Az'azouzis

 It's been a wild couple of weeks here at Malevolent Maine, MMers! A lot has been happening behind the scenes, and a lot of it has to do with our encounter with the Midnight Magician, Malachai Blackstone. There's a lot of moving pieces when it comes to running an investigative blog and often times these things take some time. As you'll see, we also weren't able to talk about this until now because of police involvement. 

After our discussion with Professor Carter Derwent, a history and linguistics professor from Bowdoin College, about Az'azouzis, a word we first encountered when we investigated the six people in Crannog's Field with no memory of who they were or why they were there. We heard the word again from Malachai Blackstone when we "interviewed" him last month. Blackstone claimed the word meant, "the end is not the end." Professor Derwent discredited this and translated it instead as, "dark watcher from beyond the stars."  

Derwent did a little more digging for us, reaching out to several colleagues from different universities. He was able to piece together a pretty clear description of Az'azouzis. Here's Derwent:

Az'azouzis, the dark watcher

Az'azouzis is a creature from beyond our plane of existence. Some call him a god, others refer to him as a beyonder - a being outside the known world. He is said to be watching the world, waiting for a way into this world. Over the centuries there have been various cults and groups dedicated to finding a way to open a doorway or portal for Az'azouzis to enter the world. One group, the Order of the End, was active in Europe from 1800 until about 1840. And here's the interesting thing, one of the high ranking members emigrated to America, specifically the New England area.

We also heard from one of our contacts in the local occult scene. He didn't want us to reveal his real name, so we'll call him Desmond. He's been a practitioner of occultism for several years and has been one of our sources for all things paranormal. Here's a transcript of a voice mail call we got from Desmond:

Hey, guys. It's [Desmond]. I have to tell you about a session I just came from. There's been some talk in the past few months about that guy Blackstone, the magician. He's been coming around to different groups, mostly doing lecture stuff, but he's been leading some ceremonies too. He's deep into the occult stuff. So the other night, I catch wind about a ceremony happening on Frye Island, in the middle of Sebago Lake. I decide to go, and when I get there, it's him, Blackstone, clearly running the ceremony. There were probably twenty of us there, no names. This was a black robes and hoods kind of event. We're all standing in a circle and that's when things start to go crazy.

Blackstone starts chanting, pretty typical occult stuff at first, but then he gets going. He starts talking about how the end is not the end. "There are tremendous and treacherous things beyond." All this kind of stuff. He starts talking about Az'azouzis, and I recognize that from your blog, right? That's when we hear this great roaring sound. It sounds like the sky is splitting open and some big angry animal is coming through. You know that long rumble of thunder you hear sometimes? It was like that times a thousand. The ground starts shaking, like an earthquake. Out of the ground comes this big stone pillar, like the one from your site. 

Occult ritual

It grows out of the ground, rising up, and then the air around us goes red. Not the light, like from the fire, but the air itself. I can't really explain that, but it's what happened. Then this rip opens up, like in the air itself, this big black void, and through it walks three naked people, two men and a woman. The whole time Blackstone is chanting something, I can't make out the words, but then I realize everyone is chanting along with him. I mean everyone, me included. I don't even understand what I'm saying, but the words keep coming out as that portal opens and those three people walk out.

And then it's done. Everything goes back to normal. The air, the sound, everything. Blackstone is standing there, looking down on those three naked people and he says to us, "The end is not the end. We will bring them, one by one, then thousands by thousands. The Army of Az'azouzis, his Chosen People, the ones who will usher in his everlasting darkness. We send you, brothers and sisters out into our world, Beyonders. Tremendous beings. Treacherous beings. Go and bring about your master's will."

It was right around this time that we were contacted by the Maine State Police. It seems that Kerri Delong had gone missing. You'll recall she was in the second batch of Black Tarot cards. She was the only person we could to receive the cards who had not gone missing. That wasn't the only reason the police contacted us, however. You'll also remember we received another set of cards from a reader going by EroDemon96. It turns out EroDemon96 is a woman named Rebecca Wentworth, aged 29, from Porter, Maine. She too had gone missing. When the family went through Rebecca's emails they found her messages to us.

We went out of our way to prove to the police that we were not involved. That included turning over lots of our emails, as well as the details of our meeting with Malachai Blackstone. In the end, the police dismissed us from any suspicion.

We find it interesting though that after the disappearance of the original four recipients of the Black Tarot, four people appeared in Crannog's Field. After the disappearance of  Brenda Williams, Kerri Delong, and now Rebecca Wentworth, three more people appeared during the ritual Desmond witnessed. Could Malachai Blackstone be the heir of the Order of the End, obsessed with summoning the being Az'azouzis to our world? Could he be somehow marking people by sending them a spread of Black Tarot cards? Could he be using their lives to open a portal to... Beyond and bringing forth new people-looking things, minions of Az'azouzis? 

We told the police everything we knew about Malachai Blackstone and everything we suspected. They were skeptical, of course, but in the end they agreed to at least talk with Blackstone. At the time of this writing, we believe Malachai Blackstone is on the run. He has not performed any magic shows in several weeks, nor any occult rituals. His whereabouts, as well as the whereabouts of the three "Beyonders" who walked through the portal remain unknown, though Blackstone's picture has been distributed among law enforcement agencies. 

Desmond believes that Blackstone was harnessing the energy of the people who visited his shows. He thinks that the password system, combined with the timing of Blackstone's performances, was a ritual derived to funnel the aether from the audience to create his Black Tarot. These marked members were somehow sacrificed to power the portals beyond. Desmond believes that after a certain number of these "Beyonders" had been summoned then they would be able to open the door for Az'azouzis, himself. 

We hope that we have disrupted Blackstone's rituals. We believe that now on the run from authorities, Blackstone will not be able to perform his ceremonies. Since the police began searching for Malachai Blackstone no new sets of Black Tarot cards have arrived and no new missing persons reports have been filed. We believe it's finally over.

Stay safe out there, Maine.

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UPDATE - 10/23/20: 

Since we originally posted this on 10/21/20, we received a black envelope in the mail. There was no stamp, no return address, something that will be familiar to our readers. We were hesitant to open it at first, but after much discussion, we decided we were not going to let Malachai Blackstone control our lives, and that we would not live in fear of him.

Inside the envelope was just a single card of the deck we're calling the Black Tarot:

Unanswered Questions - October 2020

 We've got a new feature for you, MMers. In Unanswered Questions we pose a series of questions we don't have answers to. There's a lot of spooky and unexplained out there, and we'll highlight as many as we can. So without further ado...

• What's up with that factory in Rumford that only seems to be operating after midnight? There's never any cars in the parking lot or people on the grounds and yet the smokestacks keep firing between 12 and 3 AM. What could they possibly be making there?

• Who are the bodies at the bottom of Silver Lake? How did they get there and how come no one's taken them out?

• What crept into Lori Connor's barn and slaughtered all of her sheep while she slept? She didn't hear a sound and they were torn to shreds. A wolf can't do that, right?
• Whatever happened to Perry Madison? He hiked down of Cadillac Mountain and no one ever saw him again. Where did he go?

• Why doesn't the Air Force base in Fort Kent shoot down the UFOs seen flying overhead? What do they know about these visitors that we don't?

• When did Larry Crendall come from? He's claimed 1897 and 2042. When is he really from? Head to Madawaska and ask him yourself!

• How do we shake the feeling that someone is watching us when we go to the library in Gray? We've heard rumors that three kids died in the building in the 50s' and 60s. Any truth to this? Let us know.

Houlton Wild Man

MMer Jim and his buddy Carl from Houlton, were out bear hunting in early November last year when they encountered something that wasn’t a bear at all. Jim walked us through what happened, “We are pretty close to this lady who owns a bakery, she lets us take the day old donuts and other pastries for real cheap. We take those out into the woods, find a nice little clearing and spread ‘em out, then all we have to do is wait for the bears to find the pile.” As they sat in their blind, something covered in thick matted black hair stumbled through the underbrush and investigated their bait.  

Woods near Houlton

“Carl raised his rifle right away, he ain’t never got a bear before and was eager. But I waved him off and pushed his barrel down as quietly as I could. This was one scraggly bear, it was real thin and small, and had a funny walk to it. It took me a minute to realize it was some really hairy guy running around on all fours.”

Jim quickly got out of the blind and approached the man who was stuffing his face with the day old pastries. At the noise Jim caused shuffling through the leaves and bushes the wild man quickly turned and faced Jim head on. “As I got closer to him I didn’t know how we ever thought it could be a bear, but he was covered all over with this long black matted hair. His eyes were big, and so brown they were almost black. He growled at me, real low and deep, and bared his teeth which were all chipped and sharp.”  The wild man scurried towards Jim and from the blind there was a shot as Carl tried to protect his friend.  The man ran off into the woods, “There were a few drops of blood on day old pastries” Jim said.  “But we don’t know if we hit him, or if he was already injured. Either way we ain’t going back to that spot again.”  

Wild Men have been a common sighting around
the world for hundreds of years

If you are ever in the woods near Houlton, make sure you watch out for the wild man, from the encounter reported by Jim it seems he can be aggressive or at the very least territorial. Whether this is a small Sasquatch, or simply a mentally ill man it should be avoided, stay safe out there, Maine!

Deep Dive: The Grey Fool

We here at Malevolent Maine try our best to limit the scope of our investigations to the border of our great state, but sometimes we aren’t always able to do that. We have become obsessed with this figure of the Grey Fool that has been appearing in the dreams of people around the state. And while it is affecting people in the state, the history of this figure has roots outside the state, even outside the country. We promise not to delve into this kind of content too often, but we wanted to take this opportunity to share our research with you in a new feature called a… Deep Dive!

Let’s start with a baseline on what a jester or fool really was back in the day. Contrary to popular culture’s portrayal of the role of the jester, it was actually a fairly prestigious position often occupied by nobles. They often took on the role of advisors to the monarch they served in addition to being entertaining at parties. They were one of the few people in the court who were allowed to speak freely and frankly to the king and as such they were treated respectfully. Even when kings dismissed fools they were never overtly punished, some were ex-communicated but it is rare to find evidence of a king physically punishing a jester, or executing them. 

King Louis the IX

This is where the Grey Fool comes in, we here at Malevolent Maine suspect that the Grey Fool is actually an apparition or residual psychic image of a man named Sanson de Craon. Sanson was the third son of an aristocratic French family and came to notability during the seventh crusade when he followed Louis the IX into battle. After they all returned from the crusade, Sanson was tapped to be Louis' court jester. For a few years Sanson fulfilled the role dutifully, always providing sage advice to the king, and entertaining the king’s guests with songs and long bawdy tales. However one winter in the court records we see Sanson begin complaining of strange dreams. Dreams of him walking through a desert. 

Sanson became erratic and irritable, often talking nonsense as opposed to the sharp wit he had exhibited before. His last conversation before he was removed from his role with King Louis is strange to say the least. He rambles about the end of days, the need for humanity to submit to something. He urges King Louis to kneel before the King Beyond the Desert, and this is when as expected King Louis releases Sanson from his service. Oddly enough that wasn’t the end of Sanson’s days as a jester, he relocated to Scotland and was quickly taken into the court of the King there, who appreciated his manic and crazy behavior. His term there lasted an even shorter amount of time before he was kicked out, a few months if that. Sanson then found himself in a role as a Jester in Poland. This appointment lasted only a few days.

What lies beyond the Dream Desert?

The Duke of Greater Poland was Boleslaw the Pious, and Sanson like in his previous two positions suggested he should kneel before this King Beyond the Desert figure. Bolesław took this very poorly and turned Sanson out into the street and urged the crowd gathered there to turn him into a proper fool, the crowd tore off his clothes and forced him to wear quickly patched together grey clothes. Then things turned even more violent as they dunked him repeatedly in water until he was gasping for air. They then threw him wet through foundry ashes and dragged him through the street. It all culminated in him being hanged in the town square. Sanson’s luck had finally run out. 

What drove this former soldier and nobleman to throw away his position and his life, what about this dream drove him insane? Who is the King Beyond the Desert, can he be reached in the dreams? Is everyone who has these dreams doomed to the same fate as Sanson de Craon? 

These dreams seem to pose a huge threat to those who experience them, please reach out to us if you or anyone you know has experienced them or seen the Grey Fool in their Dreams. 

Stay safe out there Maine!