Something cold squeezed my shoulder.

When I whipped my head behind me, no one was there. I shivered.

I knew I shouldn’t be here, but I heard a voice. My mothers voice, screaming for someone to save her. I knew she was dead. I knew she was within hell, body curling within the sharp tongues of hellfire.

But I had to be sure.

I pressed on, graven and earth crunching beneath my feet.

The air was thick and smelt of dead men. I swore I could hear the soil chitter, wherein corpses still mumbled and writhed beneath their coffins.

The trees billowed with the bleak breeze, whining and bowing with its vigour. The dull green leaves shimmied and cascaded down to the earth, a puppet to nature.

Ornate tombstones yawned with the beckon of the wind, candlelight flickering violently with the whip of the wind. I wondered how long these candles would last, for their whick was weak, and the wax melted unto stone. Would my mother last that long in hell?

I prowled further into the cemetery with quick steps, clutching my coat close to my chest. My heart pounded against my throat, clawing its rhythm harshly up to my head. I felt dizzy.

If my mothers wasn’t within reach, I was certainly going mad, crossing uncharted territory. My father would be correct in all his presumptions; his daughter was insane like her mother. That’s why she died, twitching with the prospect of the impossible, harking voices from the depths of hell itself.

I broken chuckle escaped me. I was a fool to come here. To reach out to a ghost. If I could save mother, my father would see that I am no mad woman. He would see what I see and hear is truth.

“Quin,” A slimy voice whispered, the sound a distant echo. “Mommy’s here.”

I froze.

It sounded exactly like her. My mother. It was uncanny, how ethereal and bewitching it sounded. Just like hers.

Some part of me wished to return home where it was safe. Another wanted to explore further. To prove my father wrong.

When I took a singular step the earth beneath my feet tore asunder with a bellow. I gasped and stumbled upon my backside, dull agony shooting up my spine.

I groaned, and before I knew it, I was swallowed by the earth.