Robert Masello - The Medusa Amulet

“Go for it,” he said, and once he’d taken a step back, the birds swooped down.

He looked up at the gray sky, getting darker by the minute, just as an airplane, its red lights flashing, passed high overhead, heading toward O’Hare Airport. And he prayed-he prayed -that David was on it.

O’Hare was tied into one big knot.

David’s plane, like dozens of others, had been forced to circle the airport, flying out over Lake Michigan and then in again, as the controllers tried to safely land all the existing traffic before the wind and snow got any worse, or made any more of the runways inoperable.

The FASTEN SEAT BELTS sign had been on for nearly the entire hour, as David had huddled, invisible and anxious, against the emergency exit, occasionally peering out through the porthole at the turbulent clouds scudding across the night sky. Would the storm abate, or would it increase to such an extent that the moon was completely obscured? From everything he knew about the Medusa-first from his study of The Key to Life Eternal, the rest from the mouth of Sant’Angelo himself-the moonlight was as essential to his enterprise as the mirror itself. As he had translated the text himself, sitting in the silo of the Newberry…

“The waters of eternity,

Blessed by the radiant moon,

Together stop the tide of time

And grant the immortal boon.”

If his plan was to succeed… if the magic was to happen… he would need all the elements to come together.

And even then, what were the chances?

When the plane was finally cleared to land and David could hear the wheels coming down, he breathed a sigh of relief. There were still a dozen hurdles to go-on a night like this, just getting out of the airport was going to be tough-but oh, how he longed to get his feet on the ground. For that matter, he longed simply to see his own feet again. Being disembodied felt alarmingly close to feeling nonexistent.

It was a bumpy landing as the wheels skidded on the runway and the crosswinds tore at the plane’s wide wings; without a seat or seat belt to hold him in place, David was buffeted from one wall to the other. But with one invisible hand, he made sure he kept the wreath on his brow. His head ached from its grip, but now was no time to be discovered and hauled off to airport security as an undocumented passenger.

“ S’il vous plait sejour pose jusqu’a ce que nous soyons arrives a la porte,” the intercom announced, and the few impatient passengers who had already tried to retrieve bags from the overhead compartments dutifully sat back down. David used the opportunity to slink silently up the aisle and position himself directly behind the main hatchway. Getting the ramp in place created another delay, but as soon as the door was thrown back, David breezed past the flight attendant, who seemed to sense his presence somehow and put a worried hand to the base of her throat, before skirting a waiting wheelchair, running up the ramp, and out into the terminal.

Following the signs for Customs, David hurried along the endless corridors and escalators, and though a luggage cart was trundled over his foot and a baby carriage was shoved into his shin, he was able to pass through the automated doors without trouble by following close on the heels of a bulky businessman.

At the Customs desks, David looked around to see which officer was already occupied riffling through someone’s luggage, then shimmied past the girl whose guitar case was being given the once-over-“Yeah, I packed it myself,” she was reciting, “and it hasn’t been out of my sight”-and then raced down the concourse, past the big plate-glass windows where people were waiting to spot their visitors, and out toward the taxi stands.

The line was interminable, passengers huddled against the biting wind, stamping their feet to keep warm as the cabs were slowly motioned forward by the dispatchers, loaded up, and sent on their way.

But David had no time to spare on this, and renting a car would take even longer.

Across several lanes, in the section reserved for unloading private car service clients, he saw a maroon Lincoln parked, and the driver-a young guy with a soul patch-was helping an elderly couple to wrestle their bags onto a trolley. David loped across the lanes, dodging the cars that of course could not even see him, and while the driver was settling up, he slipped into the backseat and took off the garland.

For a second or two, as nothing happened, he feared he’d done himself some irreparable harm. But then, he felt a tingling in his toes, the same feeling he’d get when he’d been out skating too long and the blood had slowly started to return. His boots reappeared, drumming on the floor of the car. Then the sensation coursed up his legs, and they, too, gradually became visible.

But the driver got in sooner than David had expected, jumping into the seat to count his bills.

David prayed he wouldn’t look into the rearview mirror yet.

Reaching for the radio mike, he said, “Car 6, calling in.”

“Hey, Zach.”

“I’ve just made the drop-off at Air France.”

David felt the rippling sensation moving up his torso. Glancing down, he saw his coat coming into view, and then his chest. His arms prickled, as if each hair was standing on end, and he flexed the muscles gratefully.

“You got another pickup for me?” Zach asked.

“Looks like it,” the dispatcher replied. “Alitalia.”

“Cancel that,” David interrupted, and the driver whipped around in his seat. David hoped that the crown of his head wasn’t still missing.

“What the hell?” the driver said, dropping the mike. “Where’d you come from?”

David held up a fistful of bills. “Do it, and they’re all yours.”

Zach looked very confused.

“Hey, Zach,” the radio dispatcher said, “let me give you the name.”

“Tell ’em you’re busy,” David urged.

“Those are euros,” the driver mumbled to David.

“Zach, you still there?”

“True,” David said. “That means they’re worth more than dollars.” He leaned forward and handed over the whole wad of them.

“I do know that,” Zach said, as he thumbed through the bills. “I’m in grad school.”

“Then you can figure out how to get to Evanston hospital.”

Satisfied with the windfall, Zach pleaded engine trouble over the radio, then shut off the mike for the breakneck trip to the suburbs.

David fished Jantzen’s BlackBerry out of his pocket again, called Gary, and got his voice mail. “I’m in a cab,” David said, “and on the way.” Hanging up, he simply stared blankly at the phone. What if he was already too late? Nothing he had read suggested that the Medusa could reanimate the dead. It could bestow eternal life, but it could not return it to those already gone. He reached into his shirt just to feel its presence on his chest. The silver was cold, the silk backing slick. That was strange, he thought. It did not absorb any of his body heat. It remained unaffected, oblivious to its surroundings, as if in a vacuum of its own. His fingers traced the contours of the Gorgon’s face. He knew every tendril of its hair, every furrow of its snarling brow, but for the first time since acquiring it, he feared it, too. What great transgression was he about to attempt?

The cab slowed down, and David said, “Can’t you go any faster?”

“Not on the ice,” Zach replied, “and I’m not about to total the damn car.”

But something told him that Sarah was still alive. Some intuition, some sixth sense. The bond they had was so strong, and had always been so unbreakable, that if it had been severed, he’d have known. He’d have felt the break, no matter how far away he’d been, like a punch in his stomach.