyway.”

             
She clutched the dagger in one hand, so tightly her knuckles turned white. It had belonged to the father she had never known and it was quite elaborate, the antique ebony and silver hilt carved with naked angels and demons, their bodies entangled in various acts of lovemaking, more than fitting for the occasion. She pressed the sharp point to her index finger, as directed to by the book, ready to prick herself and anoint the blade in her own blood.

             
“Satan, I beseech thee. By the blood of my body I beg your lust, your love, and your eternal devotion.”

             
She pierced her skin with the dagger, wincing and gasping as blood welled up at the wound and began rolling down her finger. She caught it on the cold metal of the blade.

             
“By the blood of my body, so mote it be.”

             
The chant was simple enough and she repeated it twice more, her tongue growing thicker and heavier with each word, her throat dry and aching. She swallowed nervously, feeling fear creep in, trying to keep it at bay. The finger she'd cut was stinging, her blood still flowing, dripping down onto the pentagram. She sucked her finger, shivering from the cold, dank, dirty basement she usually avoided like the plague, dressed in nothing more than her prettiest, pale pink nightgown.

             
When she'd completed the chant and her voice echoed away candles began to flicker violently, a sudden gust of icy wind scattering rose petals across her bare feet. Her heart trembled as the light began to weaken, inviting starving shadow to swell before darkness dominated them both, bringing with it something she should never have dabbled in.

             
“Well, well,” a deep, dark, delicious voice chuckled, “What do we have here?”

             
She heard someone inhale and then sigh with satisfaction.              “I smell a little witch with more heart than brains.”

             
Hazelle gripped the blood dripping dagger in one hand, pointing it out into a darkness so dense her eyes couldn't penetrate it.

             
“Whose there? This is private property! I have my cell phone here, ready to call the cops.”

             
“We both know your cell phone is upstairs in the kitchen, sitting by the stainless steel toaster, where you left it. You don't need a cell phone to cast a spell,” the same dark voice drawled, with a hint of devilish amusement.

             
Hazelle was far from amused. Her palms began prickling with sweat as she panicked, the dagger slipping from her hand. She reaffirmed her grip on it and turned on the spot, trying to detect from which direction the voice was coming from. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, resonating around her, as if she were in some deep, dark dungeon or an oubliette. She could see nothing beyond the protective halo of candlelight that made the white lines of the pentagram glow ethereally.

             
“There is no such thing as magic,” she insisted, more to try and convince her own conflicted conscience rather than the manifestation              , but she heard the slight quiver in her voice, felt her heart beating like a drum beneath her breast, her stomach swimming with nausea and her throat constricting in fear. “This isn't the first time I've had a stalker.”

             
“I am not a stalker. You invited me here, remember? Practically begged for it.”

             
Something stirred in the shadows, light recoiling from a presence that made her every hair stand on end, every nerve tingle, every muscle burn with the urge to run. But she knew from the book that the centre of a pentagram was a protective second shield, one that meant that whatever she had conjured, whatever was trespassing here couldn't hurt her, couldn't touch her.

             
“What do you want?” she cried out, still spinning, her eyes desperately scanning the shadows.

             
“To fulfil your every wish and desire,” the bewitching voice purred from beyond the darkness.

             
She glanced down at the spell book lying open at her feet. A few drops of her blood had landed on the illustration of the pentagram and stained it, much the same way it had in real life, in reality, where magic wasn't supposed to exist, where demons were considered creatures of legend and myth and yet here she was, currently threatening an invisible entity with an athamae.

             
“So the spell really worked? You're really here for me?” she demanded, suddenly numb with the realisation that everything she had always denied, everything she had only believed possible in movies and dreams could actually, honestly, truly exist.

             
Magic is real. Spells are real. The devil is real.

             
What have I done?

             
“You and you alone,” the voice answered solemnly, sounding serious for the first time.

             
She squinted, trying to see through the darkness, to see the entity that eluded her feeble eyesight. It was futile. Her eyes were inept, and she was very self-conscious of the fact that it, whatever
it
might be, could see her but she could not see it.

             
“Step into the light.”

             
“Why don't you step into the darkness?” it challenged her.

             
She gripped the dagger tighter. She wasn't so easily to be swayed by darkness, no matter how determined or dark it was. Something in her had been awoken by the spell, something that had lain dormant since birth now attuning to the magic quivering in the air, to the elemental energy, something shifting in her brain to accommodate the new information as she began to understand the significance of the pentagram and believe, instinctively, that it would protect her. There was no way in heaven or hell she was going to leave it.

             
“Step into the light,” she repeated patiently.

             
It obeyed.

             
When she'd committed herself to casting the spell she'd assumed that she was summoning a demon from the black bowels of hell. She never believed she'd actually be able to summon the sex god that stood before her now, completely naked in all his masculine glory, not a scrap of material to be seen. Candlelight gleamed on his immaculate golden skin, shimmering in his soft waves of russet coloured hair. He was tall, well over six feet, and his entire body would have put an Olympic athlete to shame, his long legs toned to perfection, his abs shining without an ounce of fat on them, muscles rippling scrumptiously as he stepped into the light, allowing her to see every mouth-watering inch of him. His face was a masterpiece, a homage to ancient Greek statues that had once adorned temples and palaces, a replica of renaissance art now revered around the world. His jaw was strong and chiselled, his brow fierce and foreboding, his high cheeks bones thrown into sharp relief by light and shadow dancing across his face, his expression inscrutable, betraying nothing as he studied her and she gawped at him, at his...
well
...she blushed fiercely when her eyes fell there, on his swollen manhood, the tip slick and shining with his lust. She looked away quickly, mortified.

             
“Feel free to look as much as you like, if it pleases you,” he teased her, unabashed.

             
Of course he wouldn't be embarrassed. It wasn't in the nature of his species to be coy and reserved, especially when it came to nudity and sexual, explicit acts. After all, she had summoned him for a reason and on first appearances alone he was more than adequate to fill that post...and much more.

             
She turned back, trying to be brave. Upon closer inspection he was unlike anything she had ever imagined a demon to be. There was no tail, no horns, no wings or scales. The only physical sign that he wasn't human were his eyes, which were a queer onyx colour, blacker than black, a shade no human eyes could achieve without custom made contact lenses. She resisted the urge to reach out and poke his eyes, to see if he wore any, still hanging on to hope that this was some sort of trick, a prank set up by someone in her office.

             
As it was his intense, dark gaze kept her rooted to the spot, unable to speak, unable to think, unable to banish him back from whence he came.

             
“You're really real, aren’t you?” she murmured in awe, all of her wildest hopes, dreams and fears fulfilled, made flesh by this one wicked act.

             
There was no way she could get a refund for the book now. There was nothing faulty about the spells in them, or, from the perfect specimen of male stood before her, in their results.

             
“You tell me.”

             
He took a confident step towards her, and another, forsaking the shadows that had expelled him, his bare feet crushing rose petals, but he stopped short of the pentagram. Was he deterred by it? Afraid of it? She couldn't see any fear on his face, though there wasn't much in the way of emotion there at all. The desire she did see, glimmering in his eyes, a thirst that she had, thus far, left unquenched. All that could change tonight...if she let it.

             
This was insane. This couldn't be real. Magic didn't exist. Demons
definitely
didn't exist. She had to be dreaming, or hallucinating or just plain, run of the mill crazy.               Regardless, she approached him slowly as he stood there, bold as brass, his eyes daring her to come closer, to touch him. She found herself reaching out, despite her better judgement and screaming self-preservation, to stroke the bronze flesh of his bare chest but before she could his hand shot out, lightning fast, and gripped her wrist. She did drop the dagger then, in shock, bloody metal clanging to the concrete floor as she tried to pull away, terrified of what he might do to her, or force her to do to him.