For the Love of God
By Nigel Bird
Photograph by Marzel
Over 200 years we waited for someone to arrive. All that hanging around and it was over in a flash.
“Guard the door,” she said. “Guard it well.” That was 1789.
“Whatever happens, don’t let anyone in.” Her hair was piled on top of her scalp as ever and, [...]

The Folly
By Chris Dabnor
He smiled as he poured her weak tea from the slightly scuffed metal teapot.
“When we leave here,” he said, his demeanour unchanging, his voice with a soft melodic quality, “I’m going to take you somewhere quiet and kill you.”
She looked at him aghast, but said nothing, instead drawing her fraying brown cardigan [...]

Will the peacocks inherit the earth?  Our good friend Marzel of the Dark Artists Guild took this photograph of peacocks casually hanging out in her neighborhood.
What does this image suggest to you?  Is it sinister or benign?  Is it an image from the future or the past?  What’s going on here?
We’d like to know.  Using [...]

By J. F. Juzwik
Take it slowly, dear heart, just one more step. Now then. Can you guess where I have brought you? Oh my. No sense in your getting all upset. I will remove the blindfold soon enough. I would simply like to find out just how keen your senses are. Try to guess. Please? [...]

Every picture tells a story. What mysteries lie in the corridors of this shadowed castle? Tell us, in 1,000 words or less. Send your stories to submissions@darkvalentine.net.
(Photo © Richard Outram and appears here courtesy of a Creative Commons/Attribution license.)

My little sister died when she was four.

She and her best friend Robin had followed Robin’s big brother into the woods behind their house and never come out again.

Every picture tells a story.