Snake Eyes

Prologue

There isn’t much meat on a demon.

Not that you’d ever want to eat one. Unless circumstances warranted it, you understand. Or if, say, you just really, really felt like it—one should live and let live, after all. But trust me, they are skinny and beyond that, if the Ledger is to be believed, it’s clear they weren’t designed to be predated (or scavenged), especially as they are themselves quaternary in any food chain.

It’s a well-documented fact that humans thrive best on primary and secondary food sources. In other words, vegetation and herbivores. During drought or famine, survival dictates these rules be bent but that doesn’t make snake meat tasty or tiger steaks healthy.

Demon flesh is a definite no-no.

Cogitate, if you will: primary blade of grass eaten by secondary cow eaten by tertiary human whose misery, fear and/ or heart and liver are eaten by quaternary demon. For a human, eating a demon would qualify the human doing it as quinary in the food chain. As well as making him very ill. If a demon ate another demon, it too would become a quinary source of food (as well as being classed a cannibal).

According to the Ledger, it’s not uncommon for demons to eat each other, so by that logic, if a human was, by chance, to eat a cannibalistic demon he or she could then be considered the senary participant in the food chain.

The food chain’s a lot longer than people think.

There are a few umpteenary beings, as I understand it; the kind of creatures that eat entire planets and ecosystems, but if you ask me that’s gluttony.

Anyway, the point is this: demon meat is about as healthy as a skunk dung soufflé.

Whump

It was a clear-sky day when Puff Wiggery and Blini Rickett’s work was interrupted. The untouchable above us was a silvery blue dome beyond which all the stars were asleep. There were no clouds and that was a bad sign. Long before noon, it would be too hot to work and the already waterless crops would droop still further as they struggled to survive. The heat increased daily and it was hard on us all.

Blini Rickett and Puff Wiggery shared a smallholding— most of us had our own crops and stock back then because we had so little in the way of money—on which they’d each built a home for their wives and children. Their plan had been to pool resources to create surplus crops they could sell, but their partnership never bore the kind of fruits they hoped for.

My property, tiny by comparison but more fruitful owing to intelligent planting and maintenance, bordered theirs and I spent happy hours watching them toil, sweat and debate farm management. On that particular morning, the sun already drawing beads of moisture on my forehead, I sat on my porch sipping a cool cup of goat’s milk from the cellar and casting an occasional glance their way so as not to miss any entertainment.

I saw the shape in the sky and what it became long before they did. It appeared first as streaks of pure white cloud high above us. I waited and hoped for the cloud to swirl and grow darker; we all needed rain. It soon became clear however, that this was no rain cloud. The streaks took on a shape, parts of them becoming familiar to me. Here an unfolded wing, here a curving femur, there a rudimentary tail. I’d cloud-watched a thousand hours away as a boy, pushing my imagination farther and farther into unknown territory, but this was different. I didn’t have to try to form an image from those vapours; they took the unmistakable shape of a demon.

The cloud gained mass and definition. The demon was on its back; its doglike hindquarters drawn up to its belly and its tail flailing upwards between its legs. Its wings were unfurled; the delicate structure of hollow bones that spread them open was easy to see, as were the bones of its legs and crooked arms. Because it was on its back though, the wings were controlled by the wind, not the other way around.

It looked like the cloud demon was falling.

As soon as I had the thought, the cloud turned red. There was a brief dimming of the sun, a welcome chill that was gone before I could appreciate it, and the red cloud became solid. The demon hurtled earthward. Realising I was witnessing possibly the most interesting event of the year, I stood up still holding my goat’s milk and would have shouted to Rickett and Wiggery if I hadn’t been enjoying the anticipation of the looks on their faces when the thing hit the ground. It was headed straight for them.

Instead I watched the demon fall. It was strange, the cloud had been huge in the sky and very high up, but now, as the creature neared us, it got smaller. Gauging its size under such illogical circumstances was impossible. It trailed the faintest wake of steam or smoke and the air around us took on an odour of noxious defilement.

Rickett and Wiggery were arguing as usual when the plummeting creature struck earth. It hit with such force that the ground jumped. As I heard the hiss and ear flattening whump of the impact, I spilt a little goat’s milk and cursed. A wave of dust rolled outward from the crash site and through it I saw Rickett and Wiggery trying to stand up; the air blast had thrown them back several strides. Their faces were dark with dust, their eyes wide and white by contrast. They blinked and coughed and held their ribs. The wind had gone from their chests and for once they weren’t haranguing each other. I took my drink with me as I stepped out of the back gate and strode over to the crater.

By the time I arrived, they were standing at the edge of a concave depression that had obliterated a substantial circle of sickly, wilted cabbages. Both of them had limp shreds of greenery hanging from their hair and clothes and it was hard to tell them apart.

“That’s a strange looking fertiliser, boys,” said I.

“It’s nary fertiliser,” said Blini Rickett pointing a trembling finger into the fresh pit. “That be Armageddon.”

Puff Wiggery shook his head.

“T’aint so, Rickett, you pheasant-brained muckit. That there’s a female gryphon.”

Several other villagers gathered at the crash site and more were on their way, trampling what was left of Rickett and Wiggery’s ill-conceived crops. Heads bobbed up and down and side to side to see the cause of the crater. When people got too close and started to slip down the gentle slope towards the demon, they panicked, fell over and scrambled on their hands and knees back to the safety of the crowd.

There were murmurs and whispers and the facts about the new arrival were swiftly distorted from wrong to ridiculous. Fortunately, not everyone in the village was devoid of the light of intelligence and education. I stepped forward and took a deep breath so that my voice would reach everyone present. But it was someone else that spoke first to the inhabitants of Long Lofting that day. I missed my chance by a fraction of a moment.

“Villagers, please. Quiet down now, there’s no reason to be frit.”

It was that failed intellectual and meddlesome nose-pokerinner, Leopold Prattle. He held his scrawny, pale arms up and his black robes, inappropriate for such a hot day, slid down to his shoulders revealing his unwashed armpits. The hubbub faltered and lost its lack of direction altogether. Eager ears tuned in for what would inevitably be disinformation.

“Thank you, everyone. Now, what we have here is a simple case of dragon breakdown. We could all use a decent meal, so I proffer we cut the dragon into family sized morsels and roast them at tonight’s feast.”

“What feast is that?” shouted a member of the crowd.

“Our first ever ‘Feast of the dragon’. We shall give thanks to the Great Father for food in times of hardship.”

There were cries of ‘Aye’ and ‘so be it’ and ‘Great Father be praised’. A few villagers sank to their knees and raised their hands to the sky in gratitude. I suppose they must have been the really hungry ones. I had to say something before the whole situation got out of hand.

“Hold on, everyone. Just a moment please…” They were all happy. No one was listening. “OI, YOU LOT. SHUT YOUR NOISE.”

The mob fell silent, not altogether amused to have their excitement and praise interrupted. Leopold Prattle, the stinkiest priest ever to infect Long Lofting looked even less pleased to hear my voice.

“You’d better have something very important to add to this matter, Delly Duke.”

“As it happens, I do. That isn’t a dragon. It’s a demon. I cannot advise the eating of its flesh.”

There were intakes of breath all around the crater followed by a mass wrinkling of noses. Was that the first time they’d noticed the smell of corruption? Then came the rippled murmurs of horror as the crowd’s mind flipped into negative again. People drew away. Leopold Prattle saw the effect of my words and he looked ugly over it.

“Nyev, nyev, nyev,” he said, shaking his head in annoyance. “Villagers, Delly Duke is a renowned busybody and breeder of discontent in the community. You can be certain his words are pure deceit and viciousness. The inaugural ‘Feast of the Dragon’ will go ahead as planned. We shall all have full stomachs and glad hearts.” He bunched his elongated fingers into what passed for a fist in the priesthood and punched the air for emphasis. The effort was uncomfortable judging by the way he winced. No matter how hungry and debilitated the Long Loftingers were, they didn’t exactly cheer. I’d sown the seeds of uncertainty and I’d done it a lot more efficiently than Blini Rickett and Puff Wiggery could plant cabbages.

“Please listen, all of you,” intoned the puny priest, “I can assure you with the Great Father as my witness that this fallen animal is a dragon and that we can gorge ourselves upon it this very night.”

I had to say something.

“Wait, everyone. My learned manual clearly states that this is a demon.”

I opened the little red Ledger to the correct page and held it up for all to see. It was useless. They could see the drawings but hardly any of them could read. Leopold Prattle had both the Great Father and hunger on his side. The people sided with him.

As the larger men of the village planned a way to haul the body from the crater and the children began to run around in excitement at the prospect of a meal, the mothers cried tears of happiness over the Great Father’s blessing.

I stood back and watched the rest of the crops in the field turn black as invisible waves of oppression cascaded off the fallen fiend. I took a sip of my milk but it had rotted to a scummy yellow gall that made me retch. I emptied it onto the diseased field and was relieved to overhear that they aimed to drag the creature to the opposite side of the village for butchery.

Bumcakes

I was also delighted to note that the demon’s corruption hadn’t reached as far as my croft. Stepping through the thigh high gate I saw my corn, green and healthy, my yams apparently unharmed. The chickens looked unaffected, they scratched the dusty ground and jerked their heads as usual. Mary the goat regarded me through mischievous eyes—far too reminiscent of the eyes of the malevolent beings depicted in the Ledger. Living next to Blini Rickett and Puff Wiggery might have been entertaining but it was proving to be dangerous, too. I stomped up onto the porch and through the back door.

Velvet was about her kitchen chores and though it was still morning I could smell the promise of lunch. She turned when she heard my footsteps, knowing straight away that something was wrong.

“What’s the matter, my pet? You look fair vexed.”

I set the empty cup down on our table.

“I don’t know where to start. Rickett and Wiggery are idiots. Prattle is a jumble-headed interferer. Everyone else is so hungry their brains have dried up. And a large demon has fallen into next door’s field.”

“Oh, now don’t be such a grumbler, Delly. You’ll feel better when you’ve had some lunch.”

“What are we having?”

“Corn patties with an egg on top.”

“What I wouldn’t give for a loaf of bread.”

“The flour’s almost gone. I was saving it for a special occasion.”

“If this drought goes on much longer there may not be any more occasions.”

Velvet turned back to her cooking and tutted at me. Her hair was long and dark and silky, but in the hot weather she wore it in a knot with a wooden spoon through it. I could see the sweat on the back of her neck and the press of her hips where they stuck to the faded blue cotton of her dress. That was another thing about the heat; thoughts of rutting made it difficult to concentrate on anything else.

“What is that awful pew?” asked Velvet.

“Oh, it’s what’s left of the milk. The demon’s presence turned it just like that. Killed all the cabbages in next door’s field too—the ones that weren’t already dead.”

“Those peewits. They do nothing but argue and jizjam each other’s wives.”

She picked up the fouled cup and washed it in water that was three days old. I felt a wave of pity for the two farmers and their families. They’d gained a demon and lost an entire crop.

“It’s the heat. Makes folk cantankerous and lecherous.”

“Nonsense, Delly. Those two’ve always been that way and you know it.”

As usual, Velvet was right. I opened my comprehensive almanac and turned to the section on adversarial minions. There was no mention of what to do in case of demonic fallout.

Mostly it was about how to recognise demons and how to ward them off. The whole thrust of the section related to avoiding contact in the first place. I took that to mean eating them wasn’t a good idea. The pictures were detailed and it seemed that we had acquired a relatively high level demon. Well, high in a lowdown kind of way.

From outside there came the sound of angry voices and at first I thought it was just Rickett and Wiggery having one of their customary disagreements. But the volume rose and the numbers of voices increased until it sounded like a riot was going on. I sighed, pushed my chair back and walked to the back door to take a look. In the field it looked as though a fight was about to break out. There was pushing and shoving and many fingers being pointed. In the midst of it Leopold Prattle was adeptly failing to maintain control.

“Give me strength,” I said.

“What is it now?”

“I’ll have to go out there again.”

“Don’t you be late for your lunch, Delly Duke, or I’ll paddle your bumcakes rosy.”

I turned back to see her smiling; as full of mischief as Mary the goat.

“I’ll make sure it’s stone cold before I return.”

Demonhood

In the field, merriment had turned to bitterness.

There was a very obvious split between two factions. In the smaller faction there was Blini Rickett and Puff Wiggery. In the other faction was the rest of the village. Between them, using only his body odour as a weapon, was Leopold Prattle. By the time I arrived at the scene, it looked as though a lynching might not be far away.

I asked one of the villagers, a barrel maker who lived near the church, what was going on.

“Those two fatherless muckits say the dragon belongs to them because it fell in their field. They’ve no right to it. No right, says I.”

But Jack Cooper, the one I’d asked, was wrong. I knew the law about property and ownership and it was clear. I ran to the front of the mob where things were starting to turn nasty. Puff Wiggery had bleeding scratches on his face where a woman’s nails had raked him. Even Prattle was beginning to look frightened in case they lumped him in with the other two.

I raised my hands. I’ve got a loud voice when I feel like using it and it’s a good thing otherwise events might have transpired very differently.

“ENOUGH OR I’LL SUMMON THE MILITIA.”

That caught the attention of a few of them and some of the fire went out of the mob. The shouting died down and people stopped pushing towards the two frightened farmers. I kept my hands in the air and after a few more moments the crowd was quiet enough that I could speak normally.

“Anyone who harms these men will hang. You all know it. The law says an animal found dead on your land belongs to you. And anyone who tries to take the demon away will be flogged.”

“It’s a dragon,” shouted one of the villagers. There were cries of hungry agreement from all around. Why anyone thought a dragon was more edible than a demon I couldn’t fathom.

“Whatever it turns out to be, the law says it’s theirs. Now who wants me to ring the bell for the militia?”

No one moved or spoke.

“Please, if you think you have the right to take away the lawful property of Farmer Rickett and Farmer Wiggery put your hand up and state your case. The militia can come and settle it.”

The silence expanded. No one wanted to go up against the law, especially not militia law. I turned to the two farmers who looked pleased with themselves. I think it was the first matter they’d ever agreed on.

“Now what are you two planning to do with this thing?”

“We’re going to cut it up and sell it,” said Rickett

The crowd erupted in angry jeers and insults. Someone threw a stone and it hit him in the throat. He put his hands to his neck, choking.

“If I find out who threw that, I’ll ride out and report you myself,” I shouted.

“Reasonable prices of course,” said Wiggery, “We’ll be almost giving it away.”

More shouts and curses flew.

“Just calm down, everyone,” I said. “Now listen. These two men have lost an entire field of crops because of this. I proffer they give half of the demon to the village, and keep half themselves to sell as compensation. That way, you’ll still get your Feast of the Demon—”

“Dragon!”

“—whatever it is, and they might survive to plant another season.”

There were grumbles but the atmosphere was far less hostile. I whispered to Prattle.

“Help me out, priest, I’ve just prevented a bloodbath.”

Leopold Prattle looked disgusted to have to agree with me but he had no choice.

“Delly Duke is right. The Feast of the Dragon will go ahead as planned. All we have to do is divided the dem…dragon in two. Praise be to the Great Father.”

There was a muttered and unenthusiastic ‘praise be’ from the crowd. By now they were tired and overheating. A few of the women had fainted because of the sun and the stench of the demon. In weather like this the cadaver was likely to be flyblown and rotting before the day was out and Rickett and Wiggery would never sell a single cut of meat. I didn’t see any reason to point out such details.

That was when I took my first close look at the ‘bounty’ we’d been ‘blessed’ with. The crater it had made was large, a good fifteen strides across. The creature’s wingspan was about ten strides; it’s body length something like six strides. Its naked skin was as red as ripe chilli peppers and looked tougher than leather. The legs resembled a dog’s but were far longer, with hooves instead of paws. They were still drawn up as though someone had tickled the demon just before it hit the ground.

Its arms were long and curved, the hands elongated with grasping hook-like talons. Every joint of bone to bone was visible and the sinews that strapped the creature together were as thick as woven cables. The ribs protruded and the muscles were spare. No fat inhabited any part of the creature’s body. Relative to the demon’s own frame, its muscles looked thin and scrawny. But beside it, the strongest man in the village would have looked like he was made of matchsticks.

The wings were membranous things. The dirt and rocks pressed up through them and in some places the impact had torn them.

The face of the thing was even redder than the rest. In profile it looked somewhat like the shape of a new moon, a crescent in which the forehead and chin conspired to meet. The nose hooked downwards and its nostrils were flat and broad—I could easily imagine it snorting furious bursts of smoke out through them. Its skull pressed outwards against its skin and every angle of the face was hard and aggressive. The horns were black, short and hooked inwards.

Its lips had drawn back to reveal the demon’s yellow teeth— every one a needle sharp canine and not a molar among them. It looked like it was smiling, which I found hard to overlook. Its yellow eyes, with the oblong pupils of a goat, were also open. This, too, concerned me. Had anyone even checked to see if the demon had been killed by the impact? Perhaps it was only stunned. Worse, perhaps it was just pretending to be dead.

Finally—and this was one detail that, like the smell from the thing, had escaped no one’s attention—the creature’s ‘demonhood’ was not only enormous, it was also studded with fleshy, backward-pointing barbs. And it had three testicles. This made the men of the village darken with jealous anger, the women darken with unholy fantasies. It made the children laugh and point.

It was decided that everyone depart until the worst of the midday heat was gone. At that time Rickett and Wiggery, with the help of Reginald Cleaver, the village butcher, would divide the demon into two equal pieces. Cleaver would then make the necessary incisions and removals to produce ‘edible’ cuts for the first ever Feast of the Dragon.

By the time I got back to Velvet, my lunch was well past its best and though she threatened with great sweetness to paddle my bumcakes rosy, I didn’t have the will to take her up on it. The sun was high in the untouchable and the whole of Long Lofting was either ready for or already enjoying its afternoon nap.

Headless

I woke to the sound of Velvet sweeping the dust from the back porch and lay for a while listening to the stiff, rhythmic swish of her broom on the well-worn boards. Through the shutters, I could see the sun had begun to fall towards the earth, having slipped well beyond its zenith. Wanting only to sleep and sleep, I swung out of bed and rubbed my face to rouse myself. Outside, Velvet laid her broom aside and sat on one of the two rockers facing the field where the crater was. I approached and placed a hand on her shoulder. She laid her hand over mine.

“No one’s come back yet,” said she.

“We must be the first to waken.”

“No. It’s later than usual. You’ve slept near three hours.”

I checked the position of the sun and knew that she was right. Already I was sweating again for only a little of the heat had left the day. I sniffed the air and it smelled hot and dusty but clean.

“Come on,” said I.

In spite of the heat, I almost ran across the deserted field to the crater, with Velvet following not far behind me. The demon was gone and there were ruts in the ground leading out of the field.

“Spulicks! They’ve started without us!”

I ran back to the house to fetch the Ledger and without waiting for Velvet rushed over to Reginald Cleaver’s place where I was fairly sure everyone would be. The pathways of Long Lofting were empty, the cottages quiet but as I ran, the sound of a crowd up ahead grew louder. Cleaver’s place was set away from the centre of the village to minimise the stench of slaughter. Now, his house and abattoir were partially blotted out by the entire population of Long Lofting, about eight hundred souls. The quickest way to get to the front would be to skirt the crowd and Cleaver’s property and push in from the front.

A couple of minutes later I was squeezing between the wall of the abattoir and a smaller throng of onlookers. Reaching the front of the crowd I saw the source of the latest debate. Outside the abattoir was a hoist where Cleaver would shackle and lift larger animals before slitting their throats and allowing them to bleed out into the trough that collected the precious blood. Not a drop was ever wasted. The hoist was designed to handle even the largest cows and wild bison when we were lucky enough to hunt one down, but it was far too small for the demon. They’d got as far as chaining its ankles and raising them, but at full height, the hoist had merely lifted the demon’s legs off the ground.

“Keep those mules harnessed,” shouted Cleaver. “We’ll have to shift it to the bell tower. It’s the only place high enough for the job.”

“Now wait a moment,” said Leopold Prattle, puffing himself up to his full stature, “No one is going to perform a slaughter in the Great Father’s house.”

I couldn’t keep my mouth shut.

“It’s a flaming demon, Prattle. The Great Father’ll thank you for making his job a little easier.”

“When you’re ordained to speak on behalf of the Great Father, Delly Duke, you’ll be priest of this village. Some time after Hell freezes over, I should think.”

Everyone chuckled.

It could have been the heat haze but I thought I saw the demon twitch.

“There really is no other place but the bell tower, Priest Prattle,” said Cleaver, “And I think Mr. Duke does have a point. We’ll be doing the Great Father a favour.”

“What is wrong with you people? You don’t do favours for the Great Father. You love and you serve him. That is all.” Prattle sighed and sagged back into his more usual posture of burdened martyrdom. “However, as there is no other place to perform this task, I authorise you to use the bell tower on this one occasion.”

A happy shout went up from the worried crowd who thought that they were about to be cheated out of their feast in the eleventh hour by a religious technicality. At this rate, there were going to be a lot more faces in the church on the next holy day.

Cleaver lowered the demon’s feet and unshackled them. The crowd parted for the mule team and Rickett and Wiggery assisted the mule runner in re-hitching the demon. They dragged it away from the abattoir across the square to the church. The crowd followed, exhausted and hungry but full of anticipation. Half an hour later, having run a pulley system from the beams in the bell tower, Cleaver gave the signal and the demon was hoisted. This time they hauled it up until its head was hanging a stride and a half above the stone steps of church. Its wings hung outward and open, held at their tips quite willingly by Rickett and Wiggery. Its arms had been tied up behind its back to ensure that every limb would completely drain of its blood before slaughter. Its private parts, which had been a matter for public scrutiny since its arrival, hung down towards its belly and still drew stares and sighs from many of the women.

I grabbed Prattle by his skinny arm, immediately disgusted with myself for touching him, and said through clenched teeth,

“Are you sure you want them to do this?”

“A moment ago you were all for it.”

“No, I was only saying that if you were going to go ahead with it, there was no reason not to do it here at the church. I still don’t think that cutting up and eating a demon is a good idea.”

Prattle turned towards me then and I saw in his eyes what I should have noticed a lot earlier. He didn’t think it was a good idea either. He was frightened. It was obvious that all he’d been doing was chasing popularity and more backsides on church benches. When it came down to it, slaughtering a demon was not something he wanted to be involved with.

I pursued his weakness.

“You don’t have to go through with this, you know. You have enough power to stop them even now. You can threaten them with damnation and I can threaten them with the law and instead of eating the demon we can bury it and forget it was ever here. What do you say?”

I could see he was tempted. Perhaps it was his pride, though, that made him think about it for too long. I don’t think he could bear to accept that I’d been right from the start and that if he changed his mind now it would look like weakness, while my stance would look like strength. Our final chance at negotiation was interrupted by Cleaver booming at the crowd from the top step of the church where the demon’s neck was exposed and ready for his blade.

“Menfolk and womenfolk of Long Lofting, I proffer we chop the dragon’s head off and keep it as a trophy in memory of this day.”

The crowd cheered. They were starving; they would have said yes to anything at that stage. All they saw when they looked at that demon hanging down the entire front of the church from bell tower to steps was a big fat turkey ready for the oven. I suppose some of them might have been seeing steak or lamb cutlets, but they were all of one mind when it came to the demon’s noggin.

“Chop it off! Chop it off!”

The chant grew louder. Prattle and I stepped back from Cleaver to make some distance.

I glanced into the crowd and saw Velvet had arrived, her face full of amusement and curiosity. I gestured to her to get back to the house but she just smiled at me and waved back.

Cleaver put the blade of a long knife to the demon’s throat and drew it towards himself while pressing against the skin. It opened a deep groove in the creature’s neck but no blood came forth. He proceeded to saw towards the demon’s spine and the rift in its flesh grew wider becoming a second mouth. Inside were the demon’s muscles and vessels for air and food and gore. Though severed in cross section, not a drop of fluid came forth from any part of the wound.

Cleaver’s long bladed knife sawed and sawed until he reached the spinal bones and there he sawed even harder to split his way through two vertebrae. The head was almost free. Cleaver’s sweat sprinkled the stone and evaporated in moments. The crowd’s cheering died down as the work progressed; all had seen slaughter before and all were surprised there was neither blood nor fluid within the demon. With a gristly snick, the knife slipped through the discs and ligaments between the bones and parted the final flap of skin at the back of the demon’s neck.

The head fell.

It hit the top step of the church with a dull, bony knock. It bounced upwards surprisingly high and flipped over. Instead of rolling down the church steps towards the waiting onlookers, the head landed on the stone at Cleaver’s feet. The severed neck hit the granite with a fleshy slap and for a moment or two there was total silence. The crowd, perturbed by the lack of blood, weren’t sure whether to applaud or hiss. Then the demon’s eyes, which had been open but blank ever since it landed on its back in the cabbage field, blinked. A few people at the front of the crowd tried to take step back but found they were hemmed in by those behind them. Even those who weren’t sure what they’d seen sucked in a startled breath.

But when the demon smiled, pulling its thick leathery lips back even farther exposing rank after rank of jaundiced fangs, the gasps came back out as screams and holy petitions. The entire village tried to reverse from the head and many stumbled over with others falling on top of them. Those in the dirt scrambled away on hands and knees. The outer edge of the crowd expanded and broke until everyone felt they’d reached a safe distance. Rickett and Wiggery abandoned their respective wing tips and ran down the steps to join them.

Cleaver, still holding his knife and panting, hadn’t moved. From his angle, he couldn’t see what was scaring the villagers but when the demon’s body began to move he started back, raising his hands up to protect himself and dropping into a half crouch. The great wings of the beast, slack all this time, began to beat against the wall of the church. The wind they made would have been welcome in that heat if it hadn’t signaled life in such a monster. Dust and stone chips flew from the wall where the wing bones made contact. Cleaver must have thought it was the demonic equivalent of a beheaded chicken’s twitches and flutters and that it would settle down. He didn’t move far enough away and one of the wingtips caught him a solid blow on the shoulder. He flew like a straw doll thrown by a spoilt child and landed ten strides away on his face in the dirt. His knife landed harmlessly beside him.

The demon’s body bent in half, it snapped the ropes restraining its arms and its hooked fingers reached for the chain that held its ankles. Its attempts were clumsy and ill-coordinated because it couldn’t see what it was doing. When the hands did take hold of the chain, the talons flicked against the rusted links, cleaving them like twigs. The metallic snap of sheared iron was followed by the sound of the demon’s body collapsing into a headless heap at the front door of the church.

The impact dislodged the head and it bounced down the rest of the steps with a dizzy look on its face until it came to rest on its ear in the dust. The crowd of villagers dispersed still farther, some of them taking shelter in their homes, others peering around the walls of cottages or trading posts. A few froze where they were, caught in the open expanse of dirt that served as the village gathering place and market square.

The body of the demon tried to stand. With a clawed foot standing on one of its wings, it tripped onto its chest, tearing a hole in its flight membrane and rolled into the dirt. The head grimaced with frustration and a hint of embarrassment. Its lips moved but without air from its lungs the vocal chords were useless. The body pushed itself up from the ground again and this time stood swaying in the middle of the square. I’m certain the head would have been turning from one direction to another to assess the situation, had it still been attached. Instead, the headless thing walked carefully a few steps with its arms out in front of it like a shepherd looking for black sheep on a winter’s midnight.

It didn’t find its head. It found Cleaver, still stunned from the impact and in a good deal of pain. It found him because it kicked him as it walked, rolling him over a few times. Then the demon’s body crouched down and waved its flattened palms around until it found him trying to crawl away. I saw the smile come back to the demon’s face as its body stood up and brought Cleaver to the space where the head should have been. I thought the body believed it had found its head because it pushed Cleaver into the space above its shoulders over and over again. That was before I noticed what the head was doing: chomping—the teeth clashing against each other. The demon was trying to eat Cleaver, but luckily for him it was impossible. After some more fruitless chewing, the demon, its head looking truly disgusted with itself and its body looking about as useful as one of Rickett and Wiggery’s cabbages, let Cleaver drop to the ground.

I’d seen enough by that stage. I ran forward towards the bottom of the church steps while everyone else was still either backing or running away. I heard Velvet, the sweet little blossom that she is, screaming my name and begging me to stay away. I darted behind the demon’s body and, careful not to let my fingers get near the mouth, I snatched up the demon’s head, fought my way to Velvet and dragged both of them away. The head was about twice the size of my own and far heavier than I’d expected it to be. After a few yards I was exhausted and sweating cupfuls.

“Here, Velvet, take hold of one of these horns. We’ve got to keep the head hidden from the body and then we’ll all be safe.”

“The things I do for you, Delly Duke, no other woman has ever endured.”

“Carrying a demon’s head must make a nice change then,” said I, panting.

Velvet took hold of that horn like the good woman I’ve always known her to be. She even managed a laugh at the jumble-headedness of what we were doing.

“Where are we going to put it?” asked she.

“I know the perfect place,” said I.

Prattle’s Courtyard

No one was keen to chase after us considering what we were carrying, so we arrived at the priest’s lodge several minutes before anyone else. I suppose most of the village were still watching the demon’s body stagger around in the square. But Velvet and I had the thinking end of the demon and that was dangerous part.

We pushed our way through the iron gate and up the path to the imposing thatched household that was Leopold Prattle’s home. I could never understand what priests did that warranted such grand accommodation. Surely they just needed a cell with a cot and a fireplace for the winter—not that we’d had anything approaching a frost or snowfall for as many seasons as I could remember. Why all the accoutrements and luxuries? Weren’t priests supposed to be men of simplicity and contentment? Prattle’s priest lodge had many rooms and even a small courtyard. He had three staff too—a cook, a cleaner and a gardener. All female. All young. All examples of eager, dimpled pulchritude. It made me sick.

I didn’t bother to knock because I knew there was no one home. Using my shoulder I eased the front door open. We walked through the reception hall and out to the courtyard where a spreading Cyprus tree gave shade. We placed the head, the jaws of which were snapping shut repeatedly and with great malice, out in the open on the dirt and sat down at a table to watch it and recover our breath. Some of the outer leaves on the cypress tree died in the presence of the head but most seemed unaffected.

“I love Leopold’s place, don’t you?” said Velvet as though she was a regular visitor.

“It’s a hovel. Anyway, when have you been here before?”

“Oh, I haven’t really. Just once or twice probably.”

“Whatever for?”

“It was a long time ago, Delly. I think I came for spiritual guidance.”

“From that unwashed reprobate? Tell me you’re jesting.”

“I think he washed more often back then. And he was very supportive.”

“Well, patch my pink pyjamas. I would never have believed it.”

Velvet ignored my disgust. She looked around the courtyard and through the windows of the house with appreciation.

“I could live in place like this,” she said.

“Oh, pigswill, Velvet. It’s a glorified lean-to. Our place is much nicer—the garden, the open country beyond—”

“The half-witted neighbours, the long walk to market…”

I shut up. She was right; Prattle’s place was a palace compared to ours and it had privacy, too. I took out the Ledger and scanned it for information on ridding your village of a demon. At the front door there was a commotion and several people spilled through into the courtyard with us. I saw more gathered behind them, afraid to follow. One individual, his black robes unable to hide the dirt or keep in the reek of his body, stumbled right into us.

“Nyev, nyev, nyev. You can’t put it here,” shouted Prattle as he waved his sticklike arms at me. “Take it away now.”

I brushed some grime from my shirt and tried not to breathe through my nose.

“This is the proper place for it,” said I. “It’s a spiritual matter and you’re responsible for it.”

He couldn’t publicly deny either point, so he stood there and put his hands on his hips. When he could think of nothing else to say he turned to the demon head and pretended to assess it, stroking his chin as though he was near to a solution. But he said nothing. Eventually, the small crowd of people in his courtyard approached. Among them were the joint owners of the demon, Rickett and Wiggery, and a bruised, dust covered Reginald Cleaver back in possession of his knife and looking like he wanted to use it some more.

“I say we kill it,” said Cleaver, demonstrating in a single sentence why he’d advanced no further in life than butchery.

“You going to cut off its head again are you, Reg?” I asked. Folk sniggered. Cleaver was indignant.

“No, we cut it up into small pieces and burn it to ashes.”

This was too much.

“Reg,” I whispered, “It’s a demon. From Hell. You can’t burn something that thrives in the hottest flames ever created.

“Yeah, but couldn’t we…”

The hand with the knife in it dropped to his side. The whiteness left his knuckles. Puff Wiggery smacked the heel of his palm against his forehead.

“So that means, no matter how much we cook the demon steaks and chops, they’ll still be raw, right?”

Several people made disgusted retching sounds.

“I’m going off eating the thing, I can tell you,” said Blini Rickett.

“I think we need to talk to it,” said I, “Find out why it came here.”

“Yes, that’s right,” said Prattle as if the idea had been his.

He approached the demon head and several people backed away, not certain what it might be capable of. Not one of them thanked me for bringing the head a safe distance from the body so that neither could be effective. No one said ‘you were right about this demon, Delly Duke.’ Instead, they watched Prattle kneel down at what he believed to be a safe distance from the demon and address it.

“Vile abomination, why do you come here? Tell us your purpose lest we destroy you.”

The demon opened and closed its mouth and moved its lips in what might have been language but no sound came out. Prattle leaned in a little closer.

“You’ll have to speak up, spawn of the dark one, or we will be forced to encourage you.” Prattle looked back at his little knot of onlookers and winked as though he’d interrogated many a demon. I sighed in resignation. From my angle, it looked like the demon head was laughing. His face was wrinkled tight, creases at the edges of his mouth and eyes. A few droplets of sulphurous pus trickled from the corners of his eyes; he was laughing so hard he was crying. Prattle had his own opinion. “Observe,” he said, gesturing towards the contorted face, “See how the mere proximity of a holy man strikes pain into the beast. Come now, demon, speak to us.”

Feeling very tired, I put a hand on Prattle’s shoulder and gestured for him to listen to me for a moment. He didn’t look pleased to have his routine interrupted, especially when he had the crowd and the demon eating out of his hand. I whispered as quietly as I could.

“The demon isn’t able to make any sound because it has been separated from its lungs. I’m certain there’s plenty it wants to say to you, but at this stage, it’s not possible. We’ll need to make arrangements.”

Irritated, but knowing I was right, Prattle asked:

“What kind of arrangements?”

Puff

An hour later everything was set up in Prattle’s courtyard. The demon’s head was elevated, propped up between two chairs on top of a table, and we’d managed to stick the sharp end of a large pair of bellows from the forge into its windpipe. Despite placing a sack over the demon’s head during the entire operation and everyone wearing thick leather gauntlets, Cleaver had lost a thumb to the demon’s snapping teeth. Velvet was bandaging his hand as best she could, having sewn the wound closed with gut.

“I’ll never work again,” he was saying. “I can’t do anything with my left hand, not even wan—”

“Never mind about that now, Mr. Cleaver,” said Velvet, cool as you please. “You’ll learn to use your left hand in no time.”

“Truly? You think I will?”

“Of course I do. I know it. You just need to practice. To give yourself some incentive you can start by practising wan—”

“Thank you, Velvet,” I said, “I think he’s got the idea. Now then, who’s going to operate the bellows, Puff or Blini?”

“I’m not doing it,” said Wiggery.

“Nor I,” said Rickett.

“This demon is your property, gentlemen. Remember how I helped you to establish that fact and save you from the hungry masses?”

Neither of them spoke.

“Right, you can take it in turns, then. You first, Puff.”

“Oh, come on, why can’t he go first?”

“Just do it.”

Looking frightened and put out, Puff took up a position behind the demon’s head and took hold of the bellows handles.

“Make sure you don’t knock the head off the chairs when you’re pumping. You have to be firm but gentle.” I wanted to add, ‘just like when you jizjam Mrs. Rickett’, but I held back. We had enough trouble on our hands as it was.

“When should I do it?”

“Just start pumping and don’t stop until we say so.”

With his elbows moving in an out like a slow impersonation of a flapping chicken, Puff Wiggery began to blow air into the demon’s head via the windpipe. The rhythmic sighing was difficult for the demon to deal with at first. Its eyes opened wide with surprise at the snorts of air coming involuntarily down its nose. It opened its mouth and made ‘haa, haa, haa,’ sounds with each pressurised blast from the bellows.

“Living up to your name now, Puff,” shouted Rickett and everyone laughed, their nerves forgotten for a moment.

Prattle stepped in front of the demon head. Because of the table and two chairs, it was higher up than his own head and the height advantage and the sheer size of it made him seem inferior in every way. He showed less confidence than he had earlier.

“Now then, demon, where have you come from and why are you here?”

“Haa, haa, I am from haa, haa, Hell, idiot mortal. Haaaaa, haa.”

Prattle blustered on, dusting over his mortal idiocy.

“What do you want with us? Why have you come to Long Lofting?”

The demon licked its lips, careful not to shred its venom-yellow tongue on its own teeth. The tongue extended further, sharpening to fleshy point and with great control, the demon licked at some irritation near the lobe of its ear. A few stifled gasps came from Long Lofting womenfolk who were brave enough to have squeezed into the priest lodge. I checked Velvet out of the corner of my eye but she seemed impassive, unaffected by the fiendish display of lingual dexterity. The demon might have had a long tongue but it wasn’t educated in the use of it, not like me. I allowed myself a moment of smugness—I, a mere mortal, could out-evil a demon any day of the week.

“There’s haa, haa, no more room in Hell, haa, haa. It’s too crowded.”

“You came here directly from Hell?” I asked.

“I’m asking the questions, Duke,” said Prattle, and turning to the demon head asked. “Well, did you?”

“Haa, directly. Yes. Haa, haaaaa.”

“Why are we asking him that, by the way?” asked Prattle.

“Because,” said I, feeling a little nauseous about the demon’s answer, “Hell is meant to be below us.”

Then the demon, which had been only sighing up to that point, started to laugh properly.

“HA, HA, haa, haaa, AHAHAHAAAaaaaa, haaa.”

The poisonous tears appeared in its eyes once again as its face crunched into painful looking mirth.

“Haa, haaa imbeciles aaaaah, HAHAHAaaaaaaHAHAHA.”

All the trauma to the creature’s neck region, brought on by the pumping and the laughing dislodged Cleaver’s thumb from the demon’s oesophagus. It landed, burned but recognisable on the table below it. Puff Wiggery fainted, ending his stint on the bellows. They clattered to the ground beside him and the demon was silent.

“Your turn, Rickett,” I said. “Go on, hurry up.”

No more enthusiastic than his farming partner had been, Blini Rickett pushed Wiggery’s limp body out of the way, picked up the bellows and inserted the dirty tip into the demon’s neck. When he pumped, the demon’s tongue shot straight out of its mouth and vibrated. I shook my head in disbelief.

“That’s its food pipe, pheasant brain. Stick it in the other one.”

When he’d got the apparatus correctly set up, Blini started pumping again and the demon continued to chortle to itself. Prattle was indignant. You could hear it in his high-pitched wheezy whine.

“Nyev, nyev. This isn’t correct. Why is it laughing?”

“Leopold,” said I, “I’m not certain we want to know the answer to that.”

“We jamming well do. What is so jizzing funny, you corrupted son of the devil?”

I’d never heard Prattle swear before. The demon had him riled.

“HAHAHA, Haa, haa, Hell is everywhere, haa, haaa. Hell is haa, haa, all around HAHAHA.”

“What? What did he say? Hell is all around? What is that meant to mean? Are you trying to scare us, Demon, is that what it is? Well, I can assure you you’ll have to do a lot better than that.”

A look of understanding passed across the faces of all the villagers present. Things that had never made sense before, suddenly added up in their minds. The hotter and hotter summers, the frostless winters. It all became clear to them. Even Rickett was shocked enough to stop pumping. The looks of recognition were followed by expressions of panic. Prattle seemed to be the only one who wasn’t able to accept what the demon head was saying to us.

“Call yourself a demon? Is that the best you can come up with, ‘hell is everywhere’? Pathetic.”

Prattle look like he was fairly close to taking Cleaver’s knife and sticking into the demon’s eyes. I stepped over to him before he had the chance and took hold of his shoulders.

“We all need a break from this. And you and I need to talk. Very seriously.”

I wondered if I was going to have to slap him. His eyes were boring into the demon’s head; his face was pale with rage. He understood well enough what the demon was saying. Then he turned to me.

“Yes. We need to talk.”

Religion and Law

Without the usual show of ceremony, Prattle banished the villagers from his house and grounds and he and I walked back towards the square. He seemed to hold some great force within him like a heated cauldron with its lid clamped shut. His bony shoulders were drawn up, his head hung forward as though weighted and his fists were clenched, the knuckles pale and strained. His mouth showed no trace of lips; there was only a slit, mashed closed. Behind us, the confused knot of villagers stared after us and then, in straggled clumps, followed. I tried to keep the distance between them and us greater than earshot.

“It’s telling the truth, you know.”

Prattle flashed his eyes my way but stomped onward, saying nothing.

“It’s a reasonable explanation for everything that’s happened over the last few seasons.”

A hiss escaped the cauldron’s lid:

“Thirty years.”

“Excuse me?”

“Thirty jizjamming years of devotion and unstinting faith. Thirty years of study, sweat, humility, service, selflessness–

Could he really be talking about himself?

—sacrifice, chastity and abstinence. Thirty years of poverty—

Oh, please.

—and preaching to congregation after congregation of ignorant, uneducated sinners. And what do I get?”

Knowing it was a rhetorical question I interrupted by answering,

“Some kind of promotion, I would have thought…”

The flash of eyes again. He still had Cleaver’s knife. I shut my mouth.

“Nothing, that’s what. Not even the assurance after all this faith that there’s even a Great Father still out there.”

“Oh, I’m sure the Gr—”

“What would you know about the Great Father?” Prattle’s eyes bulged. He stopped walking, turned me and screamed into my face. “Eh? You with your books and your laws and your smug self-satisfaction? You think you’re so intelligent, so above the rest of us, don’t you? And you don’t have the first idea what it is we’ve all lost today, do you?”

The villagers who’d been following us were now hearing everything we said.

“An inedible barbecue?”

Prattle laughed. It was a strange sound; not one of happiness but the strangled guffaw of the anguished in whom the emotions are too intense to be distinguished.

“Fine. Make your jokes, Delly. You might as well while your body is still alive. But when you die your soul will go to Hell. All our souls will go to Hell.” He held up his thin white arms and shouted, “The Great Father is DEAD. WE’RE ALL GOING TO HELL.”

I pulled his arms down, regretting it the moment the sour smell of his sweat hit me.

“Don’t tell them that! There’ll be a riot. You’ll be the first one they lynch. You have to help me keep everyone calm until we work all this out.”

“There’s nothing left to work out. Everyone is doomed.”

“How can you say that? We have to think about this before we give up and go like lambs under Cleaver’s blade. Maybe you’re wrong. Maybe the Great Father isn’t dead at all.”

“He would never allow this to happen. His death is the only explanation.”

“All right. Maybe it is. But what if he—I mean He—wasn’t dead? What might that mean?”

“That He has abandoned us.”

Ah. Not positive.

“Right,” said I. “ Er, Good. And so He’s a forgiving sort of…being, isn’t he?”

“The Great Father is the most forgiving of all.”

“There you go then. There’s already a way back.”

“But how can you prove He isn’t dead?”

“How can you prove He is?”

“The demon said—”

“Crusty cow flops, Leopold, you’re not going to take the word of a demon are you?”

With some of the steam gone from his pot, Prattle deflated a little. We walked on and he spoke in more even tones.

“Well, no…of course not…but—”

“But nothing. That demon’s a devious mischief-maker. He may only be telling us half the truth. He may be lying through his pointy yellow teeth. Either way, we can’t trust him. Meanwhile, we have to find out what’s really going on.”

We arrived in the open square where a circle of onlookers now goggled at the body of the demon. It was standing unmoving, as we’d left it. The villagers didn’t seem confident to go any nearer than about fifteen strides and I couldn’t blame them. It had a long reach and moved fast when it wanted to. Even the inability of its body to function without a head might have been nothing more than a ploy. The crowd parted to let us through and we stood in front of the demon scratching our chins and jumping every time the headless giant so much as twitched. Prattle looked pale and tired now as he regarded our adversary.

“What the Hell are we going to do with it?” He asked.

I shrugged, unable to answer.

“Just look at the size of its…club.”

“I know, I know. It isn’t natural. No matter what happens, the ladies in the village will be dreaming about that appendage for the rest of their lives. And to have three onions that big! Imagine the mess.”

“Thank you, Delly Duke, I’d rather not.”

We were thoughtful for a moment. Me, contemplating the results of the demon servicing our womenfolk and Prattle, no doubt, imagining he was the demon. I thought it best to curtail his fantasies before they became dangerous.

“Isn’t there any information on demons in your holy scroll? A ritual for exorcism perhaps?”

“The problem doesn’t seem to have been anticipated.”

“That’s interesting.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well why would the Great Father create Hell and demons and then not mention it in His scroll?”

“There’s a section on dragons,” said Prattle as if that would make up for it. It explained his keenness on the idea of the feast of the dragon.

“Never mind. I think there are a few more pages on demons in the Ledger. I’ll give it a more thorough read through and meet you at sunrise to discuss it.”

“I’m not having that creature’s head in my lodge until morning. It’s an abomination.”

“The people will expect you to be the custodian of the head until we fathom this out.”

“Yes, but why can’t we finish it tonight?”

“Because we’re all tired and we’re not prepared. Tomorrow we’ll all be fresh and ready to act. Right now we need a rest.” I gestured to the folk in the crowd. “Look at them, Leopold. They weren’t exactly fit before this started. Now they’re exhausted and so am I.”

As we walked back towards the lodge, Prattle asked me a question:

“Where did you get this Ledger? How can it contain so much information?”

“It’s been in the Duke family for generations. Tells you everything you need to know.”

“Let me see it.”

“I don’t think that’s appropriate, Leopold. You are a man of the cloth, after all. It wouldn’t become you to pollute your mind with the fatherless literature that the Ledger contains. I promise I’ll glean every last fact from it before tomorrow morning. Then, together, we shall rid Long Lofting of the demon.”

I clapped him on the shoulder and snatched my hand away before it became too soiled. We reached the lodge and it was deserted. I assumed Velvet had gone home ahead of me to prepare the supper. I bid Leopold goodnight and sauntered home amid long shadows of a bright evening. It was still hot enough to make me sweat and I knew that none of us would sleep deeply that night, especially Leopold, who had the topmost portion of an underworld employee right in the middle of his house. I couldn’t help smiling at that. What a stroke of genius it had been to insist he act as the demon’s guardian.

I walked through the front door of my croft into an almost cool atmosphere. The shutters had been closed all day to keep out the sun and allow the breeze to pass through. I sighed with pleasure at the relative comfort it brought, knowing that as soon as I became used to it I would feel hot all over again. The croft was silent.

“Velvet?”

I walked through the entryway into the main room where the kitchen and dining and sleeping areas were. It was quiet. No pots rattling, no hissing of escaping steam. I opened the back door to see if she was in the garden and tripped over a hen that had been pecking at the boards of the porch in a brainless bid for nourishment. When I kicked it, it flapped in shock, gaining enough air for a moment that my booted foot sent it, clucking and yodeling, far into the garden where it crashed into the corn and disappeared.

“Stupid bird. Velvet? You out here?”

Mary the goat, tethered out of reach of the crops, ignored me.

As I walked back into the shade of the house, Velvet bustled in through the front door.

“Everything all right, Velvet?”

“Oh, yes. Right finely, thanks.”

“I thought you’d gone before me.”

“No, I was just having a gossip with some of the ladies.”

“That’s not like you.”

“No, it isn’t. I don’t hang around with them long enough usually, but it was hard to avoid today.”

“Find out any meaty details?”

“Maybe. Why do you want to know?”

“Just curious, I suppose, but you’re welcome to keep it to yourself. I’ve got enough to keep my mind occupied as it is. I don’t suppose you managed to find out the general feelings of the villagers to the demon, did you? I mean, are they frightened? Do you think they’ll panic? We may have to call out the militia whether we want to or not; and not to deal with the demon but to keep the peace. What do you think?”

“They are scared. But they seem to have a lot of faith in you and Leopold to set things right. A lot of them still want to eat it.”

I smirked, only half amused.

“Hardly surprising really. We’ve got enough water to drink in the well, but not enough to ensure that the crops and beasts survive until the harvest. Hunger does strange things to people.”

Velvet smiled.

“I’m well aware of that. Now, what do you want for your supper?”

“Is there a choice?”

“Not exactly.”

I chose the simplest, easiest, most likely to be available option.

“What about a corn cake or two with and egg on top?”

“Fine. Only there’s no eggs.”

“No eggs?”

“They haven’t been laying. I think it’s the heat.”

“Not laying? Useless bloody chickens. I need a drink.”

I descended into the tiny cellar and poured myself an ale. I drank it right down in the near total darkness, filled the cup again and brought it back up the ladder with me. Sitting in the corner, I cracked the shutters to let a shaft of evening sunlight in and opened the Ledger to the section on demons. The section seemed longer and more in depth than it had when I’d first looked demons up, but that didn’t surprise me. The Ledger was an unusual book, adding to itself constantly. All Men of Law are issued with a Ledger at graduation. It’s not the kind of thing you would want to fall into the hands of, say, a local priest.

Supper came and went without conversation—I read the Ledger at the table and then took it back to my reading chair. Velvet was very attentive to my ale cup for which I was thankful. However, by the time I’d read all I needed to know, getting to bed was somewhat of a struggle. I vaguely remember hoping my head would be clear by morning.

The Demon’s Club

I awoke in blackness to the sound of insistent but subdued thumping. At first I thought I was having some order of palpitation, brought on by a nightmare. It was almost a relief to realise that the sound was coming from outside my body. Someone was at the front door. Then followed the realisation that people only ever wake you up in the night for bad news or rutting and, as it wasn’t Velvet making the noise, I had to anticipate the unhappier option.

“Get that would you, my sweet. My head’s as thick as bison dung.”

Velvet didn’t answer.

The banging intensified and I heard a hiss of words, someone trying to shout in a whisper. I rolled over to wake Velvet but she wasn’t in bed. Surely, I thought, if she’s up she’d have answered the door by now. Then I deduced that she was probably scared witless and standing behind the front door with the poker raised over her head ready to defend the homestead. Brave girl. I sighed and struggled to my feet, swaying slightly and groaning when I was upright. A headache blossomed above my eyes.

“All right!” I shouted, not caring to whisper now that I’d been disturbed. “I’m coming!”

I shuffled towards the door and saw no sign of Velvet in the gloom.

“If you’re waiting to attack whoever’s out there, my darling,” I said into the darkness, “Make sure you don’t hit me.”

I pulled the door open and there outside found not one person but a small group of Long Lofting menfolk. Rickett and Wiggery were at the head of it.

“Very sorry to disturb you, sir, but there’s a bit of an emergency,” said Rickett.

“Can’t it wait until the morning?”

“Some of the women have gone missing.”

“What? Where?”

“We don’t know, sir. Is the good lady Velvet with you?”

“Of course she is. She’s right over…just a moment.” I pushed the door to and retreated into the croft. “Velvet? Where are you?” I checked outside but the outhouse door stood open, no one inside. At the front door, even in the dark, my shock must have been obvious. I couldn’t keep the concern out of my voice.

“She’s not here. Does anyone know where they might have gone? Any of you?”

No one spoke, but I saw heads shaking. There was something about the mood amongst the men that unnerved me, not panic exactly but a sense of loss. It spread into me like the fever. I dressed quickly while they waited and brought the Ledger with me. I’m not a violent man but I also took the poker.

Not wanting to cause too much despair but unable to disguise my own fears, I said,

“We’d better check the square first.”

None of the men wanted to show too much concern but within a few moments we were almost running. In the square it was as I’d feared; the demon’s body was gone. Footprints in the dusty earth would be easy to follow, but first we had to check with Prattle.

I thumped hard on the door of the priest’s lodge, the rest of the men panting and sweating behind me. It took him a long time to answer.

“Wake up, Priest Prattle! Quickly now, the villagers are in great danger!”

The sacred moments wasted away while the scrawny hypocrite arose and composed himself. I imagined him reciting some useless prayer before answering the door. It creaked on its hinges and he stood there blinking and bewildered to be facing a group of sweaty men.

“Hurry, Leopold, let us in. The demon’s body has gone missing and we must make sure the head is still secure.”

I pushed past him not waiting for an invitation. The rest followed.

“Wait a moment. Hold on, now. Who said you could— oow!”

Someone stepped on his toe.

“Don’t you have a lamp, Leopold?”

“Yes, but I don’t see why I should—”

“Fetch it now, man! There’s no time!”

Containing his anger and still half asleep, Prattle brought a lamp and turned it as bright as it would go. I held it out towards the two chairs on top of the table in the courtyard and it lit up the demon’s head. I suppose we ought to have been grateful that the body hadn’t broken in and stolen the head back, otherwise all would have been lost. Instead, we still had the head.

But it wasn’t sleeping.

Nor was its face a mask of blankness.

Bathed in the ivory glow from the lamp its face shifted from one expression of ecstasy to another. First it closed its eyes and pursed its lips as if appreciating some kind of sensual caress, then its eyes sprang open, wide and staring and its mouth stretched into the black hole of a silent roar of pleasure, its teeth bared, lips drawn back. Next the eyes closed again and a silent sigh. Then the face was laughing, delighting in some devious thrill. Most of the men folk didn’t understand it straight away, but I did and, curiously, so did Prattle.

“Great Father,” he said, “The housekeepers. That’s why no one answered the door.”

“Follow me,” I shouted, “We can’t waste a moment. And I suggest you arm yourself if you haven’t already.”

I didn’t wait. I sprinted from the priest’s lodge back to the square as fast as I could, my headache and residual drunkenness forgotten for the moment. I followed the demon’s footprints. They were easy to see even in the dark because they were so big. On either side of the prints were many others; those of the bare feet of some of the Long Lofting women. The tracks led into the woods beyond Cleaver’s abattoir. Not checking to see if anyone had kept up with me, I hurtled along the path between the great oak trees, on the verge of uttering petitioning prayers to the Great Father.

I reached the clearing first. It had been the site of countless village festivals. We Long Loftingers even had our own fertility rituals which we combined with worship of the Great Father, performing them to ensure healthy crops and bounteous harvests. Nevertheless, the clearing had never seen such a sight as this.

Several oil lamps formed a ring of dusky golden light. Within it, the womenfolk—and there were many of them— each imbued with some admixture of wantonness, temptation and curiosity, danced in a circle around the supine demon’s body. In the centre of the circle one of the women straddled the demon, impaling herself on its most evil horn. I recognised the look of pleasure on her face, although there was an utter abandonment there I’d never seen before. As the other village men arrived beside me and stopped in shock at the sight before them, Velvet let out a carnal scream of pleasure and collapsed sideways off the creature’s knobbly totem. Another of the women pulled her away by the hair and squatted to take her place.

Prattle was standing right beside me when he muttered,

“Dear Father above, she was a sweet one. Now look what filth she’s become.”

Velvet’s comment from the previous day, about seeing Prattle for spiritual guidance, suddenly took on greater meaning. There wasn’t time to enquire about the details, however.

Wiggery asked,

“What the Hell are we going to do to stop it?”

“There’s only one thing we can do,” said I. “Two of you go back and bring the demon’s head to me. And mind your fingers.”

“Isn’t that a bit dangerous?” asked Prattle.

“Yes, very. But we have to do it. The demon has to see what I’m going to do. We’re going to make a deal with it.”

“A deal with a demon? Do you want to spend the rest of eternity in Hell?”

“No, I certainly don’t. That’s why we’re doing this. Who’s going to get the head?”

“I will,” said Puff Wiggery, a nervous eye cast towards his still dancing wife.

“Me too,” said Rickett, uncertain whether his wife had had her turn by then or not.

“Make it quick.” They ran off into the night. “The rest of you get down and keep as quiet as you can. We don’t want to do anything to disturb them too early.”

I watched the orgy progress. Velvet had recovered and was dancing in the circle again. I assumed that meant she was planning to have another bite of the fiendish cherry. It didn’t matter to me; the damage was already done. The important factor was that the dancing women’s trance was so strong they had no inkling of our arrival.

“What is this plan you’ve got?” asked Prattle as we crouched in the dry undergrowth.

“We’re going to cut the demon’s tail off.”

“What? Its tickle tail?”

“No. Its demon tail. That’s the thing that demons fear most and a demon with no tail has no power over humans. If we can get its tail, we’ll have all the bargaining power we need.”

“You’re insane.”

“I’m only going to do this once, Leopold, so enjoy the experience.” I passed him the Ledger. “Read it and you’ll see.”

“I can’t read this. It’s an arcane book of occult nonsense.”

“Read it. Then give it right back to me.”

So he read, the pages an inch or two from his face but glowing very faintly in the night, enough that he could see the words. When he was finished he handed the book back to me without saying a word.

Moments later Wiggery and Rickett returned with the head of the demon.

“Keep it facing away for the moment,” I said. “Now then, any volunteers for the next part?”

No one spoke.

“There’s no shame in that. It’s a dangerous job. You could die a horrible death and go to Hell, so I understand. Last chance,” said I. “Anyone.”

I looked across at Prattle.

“You still have Cleaver’s knife, I take it?”

He drew the blade out from his black robes and it gleamed even in the darkness. I leaned in close to him.

“You know, doing this would be great for your reputation. And this is still a religious matter. I will stand aside for you if you want to take the job.”

Prattle only shook his head and handed me the knife, handle first. I looked at the edge of the blade and the thickness of the steel behind it and hoped it was the right tool for the job. More than that, I prayed I had the strength to do what was required.

“If this works, we give the demon back its head and keep the tail.”

“What’s to stop it taking the tail away from us once it can see what it’s doing?”

“You’ve read The Ledger, Prattle. A demon without its tail has no power.”

Bargaining

I wanted to see the expression on the demon’s face when I sliced off its most prized body part but that was going to be impossible. I couldn’t risk letting the head see what I was doing or it might warn its body and then I’d be the meat. I broke cover and crept out towards the ring of swaying women and their Hellish stud. I have to admit, it was distracting seeing all those females, gyrating in sheer erotic anticipation. Most of them were naked or half naked and they bounced and jiggled in a most engaging manner. True, many of them could not be considered great works of art and that might have explained their terrible yearning for the intimate attentions of a demon, but just as many were more than presentable and a few, Velvet among them, were delectable beauties I’d have been proud to bed in my younger days. Nowadays, I was beyond that sort of frivolity, of course, although the truncheon beneath my britches protested otherwise.

The deep stupor the women had entered seemed to make them oblivious to my approach, yet it was still a struggle finding a gap in the constantly moving circle and slipping through it without a dangerous amount of contact. A doughy breast slapped against my left ear and I had an eyeful of Mrs. Wiggery’s unkempt belly-hedge before I made it past the women and into the space where the demon lay.

Carefully, I moved the lanterns that were dangerously near the demon away from its wings and limbs. I tried to ignore Blini Rickett’s wife as she skewered herself on the demon’s rough-hewn mast. She was kneeling on its upper thighs. Her hands clutched at the coarse red hairs on its stomach, her nails making no impression at all on the leathery surface. It was impossible to tell, even to my experienced ears, whether her cries were of pain or pleasure. I was thankful that she was facing his upper body—I didn’t want her to see me approach his nether regions with a knife. The spell might break and then she and all her coconspirators might turn that very knife on me.

I crawled up behind her, between the legs of the demon and was there confronted by its huge, hessian rough scrotum. It resembled a travelling pouch with three skittle balls inside and it shook in time with Mrs. Rickett’s squats and thrusts and yells. The snag was that the tail was partially obscured by the demon’s triumvirate of testicles. I was going to have to lift them in order to access the root of the tail. I knelt as close to the conjunction of its legs as I could and was then in closer proximity to Mrs. Rickett’s behind than I would have ever have chosen to be. The handle of the knife was slick with sweat as I reached forward with my left hand to lift the demon’s bag of three giant marbles and expose his greatest weakness.

I hesitated before I took hold of its adversarial gonads. What if it realised my hand wasn’t one of the women touching it? But it couldn’t know that, could it? Without its head, the only sense it had left was that of physical feeling. Convincing myself that this was logical, and knowing that there was, in truth, nothing logical about demons, I took a gentle grip on the trio of overgrown oysters and lifted. The demon’s legs twitched and stiffened. Mrs. Rickett gasped and continued her knee dance. Apparently, the extra stimulation had caused the demon’s club to swell even further. Beneath those infernal bollocks, I saw what I wanted to see. The cleft of its foul buttocks and behind that, the tail. The smell was shocking. It smelled like a chicken coop with a hundred dead goats in it on a hot day. Around me, the sounds of the entranced women with all their moaning and rustling through the dry grass, receded.

There was just me. And the knife. And the tail.

I watched my right hand point the tip of the knife at the ground beside the tail. I didn’t know if I had the strength but I had to make one single swift movement and the job had to be done. There would be no time for a second slice. I decided that a downward stroke with the force across the tail was the best way. There was hair around the base of the tail and that stopped the demon feeling the keenness of the blade. For all it knew it might have been the finger of a maiden ready with more stimulations. I took a deep breath in and mustered all my power and focus. I thrust the knife downward and towards the tail with every fibre of my strength and every atom of my will. With the other I kept a gentle hold on the tail. That was when I discovered, to my probably eternal relief that demons don’t have bones in their tails. The blade went through it as if I was cutting roast bison and the tail came away in my hand. I was so delighted I knelt there looking at the thing and smiling when I ought to have been running away.

I think it’s accurate to say that the demon felt the bite of the blade. It sat up knocking Mrs. Rickett—a still not totally satisfied Mrs. Rickett—backwards. She grappled the beast’s chest hairs and managed to hang on. There was no sound of a scream from either the body or the head, but I did hear repeated bursts of air escaping its windpipe and it didn’t take much to imagine the level of noise it would have made if its head were still attached to its body. The tail writhed like a snake in my hand and I fell backwards just as two enormous, six-fingered, talon-tipped hands came my way. Trapped by a leg on each side, I rolled backwards, ending up in a heap, but out of reach, at the creature’s feet. I stood up, knife in one hand with not a drop of blood upon it and tail in the left gripping my wrist and flailing as if blessed with its own life.

The circle of semi clad and unclad village ladies faltered in its rhythm. Some of the women looked around as if not knowing where they were and then, seeing each other as though for the first time and seeing me, they tried to cover themselves up with their hands. Most of them were far too well endowed for this approach to work. They merely looked more naked than ever. I ran past them to the sounds of Mrs. Rickett screaming, ‘NO, NO. Don’t stop. I haven’t finished yet!”

Moments later, women were running past me into the night, into the forest, trying to get home. We let them go but the men looked downhearted. Some of them looked totally defeated by what they’d seen. No doubt they thought that if they’d been lacking before in the eyes of their wives, they now had no chance. It wasn’t the moment for a pep talk on the unimportance of size. Instead I tried to rally them.

“Come along now, men folk. We have its tail. We have all the power.”

In the clearing the demon was standing, swaying with both hands clasped over the place where its tail had so recently been. Its once intimidating erection drooped defeated towards the ground. Even without its head the demon’s posture was an utter advertisement of its feelings.

It was humiliated, it was powerless, it was embarrassed.

I checked the demon’s face, knowing it knew what had happened and saw there, so contrasted with all its expressions of menace and excess, such a look of debilitation and despair that I almost felt sorry for the thing.

“Here, help me,” I said.

Prattle bent and took hold of a horn. We started to swing the head.

“One, two, THREE!”

We let go and the head flew away from us into the clearing. Rolling the last few strides and coming to rest at the feet of its estranged body. Controlling its body with difficulty from such a wrong angle, the head directed the hands downward until they had a hold of it. They lifted it back into place and for the first time since the demon had landed in the field, we saw it standing up, alive and complete except for one small and essential detail. From the front, of course, it still looked fairly fierce and the men took a few nervous steps backwards.

“Be bold, gentlemen. We are in control now,” said I.

I don’t think they believed me and to be honest, neither did I. The demon advanced towards us in huge strides, shaking the ground enough to unnerve me. The tail tried to slither free of my hand and I squeezed it tight. Even when the demon had been hanging from the church bell tower, it hadn’t seemed this large. It loomed in front of us. Well, in front of me, I should say, and looked down. Staring back up into its glowering face hurt my neck. I could hear the snorts as it breathed and for the first time saw smoke curling up from its nostrils. Its voice was deeper than a distant rumble of summer thunder. My very bones shook to hear him speak.

“Return that which you have stolen,” it said, pointing at my hand.

I had to force myself not to hesitate and my own voice sounded puny to my ears when I replied.

“I think not, demon.”

“Return it or I will slaughter all of you and devour your souls.”

Prattle tugged at my sleeve,

“Perhaps you ought to do what it suggests.”

I shook his hand away.

“Sorry, demon. Can’t do it. If you want your tail back, you’ll have to take it.”

I smiled a sweet smile and put my hands behind my back so that the tail was out of sight. The demon puffed himself up and spread his wings. He stretched his powerful arms out and uncurled his claw-tipped fingers. He raised himself up to his full height. He peeled his lips back to reveal his many teeth. He took a huge deep breath and his chest expanded to twice its normal size.

“That’s enough posturing, demon. Now, the fact is that you’re the one who’s stolen something from us. A couple of things, actually. First, you’ve taken our contentment and second, you’ve thieved the purity of some of our wives. We’d like both those things back, please. Or I’m very sorry, but it will be no more tail for Mr. Demon.”

The demon pointed a long and deadly finger at me.

“You will rue this disrespect, Delly Duke.”

“Oh, so you know my name do you? I expect I’m rather famous in Hell.”

“No, but we anticipate your imminent arrival. And the indignities I’ve suffered at the hands of you humans will be as nothing to those you’ll suffer at ours.”

“Quite so, I’m sure, but you won’t be involved in any of the fun because you’ve lost your tail. You’re out of a job. Now, I’ve given you a chance to win it back by undoing your misdeeds, but you’ve ignored that, so now the price goes up. Come and see me tomorrow if you wish to negotiate some kind of exchange. Not too early, though, it’s been a long night already.” I turned my back on the creature and walked away down the path back to the village. The rest of the men turned and followed but I saw them all cast uneasy looks back over their shoulders as we left the demon behind. Scant moments passed before the ground was shaking once again just behind us.

“I’ll return your contentment and the purity of your women. Just give me the tail. Now.”

I stopped and faced the creature again.

“I’m terribly sorry, demon. You must have misunderstood me the first time. You refused my offer and now the price has increased for the item you wish to purchase. Refuse the terms again and the price will increase yet again. It’s really very simple. Now do you want the tail back or don’t you?”

It was as though I’d pricked a bubble. The demon deflated, its shoulders sagged and its head hung down in misery and defeat.

“Yes,” it sighed.

“Then you’ve got some questions to answer and some work to do. Let’s go back to the church and make a start, shall we?”

“I don’t much like churches.”

“Tough.”

More Bargaining

In the church the demon sat near the altar shivering in discomfort. We sat in the front pews, me near the centre asking the questions.

“What is your name, demon?”

“Rupert.”

“What?”

Several men in the church sniggered and the demon looked miserable.

“It means a very terrifying thing in the language of Hell.”

“I see. Well…Rupert—” there was more chuckling around the church, “–tell us how you came to be in Long Lofting. No doubt you were on some mission for the lord of darkness.”

“No. I just needed some time off. We’ve been working overtime. My back is killing me and Long Lofting was the nearest place that I could disappear to for a rest.”

“You’re skiving from work? That’s it?”

Rupert nodded.

“I don’t believe you. If you came from Hell, how come you fell downwards from the sky? Hell is meant to be the underworld.”

“Well, metaphorically speaking, Hell is like an underworld. It’s full of caves and tunnels and labyrinths and pits. But it hasn’t been…you know,” the demon pointed towards the floor. “down there…for a long time.”

“Since when?”

“Oh, ages ago. And I mean ages. At first, Hell was a small place. Not many departed souls, very few sinners, not a lot for us to do really. And it was situated at the centre of the world. But as time’s gone by the number of departed souls has increased many thousand-fold and space became a problem. And let’s not forget how popular sinning has become. Recently, about a few hundred generations ago, Hell was moved. Instead of being encompassed by the world, it then surrounded it. After that, it started to lease parts of the world for its own purposes. Now there’s mostly Hell and very little world left. Just a few little villages like this one.”

“That explains why it’s been so hot,” said Prattle adding little of value to the conversation, as usual.

“Hot? You don’t know the meaning of the word,” replied Rupert.

“Where do the good people go when they die?” Asked Wiggery.

“The who?”

“The good people,” he repeated.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I only ever deal with bad people. Bad people just like you lot.” The demon managed a half smile that faded quickly.

“What about heaven? What about the Great Father?” Asked Rickett.

Prattle shifted in his pew seat and scratched behind his neck. Then he seemed to notice something fascinating and previously undiscovered about the prayer book he ought to

have known backwards.

“Uhm, I think you’ll find that’s just a rumour,” said Rupert.

“A rumour?” Wiggery was dismayed.

“Yes, you know, just a story. A kind of legend or folk tale.”

“I know what a jazzing rumour is. How can it be so?”

“As far as I know, the world was created by the Lord of Darkness for his own personal pleasure and diversion. He made a bet with himself about how long it would take his flawed creations to come home to him through the path of sin. He invented the Great Father and other versions of him to keep a natural tension alive in the world and give people a reason to find sinning so tempting. The game’s almost over.”

“How long is left?”

“Oh, I don’t know for certain, but he’s been smiling a lot recently which is a sure sign he’s expecting to win the bet.”

“But he can’t lose the bet,” said I.

Others nodded.

“That’s true.” The demon yawned, exposing his impossible ivories. “Explains why he’s such a happy all-powerful being, I suppose.”

Prattle was absorbed by some passage in the prayer book. He didn’t seem to have noticed what the demon was saying.

“So, what you’re telling us,” said Wiggery, “is that when the last good person in the world starts sinning and then dies, the world will end?”

“Correct. Then Hell will carry on as it always has with everyone present like they should be.”

“Won’t that be hard work for you?” I asked.

“Oh no. Each time the world ends we have a party. Gets pretty wild, actually. We all have a rip-roaring time until the Lord of Darkness decides to create another world. We try to keep him so drunk he can’t remember to do it, but in the end he always does. It’s just a cycle, really. Quite natural when you think about it.”

“Natural? Are you insane?” Rickett was beside himself at the demon’s suggestions.

“Oh, yes. Absolutely. Couldn’t have got the job if I wasn’t.” Rupert looked exhausted. I thought of all the torturing of souls he must have been doing over the previous millennia. He was the sort of creature we were all going to get to know very well before too long, if what he was saying was true.

“How can we be sure you’re not deceiving us?” I asked.

“What would be the point of that?”

“Well…you’re a demon, Rupert. Deception is your thing.”

“If you don’t believe me, slit your throat and go see for yourself.”

It was the only way to be sure, but all of a sudden no one seemed all that curious about the truth. Was the demon bluffing? Was it merely as mad as a clubless bison in a herd of fertile bisonettes? I looked from side to side in the front pews and saw dejection on every face. What did anyone have left to look forward to now that we all knew our fate? Only Prattle seemed unflapped by the demon’s tidings. Studying his face it struck me that, far from being terrified by news of the future, he seemed resigned to it and perhaps a little embarrassed. The demon picked his moment to start bargaining with the timing of an ancient master in the art of temptation.

“That takes care of your eternal souls,” he said. “And seeing as every one of you is already damned, you might as well enjoy what little earthly time you have left by engaging your physical bodies in every whim of pleasure and excess you care to imagine. A virgin or two? I can get plenty of those. Hell, have three each if you want. I’ll even throw in a sheep for the more adventurous among you. I have access to many ecstatic potions and powders that are guaranteed to keep a man’s lance firm until his slaying is done. I have others that will transport you, if only temporarily, to heaven. You can have as much as you like. If you live another thirty or forty years that’s not much heaven, but it’s better than none at all. Let me think…oh yes, you’ll need music to keep you interested and maintain a good festive atmosphere. I’ll organise musicians. Anything else I’ve missed?”

“What about food and water?” asked one of the men. “We’re practically starving as it is. The well could run dry any time. What use will wine, women and song be to us if we’re too weak to move?”

The demon shrugged.

“I didn’t mention food because it was too obvious. I shall, as part of our bargain, provide a horn of plenty to be placed in the village square. No one will lack for anything until the day they die.”

“I don’t suppose there’s any chance you could save our souls, is there?” Asked Wiggery.

“Out of the question. I have tried to explain these things to you. Your souls belong to the Lord of Darkness. Which aspect of that fact that do you not understand? You can have anything else you want. Anything. But not your souls. And all I want in return is my tail. Deal?”

“NO! No one say anything,” I shouted. “Listen here, Rupert, I’m the one with your tail. You deal with me.”

“But these men all know what it is they want. Allow them a little pleasure before they enter eternal torment. I’m merely showing them mercy.”

“You’re merely trying to get your tail back and pervert the last few good folk in the world. Everyone out of the church. Go on, out! Now!”

Confused, and not a little upset to be missing out on every fantasy they’d entertained plus all the new ones the demon had created for them, the group of men filed out of the church. They grumbled. Some of them knocked their shoulders into me as they passed by. I saw a few of them steal glances at the tail I still held. I didn’t have much time before I lost control of the situation completely.

“Not you, Leopold,” I yelled. Where did he think he was going? “You stay here with me.”

When the men were outside I put an arm around Prattle’s shoulder and walked him towards the vestry. I held the tail up to Rupert as we left.

“If you want this back, you won’t move from there.”

The old oak door creaked shut behind us in the cramped in vestry and we were alone. The air was stale and musty. It smelled of decaying hymnals and psalters and unwashed cassocks. Prattle wouldn’t meet my eye.

“How long have you known about all this, Leopold?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Fine. Then explain to me why you’re not the least bit shocked to hear the news that the demon has brought with him?”

“Because it’s always been an uphill battle—one I was likely to lose.”

“We still have a chance, you know. Giving in like this isn’t the way to finish up. Even if I’m wrong, wouldn’t you rather go out fighting? Knowing you did everything you could?”

Prattle heaved a huge sigh.

“The demon is telling the truth. Hell is all around us. The Great Father can’t hear our prayers any more. We’re cut off.”

“So, despite what Rupert says, you still think the Great Father is out there?”

“Yes, but we’ll never feel his presence again. Not here and not in the afterlife.”

“Where’s your faith? Isn’t that what your religion is all about?”

“It doesn’t stop me believing in Him.”

“But what’s the point in believing if you’re damned?”

Prattle shrugged. He’d been too resigned to our fate for too long. He’d already given up. To him, his very priesthood was an ironic joke

“Exactly,” he said.

“Will you give me a chance? Will you risk not having every physical pleasure you ever dreamed of in return for a sign that the Great Father really is out there?”

Prattle steepled his fingers in front of his mouth and pursed his lips. Something occurred to him and I didn’t like the way it made him smile.

“All right, I’ll give you that chance. But only if you promise to come to church on the holy day for the rest of your life. That is, if your plan works.”

Well, I thought to myself, at last a little interest in his job. He was still looking for converts. Or was it just that he knew if I went to church that the power base in the village would shift from me to him? For the first time since he’d come to the village, it didn’t matter to me who was held in higher esteem. We had everything to lose and everything to gain.

“Gladly. Every holy day for the rest of my life.”

I don’t think he could believe it. He looked pale. The world he’d come to know so well; the safe, damned world in which I was his arch enemy, was turning on its head. I put my hand out.

“Deal?”

I’m sure he thought I would take my hand away at the last minute and ridicule him for ever thinking I would change my ways. So when he made contact with my unmoved palm he flinched and blinked and then it was sealed.

“Come on.” Said I.

Whence it came

In the church I stood in front of Rupert who was smiling to himself like a fox who’d been willed a chicken farm.

“Have you made your list of requests?”

“We have. It’s very short.”

“It’s not my problem if you humans lack imagination.”

“Quite so. It’s very simple. We want you to fly up to heaven and inform the Great Father what happened here.”

The demon snorted angry incredulous laughter. Smoke poured from his nostrils.

“You want me to do what?”

“I think you heard me, Rupert, unless having your head and tail removed has affected your hearing. It’s not compulsory of course. I’m merely offering you our terms. If you don’t want to take them, you can spend the rest of history here in Long Lofting. We’ll keep your tail very safe and I’m sure we can find some odd jobs for you to do in the meantime.”

Rupert stood up, his head nearly reaching the ceiling of the church. His eyes flared yellow as though sparks whirled in a twister behind them. His red face became even redder and we felt the heat roll off him in dry waves. Every muscle in his sinewy body tightened. We heard his tendons creak like stretched leather. He blew a jet of fire from his mouth that melted several church candles, ignited a few prayer books and blackened one of the pews. Prattle beat the flames with his robes and then ran for the sand buckets.

“There’s really no time for histrionics, Rupert. I’m going to count to five and if you’re not in the air by then, I’ll assume the deal’s off and that you’ve decided to stay.” I counted very quickly. “One, two, three, fou—”

Rupert sprinted along the central aisle of the church towards the open doors. A great waft of air followed him out. Mysteriously, the fires he’d caused went out. I ran after him as he launched himself forward in a dive through the entrance. Outside, the men ducked as Rupert spread his wings wide. There was enough space between the top step and the dirt of the square for him to take to the air and once he was three or four strides above the earth, he began to flap his wings. They whined against the air. He was huge and deep red in the pale dawn light. It was bright in the east and that was the way he flew. It would all have been very dramatic if he hadn’t had his hands clapped tightly over the stump of his tail as he flew. We all watched him for a long time and he didn’t seem to get any smaller. Then, at some tremendous height, he turned pure white and stopped moving. The sun came over the horizon and caught the shape he’d left. It was a cloud of brilliant sharpness, perfect in every detail. It depicted, in vapour, a white-winged creature, most definitely not of this earth.

“Has he gone for the girls and the powders, then?” asked Blini Rickett.

“I fancy that horn of plenty myself,” said Puff Wiggery.

I didn’t have the heart to tell them right at that moment that it might be much, much better than that. Prattle came down the steps from the church and stood next to me, stinking faintly in the coral dawn light.

“That was odd,” said he.

“What was odd?”

“I didn’t think he’d leave like that.”

“Ah, but we’ve got his tail.”

“But even if there is a heaven and the Great Father’s still in it, he’ll never make it through Hell to get there. The lord of darkness will stop him.”

“Well, we’ll see, won’t we?” I looked over at Prattle and noticed he had some feathers stuck to his robes. “You been plucking a chicken, Leopold?”

He looked down at himself and tried to brush the feathers away.

“No. I expect a couple of geese had a set to in the church. There’s feathers everywhere in there.”

A strange thing happened then—I say strange; what it was was unusual—we all felt a breeze moving the air. It was the first breath of wind the village had felt in months. Years perhaps. From above us more stray feathers floated down to earth, wafted on invisible currents. I turned back to Prattle and began to speak.

“Leopold, you don’t suppose that Rupert might have been an—”

But I never finished my sentence. Something was happening to the cloud. It was growing. Like a tide sweeping across a flood plain it spread out over the sky, keeping all the time its winged shape. In this way it appeared to be coming towards us at great speed. Rickett and Wiggery flinched at the illusion. Watching calmly I saw that cloud take up the whole sky from horizon to horizon. It blocked out the momentarily risen sun was then darkened from white to grey to dark slate and then to shades of charcoal. The vapours lost their shape and began to turn and roil like a dark ocean suspended above our heads. There was a distant rumble of thunder that reminded me of Rupert’s voice and then a wind, a true gusting wind, came to life around us blowing the dust of the square against our skin. It stung and brought with it a thrill of coolness. The hairs all over my body stood up and I shivered at the touch.

And then, as if it was the most normal thing in the world, it began to rain. Warm, fat drops pattered and broke against every upturned face. They rolled and dirtied themselves in the dust. They made us blink. In moments, no one yet believing it could be true, we were all drenched to the skin. In Prattle’s case, this made him smell worse as his robes became fragrant with moisture.

“If I’m going to come to your church every holy day, is there any chance you might bathe with similar frequency?”

Leopold smiled. I didn’t recognise the look at first because I’d never seen it before.

“I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.”

Epilogue

And that was how Leopold Prattle and I came to exchange our favourite books from time to time. He would peruse the Ledger, when none of the congregation was around, and I would do the same with his copy of the holy book. We occasionally met for an ale, in addition, but I wouldn’t say we became great companions. A margin of respect grew between us that both held us together and maintained our distance. It suited us both very well, I believe.

The demon, Rupert, we never saw again, but after he was gone we marked the event with a festival—one day later than the original event had been planned for—that to this day remains incorrectly named ‘The Feast of The Dragon’. Even Prattle and I agreed that you couldn’t hold a holy festival that involved a demon in the title. No one, not a single soul, ever ventured out loud what they thought Rupert might really have been, but I’m sure that even Wiggery and Rickett had their suspicions.

The women that cavorted in the wood that night, including Velvet, were never told that they’d been liasing with anything other than an evil employee of Hell. They needed to suffer a little for their transgressions, after all, and a little guilt was good for them.

It’s interesting to note that the animals we kill and eat for The Feast of The Dragon are white geese or white chickens. The purity of their feathers serves as an important symbol to those who remember the events of those days. To everyone else, those born later and those who weren’t really involved, The Feast of the Dragon is just another good excuse for an excess of food, ale and flirtation. Not to mention music and dancing.

But never the occasional sheep.