GRANDMOTHER'S SECRET
386 Words
The fire burned low, casting long, wavering shadows across the walls. Blessing sat close to her grandmother, still shaken from what she had seen. The old woman’s hands trembled as she fed another stick into the flames.
“You are old enough to know now,” she began, her voice low and heavy. “The spirit you saw—it is older than this village, older than me, older than you. It is the Ancient One.”
Blessing swallowed hard. “What does it want?”
Her grandmother’s eyes clouded with memory. “Long ago, our ancestors made a covenant. There was famine, sickness, war. They called upon the spirit of the land for protection. It answered… but at a cost. Blood was spilled to bind it here, hidden beneath the bush. As long as the offering was made, the people were safe.”
Blessing shivered. “Offerings?”
Her grandmother nodded grimly. “Each generation, one life was given. A chosen one from the bloodline. That is why our family left this place, long ago. I thought if we stayed away, the spirit would sleep. But blood remembers. Soil remembers. It has waited, and now it has called again.”
Blessing’s voice cracked. “And it wants me?”
Her grandmother took her hands, squeezing them tightly. “It wants freedom. But freedom requires a sacrifice. I had hoped my time would end before it came again. Yet it has followed us.”
Tears blurred Blessing’s eyes. “There must be another way.”
Her grandmother’s face softened, but sorrow lingered in her gaze. “There are rituals—dangerous ones. To banish it. But if they fail, it grows stronger. If they succeed, the land may never forgive us.”
The fire snapped, sending sparks upward. Blessing glanced toward the window, half-expecting to see the shadow watching.
Her grandmother whispered, almost to herself: “Once you hear its voice, you are bound to it. You cannot turn away. You must choose.”
Blessing felt the weight of the words press down on her chest. Her life had changed forever—not because of what she had seen, but because of the blood in her veins.
The whispers rose again outside, circling the house like the wind. And Blessing knew: the Ancient One was waiting.
- Writer
