The city has fallen silent. The nightingale stopped singing. Nothing was alive, except for the great glow coming from a precious stone lying cold dead on the floor, beside a motionless pale figure.
Delia Wood is a tall and awkward girl of eighteen. A very lonely and isolated girl from everyone else since her parents are too occupied with their jobs that they do not even have all the time in the world for their only daughter. Oddly, Delia does not mind about this matter at all because she has made acquaintance with loneliness for many years now and they have become the very best of friends.
One thing that Delia loves to do on her everyday agenda in order to fill her time and clear her head-space is strolling through a beautiful park which lies two miles away from her home. Quite a small park in acres, but very peaceful indeed. Families from around the neighbourhood of the city would often go there with their little children on Sundays for a little picnic, having tea and scones with butter and jams of all flavours. As content as her heart feels, there is always a little green of envy and pure sadness buried deep inside her as she watches other families bonding lovingly with each other. She wishes for those things to happen to her, and prays with all her might every night for the Holy God to grant her lifelong wish someday soon.
On that particular night, Delia couldn't concentrate on reading her book and decides to take a leisurely stroll in the park and have some fresh air to ease her troubled mind. She grabs her night robe and wraps it around her slim body, and she is out the door. When she arrives at the go-to destination, she discovers several animals up on the trees and on the grass. She studies their movements intently like a hawk eyeing its prey. A squirrel is running for its dear life while holding an acorn firmly under its tiny arm. For a moment, it seems like as if some other animals are chasing after it to steal the acorn away from the poor creature. A snail is gliding on the wet grass very painfully slowly to the point where it hurts Delia's eyes to follow the poor creature's ridiculously slow pace, and thus decides to leave the snail behind and continue on to study the other animals in the park. A rush of chilling air blows by Delia suddenly and she instinctively wraps her arms around herself, a gesture to protect and shield herself from some invisible entity. All at once, she instantly hears a distant singing somewhere deep in the heart of the park. The singing is carried off by the cool wind and chimes beautifully in her ears like a soft ringing bell:
'A stone of weight in gold,
Bright as stars of the old,
A pretty sight to see,
Beware of what it can be.'
Delia is now eager to discover for whose voice could sound so angelic and runs hurriedly to investigate it by following the source of the singing through the night. At last, she comes upon an old oak tree and sees that the singing belongs to a nightingale that is perching gracefully on the oak branch. The nightingale continues to sing its song dreamily and if her eyes have not yet to deceive her, she had thought for a moment that the bird is actually singing to something. For under the feet of the pretty bird, a great glow is producing itself in the dark of the night. Now, this precious light rises luminously and is calling Delia closer and closer, pulling her so murderously near to its enchantment. The next thing she knows, her shaky hand is gripping the great light. It is like nothing that her eyes had ever laid upon before. After the luminous light has dimmed its glow a little, she soon realizes that it is coming from a stone on which she is now holding. And this is like a stone that she has never seen before. Small in size, but even diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires and topaz could not compare their beauties with the fairest of the entire white gem that Delia is now holding. The stone is cold in her hand and she holds it high under the bright moon to appreciate and gaze at its full magnificence. It is like a globe with thousand facets. So beautiful. She imagines on how it would shine like silver upon Moon, like gold under the Sun and like rain under the twinkling stars. In that moment, she immediately realizes that she could never bring herself to part from the stone and swears an oath to keep it to herself for all eternity.
When Delia reaches home that night, she changes into a sheer lacy nightgown and climbs onto bed. The white gem is kept safely in her hope chest on her bedside table which is locked securely with the key around her neck as a locket to her necklace. But what she doesn't know is that the nightingale has been silently following her home ever since, observing her from her bedroom window that night and again, singing its angelic song as a lullaby to her:
'A stone of weight in gold,
Bright as stars of the old,
The girl has caught in its spell,
O' Lord! Soon down will she fell.'
She succumbs herself to slumber and sleeps peacefully that night for nothing fills her heart but joy. At last, Delia Wood feels bliss and all her troubles are worlds away from her mind. Or so it seems.
The next morning, Delia wakes up with a queer feeling in her chest as she remembers that she had a wonderful dream last night.
"Strange. I thought I dreamed about finding a magical stone."
She is thoroughly convinced and thinking that it was nothing more than a silly harmless dream. But at that precise moment, she spots a nightingale eyeing her from her bedroom's windowpane.
"Wait a minute, I remember you. Yes! You're the pretty bird!" she squeals. "I've seen you last night. You were - hold on,"
she halts as she soon registers what the reality means.
"If I saw the bird last night, then that means..."
she whispers in horrification to herself and slowly turns her head towards the hope chest on her bedside table. She takes a careful moment to stare at it while her heart is beating faster and louder, right up to her throat. But she can no longer prolong the anticipation and quickly opens the chest to see the content. And there it is, glowing brightly as ever of pure starlight.
"By my life.."she chokes on her words,
unable to stifle her hyperventilating breath. Outside her bedroom window, the nightingale is watching her in full fright:
'A stone of weight in gold,
Bright as stars of the old,
She now lives on the edge of a knife,
For the stone will soon eat her up alive.'
Time goes by and ever since the stone was in the firm possession of Delia, she barely eats and refuses to leave her bedroom. She talks to no one but only to the stone about everything and in return, the stone will ultimately responds back to her by glowing every now and then. Sometimes the stone will even produce its glow in the colour of Delia's emotions and feelings. Other times, it would even entertain her by telling the tales of the galaxy on its globe-like facets. Her bedroom would then be filled with thousands of bright colours on the walls and with many constellations of stars upon her dark ceiling. Delia would even play a little game of guessing the shapes and zodiac signs based from the stars' constellations. For the first time ever, she feels life in her.
Several more weeks and months had passed since Delia uncovered the stone. All is well until one frightful day; bad instincts are starting to bloom from her heart. It's as if someone has ripped her soul out of her chest and trampled it to extinction. Her thoughts straight away flashes to the stone. Oh, no! She immediately races on her heels to her bedroom, snatched the hope chest and opens it vigorously.
Her lungs stopped breathing.
The stone is missing.
What? Why? How?
Who steals it, she knew not for the existence of the stone has never escaped her lips to any living soul. This is indeed a dark mystery to her.
But what she has done next could never be imagined in any humanly way possible.
She begins to cry, howl and bites herself in agony. But the writhing pain that she inflicts on herself is absolutely nothing compared to the pain of losing her precious stone.
With every cut that she thrusts on her flesh, the more pleasure her body accepts it. She enjoys every moment of tearing her beautiful body to pieces, skin and bones.
Actually, she feels satisfied as she does this.
The bird is watching her sadly from the windowpane.
The stone does that to people.
She cries yet laughs at the same time. But why did the stone betray her?
She cares for the white gem. She loves the white gem like any mother would love her child, even though many children acted sinfully towards their mother when they grow up. But why did the stone leave her? Has it gone to look for another master? A new prey to sink its teeth into?
As all these thoughts are running through her head, she feels a sudden pang of hatred.
It is no longer a mystery that the stone has been eating her mortality all along, yet it is also the only thing that has been keeping her alive. The floor is now drowning with blood, oozing and gushing from her fresh cuts. Darkness begins to close around her, blinding her from sight. And for that last moment, she sees a white light approaching her. She knows that the white light is of Heaven and is ready to carry her to the palace of angels and saints. This is it. The white light draws closer and nearer, but there is no more voice left in her to cry piercingly at the great glow when she finally perceives what it actually is.
The precious gemstone is smiling wickedly, exposing its teeth of a thousand bright razor-sharp stars. Distant singing could be heard for the last time in Delia Wood's ears before the shadow swallows her:
'A stone of weight in gold,
Bright as stars of the old,
Another prey is dead,
And soon more shall pay in red.'
