The Hermaphrodite's Curse Ch. 28

PART FOUR - BODRUM

- 6 -

It was at least a larger, roomier, airier cell than the one in which they had locked him back in Cambridge. Other than that, however, this situation had a distressing sense of familiarity to Gabe. This time he had not blacked out when assaulted by the bald eunuch assassins, but he had been far too fearful and panicked to notice especially where they were being taken. All that he knew was that they were still in Bodrum, they had not been moved that far. The Hospitallers must have a base of operations designed to be close by their original castle.

This time, of course, there was also the difference that he was not alone. The room had probably once served as a wine cellar. It was long and thin with a vaulted ceiling. However, one side of the room had been converted into a series of cage like cells made up of iron bars and locked gates. Gabe sat on a hard wooden bench in one of these cells. In the next one along, Saphy was pacing back and forth, separated from Gabe by just a set of bars. Next to her, the naiad sat in the centre of the floor, unmoving, staring defiantly out. In the other half of the room, there were a pair of guards in the black Hospitaller robes.

There were a lot of these guards around. The whole operation here seemed a lot more efficient and organised than it had in Cambridge. They had been subject to a pretty exhaustive search when they had been brought in here. They had been stripped and dressed in shapeless white smocks that covered most of their bodies in one piece of material. Gabe's ubiquitous bag of camera equipment now lay in the corner of the room, unreachable on the other side of the bars. A little nearer, but still beyond grasp of their hands, there was a pile of their clothes.

Gabe watched as Saphy paced, his own slumped despairing posture was the complete opposite to her fidgety inability to remain still for a moment. In the third cell, the naiad was as unmoving as Gabe, but her face had an expression of calm that he could not feel. He could see no way out now and knew that as soon as the Hospitallers and Gerard could extract what they needed to know from the naiad then he and Saphy would rapidly become surplus to the warrior monks' requirements.

Saphy seemed lost in her own thoughts, trying desperately to figure something out. Her eyes mostly remained fixed to the floor as she paced like a caged zoo animal, always following the same track. Gabe could feel the eyes of the guards on him, though, even from behind the black shadow of their hooded robes. It made him feel uncomfortable about even moving. He felt very exposed, trapped and watched. For a moment, he wondered how the subjects of his photographs felt, knowing he was always there watching from behind his camera. He didn't much like the thought.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs leading down to the cellar. There was a certain degree of urgency to the sound that made Gabe's heart jump with fear. Saphy stopped pacing and looked up, catching Gabe's eye. She had a look of steely determination and, last week, that was all that Gabe would have noticed in her look. Now, however, he could see beyond that, could see the fear that was in his eyes mirrored back in hers. She opened her mouth to speak, but was silenced instantly by an angry word from the guard.

The door to the cellar flew open and in strode Dr. Gerard, the Grand Prior, flanked by two of his robed henchmen. All three were dressed in the order's black robes with white crosses, but their hoods were down to reveal their faces. Looking up, Gabe realised that the two men accompanying Gerard were equally familiar. It was DI Gilbert and DS Godfrey from the Cambridge Police Force. Gilbert gave him a nasty looking smirk. Godfrey, meanwhile focused his attention on the beautiful naiad in the third cell.

"We'll deal with you later," Gerard dismissively turned from Gabe and Saphy and walked quickly over to the cell where the naiad was being held, "You, however, can tell us just what we need to know right now," he said to her, then to the guards, "Unlock this cell and bring her with me."

Godfrey opened the door of the cell and walked over to where the naiad sat silently on the bench. He laid his hand on the small young woman's shoulder, but, before anyone in the room had time really to comprehend what was happening, he doubled over in pain. The naiad's hand had moved at incredible speed and struck the detective hard in his solar plexus. In a second, she had sprung up, swinging on the bars of the cell, her leg spun and landed a hard kick to the side of Godfrey's head, bringing him to the floor.

He struggled to get to his feet and, in doing so, swung his fist wildly at the spot where she had been standing. She was simply too fast for him ever to make use of his superior size and strength. Before he could stand, she was on top of him, her hands wrapped around his head. With a sickening crack that made Gabe gasp out loud, she twisted his head in her hands, snapping his neck, and dropping his limp body to the floor.

"Impressive," came the sound of Gerard's sneering, superior voice as he clapped his hands together, "But completely useless."

Gabe turned his attention from the naiad and saw that the other three Hospitallers had now approached. All had drawn their guns. The naiad looked around for a way out but found none and was soon taken by both arms by the two hooded guards that had been standing by the door.

"You can kill me if you will, I will never reveal the secrets of my sisterhood," she spat out defiantly.

"Oh I won't kill you," Gerard replied, "Not yet, anyway. I've got something much better in store for you. Well, better for me, worse for you."

He led the way as the two guards escorted the naiad from the room. Gilbert stood behind, staring at his police partner with shocked awe.

"Get rid of that body," Gerard said, turning back to him before leaving the cellar.

Gilbert glared angrily at Saphy and Gabe as he dragged his partner's heavy corpse from the room, never saying anything but conveying quite clearly in his eyes the feeling of hate he had toward them, hate and blame for what he had just witnessed the naiad do. He slammed the door behind him and the sound of him angrily dragging his partner's body continued for some time.

Gabe and Saphy, locked in their adjoining cells, were left alone in the cellar. For a few moments they stayed in complete silence, just trying to absorb what had just happened. Saphy was no longer pacing, she just stared across the cellar, unspeaking.

"She'll be OK," Gabe said, just wanting to break the silence, "She can handle herself."

Finally, Saphy turned to face him, but what she said next did not appear to follow on at all from what he had said, nor what had just happened.

"Back in the cave," she began to say, to Gabe's surprise, "Why the hell did you dive into that pool of dirty slime like that?"

"Honestly? I have no idea," Gabe replied, "I just felt compelled to do it, like I really needed to feel it."

"What were you hoping to get out of it?" Saphy questioned.

"I...I just needed to do it. I can't answer more than that. I wasn't really thinking rationally."

"Because, to my mind there's only two possible outcomes," Saphy had come right up to the bars separating their two cells now, turning her smart, sharp gaze thoughtfully on him, "Either this really was the mythological Fountain of Salmacis and, by diving in, you would become a woman, or it's just an old puddle of stagnant water and, by diving in, you'd have got wet, cold and dirty. So, why would you want either?"

"Like I said, I didn't think about what I wanted."

"Even so, there must have been an instinct inside you that made that choice. Given that I can't believe you wanted a dunking in sludgy water, I can only conclude that, at least in part, you wanted to see if the myth was true. You wanted the waters to make you a woman!"

"Don't be ridiculous," Gabe said defensively, "I just...I needed to know if it was true. You're right about that part at least."

"But why?" Saphy pondered before continuing her train of thought to answer the question before he could articulate it himself, "That story has always fascinated you, hasn't it? You grew up wondering whether it could possibly be real."

"Yes, exactly," Gabe agreed, surprised at how well she had come to know his inner thoughts, "How could you know that?"

"I've seen how you responded to Jane Cavendish introducing the idea of Hermaphroditus, how you behaved on seeing the statue at the Louvre. You're a stay at home introvert and yet you've been whisked away on this adventure, caught up in it because you feel you may finally come close to just what you've dreamed of all these years."

In all his life, Gabe had never met anyone who really understood how he felt. Ever since his first fascination with Love's Children and the Hermaphroditus story, he had never felt anybody else could grasp what it meant to him. But here was Saphy, this strange, aggressive, troubled intellectual, a woman whose life was so far from his own, telling him just how he felt.

Saphy still stood right by the bars of the cell, leaning in to talk to him in a breathy, excited voice that he had not heard her use before. He was drawn towards her now as he had been to the pool in the cave. He found himself standing close to the bars on his side of the cage until they were face to face, so close to each other that they were almost touching.

"But it isn't just a burning curiosity to see if the reality behind the myth, is it?" she went on, "Whatever you say, you want it to be true. You want to be able to plunge into the cold waters of the fountain and emerge with a beautiful body. A body you feel comfortable in. All these years you have never felt happy in your own body, you've longed to challenge and change it. You want to transform, like a butterfly, into something beautiful. I know you Gabe, I know what you're feeling. And I know that you do really want to become a woman as beautiful as Salmacis, as Venus, as Hermaphroditus."

"Yes," Gabe sighed, finally realising for himself that she was right, that part of his fascination with the Fountain of Salmacis was a yearning to transform himself completely, "If only I could, if only it were true."

Her eyes fixed on his, staring deeply into his soul until all each could see was each other's eyes.

And then she kissed him.

He was shocked. Even in this moment of shared intimacy, he had not expected this. And yet here it was. The imposing, aggressive lesbian who had quarrelled and teased him now had her lips pressed wetly against his through the bars of the cage. Her tongue slid over his, her tongue stud rubbing against his mouth.

Everything else in the room faded out completely, he was lost in Saphy's long, lingering kiss. The cells seemed to disappear around them and it seemed to Gabe that, as the kiss continued, he was standing in soft grass beneath the hot sun, that he heard running water.

Sure enough, as he looked beyond Saphy's face, still pressing their lips together, he could see a stream of clear running water and out of it, emerging just like the image on the cover of Love's Children, was a familiar figure of incredible beauty, her naked body draped with long golden hair. Venus.

"Now is the time my son," she said in a soft whisper that made Gabe wonder if Saphy could here it too, "Now is the time to become the real you."

Suddenly, the vision disappeared to be replaced with the harsh environment of the cellar and the cell bars as Saphy broke from their deep kiss. It seemed clear then to Gabe that the divine manifestation of the love goddess had only been for him, perhaps only ever in his head. Still, something had caught Saphy's attention to make her pull away so suddenly with such an exclamation.

"Of course!" she cried, as soon as her mouth was hers again, "Our clothes, that's it. We're getting the fuck out of here."

"Huh?" Gabe was confused, clearly no longer sharing her thoughts, "How are our clothes going to get us out? And, anyway, they're way over there. How do we get at them?"

"Just watch," Saphy smirked.

With no further words, she had pulled the white smock she was wearing right over her head, completely exposing her naked body to Gabe's view. He knew that the polite thing to do would be to turn away, but after the depth of passion in that kiss he felt no shame in seeing Saphy completely unclothed, seeing her whole story spelt out in the tattoos that covered her skin.

While Gabe stared at her open mouthed, Saphy was not idle. She twisted the shapeless material into a sort of a rope and flung it between the bars of the cage where it flopped down on the cellar floor and Saphy pulled it back in like a fisherman without a catch.

Seeing this, Gabe cottoned on to just what was happening. Saphy was trying to use the makeshift rope to pull their clothes from the pile across the cell back toward them. He had no idea how this was going to get them out or what possible benefit it could have beyond giving them something more usual to wear. Still, he had come to trust Saphy's brain and was willing to support what she did without knowing why she did it.

"Here," he said, turning to take the bundle of Saphy's clothes from her, unable to help himself eyeing up the curve of her breasts and between her legs, "Let me have a go. I'm closer."

Saphy handed him the crudely constructed rope and he had two or three goes at throwing the end across the room before, finally, making it land squarely in the pile of clothes across the cellar. It caught against something on Saphy's baggy, torn punk t-shirt. This was the only thing he could pull from the pile, but Saphy seemed excited and reached between the bars of her cell and grabbed it just as it slipped from the rope Gabe was pulling in.

She quickly pulled the large t-shirt over her head, covering her breasts and much of her nakedness, while her pale thin legs remained exposed. Her tattooed chest now hid behind the aggressive image of the punk logo emblazoned across her shirt. The tears in the material allowed glimpses of her skin beneath as safety pins did little to hold them together. It was one of these pins that Saphy now unfastened.

"See, all along I've been prepared for just such an eventuality as this," she grinned, "Because I've been walking around wearing a complete set of fucking first class lock picks."

Gabe watched, impressed, as Saphy took the point of two safety pins and inserted them into her cell's lock, feeling her way for a point that would give.

"Are you sure this will work?" he wondered.

"Don't worry," she grinned, excited to be problem solving once more, "This isn't the first time I've done this."

Sure enough, Gabe heard a click and, in seconds, the door to Saphy's cell swung open. Moments later, he too stood outside the cell, watching as Saphy pulled her mini-skirt and biker boots back on. She was now starting to look more like herself again.

For his part, Gabe remained dressed in the white smock the jailers had put him in. His concern was not for his clothes but for the camera equipment that he had carried with him all the way from England. He opened the bag and started eagerly looking over all his equipment, making sure that it was still all operational.

"What the hell are you doing?" Saphy demanded impatiently, "Get dressed and then let's get the fuck out of here. We need to plan our next move."

"That's just what I'm doing," Gabe answered, "We're still headed for the Fountain, right? They're not going to stop us now."

"Hell no, they're not."

"Right," he agreed, "So, we need a clue. We need to remember what was in that pool in the cave."

"The map?" she sighed, "It really looked familiar. If only we could remember it. I don't much fancy going back to the castle. Gerard's sure to have it watched even if we can get past the guards to get out of here."

"Good thing I have a photographic memory," Gabe smirked, "And I mean that in a very literal sense."

He held up his camera, he was scrolling through pictures on the viewing screen.

"You remember the underwater photography equipment I've been carrying?" he smiled, "I know you thought it was a heavy inconvenience, but let's just treat this as my version of your lock picks."

"You mean...?"

"That's right, while you were distracted talking to Gerard, I used this to get a shot under the pool. It's kind of blurry but you can certainly make out the map."

Eagerly, she came over and peered over his shoulder at the small screen. Sure enough, it showed a hastily taken image beneath the murky waters in the cave at Bodrum Castle. It was not quite straight, nor completely in focus, but the shape of what appeared to be an island, a coastline and a mountain were obvious.

"I know that island," Saphy exclaimed, "That's why it's familiar. It's Lesbos."

"Lesbos?"

"It's Sappho's home island," she said, "Sappho the subject of the Swinburne poetry, the lesbian icon, the one who I take my name from, just like lesbians take theirs from the island."

"So, what's Sappho got to do with the Fountain?"

"Where was Hermaphroditus from? In your story book, I mean."

"Mount something," he could not quite remember.

"Mount Ida?"

"That's it. Why?"

"Because Lesbos is an island in a bay just off the coast of Turkey. The mountain that stands above that bay, the one on the map, is a mountain called Kazdağı, or Goose Mountain, but, historically, it used to be called Mount Ida."

"That's it then!" Gabe said, excitedly, "That must be where this quest ends. There, on the mountain, where the map shows the sign of that stream," he pointed, "That must be where to find the real Fountain of Salmacis!"

"What are we waiting for then?" Saphy looked bold and decisive, "Let's get out of here before they find we're gone."

Both turned toward the door of the cellar and, at that exact moment, heard the sound of footsteps in the corridor outside and looked in fear to see the door handle begin to turn.