Darkness fills the air, in the way that fear can fill a human heart.
The dark silhouetted outline of a tree is waving like a candle flame.
It's long outer branches tap at the window like the hand of a man
So long dead his skin has returned to the earth from whence it came.

Far away I hear the sound of a gate being wrenched open against
The determination of an old and rusty chain that has met its equal.
A powerful urge to run comes upon me as my heart begins to race.
I know he will find me. No earthly thing can stop such ancient evil.

But I do not run - tied to the spot like a rabbit caught in headlights.
Afraid I might run to him, rather than improve my chances of escape.
A rush of air comes through the room, and raises the hairs on my neck.
He has found the door. In the house. I hear every crash and scrape.

I cry out in fear. Nowhere to hide now. The reaper hones his blade.
My sweating palms drop beads of liquid not yet blood upon the floor.
I can smell the static in the air as some unearthly creature nears me.
I scream as I see it force the hinges from off the one remaining door.

In the time before my widened eyes could blink, it leapt upon me.
Felt the pain of crushing bones and flesh pulled far beyond its place.
I saw no form inside the cloak but I felt my life-force drain away.
And just before my final thought, the creature revealed its ugly face.

Its fangs gleamed, and blood had stained its gnarled and hairy skin.
Nothing I had ever seen had prepared me for its intensely evil stare.
It howled with joy, and with practised ease, split my body into two.
Death came swiftly. My emptied body now lay motionless and bare.

It had come in from the dark, and to darkness it returned.
A darkness which I had only just begun to know.