Crimson Snow

• Tahlia Kertesz, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2009

Snowflakes of diamond like patterns fell from the heavens above; filtering the chilly air with their elegance and beauty. They fell onto the ice-glazed surface of every tree and every rose bush, freezing the scarlet petals in place, asleep to the world; Snow bathed the wintery starless evening in white, emitting the ludicrous sense that all was well in this small inconsequential city.

Such assumptions were often entirely and condescendingly wrong.

In the dead silence, one scream of a high pitch shattered the peace of this winter’s night and faded away in the whispers of the wind. It was not old Jack Frost that robbed this young lady’s hair raising scream. It was the demon of the snow that sunk his sharp fangs into her pale, innocent pretty neck.
Her blood poured down that paleness and dripped onto the now tarnished white a violent crimson red. The young lady, Lana Cross could hear her own blood been drawn from her body, concentrating into her neck and being drained. The demon lapped up the sinful drink, growing stronger with each gulp, his strength regenerating. Alas he would not drink another woman’s blood again, Miss Cross’s blood was irresistibly sweet and of a youthful type. She was all the blood drinker needed.
Would it be such a lie as to tell you Miss Cross desired this sinful act? That she somehow loved this demonic being to the very core that she would offer her own life force to sustain his thirst;
To be the only woman

His only woman

His only victim

Riley Knight was a vampire, a demon, a monster; in love with a weak, frail human girl, was that such a sin? Yes and no. A love of blood is forever, the snow melts, the leaves fall; the roses grow while the sun rises and falls on so many lonely years of eternal life. What of everlasting breaths, when there is naught to breathe for?

A winter not alone - That was Riley’s reason for breathing.