Chapter 24. Damnation.
The tallow candle gave off a very weak light and filled the prison cell with an unpleasant smell that made her cough worse, but she was too concentrated to notice.
Pale and dishevelled, the only thing that seemed to have life in her withered face were her eyes, red and full of fanatical determination. Carefully, she stroked the black hen's egg that she hid among her clothes, soft and warm. For nearly three weeks she had protected it with dedication, hoping to succeed this time. She was sure the little chick was alive.
In the flickering light of the candle, she used a stick with a charred tip to draw a symbol on the Bible leaf that she had managed to steal from the prison chapel. The passage of the Apocalypse she was writing on was the right one for her purposes.
The diabolic symbol burned in her mind and threatened to destroy what little sanity she had left, but her hatred was more intense than her fear and she managed to finish it.
She drew a knife made of copper from the waist of her tattered skirt. It had cost her promises and threats to get it, but finally one of her former accomplices had managed to get it into the prison among the kitchen supplies. She didn't care if the man kept all her material possessions, she didn't expect to get out of prison alive. All she had left was revenge.
As she recited a litany in an ancient and forbidden language she held the knife to her arm. Her voice did not falter as she cut herself and dropped her own blood on the paper. She carefully placed the egg next to the symbol, ready to open it and sacrifice the small creature it contained as soon as the apparition she was invoking manifested. It was a very meager sacrifice for a demon, but she hoped it would be enough for the entity she had summoned. She closed her eyes and saw in her mind the door that would bring the creature she wanted to deal with. She repeated the ritual a third time, and felt the door become clearer.
The door was already summoned, now all that remained was to wait. She looked up for a moment and saw a shadow moving near the back wall. She thought it was a rat, but as she focused her eyes, she realized it was a fox that showed its teeth before licking its muzzle.
"Where are you, you cursed fox?" she hissed.
At last she saw him, a masked figure standing by the cell door. Looking up at him from the ground, he seemed even taller than he really was.
"I'm not impressed with your tricks, de la Vega. I know them all, and many more than you would not dare to use."
"I'm not like you, what I have is enough for me."
"You say it as if you have little. Lucky boy. You should have been mine, and given me the power. I would have taught you to do things you never even dreamed possible. Your brother was a poor imitation, only had a pale reflection of your gifts. I should have known better. The ghost we questioned said to take her eldest son, but ghosts always try to deceive their masters, so he spoke in Latin, to confuse us."
"Gilberto was my mother's firstborn. You said he was born before me."
"Yes, he was born first, but I failed because in Latin primogenitum does not refer to the first to be born, but to the first to be conceived. I had to perform a ritual to make sure I was carrying the right baby, but your father was suspicious of me and the woman who was watching me wasn't going to be back long, so I didn't remember in time and ran off with him."
Diego looked at her coldly. "For a while I thought you were crazy, but it's worse. You're corrupted to the core."
"No doubt you're done with me, but there's still time for me to get even. The door has been summoned, and the creature that will enter will destroy your veil. It will track you down and hunt you wherever you are. This time I will not fail, everyone will know who you are, and you will hang with your father. They will have to wait for your wife to give birth to your son, but eventually she will end up on the gallows."
"I don't understand that you hate Victoria, too. You don't even know her. Hating so many people has to be exhausting."
"My vengeance shall be upon you all. Your son will put his gifts in the service of my lord, and the wolf-eyed harlot will be executed as well."
Diego moved, surprised by that last statement. "Do you know Doña Carmen?"
"If you try to get close, I'll crush the egg and with it the chicken inside. It's better that the sacrifice be made with the hellhound here, but it will be enough. You won't be able to stop it."
"I wasn't going to try."
"You think you're more powerful than him?"
"No, but I beg you to stop this madness now that there is still time. Sometimes invocations don't go the way you expect, I tell you from experience." (1)
They both saw in their minds that the door she had summoned was beginning to move.
"As I told you before, it's too late. Your damnation is near," she said with a mixture of hatred and triumph.
"Someone's damnation, anyway." The serenity in his voice sent a chill down her spine.
The door began to open, and as it did so, a white light filtered through the slot, increasing in intensity.
"It can't be." Ines Risendo rasped. She looked at the sheet of paper in front of her and saw that it was a white paper which contained only a five-pointed star and a capital A letter. Horrified, she looked again at the door that had already opened wide, revealing a figure in armor with a huge sword in her hand. She looked up at Diego in awe.
"You shouldn't have closed your eyes when you made that last call," Diego said almost with compassion in his voice.
The avenging angel approached the terrified woman and pierced her chest with her sword. She fell to the ground, although she had no visible wound, her eyes were empty.
"Is she dead?" Diego asked in a hoarse voice.
"Not yet, but her soul is no longer chained to her body and will soon expire. You'd better get out of here before the demon she made a deal with comes to claim her. It's not going to be pretty."
Diego picked up the paper from the floor and after some thought he picked up the egg as well.
"Don't tell me you're going to save the chick too," said the angel.
"It's a shame to leave it here and let it die of cold. I can go to the pen that one of the prison guards has in the area where they live and leave it in one of the nests."
"You know It'll most likely end up in a casserole."
"Well, I suppose so, but at least its death will come in handy for someone."
They left the cell and Diego locked it again using a lock pick. When they reached the prison yard, he hid in the shadows and turned to her.
"Thank you for coming, Agueda."
"You know you can count on me, even though I seem to remember somebody warned you not to do anything like that again."
"I know, but it's not the same. In this case it was a hellhound, not a demon lord."
"That's your excuse, that it was just a dog? That hound could have given you a lot of trouble."
"That's why I couldn't let it loose, it wanted to expose me in front of my enemies."
"Come on, you don't think a two-bit creature could destroy your veil. You inherited it from your grandmother, it is reinforced by the prayers of 999 nuns and blessed by St. Michael the Archangel. It takes a lot more than a crazy witch to take it off. She's been trying for quite some time, creating all sorts of problems for you. She even sent Doña Carmen, and she failed."
"She sent her to reveal my secret?"
"Yes, officially her soul was doomed, so Ines and her demon lord thought she'd sell you out for the reward."
"Does Carmen know?"
"No, they influenced her without her knowing what was going on."
"So why didn't it work?"
"Because she's not what they thought, of course, but basically what happened was that Victoria didn't judge her, she trusted her and they became friends."
Diego smiled, proud of his wife, but something was bothering him. "Can they use her against me again?"
"Of course not, they lost the game and now her soul is free of the burden it carried. They can no longer manipulate her."
"Did you make a bet?"
"To some extent, but it's complicated, more like a game of chess."
"And de Soto is one of those involved?"
"Well, yes, without you suspecting, the ghost of Luis Ramon was influencing him, but he ran out of time to stay here, and now it's my turn."
A suspicion arose in Diego's mind. "Did anyone help my father with the story he told?"
"Luis Ramón influenced one person, Don Raimundo, so I was able to influence another. Actually, your father was willing to help, so I just had to inspire him a little bit with the details. But don't keep asking, now I can't tell you anything else, because if I give you too much information they will be able to do the same with someone else. If another threat comes up you can ask me."
"Can I really? I thought angels couldn't be summoned. I've only found rituals to call out demons."
"It's not an invocation as such, it won't force me to go, just ask me, and if I can, I will. Let's change the topic. Congratulations on your wedding, your mother and I were there both times, your father-in-law left after the second one, because he couldn't attend the first one. Beautiful ceremonies. I told you she would forgive your follies."
"It's true, you told me. I didn't remember. But no ghost is supposed to enter the estate or the cave without my permission."
"Don't worry, the exile is well done, remember I'm not a ghost, and your mother lived in that house, so she doesn't need anyone's permission to enter. I must go now."
"I know. Thanks again. For everything."
Agueda drew her huge sword to greet him and Diego returned the gesture with a smile.
"I still think that your sword is too big and old-fashioned," he added.
"You'll see that you'll change your mind when they offer you one," Agueda laughed just before she disappeared.
zzZzz
After attending to Tornado and changing his clothes, Diego entered his room without making any noise, trying not to wake Victoria, but she turned to him and stood up.
"I'm sorry I woke you up."
"You know I can't sleep well when you go out."
"I wish I could have prevented it, but in the dream I had, your father told me clearly that there was an outside influence trying to hurt us."
"Was it that awful woman?"
"Yes, but we don't have to worry about her anymore."
"Is she dead?" said Victoria in a distraught voice.
Diego nodded. "She made a summoning that went wrong. In any case she was ill, she didn't have much time left."
"Will more like her come?"
"I don't believe it, she tried to reveal my secret but she couldn't. What she did tonight was one last desperate attempt."
"Then we're safe."
"I think so, but if you want I'll do a ritual to make sure. I don't want you to worry about anything. It's important for you to get plenty of rest."
Victoria placed her hand on her swollen belly and nodded. "Why do I get the feeling you're hiding something from me?"
Diego sighed. "It's just something that woman said, about the baby, but maybe it's not true."
"You think she was lying?"
"Probably not."
"Then I want to know what she said."
"It's all right. She said our baby's a boy, and he'll inherit my skills."
Victoria frowned slightly. "Your skills? That ability of yours to sneak around, too?"
"It's quite possible."
"So what are we going to do? I won't be able to watch him."
"Carmen will always be able to see him."
"But she can't take care of him all the time."
"Well, I can train a golden-eyed familiar to help us. Would you prefer a dog or a cat?"
zzZzz
11 years later.
That year had been drier than usual, and the wind was raising clouds of dust. Antonio arrived at his friend Pedro's farm and was offered something to drink. In the yard, several hens were digging and pecking at the ground, under the attentive gaze of a slightly plucked black rooster.
"Do you still have that old rooster?"
"Yeah, he's the best I've ever had."
"Come on, it's not even big. It's just a lousy rooster."
The rooster turned his head sharply and looked at him, and Antonio saw that his eyes lit up like embers.
"Por todos los santos! What was that?"
"You shouldn't insult him, he's an exceptional animal. He's the best cockfighting rooster I've ever seen. Even as a chick, he kept adult roosters at bay. Besides, when the others saw him, they bet against me trusting that their roosters would win him easily. With what I've earned from him I was able to retire from prison work and buy this farm. I've even paid for my children's studies."
"But... his eyes."
"Yes, he does when he's angry. That's why I called him Diablo."
Fin
Author's notes.
(1) See "The Missing Name" chapter 10.
Thank you for reading, and especially if you have included a comment. I'm going to miss this story, which I started to publish on Halloween 2019, although by then I had been working on it for a few months. I can still enjoy the main characters in other fanfics, but the fox spiritual guide and Doña Carmen will not be there, and it will not be the same.
Thanks to kasiaeliza for playing the beta, and keeping the pronouns from being wrong all the time.