This Present Darkness

  THIS PRESENT DARKNESS

  by Frank Peretti

  Description:

  The small town of Ashton is the unexpected setting for an epic clash between good and evil as a Christian preacher and a news reporter unearth a plot to take over their small community, and eventually the world. Unseen supernatural forces are at play, as armies of angels and demons wage battle, with groups of Christians and New Agers influencing what they cannot see by the power of prayer.

  Frank Peretti:

  With more than 12 million novels in print, Frank Peretti is nothing short of a publishing phenomenon and has been called “America’s hottest Christian novelist.” The Oath (Word Publishing 1995), sold more than half a million copies within the first six months of release. The Visitation (Word Publishing 1999), was #1 on the CBA Fiction Bestseller list for four months. Peretti is a natural storyteller who, as a youngster in Seattle, regularly gathered the neighborhood children for animated storytelling sessions. After graduating from high school, he began playing banjo with a local bluegrass group. He and his wife were married in 1972, and Peretti soon moved from touring with a pop band to launching a modest Christian music ministry. Peretti later spent time studying English, screen writing and film at UCLA and then assisted his father in pastoring a small Assembly of God church. In 1983, he gave up his pastoring position and began taking construction jobs to make ends meet. While working at a local ski factory, he began writing This Present Darkness, the book that would catapult him into the public eye. After numerous rejections from publishers and a slow start in sales, word-of-mouth enthusiasm finally lifted This Present Darkness onto a tidal wave of interest in spiritual warfare. The book appeared on Bookstore Journal’s bestseller list every month for more than eight years. Peretti’s two spiritual warfare novels, This Present Darkness (1998) and Piercing the Darkness (1989), captivated readers, together selling more than 3.5 million copies. The Oath was awarded the 1996 Gold Medallion Award for best fiction. Frank Peretti and his wife, Barbara Jean, live in the Western U.S. In spite of sudden fame and notoriety, Frank still lives a simple, well-rounded life that includes carpentry, banjo making, sculpturing, bicycling and hiking. He is also an avid pilot.

  THIS PRESENT DARKNESS

  Howard Books

  A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book 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.

  Copyright © 1986, 2003 by Frank E. Peretti

  Originally published by Crossway Books in different form.

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Howard Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  First Howard Books ebook edition February 2012

  HOWARD and colophon are trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  Designed by Jaime Putorti

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 86-70279

  ISBN 978-1-4516-7333-3 (ebook)

  For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

  —EPHESIANS 6:12 (ESV)

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  CONTENTS

  Foreword

  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

  Illusion Excerpt

  FOREWORD

  PEOPLE OFTEN ASK me, Which of your books is your favorite? Of course, as any parent would speak of his children, I reply that I prize all of my books, and it’s hard to pick a favorite. Each book is unique, reflecting a particular time in my life, a stage of growth, something I was learning, pondering, and experiencing. You can almost trace Frank Peretti’s spiritual journey by reading his books.

  But having said all that, I can tell you that This Present Darkness holds a special place in my heart because it was my very first novel, written during a time of dark discouragement and bitter struggle. I was in my midthirties, I’d pursued many dreams with no enduring success, and now I was a frustrated, burned-out former minister working in a ski factory with only one dream left: to be a writer. When Crossway Books called me to say they would publish my book, that was probably the pivotal moment of my life.

  What inspired this book? Nothing in particular and a lot of things in general. Twenty-five years ago, the drug tripping of the sixties was “maturing” into the neopaganism of the late seventies, and demons—and their doctrines—were gaining a weird, glassy-eyed respect from the popular culture; Star Wars was a smash hit movie that dazzled us with sights, sounds, and spectacles from other worlds; Superman and Indiana Jones were reviving the mystique and appeal of the “superhero.” Somewhere in all this mix of spirit and spectacle, I envisioned a story that would convey the dangers and workings of warfare in the spiritual realm. I envisioned a movie-of-the-mind, a fiery-winged flight through dimensions never dreamed of, blade-to-blade encounters with the ugliness of spiritual evil, and the triumph, the blazing white light of God’s holy angels, slingshot to victory by the prayers of struggling saints. For five years I dreamed, fantasized, and “played pretend” on paper, on and off, frequently abandoning, always returning to the project, the vision, the one thing I just had to finish before I died, published or not.

  Seventeen years ago—three years after it was finished—TPD was in print. After a slow start, it leaped suddenly from store shelf obscurity to front-counter celebrity, and stayed on the bestseller lists for nearly ten years, breaking publishing barriers and records alike. Of all the books I have written, This Present Darkness has been the most popular. Of all the topics I’ve addressed in my books, spiritual warfare seems to be the one topic with which I will always be identified, probably to my grave.

  Today, fifteen years after the publishing of the sequel, Piercing the Darkness, I don’t talk mu
ch about spiritual warfare. I’ve moved on to learn and write about other topics as God leads me. But that’s the nice thing about books: Even though the author has moved on to other things, the books remain. This Present Darkness is still speaking the same message to new generations, in many countries, in many languages. God is still using my feeble effort from years ago to open eyes, change hearts, and save souls. Do I find that satisfying, fulfilling, and awe-inspiring? Ohhhhh yes, and from the days in the factory until now, I have never been able to comprehend the vastness of God’s power and purpose. I can only stand in wonder and give thanks for what He has done.

  —Frank E. Peretti

  May 19, 2003

  CHAPTER 1

  LATE ON A full-mooned Sunday night, the two figures in work clothes appeared on Highway 27, just outside the small college town of Ashton. They were tall, at least seven feet, strongly built, perfectly proportioned. One was dark-haired and sharp-featured, the other blond and powerful. From a half mile away they looked toward the town, regarding the cacophonic sounds of gaiety from the storefronts, streets, and alleys within it. They started walking.

  It was the time of the Ashton Summer Festival, the town’s yearly exercise in frivolity and chaos, its way of saying thank you, come again, good luck, and nice to have you to the eight hundred or so college students at Whitmore College who would be getting their long awaited summer break from classes. Most would pack up and go home, but all would definitely stay at least long enough to take in the festivities, the street disco, the carnival rides, the nickel movies, and whatever else could be had, over or under the table, for kicks. It was a wild time, a chance to get drunk, pregnant, beat up, ripped off, and sick, all in the same night.

  In the middle of town a community-conscious landowner had opened up a vacant lot and permitted a traveling troupe of enterprising migrants to set up their carnival with rides, booths, and portapotties. The rides were best viewed in the dark, an escapade in gaily lit rust, powered by unmuffled tractor engines that competed with the wavering carnival music which squawked loudly from somewhere in the middle of it all. But on this warm summer night the roaming, cotton-candied masses were out to enjoy, enjoy, enjoy. A ferris wheel slowly turned, hesitated for boarding, turned some more for unboarding, then took a few full rotations to give its passengers their money’s worth; a merry-go-round spun in a brightly lit, gaudy circle, the peeling and dismembered horses still prancing to the melody of the canned calliope; carnivalgoers threw baseballs at baskets, dimes at ashtrays, darts at balloons, and money to the wind along the hastily assembled, ramshackle midway where the hawkers ranted the same try-yer-luck chatter for each passerby.

  The two visitors stood tall and silent in the middle of it all, wondering how a town of twelve thousand people—including college students—could produce such a vast, teeming crowd. The usually quiet population had turned out in droves, augmented by diversion-seekers from elsewhere, until the streets, taverns, stores, alleys, and parking spots were jammed, anything was allowed, and the illegal was ignored. The police did have their hands full, but each rowdy, vandal, drunk, or hooker in cuffs only meant a dozen more still loose and roaming about the town. The festival, reaching a crescendo now on its last night, was like a terrible storm that couldn’t be stopped; one could only wait for it to blow over, and there would be plenty to clean up afterward.

  The two visitors made their way slowly through the people-packed carnival, listening to the talk, watching the activity. They were inquisitive about this town, so they took their time observing here and there, on the right, on the left, before and behind. The milling throngs were moving around them like swirling garments in a washing machine, meandering from this side of the street to the other in an unpredictable, never-ending cycle. The two tall men kept eyeing the crowd. They were looking for someone.

  “There,” said the dark-haired man.

  They both saw her. She was young, very pretty, but also very unsettled, looking this way and that, a camera in her hands and a stiff-lipped expression on her face.

  The two men hurried through the crowd and stood beside her. She didn’t notice them.

  “You know,” the dark-haired one said to her, “you might try looking over there.”

  With that simple comment, he guided her by a hand on her shoulder toward one particular booth on the midway. She stepped through the grass and candy wrappers, moving toward the booth where some teenagers were egging each other on in popping balloons with darts. None of that interested her, but then … some shadows moving stealthily behind the booth did. She held her camera ready, took a few more silent, careful steps, and then quickly raised the camera to her eye.

  The flash of the bulb lit up the trees behind the booth as the two men hurried away to their next appointment.

  THEY MOVED SMOOTHLY, unfalteringly, passing through the main part of town at a brisk pace. Their final destination was a mile past the center of town, right on Poplar Street, and up to the top of Morgan Hill about a half mile. Practically no time at all had passed before they stood before the little white church on its postage-stamp lot, with its well-groomed lawn and dainty Sunday-School-and-Service billboard. Across the top of the little billboard was the name “Ashton Community Church,” and in black letters hastily painted over whatever name used to be there it said, “Henry L. Busche, Pastor.”

  They looked back. From this lofty hill one could look over the whole town and see it spread from city limit to city limit. To the west sparkled the caramel-colored carnival; to the east stood the dignified and matronly Whitmore College campus; along Highway 27, Main Street through town, were the storefront offices, the small-town-sized Sears, a few gas stations at war, a True Value Hardware, the local newspaper, several small family businesses. From here the town looked so typically American—small, innocent, and harmless, like the background for every Norman Rockwell painting.

  But the two visitors did not perceive with eyes only. Even from this vantage point the true substratum of Ashton weighed very heavily upon their spirits and minds. They could feel it: restless, strong, growing, very designed and purposeful … a very special kind of evil.

  It was not unlike either of them to ask questions, to study, to probe. More often than not it came with their job. So they naturally hesitated in their business, pausing to wonder, Why here?

  But only for an instant. It could have been some acute sensitivity, an instinct, a very faint but for them discernible impression, but it was enough to make them both instantly vanish around the corner of the church, melding themselves against the beveled siding, almost invisible there in the dark. They didn’t speak, they didn’t move, but they watched with a piercing gaze as something approached.

  The night scene of the quiet street was a collage of stark blue moonlight and bottomless shadows. But one shadow did not stir with the wind as did the tree shadows, and neither did it stand still as did the building shadows. It crawled, quivered, moved along the street toward the church, while any light it crossed seemed to sink into its blackness, as if it were a breach torn in space. But this shadow had a shape, an animated, creaturelike shape, and as it neared the church sounds could be heard: the scratching of claws along the ground, the faint rustling of breeze-blown, membranous wings wafting just above the creature’s shoulders.

  It had arms and it had legs, but it seemed to move without them, crossing the street and mounting the front steps of the church. Its leering, bulbous eyes reflected the stark blue light of the full moon with their own jaundiced glow. The gnarled head protruded from hunched shoulders, and wisps of rancid red breath seethed in labored hisses through rows of jagged fangs.

  It either laughed or it coughed—the wheezes puffing out from deep within its throat could have been either. From its crawling posture it reared up on its legs and looked about the quiet neighborhood, the black, leathery jowls pulling back into a hideous death-mask grin. It moved toward the front door. The black hand passed through the door like a spear through liquid; the body hobbled forw
ard and penetrated the door, but only halfway.

  Suddenly, as if colliding with a speeding wall, the creature was knocked backward and into a raging tumble down the steps, the glowing red breath tracing a corkscrew trail through the air.

  With an eerie cry of rage and indignation, it gathered itself up off the sidewalk and stared at the strange door that would not let it pass through. Then the membranes on its back began to billow, enfolding great bodies of air, and it flew with a roar headlong at the door, through the door, into the foyer—and into a cloud of white hot light.

  The creature screamed and covered its eyes, then felt itself being grabbed by a huge, powerful vise of a hand. In an instant it was hurling through space like a rag doll, outside again, forcefully ousted.

  The wings hummed in a blur as it banked sharply in a flying turn and headed for the door again, red vapors chugging in dashes and streaks from its nostrils, its talons bared and poised for attack, a ghostly siren of a scream rising in its throat. Like an arrow through a target, like a bullet through a board, it streaked through the door—

  And instantly felt its insides tearing loose.

  There was an explosion of suffocating vapor, one final scream, and the flailing of withering arms and legs. Then there was nothing at all except the ebbing stench of sulfur and the two strangers, suddenly inside the church.

  The big blond man replaced a shining sword as the white light that surrounded him faded away.

  “A spirit of harassment?” he asked.

  “Or doubt … or fear. Who knows?”

  “And that was one of the smaller ones?”

  “I’ve not seen one smaller.”

  “No indeed. And just how many would you say there are?”

  “More, much more than we, and everywhere. Never idle.”