Mother held unto a lit candlestick, wet, scalding wax dripping from both her hands. Slowly at first, she descended the steps — one at a time — until the light of day was no more, and the dark of her basement came to smother the senses. Still, she ventured forth, heart thumping, breath weary, knees weak and arms heavy.
The air was damp down here, and the stench of decay, unmistakable. Skittering pests, with any number of limbs, plagued the basement altogether, scampering from floor to wall, wall to ceiling, ceiling to holes in the bricks and from thereon, to the shadows beyond. Mother did not care for the pests.
She cared only for Little Brother, and Little Brother was no more.
She stood before the blood, falling unto a knee. Earth from a pagan burial site, long forgotten; water from a running river, tainted by virgin souls; wind from the valleys of the east, carrying cries of the tormented; and fire that burned brightest, when it licked squirming flesh alive. All was as it should be, and all was here alas.
Mother sat by the circle, candle in her hands, and Father lay within, eyes lifeless as ever. Already, the maggots had begun feasting upon his charred skin and brittle bones, digging into his blackened flesh, and nestling into his running eyes. But it mattered little; Mother was ready, now more than ever.
I watched as she placed her hands together.
I watched as the tears rolled down the sides of her face.
I watched as she prayed, and prayed, and prayed.
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And I watched as her prayers were made real.
A hole in the floor, the size of a small well, opened up. Father’s body flew unto the basement ceiling, spraying Mother in bits of charcoal and patches of dried skin. Then, just as in the storybooks, a set of hands emerged from the very same hole — black, crooked, devilish — dragging his corpse into the void, swallowing it whole.
And just like that, Father was no more.
The Abyss had accepted her offering.
And so did It Who Hungers.
But Gentleman Death — wicked as he was crafty — did not. How could he? He had been denied his rightful claim and Life’s greatest treasure yet, that is, death itself.
He sent for Mother a gift she sought to the ends of the world.
He sent for her a soul, lost to the sands of time, but not forgotten.
He sent for her, Little Brother.
But not Little Brother as Mother would have remembered.
All that remained of him was but the face.
A face that Father and Mother and I once knew.
But a body no longer his, grotesque and malformed — with arms for legs and legs and for arms, and with only flesh and bone but no skin.
Mother knew what she had to do.
Father would not suffice.
She turned and faced me, crawling upon all fours up the basement stairs.
“Just one more. . .”
Little Brother smiled.