The Byssus Killer by Charles Tucker (read a book .TXT) 📗

if it mutated on the inside of a fleshy creature, growing within it? It would kill it!

Should this terrible thought become reality, as a land-bound race, we could never find its source in the depths of the oceans. A sea sourced mutation, a sea sourced virus would wipe us out!”

Dr Emlyn Jones clutched on to his cowrie, feeling he had let his fears run away with him, his philosophy one of desperation, not of clinical analysis. The cowrie was getting too hot to handle. It was relaying the truth!

The sun peeked over the horizon. The old codger was definitively younger. He looked straight at Jones.

“We have our ancestral homes on the Lost Land of Lyonnesse, on Lyonnais, on Tresco’s Valhalla and on our castle on the Seven Stones reef. Valhalla on the island of Tresco is home to the figureheads of ships honouring our seamen warriors. Our Lyonnesse ancestors can see back in time to the castle on the reef greater than the one on St Michael’s Mount. Fresh water came up from the depths to supply the castle. It is still flowing, creating the distinct creamy breakers.

“The runes told us our Seven Stones home had an invader. Malign Pinna nobilis king mussels were wrecking the reef and killing all that came near. We took young Ask out of our home of the gods, Asgard, and sent him down to Midguard, your human home, to deal with the renegade shells.

“He lost the battle. He wrestled with the many invisible byssus mutations of Pinna nobilis and lost. You witnessed his sad arrival on Sennen beach encased in killer byssus diamond hard coating. He had been wrestling inside his stone casing ever since, desperate to get out and continue the fight. He frightened you.

“Your empathy with our need to stop this mutation was not lost on us. We could have recovered Ask, but our human race would have lost the war against the killer byssus mutation. Keeping faith with Ask in his Stone Man prison and gathering up the scientists to solve the byssus-chitin virus invasion was a master stroke.”

Jones snapped out of the praise heaped on him and realised the old codger was no longer old, but a young man, talking in terms of ‘we’ of Norse mythology heritage.

The quay at Sennen Cove was about thirty minutes away. Flooded with curiosity, Jones had to ask the man so well versed in Norse legend and who had transcended from old to young within a night -time:

“Who are you?”

“I have many guises when I am with you in Midgard. This time my challenge was to retrieve young Ask from his travail. I came from the golden halls of Asgard to meet the challenge. I kept watch over your defeat of the killer byssus virus and your personal guardianship over young Ask. Be certain, you will meet me again in another guise. In Norse legend, I have nine mothers. You would say nine lives.

“I am Heimdallr the Mysterious.”

The pilchard boat reversed on to the quay. Heimdallr leapt lightly on to the granite steps and was lost to view, striding through the narrow streets of Sennen.

 

 

 Return to Sant Antioco

The factory ship set sail from Falmouth, destination Bourgas on the Black Sea. The hundred crew had recovered well from their awful capture and the terrible encasement in suspended animation by the killer byssus shells. They were pleased to be going home.

The fish processing deck was laid out with many wooden crates holding a precious cargo of golden Pinna nobilis shells. An equal number of crates held the mutated killer byssus shells made visible and golden by lemon juice sprays. Golden byssus thread, cloth or shell is more valuable than gold. It cannot be bought. It cannot be sold. Senora Vigo, the last person known to spin and weave byssus thread or sea silk, would take custody of the precious cargo. A golden cattedrale mare under the sea would be her lasting memorial to the most magical of shells the ocean had ever produced.

Jones enjoyed his four-day voyage to the Sardinian islands. The call of the islands would never leave him.

Senora Vigo was at the dockside to greet him.

Standing beside her was a smiling, flaxen-haired young man.

Jones could not believe his eyes. He rushed up and hugged them both.

“Senora Vigo, how wonderful to see you again.”

He turned and bear hugged the flaxen haired young man.

“Heimdallr! I never thought I would see you again!”

Senora Vigo looked astonished.

“That is not Heimdallr. He is my Enevow a Mor from the Lost Land of Lyonnesse. Enevow a Mor is his old Cornish Kernewek name. He is the protector of my Pinna nobilis colony. He can adopt the aura of a Viking warrior and frighten the life out of pirates and looters who would take my Pinna nobilis for enormous gain.

“You obviously know him very well. His Asgard family called him recently and he returned to Lyonnesse, where a rogue Pinna nobilis colony had upset his ancestors. They were destroying the legendary Norse castle on the Seven Stones reef. I saw him leave at sunset. I swore he looked like a towering old sea dog outlined against the brilliant red sunset. I blinked in the glare and he was gone. It was a sad parting. I thought I had lost him for ever.”

Senora Vigo choked. Her emotions welling up.

“Did you meet the old sea dog?”

Jones took Senora Chiara Vigo by both hands.

“Oh yes. I met him!”

“Then you will really know him as I know him, as a brother: our SOUL OF THE SEA.”