deehellcat (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
dixiehellcat) wrote2011-09-02 10:20 pm
dixiehellcat) wrote2011-09-02 10:20 pm
Entry tags:
That Which Lies Hidden, a Ghost Adventures fic, 6/12
That Which Lies Hidden, a Ghost Adventures fic, chapter 6/12 (I think. The guys & Claire keep running their mouths.)
Hope nobody minds a really loooong chapter--I could have broken it, but it would have left one H of a cliffhanger, and I couldn't bear to do that. :)
Translations of the Latin exorcism excerpts are at the end, so as not to break up the flow of the scene. Picture this as one long camera shot. Also a few notes down there.
Again, THANK YOU to xXTailo-Lives-OnXx of deviantart for continued support and for not minding when I make a mess of the sandbox.
And now, the exorcism!
6 The hardest thing I believe I've ever done was to stand still, with that monster coming toward me with the necktie taut between its fists like an assassin's garotte—and then waggle my eyebrows and say "Ooh! Maybe I shouldn't run too fast."
I spun and dashed down the short hallway to the bedroom, with the demon in hot pursuit. The timing had to be perfect…The foot of the bed faced the door, and just inside I jumped, landed on the bed and twisted around just in time to see my pursuer closing in. As it pounced, I rolled to my side and off, coming to my feet as the demon hit the mattress full length. The end of the tie hung off the edge of the mattress, and while its would-be wielder was regrouping I grabbed it and jerked it loose—one less weapon in its arsenal. I draped it around my neck, giggled like I was having the time of my life, and took a side step as though about to run again.
With an animal growl, the demon came to all fours and turned to come off the other side and cut me off—and stopped cold. It growled again and slapped at the mattress, but it was stuck. It couldn't move off that bed. I had time to think yay, it worked! followed by oh fuck, this is real before I dove for my gear. The face it turned to me, contorted with inhuman fury and with black holes for eyes, only confirmed what the devil's traps had proven. "Surprise, asshole," I said and stood with the printout in one hand and the spray bottle of holy water in the other.
The demon still seemed unsure what was happening, until I began to read the Latin words. Then it howled, crawled to the foot of the bed, and slashed the air with claw-like fingers trying to grab me; but even Zak's small bedroom was big enough for me to stay clear. The room was, however, small enough for me to easily fire several spurts of holy water into its face. It yelped and fell back, scrubbing frantically at its eyes. I hoped Zak wasn't hurt by the water, and hoped more that I would get a chance to apologize to him for it.
Realizing it couldn't reach me physically, the demon sat back with a thump and attacked verbally, trying to break my concentration. Dividing my attention was a real challenge; I had to keep track of it, but at the same time filter it out as much as I could. Another of Sam's training dictums rose to mind: Don't listen to it, and whatever you do, DON'T answer it. No matter what it says, it's a lie, every word. It wants you to play its game. Stick with yours!
The flow of the Latin helped. The words were beautiful, and I knew the meanings, so I could put the emphasis where it belonged and hurl them like missiles of righteous anger. I let it wash over me and block the hateful semi-voice of the demon.
"—you pathetic little geek bitch, playing at being a huntress—"
"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus--"
"—couldn't be a hunter, couldn't be a cop, you're even a bad lay—"
"Ergo draco maledicte, et omnis legio diabolica—"
"—you think you're gonna get your faggy buddy back? He's lost his mind. He's in here suckin' on his toes—"
"cessa decipere humanas creaturas!!"
It raised hooked fingers to face, and terrified it was about to try and claw at Zak's eyes, I darted close and hosed it down with another blast of holy water. It screeched, screwed its eyes shut and began to jerk as though having a convulsion. I gasped in sudden hope; it didn't know I'd seen this before, but I had, in the Kansas lockdown video, and I knew what it meant. "Zak!" I yelled. "You're in there fighting, aren't you? I know you are! Can you hear me?"
The next groan seemed to change timbre midway through, from harsh and guttural to something more—human. The body on the bed sucked in a great shuddery gulp of air, as though surfacing after a near drowning, and the eyes flew open and locked with mine. They were no longer black, but green, and such a green—awake, alert, alive, and snapping with fire: a little scared, and a lot angry. I knew those eyes, even though I had never looked into them in the waking world.
"Claire!" Zak gasped, and his strained voice was as beautiful as an angel's.
"Yes!" I pumped my fist, squirt bottle and all; but my heart panged when he reached out toward me. "I can't touch you, baby, not till we finish this. Stay with it! It can't beat both of us together. Keep fighting it!"
His outstretched hand clenched into a fist. "Yeah," he panted, and his focus turned back inward. His body began to shake again, and through his teeth he gritted out, "Get—the fuck—OUT—of me!!"
As the inner battle continued, I tore back into the exorcism. For a few moments it seemed a stalemate reigned, until a horrible gurgling noise rose from the contested throat. I faltered, frightened the demon had found a new way to attack Zak, but then steeled myself and pushed on.
"Deus caeli, Deus terrae, humiliter majestati gloriae Tuae supplicamus--"
Abruptly, Zak's head flung back, and a solid column of purple-black smoke began to pour from his mouth. My heart jumped, but I kept reading.
"--ut ab omni infernalium spirituum potestate, laqueo, deceptione et nequitia, omnis fallaciae, libera nos, Domine—"
Removing the demon from its unwilling host was only half the battle; the rest of the rite would banish it back to Hell. It knew that as well as I did, and it flew at me, battering me with a stinking wind, picking up objects to hurl at me. The talisman around my neck warmed in response, protecting me from possession. I'd memorized the end of the ritual by Sam's direction for just such a situation, in case the pages were torn from my grasp, but I held on tight. I had to finish before it decided to try and take Zak again.
"Vade, Satana, inventor et magister omnis fallaciae, hostis humanae salutis. Humiliare sub potenti manu dei, contremisce et effuge!!"
Like a spike struck by a hammer, the black pillar slammed into the floor. With a sizzle and a burning stench, it was gone. I bent over and rested my fists, still clutching my weaponry, on my thighs while I chased my breath. Eyeing the scorch marks on the carpet I thought Man, I hope nobody was downstairs. The demon could possess no one there, though; completing the rite punched its one-way ticket to Hell, a place, according to Sam, even demons didn't like. I didn't ask how he knew that.
Finally I felt able to stand. Zak had crumpled back onto the mattress, and now lay on his side facing away from me. Thankfully, his breathing looked regular. Everything in me screamed to run to him, but I couldn't yet. Sam had warned of possible secondary possessions, weaker inimical entities that attached themselves to demons and could be left behind after an exorcism. There were ways to detect them, and those were the tools I had to implement now. "Zak?" I called. "Zak?"
"Mmmnfph." The answering grunt sounded so normal I had to swallow a laugh. Wonder if he sounds like that first thing in the morning. Wonder if he's a night owl or an early bird. So many things I didn't know about him! I prayed that now I would have the luxury of finding out some of them.
"Hey, Zak. How're you feeling?"
Another grunt replied, and finally he mumbled as though half asleep, "Feel like I went six rounds of MMA."
MMA? Oh right, Nick said once Zak was into mixed martial arts. "C'mere a minute."
This time the answer left me torn between jumping for joy and running to hide. It was a low, throaty chuckle, just a bit lewd. "Mmmm, how 'bout you c'mere?"
Does he not remember? But he knew me, just a minute ago; he called my name. Has he forgotten? Suddenly half sick at heart, I managed to say "C'mon, Zak, seriously, just come over here, please."
"Okay, okay," he grumbled. "Damn, why am I so sore?" He rolled off the far side of the bed and stood, with a long, languid stretch, and the same grace I'd seen on the videos. I relaxed a bit; if any demonic being had been hiding inside him, the devil's traps would have held him. "I had the craziest fuckin' dream, I was—" Halfway through turning toward me, he halted, then finished more slowly, looking down at his dress work clothes. The bewildered look on his face was not improved when he looked up at me. I knew I must be one hot mess, in my sooty, sweaty sex jammies, clutching a wrinkled sheaf of paper and an old squirt bottle. "Claire…what the fuck just happened?"
I opened my mouth, and the world began to tilt and slowly spin. I dropped the exorcism and dug my fingers into the window facing, sagging against the wall to keep from falling headlong. Before a roar blotted out all sound, I thought I heard Zak cry out my name. For a moment, or a few, I lost track of everything, and roused to find my feet off the ground and my bottom coming to rest on something soft, accompanied by frantic mumbles. "Pillow, where's the fuckin'—pillow, there it is—" My head rose, then settled back. "Claire, Claire! Shit, sweetie, don't do this to me." I made a feeble noise of protest as my fingers were loosened from their death grip on the Windex bottle. No, no, I need that, Sam said squirt him with it to be sure— "What the hell's in this anyway?" A faint squich, squich, snif sounded. "Rosewater? Okay, whatever. Claire! Come on, sweetheart, wake up…" Cool damp fingers swiped my cheeks, and I coaxed my eyes into opening. Zak's worried face hovered about me where I lay on the bed, and a little grin of relief tugged at his cheeks. "Hey, there you are."
"Yeah," I whispered. "God, what a beautiful smile you have…I've never seen you smile. You—it—never did."
The grin faded. "It wasn't a dream, was it." The words were not spoken as a question. "The demon, the—the possession."
"No, it wasn't a dream." His hand still rested against my face, and I covered it with mine. "But it's over now. You're free. This proves it, if it came out of that bottle." The spray bottle lay on the mattress beside his other hand. I tipped my head toward his damp fingers. "It's holy water. Your body couldn't tolerate its touch if anything demonic were still in there."
"It burned before. Not unbearably, to me; more like shampoo in my eyes. But to—to it—the stuff was like acid. Now it just smells like rosewater."
"Really?" I turned my head and sniffed his palm. "I don't smell anything."
Zak followed suit. "I don't either, now. Weird." I pushed myself up to sit—slowly; I was still a little woozy—and watched him process. "How long?" he asked finally.
"Almost two years, Nick says."
"Two years…" He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. "It took everything from me. My house, my car, my dog…my life's work, my friends…everything I valued. Everything." I hurt for him, but a selfish little corner of me was a bit hurt I didn't seem to rate any mention. That lasted only until his eyes popped open. "Except you," he said and pulled me into a fierce embrace. "It didn't get you. I wouldn't let it have you. But it got so close…it knew, at the end. When you said you'd do anything it wanted, I couldn't—couldn't hide the truth any more. It knew. And it was gonna hurt you, and make me watch…oh fuck, the things it said it was gonna do to you…" His grip tightened, and he shuddered violently. I wrapped my arms around him, and rubbed little circles on his sweat-wet back. "That's why I was up front, where I could jump it—it had to show off how sadistically creative it was."
"It didn't happen, Zak," I soothed him. "We stopped it. You stopped it." I drew back just far enough to look at his face. The shine of tears in his eyes cut my heart; I ached to kiss them away, but couldn't be that forward with a man to whom I must certainly be half a stranger still. "You said you were hiding truth from the demon. About what?"
He blinked the tears away. "I told you," he said simply. "It took everything I loved away from me. The only way I could keep you safe was to not let it know that I loved you." I guess I looked as stunned as I felt. "Okay, so maybe it sounds crazy to say I love you, but I do, all right? I've seen you, I've watched you. You're smart and compassionate and gorgeous, and you took on fuckin' HELL for me. How could I not love you? Yeah, I know I can't expect anything back for now, because you don't know me at all—"
"Yes, I do," I interrupted him. "I know you. Through videos, and through your friends, and---other stuff—I know you. I know you're sharp, and strong, and hot, and crazy brave. And yeah, I believe I love you. But, Zak, don't mistake gratitude or guilt for love. Don't you tell me you love me unless you mmfph—"
He interrupted me right back, with a kiss that scorched my eyelashes and curled my toes. "Did that feel like guilt?" he demanded when we parted. "Did that taste like gratitude?"
"Um, no," I conceded, trying to make my eyes stop crossing.
"Good," he grumbled. "Just so we understand each other. I'm no saint, Claire. I'm stubborn, and I leap without looking, and I've been called an asshole a few times. Well, more than a few. But mostly, that's because I don't like being told what to do, or what to think. So. Don't tell me I don't love you. Okay?"
"Okay." How bad was it that listening to him enumerate his bad qualities made tears of joy that much harder to hold back? "You should know, I'm no angel either."
"More like an Amazon," he retorted. "Damn, girl. Any other woman—fuck, any other person—would never have walked back in here if they knew what was in me. You obviously knew, and you came prepared. How did you know, sweetie, how?"
The portion of the exorcism Claire is reading while the demon is taunting her translates as:
We exorcise you, every impure spirit,
Thus, cursed demon
and every diabolical legion
Cease to deceive human creatures!
And the part she reads as the demon cloud attacks her:
God of Heaven, God of the Earth,
humbly by the majesty of Your Glory we implore
that from every power of the infernal spirits,
from their snare, their deception and their wickedness,
from every deceit, free us, Lord.
Go away, devil, inventor and master
of all deceit, enemy of humanity's salvation.
Be humble under the Powerful Hand of God --
tremble and flee!
Couple of notes--If you follow Zak's twitter you may have seen him mention a while back that he hatessss to get up early, so that answers one of Claire's questions. hehe
The reference to rosewater comes from many reports of encounters with benign spiritual entities, such as the Virgin Mary, which are often accompanied by the smell of roses. I like to think Zak and Claire's love may have led one of the host of heaven to lend them a hand in their struggle.
Has anybody seen the show Best Places I've Ever Been on Travel Channel? And was my tv color on the fritz, or are Zak's eyes really that incredibly green? :D
Hope nobody minds a really loooong chapter--I could have broken it, but it would have left one H of a cliffhanger, and I couldn't bear to do that. :)
Translations of the Latin exorcism excerpts are at the end, so as not to break up the flow of the scene. Picture this as one long camera shot. Also a few notes down there.
Again, THANK YOU to xXTailo-Lives-OnXx of deviantart for continued support and for not minding when I make a mess of the sandbox.
And now, the exorcism!
6 The hardest thing I believe I've ever done was to stand still, with that monster coming toward me with the necktie taut between its fists like an assassin's garotte—and then waggle my eyebrows and say "Ooh! Maybe I shouldn't run too fast."
I spun and dashed down the short hallway to the bedroom, with the demon in hot pursuit. The timing had to be perfect…The foot of the bed faced the door, and just inside I jumped, landed on the bed and twisted around just in time to see my pursuer closing in. As it pounced, I rolled to my side and off, coming to my feet as the demon hit the mattress full length. The end of the tie hung off the edge of the mattress, and while its would-be wielder was regrouping I grabbed it and jerked it loose—one less weapon in its arsenal. I draped it around my neck, giggled like I was having the time of my life, and took a side step as though about to run again.
With an animal growl, the demon came to all fours and turned to come off the other side and cut me off—and stopped cold. It growled again and slapped at the mattress, but it was stuck. It couldn't move off that bed. I had time to think yay, it worked! followed by oh fuck, this is real before I dove for my gear. The face it turned to me, contorted with inhuman fury and with black holes for eyes, only confirmed what the devil's traps had proven. "Surprise, asshole," I said and stood with the printout in one hand and the spray bottle of holy water in the other.
The demon still seemed unsure what was happening, until I began to read the Latin words. Then it howled, crawled to the foot of the bed, and slashed the air with claw-like fingers trying to grab me; but even Zak's small bedroom was big enough for me to stay clear. The room was, however, small enough for me to easily fire several spurts of holy water into its face. It yelped and fell back, scrubbing frantically at its eyes. I hoped Zak wasn't hurt by the water, and hoped more that I would get a chance to apologize to him for it.
Realizing it couldn't reach me physically, the demon sat back with a thump and attacked verbally, trying to break my concentration. Dividing my attention was a real challenge; I had to keep track of it, but at the same time filter it out as much as I could. Another of Sam's training dictums rose to mind: Don't listen to it, and whatever you do, DON'T answer it. No matter what it says, it's a lie, every word. It wants you to play its game. Stick with yours!
The flow of the Latin helped. The words were beautiful, and I knew the meanings, so I could put the emphasis where it belonged and hurl them like missiles of righteous anger. I let it wash over me and block the hateful semi-voice of the demon.
"—you pathetic little geek bitch, playing at being a huntress—"
"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus--"
"—couldn't be a hunter, couldn't be a cop, you're even a bad lay—"
"Ergo draco maledicte, et omnis legio diabolica—"
"—you think you're gonna get your faggy buddy back? He's lost his mind. He's in here suckin' on his toes—"
"cessa decipere humanas creaturas!!"
It raised hooked fingers to face, and terrified it was about to try and claw at Zak's eyes, I darted close and hosed it down with another blast of holy water. It screeched, screwed its eyes shut and began to jerk as though having a convulsion. I gasped in sudden hope; it didn't know I'd seen this before, but I had, in the Kansas lockdown video, and I knew what it meant. "Zak!" I yelled. "You're in there fighting, aren't you? I know you are! Can you hear me?"
The next groan seemed to change timbre midway through, from harsh and guttural to something more—human. The body on the bed sucked in a great shuddery gulp of air, as though surfacing after a near drowning, and the eyes flew open and locked with mine. They were no longer black, but green, and such a green—awake, alert, alive, and snapping with fire: a little scared, and a lot angry. I knew those eyes, even though I had never looked into them in the waking world.
"Claire!" Zak gasped, and his strained voice was as beautiful as an angel's.
"Yes!" I pumped my fist, squirt bottle and all; but my heart panged when he reached out toward me. "I can't touch you, baby, not till we finish this. Stay with it! It can't beat both of us together. Keep fighting it!"
His outstretched hand clenched into a fist. "Yeah," he panted, and his focus turned back inward. His body began to shake again, and through his teeth he gritted out, "Get—the fuck—OUT—of me!!"
As the inner battle continued, I tore back into the exorcism. For a few moments it seemed a stalemate reigned, until a horrible gurgling noise rose from the contested throat. I faltered, frightened the demon had found a new way to attack Zak, but then steeled myself and pushed on.
"Deus caeli, Deus terrae, humiliter majestati gloriae Tuae supplicamus--"
Abruptly, Zak's head flung back, and a solid column of purple-black smoke began to pour from his mouth. My heart jumped, but I kept reading.
"--ut ab omni infernalium spirituum potestate, laqueo, deceptione et nequitia, omnis fallaciae, libera nos, Domine—"
Removing the demon from its unwilling host was only half the battle; the rest of the rite would banish it back to Hell. It knew that as well as I did, and it flew at me, battering me with a stinking wind, picking up objects to hurl at me. The talisman around my neck warmed in response, protecting me from possession. I'd memorized the end of the ritual by Sam's direction for just such a situation, in case the pages were torn from my grasp, but I held on tight. I had to finish before it decided to try and take Zak again.
"Vade, Satana, inventor et magister omnis fallaciae, hostis humanae salutis. Humiliare sub potenti manu dei, contremisce et effuge!!"
Like a spike struck by a hammer, the black pillar slammed into the floor. With a sizzle and a burning stench, it was gone. I bent over and rested my fists, still clutching my weaponry, on my thighs while I chased my breath. Eyeing the scorch marks on the carpet I thought Man, I hope nobody was downstairs. The demon could possess no one there, though; completing the rite punched its one-way ticket to Hell, a place, according to Sam, even demons didn't like. I didn't ask how he knew that.
Finally I felt able to stand. Zak had crumpled back onto the mattress, and now lay on his side facing away from me. Thankfully, his breathing looked regular. Everything in me screamed to run to him, but I couldn't yet. Sam had warned of possible secondary possessions, weaker inimical entities that attached themselves to demons and could be left behind after an exorcism. There were ways to detect them, and those were the tools I had to implement now. "Zak?" I called. "Zak?"
"Mmmnfph." The answering grunt sounded so normal I had to swallow a laugh. Wonder if he sounds like that first thing in the morning. Wonder if he's a night owl or an early bird. So many things I didn't know about him! I prayed that now I would have the luxury of finding out some of them.
"Hey, Zak. How're you feeling?"
Another grunt replied, and finally he mumbled as though half asleep, "Feel like I went six rounds of MMA."
MMA? Oh right, Nick said once Zak was into mixed martial arts. "C'mere a minute."
This time the answer left me torn between jumping for joy and running to hide. It was a low, throaty chuckle, just a bit lewd. "Mmmm, how 'bout you c'mere?"
Does he not remember? But he knew me, just a minute ago; he called my name. Has he forgotten? Suddenly half sick at heart, I managed to say "C'mon, Zak, seriously, just come over here, please."
"Okay, okay," he grumbled. "Damn, why am I so sore?" He rolled off the far side of the bed and stood, with a long, languid stretch, and the same grace I'd seen on the videos. I relaxed a bit; if any demonic being had been hiding inside him, the devil's traps would have held him. "I had the craziest fuckin' dream, I was—" Halfway through turning toward me, he halted, then finished more slowly, looking down at his dress work clothes. The bewildered look on his face was not improved when he looked up at me. I knew I must be one hot mess, in my sooty, sweaty sex jammies, clutching a wrinkled sheaf of paper and an old squirt bottle. "Claire…what the fuck just happened?"
I opened my mouth, and the world began to tilt and slowly spin. I dropped the exorcism and dug my fingers into the window facing, sagging against the wall to keep from falling headlong. Before a roar blotted out all sound, I thought I heard Zak cry out my name. For a moment, or a few, I lost track of everything, and roused to find my feet off the ground and my bottom coming to rest on something soft, accompanied by frantic mumbles. "Pillow, where's the fuckin'—pillow, there it is—" My head rose, then settled back. "Claire, Claire! Shit, sweetie, don't do this to me." I made a feeble noise of protest as my fingers were loosened from their death grip on the Windex bottle. No, no, I need that, Sam said squirt him with it to be sure— "What the hell's in this anyway?" A faint squich, squich, snif sounded. "Rosewater? Okay, whatever. Claire! Come on, sweetheart, wake up…" Cool damp fingers swiped my cheeks, and I coaxed my eyes into opening. Zak's worried face hovered about me where I lay on the bed, and a little grin of relief tugged at his cheeks. "Hey, there you are."
"Yeah," I whispered. "God, what a beautiful smile you have…I've never seen you smile. You—it—never did."
The grin faded. "It wasn't a dream, was it." The words were not spoken as a question. "The demon, the—the possession."
"No, it wasn't a dream." His hand still rested against my face, and I covered it with mine. "But it's over now. You're free. This proves it, if it came out of that bottle." The spray bottle lay on the mattress beside his other hand. I tipped my head toward his damp fingers. "It's holy water. Your body couldn't tolerate its touch if anything demonic were still in there."
"It burned before. Not unbearably, to me; more like shampoo in my eyes. But to—to it—the stuff was like acid. Now it just smells like rosewater."
"Really?" I turned my head and sniffed his palm. "I don't smell anything."
Zak followed suit. "I don't either, now. Weird." I pushed myself up to sit—slowly; I was still a little woozy—and watched him process. "How long?" he asked finally.
"Almost two years, Nick says."
"Two years…" He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. "It took everything from me. My house, my car, my dog…my life's work, my friends…everything I valued. Everything." I hurt for him, but a selfish little corner of me was a bit hurt I didn't seem to rate any mention. That lasted only until his eyes popped open. "Except you," he said and pulled me into a fierce embrace. "It didn't get you. I wouldn't let it have you. But it got so close…it knew, at the end. When you said you'd do anything it wanted, I couldn't—couldn't hide the truth any more. It knew. And it was gonna hurt you, and make me watch…oh fuck, the things it said it was gonna do to you…" His grip tightened, and he shuddered violently. I wrapped my arms around him, and rubbed little circles on his sweat-wet back. "That's why I was up front, where I could jump it—it had to show off how sadistically creative it was."
"It didn't happen, Zak," I soothed him. "We stopped it. You stopped it." I drew back just far enough to look at his face. The shine of tears in his eyes cut my heart; I ached to kiss them away, but couldn't be that forward with a man to whom I must certainly be half a stranger still. "You said you were hiding truth from the demon. About what?"
He blinked the tears away. "I told you," he said simply. "It took everything I loved away from me. The only way I could keep you safe was to not let it know that I loved you." I guess I looked as stunned as I felt. "Okay, so maybe it sounds crazy to say I love you, but I do, all right? I've seen you, I've watched you. You're smart and compassionate and gorgeous, and you took on fuckin' HELL for me. How could I not love you? Yeah, I know I can't expect anything back for now, because you don't know me at all—"
"Yes, I do," I interrupted him. "I know you. Through videos, and through your friends, and---other stuff—I know you. I know you're sharp, and strong, and hot, and crazy brave. And yeah, I believe I love you. But, Zak, don't mistake gratitude or guilt for love. Don't you tell me you love me unless you mmfph—"
He interrupted me right back, with a kiss that scorched my eyelashes and curled my toes. "Did that feel like guilt?" he demanded when we parted. "Did that taste like gratitude?"
"Um, no," I conceded, trying to make my eyes stop crossing.
"Good," he grumbled. "Just so we understand each other. I'm no saint, Claire. I'm stubborn, and I leap without looking, and I've been called an asshole a few times. Well, more than a few. But mostly, that's because I don't like being told what to do, or what to think. So. Don't tell me I don't love you. Okay?"
"Okay." How bad was it that listening to him enumerate his bad qualities made tears of joy that much harder to hold back? "You should know, I'm no angel either."
"More like an Amazon," he retorted. "Damn, girl. Any other woman—fuck, any other person—would never have walked back in here if they knew what was in me. You obviously knew, and you came prepared. How did you know, sweetie, how?"
The portion of the exorcism Claire is reading while the demon is taunting her translates as:
We exorcise you, every impure spirit,
Thus, cursed demon
and every diabolical legion
Cease to deceive human creatures!
And the part she reads as the demon cloud attacks her:
God of Heaven, God of the Earth,
humbly by the majesty of Your Glory we implore
that from every power of the infernal spirits,
from their snare, their deception and their wickedness,
from every deceit, free us, Lord.
Go away, devil, inventor and master
of all deceit, enemy of humanity's salvation.
Be humble under the Powerful Hand of God --
tremble and flee!
Couple of notes--If you follow Zak's twitter you may have seen him mention a while back that he hatessss to get up early, so that answers one of Claire's questions. hehe
The reference to rosewater comes from many reports of encounters with benign spiritual entities, such as the Virgin Mary, which are often accompanied by the smell of roses. I like to think Zak and Claire's love may have led one of the host of heaven to lend them a hand in their struggle.
Has anybody seen the show Best Places I've Ever Been on Travel Channel? And was my tv color on the fritz, or are Zak's eyes really that incredibly green? :D