Sacrifice.

Martha turned the wine glass on the table then stood back and frowned. She then leant back and turned it back to its original position before smiling and stepping to the next place setting. The sound of her shoes against the floorboards echoed through the room.
The house was quiet, empty and waiting.
After checking each glass Martha stood back and took in her handiwork. The table was square, wooden and simple and Martha had set it meticulously. Every element before her was arranged by a formula only known to her. Chairs ordered, plates stacked, candles placed. Cutlery lay parallel to their neighbours and sparkled under the lighting of the carefully dimmed bulbs above them. Flowers twisted and curled in the most particular way and together it surrounded a curiously empty centre. A horseshoe shaped hole that ended on one side of the table where there were no plates, cutlery or chairs at all. It was purposeful and calculated.
Martha looked up at a clock on the wall. Archaic and ugly the clock stood out against the elegance of Martha’s modern place setting. Gold around its edge was faded and rusting and scrawling symbols of some unknown language had been cut into its face. The clock hands were bent and still and had not moved for centuries.
Martha looked up at the clock and nodded to no one. They would be here soon.

There was a tap at the window.

Martha turned and saw no one in the darkness outside. Her own reflection stared back and watched her as she exhaled then turned back to the table. Her reflection did not turn with her.

There was a tap at the window.

Martha whipped around, facing herself. Her reflection smiled at her, a smile that Martha did not echo.
Martha tilted her head.
Her reflection did not.
And then its smile grew wider.
The edges of the reflection’s lips stretched further and further up its cheeks in a way that flesh should not allow. Martha, unchanged, watched as her face split in half. The eyes of her reflection rolled back and turned red.
Now Martha smiled. They were here.
Martha opened the windows of the room and beamed as her guests crawled inside. Pale figures, skeletal and hairless, slid headfirst into the room. Their long and bony limbs twisted around each other as they fell forward, so eager to get inside and take their place at the table. When they stood upright they loomed over Martha and had to bend their necks to stop their heads from scraping against the ceiling.
Once settled they turned to their host. Martha smiled at each guest before leaning back against the table and carefully laying herself in the centre of the congregation. The hole in the setting was filled.
The figures stood silently, their skinny chests rising and falling rapidly.
Martha nodded and her guests sat down.
A ticking began from the clock on the wall and Martha’s guests started to feed.