Contest entry for Suz-Chan's Contest - Bigger Than You.
Don't know how to add picture but i used inspiration picture 1.
The Narrow Path
The old, worn beads were flicked quickly through long slender fingers. Manicured digits nervously caressed the small wooden balls.
Uneven candlelight stuttered as an icy gust of wind blew suddenly down the dark hall. The flames glinted off a silver crucifix, partly hidden amongst a woollen shawl, the garment wrapped and held tightly to the body, as if in someway it could offer protection against the unseen elements that haunted this subterranean hell hole.
The old woman’s hunched and fragile frame kept moving, arthritis stricken legs trudging resolutely on. Her stubborn mind ignored the cold bite of fear that gnawed on her very soul. Her timid footfall, quiet as it was, enough to create echoes in the depressive silence that hung sullenly over the gloomy depths.
The darkness was overwhelming; it seemed to suffocate her, the rapid breaths an indication of her fretful state of mind. Only the large white candles in their rusty metal brackets, casting an eerie, dancing light over the uneven surface of the damp stone walls, where any let up in the mind numbing blackness.
Still she moved forward, a diminutive, frail figure alone in an ocean of darkness, but not unaided. Or so she thought/ wished. Surely now, in her hour of need, the guardian would not desert her. She hoped there was not just one set of footsteps in the sand, unless he was carrying her. Like she supposed he had done her whole, long life. Perhaps it’s time you walked on your own two feet. Yet even as the thought flittered across her mind, a prayer escaped from her lips. OhFather . The words were whispered with holy reverence, as they had been her entire life.
She sensed the passage was coming to an end. The journey was near completion. Her little steps quickened in excitement and then slowed to a halt. The tunnel branched off into two separate paths. Instinctively she knew which one to follow. She walked on down the narrow, dimly lit, rough passage, her feet snaring on the jagged rocks which lined the way. The old women merely glanced at the other pathway. It was wide, with smooth flagstones paving the brightly illuminated walkway.
Seek and ye shall find. She had been taught that well known phrase from an early age. Even as a young child she had eagerly swallowed, where many others would have thrown up, the Book as it was crammed down her infant throat. Yet it had served her well. She had led a contented, if not mundane life, four healthy children and a happy home.
Pain suddenly thrust these thoughts from her mind and she bent slowly down to nurse her throbbing toe which had been stubbed on a particularly large rock. She grimaced as she tried to straighten her aching back, and as she did so she glimpsed a light at the end of the tunnel.
A small gate blocked the narrow path. In scripted in the stone above, the old woman could just make out a few, barely legible words. Fading blue eyes squinted behind thick spectacles. 'small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life and only a few find it.’ The weathered, creased features broke into a large, nearly toothless grin. Heart hammering in the narrow ribcage the old lady pushed open the gate, it squealed loudly in defiance. With one last heave it gave way. Gold reflected from the woman’s liquid eyes as she stepped through and was consumed by light.
Sobbing filled the large room. A dainty figure lay on the double bed, the small frame nearly drowned in thick blankets. Slender fingers tightly grasped wooden rosary beads. A hand reached over, nudging the woolen shawl away from where a silver crucifix hung loosely around the neck. Soft fingers felt for a pulse, there wasn’t one. As the fingers carefully closed the eyes for the last time, the pupils shone golden, above the large, nearly toothless grin.
