The Gift

The Gift

by Alexandra Dean

It wasn’t much of a gift. Lara vaguely remembered having a fascination with it when she’d stayed at Grandma’s as a young child. Grandma had always treated it as something exceptionally precious; she kept it out of sight from the rest of the family and only took it out it when she and Lara read bedtime stories together.

Lara had incorporated the strange stone into her own stories and games; it was the final clue in an impossible puzzle; a prize to be won; a key to unlock a secret door. All to defeat the mysterious Shadow Man who was the eternal villain in every plot she and Grandma concocted together. Grandma was a master at describing him. Lara often wondered if she’d known someone who had looked similar to the vivid portrait she painted; a tall, dark but handsome figure with piercing blue eyes who carried a cloud of darkness with him. Grandma explained that he wanted to destroy all that was good in the world and only the mysterious stone could stop him. Lara planned how he would be defeated in a range of plots involving fairies, princesses and noble heroes, but Grandma’s villain was always the same: the Shadow Man.

But those times were long gone. Even before Grandma died, Lara lost interest in stories, preferring to spend her time on her phone. In its bright, illuminated surface, she scryed for the secrets of high-school gossip, deep conspiracy theories and cat pictures. Grandma had seen it as a betrayal and their relationship had suffered but to Lara her Grandma just did not understand that she was too grown up for their fairy tales. If her imagination had meanwhile grown dark and cold, she hadn’t noticed or missed it. What use was imagination anyway when the real, exciting world was right in front of her on the phone’s screen?

The stone nestled unremarkably in the palm of her hand. A blue, square-ish shape with a hole in the centre. She was surprised to see it again; that Grandma had thought it important enough to include it in her will. Lara sighed, feeling sad. It was both a reminder and a reproach.

Lara slipped it into the charity bag, vaguely hoping it wouldn’t turn up on the Antiques Roadshow in a few years as one of those amazing £1million finds.

She turned back to her phone.

A week later, the stone was discovered by a new owner. He was pleased with his discovery and quickly paid for it, slipping it into his pocket.

As he walked away, the tall figure dressed in black held up the stone to a piercing blue eye and smiled a dreadful, malevolent smile before disappearing into his own darkness.