Golden Box Book Publishing One Picture: Thousands of Words | Page 63

A snort escaped her nostrils as she wandered through her grand
daughter's shattered remains, absently shuffling the shards with her
foot, searching for any sign of life. Satisfied, she turned on her heel
and walked back to the shadowed corner to fetch a shovel.
For the next hour, the old woman scooped up shovelfuls of the
basement floor. The deeper she dug, the softer the earth became.
Finally, the tell-tale clink of metal on metal rang out from the ground.
The old woman flung the shovel behind her, then dropped to her
knees and frantically began brushing away the soil. Soon, the top of
an oblong box emerged from under her brittle hands.
Waving a single finger over the box, the old woman uttered a
spell. A thin blue beam of magic shot out from her fingertip, cutting
through the box like a blow torch. Within moments, the box was
open.
There beneath the floor of the family basement, lay her daughter
in law. The once angelic face had sunk into itself like a mummy in
the desert. Her skin, dry and tight, clung to her bones like plastic
wrap.
“You foolish whore,” the muttered to the corpse. “stealing my son,
TWICE! If the child hadn't done it, I would have killed you myself.”
Grandmother let out a gasp, as her eyes fell on her daughter in
law's left hand. There on her finger rested a single gold band, covered
in faintly carved runes. The setting held a small crystal, shaped like a
closed human eye.
Licking her lips, the old woman reached in and took the dead
woman's hand in hers. She lightly brushed her thumb across the gold
band, clearing away years of grave dust. The eye shuttered in its
setting, then opened, silently taking in all there was to see. Then she
slipped the ring off the corpse's finger and stood up.