She walked by,
banging the walking stick clutched in her skeletal hand against the iron fence
signaling to the gargoyles that it was time to go to sleep.
They slunk off sheepishly,
Not wanting to anger her with disobedience.
They knew their motherly grounds keeper didn’t like them out after midnight

She hopped on fractured cobblestones,
over a river of equally fractured,
crying souls.
She took her time, not wanting to fall in a second time.
the last time she fell, it had taken weeks
to wash the despair from her clothes

As she walked down the path, idly knocking away pebbles with her cane,
she heard a creaky, jangling voice call out,
“Hello there!”
When she turned her head she saw what she knew she’d see,
a large gold filled chest on it’s own little pedestal,
it’s lid excitedly flapping like it did every night.

“Would you like some treasure?”
It asked in a sing song voice.
She rolled her eyes.
“I tried to take some last time you asked me,
and you bit all the skin off my hand.”
She said to the chest, starting down the path again.

“No I didn’t!” The chest whined.
She held up her flesh picked hand as her evidence.
“I won’t do it again.” It said meekly.
She kept walking. It was best not to humor the tricksters.
As everyone did, they would learn their lesson,
all it took was time.