Prologue:
If you listen closely, sometimes you can hear the sound of their dark wings flapping through the night. Some people think that I’m crazy to talk of such things-after all, monsters only exist inside of us, right? Oh, how wrong you are. For they exist in the real world, too, and if you listen even closer, you can hear their soft murmuring. They talk of death and the despair that they have every intent of bringing upon the people. They unleash their dark powers, granting us blizzards and horrible storms. Stripping us of what little humanity we had left. For humans have only the intent to care for themselves, and the wings of darkness know this.

You think I’m crazy, right? Certainly I am only a little girl who knows nothing about the real world. I’ve only been on this earth sixteen years, what could I possibly know about the true darkness that lays its reign across the physical and mental arenas? But age simply makes no difference, and you will find I am not as crazy as you think I am, if you only listen to what I have to say. For I have a story to tell you, one that I assure you will only understand if you have some idea of the darkness for yourself. Because what I am about to tell you will change your life forever…

Part one:
The soft pitter patter of rain begins to grow as I step outside my cottage, clinging on to the hope that it will hold off as much as possible while I rush to my grandmother’s house. A crow calls in the distance, letting off a warning cry as I run through the graveyard that serves as a shortcut to my grandmother’s house. I clutch my small pouch, in it containing some valuable coins so my grandmother may pay for the surgery she needs.

I look down at my soggy clothes as the rain continues to grow. The darkness looms before me as I enter the forest, my grandmother’s house being just on the other side of it. Tall trees protect me a bit from the rain, and the moonlight disappears beneath them. I listen to my footsteps crunching leaves on the forest floor, and I pull my wet windbreaker closer to me. It is nearly wintertime, and it always gets awfully cold.

I squint my eyes, peering off into the distance at the faint lights of my grandmother’s house. She is often up late at night, reading one of her many books or knitting a scarf or a blanket that she sells in the town square. I near it, making out the faint silhouette as I exit the protection of the trees. The rain drenches me even more. 

I enter her house without knocking-she does not have good hearing anyways. I see her sitting on a couch, facing the other way, a fire lit in the hearth. She is knitting, of course, and she doesn’t notice me approaching. I clear my throat and she jumps a bit, turning her head to look at me. She looks as old and unhealthy as ever, with a pale face and red eyes. She was diagnosed with cancer a year ago, so she’s lost all her hair, and she needs the money to pay to get a tumor removed before it kills her.

My grandmother doesn’t speak much. In fact, I’m fairly sure she’s forgotten how to. All she does is stand up, clearly not bothered by the fact that she left her front door unlocked again, as I do not have a key to it. My mother and I try to tell her how important it was to keep it locked, especially in this part of town, but she never seems to understand.

She looks down at the red pouch in my hand and takes it from me, opening it and spilling out the contents on the kitchen table. She nods, lost in thought, and points to the door, clearly ordering me to leave. I do, without so much as a word to my grandmother. I shut the door behind me, making sure to lock it first. I walk back home.

Part 2:
I could never understand how my grandmother was still alive after all the damage the cancer had caused to her body. It seemed as if it would have killed her by now, but apparently the doctor had told her that if she could find the money, she could essentially get rid of the cancer. It seemed impossible, since she’s had it for so long, but I didn’t want to lose my grandmother, so I remain hopeful. She asked my mother for money a few days ago to pay for the surgery; money my mother spent days working overtime to afford. I only hoped it wasn’t too late.

Later that night, I am lying awake in my bed, staring at the ceiling. The rain continues to fall outside, and I listen to the sound of it as it hits the roof of my small cottage. I move to lay on my side, staring at my bedroom door. I keep expecting my mother to walk through it, to tell me goodnight or read me a bedtime story like she used to, but she never seems to speak to me anymore. I rarely even see her, with her heading to work early in the morning and often taking late night shifts. I was almost certain that my mother was ill as well, because lately she was acting an awful lot like my grandmother. It seemed to start when my mother began working overtime more often, attempting to pay for another surgery that my grandmother needed. The surgery hadn’t worked, though, which was why I was uncertain about the upcoming one.

But my mother had lost hope while I still had it. I prayed that my family would be okay, that my mother wouldn’t ever leave me like my father did. I remember him dearly, the night he left, face pale and eyes red. I miss him.

The next morning, I wake in a haze. I look out the window to see dark clouds swirling up above. Today would be another rainy day, I could tell. I walk outside the door into the narrow hallway that separates my mother’s room and mine. I can hear her softly snoring from inside.

Moving past her room, I head to the kitchen. I let out a gasp as my eyes fall upon my grandmother. She is sitting at the table, a blank expression on her face as she stares at nothing. When she notices my presence, she slowly turns her head to me, and I stare at her grotesque face as it stares back at me. She looks worse than I had ever seen her before, with saggy white skin and red eyes and a look of death present in them. My grandmother just stares at me.

I do not say anything. My grandmother is odd, but this surpasses everything. I cannot understand how she even got into our cottage. She does not have a key.

But here she is, looking as sick as ever. She turns her head and directs her gaze at nothing in particular again. I am truly terrified in this moment, and I begin to back away to call for my mother. But before I can, she speaks for what seems to be the first time in months.

“He’s coming for you,” a wicked smile stretches across her wrinkled lips. Sharp fangs extent from her mouth when she opens it to laugh. My eyes widen with horror and I spin around, racing to my mother’s room. “I won’t be alone anymore,” I hear her call to me, followed by more unnatural laughter.

Before I can open my mother’s door, I feel something grab my ankle. I am dragged to the ground as I let out a loud scream. I turn, greeted with not my grandmother, but by a boy that looks around my age. One of his hands is holding me to the ground while the other holds the small red pouch I had delivered to my grandmother the night before.

The boy smiles a twisted smile as he looms over me, his dark hair disheveled and his eyes red. I scream again, noticing the giant black wings that protrude from his back. They seemed to have materialized, and I watch with wide eyes as my grandmother transforms into a beast in front of me.

The next thing I know, my grandmother is no longer my grandmother. In her place stands a perfectly healthy, young woman. But her eyes are even redder than before, and long horns grow from her head, along with a pair of wings to match the boy’s.

My mother swings open the door and stares at me on the floor, the boy still on top of me. She looks nothing more than a bit surprised, as if what she was witnessing was only slightly out of the ordinary. She turns to my grandmother, whose eyes are now black, matching the dark venom that is falling from her fangs. I look at my grandmother before looking back to my mother, letting out a cry at my mother’s own pair of wings that suddenly appear behind her.

“It’s about time,” my mother says, gazing at me with narrowed eyes. The boy grips my wrists harder, and I let out another cry. “You’re one of us now.” She smiles, showing her long teeth.

“I don’t understand…” I manage to utter, shock coursing through my mind.

“Don’t you see? Your grandmother was turned by this boy,” my mother looks to him. He gazes down on me, darkness lurking in his eyes. “He’s a Converter. Together we can be a family again.”

It all comes back to me. The cancer my grandmother had-it was never really cancer. It was some freakish disease that turned her into a monster and kept her alive. The money for her surgery was to pay this… this Converter… to turn me into a monster as well.
My mother had been devastated when my father left us. He had said he no longer felt like he was a part of the family. I recall how ill he looked when he had gone, face pale and eyes red. Just like my grandmother looked last night.

“Once your father sees you turned, he’ll come back to us,” my mother tells me with a sadistic smile.

I am too in shock to do anything. I cannot even feel it when the boy plunges his fangs into my neck, or the venom coursing through my blood.

All I see now is darkness. I told you, didn’t I? Monsters exist in the living world as well, ones we can see and touch. Ones that you went your whole life unaware of the darkness within. Be careful, for now I lay my realm in the depths of the unnatural, training to be a Converter and planning to ruin more and more lives.

For the darkness that lies within all of us is a constant presence. Sometimes it just takes another monster to help it escape.
And when it does, I’ll be waiting for you.