The Heart of the Sphinx

Chapter 16

Medusa was reading one of the books that she had collected from the dead men’s library in the light of the candle when Bella came in running. Her ears perked up and she turned towards the teen.

“What is it that has happened?” asked Medusa as she looked at her flushed face and raised her brows.

“There is a group of men coming here towards this building. I think that they are another gang who are I think looking for another place to start their business,” said Bella as she kept on huffing.

“And what is it that you are expecting to happen? Are they a bunch of innocent mortals like you who are doing this just for the sake of livelihood or are these the people who are deliberately hell-bent on hurting others because they like doing so?” asked Medusa as she closed the book with a snap and then looked at her with a murderous gleam in her eyes.

“I think this is the most notorious gang who works and prowls the streets of London. I am not sure that they are going to look at us kindly at if they find us covering the floors of abandoned buildings lined with books. And moreover we are not anyway people who have any kind of drugs at all with them which might have given us some kind of leverage or time to get out of this place,” said Bella as she kept on looking at the doors of the building where the plastic sheets kept on flapping at the slight wind.

“Of dear child…you still don’t get it, do you?” asked Medusa as she could see thee fear instilled in the eyes of the young girl. When she did not reply anything Medusa said,” When it comes to people who have already sold their souls to the devil because they had no idea what to do with the inherent milk of human kindness and features they have been granted by God then they already lose their choice to live.”

“But what are you going to do?” asked Bella as she looked at Medusa in fear.

“You are still a weakling dear child but with a brave heart. Fear not, I am not going to allow anything to happen to you at all. You are going to be protected at all costs. Now, are you ready to do something in the meanwhile?” asked Medusa as she rose to her full height and unfurled her wings. She looked definitely majestic…..and regal in her full body. She was so beautiful that no one was going to be able to resist looking at her in her full glory.

“What is that I have to do?” asked Bella as she straightened her back.

“Make sure that the books are shifted away by the time they reach here, and I don’t want any single of these texts to be harmed in any way. There is a lot that I still need to acquire from all these texts,” said Medusa as she looked at her talons and smiled at her.

“But Medusa, there are thousands of volumes which are kept here, how do you expect me to lift and carry them to safety?” asked Bella, in a shocked voice.

“Oh I don’t…I really don’t…just make sure that they are covered and protected from any kind of harm and are not inflamed because these things are flammable since they are made with the worse versions of papyrus scrolls and they don’t make them protective as well like we used to with wax layers,” said Medusa as she started walking out of the building and did not look back at her.

“I don’t understand what you want me to do but sure I am going to try,” said Bella as she muttered the words to herself and found that there was no one in sight to listen to her, she sighed out loud and started looking for the things which were supposed to be protective layer on the books.

Outside Medusa perched on the ledge of building on a few storeys above where the street was. She could see why Bella was acting scared. These were the boys who did not have any qualms in doing anything at all. They were rowdy, fierce and disgusting and covering with dark drawings all over their bodies. She was disgusted at the sight of these people. Such vagrants were always punished and put to death in her time and now they were roaming free as if they were the king of the streets.

She huffed and the air came out like a wisp of air from her nostrils. These were not creatures who were worthy of being called men. She did not want them anywhere near her ward. She knew that they had lost every single quality that made them humane and they were nothing but flesh suits of demons from hell itself. Suddenly she knew that she needed to get Bella out of that place so that she would not be hurt in any of the ensuing fight. Because she might be immortal but Bella was not. And they had these things which had fire-power and they were not going to hesitate to use them over anyone if they were scared.

Fear was a strange thing altogether. Sometimes it gave men the capability of achieve things which were thought to be unachievable before and sometimes, rather now most times it made her cringe to think that fear was the driving force behind every single action of violence. They were all scared and running away from something. She did not think that there was much time or energy to be wasted on these creatures when there were still two more urns that she needed to take care of and there were still no clues which she had been able to find from all this books that why would they even do something. There must be some reason that they must have done this and she needed to find that out.

These men, were not exactly men. They were younger than men but their coarse language and all other things which they exuded from their entire being made it certain that they were not really the crème-de-la-crème of earth and if they were tossed off in the gutter with their lifeless bodies then no one was actually going to care.

Medusa did not wait anymore as she swooped down suddenly and picked up one of the teenage boys and flew up again on the top of the building. Before the boy could make any sound his neck was snapped and just like that his life was over. As she swooped down once more and picked up two in both her hands she did not snap their necks suddenly. She waited for them to scream, it felt as if she was loving the way that adrenaline coursed through her veins when she was the only one who is going to be the master of their fate, sorry, wrong notion, master of their death.

 The screams of these boys made all the rest of the people aware on the street below that some of them were missing and just then they took out their guns and started shooting hither and thither up at the building thinking that they were being attacked by some kind of rival gang on that side. But soon two bodies fell on the street with a pitiful thud which was more than enough to snap off their backbones and crush their cranium making them bleed from their ears as they were dead immediately. The rest of the men were now scared and shouting at one another and now she just needed to find a few more of these bastards before she could snap their necks. But she did not need to, they were already running away as if their tails were on fire.

Medusa grinned as she licked her paws and hands when she was down back at her place where all the books were stored and Bella was still sitting there in front of the piles.

“Was it necessary to kill them all?” asked Bella as Medusa was silent to her question. To be honest, for the very first time in her life she had a feeling that she was doing something which did not precisely have a strong reason behind it and she felt good doing it.

“No, it was not necessary to kill them,” said Medusa, as she sat down before the girl.

“Then why did you take their lives? I mean, they could have been scared away in some other way as well…why did you have this need of making them suffer? But then you don’t need to answer Medusa. I already know it,” said Bella as she looked at her, her eyes were grim and her mouth was in a straight line.

“How can you possibly know or understand the reason of any of my actions? You are nothing else but a child!!” said Medusa as she scoffed.

“I might not have seen a lot of things or experienced so much like you but I know when someone starts to like killing. It is just like when the fox gets the taste of blood and he cannot stop hunting,” said Bella and Medusa knew at the moment that nothing could be truer than what she had just said.