Chapter One: Beckoning.

Chapter One: Howling

Toys made gray, little stitched happy faces and dark eyes on dolls. Gray bed covered thickly by silky sheets. Curtains draped to the sides. But the little girl in the center of the room wasn't staring at her dolls. Nor the grandfather clock that swayed to and fro. 

Her eyes were set through the delicate massive window against the wall. A red haze drifted inside her room with a horrible Omen. She stared. Never has the moon ever been so.. Big. Her eyes were fixed on to the red color. Burning into her eyes. Bright and innocent, yet gray. Like the rest of the world.

"Alice.. why is the moon so big and bright? Where is mommy on this night?"

The doll did not answer her. But merely smiled, the red light beginning to dye her worn cloth and passing a shadow to her side.

"Alice? You've gone quiet too?" The little girl turned to her doll. The quiet smile staring up at the girl, a secret trapped on her lips.

"You'd tell me, wouldn't you Alice? No, you'd never hide anything from me." The girl seemed satisfied with the answer of the voice only she could hear.

She began playing once more. Worn cloth prancing around from the hand of the master. A slight giggle leaving the girl every now and then as she heard the voices whispering to each other from the doll's mouths. 

But the moon kept drifting into her room, growing darker and darker by each passing hour. The wind beginning to stir restlessly with excitement. Whipping against the window sill, The tree's arms began waving in fear. The house settled with an uncomfortable silence. 

The little girl's frown drew over her young features when the candle went out. Leaving the room into darkness. Except for red.

It was then that she stood up. Brushing the wrinkles out of her nightgown and walking closer on unsteady legs to the window. Pressing her tiny hands against the cold glass. But something was different that caused her to look in confusion. 

The cold that touched her soft skin wasn't the window. But it was from inside. Chills branching off like trees up her spine and across her flesh. Tiny bumps forming on her skin as the tone of worry settled itself deeper and deeper into the dark parts of the girls heart. 

Her eyes went back outside the glass, staring up at the red moon, that was staring down at her.

There was a faint voice to the wind. Sounding almost like laughter. As though beckoning her to come out and play. It's tone full of false promises that the child didn't understand. She looked to her doll excitedly. "Oh, Alice! What if the other girls and boys are playing outside under this moon? Wouldn't that be so interesting Alice?" The dead eyes made from the cold metal nettles were the only answers the overly oblivious girl got. 

"Let's do go out and play Alice!" She took her doll by the hand, running silently to her door which swung open with ease against her soft touch. The cold wooden floor beckoning her with shadows, and whispers moaning in from the window. Almost like they were calling for her, exactly.

Come on now, Sarah, come out and play with us. 

Sarah merely giggled. Stepping into the darkness the enveloped her, little bare feet running down the unworn stairs with silence as the only sound. Alice dragging close behind her. Grinning with knowledge the young girl did not possess. 

When they reached the cold floor yet again, the girl noticed with suspicion that the fire was burning. Much, much more than it usually was. Her frown deepened as she realized the door was also double bolted shut. 

"Alice, mommy and Daddy never lock the door so, what do you think that it means?" she asked her doll. But yet again, the doll stared into the fire, it's shadows flickering across her face.

Sarah shrugged again. Unbolting the door. It was a sound which filled her with dread, for reasons she wasn't sure why. The quiet sound of the metals drifting apart in an aching force. Screaming at her silently not to continue. Yet, the click happened almost as heavily as a drop of a body. 

One, Two.