The Diabolist (Dominic Grey 3) Read online

  BOOKS BY LAYTON GREEN

  THE DOMINIC GREY SERIES

  THE SUMMONER

  THE EGYPTIAN

  THE DIABOLIST

  * * *

  HEMINGWAY’S GHOST: A NOVELLA

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Text copyright © 2013 Layton Green

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer

  PO Box 400818

  Las Vegas, NV 89140

  ISBN-13: 9781611099843

  ISBN-10: 1611099846

  CONTENTS

  Start Reading

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  43

  44

  45

  46

  47

  48

  49

  50

  51

  52

  53

  54

  55

  56

  57

  58

  59

  60

  61

  62

  63

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Satan’s successes are the greatest when he appears with the name of God on his lips.

  —Mahatma Gandhi

  MISSION DISTRICT, SAN FRANCISCO

  SEPTEMBER 21

  They called themselves the House of Lucifer. Thirty minutes before midnight High Priest Matthias Gregory swung wide the doors to Red Abbey, and one by one the members filed inside.

  The interior was a Gothic-inspired mockery of its Catholic counterpart: The crimson walls and vaulted ceiling hovered over the aisles with garish menace, pentagrams served as stained glass windows, an inverted crucifix hung on the wall behind the pulpit. Guttered candles lit the interior with a red glow, and Matthias had to admit the architects had achieved the desired effect: He felt as if he were walking straight into the mouth of Hell.

  Recognized by the government as an official nonprofit religious organization since 1966, Matthias had shepherded the House of Lucifer into hundreds of chapters worldwide. In the sixties and seventies, America had been fascinated by the House and other occult pseudo religions that had sprung up, like demented cornstalks, out of a collective repressed subconscious. Now demons and warlocks and vampires were regular occurrences in popular novels and films, and the popularity of the occult had leeched its power to shock.

  Which made it all the easier, in Matthias’s mind, to carry out the business of the House.

  Two armed guards frisked everyone at the door. The House of Lucifer received plenty of hate mail, the majority of it from fundamentalist Christians, but the most recent death threat had been different and more than a little unnerving. Matthias had found the letter on the pulpit six days earlier, after he had unlocked the church in the morning. This disturbed him because he had closed up the night before, and there had been no letter.

  Matthias glanced at the clock above the front entrance, his eyes resting on the two naked succubi forming the hands.

  Twenty minutes until midnight.

  Incense wafting into the cathedral added to the gloom, swirling in scarlet motes above the aisles. Matthias waved a hand, his lieutenant struck a kettle gong, and the congregation began intoning the words to one of the Satanic psalms.

  Matthias concentrated on the words, determined to let the ritual chanting clear his mind and strengthen his resolve. Despite his attempts to scoff the threat away, a lump of nervous dread had settled in his stomach.

  The letter had arrived not as an anonymous e-mail, or a crude letter bomb, or a phone call in a muffled voice. Instead, he’d found the letter on the pulpit, inside an envelope sealed with red wax, a single word handwritten in capital letters on the face of the envelope.

  HERETIC.

  Matthias had opened the envelope with a frown and read the words, scrawled in black ink, that appeared below his own name.

  You will renounce your false religion and declare yourself a HERETIC, or you will die at the hand of the one true God on the sixth midnight hence.

  The letter was unsigned.

  The next night Matthias told his congregation about the letter, and in a show of righteous fury he announced a special worship service on the night of his threatened demise. Tonight was that night. Just in case, he had tightened security for the service.

  A quarter to midnight. It was time to begin.

  Matthias held the letter up, shaking it in his fist. “One more childish letter from the narrow-minded,” he shouted, as the members smirked and clapped. “One more act of hate from those who preach love.”

  The high priest made a good living from the generous tithing of the congregation, but this job was not just about the money. Nor was it about the Devil. Matthias did not actually believe in Lucifer or any other supernatural being; he did not believe in anything outside the Darwinist reality of his own existence. What he did believe in was satisfying his natural carnal desires, and he despised any person, government, religion, or institution that stood in his way.

  His members hailed from all walks of life. Plenty came from the margins of society, but there were also businessmen, professionals, politicians, and even a few celebrities. Some joined for the novelty, some joined for the secret orgies, but most joined because they believed in the mission of the House, which was the ridicule and disruption of mainstream religion.

  His eyes slid to the clock. Eleven fifty.

  Matthias continued his speech, analogizing the death threat to prophecies from other religions that had failed to come true, especially some of the pseudo-Christian cults whose response to failed prophecy was to change the words of the sacred texts and issue new versions.

  The vigorous nods of the congregation energized him. As the gong announced the stroke of midnight, Matthias ripped the letter in half with a triumphant shout. Instead of the cheers he expected, the members in the front row reared in alarm. Some flung outstretched fingers in the direction of the pulpit. Even Oak, Matthias’s right-hand man and virtual cofounder of the House, looked stunned, and Oak wasn’t stunned by much of anything. The lump in Matthias’s stomach expanded, tightening his chest with the grip of fear.

  He spun to see what had caused the stir. Not three feet behind him stood a black-robed figure, face hidden within a cowl. Just like on the day he had received the letter, Matthias had been first inside the locked building. There was nowhere behind him to hide, and it was impossible for someone to have slipped unnoticed down the constricted aisles.

  Before Matthias had a chance to react, the figure flicked one of its wrists and whispered a single word.


  “Burn.”

  And burn Matthias did. The flames sprouted as soon as the word was spoken, and Matthias looked down in disbelief as the fire licked and tumbled across his robe. Disbelief turned to horror when he felt the assault of heat against his face, smelled the nauseating stench of his burning flesh, heard the dull whoosh of the flames, saw the hair on the back of his hands curl and wither into blackened wisps.

  As Matthias fell to the floor in agony, batting at the flames with the screams of his congregation ringing in his ears, the figure in the black robe disappeared, winking out of existence as impossibly as it had arrived. With his last coherent thought, Matthias wondered if he had been wrong all this time, and if Lucifer himself had not come to reclaim his house.

  GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, DC

  Viktor Radek waited in the front row while Professor Johannes Holzman, whom Viktor had once mentored at Charles University in Prague, made the introduction. The room was cavernous; Phenomenology of Religion 101 was quite the popular course, and hundreds of chittering students filled the amphitheater.

  “It is my pleasure to announce,” Professor Holzman said from the podium, “the most respected religious phenomenologist of our time, the world’s foremost expert on cults, the man who taught me everything I know but very little of what he knows… ladies and gentlemen, I give you our very special guest lecturer, Professor Viktor Radek.”

  There was the usual applause, but as Viktor rose to his nearly seven-foot height and stepped to the lectern in his somber black suit, he sensed an apprehensive curiosity in the room, as if the students were observing a fascinating but dangerous species from behind the glass.

  Without dispensing a greeting, Viktor said in his clipped Czech accent, “If I were to ask you, from a phenomenological perspective, whether human sacrifice was evil, what would be your answer?”

  A murmur rippled through the students. Viktor called on a redheaded girl in the second row. “No,” she said, even as her pinkish face wrinkled in displeasure. “There’s no absolute good and evil.”

  Viktor chided the incorrect response, then called on a young man wearing a Notre Dame sweatshirt. “Isn’t something as terrible as that,” the young man said, “always wrong? It shouldn’t matter from which perspective you’re studying it.”

  Viktor saw Professor Holzman wince. It was early in the semester, but that should have been covered on day one. More likely the student hadn’t been coming to class. “You might wish to reread the class description,” Viktor said. “Perhaps you thought this was Ethics 101.”

  The class chuckled, and in the back left corner a skinny, goateed African-American student raised his hand. “The answer depends on whether the culture where the sacrifice took place believed it was evil. Or perhaps they believed it was evil, but necessary and justifiably so.”

  The room quieted as Viktor stepped to the edge of the stage, dark brow tightening, blacksmith shoulders hunched. “Human sacrifice,” he boomed, “was perceived on rare occasion—and sometimes not so rare—as necessary for the greater good in many ancient cultures, to appease malevolent spirits and keep the village safe. It was used for other reasons as well, including”—Viktor turned to face the student in the Notre Dame sweatshirt—“as a test of faith.”

  Viktor’s gaze withdrew from the room, to a time when he had stood amid a mesmerized crowd of worshippers in the African bush, rather than college students in an air-conditioned auditorium. His attention returned to the present with even more intensity. “And in certain Yoruba ceremonies, the sacrifice was tortured first, the flesh stripped from the body while the victim was kept conscious with potions from the babalawo, in order to increase the pain quotient and gain the attention of the spirit world.”

  A collective gasp issued forth.

  “I use this example not to shock but to illustrate the lengths to which you must go to remove emotion from the study of religious phenomenology. In order to understand—to truly comprehend—you must step outside of your milieu and put yourself wholly in the mind of the believer. Your modern-day subject might believe in the existence of angels and demons that walk among us, in ghosts and djinn and mystics, Satanic possession, or multidimensional planes of existence. You’ll find your own beliefs challenged; you’ll find yourself drawn into a new world that frightens and excites you. You might find yourself ensconced in a remote Siberian village with shamans claiming they have the power to walk in dreams, studying witchcraft and warding off vampires with gypsies in the Carpathian Mountains, visiting a temple in India where thousands of free-roaming rats are revered as reincarnated ancestors, or investigating ascetics and faith healers with powers of the mind that defy science.”

  By now the students were leaning forward in their seats, and when Viktor stopped speaking a falling feather could have broken the silence.

  “But if you decide that religious phenomenology is for you,” he said without breaking into a smile, “then for the next eight or so years you will find yourself trapped in a dusty library.”

  The class chuckled again, and Viktor paced the stage, his looming presence filling the room. “Yet the proper religious phenomenologist must go further still. What is evil? How does the term evil apply not just to one particular act but to the larger ethos of the worshipper? From where does the idea of evil derive in that belief system? Is it merely illusory? How does the adherent reconcile the existence of evil, if applicable, to the belief in an omnipotent God?” Viktor folded his arms. “Perhaps the hardest lesson of all is to realize that you, as the dutiful scholar, might have learned nothing about the true nature of good and evil. And that for each investigation you must clear your mind and start anew.”

  The goateed young man raised his hand again. “I’m cool with all of that. But whether you’re religious or in a cult or not, you still have a viewpoint, right? That’s just human nature. I suppose one can be one’s very own phenomenological study.”

  Viktor’s lips turned upward for the first time.

  The young man continued, “So what do you think, after all you’ve seen and studied? Is evil real, or is it just perspective, a state of mind?”

  The class tittered, and Viktor let the question hang in the air.

  “An inquiry,” he said finally, “you must make for yourself. But I shall guarantee all of you one thing.”

  Viktor waited until the anticipation in the room became palpable, not just for theatrics, but because it was the most important lesson he could teach them.

  “If you do continue to become a religious phenomenologist,” Viktor said, “you’ll be given the opportunity to decide.”

  After class ended, Viktor retired to Professor Holzman’s office. He had once reminded Viktor of himself, back when Viktor was a full-time professor at Charles University and Professor Holzman was simply Jan, an eager PhD student who received the best marks in Viktor’s class. Jan had shown great academic promise, which he fulfilled, but the drive for fieldwork had never manifested. He needed to put down his Belgian beer and get his hands dirty.

  Viktor didn’t understand this: Religious phenomenology was simply anthropology of the mind, and were it up to him, extensive fieldwork would be mandatory. That was what drove Viktor to his career in the first place: The traditional study of religion was too dogmatic and dry, philosophy too remote and theoretical. But religious phenomenology, that shadowy borderland where subjective belief is paramount, that realm of cults and miracles and unexplained phenomena, this Viktor could sink into like a beautiful opera of mysterious origin.

  Viktor uncorked the bottle of Absinthe Suisse Couvet on Professor Holzman’s desk, preparing the absinthe—Viktor’s preferred drink—with a practiced hand. As he laid the slotted spoon above the glass he remembered his own youth, his privileged upbringing in a Czech family that was once minor Bohemian royalty. He had wanted for nothing, had not even had to choose a profession, though his family had urged him to join the family business and become an “important” politician.

  Important?
he had thought. Governors and senators come and go; kings and empires rise and fall. Something else had interested him, something more. The secrets of the universe, of life and death, of God and before: The timeless truths, if there were any, had driven young Viktor.

  They drove him still. He sensed that the secrets lay just under the surface of the ice, floating away whenever the ice was tapped. The trick was to approach the ice from the proper angle, not to shatter but to peer beneath.

  His cell buzzed, breaking his reverie. The caller was Jacques Bertrand, his Interpol contact. Viktor’s investigations occupied the bulk of his time now. He consulted with police agencies worldwide, and sometimes private clients, on the pathology of dangerous cults. Swirling his absinthe before he answered, he noticed that Jacques had called from his office number, even though it was after one a.m. in Lyon.

  “It’s very late, Jacques.”

  “Oui, thank you for answering. We have need of your assistance. You’re available?”

  “That depends.”

  Viktor felt the familiar tingle at the prospect of a new case. Most often the case would involve a cult familiar to Viktor, but the tingling was for the sect, religion, or secret society that he had yet to investigate. Or, better yet, one undiscovered: potential bearers of the hidden knowledge that Viktor craved.

  “There was a murder in Paris this morning,” Jacques said. “Elements are involved that… require your expertise.”

  Interpol called him for one of two reasons: either the case involved Viktor’s specialty as well as multinational criminal issues, which was rare, or else the local police in some jurisdiction had requested information from Interpol that suggested the need for Viktor’s involvement, and Interpol would recommend him.

  Strange, however, that Jacques had called him so quickly. The link must be obvious.

  “If possible,” Jacques said, “we would like you to go to San Francisco first. There was a similar murder there. It is closer to you than Paris, and there were witnesses.”

  “Similar? Who was murdered in San Francisco?”

  “A man named Matthias Gregory. He was—”