1 Prologue

A vision of brutality unfolded before her ruby eyes, a sickening sight and the sounds of her sister's beating being continued by their intoxicated father with no intention of letting up. A crack filled the air, and what followed was a wet slide down the wall. Her sister's blank, wide eyes gazed lifelessly at her, blood now pooling around her beaten corpse. The father would laugh at Black, although she no longer cared who the man was before her now. A sudden smack from the darkness of their home with a glass jug wielded by the monster of a man would send the young girl into an unconscious state.

There stood her sister. They looked at one another in pure silence, all the while standing in a field of flowers kissed with red. As if not in speech, but thought she would know what to do now. Her sister was lonely. Taken away to another place with no friends to play with. She smiled softly and nodded, "Yes. Yes, I'll do that for you.". Darkness engulfed the two as Black whispered these words and a vision of a single drop of blood falling into that of the pond her mother and sister would frequently visit before illness took her from the two.

She awoke with a blank expression painting her bruised face, and her eyes slowly traced back and locked onto the body of her sister, which still laid motionless on the floor before her. Picking herself up, she quietly shuffled to the doorway of her father's room after collecting a knife from the kitchen. She gripped it tightly with both of her hands, all the while emotionless eyes examined her intoxicated father sleeping carelessly with his back exposed. It would seem easy prey blessed her this night, and with that, she entered the bedroom. A deep slash across the tendons of his arms. Wrist, hand, then the forearm and up rapidly. The blade drew its path for her so naturally, her grasp practically felt airless.

Her father awoke in shock as his daughter sat on top of him, carving away. He attempted to scream, but a quick reposition of her knees to his neck would force his agony to be muffled. Now unable to use most of his upper muscles to assist in any hope of moving, the legs would be next to feel the dance of the blade. Each major muscle group would have its control systems shut down. Small streams of blood would appear almost artistic as she huffed away with her self-proclaimed vendetta.

"You can't move now, can you? Good." She mumbled as she deftly slid the dagger downward with unknown guidance to her victim. Pinning the tongue down between blade and lower jaw, she spread a malevolent grin across her lips in the room's darkness. Using just enough force to slip the knife between his teeth, she severed his tongue with one swift motion, the front half of the jaw would then be wedged open at the cracking of teeth, and the organ slipped out of his mouth, followed by a sprinkling of teeth fragments. Wrapping the blanket around the man's legs, she dragged him out of their home and to the center of the village, a bit of cloth cut and forced into his mouth, slowly being painted with blood. A single thought raced through her broken mind now. There will be no pass for prey. Everyone here is prey.

Slinking off into the night as if ghosting away like a wisp into the fog, she would go from house to house in the village with no intention of mercy. All who had cast a stone or judged them would feel the dance of her blade. There were so many new friends soon for her sister to play with. This thought crossed her mind as she slashed the fifth victim inside a particular house. The victims would all be bound and slowly dragged into the center of the village. Channels of blood from the prey being pulled out of the inadequate housing they all had painted the paths. The decisive proof drink they all so much enjoyed would be pushed out of the storage of the Inn and set before them as Black glared with no intention of mercy overwhelming her silhouette. She gently removed plug after plug from the wooden casks and tipped them over, allowing the liquid to slosh and wash all over the villagers she so happily now called her prey. Soaked with alcohol intermixed with their blood trails, Black nodded with satisfaction as the air filled with groans and pleas.

Poofing back into the darkness of the night once more, Black soon reappeared, cradling her sister's corpse in her arms. She had brought her to her proper place at the center of the mass of bodies writhing in agony. The same bodies that shifted such hateful looks and repeated abuse to the two for so many years. The body was wrapped with a white cloth filled with honor and love for her dear sister. A single gold hair clip that she had always worn holding it all together. Black gently set her down and took a few steps back, bringing her attention to a nearby torch lighting up the front porch of one of the first houses she had invaded. The crowd livened up as she walked towards it, wrapped her hands around it, and removed it from its metal holster.

The moment she turned around, the full realization of what would happen hit every single villager in the mass gathering. Eyes littered with fright. A fate filled with agony and pure misery, an uncertainty that will cause the pain and suffering to continue well into the afterlife. Death by fire. To her, this was retribution. The first of gifts she would give to the darkness inside her. Her sister would have company in the next place. Nothing could change that now.

Walking at a slow, purposeful pace, she would tap each point of the cardinal directions with the kiss of her dagger in her right hand, all the while holding the torch in her left. Coming to a pause, her eyes shifted to the prey that was once her father but now a mass of meat ready for the slaughter, a broken man that would know only the worst pain, a smile would cross her lips as she said, "Sister. I am so, so sorry that the wretches tonight are the only ones I can send. But I do hope in the next place you enjoy making prey of them just like they did of us." She pointed the torch at her father, giving him a snarl, and continued, "I don't judge you, nor do I hate you. What's done is done, right?" A giggle escaped her lips. "It's all up to the gods, up above and down below now. I'm sure they'll be delighted to hear your screams as I send you to them.".

The torch fell from her grasp, and it ignited the fumes in the air before even fully touching the ground. The potent liquid they all so much enjoyed was consumed by flame, creeping along it spread from each villager as they screamed at first in fear then shriek and wail in agony as the fires at first started with searing kisses followed with scorching and charring of the flesh and clothes.

When all the souls that still drew breath inside the pyre had shrieked in pain, the girl let out her scream into the night. A genuine wail of torment and that of more to come. A banshee's cry being birthed from the darkness of the world. Farmers in neighboring villages still to this day speak of the fire and the haunting scream that cascaded across the land. Piercing the silence of its sleep. A thing of the night being born into this world.