SUNSET

He watched the sun go down for the umpteenth time.

An hour ago, it had intrepidly lit the skies. However, as the horizon swallowed it up, only a reddish tinge, vestiges of the sun’s brilliance, lingered. He had recently found the setting of the sun fascinating. How a seemingly mundane natural phenomenon could evoke the most profound messages – cyclicity, transience and hope.

But it was different this time.

Slowly, he shifted his gaze to the woman in his arms. She looked to be at peace. Her lips were slightly curved into a smile and her arms, affectionately wrapped around his body. Her green eyes stared him in an unbreaking gaze.

Lifeless.

He could see vitality seep out through them. The entrancing brilliant forest-green eyes he knew were no longer there. They were something else.

Something alien.

A tear slid down his eyes. And another.

The sun had set, and for the first time in a while, he felt despair. His sun was not going to rise anymore. What was left of his world was dark, gloomy, and chilly. Like three years ago before he met her.

….

He had met her at a zoo. He was entranced by the sight of an exotic bird in its cage, locked out of the ambiance. Her voice had plunged him out of his reverie. She seemed to be just as fascinated about the bird as he was, and later over drinks, he had found out that they had more than a liking for exotic birds in common.

They were two brooding souls enveloped in depression – and they had sat a few feet away from each other at the bar in town for days on end, oblivious of each other until a parakeet had brought them together.

She was healing from a nasty breakup, and he was grieving the death of his brother. After a few more weeks of accidental bump-ins and curt conversations, their eventful love had story begun.They had both decided to leave the past behind and give life a second chance, and their love was the unlikeliest beautiful mosaic, built from the broken pieces of their pasts.

After a year of seeing each other, he had proposed – and she accepted. They had moved into his family estate and were happily married for two years.

Until today’s incident.

….

Sullen clouds hung loosely in the skies, tainting its shades of brilliant blue with gloomy grey, and blotting out the vestiges of the sun’s brilliance. A downpour was nigh. In no time, it came down – first in a few drops, then a drizzle, and then in torrents. The rain beat him relentlessly.

However, he didn’t care.

It was the least punishment he could get for his grave mistake.

He never should have let her leave the house.

He rose his head to meet the rain’s pummels and beheld the skies. Flashes of lightning went haywire with loud booms of thunder trailing behind them. It was as if the sun never rose in the first place.

He turned to look around him, his breaths, slow and heavy, visible in the cold air. In the distance, the trees swayed violently as gales swept through their canopies. The river tributaries that meandered through the trees and headed out through the back had overflown their banks. Other houses, partly hidden by the trees, stood proudly in the rain. Frantic shrieks from a bird echoed through the air relentlessly.

There seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary.

But it was far from it.

It was certainly not a mugging, as their community had tight security. No riffraff could have slinked into the place. Not with all the guards and the high-tech security gadgets. It was neither an accident nor a fall too. There were no bruises or dirt on her body. Her burgundy dress, although wet, still looked as good as new.

He knew what this was.

If his senses were not so acute, he would have missed it. However, he knew the scent all too well. Strong and sickly sweet. He could have missed it earlier too, but at a closer look, a portion of her dress had a deeper reddish tinge than the other parts. Trickles of blood had soaked into her dress – almost subtly. She had bled before she died.

Slowly, he turned her neck. Two deep puncture marks came into view, spaced apart.

It was no mere accident.

It was another trigger of an ageless vendetta.

And it had begun in full swing.

Slowly, he laid her body down. It was still warm. The perpetrator had not gone far. Their scent, although thin and wispy, still lingered in the air. He could not have missed it – not with the rage brewing within him.

Bastards, he muttered.

“How did they get in?”

But that didn’t matter at the moment. All that mattered to him was vengeance.

Above all, he would have their head. This was a stain on his personality. A bruise on his soul that would never heal.

Because his wife was killed under his watch. Particularly, on his property.

His dark brown eyes glowed ominously as they lightened into a golden color that he had not been acquainted with in years. He let out a painful groan as the bones of his hands cracked, morphing into monstrous claws. His features and figures slowly contorted into a beastly frame.

Hurriedly, he took off his jacket and disappeared into the trees in a blur.

A howl echoed through the cold, rainy air.

More resounded in the far distance.

The hunt had begun.

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