I did not flinch at his language. Talking with Yolanda has made me less shockable. “You would know better than I,” I said.
He laughed. “Such humility! You have no interest in it, I suppose? It was not that aspect which attracted you, I suppose? I tell you, my Lilith, the spiritual ecstasy, the shooting forth of the unstoppable Will, is the greatest experience of all. Sex is a dim reflection, but not a poor analogy. For lesser mortals, the sexual coupling releases the greatest force they shall ever know, this side of death. But they all stop there, unaware of how to harness this energy so as to reach even greater heights of pleasure and power.
“I think Yolanda has told you that our rituals involve sexual congress. The coupling builds up energy which the properly disciplined Will can feed upon and grow strong. There is nothing else to match the power inherent in sexual intercourse, save violent death. And death has its drawbacks. Sexuality is endlessly renewing, while the blood sacrifice . . .” He shrugged, smiling like a devil at me.
“The spurting of blood or the spurting of semen—one or the other is necessary for a ritual to succeed, for the magic to work. Sex or death, to focus the power of the Will.”
He talked on and on and I sat numb and entranced, both repelled and fascinated. He may be the most powerful man on earth, and I want, I need, some part of that power for myself. I am weak, I know how weak I am, but I have my love to give me strength. I love Walter, and for that love I will do anything. I will do whatever I must to learn how to win my husband back.
And before he left—again, seeming to read my thoughts—Jade promised me: “I shall give you what you truly want, my Lilith. Your heart’s desire. Blessed art thou among women.”
The devil quoting scripture. His words should have pleased me, but they made me shiver with a sudden dread.
March 12
I am in it now, well and truly in it. I could not escape if I wanted to.
They need me for something, although I do not know what. I am to help them and, in return, I shall have what I most want. I know they can teach me how to get Walter back, and I will do anything for that.
Although I am afraid of what is to come, I am impatient for it to begin. I think about the days after, when Jade and Yolanda will have gone away and left me to resume my life with Walter.
I have already begun, on my own, to will his return.
At night, every night, I place his picture beneath my pillow and dream of him. During the day I carry a photograph with me, in my apron pocket while I do my chores, and I stare at it and kiss it and touch it many times. Walter is never out of my thoughts. Thoughts, properly directed, can compel. Unskilled as I am, I can concentrate. The force of my thoughts must reach Walter, wherever he is. Eventually they will draw him to me, like a magnet pulling steel.
March 15
Today Ursula came by to warn me against Yolanda. I nearly laughed out loud.
“She means you no good. She’s a dangerous, untrustworthy creature—I say it even though she is my own sister. You do not understand her, and she will harm you. She has dangerous friends and vicious habits. She means you harm, I fear.” Etc. etc.
I scarcely remember what she said. During her visit I was thinking about Walter, as I always do. I saw Walter sitting in the chair where Ursula perched; saw Walter walking in through the door as she walked out. Walter, filling my vision like the sight of God.
March 20
At night I can feel him beside me in our bed. When I open my eyes, the illusion vanishes, but for just a few moments it is so real. Only a matter of time, now. My will is almost too strong to deny. While Walter sleeps, my soul flies to him and takes stitches in his skin. I pull the threads, and his astral body flies to me, to nestle in my arms. His physical body will not be long in following.
Soon he will return. Soon he will be here beside me. And then Jade will tell me how to keep him, how to bind his soul to mine with bonds he cannot break in this world or any other.
March 27
I gather hints and try to guess what they want of me, for they won’t tell me what I must do or what they need me for. I know that the date set for the ritual is in April; that is all I know. I think of Walter and try not to worry.
March 29
Yolanda took me to Jade’s lodgings today—a suite in the Driskill Hotel. I don’t think Jade was expecting us—although he showed no surprise—and I don’t know what Yolanda intended by the visit. Jade had coffee sent up and we sat around sipping it and making small talk, as if we were in society. It was very peculiar.
Eventually, almost as if he were at a loss for anything else to do, Jade took something out of a case. He unwrapped a piece of silk from it and put it into my hands. “What do you make of her?”
I held a dark green carved stone—jade, I think—about six or seven inches high and no more than three across. It was in the likeness of a naked woman.
Oddly, it felt warm, almost hot, to my touch. And as I looked at it I felt the most powerful sensation. It was a blast of pure evil, as if the thing had been a poisonous snake, uncoiling in my hand. I was so frightened I nearly dropped it. But Jade must have anticipated such a response because his hands had closed around it before it could fall.
He set it down on a small table. I looked at it out of the corner of my eye, not liking to look at it but not feeling safe leaving it unwatched, either. I was too shaken to speak. Yolanda, too, was staring at it. She was very pale, although with fear or simply excitement I could not tell. Jade was watching both of us with his usual calm amusement.
I felt he was challenging me. Frightened but determined to prove my courage, I rose and walked to the table. I heard Yolanda gasp. I reached out and touched the figure for only a moment. It was enough. I knew I had not imagined it—the thing was alive. No, that’s not true. The stone was merely stone; the woman merely a carved representation. But there was life within it, like electricity glowing in a glass bulb, like lightning caught in a jar. Some spirit, some living spirit, had been put into the figure. It did not belong there; it was trapped there, unnaturally preserved within the solid stone.
I looked at Jade and saw him watching me.
“I must leave now,” I said. I was terrified, so frightened that I felt ill. The life in that stone was so wrong, so unnatural, that I could not stay in the same room with it. I did not know if it was evil or dangerous, but it horrified me.
When we were away, I questioned Yolanda about the little figure. But she was evasive, claiming to know nothing.
“You had seen it before,” I said. “It didn’t surprise you.”
She admitted that Jade had shown it to her, had her hold it, some time past. But I suspected that she knew more and I was determined to have it out of her. So all the way home I persisted in talking about it—even though I would rather have forgotten it—speculating on what the thing in the stone was. At last I hit upon something.
“It wants to get out,” I said. “I could feel that. It is trapped in the stone and wants out. Do you suppose Jade can keep it trapped?”
“Oh, yes! He—” She stopped short but my imagination finished the sentence for her. “He put it there.” Was that right? As casually as if I knew what I was talking about, I said, “Of course, he will call it out again, with our help.”
She turned her head to look at me, making me fear for our safety as she was driving a poorly paved road. “What has he been telling you?” she demanded.
I smiled, smug as a cat. “What hasn’t he told you?”
A silly trick, but it made her uneasy. “Why should he tell you anything?” she wondered aloud.