My Babylon: Book Four: Host

By James L. Wilber

My Story

An obsessed magician will do anything it takes to satisfy his perverse needs.

My Myth

He turns to forbidden arts to manifest his will.

My Revelation

In doing so, he will bring about the end of everything.

My Babylon

A serial novel about the paranormal and dark desires. The story of a cursed young man who has an intimate view of the Apocalypse. My Babylon weaves elements of urban fantasy, erotic horror, and real-world occult practices, to form a unique personal tale that thrills, terrifies, and even enlightens.

In Book Four: Host, the magus learns about the forces that are arrayed against him, and the power he has carried with him all along.

My Babylon is told in a series of novellas. The Complete edition containing all five books is now available in print.

Find more great indie authors at Midworldarts.com.

• Language: English
• Publisher: James L. Wilber
• Release date: Sep 6, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301902583

James L. Wilber

James L. Wilber describes himself as Anne Rice and Chuck Palahniuk's bastard love child. He's a pretentious prick who claims to pen, "literary genre fiction." Which means he writes smarmy shit about wizards and vampires doing a poor job at hiding his symbolism and metaphor. He's turned to self-publishing on the correct assumption his stories are just too fucking weird for mass consumption. He has contributed to numerous books for roleplaying games from companies such as: Wizards of the Coast, Paizo Publishing, White Wolf Studios, Bastion Press, and Atlas Games. He was also a writer on the Origins Award nominated, Buffy the Vampire Slayer Roleplaying Game by Eden Studios. Mr. Wilber also assumes the roles of husband, ceremonial magician, podcast host, and owner of a 100-lb Alaskan Malamute. He lives in Indianapolis, a dreary place built by masons obsessed with circles. Along with Stephan Loy and Dick Thomas, James is a member of Mid-World Arts, a collective of indie writers dedicated to helping each other produce quality works. Find out more at midworldarts.com. You can read his thoughts on politics, culture, and what he calls pagan chaos magick at scrollofthoth.com. He only uses social media that he enjoys, which means tumblr. Get to know him at scrollofthoth.tumblr.com, jameslwilber.tumblr.com, and geeksoutafterdark.tumblr.com. You can hear him on the podcasts Scroll of Thoth, and Geeks Out After Dark. Get more of his writing at jameslwilber.com.

Book preview

MY BABYLON

A NOVEL IN FIVE PARTS

BOOK FOUR: HOST

BY JAMES L. WILBER

Copyright © 2013 by James L. Wilber. All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Mid-World Arts

James L. Wilber is a part of the Mid-World Arts Studio, a group of independent artists helping to promote each other in order to challenge traditional media. If you liked this story, please visit Mid-World Arts to find other quality publications.

The author greatly appreciates you taking the time to read this work. Please consider leaving a review wherever you bought this book and telling others about it.

Published by James L. Wilber at Smashwords

Dedication

This one is dedicated to all the friends, teachers, and gods who have taught me to question everything.

If there's one leading principle which unifies them, it's a simple one. It's based on the assumption that any structure of authority and domination has to justify itself- none of them are self-justifying. Whether they're in individual relations, or international affairs, or the workplace, or whatever- they have a burden of proof to bear, and if they can't bear that burden (which they usually can't), they're illegitimate and should be dismantled and replaced by alternative structures which are free and participatory and are not based on authoritarian systems.

-- Noam Chomsky

We create no myths.

There will be no new holy books written. There will be no new great revelations.

We only have stories.

We are jaded by excess. The great sea of information, capable of connecting us all, only serves to divide us by faith, culture, counterculture, and ideology. It makes us incapable of seeing the great works around us. At least for now.

I have done my best to be honest. To reveal these events as they happened, to put myself in the same mind as when they occurred.

I am the magus Ego Sum Legio. This is:

My story,

My myth,

My revelation,

Liber 589 – The Book of Eschaton

My Babylon

I'm an angel. I kill firstborns while their mamas watch. I turn cities into salt. I even, when I feel like it, rip the souls from little girls, and from now till kingdom come, the only thing you can count on in your existence is never understanding why.

-- Gabriel, The Prophecy

Chapter 1

She had a purple robe now, cut much like the red one, only better made. She stuffed it into a leather satchel, also new, also something I didn't buy her. Every argument with Aiden had to be approached like a chess move, with each counter-move considered beforehand. The problem was, she knew me better than I knew myself.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I recalled a simpler time only six months ago, when my phone went off maybe once a week. After giving a phone to Aiden, I learned quickly to keep mine on silent mode lest the constant ringing and chirping drive me mad. I received not only her communications, but ones from those who cared about her, chiefly Ezra, Morgan, and my father. The buzz, like a swarm of locusts chasing me, was only slightly less irritating.

A text from Morgan, I told her not to.

I sighed and moved a pawn. What did Morgan say? I asked.

Aiden pushed her red hair back, looking into the satchel. I could see she was going through a mental checklist, making sure she had everything she needed for ritual. She told me to be careful.

Aiden's own interpretation, but being careful meant not going at all. Not taking the risk that the police would show up. Not taking the risk that she would be stopped and asked for ID. Not setting off a chain reaction that led to a place with a lot of questions without answers.

It's not a matter of careful. It's a surveillance society. You could be stopped anywhere for anything. Guilt by association.

She stopped what she was doing to fire back. What do you want me to do? Sit here all day and plan for you to come home?

The words and the way she said them had levels of connotation. Was I to make her a slave even though I swore not to? I couldn't trust myself with that kind of control over her. Keeping Aiden in bondage meant freeing things inside me best left locked up. And what devious plans would she concoct to bed me if left to her own devices all day? We had called an uneasy truce on that front, but we both made occasional forays across the border. I was sure I couldn't resist if she returned to full prick-tease mode in earnest. Morgan was right about that. It seemed inhuman to live with this luscious fruit, all hips, and breasts, and lips and heat, without succumbing to temptation.

No. Of course not. But we need to make sure that when you do go out, you're not putting yourself in danger.

Danger? Her eyes flared. I'm not a squeak-mouse like you.

She always knew where my goat was, ready for getting. There's a difference between bravery and stupidity.

You gave me freedom, now I want to use it. If I live by my beliefs, then I'm free, no matter what jail they put me in.

This trait, this recklessness... I have no idea where it came from. Not from me, not from Rose, or even Ezra. The dead girl maybe, but it seemed a strange personality quirk for the suicidally depressed. What beliefs? What are you talking about? The OTO? Ezra's cult? That crap?

Stop calling it that. You know better.

I did know better. I had reached the conclusion a long time ago that the only difference between a cult and a religion is size. We shared the same opinion just like we shared our memories. I know this, because Tyler knows this.

It's still a load of crap. It's still the Church of Crowley. I thought you knew better than to join in the veneration of a Victorian megalomaniac-heroin-junkie.

We're not in the OTO. It's not about that anymore.

Then what the fuck is it about? Explain it to me. You want your own cult? You want them to worship you?

No. I don't know. I want to....

Why do you want people to follow if you don't know what you believe?

"I don't want them to follow. I want them to try. To explore.... It's complicated. At least we're doing something. Unlike you." She pointed a loaded finger at me.

The familiar whine of Ezra's BMW came from below and