The House Without Mirrors

Deep in a dark wood was an old house and one day a young maiden named Shara was wandering through the woods when she heard all rustling leaves upon all the trees whisper,

“Shara, shara. Go no further, for the Brinith waits for you”.

But the girl did not believe in talking trees and so she ignored them.

“It is just the wind in the trees”, she said.

But then the girl passed by a tree full of crows and all the crows in the tree cawed,

“Shara, shara. Go no further, for the Brinith waits for you”.

But the girl did not believe in talking crows and so she ignored them.

“They are just crows cawing”, she said.

But then she came to a lake by the side of which , she saw a strange but beautiful flower growing and so she went over to the edge of the lake and bent down to pick the flower.

As she was bending down however, to her horror, she saw the face of monstrous creature reflected in the lakes surface.

“Strange how a beautiful thing like a flower can lure people into danger”, said the creature in the reflection.

Gasping; her heart pounding in fear, the girl looked round about her but she could not see anyone.

“What are you?”, she asked.

“I am a Brinith; a creature that is only visible in its reflection”, said a voice speaking out of the air.

“Well, what do you want with me?”, she asked, trembling, “Please don’t hurt me”.

“I don’t want to hurt you”, said the Brinith, “I want you to be my strange beautiful flower”.

Then the Brinith forced the young woman to come back to his dark house in the woods and told her that she was to use her beauty to lure young men to his house so that he could kill them and eat them.

“You will tell them that you live in the house all alone”, said the Brinith, “There are no mirrors in the house so they will not see me. You will meet them in the woods; beg them for help take them into the house and when they are in the house, lock the door. I shall do the rest”.

“And what if I do not?”, asked Shara, “What if I refuse?”.

“The last girl refused”, replied the Brinith, “She tried to run away into the woods but she could not see me and so she could not hide from me. I keep a ring to remember her by and the finger it was worn upon; the rest of her. Well, let us just say that she was delicious”

And so Shara, though it disgusted her and filled her with guilt and shame, because she was frightened of the creature, became his lure; stopping young male travellers in the forest, seducing them with her beauty and taking them back to the dark house of the Brinith where, because they could not see the invisible creature, they were helpless against it when it pounced upon them roaring and screeching; clawing with long sharp talons and biting with long sharp teeth.

But then, one day, Shara felt that she could bear her dark, miserable life no more and, going to the lake where she had first seen the reflection of the Brinith, she started to wade into the lake determined to drown herself.

“I shall not weep underwater and the blood shall be washed from my hands”, she said, “I shall go so deep that I will enter that place where even the Brinith cannot follow me and if heaven can forgive me, then angels might dive down and bear my soul out of the water; if not then there will be fire under the lake, an eternal fire and an infernal darkness but perhaps that is what I deserve”.

But as she was wading into the lake, just as her long bright red hair was strewn, floating across its surface and her mouth was about to taste the bitterness of its water; suddenly, a young nobleman, named Perequin was riding passed upon his white horse when she saw her and, leaping from his horse he ran to the lakes edge and, diving into the lake and wrapping his arms around her dragged her body out of the lake.

Then, upon the bank, he lay her down and kissing her breathed life back into her body that had grown pale and numb.

“What can ail such a beautiful young maid so deeply that it would make her want to end her life?”, asked the knight.

“Please do not call me beautiful”, said Shara, coughing up lake water onto the bank, “For every man who has thought me beautiful is dead; behind my face there is the face of the horrible Brinith; his sharp teeth and his claws”.

Perequin thought the young lady must be delirious,

“You are not making any sense”, he said.

But then she told the young man the story of how she had met the Brinnith and of how he had taken her prisoner, kept her a slave and of all the men she had lured to their deaths in his dark house.

“Then take me to the house”, said Perequin, “And I will kill this vile monster and you will be free”.

“But I don’t deserve to be freed, except by death. I should go where all those poor young men have gone”, she said, “And why would you want to help someone as evil as me?”.

“After what you have been through, you deserve so much. You deserve love and kindness and friendship and I would happily give those things to you”, said the young man.

But then the young man told her how he intended to kill the evil Brinith; he took a small mirror and a dagger from the pack upon his horse and he said to her,

“Take me to the house of the Brinith, lead me into it as you led the others in only I will not be as blind as them for I will see the Brinith in this mirror and when I see him I shall strike him down with this dagger”.

And so Shara led him through the woods to the house of the Brinith and, opening the door led the young man inside just as he had instructed her, while he gazed at the mirror in his hand.

But then, unfortunately, the Brinith saw a flash of light in the young man’s hand and guessing that it was a mirror and that Shara had betrayed him, the monster picked up a stick and struck the man’s hand with it, knocking the mirror out of it and onto the stone floor where it shattered into twenty pieces.

Now, without the mirror the young man could not see the Brinnith and, panicking he started to run back towards the door which, to his horror, shut and locked itself in front of him, then he heard a terrible loud roar near to him that made him freeze with terror and, suddenly, the creature leapt upon him, knocking the dagger from his hand and he to the floor.

“Oh god”, he screamed in fear, “Help me someone. Help me”.

Just then however, seeing the dagger upon the floor and because she was no longer afraid of dying, Shara picked up the dagger and, seizing it in her right hand, brought its sharp blade down upon the back of the invisible monster and though it seemed as if she was merely stabbing upon the air, wounds opened up in it and blood poured out of them and the Brinnith screamed; a hellish scream so loud that all the windows of the house shattered with it then, rolling over into a red puddle of its own blood, the monster stopped screaming and then it stopped breathing altogether.

Dropping the dagger, clattering upon the floor, Shara reached down and helped young Perequin back onto his feet and putting his arms around her, he hugged her tightly, so relieved to be alive.

Shara was finally free of the evil Brinnith and, not only that, then Perequin took the young woman home to his castle and there she grew to love him; married him and lived with him happily, ever after.