The Ever-Loving Grave

An excerpt from The Ever-Loving Grave

The smell of death brought Mina slowly back to consciousness. The veil of darkness lifted gradually, and her eyes adjusted to the flickering light of candles in a large, stone-walled chamber. Her arms were tied behind her back. She was naked.

Mina tried to move, but it seemed that every part of her was bound; arms, hands, legs, and thighs. She was solidly lashed to some dry, scratchy thing that ran the length of her body down her back.

Then she saw it.

Across the dimly lighted room, another girl, nude and unconscious, bound hand and foot to a similar dry, scratchy thing: a decayed human corpse.

Mina twisted around in a sudden panic, and saw the dead, desiccated arm of a cadaver swing in front of her. A cold dizziness overcame her; her eyes rolled back into her head, and she passed out again.