The Kingdom (Berkeley Blackfriars Book 1) Read online

  THE KINGDOM

  BERKELEY BLACKFRIARS • BOOK ONE

  J. R. MABRY

  Apocryphile Press

  1700 Shattuck Ave #81

  Berkeley, CA 94709

  www.apocryphilepress.com

  © 2010 by J. R. Mabry. Revised and corrected edition 2018.

  All rights reserved

  Printed in the United States of America

  ISBN 978-1-944769-99-4

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  Cover graphics by Milo at www.derangeddoctordesign.com

  CONTENTS

  Claim Your Free Book

  Reviews

  Other Books by J.R. Mabry

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements & Caveats

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Claim Your Free Book

  Reviews

  Untitled

  Prelude 1

  Prelude 2

  Prelude 3

  Prelude 4

  CLAIM YOUR FREE BOOK

  To find out more about the Berkeley Blackfriar’s universe, download your free copy of The Berkeley Blackfriar’s Companion. Includes short stories set in the Blackfriars’ universe, photos of main characters, a complete glossary, a walking tour of the Blackfriars’ Berkeley, recipes from Brian’s kitchen, a short history of Old Catholicism, a Q & A session with author J.R. Mabry, links to music and videos associated with the books and more!

  Click on BookHip.com/DXDCAS

  to get your free copy!

  REVIEWS

  If you enjoy the Blackfriars books, please help other people find them by leaving an honest review on amazon or kobo or wherever you buy books. Thank you!

  OTHER BOOKS BY J.R. MABRY

  The Berkeley Blackfriars Series:

  The Kingdom

  The Power

  The Glory

  The Christmas at Bremmer’s Series:

  What Child is This?

  The Temple of All Worlds Series:

  The Worship of Mystery

  DEDICATION

  This book is offered with gratitude

  to the memory of

  FRATER QUI SITIT VENIAT

  “Under the Mercy”

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & CAVEATS

  Grateful thanks to all of my friends who encouraged me in the writing of this novel. Special thanks are due to those who read the first draft carefully and made invaluable suggestions, especially B.J. West, Lola McCrary, Dan and Kathie McClellan, Ric Reed, Liza Lee Miller, Bill Armstrong, Kittredge Cherry, Audrey Lockwood, Lizzy Hull Barnes, Liz Stout, and others who prefer to remain anonymous. Thanks also to my editor Jason Whited for making the second edition sparkle. I wish to acknowledge my debt to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the best show in the history of TV), the novels of Charles Williams (oh, when will people discover him?), Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s Preacher, and James Blish’s The Devil’s Day (the demonic processions it depicts inspired the one in Chapter 65). Liturgical rites were adapted from the Roman Catholic Ritual for Exorcism, the Liturgy of the Liberal Catholic Church, and the UCC Book of Worship. To shield myself from possible litigation, I have changed the names of some institutions, especially in the Gourmet Ghetto neighborhood of Berkeley in which the friars live and work. Those familiar with the area will no doubt sort out what is what fairly easily.

  For your face turns toward all faces

  that gaze upon it.

  Therefore, those who look upon you

  with a loving face will find your face

  looking on them with love…

  Those who look upon you in hate

  will similarly find your face hateful.

  Those who gaze at you in joy

  will find your face joyfully reflected back at them.

  —Nicholas of Cusa

  THURSDAY

  PROLOGUE

  WHEN THE DEMON APPEARED, Randall Webber nearly jumped out of his skin. He was an experienced magickian, but the appearance of an infernal dignitary is never a commonplace event, and it shook him every time. He knew that if he stepped even momentarily outside the circle he had painstakingly burned onto his hardwood floor the demon would be at his throat, and in an instant would separate his soul from his body and devour it—or worse.

  Webber mustered his courage and put on his best poker face. He was in control here, he told himself. He was the magickian. He called the shots. He commanded the hosts of Hell. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and upper lip and then put his hand in his back pocket to stop it from shaking.

  The demon did not speak but appeared in the form of a dragon. It hovered as an image cast upon a small paper triangle about the size of Webber’s fist, set safely outside the circle on an end table. The dragon uncoiled its tail in slow motion, gold-flecked pupils staring straight into Webber’s own. Webber gulped and willed his voice not to waver as he spoke.

  “Greetings, noble Articiphus, commander of many mighty hosts, Duke of Hell. I acknowledge thee and bid thee welcome. I command thee by the holy Tetragrammaton to assume thy human form and speak with me!”

  So far, so good, Webber thought. He was still in one piece; the demon was still constrained within the folded paper triangle, and he thought he had just given a flawless performance of a man in command of himself. He fought the urge to run through his mental checklist to make sure he had not forgotten anything. One missing link and the whole house
of cards would come tumbling down and he would be demon chow. He fought the urge. He had been careful, and if he had missed anything it was too late now to do anything about it. Right now, he needed to focus.

  The triangle shimmered, and a regal-looking gentleman hovered in it dressed in ermine and satin. One half of his face was serene, the other horribly scarred. A diadem sat upon his head, and his face bore a resentful scowl. Nobody likes to be told what to do, Randall thought, least of all a man of power—or a being of power. “Hail, Articiphus, Duke of—”

  The demon interrupted him impatiently. “Cut the shit, Magickian. What do you want?”

  Randall’s eyes widened. He pushed a lock of long brown hair out of his eyes and consciously straightened his perpetually stooped shoulders. He was expecting the typical exchange of ritual pleasantries, a ping-pong volley of testy manners conducted in Elizabethan English, but he had never summoned this particular spirit before. This one, apparently, had no time—or patience—for small talk. Very well, Randall thought, let’s just cut to the chase. “Is it true, noble Duke, that you have the power to remove souls and put them in other bodies?”

  Whether the demon’s voice was audible or whether it merely resonated in his mind, Randall couldn’t tell. It had an odd quality about it as if Randall were wearing headphones. There was no resonance in the room, so it was hard to tell. He dismissed the thought as irrelevant and willed himself once more to focus. The words were clear, regardless of their source. The big question had just been asked. And for a demon in a hurry to be rid of this pest of a human, Articiphus was certainly taking his time replying.

  The demon’s eyes narrowed, and he looked like he was trying to stare past the magickian. Randall stole a glance behind him, but there was nothing. Out the window he could see drizzle swirling around a streetlamp, forming wispy ghosts that, he prayed, were neither conscious nor malevolent. In this business, however, one could never be sure.

  Randall shifted nervously, noting that the meat of his thigh seemed to have gone numb. He slapped it with the flat of his hand. “What say you, noble Duke?” he called, with a note of impatience.

  “I. Can.” The demon let the two words drop like ice. He squinted at the magickian. “You want to share a body with another soul.” He spoke it as a statement, but a raised eyebrow indicated that it was more of a question of clarification.

  “No. I want to trade bodies.”

  Randall saw the demon nodding, understanding. “Man or woman?” he asked.

  “Neither one,” Randall said. He forced all the air he could into his lungs, expanding them as far as they would go given the acrid sting of the incense that hung as thick in the air of the apartment as the fog outside. “The being I want to swap bodies with is…not human.”

  The demon opened his mouth to speak but then closed it again, furrowing his brows instead.

  “Oh yeah,” Randall added. “When I go, I need to take this with me.” And he held forth a purplish-green fruit.

  “What are you going to do with an avocado?” asked the demon, now truly curious.

  Suddenly, Webber was not nervous at all. He knew what he had to do, and he knew he had the means at hand to do it. He didn’t answer the demon but only smiled.

  FRIDAY

  1

  FR. RICHARD KINNEY didn’t mind the rain. It was turning out to be Berkeley’s wettest winter in decades, but he smiled as he turned his nose to the sky, quietly relishing the tiny splashes on his nose and cheeks.

  It was a cold midmorning, though, and he thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans as he walked. He cut through to Spruce Street and turned right at All Saints’ Episcopal.

  He was a middle-aged friar habited in a black Anglican cassock, yet no one seemed to think his attire out of place—there were plenty of people in the vicinity of the Graduate Theological Union in religious dress. His hair was tonsured—a round bowl of skin poked through his already thinning hair on the very top of his head—and though his frame carried a few extra pounds, he carried them well.

  The wind seemed to pick up when he reached busy Shattuck Avenue. So did the rain, and he suddenly wished he’d brought his hat. He didn’t dwell on it, though. The Old Catholic Order of Saint Raphael, of which he was the prior, had just finished a very successful series of exorcisms for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Oakland. Not only had they succeeded in banishing a whole host of demons from a Lafayette orphanage, but they had been well paid for their efforts. Good pay—or even adequate recognition—was a rarity in the exorcism business, and Richard gave himself permission to enjoy the success—for a little while at least. Beware undue pride, he reminded himself, but he smiled as he did it.

  He felt relieved as he darted in the door of the Gallic Hotel’s café. The smell of coffee wafted over him like a pleasurable veil, and he paused to savor it, filling his lungs.

  The line was unusually short, no doubt due to the weather, and he ordered a cappuccino. Passing his hands through the slits in his cassock, he unzipped his fanny pack and felt around for some change. He paid, and, picking up a discarded newspaper, he found a table and waited for Philip to arrive.

  He liked Philip. They had met online about a year ago and had had an on-again-off-again relationship that was both promising and maddening in equal measure.

  They seemed, at least to Richard, to be well matched. Philip was a seminary student, embarking on a second career as an Episcopal priest. They had a lot in common, and where Richard was an extroverted, charge-ahead kind of guy, Philip was quiet, reserved, and cautious. A little too cautious, Richard sometimes thought, but he also realized that Philip’s reserve provided a useful balance.

  They were different in other ways, too. Richard was tall, standing a good six feet, with broad, though somewhat stooped shoulders, while Philip was a smaller man, five foot five, with delicate features that often looked pained when he was concentrating on something.

  Philip appeared in the doorway, and Richard waved at him. Philip flashed a grimacing smile and sat down without ordering. “I can’t stay,” he said, brushing rain from his coat.

  Richard had been expecting a kiss, and Philip’s brusque demeanor caught him off guard. “Hey, Baby. You look worried. What’s up?” He reached out and took Philip’s hand. Philip withdrew his hand from the table and sighed. “Dicky, we need to talk.”

  As if mirroring the weather, dark clouds gathered on Richard’s interior horizon, and he didn’t like it at all. “That’s never a good thing to hear,” he said, almost as an aside. “What’s wrong?”

  “How can I put this?” Philip softened a bit. He leaned forward and squeezed Richard’s hand. “You’re driving me crazy.”

  “Innnn…a good way?” Richard asked hopefully. “Like crazy with lust, or an obsessive fascination with my winning personality?”

  The levity didn’t help. Philip blew air through his cheeks and lowered his head. Richard took that moment to admire the full head of hair his lover sported. Some guys have all the luck, he thought. His thoughts returned to what seemed to be inevitably coming. Some guys that are not me.

  “Dicky, for the past month you’ve been playing Batman and Robin, scurrying all over the Bay Area chasing bad guys and…doing your thing.”