The Atlantis Keystone by Caroline Väljemark

her grave. This had been a common occurrence when she was alive. He had lost count long ago of the number of times she had preached about the importance of virtues and taking a moral high ground. Therefore, he saw this possibility as the more likely, although he had never got the impression that his grandmother took offence to Anna. In fact, she had been one of only a handful of people the old woman had actually accepted, or at least not bullied. The second possibility was that his grandmother would have expected that her particular copy of the holy bible actually meant something to Anna and that they had discussed it at some point. It was possible that Anna had had conversations with the old woman while he was not there. Erik was intrigued as this would have revealed a side to his grandmother that he had never seen. Anna, like himself, had not been in the least bit religious but a common interest here could not be seen as a complete impossibility given her interest in ancient history, of which the bible was one ‘source’, and his grandmother’s fascination or perhaps obsession with preaching the ‘word’ of god. She had been a regular churchgoer before the ‘demise’ which confined her to her bed. Unfortunately, he thought, he would probably never know the reasons behind the gift. Both were dead, never to return…
    The captain turned off the seatbelt sign and Erik made his way out. It felt like an eternity before he had collected his suitcase and rushed through passport control. He then went straight outside to the taxi rank where he got into the first taxi he laid eyes on. After only a short journey through town and on a country road by the sea, the taxi slowed down and turned onto a small lane. The villa was conveniently located, only a stone’s throw from the sea and about twenty minutes from Heraklion. The house looked contemporary from the outside, clad in white render which complemented its boxy shape. After he had paid and got out of the car he knocked on the front door. No one came to open so he stepped inside. The house had an open plan layout and a large kitchen with modern appliances. He could not have chosen better himself. He heard excited voices outside on the patio area. He went through some sliding doors by the sofa and as he came outside he saw four people sitting at a plastic patio table unnecessarily shielded from the cloud-weakened sun by a large parasol. There was even a small swimming pool. The patio was enclosed by a low fence which didn’t block out the view of the surrounding open fields, a couple of bungalows further down and the sea in the distance. They all stood up to greet him. Emma walked up to him, giving him a friendly hug. He noticed that her complexion had deteriorated and that she was as pale as when they had first met in London but that she looked well nevertheless, albeit very unlike Anna.
    “Lovely to see you Erik!” she beemed.
    “And you,” he responded with mixture of sincerity and doubt about his decision to join them.
    Paul gave him a light clap on the back, almost as if they were best friends. “Good to see you man,” he said before he sat down again.
    Emma introduced Ball, the Japanese PhD student and Laura, a post graduate student of history at Oxford. What Ball was wearing was somewhat at odds with his general appearance: a T-shirt displaying the 1980’s rock band Guns ‘n Roses but other than that he was very much like Erik had pictured him from Emma’s previous description; extremely polite and with typically Japanese features, although remarkably tall for a Japanese man and somewhat older than he had envisaged, perhaps in his early thirties. Erik guessed that Laura was a couple of years older than Emma. He noticed that she had a very pretty well-groomed face and fair skin but her thick ill-suited glasses seemed to hide most of her potential beauty and her long dark brown hair was messily arranged in a knot which threatened to untie itself. She was very