yelp accompanied my abrupt movement making me

shift my widened eyes down only to find a pair of

yellow eyes looking up at me through the gap
between my thighs.

It was a small black kitten, which had been lying on

top my torso and had fallen down on my legs due to
my unannounced action.

Rubbing the back of head with the side of my palm, I

picked the kitten up with my left hand, looking around
at the same time as I pushed my legs to stand up. As
far as my sight allowed, I could only see a humongous
sugarcane field surrounding me.

“How, in hell did I end up here?”

“Meow,”

The soft purring brought my attention back towards the

small creature huddled in my palm, looking up at me
with its cute little amber eyes.

‘Wait, amber eyes?’

“Hysteria?”

A slow Cheshire cat like grin spread across the kitten’s

lips, taking over more than half of its small face,
making me turn pale with the realization. I had heard
that djinns can take forms of both humans and animals
but I had never witnessed it with my own eyes. Seeing
it happen before me seemed to have rattled my brain,

’Is he a djinn?

Just as I was about to look at the kitten closely, it jumped

up towards my face, licking my lips with its slimy
tongue before sprinting away without a look back,

It took me a moment or two to recover from the shock.

Hysteria was guarding my unconscious body in

animal form yet he was the one who had brought me
here in the first place, and now that rascal had run
away, leaving me alone in this unfamiliar place,

“Come back here, you bastard! Take me out of

here!” I shouted loudly in the direction the kitten

had
disappeared off to, hoping for some kind of cheeky
reply to resonate through the dark, but only soft
whooshing of air answered me back,

“Fuck

you!”

Nothing.

“Is this your way of dumping me in a harder level?

This is my life not a game!”

I continued speaking gibberish, aiming to cajole

a remark out of him but still no sound was
heard.

Puffing my cheeks with frustration, I took my phone

out of the back pocket of jeans, turning its flashlight on
to cast some light on the murky fields encircling me.
Nothing much was visible except for the green leaves
resting on top of tall stalks sticking in every other
direction. Cool night breeze passing through the crop
would stir the deadly silence every other minute by
rustling the tips of the elongated leaves, urging me to
tighten my clutch on my phone impulsively as I
continued looking side to side in order to avoid a
repeat telecast of the night earlier.
‘I need to get out of this maze and I need something sharp
to protect myself as well,’

Just thinking about something popping out of these field

had lead me to break into a cold sweat.

Trailing my free hand up the front of my sweater, I

gripped its neck to pull it away from my body, trying
to cool myself down somehow, but as time continued
passing, the situation became more and more nerve-
wrecking, making it almost suffocating for me to keep
wearing the sweater.

“Whatever.”

Pointing the flashlight down, I used my free hand to

tug the sweater over my head, but the moment I
closed my eyes to let my head out of the tiny neckline,
a slurping sound pierced through the deafening
silence, making me open my eyes immediately,

‘What was that?’

Quickly removing the stuck sweater from my head, I

rolled it in my arms, my hair scattering in every
direction as I squinted my eyes trying to locate the
source of the sound, but the only sound that could be
heard was the soft rustling of sugarcane leaves.

‘Am I hearing things now?’

Ruling it out as paranoia, I clicked my tongue against

the roof of my palate, prior to raising my phone up
from the ground, directing the flashlight in front of me
but as soon as the scene in front of me became
illuminated, the phone fell out of my hand with a loud
thud, setting forth my worst nightmares in action.

“Shit.”

There, in the light coming out of my phone, I had seen a

straw stuffed figure leaning over an animal that
suspiciously looked like a cat. The cat’s belly was ripped
open and half of its intestines were hanging out of the
stick frame’s sewn mouth.

I wanted to move back and run away the instant I had

seen the gruesome scene but my flashlight, the moment
it tore its way through the darkness to reveal the
deepest secrets the field had been hiding, had incited
the creature’s head to lift up towards me and now, it was
staring directly at me through its button eyes.

‘No one told me I was up against Harold’s twin.’

To my surprise the scarecrow was still staring quietly at

me. I would’ve doubted his sight if it weren’t for the fact
that he was clearly able to see the light that had fallen
on him,

‘I can’t underestimate him,’

Gritting my teeth, I tried casting a quick glance around

to see whether I could find any escape. I almost let out a
sigh of relieve when I saw a small shed some distance
behind him.

‘There must be some kind of sharp equipment in there. I

need to hurry.’

Not wasting another second, I tossed my sweater on the

deadly still creature’s face before sprinting in the shed’s
direction.
‘I hope it works, Please let it work.’

Just as I finished sending a silent prayer up the

heavens, rapid rustling of grass behind me reached my
heightened hearing making me work my legs harder,

‘Hysteria, you bitch!’

He was using my worst fears against me, deliberately

trapping me in places where I’d be forced to call him
for help. My life was a mere circus for him and he was
the ring master, the one in control.

I was definitely not an athletic person. I was good at

hiding but I hated being chased like a mouse.
Moreover, these things were never this bold. Deep
down, I always knew that they weren’t going to kill
me, but all that had became nil for tonight. I was
running for my life, literally.

My lungs were burning with the need for more oxygen

as I continued pushing my limbs forward, shoving the
long leaves out of face, a lot of their sharp pointed
ends and rough surfaces of tall stalks kept hitting me,
cutting through my skin, making my crumbling
exterior burn
along with my heaving insides as I kept sprinting
blindly towards the shed.

The dense fields had started thinning by now. I could

almost see the parted doors of the shed peeking from
behind the tall grass hindering my vision. The
building was drawing closer and closer, nearly in
reach, just about a couple of meters away.

‘Yes!’

My right hand, fingers outstretched, was about to grab

the handle when a slender straw stuffed hand, covered
by a leather glove pulled me back from my hair, making
me scream on top of my lungs.

My scalp was burning as the scarecrow continued

pulling my hair out of their roots, dragging me away
from the door. Pressing my teeth hard into my bottom
lip, I refused to scream or beg him. There was no point
in it. Instead, I was scratching at his gloved hand,
trying to let him go of the fistful of my hair.

My legs were dragging on the ground, kicking hard, as I

tried my best to stay rooted on my spot but much like
the corpse, the scarecrow was far too powerful for me
to oppose. I knew from experience that kicking and
scratching was not going to do me any good.

‘Head…’

Suddenly the scene where Hysteria had kicked and

slashed the corpse’s head flashed before my eyes,

‘Is their head their weak point?’

I was not completely sure regarding my theory but I

needed to test it, and by the way the scarecrow had
almost dragged me back inside the corps, I needed to do
it fast.

Looking around frantically, I tried to locate anything in

near vicinity that I could use as a potential weapon
when my eyes landed on a group of wooden logs lying
nearby. I let my hold on his gloved hand lose,
attempting to grip the rough bark but I couldn’t reach
for it either.

‘I can’t die here. I can’t…’

I was almost at the edge of the fields by now, close to

losing all hope, when my defeated eyes met with the
loose noose hanging around the scarecrow’s neck which
I hadn’t been able to see previously.

‘Is it one of those hanged scarecrows?’

Gulping inaudibly, I lifted one hand to hold the dangling

part of the rope, trying to be as discrete as possible so
the scarecrow wouldn't notice my actions. Once I was
successful in wrapping the loose end of the rope around
my hand, I swiftly brought the other one near the knot,
pulling the rope down to tighten the noose around its
neck. The scarecrow, immediately let go of my hair,
gripping its own neck to free it from the rope. His one
hand was wrapped around the tight noose while the
other one was slashing the air blindly, trying to cut
through my skin.

Not wasting another moment, I sprung up from position

kicking the scarecrow hard in its straw belly before
sprinting again in the shed’s direction. I didn’t stop to
look back at his condition. I was already stumbling up
the stairs, running inside the open shed, picking the first
thing that I could get my hands on. It was a pitchfork.
Not caring about the consequences, I quietly hid behind
the door. Waiting for the scarecrow to enter through the
door.

'Now!'

Just as I heard angry feet dragging inside the small

building, I swung the pitchfork hard in its direction with
all my might, but I had clearly underestimated the
demon. He was already anticipating it. Holding the blow
off with one hand, he swiftly moved forwards to grab
me with the other one. I had expected him to
immediately snap my neck like a twig but contrary to
my assumption, the creature started inching closer and
closer to me until its poorly sewn face was directly in
front of me.

‘He’s trying to suck Hysteria’s soul out of me.’

The demon was clearly distracted and vulnerable and

I knew for a fact that all his attention was fixated on
my lips which definitely provided me with an
opening. My eyes slowly slid up the table, which he
had pinned me against, my eyes traveling over the
place where I had picked up the pitchfork from,
eventually landing on a
sickle lying nearby.

‘This is my chance. I have to do it like he did.’

Recalling the event from my memory, I let my hand

wander back, probing lightly over the wooden
surface until it landed on a cylindrical handle made
of metal,

‘Go.’

With one swift blow, I had separated the scarecrow’s

head away from its shoulder. It fell down with a loud
thud but before it could turn into an updated version of
the corpse, I buried the pointed corner of the sickle in it,
lifting it up to smash it hard against the rough surface of
the wall behind me, much like Hysteria had done. Right
in front of my eyes, the scarecrow’s body and head both
evaporated into a thick black smoke.

“I-I did it…”

I couldn’t describe the mixed feelings swirling around

in me at that point. I felt relieved to some extent but
there was still raw fear buried inside its surface, as I
knew that it was not the end. The night was still young;
more
of these were going to come after me.

Sickle still gripped in my hand tightly, I passed the

other hand through my messy ink colored locks,
pushing them away from my sweaty forehead before
turning to move out of the dark building. The moment I
stepped out of the small shed, I saw a silhouette
leaning against the wall adjacent to the door, his amber
eyes giving me a scrutinizing look.

“My darling learns fast.”

Not wanting to indulge in his meaningless chatter, I

avoided making eye contact with him as I started
trudging silently towards the road which definitely
wasn’t there before.

Next Chapter