Sitting in a stall in the Kaima Inn, Malik had a small razorblade that he had had since he acquired his depression. Blood was stained across nearly every surface of the razor, but much thicker at the bladed areas. He roled up his sleeve and cuffed it back so it wouldn't fall forward and interrupt his doings, his business if you will. He took the blade in his right hand and placed his left arm in his lap, forearm facing up. He took the blade and pressed it against his gray-colored skin. He pressed hard and slowly drew the blade back towards his abdomen. Blood so dark it looked black began to rise up around the blade. He was merely adding a scar to his skin out of self-oppression. The blood slowly began to accumulate on his arm. I ran around the side and down where a stream running down either side met. Drip. A drop of blood splashed against the stone and wood floor. It's dark red color stained it nearly instantly. Another drop, and another. Not a single drop ever touched another one. Then tears touched the floor running from his white eyes.

He thought of himself as an abomination. He did this whenever he grew angry at himself because of his 'condition' as he called it, being part human, part demon, and part vampire. A man outside in the town had called him a disgusting and foul example of life itself and said that Malik should die for his uncomforming mutation. Malik just wanted a friend...

Willow walked by, carrying a bucket of water and some clean cloth. The owner of the Inn had hired her, just for the day, to clean all the windows on the building. Willow had never cleaned a window in her life, in fact, she'd never even seen a pane of glass up close, but she didn't think it would be too hard. She'd seen all sorts of women doing that. And with the gold, she'd buy something nice, she told herself. Maybe a cake from a baker, or some yummy fruit. She took two steps past without thinking, then stopped. She thought about it. She took three steps backwards.

Yes, there was someone there. "Hey. Hey, you're bleeding." Willow remarked, the same way a person might say "You've got dirt on your face." With surprising suddeness, she was standing right before him, tearing two strips from the cloth she'd been given, dunking one in the clean water she'd just drawn, washing away most of the blood on his arm before wrapping the dry one tightly, but gently, around the injury. She looked up into his face. There was no fear, no disgust, and no repulsion in her expression. Neither was there that sickening expression of pity. Just an honest, sincere concern for another person without the prejudices of fear and difference.

"Does that hurt? I'm sorry. Sometimes I cry when I fall down and hurt myself, too." Willow confessed. He looked different than anyone she'd seen before, but then, all people looked strange to her. Even her own reflection surprised her sometimes. Malik's uniqueness was no more fearsome or ugly to her than a humans, or a dwarf's. And because he was sitting down, he didn't even seem so very tall!

"What are you doing little girl? Stop that!" he said in a quick and seemingly angry hushed voice. Malik had no idea to what the girl was doing. He didn't understand her reaction or why this little girl was trying to clean him. He grabbed her wrists and pushed her back a little bit, but didn't let go. "Who are you?" he asked looking into her eyes. He looked at the bloody washcloth that she had attempted to clean him with, he looked back at her. He felt something in her he hadn't felt in the other people he had met... perhaps because she was so young.

Willow looked back at him, meeting his eyes fearlessly, though she was a little surprised. She hadn't thought clean water would hurt that much. He seemed to be as surprised as she felt. His angry tone didn't make her feel any different, however. People yelled when they were hurt, she knew. It was normal. When he caught hold of her and pushed her away gently, she didn't fight or struggle. Though he held her wrists tightly, it wasn't a painful grip.

"You're bleeding." She explained again, patiently. Perhaps he didn't know? Willow had scraped her knee once when climbing up a tree to get away from a bear. She hadn't even felt it until Old Willow had told her, later. Then it had hurt. Perhaps it was like that for him too. "If you don't wash away the blood, it gets yucky and sticky. It goes bad and it makes the blood inside you sick, too. Besides, it makes a mess! And getting blood out of clothing is very, very difficult." She told him, just a little sternly.

"Who are you?" he had asked her.

"I'm... me. Who else would I be? My name is Little Willow." She replied, simply. It always made her worry when people asked who she was, instead of what her name was. She wondered if other people had some mysterious way of explaining their very essence to people. And if she was missing these cues, somehow. Because people seemed to ask her who she was an awful lot!

"Please, don't wash me. You don't know what you're doing. I know what blood looks like when you don't wash it away, it turns blacker than it already is. And I know what it looks like when it stains clothing. I've seen enough of my own blood in my lifetime for the both of us," he spoke softly. "Why do you insist on helping me?" he then asked.

He looked at her, she couldn't have been older than 5 years old. He had a wife once that gave birth to a girl that had lived for 5 years before the demon took hold of her and he was forced to kill her in vain. Her eyes were the same as his daughters before he had to kill her, while he killed her with his sword. He smiled at the girl and said, "It doesn't hurt as much anymore. I've grown accustomed to the pain. Where are you from and where are your parents?"

"...You don't know what you're doing."

Willow thought, just a little impatiently, that of course she knew what she was doing. She was trying to clean a wound that must be painful, because he was bleeding on the floor. She thought it much more likely, in her childish mind, that He didn't know what he was doing. But she said nothing, until he asked another question.

"Why do you insist on helping me?"

Willow frowned a little in puzzlement. "Why wouldn't I? You're alive. You're not going to hurt me. And I can't eat you." While it sounded very strange, what she meant was that he wasn't an inanimate object, like water or a rock. Nor was he a predatory animal, one that was putting her in a position where she would need to defend herself. And he certainly wasn't like a fish, or a rabbit, or an edible plant. So to her, the instinct to help was only natural. Then, he smiled at her. Willow smiled back. When he told her that he felt better, she was pleased. She didn't understand what he meant about be accustomed to pain, because she'd never suffered prolonged pain. When he asked about where she had come from, and about her parents, She looked confused.

"I came from outside the inn. And what are...parents?" She asked, in return.

"Why wouldn't I? You're alive. You're not going to hurt me. And I can't eat you."

Malik laughed as she said that. "How do you know I'm not going to hurt you? And how do you know I can't eat you instead?" He was being sarcastic, of course.

"I came from outside the inn. And what are...parents?"

This befuddled him. He had no clue what to say. She didn't have parents. What sort of child doesn't have parents? He looked into her eyes and spoke, "Parents are your mother and father, mommy and daddy, the ones that give birth to you and raises you. Don't you have a mother and father, or siblings, brothers and sisters?"

He had been thrown out of his father's house because he wasn't completely demon and he had been thrown out of his mother's because he wasn't completely human. Humans nor demons like him vary much because he is a half blood. He hated his parents for making him an abomination to all kind, and he hated all kind for their prejudice. Except this girl wasn't like that. She said nothing to him about his ugliness nor his cold demeanor. Perhaps he should be nicer to this little girl than he has been.

"How do you know I'm not going to hurt you? And how do you know I can't eat you instead?"

Willow looked at him seriously for a moment. Sarcasm was an unknown concept to her, so she took the question seriously. "You won't hurt me if you don't have to. I can tell. Why would you? But if you're starving and you can't eat anything else, you might eat me. But if you're going to do that, it wouldn't be any worse than the way I eat a fish or a rabbit. But I think a cake would taste better." She told him, without any fear.

"Parents are your mother and father, mommy and daddy, the ones that give birth to you and raises you. Don't you have a mother and father, or siblings, brothers and sisters?"

This question brought to sudden and near blinding light a thought that Willow had been trying to put into words for months. She was thinking so hard that she spoke the words aloud without thinking about it."Trees...have children with seeds... Animals...grow babies in their tummy. I've seen that. But when the babies come out, they look like the...ones that take care of them. People too. They have babies that look like their...Mother and Father? But I didn't come from a seed. But I've never seen a mother or father for me, either. It's always been me and Old Willow. But I don't look like her. So where did I come from?" She asked herself, more puzzled than ever.

"You won't hurt me if you don't have to. I can tell. Why would you? But if you're starving and you can't eat anything else, you might eat me. But if you're going to do that, it wouldn't be any worse than the way I eat a fish or a rabbit. But I think a cake would taste better."

"Some people would hurt small children like yourself out of pure enjoyment. That sort of people, even demons aren't very kind," he spoke. Then he thought to himself that he was half demon and he was glad he wasn't in his possessive trance, where he is a bit evil, notorious, and mean. He didn't want to be any of those things to this little girl, Young Willow.

"Who is this Old Willow?" he asked. "I had parents once..."

"Some people would hurt small children like yourself out of pure enjoyment. That sort of people, even demons aren't very kind,"

Willow hesitated. She really had trouble believing that people would hurt their own kind. Much more trouble did she have in believing that they got enjoyment out of it. Nothing she had ever known could lead her to believe that anyone or anything got pleasure out of causing suffering. Yet, she really didn't think that this person was lying to her...

Willow didn't know what to think. She was glad when Malik asked about Old Willow. She wasn't sure she could explain, but it was something else to talk about. "Old Willow is...was.." she corrected, a little sadly "Like a parent, I think. She was a tree. She was a person. She taught me how to live. But then, she died. She was very very old. She named me after her. She told me that it would keep her connected to me, like the way some trees send out their babies from the roots instead of seeds. I miss her." She admitted, honestly. Then, she looked him right in the eye.

"I forgot to ask. What is your name? What were your parents like?" She admitted, with a little giggle.