Finding the truth
1706 Words
I closed my eyes and drifted, the next few days went by like a breeze. I docked my ship on the dock where my journey began, I walked hand in hand with Osilus to Charlene's house. I looked at Osilus and he nodded, knowing I was scared. I knocked gently and heard a hauntingly familiar voice come from within the house.
"I'm coming!" I heard Charlene's chipper voice say.
She opened the door.
"Hi mama Charlene." I said, watching her awestruck face.
"Silver Rose is that really you?!" She exclaimed, pulling me into a tight hug.
"Yes its me mama, I need oxygen though!" I said, pretending to gasp for air.
"Oh sorry, Silver who is this strapping young man?" She asked, eyeing Osilus as we walked into the house I grew up in.
"This is my fiancée, Osilus, the one I wrote to you about." I said, hanging onto Osilus' elbow.
"Fiancée huh?" Charlene said, pacing around Osilus.
"Yes ma'am." Osilus finally said.
"Ma'am? Oh no you can call me mama Charlene dear." She said, walking to the kitchen to get snacks.
"Really mama, you approve?" I said happily.
"Of course dear, he seems like a careful and caring young man." She said, seeing Osilus blush.
"I'm going to show Osilus, we will be back in a few minutes." I said, guiding Osilus outside.
"Alright dear." Charlene said, waving at us.
"What exactly are you showing me?" He asked.
"My home." I said, stopping.
"But your home is back, oh." Osilus said, stopping with me.
I walked into what was left of my real home, stepping over burnt furniture and pictures. I stopped at the burnt stair case and went up to what remained of the second floor, I went back down and picked up a locket that was hardly touched by the flames. I held it close to my heart and opened it, seeing a letter drop out. Osilus picked up the letter and handed it to me, I cautiously opened it.
"Pearl is your birthstone and purple is your color, you will find what you need in the ruble. Sincerely, mother." I said, crying at my mother's hand writing.
"A riddle?" Osilus said.
"They hid a fortune away for me in the house, and I remember them saying that I would get it if something should ever happen to them." I said.
"They knew this would happen?" He asked.
"Apparently, and I know what the riddle means." I said, going to what remained of the living area.
"What are we looking for, a safe?" Osilus asked, helping me dig.
"In a way, yes. Ah ha!" I exclaimed when my hand touched a metal handle.
Osilus helped me open the door and brought a candle he found into the tunnel, I lit the candle and saw a slightly burnt letter ahead. We walked towards it, I opened the letter to find my father's handwriting.
"Dearest daughter, you have found my secret. I am long gone by the time you read this letter, but as you know we left you something. Here is my riddle: go to where the light ends and darkness begins, follow the sound you can sea and come to the house of need." I quoted.
"What does that mean?" Osilus asked.
"Snuff out the candle." I said, watching the light vanish.
"What now, its too dark." He said, gripping my hand.
"We follow the sound of the sea like my father said." I said, listening to the crash of waves and following it.
We came back up into my living room and I looked at the note again. I got out my compass and headed north to the burnt stairs. We cautiously walked up them and avoided the ones that creaked to much. I walked across a beam with Osilus and looked at the ground. I gasped and I found one big "X" in the remains of the kitchen, the x was etched into the wood and it was like a huge beacon. We walked back down and removed the floor boards in the kitchen and found my mother's serenity chest, thankfully untouched, and a note with a picture of my amulet.
"Dear daughter, you are nearly there. I have hidden your treasure not in our house but in another. A friend who raised another's daughter is the one who holds the key, find her heart and find your cache. " I quoted my mother and I held my head.
"I think I know this one." Osilus said, grabbing my hand.
"Where are we going?" I said.
"The one who raised you." He said, mentioning Charlene.
We came into the house and looked around, Charlene came in and looked worried.
"What are you kids looking for?" She questioned.
"I am not sure but they, my parents, left me clues to the money they left behind." I said showing her the clues.
"Did you check your room Silver?" She said, winking. She knew all this time.
"No but I will." I said, taking Osilus with me.
We looked around my room for hours, looking for the only thing my parents left behind for me except clues. I peered in my closet and Osilus checked around, we sat on the bed, having looked everywhere, and sighed. Charlene came in and sat next to me.
"Maybe they forgot to leave it here and it burnt with them." I said.
"No they left it here before you were born, look." She said, pointing to designs on my floorboards you would think I would have noticed over the years.
"Hey, this is just like the back of my pendant!" I said, taking off my necklace and putting the back to the etching. I heard a loud mechanism and the back of my closet folded down into a staircase.
"You always did have a thing for figuring things out." Charlene said, patting my shoulder and walking out.
"She's right, I do, come on." I said, grabbing Osilus and dragging him down to the basement.
"The basement, I don't understand." Osilus said, scratching his stubble.
We saw a note attached to the wall and it was my father's handwriting. I opened the yellowing letter and read it.
"Daughter, you found it and you did it. Take this key and search for the key hole, it is behind the thing you thought was a dragon and it lies in between two uneven stones." I quoted and searched.
"The radiator." I said, slipping behind it.
"Do you see anything?" Osilus asked.
"I'm looking for two uneven stones." I said, looking around.
"Alright, tell me when you found it." Osilus said.
I went over the stones three times and sighed, maybe it wasn't here. I looked at the ground and say a small key shaped hole, I crouched and the stones were uneven.
"I think I found it!" I shouted, inserting the key and turning it.
I heard a loud click and heard a crash, I came out from behind the radiator. I saw a huge gaping hole in the ground that led further down, I gripped Osilus' hand and we went down together. I saw a small door ahead and opened it, I crawled through and helped Osilus through. We looked around the room and saw a small table with another note. I grabbed it and read it.
"We knew you would find it, with or without help, go three paces north and recite your name and your treasure will be thine." I said, walking three paces north and stopping.
"Go ahead, honey." Osilus said.
"Silver Rose." I said, seeing the wall open to reveal over a hundred pounds in gold and silver and jewels. I clutched my heart and felt the pieces, they were worth more than the queen herself.
"Sweet heaven." Osilus said.
"I never knew." I said.
"Your parents never told you, because you were too young to know." I heard Charlene say. I turned to face her and she handed me a sealed envelope.
"Dearest daughter, by the time you read this we will be either dead or out of the country. We leave our fortune, given to us by the Queen, to you and Charlene. Do with it what you will and be sure to share it with a potential husband, we are so proud. Love you dearly, mother and father." I said, crying.
"They left this for you too." Charlene said, handing me a silver key with a heart shaped handle.
"What is this too?" I asked.
"Read the inscription on the key." She said, handing me a magnifying glass.
"Where we lie, side by side, in the roses you might find a final clue to these clues." I read.
"The graveyard?" Osilus asked, seeing me nod.
We ran to the graveyard and stopped at my parents' graves. I kneeled in silence and twirled the key. I saw some fresh roses and thought Charlene put them there. I saw a small hole on the grave stone that bore my parents' names, I took the key and put it in. The key fit so I turned it, a small wood box popped out from a secret compartment in the tombstone. I picked up the box and opened it, I found my parents' wedding rings in it and a small note.
"This is the last time we will see each other and by the time you find this box, we will be dead. Daughter use our rings at your own wedding, like we know you would find a man who is worthy of you, and cherish one another for many years. We may be gone but we know you shall never forget us, we shall love you forever. Love, mother and father." I read, gripping the rings tightly.
"At least they wanted you to have one last gift from them as a remembrance of them." Osilus said, wiping my tears.
"True, I wish they or Charlene would have told me about this." I said.
"Maybe they didn't tell you to keep it a secret from the people that killed your parents." He said.
"I get it, so I wouldn't be threatened or killed." I said.
"And I bet, wherever they are, they are proud of you." Osilus said, lifting me to my feet.
"Your right, thanks hon." I said, hugging him tightly.
We walked back to Charlene's hand in hand and smiling, I hugged my step mother, as did Osilus, and we bid her goodbye. We went to a hotel temporarily and slept the days away. I dreamt of my parents meeting Osilus and smiling when my father gave Osilus the death glare, Osilus held me all those nights and hummed me to sleep.
- Writer
