In the dark, the falling snow outside looked like ash. The flurries that spun around the ruddy polluted glass of the oil lamps became the warm colors of a shattered rainbow. They didn't have the inner brilliance of fireflies or the sinister playfulness of…

Mary had a little lamb

Its heart was black as coal.

And everywhere that Mary went,

It swallowed children's souls.

It followed her to school one day,

At which it ate its fill.

The teacher cried as children died.

It savoured every kill.