THE SIX: A Dark, Dazzling Serial Killer Story

by Anni Taylor

The monk reached inside his clothing and produced a scroll.

  “Thank you,” I said, trying to hide my shock.

  “Bingo. He responds to commands.” Richard took the scroll and picked at the twine that held it closed. “When we first came in, you said, show us what you’ve got. The guy showed you what he was holding—a candle.”

  “Okay . . . okay,” I said, collecting my breath. If it was that simple, we had this challenge in the bag. “Get it open.”

  Richard rolled out the scroll on top of the hexagonal box. It contained an illustration of a cave, some people chained up and a fire.

  Raising his eyes to me, Richard made a derisive snort. “Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. I learned this in the first psychology class I took at college. It’s kids’ stuff.”

  I looked closer. In the cave, a line of chained prisoners stared at a wall. Behind them, a fire burned. In between the fire and the prisoners, there was a puppeteer—making a shadow puppet on the wall for the prisoners.

  “What does it mean?”

  Richard screwed up his face. “Something about shadows. I don’t remember. Hell, I was smashed at the time.”

  I whirled around to the monk. “Tell us what this means.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Show us what this means,” I demanded.

  He remained staring at me blankly.

  I looked back at the picture. The mask that the puppeteer was holding up reminded me of the awful faces in the mirror in challenge four. The prisoners’ heads were restricted. They couldn’t turn around and see what was behind them. “So, all the prisoners can see is the shadow, not the real thing?” I asked Richard urgently.

  “Yeah.” He nodded. “That’s right. But the shadow pictures I saw back in college were of animals or something. Not that image.”

  I could practically hear my heart ticking as I looked at the clock again.

  Four minutes left.

  “Give us anything else you have to show us,” Richard told the monk.

  The monk stared straight ahead, unmoving.

  “All right,” Richard muttered. “So, there’s nothing else. This is it. What are we supposed to do? Make our own shadow puppets?” He bent his head as if thinking hard. “Give me the candle, monk.”

  Again, the monk didn’t move.

  “Richard, you already asked him if he had anything else to give us. I don’t think we’re meant to have the candle.”

  Richard jabbed an angry finger at the monk’s chest. “You. Make shadow puppets.”

  We waited.

  Nothing.

  Three minutes.

  I could hear Richard breathing now. He pointed at each of the prisoners, of which there were five. “The five senses. Sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. I remember that much. Plato was making a point that they couldn’t rely on their senses to work out what was real and what wasn’t.”

  I bent my head over the picture. I should have worked that out. Each of the prisoners was subtly touching a different part of their body with one of their hands—eyes, mouth, ears, nose or body.

  The clues were all here, in this picture. Clues that were based on Plato but also clues that were made especially for this challenge.

  Two minutes.

  The challenges were simple. Designed to be completed within time. Don’t go crazy. Go simple.

  But what? What were we missing?

  If we couldn’t use our five senses, what was left?

  Thought.

  Mind.

  Brother Vito’s numbers and inevitability.

  The monk had nothing left to show us. The answer lay somewhere else. Richard and I had found nothing on the walls or floor. Unless we’d missed something.

  No, the answer wasn’t anything we could find by touch.

  If there was anything else out there in the room, then it was moving around. Evading us.

  If it was evading us, then it was human.

  One minute.

  My palms sweated as my hands formed fists by my sides. “Whoever else is in this room, show yourself.”

  Richard jerked around to me, eyebrows raised.

  No response.

  But then a glow. A candle being lit. And a face—a mask—that matched the mask in the picture.

  “Holy—” Richard exclaimed.

  Then another candle from the other side of the room, and another and another and another.

  Five monks, all wearing the masks.

  Six monks altogether. But because we’d only seen one, we’d assumed there was only one.

  I shivered internally at the thought of these masked people silently stepping around us in the darkness.

  The clock stopped with seconds to go.

  The bulb below turned green.

  Richard and I stared at each other. It was over.

  54. GRAY

  RICO VASILIOU WAS WAITING FOR us on the landing of his apartment.

  “Yassou, yassou.” He pulled a surprised Constance in for a hug and then gave me a back-slapping hug, his shirt smelling of tobacco and olives. “Come in, you both.”

  We’d given him and his wife fake names—Michael and Lara. I repeated our new names in my mind as I entered the apartment so that I didn’t slip up.

  The apartment was large and airy. Bright artworks covered the walls—all of a bay with white Greek houses dotting the hills. Everything in the apartment was decorated in clean whites and blues. The round-edge, ornate door frames were distinctly Greek.

  Rico’s wife came out to greet us. “Hello and welcome. I’m Petrina. Can I get you two a cold drink? The heat must be stifling out there.” She was short—short hair too. Together with her large, expressive eyes, she had a kind of pixie look.

  Rico and Petrina seemed genuine. But I remained wary.

  “Oh, yes, please—anything cold would be lovely.” Constance mopped her brow with a handkerchief.

  I nodded. “Cold would be great.”

  That didn’t seem to be enough information for Petrina. “Iced tea, Retsina, ouzito?”

  A single, deep wrinkle appeared between Constance’s eyebrows. “I don’t drink anything alcoholic or caffeinated.”

  “Make mine alcoholic,” I said quickly.

  Petrina smiled warmly. “I’ll get you ouzito, Michael. Retsina can be a little strong if you’re not used to it. And water with lemon for you, Lara?”

  She showed us out to a tiny balcony where the view swept far into the city.

  Constance watched her step back inside then turned to me. “They seem okay?”

  “Maybe.” I whispered back. I stuck my head over the balcony railing and checked the street below. What would we do now if two carloads of Yeqon’s Saviours thugs suddenly screeched up? We’d be trapped.

  I wanted to zip this up quickly so we could get out of here.

  The Vasilious returned together. Rico placed a platter of bite-sized things on the table—olives, sliced cucumbers, triangles of pita bread, three little cups of dip and some cheese-filled eggplant rolls. Petrina set down two glass jugs, one of water that had ice and sliced lemon floating in it and another of what I assumed was ouzito.

  “I hope you like it how I make it,” Petrina told me as she poured a glass. “It’s got ouzo, sugar, soda water and lime. I didn’t have any mint, but I prefer the lime anyway.”

  I sipped the drink. “Tastes good to me.” I didn’t tell her that I’d never had ouzo before, let alone ouzito. I liked it, so I wasn’t lying.

  Constance delicately touched a pita bread triangle to a cup of dip as though she were anointing it. I guessed nothing on the plate was her kind of food.

  Petrina tucked stray strands of hair behind her ears, her eyes bright. “So, you two are students of Greek history?” She looked from one of us to the other, seeming to be asking more than she was saying. I guessed she was trying to figure out who we were and why we were travelling together.

  But I wasn’t going to volunteer any information. “Yes, that’s right. We’re interested in ancient
symbols. Can I show you the one we’ve come across?”

  Rico nodded, downing his ouzito. I caught a flicker of something in his eye. Apprehension?

  Reaching for my satchel, I took out the photocopy and handed it to him.

  He studied the picture, looking up at me twice before he spoke. “What is your interest in this symbol?”

  “We just want to know what it is and where it came from, originally,” I told him.

  “It is based upon the Ladder of Divine Ascent,” he said. “See the thirty rungs of the ladder? It signifies the thirty steps to reach the highest level of religious perfection. Each step is an instruction. Created at the request of the Abbot of Raithu in 600 AD, his monastery being on the edge of the Red Sea.”

  “So, it’s an old religious symbol?” I asked him. “Is it possible to trace where this particular one came from?”

  “It is old,” he replied, “but it’s not religious. Not this symbol. If it’s religious artifacts you’re after, I would advise you not to pursue this one.” He passed it to his wife. She looked at it briefly, her eyes clouding.

  “Our study would be incomplete,” Constance protested. She glanced at me in a half-anxious way that I was sure our hosts noticed.

  “Yes.” I forced a smile. “We’ve come a long way to find out more about this.”

  “You’re seeking someone,” said Petrina flatly. “Aren’t you? Someone who is missing.”

  I leaned back in the chair, confused at Petrina’s question and trying not to look defensive. “That’s not why we’re here.”

  But she eyed me levelly. “Are you sure, Michael? Who are you two, and why are you here? At first I thought you were perhaps a couple, despite the difference in accent and age. But I can tell by your body language that you are not.”

  “I didn’t think we’d be given the third degree,” I muttered. “We’re just—”

  Constance’s sudden change of expression burrowed underneath the exterior I was trying to project. She shook her head, closing her eyes and pressing her lips into a thin, guilty line. “We’re looking for my daughter and Gray’s wife.”

  I turned to watch Rico and Petrina’s reactions. Constance had not only told them what we were doing here in Greece, but she’d just said my name. If the Greek newspapers were running stories about me, it wouldn’t be hard for them to put two and two together.

  Constance’s eyes snapped open as she realised she’d given away too much, giving me a look of open-mouthed alarm.

  Rico exhaled a low, weary grunt. “Two people? A daughter and a wife?” He exchanged looks with Petrina.

  I kept both Petrina and Rico in my line of sight as I gulped the last of my drink. I didn’t know the first thing about these people. How had Petrina figured out we were looking for someone? Again, I felt trapped, here on the ninth floor with only a narrow set of stairs for an exit. If someone with a gun—or a knife—was waiting on the stairs for us, Constance and I might not leave this building alive.

  “You didn’t want us to know, but we know,” Petrina said to me in a gentle tone. “You wouldn’t be so interested in this symbol otherwise. I also know you won’t take our advice and leave this alone, because you’re seeking loved ones.”

  “Can you help us?” said Constance, breathy and tense. “Please.”

  Rico’s brow indented itself with deep, crisscrossing lines. “We can’t promise anything. But to go any further, I must insist on you showing us some identification.”

  There were just two courses of action now: get up and leave or go for broke. Constance stared at me with round eyes, waiting for me to decide. I had far more to lose than her in revealing who I was.

  I decided to show them my ID. Constance followed suit. They asked about our missing relatives, and we told them about Evie and Kara. I left out the part about the police seeking me for murder, but they’d easily be able to find that out for themselves now.

  Rico stood. “Let’s head into the living room. There is much to talk about.”

  Were the Vasiliou couple really going to tell us more, or were they just stalling for time now they knew for certain who we were? I couldn’t put aside my increasing nervousness at being here.

  “I need to know,” I said, as Constance and I followed them but before we’d seated ourselves on the sofas, “how you knew we came here looking for missing persons?”

  Rico sighed heavily. “Please, sit, and we’ll tell you how we knew.”

  Constance and I stood rigidly in the living room, and I could tell that she was wondering, as I was, if the Vasilious were our way forward or if we’d just stepped willingly into a trap.

  55. CONSTANCE

  RICO AND PETRINA FACED GRAY AND me with serious expressions that were edged with something I could only call dulled fear. Yellow Athens sunlight streaked in from a window, catching a cloud of dust motes—the unseen occupiers of air suddenly made visible.

  I felt the tension in Gray, as evident as if it were another presence in the room. I knew the balance of everything was hanging precariously. Whatever the Vasilious were about to tell us would either end everything or begin it.

  Gray and I sat, ready to listen, ready for whatever came next.

  “This is not a happy tale,” Rico began. “It’s about a family who once came to us seeking their loved one. The year was 1992. They were an English family with a young daughter and a teenage son. The son, Noah, had been in trouble for many years prior. Lost to the drug culture. He was offered a place in a special treatment program. They offered him money for taking part in the treatment, a chance to start again. He told this to his parents over the phone—and he apparently accepted this offer.” Rico paused. “His parents never saw him again.”

  “What kind of treatment?” I asked, confused at how this story connected with the things Gray and I had discovered.

  Petrina placed a hand on her husband’s knee. “A treatment for his addiction. The treatment centre was meant to be somewhere here in Greece. Noah wasn’t meant to say anything about this program—he’d signed a confidentiality clause—but he did. That was the last they heard from him. The boy’s parents were beside themselves, of course, when week after week went by without a word. They came to Greece in search of him. They were not rich people—they sold everything they had and bought an old motorcycle to get around on. Tragically, they were killed in a road accident not long after we met them. They were on their motorcycle when they were run off the road on a steep mountain bend. The driver of the other vehicle never came forward.”

  “That’s awful,” I breathed. “But why did they come to you about Noah? You’re history professors.”

  “Like you,” Rico told us, “they’d found out some information about the symbol you showed us. We were their last resort after the police couldn’t help them. It was the worst decision for them, I’m afraid.”

  Gray was concentrating steadily on their faces. He still seemed wary, as if weighing everything they said against some measure of his own.

  Petrina gave a silent sigh, her shoulders rising and falling. “We made some discoveries, and then those discoveries led the couple to discover more. But they were murdered before they could tell us what they found out. It would have been better if we hadn’t agreed to help them.”

  “They were murdered?” I gasped. “It wasn’t an accident?”

  “I don’t believe it was an accident,” Petrina answered. “Most people would stop or at least try to get help. The driver of the car did neither.”

  An uneasy feeling embedded itself in my lower spine. “That’s terrible.”

  “Yes, it is terrible,” said Petrina. “At the time of their death, their ten-year-old daughter was staying with us—Jennifer. She was devastated, naturally. There was barely any family that could take her, just a couple of elderly relatives that weren’t certain they could cope with a child. Anyway, Jennifer wanted to remain with us. And so that’s what happened. We raised her. We always wondered if she might head back to England when she turned eigh
teen, but she didn’t. She stayed in Greece and took up her parents’ cause.”

  “What do you mean, her parents’ cause?” asked Gray. “You mean finding her brother?”

  “Exactly.” Petrina gave a nod. “We were terrified for her, as it was a dangerous thing for her to do. But she’s thirty-five now. A lot of time has gone past.”

  Gray leaned forward, resting an arm on one knee. “Is she still looking?”

  Petrina seemed uncomfortable with his question. “No. It’s been twenty-five years. She did end up returning to England and making a life there.”

  Gray raised his chin in a slight nod, but his gaze remained intent. He was so different to the lost, angry young man I’d first met at his doorstep clutching his wife’s note. He seemed so focused, like he was constantly running calculations in his head.

  “What a difficult time Jennifer must have had with losing all of her family,” I said to Petrina. “I’m glad she had you and Rico.”

  “We’re glad we had her.” Petrina’s eyes turned wistful. “She was a lovely child. Loved to swim and paint pictures in equal measure. She could have gone far with either passion, but she didn’t wish to.”

  Rico squeezed his wife’s hand, which was still on his knee. “Now, you two will want to know what we know about the symbol you brought to us. What we know isn’t much, I’m afraid.”

  “Yes, please tell us whatever you’ve got,” I pressed and then prepared myself. I sensed Rico was holding back, and I wanted him to tell us everything.

  “The symbol is very, very old,” he told us. “It is like the Ladder of Divine Ascent, but it is turned upside-down. The monks on the ladder are looking back to the earth, not to heaven. The demons are not trying to prod them off from the ladder. These people are not seeking God.”

  “They’re Satanists?” When I’d arrived in Greece, I’d been prepared to pursue the sex trafficking avenue. I’d gone from that to thinking the Saviours were a religious cult. But this could be worse. Far worse.

  “We’re unsure,” Rico said. “Even if they are, not all Satanists share the same beliefs. People are often surprised to learn that some groups of Satanists believe in neither Satan nor God nor any spiritual being. And not all Satanists think that human sacrifices or harming people is a good idea. And I haven’t known any large satanic organisation being so under the radar as this one. If you want new members, you need to be at least a little open. How such an order as this survived from the twelfth century, Petrina and I cannot fathom. It doesn’t make sense.”