E I G H T

"My name is Griffin people just call me Fin. I don't really like it but call me whatever." He introduces himself to me stretching out his hand for me to shake. I recoil back into my shell and stare at the outstretched hand. He shakes it for emphasis, that he really does want to shake my hand and I reach out my fore fingers.

His hands are cold, so cold I don't know how he lives like that. He starts walking before stopping and looking back at me, "you are coming with me." I don't know why he thinks that o will just walk off with a stranger like that, without having a mind of my own. "Unless you want to be a hashwi's[1] dinner then okay, you can stay back." I may not know what a hashwi is, but they sound dangerous. I pick my self up in lightning speed and trail after him.

"What are hashwis?" I ask and he stops to pick a twig from the ground. He separates it to the tiniest bit before sticking it inside his mouth.

"You don't want to meet one." He gives me a vague answer before plucking the stick out. It now resembles a foundation brush I once owned. The thought itself is enough to send me into over drive and I begin thinking of how I look just then. I did not cleanse my face the morning or apply my morning cream.

My hands reach up to my face on reflex and I feel really ugly, like the creatures I just met earlier. Will my mother even look for me? I doubt. Maybe she will rejoice that am no longer in sight, that am no longer bringing shame upon her.

"How did you get here?" He asks as we ascend a narrow path up a hill. At the top is a round grass thatched hut, the walls suffocating under the twigs and plants growing around it. At the far background I can hear the tumble of water on rocks and my guess is backed up when the wind blows mist towards us.

"It was a woman, she pushed me inside my mirror." I explain the words before shaking my head. I can't believe them myself. She was terrifying and harsh. I don't even understand how I could fit into that mirror.

"Ah." He nods in realisation. "Those are Calarks.[2] They live in mirrors and watch your every move. Mostly in the clearest of the mirrors. Once they find a weakness, they take the chance and pounce." He explains before kicking a rat like created with a tail too long for itself out of the way. "Everyone inside this place wants to get out someday..." He proceeds with his speech before pushing the door inside.

I don't want to get inside the hut. It is radiating such an awful smell I could compare it to rotten eggs, but that is just better. Griffin is already inside the abode, and he peaks out to motion that I hurry inside. The top part of my night dress is not wet, so I lift it to my nose and force my kegs to step inside.

"It smells horrible." I complain when the fabric can hold nothing inside.

"What?" He asks taking a seat on a patch of soil carved into a seat.

"The smell!" I muffle back and he shrugs.

"Well I don't smell a thing." He says in finality before getting up from hi seat with a start. "Tea perhaps, I used to like it when I was human." He suggest and for a moment I forget that the smell around me is not good for human health.

"You were human?" I ask and he stops for a moment, glancing back at me and regretting what he just said.

"Have some tea." He thrusts a metal cup into my hands, too hot for handling and he takes it back seeing my struggles. He is not going to avoid my question like that.

"How did you get here if you were human?" I ask a different version of my earlier question and he shrugs.

"Am not human as you can see." He snaps back walking off to a section of what I assume to be his home. The raised tuffs of soil are four in number, with a larger surface area of it to act like a table. The divided section which is his kitchen has all sorts of pieces of items to act as utensils, some hanging on the walls.

At the far back there is a depression, and the burrow leads further down into the mountain.

"But you said –"

"I think you heard your own words." He cuts me off before opening a little cabinet at the bottom. "I would gave some Dire[3] by now if not for your magical drop from the sky." He how's on complaining before lifting a plant. "Now am having cabbage for breakfast." He finishes with his speech, proceeding to chop down the cabbage in large square pieces. No one in their right mind has that for breakfast. I realise that he won't answer my question but I won't give up. I push it to the back of my mind for later.

"What's Dire?"

"Dire?" He questions back before laughing. "Everyone loves Dire! The only sustaining food supply. Now that the supply is dwindling, all of us are going to die – " he leaves the statement hanging his mouth twisting in a weird fashion to whistle along to his task.

I hope my father is looking for me... he won't even find me! What the hell is this place? I want to go home. I slap away a cold feeling on my feet and get lost in my own thoughts. The coldness is back and I look down, finding an ugly, fat leech on the surface.

I let out a piercing scream that I hurt my own eardrums. Griffin rushes over to my side and on seeing the leech, let's out a stream of words before asking that I keep quiet.

"Get it of! Get it of!" I go on wailing and he freezes by two urgent taps on his door.

"I told you to keep quiet!"

•|•

A/N

1. Hashwis are large creatures with exaggerated features, mostly appearing with three or one eye. Females have the third eye in red colour. They eat anything crossing their path.

2. Calarks are dead ghosts with unsolved missions, stalking the mirrors of bathrooms and sinks (where water seems to be close by.) They are mostly female and feed on weaknesses and fears.