Bastet
Little Changeling
•† SECRETS ARE HIDDEN WITHIN †•
••------------••
She was a little old lady that sat in the same outside table at the same diner alone every night. She always had the same turkey and avacado sandwich, a small plastic water cup, and finished it off with lemon meringue pie. She was a simple woman with a simple smile. She would always give you a smile as you passed by until her image stuck in your mind and you just had to say "hello" just once to sate your raging curiosity. You never regretted it. The woman's thoughtful hazel gaze held your own with a gravity that understood all you told and she was not like other elderly who were constantly lost in "the good old days". She had come to be a mentor, an ear to all the travesties of the world. Her wise eyes always seemed to hold an answer even when the topic was on joy and difficulties were left underneath the pleasantries. She was a good woman. You had learned her name was Margaret Pierce. She had never married and was an only child who enjoyed the time she had at the diner every night because she loved the quiet and mildly cold breeze on her arthritis-ridden bones. She said it was her peace from her life and she had been doing it for years even before your visits.
So long had gone by that it had become routine to see her in that same chair. So much so that her absence let you know what had happened long before her lawyers contacted you.
The old woman had died peacefully in her sleep apparently. It was a rare but gracious death and you alone would mourn her companionship. They told you all of this before they invited you to sit down with them and discuss her will: your inheritance.
You came in on a bright Monday morning. The lawyers were pleasant enough albeit stiff and formal. It was a boring list after the initial shock wore off, but the gist of it was as simple as she was. You had inherited it all. A fortune was cut out in your name, a manor large enough to house a platoon comfortably, so many expensive items you were unsure if you would ever have enough of a lifespan to use them all, but most importantly you received a letter.
The letter was sealed with wax, just like the old days. It was perfumed as well, which was an odd flair even for a woman as habitual as her, and the script was well written and precise. Your instructions were clear.
Standing inside your new home, you looked down at it and breezed past the reasons and gratitude to the meat of what you had to do.
First, there was a book in the study that was bound in black leather with red inscriptions that you had to retrieve. You were told to keep it with you when you went into the basement for a package kept within the wine cellar. You were warned to keep your eyes open and not to fall for any trickery, which was apparently inevitable, when you followed the next steps.
The final steps were instructions on how to get into a secret room beneath the cellar that had a "great weapon through life" within. It was now yours and once there, the book and the prize was yours.