There was a small village inside the dark forest.

Naani and I seeked refuge in one of the shacks after hiding from Indian soldiers. It was a town cut off from the city. There were only a few villagers but they said we would be safe here and smiled. But Naani shut the doors and told me to stay quiet. 

“Don't trust anyone.” She said as she placed charms around the house that was supposed to ward off the Jinns. She told me stories about the Jinns. Demons that can take the form of your mother and sister, stray dogs and black cats, that they can watch you as you sleep from the corner of your room, that they can possess your body. 

“I encountered one when I was a little girl.” She spoke coldly as she twisted the amulet around her wrist. “The Banshee. I was the only one that heard her screams. Against my window. Every night.” I shifted my seat closer to Naani.

“My uncle told me I had something in my possession that she wanted and the only way to get rid of the Jinn was to pass it on to someone else.” I peered up at Naani. 

“What was it?” 

“I never knew. A flood swept away all my belongings and half of the house and I never saw it again.” I stared outside the window, the forest trees looming over the house in an eerie silence, waiting.

One day, I spotted a sheep in the middle of a clearing in the forest. I reached out to pet it when a shadow was casted over the sheep.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” I turned sharply to be confronted by a thin man grinning with blackened teeth from ear to ear, a hand behind his back. I could see my shack behind him a few metres away but he moved in front of my vision, with a grin still plastered against his face.

“Why?” I thought to distract him. 

“Didn’t Granny Naani tell you?” His eyes shined as mine widened with shock, a slight nip of fear triggered a fight or flight response.

“How do you know my Naani?” I questioned him. He brought out the hand behind his back. A cuckoo clock. Wooden but black and seemingly brand new.

“A humble present for the newcomers.” I looked at him in confusion, stepping back cautiously. His grin wavered slightly, his voice decreasing in darkened timbres. 

“You must accept it.” Maybe if I take it, he would let me go, I thought. I snatched the wooden clock from him and he breathed out a sigh that oddly sounded like relief. That sinister grin re entering his visage as the air seemed to mutate into an ill-omened atmosphere.

I looked down at the sheep and paused. 

“What's wrong with your sheep?” I whispered shakely. The thin villager started to laugh. My heart thrashed against my chest, throbbing against my ears the longer I stared at the thing next to him, the longer he laughed a spine-chilling wail. 

It had ten spider-like legs with its body stretched from behind me.

I ran with the dilapidated shack as my focus, hand clasping the amulet around my neck and fear clogging up my throat as the man’s laugh echoed against the trees of the forest which laughed with him. 

Naani slapped me when I told her what happened. She placed me in my room with the charms and amulets painting the expanse of the mouldy walls and blew on me, whispering prayers.

I didn't tell her about the clock.

I woke up to its sound. The black bird inside letting out a broken, slow screech. I peered out of the door and heard Naani shouting in the kitchen. But there was someone else. A woman in grey clothing and coal-black, wet hair that stretched to her waist. She was eating out of Naani’s pots calmly as Naani moved hysterically around her.

“How dare you come in here and eat our food!” Naani grabbed the woman and bended her forwards, slapping her back. My lungs were constrained at the sight of the woman, still and calm but her hair was dripping out something black as it stained the floor. 

Everything stopped once I saw it.

“Naani..” My whisper was encased in a singular form of terror as Naani let out a low moan, seemingly noticing what I saw. 

Its feet were twisted the other way.

The woman in grey let out a groan with a deep, gurgling sound and rose upwards. Naani’s amplified breathing did nothing to calm mine. When she turned towards her, Naani screamed as the demon spat out strings of black into her mouth. 

I sunk down low, sobbing hopelessly into my hand covering my mouth. Naani thrashed around, choking and spluttering and wailing as The Banshee passed through her. 

Forcing my shaking legs up, I rushed towards the kitchen. Naani was heaving out slowly, head lowered. 

“Naani?” She rose her head up, her breathing seemingly calmer and steady. 

“Naani, tell me you’re okay!” I pleaded desperately. Naani turned to me with an unfamiliar grin. The air began to curdle in a foreboding manner. Naani cradled the cuckoo clock in her hands, stroking it as it let out the same slow, broken, demonic song.

“Beautiful.”