* * *

  As the last of the guests left Hartswell Hall just after midnight, dark shapes and figures could be seen gathering in the fields around the mansion and a strange hissing filled the air. To the uninitiated it sounded like a hundred airbeds were being deflated.

  To those who were attuned, words could clearly be heard, carried on the breeze, “Crysssssssstal… cryssssssssstal… cryssssssssstal. Give usss the crysssssssstal …..”

  A large black panther with yellow saucer-eyes bounded down Hartswell Hall steps and made its way speedily through the grounds, dropping to its belly as it approached the fields, every sinew and every muscle tensed in anticipation.

  Overhead an eagle flew, wings outstretched and talons at the ready. Together they struck: silent, ferocious and deadly.

  For a few seconds, the air was rent with screaming and thrashing as teeth and claws, beak and talons did their worst. The black figures were torn to pieces without discrimination or mercy, fronds and shards of dark matter littering the grass or picked up by the breeze and dispersed into the hedgerows and trees, where they snagged on branches like flimsy black rags, flapping in the cold night air. Such was the ferocity of the attack, it was over in minutes.

  Surveying the massacre and ensuring all were destroyed, the predators retreated as speedily and silently as they had attacked. One to the air, the other back into the undergrowth.

  Slowly but surely, the pieces of dark matter were absorbed into the atmosphere, each becoming gradually more transparent before disappearing entirely, leaving not a shred of evidence that minutes earlier the field had resembled a battlefield.

  Only one small shadow remained, hidden in the undergrowth, wounded and flailing but not destroyed. Once the predators were gone, it cautiously broke cover, looking around for other survivors. Finding none, it crawled to the edge of the field and lay waiting, weak and wounded, silently watching for some life form to appear. A sheep or dog would do, but a human was preferable.

  The battle had seriously depleted its strength, and its energy was all but gone. It needed to feed quickly if it were to survive. As if in answer to its prayer, old Grace Wisterley stepped obligingly into the field, shot gun at the ready, eyes peering through the darkness. She’d heard noises and was determined none of her sheep would die that night.

  “Come out, yer blighter,” she said into the night, “show your face. I’ll make short work o’ thee.” She shone a torch around the field but could see nothing out of place. “Just as well I penned the sheep up las’ night,” she muttered to herself.

  The shadow crept up silently behind her, and in an instant it attached itself to her back like a limpet, feeding off her energy field. Grace walked on, unaware of the parasite she’d picked up, flashing her torch and peering through the dark for any sign of the predator she knew was out there. She checked the pen and finding all her sheep accounted for, walked back to her house, feeling suddenly heavy and tired and old.

  “Crikey, Grace Wisterley, yer age is catchin’ up wi’ thee,” she muttered to herself.

  The shadow continued to feed, getting stronger with every mouthful of energy it consumed.