Ivy awoke to the chaos screaming. Standing in-between the two sisters as the dust cleared was an amalgamation similar a gargoyle. Bat-like wings, a lizard's torso, and a chimp's face meshed together with hairless, leathery skin that was an ugly sienna. It was around a head taller than Cary and had a powerful build. Glossy talons tipped the end of four digits on each limb and its fierce eyes were set within a thick, shadowed brow. It rose on its hindlegs with a deep, guttural cry as the dust settled.

Time seemed to go still. Caught between horror and a grim fascination of the beast in front of her, Cary couldn't move. All she could do was stare back at the twin dark sockets turned her way. It leapt forward—

A sudden blur to the right rammed the monster back. Sedgley had scrambled back up to the loft. Jumping out of reach after the initial strike, he waved the candle like a torch in front of him to try keeping the creature at bay.

Spurred into action by the close call, Cary raced around the dangerous scene and yanked Ivy out of bed. Sedgley's efforts wouldn't last long, the small flame only able to astonish the monster for a short second before it smacked the candle out of her brother's hand. Sedgley narrowly missed its claws tearing through his chest, instead receiving a long gash on his arm. The trio fled, practically lunging to the level below.

The front door was wide open. Outside, their father was battling another one of the creatures, barely keeping it off of him a shovel. Beyond him, targeting the town—their neighbors—was a hoard of over a hundred of the same beasts. Sedgley ran out first, but before his sisters could join him, their path was cut off by the first monster jumping down from the loft. 

"In here!" Cary spun around to see their mother yelling at them from the bedroom. She pushed Ivy ahead of her and the two sprinted to safety behind the door. The wood bucked as the gargoyle slammed into it behind them, but terror awakened untapped reserves of strength. Cary braced it with the full of her weight, keeping it tightly shut.

She glanced over her shoulder. Their mother threw open the window and encouraged Ivy to jump out, "Cary, come on!" 

But she couldn't move. The instant she let go, the gargoyle would break through. They'd be trapped: There was no way the both of them could escape quickly enough. 

She gritted her teeth as the door lurched with more force than before and a harsh crack sounded from the other side. Worse than that, however, was the smell of smoke that began to permeate the air.

The forgotten candle's meager flame was spreading.

"Mom!" Ivy panicked and pushed back against their mother's arms, not wanting to go alone.

She was thrown out with a final shove. Racing back over, the middle-aged woman hurriedly looked around for anything that might block the door in their place. Minutes ticked on like hours as she settled on a tall dresser and wrestled it across the room. Still keeping herself bound by the entrance, Cary grabbed it with a free hand as soon as the dresser was within reach, flinging open one of its own doors, and attempted to drag it the rest of the way toward herself. Light as it was, she worried if it would even hold.

Some of its contents spilled onto the patch of floor in its path, adding to her already frantic urgency. She yelled at her mother, “Go!”

However, the other refused to leave without her. The two shoved the dresser into position, only stepping back when the beast’s thrashings somewhat lessened. By then, the room had grown hot, the crackle of old wood and the low roar of flames whispering underneath the monster’s furious cries.

They reached the window. The stronger of the pair, Cary spotted her mother from behind as she climbed out of the house. A hand on the other’s back, the girl maintained a firm gaze on the weak barricade behind them.

The sound of breaking wood sharply grew louder. Without further warning, the roof of the bedroom fell in.  Cary pushed her body against the wall, raising an arm to shield herself from the mass of burning debris that collapsed only a few steps away from her—narrowly avoiding the large eruption of sparks that followed it. She glanced up. The small loft was completely devoured in a heavy cloud of smoke.

Her mother was out. At last, Cary scrambled through the window herself, but something caught her—an unseen force tugging her back from above the shoulders. She gasped at the unfamiliar pressure, pushing her weight forward, yet somehow still unable to fit through the tall opening. Terror raked at her chest.

A pair of callused hands snatched her by the nightdress and pulled her down. A strange, naked chill tore over Cary’s spine as she felt the night air, contrasting with the heat still raging behind her. The young woman fell to her knees on the grass, dragged a step further before her mother let go, turned her attention to the chaos of the townwide invasion, and grabbed a hoe from the side of the house. Fortunately, the monsters were spread-out, but the trio was out in the open. She called for their father and Sedgley, who were nowhere to be seen.

Ivy stood trembling only a short distance away, frozen like a small deer caught by a predator’s gaze. Cary jumped back onto her feet, racing over to grab her by the arm and drag her away from the fighting. No sooner than she did, however, the child screamed and tried to pull away.

Bewildered, Cary only tightened her grip. “We need to leave!” she tried explaining to her sister in a desperate, stern tone, “We can go to the woods for cover, we’ll be fine!”

The harsh sting of metal digging into her skull threw her to the ground in a painful blur. The strike came so fast that the young woman couldn’t even react to it until the warmth of her own blood began to pour over one of her eyes. She’d been struck hard near the temple, a wide gash oozing above her brow. The world stayed dark for several seconds before slowly returning to her to the rhythm of a throbbing pulse.

Her first thought was that one of the gargoyles had jumped her from behind—that she needed to get away before it could deal a killing blow next. However, once her vision returned, it wasn’t one of the monsters looming over her. It was her mother with the hoe tightly clenched in her hands, now positioned between her and Ivy with a guarded stance.

Not immediately understanding, there was a part of Cary that first tried to call to the woman for help. The words died in her throat though as the two stared at each other for a long while and reality settled in. The look in her mother’s eyes ricocheted between fear and confusion, then horror and guilt as she realized what she had done. Nevertheless, she never lowered the improvised weapon or took another step toward her eldest daughter.

Had fear driven her to lashing out? Once more, Cary tried to speak. “It’s me…” she swallowed, fighting through tears as the pain of her wound settled in, “It’s just me. We need to get out of here—!”

Another agonizing bolt stabbed her body and she screamed. This time, she couldn’t tell where she’d been hit. Again, like at the window, the sensation was too high up. She bent forward, instinctively reaching for the source of the pain, and felt the slim shape of an arrow pierced through a thick, leathery hide. Her eyes widened.

At once, Cary became all too aware of an extra set of limbs she didn’t possess: Two black wings that had torn through her nightdress, now protruding out of her back.

The weight of her fear, the shock of her injuries, and the impossibility of her circumstances all left her frozen in place. What was this? Why was it happening...?! It had to be a nightmare—or some trick of the monsters surrounding them now.

However, there was no time for rationalizing. The sound of hurt prey attracted some of the gargoyles hiding behind their larger, braver counterparts. Three moved away from the worst of the fighting, headed right for Cary and her family. The marksmen who shot her was thrown to the earth as they flew overhead. He launched another arrow from a small crossbow, which embedded itself in one of the gargoyle's legs. The beast shrieked, turning to face him while the other two sped on.

"Mom! Ivy!"

It was Sedgley, charging toward them with their father not far behind. One of them carried some farming tool for a weapon while the other held onto a flaming board from the house. Cary pushed herself to stand, a faint smile pulling at her lips, but it was only a fleeting moment's hope. He hadn't called her name.

Her own shadow, flickering in the light of the ever-growing fire, caught her eye. It seemed larger now. The wings were undeniable, and the transformation only grew worse. Her breath hitched at the sight of the long, reptilian tail that had manifested by her side.

Her fingers felt slick. Withdrawing her arms from around herself, she noticed her nails had elongated, growing thicker, sharper, claw-like. A bright crimson was caked underneath them from where she’d dug into her own skin. The once earthy brown color of her hair had darkened into a fearsome shade of black.

Cary took one unconscious step back after another. Her mother swung at one of the gargoyles as it landed. Ivy had begun crying, crawling along the ground to get to safety. Another arrow fired past them as the men closed in. Enemies on all sides, blood half-blinding her as it dripped from her brow, Cary could only give her body one order: Run.

The beasts and her family were too preoccupied with each other to immediately pay her any mind. She fled toward the tree-line. The wind caught beneath the wings and tried to lift her from the ground. She stumbled, part due to the drastic changes to her balance and part from the wound to her head.

She felt the gargoyle’s presence before she saw it. It lunged at her from above and she ducked, releasing another sharp cry. She could feel its claws raking along her flesh, its heavy body rushing past her as it missed—rolling as it hit the ground.

Briars hidden in the undergrowth stabbed her feet as she reached the forest, yet Cary kept running. She ran even as the light of the fires consuming her hometown and dimmed sound of the panicked villagers went eerily silent.