The Key

The car was speeding round the corner at 150 kilometres per hour - far over the speed limit. It was no surprise that the young mother didn’t see it coming nor that it hit her. The baby in its pram had time far one far reaching cry of shock before it was slammed backwards, the wheeled pram transformed into a lump of metal and material. The woman was thrown from the road, thankfully missing the sight of the pram and her child's death.

She was knocked unconscious from the impact and lay unmoving as the driver stepped out of his car. He was a tall man, dark of skin and hair. In startling contrast his eyes were a bright, cold blue, the colour of sapphires. He walked calmly over to the twisted wreckage of the pram and as he stood there staring, a cold, satisfied smile spread over his thin lips. He gave the pram a nudge, and turned back to his own car. A frown flickered across his face as he took in the scratches on the green paint of his new Mercedes.

To one side the woman moaned, coming to slowly. With barely a glance the man stepped past her to where her handbag had flown. He knelt and emptied the contents out, searching through them with one hand. The other lay concealed beneath his jacket. With a faint tightening of his lips, he stood and walked to the side of the woman. "Where is it?" he hissed in a ancient language. There was no reply and in pure frustration the man kicked out at the woman. Bones crunched beneath his blow and he laughed aloud. It was a strange chilling sound.

He stepped back to his car. "Never mind child, I will find it." He pulled his concealed hand free and examined the horror there calmly. It was a red-black colour and mutated into a claw. The skin bubbled and occasionally a small explosion occurred under the surface. " And then your kind will pay." He opened the door and slid in. With a rumbling purr the car slid away from the curb. It turned the corner quickly and almost seemed to disappear.

By the road the woman drew in a ragged breath, hoping for the painless oblivion of death. Her wish was granted and she slid silently down into the depths of the death-well. As her spirit left her body, it shimmered and for a moment seemed to disappear. Around her neck a thin gold chain appeared. From it hang, of all things, a ordinary door key made from brass.

It was hours before anyone discovered the scene of the accident, as the road was seldom used those days. The poor old lady who had almost stumbled over the woman's body while taking her dog for a walk, phoned for an ambulance, once she had gotten over her screaming fit. The ambulance was quick to arrive and treat the old woman, Lucie Umbridge, for shock. They could do nothing for the dead young woman except see to it that she was covered.

As for the baby, it was unlikely they would be able to separate it from the pram and so covered the whole thing. As they were loading the stretchers into the back of the ambulance Lucie set up to screaming again. Turning to see what was wrong there was nothing unusual in sight. It took a few minutes but the were finally able to calm the old lady down enough to get something coherent out of her. Even that wasn’t very understandable, just something about a man.