The Guardian's Legacy

by Luciana Cavallaro

  ‘One relates to the goddess Aphrodite, who acknowledged the homage in the coins being dedicated to her by infusing them with unusual properties. Another story was that a bolt of lightning struck the rock.’

  ‘That one at least makes sense,’ said Nik.

  ‘I considered that too and read the effects of lightning and its impact on rocks. The heat of lightning cannot only melt rock, but cause a reaction much like a bomb exploding. To date, there’s no evidence that lightning transmits anything to rocks other than blasting it to pieces,’ said his grandfather. He spoke as though he were a journalist reciting unpleasant news to a television audience.

  Nik looked at the book on his lap. Its weight seemed to press down as if to make him understand its message through the thousands of words printed on its pages ‘You can’t mean to say …’ he couldn’t voice the words. His grandfather’s explanation sounded too farfetched.

  ‘I haven’t discounted the possibility of truth in the legends,’ Papou replied. ‘Sometimes such factors that confront us are unexplainable and difficult to substantiate, yet they happen.’

  ‘You believe the Greek gods, and those from other cultures, existed?’ asked Nik.

  Papou shrugged. ‘Who’s say they didn’t? No-one can discount their existence, to do so is to ignore the progress of civilisation and religions. Come with me, I want to show you something.’

  Nik placed the book on the coffee table and followed his grandfather to the vault. Papou entered the code, and waited a few seconds as locks opened and emitted a hiss. He pulled the heavy door ajar and entered the compact room. On three walls were tall glass cabinets filled with scrolls, each fitted with an independent thermostat. In the middle of the room was a draftsman’s table. Nik stared at the shelves layered with yellowed and brown-edged parchments.

  ‘What are these?’

  Papou turned, amused. ‘After all you’ve seen and heard, Niko, you need to ask?’

  ‘Holy cow, Papou! Do you have any more hidden rooms like this?’

  Papou chuckled. ‘No, this is the last one.’ He pointed. ‘In the desk drawer you’ll find white gloves. Grab a pair for me and one for you.’

  ‘Where are the scrolls from?’ Nik asked as he handed the gloves to his grandfather.

  ‘Oh, here and there,’ Papou replied, closing the door of the vault. He then unlocked one of the cabinets and grabbed a scroll from the top shelf. He closed the glass door and walked to the table. With care, Papou undid the ribbon and placed the ancient parchment on the table and with a thumb and forefinger, took hold of the edge to pull it away. He unravelled the scroll with care. Nik held his breath as the black-inked brush strokes came to light.

  ‘Ancient Greek,’ Nik said in a whisper.

  He sensed rather than saw his grandfather nod. ‘Yes. This pre-dates the Dead Sea Scrolls. All myths had an origin and were sometimes based on actual events and people. The gods were no different. How can any person disavow the wealth of texts and evidence from ancient cultures around the world? Hesiod’s own works outline the creation of the world and the gods.’

  ‘This is Hesiod’s Theogony?’

  ‘No, it is a copy of the original one housed in the Alexandria Library.’

  Nik reached out, his hand shaking as he touched the scroll. ‘This is incredible, Papou. You own the oldest surviving text of Hesiod’s poem. How on earth did it end up here?’

  ‘Why do you ask such questions when the answer is obvious?’ Papou demanded.

  Nik gave a sharp snort of laughter and shook his head. ‘You may be used to this but, Papou, it takes time to digest. It’s so surreal: the secret bunker, the computers, thousand-year-old weapons, the rare books and now the parchments. You’ve had these all this time and never let on. I don’t know how you live a normal life surrounded by the world’s most extraordinary and valuable collection of artefacts. This is incredible.’

  His grandfather glanced at the scroll he held open. ‘It never occurred to me that showing you may cause anxiety.’

  ‘I’m not anxious, Papou, more like excited and overwhelmed,’ said Nik. ‘I know you’re not rushing me and I’m grateful you’re taking time to explain and teach me, but it’s still a lot to absorb. Just when I’ve got it under control, you zap me with another surprising and exceptional wonder.’

  ‘You are right. When my father introduced me to this I, too, had difficulty in accepting the truth. But unlike you, I needed to learn it all after my father departed for the war. Take a break and come back tomorrow.’ Papou rolled up the scroll.

  ‘Papou, I didn’t mean to …’

  ‘Niko, it’s fine.’ His grandfather smiled. ‘Go out and have fun. Don’t worry about the coin and the guardianship: it will be here when you return.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘Go.’ Papou waved a gloved hand at him. ‘Close the doors behind you when you leave.’

  Chapter Nine

  ‘For the last five months, you’ve been training to get fit, learning how to use weapons and how to defend yourself if in a fight from boxing to martial arts, and you have been studying the ancient texts.’ Nik and his grandfather were sitting in the bunker beneath the bathroom.

  ‘The time has come to carry the coin. We’ll begin here, under a controlled situation and where I can assess your reaction.’

  ‘Reaction? What do you mean?’

  Papou scratched the corner of his mouth before answering. ‘Each guardian has a peculiar response when they first touch the coin, as you did initially holding it for a few moments.’

  ‘Like what?’ asked Nik. He remembered their conversation about the early guardians and their use of alchemy to work out the elemental properties of the coin and how it worked, but they could not solve the riddle.

  Papou shrugged. ‘It’s different for every guardian, and there have been very few cases where the guardian did not feel the effects.’ Nik watched as his grandfather reached into his pocket and withdrew the coin and held out his palm. ‘And in a rare case, the guardian could not carry the coin without being crippled and another person had to take their place.’

  Nik felt the skin prickle on the nape of his neck. ‘What …’ His voice croaked and he stopped to clear his throat. ‘What did the coin do to you?’

  His grandfather looked at the coin in his outstretched hand. ‘I was fortunate, and the side effects were milder after the initial contact.’ He looked at Nik. ‘A headache and the occasional migraine.’

  ‘Right. Well let’s hope I won’t be number two on the rare case statistics,’ Nik joked with a half-crooked smile. He held out his hand. ‘Time for the truth.’

  Papou dropped the coin into Nik’s palm. ‘Best you close your fingers around it,’ he advised.

  Nik did as instructed, the weight of the small irregular-shaped coin heavier and thicker than today’s currency. If an inanimate object could burn a hole through his hand, Nik expected this coin to do so. He frowned and expelled air. He hadn’t realised he’d been holding his breath.

  ‘Do you feel anything?’ asked his grandfather after ten minutes had passed.

  Nik looked at him and shook his head. ‘Not this time. Not even the sensation of yearning I had when I held it for the first time the other day.’ He opened his palm and stared at the coin and then looked at his grandfather. ‘How long did it take for you to react?’

  Papou sat back in his chair and gave him an enigmatic look of appraisal. ‘I got a headache within the first few minutes of holding the coin.’

  Nik peered at the coin.

  ‘You may belong to the minority the coin does not affect.’ Papou’s voice was enthusiastic. ‘But we will continue with the test to make sure. Hold the coin in your hand for another ten minutes. While you do that, I will make us a coffee.’

  Nik watched Papou as he walked to the kitchenette. ‘Do you know why the coin impaired a majority of the guardians and not others? I mean, are there any records or information of their reactions?’

  ‘There isn’t any document
ation, just the collective knowledge communicated from one guardian to the next.’ Papou spooned ground coffee into the electric percolator. ‘The most common symptoms are a headache, nausea, stomach cramps and migraine, and it is common for many protectors to experience one or two of the effects at most.’

  ‘Has anyone travelled with the coin, like how Herodotos and the guardian from the Middle Ages did?’ Nik leaned forward, elbows on his knees, the coin clasped in his fist.

  Papou turned, his arms crossed against his chest as he waited for the coffee to percolate. ‘No. From that time on, they decided no guardian was to learn how to use the coin, and the knowledge was not passed on. Though many tried, no-one was successful.’

  ‘Don’t you find that odd? That none of the later guardians figured out how to jump from one location to another? I cannot believe, after hundreds of years, that no-one made any attempt.’ Nik opened his palm and flipped the coin over to the obverse side. The percolator started boiling and the scent of brewed coffee wafted across the room.

  ‘The predecessors considered the practice too perilous, and there was no guarantee of what would happen to someone if they used the coin. The other problem was the world’s population growth, and avoiding transporting to a major city or town with lots of people. The coin would not be a secret anymore.’ Papou returned to the chairs with two steaming cups of the black brew. ‘My father and I believed there was a reason Herodotos did not record the manner in which he used the coin.’

  Nik reached out to take a cup from his grandfather. ‘And what would that be?’

  Papou took a sip of his coffee. ‘I believe there were detrimental effects he endured, the ramifications were too great. Besides this, Herodotos did not want future protectors to experience what he had, and also to prevent the misuse of the coin by those who wanted to use it for ill-gain, as had the guardian whose greed exposed the coin and its unique properties.’

  ‘And in case a person like Hitler got his hands on it.’

  Papou nodded. ‘Can you imagine what the world would be like if Hitler or his general commander Himmler had located the sister coin?’

  Nik shuddered. ‘Too terrible to even consider.’

  ‘Hence that is why I think Herodotos did not explain how he used the coin.’ Papou pointed to Nik’s hand. ‘How are you feeling? You’ve been holding the coin for almost thirty minutes.’

  ‘I feel fine,’ said Nik and shrugged.

  ‘Stand up and walk around.’

  Nik gave him a questioning look. ‘Why?’

  ‘Humour me,’ Papou crossed his arms against his chest

  ‘Okay.’ Nik placed the cup on the low table and stood. He turned to his grandfather, perplexed. ‘What were you expecting to happen?’

  ‘Some of your predecessors felt nothing, much like you, and yet when they moved around they experienced a few of the symptoms I mentioned earlier.’ The look Papou gave him was enquiring. ‘Walk around.’

  Nik did as instructed, moving from one end of the room across to the other, walking around the perimeter a few times.

  ‘Enough?’ he asked as he rounded another circuit of the room.

  ‘Go up the stairs and come back down.’

  ‘Okay.’ In a few strides, Nik was at the door. He pulled it open and trod up the stairs. The bathtub swung away to reveal the tiles in the bathroom and a yellow towel hanging from the railing on the wall. He went to the top of the stairs and then turned around, returning to the bunker where his grandfather waited near the doorway.

  ‘How are you?’

  ‘Same as before, Papou. Feeling good.’

  Papou scratched his head as they returned to their chairs. ‘You are one of the rare guardians immune to the effects of the coin, but the ultimate test is having the coin with you all day. I want you to take it home tonight, and keep it on you at all times.’

  ‘Even when I go to bed?’

  Papou nodded. ‘Put it under your pillow and when you shower, make sure you bring it into the bathroom. Do not leave it unattended.’

  ‘I’m not sure about taking it to work, it’s too precious.’

  ‘You must treat it as if it is inconsequential, an object just like a mobile phone. Soon you will consider it as a possession you have with you all the time, much like wearing a watch.’

  ‘This is a little different to a watch or a mobile, Papou,’ Nik argued. ‘The coin is invaluable and not some ordinary trinket.’

  ‘That is why it is important to adjust to your life with the coin. The sooner you accept its rarity and history and treat it as an item you wear every day, then you will no longer consider it priceless.’ Papou touched his head.

  ‘If you keep thinking about the coin, how important it is, odds are you will lose it or someone may learn of its existence, and that we don’t want. The coin and you are inseparable, partners in life, that is your reality now. When you marry, then you must decide if you will tell your wife about the secret, but until then, you and the coin are as one.’

  ‘If I get married,’ corrected Nik. ‘I haven’t met a woman who I’ve fallen in love with.’

  His grandfather smiled at him and patted him on the knee. ‘It will happen. The Zosimos men always find the right woman. No female teachers at work who strike your fancy?’

  Nik shook his head. ‘Not really. Likeable women, but none who I want to date or be with. There’s no spark.’

  ‘Sometimes the “spark” takes time to ignite, a tiny flicker of light that becomes a roaring flame.’ Papou winked.

  ‘Is that what happened between you and Yiayiá?’

  ‘No, for me it was instant attraction to my beautiful agápi tis zoís mou, love of my life, right away.’ He wagged a finger at Nik. ‘However, it took your Yiayiá a few days to warm to me!’ His grandfather laughed. ‘Now, my boy, time to show me your knife skills. Your trainer told me how pleased he was with your lessons and how adroitly you have become in the skills of defending yourself with a blade.’

  ‘Okay.’ Nik handed the coin back to his grandfather and then placed the cup on the table, stood, and pulled off his jumper. The muscles on his arms bulged, the t-shirt stretching against his well-developed chest. He strode to the weapons cabinet to retrieve a hunting knife, while his grandfather pulled out the wrestling mat.

  ‘Afterwards, we’ll practice your krav maga, the Israeli self-defence martial arts.’ Papou nodded at Nik. ‘Let’s begin.’

  Chapter Ten

  Sunday morning two months later, Nik let himself into his grandfather’s house with the keys entrusted to him when he started training and studying to be the guardian. His grandfather had given him the coin in the last month. To begin with, he kept it in his wallet, but after a week transferred it into his right front pocket. He waited for some sort of reaction, thinking by housing the coin on his person, he might feel some of the symptoms his grandfather described. Still nothing.

  He glanced into the kitchen and saw it was empty, and kept walking until he reached the back door. He saw his grandfather pottering in the veggie garden and pushed open the fly-screen door.

  ‘Good morning, Papou!’ He waved. His grandfather straightened and waved back.

  ‘I’ll be in later, once I have fed the chickens,’ said Papou.

  ‘Okay.’

  Nik let the door slam closed behind him and went into the bathroom. He grimaced as he walked down the stairs, and put a hand to his side. The boxing bout earlier that morning with Danny, the boxing champion his grandfather knew and had arranged regular sessions with, was sure to leave some bruises. Danny didn’t hold back, though Nik grinned as he recalled a few of his own punches catching the champ off guard. Once he let himself into the bunker and secured the bathtub in its place, he set himself up with a cup of Greek coffee and settled in front of the computer monitors, scanning the constant stream of information as it searched for content relating to the coin.

  Thirty minutes later, he went to the kitchenette to refill his coffee cup when a chime sounded. He frowned a
nd looked over his shoulder, returned to the computer and clicked on the link. He grabbed a pen and notebook and wrote the details, a list of locations and terms his grandfather had set up. There was another beep and another. A series of phrases and names followed them.

  Nik went cold as he went from one feed to the next. He shoved the chair back, tapped the panel near the door, hit the button by the wall and bolted up the stairs. The bathtub swung back into place.

  ‘Papou!’ Nik darted along the passageway and flung the fly-screen door open. It hit the wall and rebounded back at him, missing him by a hair’s breadth. ‘Papou!’

  He saw his grandfather in the chicken house and sprinted to the enclosure. Papou had a fistful of corn in his hand and clucking chickens clustered around his feet waiting for the feed. The genial smile on his face froze.

  ‘What is the matter? How many hits?’

  ‘A dozen.’

  The corn fell from Papou’s hand. The hens squawked and rushed to gobble the golden kernels.

  ‘Where are they coming from?’

  ‘Europe.’

  Papou’s face was grim. ‘Right, we need to analyse and decrypt the feeds.’

  He hurried out of the chicken coop, rammed the latch in place, the hutch frame rattling, and the two hastened back to the house.

  ‘Papou, you still have your boots on,’ said Nik. He glanced at his grandfather’s gumboots, complete with feathers and crud.

  Papou pulled the boots off and tossed them aside. He yanked the door open and stepped inside, not stopping to put on any shoes. Nik followed.

  Back in the secured room, Nik pointed to the first warning and the others that had followed.

  Papou paled. ‘Someone has found the sister coin.’

  ‘That’s what I thought too,’ said Nik. ‘What do we do?’

  ‘We narrow down the location, and hope that will lead us to the person who has it.’

  ‘Is that possible?’

  ‘We will find the site, though it will take time. As for the individual, that may prove to be more difficult. If we know where, we can focus our search on a particular area,’ confirmed Papou. ‘Let’s start with the first alert and work through each one.’ Papou reached for the mouse and clicked on the feed.