Mildred pulled out the antique skeleton key that was hooked onto the gold chain around her neck. The emerald gemstone at the center of the key was glowing a brilliant green.

“This is the place,” Mildred whispered to her younger sister, Daphne, who had just stepped up beside her. The two had been hiking in the woods for most of the afternoon in search of the place known as “Anton’s Cabin,” which to the naked eye was merely a dilapidated barn next to a stone foundation of a once beautiful log cabin.

“So now what?” Daphne asked as she brushed burrs and dead leaves from her pants.

“So now we wait,” Mildred replied as she sat down on a cold cornerstone of the foundation. This place was special to the young women not just because they used to come here as children and let their imaginations run wild, but because it had once belonged to their great-great uncle, Anton Comar, who had immigrated to Brightonville from the Alsace region with his three daughters during the Franco-Prussian war. Anton had been an esteemed apothecary renowned for his homeopathic remedies. But the war, and the tragic death of his wife, had changed all of that.

Although he continued to run his apothecary shop from his cabin in his new country, the citizens of Brightonville respected his privacy. Yet, rumors of his “magical cures” spread far and wide, and Anton became bombarded by not only people seeking cures but by collectors of curiosities and oddities. He even received threats by radical evangelicals who claimed he was doing “the Devil’s work.”

One day, without any notice, Anton and his daughters disappeared, leaving everything behind. The barn and cabin immediately turned to ruins, and were taken over by vines, wildflowers, thicket and tree roots.

Daphne, always a skeptic, allowed Mildred to convince her that their heirloom key, complete with emerald gemstone, was part of a larger set and somehow connected to Anton and his curative ways. Although they had never met their long-lost ancestor or his daughters, they found themselves on this trail in search of the rumored treasure he may have left behind.

Once the two women, many of whom considered spinsters at the ripe old ages of 28 and 25, finished their snacks, they began to rummage through the barn only finding rusted tools, buried glass bottles, and other odds and ends. The same went when they searched the old stone foundation. Daphne pocketed three old buttons while Mildred pushed away beer cans and litter, remnants of rebellious teenagers’ partying ways.

As night fell, the defeated sisters set up camp. And after a meal of baked beans, soda, and a stack of Smores, they banked their campfire and crawled into their respective tents.

Just before dawn, Mildred awoke to the sight of a red glow outside her tent. When she crawled out, she saw a brass skeleton key with a ruby glowing from its center. She rubbed her eyes in disbelief. The key appeared to be suspended in midair.

“Daphne! Wake up! You won’t believe this!”

Daphne crawled out of her tent, moaning and groaning about having a terrible night’s sleep on the hard ground. She kicked away a twig and grimaced when she noticed her glamorous sister hadn’t a hair out of place while hers looked like a rat’s nest piled on top of her head.

“What are you clamoring on about?” Daphne whined as she wiped the sleep from her eyes.

“Look! I told you our key was part of a set, didn’t I?” Mildred touched the key around her neck, noticing it was warm to the touch. Suddenly the emerald glowed as brightly as it did yesterday.

Before Daphne could respond, the pair caught a glimpse of an old man with a walking stick in hand. He was wearing dark blue denim overalls and a woolen cap was pushed down low on his brow, pressing his big ears away from his head. He waved and smiled a half-toothless grin before disappearing down a newly revealed trail filled with vibrant wildflowers. The barren trees now were laden with lush leaves that enveloped the old man as he walked away.

“He left the key!” Daphne exclaimed as she watched the ruby-glowing key fall to the ground. The sun was now peeking above the horizon and the woods were serene once again.

“Seek and ye shall find,” Mildred said then chuckled as she walked over to the brass key, picked it up, and handed it to her equally bemused and befuddled sister.

This is the last of the short, short stories series from my May photo contest. It’s also a prequel to my new novel, Guardians of the Keys, which releases in summer 2022. Thanks for reading and playing along with me!