Clara awoke from her thin veil of sleep with a start; it took her several seconds to remember who she was, another few to recognize where she was, and yet another several agonizingly confused moments to piece together why she was there. She sat up abruptly, disregarding her aching head and the screaming burns that covered her body, and looked blearily around the deserted park.
Most werewolves feel perfectly at home in the dark; when the moon brings with it inhuman power, one begins to feel more vulnerable when light covers the earth. Clara had felt this way for years- the night made her invincible- but now it bore down on her, terrified her like it had when she was a young child with a nightlight. The closest thing she had at the moment was a lone street lamp that flickered irregularly, but somehow that made everything worse.
A breeze barreled through the park, causing her battered body to shiver painfully. She looked up at the night sky, to check the moon's progress. It was well past 2 a.m.; she thought he would have come for her by now. A moment's meditation made her previous assumption seem absurd: it was a creature of darkness, this Balor Lord, and it would only come when it knew she could feel terror at its approach. As long as she slept, it would not come for her.
"You seem to be laboring under an unfortunately incorrect assumption, my dear." A reedy voice came from nowhere, somehow impossibly close to her ear. It was all she could do to keep from screaming.
"Who...who's there?" she managed, unable to keep the tremors from her voice. Her entire body had started trembling painfully, and she knew it had nothing to do with the cold.
This time a small yelp did escape her lips: a man appeared directly in front of her, with an impossibly round head, an impossibly large, toothy grin and wearing an impossibly out-of-place tuxedo, complete with bowtie. He was crouched so that his pale face was mere inches from her own, his eyes- blood red and shimmering with sadistic glee- staring directly into hers.
"Who indeed?" the man whispered. He rose from his crouch; Clara could see now that he was impossibly lanky, as thin and angular as a bare skeleton, but that his tuxedo fit his awkward limbs with ease. He produced a top hat from thin air, placed it atop his head, and began whistling as he strolled in a circle around the park bench Clara was seated upon.
"You..." the young werewolf began, then ended abruptly. "You...cannot be the Balor Lord. You look nothing like-"
"That's RIGHT!" the strange man screeched in a falsetto, his skeletal hands gripping the back of the bench. They were gone a moment later, but Clara could see the deep indentations they left in the wood. He can't possibly be that powerful. There is something terrible about this man...and I have a feeling...
"But surely!" The little man continued, having made his way back to the front of the bench, "surely you knew what you saw! The marks were clear, weren't they? How could it have been anything but a Balor Lord?"
"Unless..." Clara mused. She felt a sickening feeling in the pit of her stomach.
"Yes?" the bizarre man pressed, his smile growing even wider.
"It...was a Balor Lord. It...wasn't you."
The smile grew still wider.
"Puzzling...who, then, am I, my dearest Clara?"
Tears came to her eyes as the revelation stood clear before her. Her friends...Paul...they had no chance.
"You..." her head drooped, hiding her face in shadow. "You are its master. An even....even greater demon, the likes of which..."
The streetlight flickered on and off, and the lanky man flickered in and out of existence with it. He gave her a wink, and vanished.
The bushes to her left rustled and Paul burst into the clearing where Clara now sat alone. "Clara! There you are!"
"PAUL!" she shrieked. "RUN AWAY!"
"What?" he managed, both confused and relieved.
The tears that had been welling in here eyes finally released, and with an audible snap her neck twisted 180 degrees.
GPI: Fondly regard crustacean
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