"In The Dark" Contest

Pen Name: herinfiniteeyes
Title: The Land of Lost Children
Summary: Something mysterious is happening to the children in town. What does the dark man in the window have to do with it? ExB
Word Count: 2,492

For Rules and Other Submissions, please visit: http://www(DOT)fanfiction(D0T)net/u/2003775/

BPOV

I walked down the deserted street, my feet slapping on the wet pavement as the dark clouds shifted overhead. I cast a look to either side of me as I passed houses with lights shining brightly in each window.

I was on the outside, looking in.

My lonely footsteps carried me down the cobblestone street as I absorbed the gloomy darkness around me. It felt foreboding, and when a crack of thunder and lightning dashed across the sky, I felt its electricity raise the fine hair on the back of my neck.

Something was in the wind tonight.

When I reached 48 Circle Drive, I knocked on the wooden door and waited under the overhang, watching rain droplets drip steadily from the roof onto the ground, forming little puddles in which the darkness around me was reflected.

A Spanish woman with a heavily lined face and rough, callused hands answered the door. She wore a faded floral print shirt dress beneath a crisp white apron. Her coarse black hair was pulled back into a tight bun at the base of her neck, and wings of white hair decorated her temples, revealing her age. She nodded to me and stepped aside so that I could enter the small house.

I entered directly into the warm kitchen, my eyes landing on the staircase to the second floor. To my left was the dining area, littered with the mess from this evening's early dinner. In the kitchen, a pot-bellied stove warmed the area with an orange glow. The Spanish maid walked over to the stove and lifted a whistling tea kettle from the heat so she could pour the hot water into a cup.

The smell of Earl Grey filled the small space as a blond woman came down the stairs in a black evening gown, laughing as she looked over her shoulder at her husband. I stood and waited for them to acknowledge me.

"Oh, good, you're here!" The beautiful woman said as she laid a hand on her husband's arm. "Here, honey, let me fix your tie." She straightened his bow tie and patted his shirtfront affectionately. "Bella's here to watch the girls so we can go out tonight."

The husband was as dark as his wife was light; he had dark curly brown hair with thick eyebrows that settled heavily over his brown eyes. His face was pinched in worry. "Rose, what if the rumors are true? What if..."

His wife waved her hand and made a dismissive noise. "Oh, those rumors are ridiculous. I mean, yes, something strange is going on, but these people with their superstitious behavior are only spreading these rumors to scare people. The girls will be fine."

I knew the rumors of which they spoke, and I wasn't quite so sure that they were rumors. I'd never witnessed anything like it firsthand, but I knew that it couldn't just be something easily explained.

The man turned to me. "Well, just to be on the safe side, please don't leave the girls alone, even for a minute, okay? I don't want to find out that we were wrong about this," he told me uncomfortably.

His wife cut off a short snort when he shot her a serious look. "I don't have to go to this thing, Rose. Don't make me worry needlessly when just a simple precaution will reassure me."

Rose sighed and gripped her evening purse. "Very well, honey. I just hate to see you getting nervous over something that would never happen to us. Our girls are completely safe and sound, and Bella here has the best credentials of any of the babysitters in town."

The man nodded and kissed his wife's forehead before turning back to me. "So you won't leave them alone?" he asked.

I nodded in confirmation. "I promise, your girls are safe with me."

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the Spanish maid turn to look at me. Something in her dark eyes made me wonder if I would regret my words.

The girls I was watching were identical five-year-old twins. Both had long blond hair like their mother with dark brown eyes like their father. Brynn and Brier were beautiful and pale, but their normal rambunctiousness was subdued because they were both currently suffering from a cold.

"But I wanted to play with Polly!" Brier whined as Brynn picked up the doll in question.

"So? I got her first!" Brynn whined back.

We were in their parent's bedroom because their father wanted them to be comfortable while they rested. The walls were lined with light oak paneling, and the bed was a curious four-poster affair surrounded not by the traditional style of heavy curtains, but more oak panels that closed like doors. When I asked the girls about it, they said their mother had a hard time sleeping with any source of light in the bedroom, so she had the bed designed for complete darkness.

It looked pretty creepy to me, but I didn't say anything.

I was sitting in a tall, pale blue wingback chair in the far corner of the room. It was situated next to a large bookshelf, and I took a book down to read while I hung out with the girls. I'd closed the tall window when I came in, because the storm outside looked to be gathering force and I didn't want rain to damage the hardwood floors.

Things would get pretty boring if I wasn't able to leave the room for even a moment, so I hoped the book would keep me entertained.

Brier kept insisting that she'd claimed the Polly doll first, but Brynn argued fiercely that she'd had the doll before her and Brier only wanted the doll because she had it.

I peeked over the top of my book to monitor the argument, but I wasn't planning on stepping in unless things got out of hand. It was my personal belief that kids should fight these things out for themselves, or else they'd never learn how to negotiate on their own.

"Give it to me! I wanted her first!" Brier shrieked.

"No! She's mine!" Brynn yelled as Brier reached out to tug on the doll's leg. A tug-of-war ensued and each girl was pulling her hardest.

"Be careful, or you'll break her and then neither of you will be able to play with Polly," I warned from across the room.

They both ignored me as they continued to pull, and finally the leg and arm each girl was holding tore off her body. Brynn wailed in protest and Brier fell back against the bed. She began to cough spastically.

Brynn was sobbing over the torn doll and hurling angry accusations at her sister as I laid my book down to intervene. Brier's cough was rattling in her chest, so I knew she would need some attention until it abated.

As I walked over to the bed, her coughing intensified. Her cheeks turned red and Brynn dropped the doll's torso, completely forgetting about the previous tragedy in the face of her worry for her twin. "Bry! Are you okay?" The small girl crawled over to her sister and tried to comfort her by patting on her arm.

I walked to the pitcher of water by the bedside, but found it empty. I wasn't sure what to do, since I couldn't leave the girls alone to go get more. I thought I heard the maid in the girls' room across the hall, but I didn't know if she spoke any English.

Brier's coughs were strong and phlegmy. Brynn ran her hands through her sister's hair and bit her little lip nervously as she watched her sister. "Sissy? Are you okay? ...Sissy??" Small tears gathered at the corner of her big brown eyes and I watched as her chin began to tremble.

I shifted from foot to foot indecisively as I tried to consider what to do. I turned the coughing girl on her side and began lightly slapping her back, hoping to help her release the phlegm in her lungs. She was gasping for breath between coughs now, and it was starting to seriously concern me.

"She needs water!" Brynn demanded, her small cheeks almost as red as her sister's.

I nodded and called for the maid, though I didn't know her name. "Hello? Hello? Can you help us in here?" I shouted helplessly.

After a few tries, the maid finally came to the door and looked at me vacantly. "Can you get us some water, please? Brier..." But the woman was shaking her head, looking at me without any understanding in her eyes. She looked confused, as if I were speaking gibberish to her.

I kept patting the little girl's back uselessly. "You don't speak English, do you?" I asked pitifully. The maid just looked at me with wide eyes and shook her head, though I could tell it wasn't in response to my question, but rather to tell me she couldn't understand a word I said.

I saw her look down at the girl with concern, so I hoped maybe she would understand if I lifted the empty water jug and motioned for her to stay with the girls. "You stay here, I'll go get water," I said slowly, though I knew that wouldn't really make her understand a foreign language any better.

She shrugged and I motioned from her to the girls once more. "Watch them," I said, hoping she'd get my meaning even if she couldn't understand my words.

She nodded and I hoped it meant she understood. I quickly raced from the room and down the stairs into the kitchen. I had no idea why I was suddenly so terrified of leaving the girls alone, because I knew the maid was there with them. Perhaps I was merely feeling bound by the promise I'd made to their father to stay with them constantly, but how could I have foreseen this happening?

I rushed to the wide sink and filled the pitcher with water as fast as I could. I heard a loud crack from upstairs and my heart froze in my chest, but my body instantly began moving back toward the stairs. The water jug was heavy and my muscles shook as I rushed to the base of the steps, looking up in trepidation.

I'd reached the middle of the stairway when the maid came rushing down. She was repeating something over and over in Spanish as she gripped what looked like rosary beads. Her face was pale and her eyes were wide as if she had seen something terrible.

I tried to reach out for her arm, but she pulled away from me and pushed past me, rushing down the stairs and into the night, leaving the front door wide open. A gust of chilly wind blew through the front doors as if to propel me up the stairs.

In my haste, I dropped the water pitcher and it smashed on the step beneath my feet. Water drenched my shoes as I ran up the stairs, terrified of what I would see.

When I got to the bedroom, the first thing I noticed was the bed. It seemed to dominate the room, because the oak panels were closed. An eerie green light seemed to be emanating from the seams between the panels.

I shook like a leaf as I stupidly approached the bed, drawn by some unknown force that kept me from turning and running away just like the maid.

When I was about a foot from the bed, I reached out to open the panels. I had no idea why I was so compelled to do it, because I had no idea what I would find on the other side, but I just knew that I had to look.

I had to know.

I'd promised their parents that I would take care of them. I'd promised.

I pulled the doors open and the green light seemed to dissipate. The girls were still there, lying on the bed with the covers pulled up as if they were peacefully asleep. Brier no longer coughed, and Brynn no longer cried. Their hair was combed perfectly across the pillows, and their small hands were folded neatly across their small chests. I watched them rise and fall steadily and realized that they were merely sound asleep.

I tried to shake Brynn awake to ask her what had happened, but she would not budge. I half-lifted her up and shook her some more, but she would not wake up. I began screaming the girls' names, shaking the bed and slapping their cheeks, trying to get them to wake up.

"Leave them be. They will not wake up for you."

I stopped and realized I heard a voice in my head. Slowly, I released Brynn and stood up straight, my heart racing a thousand miles per minute. Where had that come from?

"Come to the window."

The voice was dark, smooth, and dangerous. I lifted my head and looked at the window.

My body froze and my heart stopped completely. In the window was a man, and he was standing on thin air. He seemed to float effortlessly, his arms slightly outstretched toward me. His skin was pale, too pale, and his eyes were black as the night surrounding him. His hair was dark and he was hidden in shadow.

The most confusing thing about him was the fact that he was wearing traditional priest robes. The crisp white collar at his neck contrasted with the long black robe swirling around him in the night air.

"Come to the window," the voice said again. His voice. In my mind.

I felt myself moving forward against my will. I was entranced by this man, drawn to his darkness and his compelling mysteriousness.

"Come to me," he said, his tone demanding.

My feet carried me toward the window, and everything around me was forgotten. The rumors, the truth, the girls, the maid, the father, and my promise...all of these things disappeared from my mind as he held my gaze, pulling me forward with his magnetism.

I stopped short of the window and felt the wind swirling around me, pulling at my clothes and hair.

"Come with me," his voice coaxed in my head.

His hand reached for mine, and I took it in my own. The wind blew through the room, pushing me the rest of the way to the window.

His arms wrapped around me tightly and I felt myself lift from the ground as we flew off into the night.

A/N: This is just a prologue. If people would like to see this continued, I plan on writing more.