Seobanien watched the girl as she strung wispy threads of mock spider web across a flimsy wooden coffin. She had been working for hours decorating the small house and bit by bit transforming it into the very ideal of suburban festivity. Stark white plastic ghosts frolicked in the yard alongside cardboard gravestones. A scarecrow sat limply on the top of a tree stump, his painted on face pleasant and happy. Jack-o-lanterns lined the front steps and grinned their idiot smiles of welcome.
It had not been those false monuments to a dead religion that had brought Seobanien to the edge of the wood. He had no interest in the trivial observances that humans indulged in during this era of 'modern' thinking. No, his attention was riveted on the girl. It had been her soft singing that had captured him, the sibilant melody of her young voice, so full of life that had drawn him from his sanctuary. Seobanien did not know how old she was; he had lost all sense of human age millennia ago. From the curve of her hip, the swell of her breast through the thin costume she wore he guessed that she was well past adolescence.
He stared at her hands as she wound another string of the artificial web around the coffin. Her fingers were long and thin, tapering perfectly into long nails that were painted black. The green dress she wore clung to her body, accenting every supple contour like a lover's embrace. Her hair was plaited in intricate braids that looped around her face and accented the graceful lines of her features. A sparkling green powder glittered on her eyelids, matching her dress, her eyes. Her delicate feet had been bound into black slippers with thin cords of satin that crisscrossed up her calves. A pair of wispy wings floated on her back and though Seobanien knew they were false the image she created charmed him in a way he barely remembered.
Voices, high and piercing, interrupted his train of thought and Seobanien looked on in consternation as a group of fantastically dressed children scampered up the street. There were princesses, pirates, gremlins and each one held a bag or bucket of some sort that displayed decorations similar to those that the girl had put up so diligently. They clambered around her with a singsong chant, giggling and jostling each other. To Seobanien's surprise, instead of sending them away, she gave them handfuls of small brightly colored packages that were piled high in a glass basin. He did not completely understand the function of the custom and before he could deduce its meaning the children were gone, running back up the street with squeals of laughter.
As the hour grew late, he watched the scene repeated again and again. As the moon neared its zenith the groups of children trickled off into pairs then they stopped coming altogether. Seoban could feel the girl's fatigue as she took the nearly empty basin into her small house then returned to the steps. With a tired sigh she sat and turned her green eyes up to the moon with a wistful expression.
Seobanien knew the time was nearing when he would be able to leave his hiding place and approach her. It was Sow-en night, a night when the barriers between the worlds grew thin. It was during this time that all the peoples could mingle together, good and evil. He slipped down through the branches of the tree where he had been waiting. His slender form moved among the branches with a gracefulness that no human could match, making no sound as he dropped to the ground in a crouch.
The girl did not move as he made his way to where she sat; in fact she had not yet realized that she was not alone. The shadows were Seobanien's friends and he slipped between them as if he were one of their own, letting their soft darkness cloak his body until he was nearly upon her. When he finally stepped into the harsh yellow light pouring from the windows of the little cottage the girl's eyes widened in fear. Seobanien had not been expecting fear from her and it pained him to see it in her gentle features.
