(no subject)

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

Blessed be the Lord my strength, that teacheth my hands to war, and my fingers to fight.

The beast bristles with bolts, seemingly unharmed. Brother Thorgeir hacks it to ash with one blow. Brother Lothar has to crush down unclean thoughts about the woman; she is lovely even as his lord and young Aethelthryth charge in and, blades rising and falling, reduce her to trembling, dying meat and then ash.

Cast forth lightning, and scatter them: shoot out thine arrows, and destroy them.

He roars as he looses a bolt at the creature. "She-bitch of Satan! Whore of Babylon!" She screams, dying, her soul flying to hell in an instant. But the great beast is here, and now the battle truly begins. The brethren clutch holy relics and chant in unison: Bardulf's thin, young voice, Thorgeir's rumble, Odo's clear tenor, Aethelthryth's sweet voice shaking in horror, his own booming baritone, and Kyle, unifying them all, guiding the prayer.

Send thine hand from above; rid me, and deliver me out of great waters, from the hand of strange children; whose mouth speaketh vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood.

One by one, they die, but they have seen the demon vanish into the air and the flames licking at the profaned church. Their work is done. In the last moment, he clutches his mace, kisses his pectoral cross, and thinks of the example of St Guthlac, and is gone.

And sunset jolts Kevin Callaghan awake, eyes wild. He shakes his head. To dream of her, of course, and of the demon. That is natural. But how odd to dream of the others. Scattered around the bed, his notes. He looks down at them. Coincidences seem unlikely. Nothing is implausible any more.

This will require careful analysis. He shakes his head, doesn't think about a girl, and stumbles out of bed to get back to work.