The Medusa Stone (Order of the Black Sun Book 12)

by P. W. Child

  Soula Fidikos laughed heartily and comforted the curator with a quick hug. “I’m sorry,” she apologized, still cackling by herself. “Why are you so jumpy? Look,” she motioned to the turn-out, “the exhibit is a rousing success, my darling. You have nothing to be anxious about. I venture to guess you have not had this kind of attention in this old museum in years.”

  “No, about that you are dead right, Soula,” Helen admitted, still steadying her heart rate. “I just cannot help but feel creeped out but Heidmann’s three statues. And what he calls them just freaks me the hell out.”

  “I saw that,” Soula scoffed indifferently. “Where do you acquire a piece called ‘Son of Zyklon-B’? What are the other two? Something that shows how ambivalent Heidmann was in naming them…”

  Helen turned to face Soula in front of a large painting, pretending to discuss the artwork, but she was of the same mind as the Greek millionaires. “The others are called ‘Klónos²’ – one name for two statues – which is Greek, is it not?”

  Soula nodded. “It means ‘clone’ in my mother tongue, but here is another oddity. The two statues are probably the reason for the small number two, you know, making it ‘Clone Squared’.”

  Helen was flabbergasted. Now it made more sense to her.

  “Ah, I thought ‘Klónos’ was Heidmann’s erroneous interpretation of Kronos, the Greek Titan,” she told Soula, who shook her head slowly.

  “I thought so too at first, but the fact that there are two of the same size and features explained it to me. Dr. Heidmann is quite a jumpy fellow, have you noticed? I could be wrong, but he appears to be anxious when he is around us,” Soula remarked, looking around her crowded surroundings to see if he was there.

  Helen smiled, “He confided in me about that, actually. And it’s your fault.”

  “He did?” Soula asked.

  “Yes, he told me that being in the presence of someone as knowledgeable and upstanding as you made him very nervous. Look, I’ve known the man a few years, and he has never been timid, but I understand that he finds your stature intimidating and captivating altogether,” Helen explained on behalf of her old acquaintance.

  “Bullshit. It’s the money,” Soula rasped in her strong voice, looking highly amused nonetheless.

  The two women chuckled in front of the prominent painting they pretended to discuss, which is where Helen’s assistant found them.

  “Professor Barry! Professor, thank God I found you. I have been looking everywhere for you,” the small female undergraduate sighed in relief. “Begging your pardon for the interruption.”

  “No problem, Gail,” Helen replied. “What’s the matter, love?”

  “It could be nothing, but you know me. I just want to make sure you are kept up to date with things,” Gail said.

  “Is this a private matter?” Soula asked. “Should I excuse myself?”

  “No, no, Mrs. Fidikos, by no means,” Gail protested cordially. “I merely wanted to let Prof. Barry know that the weather channel predicted an earthquake that could strike London within the next 24 hours.”

  “An earthquake?” Soula frowned.

  “Thank you, Gail. I will look into it and see if we need to take precautions, alright?” Helen assured her assistant.

  “Okay, Professor. See you in the office,” Gail replied, turning on her heel and heading for the administrative offices.

  Soula and Helen shared a long look, both trying to determine the legitimacy and urgency of such a claim. Helen drew a deep breath.

  “I suppose, just for safety sake we should get the maintenance people out to secure the sculptures and the vases on display,” she told Soula.

  “Alright, you do that. I have a previous engagement to get to in Oxford, so I will take off now. Please, let me know immediately if there is anything I should be made aware of, Helen,” Soula requested, laying her jewel-adorned hand on Helen Barry’s shoulder.

  “I shall,” Helen nodded.

  She made her way to the medium sized display chamber especially laid out for the ancient Greek Art exhibition, where both Soula and Heidmann’s collections were tastefully presented. The room was decorated in such a way as to denote a feeling of antiquity as if it was, in fact, a temple from millennia past. Even the air conditioning was altered to dispense the scent of spices, mud and incense every few hours to effectively capture the smell of old papyrus and musty sarcophagi to give the exhibit an authentic feel.

  Even though the chamber was occupied by at least 60 beguiled visitors, milling in aimless intrigue to examine the astonishing fluency and perfection of the artworks, Helen still felt uneasy at the sight of Heidmann’s works.

  Among the murmuring onlookers, she moved to make her way to Dr. Heidmann’s section of the display, checking the sturdiness of the pieces and how they were fixed to the pedestals rigged by the maintenance staff that constructed it. It looked sound to her, but of course, Helen was no expert.

  She could not help but once more fix her eyes on the amazingly accurate sculptures with the strange names. In fact, she was quite excited to see Dr. James Heidmann again to ask him how he decided on the names. On the other hand, she wondered if they were already named so when he acquired them.

  Either way, their identification made them no less mesmerizing in form. There were three in total, in the way of statues. The other pieces Heidmann possessed existed in the form of pottery and etched plaques in limestone and clay. Helen and Soula had examined the fine perfection of human posture and resilience the day the pieces were delivered. However, it was peculiar, according to Soula Fidikos, that two of the figures did not contain Epirus limestone or traces of the more durable Pentelikon marble, which assured that the artworks would not crack or crumble too easily. Yet here they were, thousands of years old according to their records, in good condition.

  She could not help but find them completely spellbinding, akin to the grotesque brilliance resident at the Musée Fragonard in Paris. In fact, Dr. Heidmann’s three sculptures reminded her very much of the flayed cadavers modelled by 18th Century French anatomist Honoré Fragonard. Perhaps this was why she felt an eerie fascination for them. It was like witnessing the aftermath of a highway pile-up. She could not look away without scrutinizing the most trivial of aspects about the figures, down to the visible pours on their skins. Helen shivered from the chill she felt as she studied the two entwined statues, a mere foot away from the other sculpture.

  At the foot of their platform, their strange appellation still confounded her. It seemed to beckon for attention -‘Klónos²’.

  Helen looked at the statue on the left in comparison to the one of the right. They were precisely similar in height and build, but they lacked the intrinsic muscle definition of the era, appearing almost robust. However, their musculature was extremely well displayed in perfect anatomical prowess. For a moment, Helen pictured Michelangelo’s ‘David’ as a warrior or centurion, and that would be what ‘Klónos²’would resemble.

  Had it not been for her intricate knowledge of Greek and Italian art in general, Helen would not have been able to tell the difference between ‘Klónos²’ and ‘Son of Zyklon-B’. She could barely discern the discrepancies, yet she could tell exactly where they differed.

  “The interwoven bodies of ‘Klónos²’ depict not conjoined twins, but two men fused into a forced symbiosis, although of the same species. No facial features are present on either head, yet the sculptor gave them distinct jaw lines to depict their independence,” Dr. Heidmann thundered behind Helen, sending her into a frightful jolt.

  Feeling stupid at her reaction, she chuckled along with the amused group of people who followed the lecturer to his pieces for a more in-depth tutorial.

  “My apologies, Prof. Barry,” Dr. Heidmann smiled. “We did not mean to scare you back to the Stone Age.”

  The people in his group smiled apologetically at the curator as she shook her head sheepishly. “I’m sorry, Dr. Heidmann. I was just…”

  “Yes, I’m sure the
y do set one up for a good scare, don’t they?” he said loudly to accommodate his followers as well. The group mumbled at the startling effigies and soon forgot about the curator, who elected to tag along and get an idea of how Heidmann himself perceived the works.

  “In effect,” he continued professionally, “they are a symbol of socialist defeat, not so? Rather, I would like to think that the artist wished to portray the efficacy of dual ambition when assimilated into one ideology.”

  Helen noted the posture of the two figures, seemingly reaching for the sky while Heidmann’s words trailed off in her head. Both faces were blank, the heads earless and the bodies were nude while their feet were nailed together and their legs bound by thick rope, excellently carved from limestone in pristine detail.

  “What gives the sculptures a distinguished image from the Hellenistic look, as you will see, is the manner of carving uniform locks on their heads, unlike that of famous busts of that time, capturing the human properties of philosophers and gods,” he preached as he pointed out the other exemplary pieces from Soula Fidikos’ collection in the chamber.

  The people nodded in agreement and Helen took notice of these small details for the first time. The hair on ‘Klónos²’ was in fine, myriads of stripes painstakingly applied in the limestone. Only now did she realize how truly unique these pieces were.

  “Why did the artist bother to give them hair if they weren’t important enough to have faces?” asked one of the younger members of the group, a slight built Scottish lad in his high school years.

  James Heidmann took a moment as everyone waited. Finally, he shrugged with a humorous smirk, “Who knows, maybe the sculptor was a woman, seeing men as faceless and yet insisting on grooming them.”

  The youth looked satisfied with the evasive comment as the rest of the group found Heidmann’s response a polite way of admitting that he did not know. Helen shook her head amusedly, but she had a question of her own.

  “Dr. Heidmann, when you acquired these pieces,” she asked loudly to get everyone’s attention, “were they mounted upright or lying down?”

  He cast Prof. Barry a look of bewilderment, “What difference does that make, Professor?” He tried to smile to maintain the light hearted nature of the lecture, but she could see that he was not pleased with her question at all, for some reason.

  “No reason, really, other than curiosity, Doctor. I was just wondering, because if you procured ‘Klónos²’ in a lying position, that maybe that was the sculptor’s intention, that’s all,” Helen Barry noted. “Maybe the artist’s meaning would transpire in different ways if the piece was in its original position.”

  “I’m sure that was of no consequence, Prof. Barry,” Heidmann answered abruptly. “The sculpture still exhibits the exact same features, which makes it irrelevant.”

  “Of course,” Helen conceded. And with that she turned to go and take care of some administrative work, smiling to herself.

  Chapter 5

  Shortly before 8 pm, the lecture hall was filling up slowly. There were quite a few people interested in what the lecturer had to offer in the way of what certainly was a Devil’s Advocate point of view on the less popular gods of the main mythologies.

  Sarah and Abbie had already taken their places in the second row from the front as most students and faculty preferred seats farther back in the auditorium.

  “I feel singled out,” Abbie whispered to her friend.

  Sarah chuckled, “You chose these seats, idiot. Do you want to sit in the back? We still have time, if you want to move.”

  But Abbie’s face was frozen in astonishment, staring past her friend into the dark extremities of the hall where the bright auditorium lights did not reach.

  “What are you looking at?” Sarah asked.

  Only Abbie’s lips moved while her gaze remained frozen on her target. An expression of obsession and fear mingled on her face as her cold hand gripped Sarah’s forearm. “Don’t look now. You will see him soon enough.”

  “That sounds vaguely ominous,” Sarah mumbled. She was not sure what to make of her friend’s countenance, but if anything it piqued her interest. “Abbie, are you going to keep me in suspense? Telling me not to look sort of makes me want to run and hide. Very creepy.”

  “Shh,” her friend urged. “Be quiet.”

  “Why?”

  Abbie spoke like someone in a trance. “It’s him, Sarah. Oh my God, it’s the man Jess, and I chased down the other night. It is the same bloke!”

  “Awesome!” Sarah smiled. “Now you can get his number,” she winked and nudged her friend, but Abbie was in no way amused. “What is wrong?”

  For the first time since the conversation started, Abbie locked eyes with Sarah in a matter of urgency. “Did you forget what happened in the graveyard after I trailed this man, Sarah? I am not sure he is someone I want to know more intimately than at a healthy distance.”

  “Oh,” Sarah replied. “I forgot about that part.”

  Professor Maggie McIntyre, head of Celtic and Scottish Studies, walked up to the podium with the main spotlight seeking her as she moved. Finally, she stood before the microphone, pausing for a moment before speaking.

  “Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Thank you so much for joining us for this fascinating study of classical mythology and its perceived forgotten qualities, concerning the lesser known aspects of the Pantheon,” the 61 year old academic smiled into the darkness in front of her. The yellow light on her produced a shadow behind her that made her look decidedly titanic, and Abbie could not help but feel an inkling of fear at the sight of it. “It is my pleasure and honor this night to welcome our guest speaker all the way from the Universitas Obscurum in Piraeus, Greece.”

  The auditorium lights dimmed, giving Abbie a distinct feeling of apprehension she could not explain. She could not see him anymore, but something moved in the darkness on the right side of the podium as Prof. McIntyre finally announced the name of the man Abbie had experienced as dream become nightmare.

  “Professor Costa Megalos,” Prof. McIntyre smiled proudly and applauded along with the audience as she looked toward the dark corner from where her guest emerged. As the tall, lean man strode to the podium, Sarah gawked, enthralled by his retro allure and undeniable handsomeness. She squeezed Abbie’s hand, “Oh my God; he is gorgeous! No wonder you followed him all through Old Town.”

  Abbie did not share her fascination this time, though. To her, all that mattered was that he was involved in something sinister that she still could not process. More than that, she had no idea what the heated discussion in the graveyard was about or how the people she saw there just seemed to disappear after she heard the awful sound that left the statue she then beheld.

  Now, as she looked at him in plain sight, her feelings were challenged. There were still traces of adolescent lust for the good looking professor, no doubt, however, the bizarre circumstances under which he vanished that night had her more than wary around him. With Sarah’s swooning next to her it would be hard to listen to his lecture without prejudice.

  “Shut it,” she whispered hard through the applause.

  “Sorry,” Sarah grunted playfully, “but damn!”

  “I know, I know,” Abbie agreed, “but I am trying to see him for what he is, and you are not helping, you horny bitch.” But Abbie had to smile at her friend’s reaction. At least she now knew it was not her alcohol consumption that had her acting like a queen cat in heat that night. Sarah had the same reaction.

  “What do you think he is going to do? Shape-shift right here? Vanish into thin air? Make a lovely statue out of Prof. McIntyre to plant in the southern quad?” Sarah frowned as the applause died down.

  Abbie just sighed. “He looks suspicious by default.”

  “He looks like a Steampunk Jesus,” Sarah whispered in a naughty groan as the man started speaking in front of them.

  “Thank you so much, and welcome to my lecture on ‘The Lost Pantheon: The Omnipotence of Corrupted Power’, a
study of the influence religion and social tradition had on dismissing and demonizing the less genial deities of the central mythologies of the modern era,” Costa smiled.

  “He is incredibly charming, isn’t he?” Sarah swooned.

  “Aye, why do you think I chased him for so long?” Abbie winked.

  “Pity you did not catch him. Good God, he is to die for,” Sarah whispered, flushing like a virgin at a strip show.

  “I would like to draw you your attention, first off, to the role of so-called monsters in the old legends. Now, from what I have found in all my studies I have come to realize that pretty much all creatures of mythology are to some extent monsters,” he dove right into his lecture. Behind him, a screen lit up with the best known depictions of Greek, Roman, and Norse gods throughout history.

  “As you can see, they have all been likened to humans by those philosophers, priests, and historians who perpetuated their legacies. And by no means unattractive were they depicted, right?” he asked with a playful wink that had the audience cackling softly in a hum of humor. Costa stepped back for a moment to allow the audience to see the paintings of Venus, Zeus, Poseidon, and many others.

  Then he returned to the microphone, and his kind demeanor fell away, leaving his eyes dark with a perfectly timed leer across the heads of the people listening. He leaned heavily on the podium and spoke in a foreboding low tone for dramatic effect.

  “But what makes a monster? What if I told you that these gods were not beautiful at all?” He paused, leaving the auditorium draped in an uncomfortable silence that almost had substance. “What if I told you that they did not even look like people? After all,” he said, dropping his gaze and piercing Abbie’s eyes directly, “can a monster not hide behind a beautiful face?”

  Her heart stopped, but it did not shudder from affection or attraction. Abbie was terrified, knowing that he was speaking directly to her and that he was categorically telling her something. The frightened student swallowed hard, but her mouth was dried up, arid as the wastelands of the desert temples portrayed behind Costa’s frame.