Free Demonized by Naomi Clark Page B

wasn’t going to kneel down here like an idiot if I wasn’t being exorcised. “Listen, I don’t need counseling, okay? I need exorcising. If I wanted counseling, I’d have gone and paid some lousy shrink for it.”
    Crane frowned back at me, lifting a small silver bowl of water from the altar. “If it makes you feel any better, Mr. Banning, I will be flicking you with holy water throughout.”
    “It doesn’t make me feel better.”
    He sighed and gestured for me to stand again. “Mr. Banning, if you’re expecting burning crucifixes or levitating beds, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. Far too many unscrupulous people have made money by preying on others’ fears and superstitions when it comes to possession. I am offering you a practical solution to a spiritual and psychological problem. Either you want it or you don’t.”
    I shifted my weight around uneasily and looked back down the aisle at Mutt. He’d curled up under one of the chairs to doze. Since he seemed happy enough where he was, I figured I might as well stick out the exorcism, or ceremony, or counseling session, or whatever. “Yeah, okay.” I knelt again. “Let’s do this shit.”
    “I might also ask you to mind your language,” Crane added mildly.
    I bit my tongue to hold back the vile reply the Voice had for him.
    Crane opened the Bible, his voice sonorous and solemn. “And it came to pass, as we went to prayer, a certain damsel possessed with a spirit of divination met us, which brought her masters much gain by soothsaying.” As he spoke, he dipped his fingers in the holy water and flicked it at my forehead. I waited for it to start sizzling or something, but nothing unholy happened. The Voice snickered.
    “The same followed Paul and us, and cried, saying, these men are the servants of the most high God, which shew unto us the way of salvation,” Crane continued, flicking more water on me.
    I flinched as the droplets hit my head, and the lights above the altar flickered and blinked. I shook my head, sure I’d imagined it, but no...there they went again. On, off, so quick it was barely noticeable.
    “And this did she many days. But Paul, being grieved, turned and said to the spirit, I command thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And he came out the same hour.”
    “ I won’t leave,” the Voice snarled, an edge of anger and panic in its tone. “ Nothing can make me leave.”
    Crane looked taken aback for a second and then spattered more holy water on me. “You will leave,” Crane responded. “I command you in the name of God to leave.”
    The lights flickered again, on-off, longer this time, so I couldn’t pretend it hadn’t happened. The cool air in the church slowly warmed up too, turning oppressive and foul.
    “ You think your words and water scare me? You think your precious God has anything to do with the Netherworld?” the Voice spat at Crane. “ We were around long before your savior walked the earth. We existed when your church was nothing but a few madmen wandering the deserts crying about angels.”
    The lights blinked once more and stayed out this time. Tiny bursts of shattering glass filled the air as the bulbs broke. Way behind me, Mutt growled and whined. The church felt hot now, and the shadows at the edge of the aisle shivered and twisted like they were alive. Sweat poured down my brow and Crane’s. Creeping fear filled me. The Voice sounded pissed off.
    “ This mortal is mine. This body is mine, and no amount of prayer and hope will save him,” the Voice crowed. My body shook as the Voice forced me to my feet, squaring off against Crane. “ I will ride him to his death, to the moment he chooses to eat his gun rather than spend another day with me, and then I will move onto you, priest, and drive you to the same fate!”
    It felt like watching a movie. Nothing I did felt like I did it. I watched in horror as my hands clasped Crane’s throat, shaking him until he dropped the Bible. I