A/N: Prompt of "mask." Thought of it while getting ready this morning!

As the girl's face changed from a catlike intensity to the fright of an eight-year-old girl who believes in ghosts, he pondered his appearance.

His skull grinned, his eyes jumping from their sockets to the rhythm of cracking ribs and snapping teeth with no lips to hold them back.

His true face.

But what of his other, he wondered (for he was a philosophical sort when time permitted). That mask of meat, flesh that would no doubt be eaten by burrowing maggots were it more than a cruel illusion. He felt trapped by it, somehow, too connected to a man he had been years ago, when he had been naive enough to let greed consume him.

"Best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Swann," he growled. "You're in one!"