The Devils Cloak - 1/3
He will break you and remake you. These are common connotations to this masterful Godd of magick. Steeped in folklore ranging from one worldly origin to the next. One thing is for certain, he is a lover of the truth and a formidable foe to those whom cross the line of such truths. I find it rather curious when a witch claims a relationship with him. What part are they speaking to I wonder.
Is it to the anti-empire, tower crusher, anti-colonisation, and holy liberator? I have seen many witches who claim his company however refuse to understand this face. I have seen him offer conspiracy to desired aims of one bold enough to seek him, and then poison them requesting it as a lesson in truth and greed. Perhaps it’s to the Firery fallen in Love angel. A heart that yearns I have pondered, right as they discover grief and love are not so far apart, some might say lovers. Or maybe they mean the queer and verdant defender. I often laugh to myself when I hear people discover his queerness for the first time, some have even dismissed it and in doing so I have watched him turn away from them, all the more to wait till they are ready to see him whole - he’d say something like, ‘You can’t see my heart when the blindfold you bare is made of the very bramble and nails used to crucify me’. Perhaps it is the three-horned one of Arte, I often see the sex appeal of this face, glimmer in the eyes of those who seek it, but I have also seen them shy away, tied with trepidation and insecurity as the Devil holds a dark mirror of honesty before them.
The point is that none of these faces are wrong, none of them less or more worthy of getting to know, but it is worth noting that you cannot spin lightning if you are avoidant of the storm it yields. No witch is left unmarked by magick, I have not seen a single witch perform ritual and or a spell and not be in it, spun by it, breathed by it.
How it marks you is dependent on the relationship. ‘Relationship’ is the lover’s bridge. It unites the wyrd in life-turning ways. Love brought forth the Devil. He is not a meer concept, a feeble hope, or a loose whim. He is all the Devil and the faces of this wild untameable force and yet he is something more simple than that, more real. People that do not heed this truth have yet to feel him hold you gently in his arms as you weep for the world.
Ultimately there is a process of reforging, of heresy by its original definition “to choose”. He is a choice, he is hunger, he is magick. Some say he is the most human of the Godds. He’s all gender fuckery, raging sea, that spark in a kiss from a lover for the first and last time, and most of all he has this incredible ability to undo you, strip you of deception, and dare you into transformation. True magick cannot be made by the rigid and avoidant. Verdancy is in the adventure with him, you have to be ready to take the risk, to fall for and in the name of love.
In the making of the Devil’s Cloak, I wanted to ensure that this legacy beheld by those who purchase and use it for its intended act of protection would be shielded from maliciousness and the curses that may waft their way, and that their work would not be intercepted by the hateful. Every inch of this intense ritual and production process is met with fierce unwavering love. From the hand-foraged ingredients to the seven-day blessing, the rituals and the house blended protection agent - nothing is unconsidered.
I wanted to cloak you in his cloak, for you to see yourself in his amber eyes. When you light this I wanted you to feel yourself in his wild meadow, atop that altar stone.
I recall a part of the ritual for the consecration of the candles. It was day five of seven in the rite. I was atop a cliff face in a secret place near the wild untempered ocean, the air was cold and sharp in the lungs. It was twilight, my body shaking, the icy wind picking up as I called to him. I could feel the storm shifting in the distance - rising in the east where I was grasping my hands. My face and torso coated in handpainted sigils made from a paste I make using various plant agents. The scent of the thick red viscous liquid betwixt my legs permeating the smells of wild honey, frankincense, various strange burnt woods and wild berries. I raised my blade to the heavens and a loud crack of lightning shook the earth, I could feel my head spin, but I was safe, he had me wrapped in his arms, in his cloak.
All I could think of was love, need…truth. I felt my Fetch rise through me.
Not all magick is clean and tidy, it gets messy, and it gets real - the good kind does anyway. Sometimes it’s all sound and other times defining silence, but not a single inch of this work was not saturated in his blessing, in unapologetic wild love.
And is that not just the beginning? Is love not the point of everything?
xo A
Where there is beauty, a Witch is born to cultivate it. Where there is Corruption from empire, a Witch is brought to ensure its crumbling.
- Ardwen Briarheart