Fingers of Shadow

Fingers of Shadow

Prologue

Translucent webbing decorated the abandoned part of the building. Hundreds of pinhole-sized eyes glittered in the shaft of the moonlight that drifted in from the small window near the ceiling. The scuttling of many legs was the only noise constantly heard. But if there is no one to hear them, are they really making sounds?

The spiders had been breeding faithfully in the decades since the last human-being- if it could even be called a human- had stepped through the creaky wooden door. There were several piles of boxes, an armoire or two, handcrafted standing mirrors whose elegant features were completely covered in dust, and trunks whose padlocks had rusted into uselessness.

And among all of the old keepsakes was a small, non-descript box.

It looked simply like one of those common white boxes that could be seen on a bakery shelf. It sniffed, it would be possible to catch the slightest sugary whiff of confectioner’s sugar in some stiff cake icing.

Just a box.

But then again, among the sweet aroma was the smallest amount of smoggy, smoky air and crystal- sulfur on the sheen-covered surface of diamond. There was also the occasional rustling that, other than the legs on the old, rotting wooden flooring, shook the attic’s otherwise silent atmosphere. The arachnids were used to the sound of small claws against papers that frequented the room the minute before midnight on Sunday.

Ever since it had been deposited by her all those years ago, it had waited. For what, it didn’t really know. It guessed just for someone to find it. It was allowed escape from the small spell she had put on it only a minutes every week. Even after that fact, it was still ultra-sensitive to the magical aura emissions twenty-four seven, three hundred sixty-five days a year. It had lost track of exactly how many years it had been in the box a decade of so back, but it didn’t bother it in the slightest.

For time meant nothing for it, other than the moments that trickled slowly by.

And so it waited.

But this moment was unlike that of the ones previously. The door to the forbidden room creaked open, little tendrils of light seeping into a room that had been forbidden such a saccharine delicacy for so long. For a second, the person hesitated upon seeing the collection of dust, wary of possible probably sounds that could be made under its gray-brown mystery. However much they disliked the thought of touching it, one foot preceded the other. It stopped a centimeter off the floor before finally making contact. Sneezing after a dust cloud infiltrated their nasal passages, they crept on making sure their tread was noiseless.

Glancing around at the derelict room, their gaze stopped on the singular box. It was almost like it was on a pedestal, the wedge of wood below it carved into a block. Even without the light from the hallway reaching it, it seemed to emit an ethereal, heaven-like glow. As the glow wandered onto their hands, they seemed to lose possession of their body and walked up silently to the box. For a fraction of second, they hesitated as they lingered over the innocent-looking container. This moment of control was dispelled as the radiance seemed to increase in intensity. Their fingers reaching the edge caused a thick cloud of dust, but it was as if a shield of air was erected. The dust gave them a wide berth as they ignored it and tugged opens the box, which was shuddering alarmingly and emitting a high keen of excitement…