Return to Sender
Prologue:
Everything all
started when a small, unmarked package arrived mysteriously during the night.
In the
morning, I found it sitting on my kitchen table when I went to make coffee. The
wrapping paper was brown and plain, unadorned with any address or postage. The
only writing on it was a short missive: ‘Return to Sender’. The message was
written out in a pretty cursive across the top in red ink.
Needless to
say, I was surprised and confused by this strange package’s sudden appearance. What
was I supposed to do with this? Even more importantly, how had it appeared
inside my apartment without me knowing? A quick internet search while the
coffee was brewing didn’t yield me any answers. The post office didn’t sound
like they’d touch it without some sort of proof of postage.
It seemed so
personal, too. Not necessarily in a good way, either. My eyes couldn’t help
darting to the front door, and I resigned myself to a thorough check around my
home to make sure no windows were broken anywhere. There was nothing out of
place, though. Nothing but that package.
Eventually, I
decided to pour myself a drink and then sit down at my table and just open it, get
rid of the suspense. I grabbed a knife, but it almost wasn’t necessary. The
paper parted easily, and within was a small and light box barely longer than
the width of my hand. It was a pretty red-brown that I assumed meant it was
made from some kind of cherry wood. On the top was carved some designs that
looked almost like an intricate Celtic knot, and when I lifted the box up to peer
closer, I saw a tiny keyhole on one side.
An
investigation of the discarded wrapping yielded nothing else, though. No key,
and no note. Disappointed, I gingerly shook the box, turning it over to see if
there was anything taped on the bottom. While I definitely heard something
moving around inside, I still couldn’t see any way to easily open it. I pressed
my fingers against the sides, wondering if it was one of those puzzle boxes,
but no clever latches formed along the edges. The design on the top remained
the same. After a few minutes, I carefully set it back down, feeling let down
that I couldn’t seem to open it, and a hundred times more curious than before.
On my way to get a second cup of coffee, I resolved to somehow solve the little
box’s mysteries.
Though I couldn’t
have known it at the time, the box would reveal its secrets to me all on its
own, and I would regret learning them forever. The arrival of that box was the
beginning of everything, the start of a war that would tear apart a world I
didn’t even know existed back then, a war that would later become known as ‘The
Seven Years of Blood’.
