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I was asleep but not.

People were speaking around me, their frenzied whispers unaware that I'm listening.

My mother's voice rang loud, the most sorrow-filled out of the panicking ones.

"They're going to kill her, Jose. They're going to kill her. We have to do something. We can't run forever." She cried, undoubtedly clinging to my father.

Father sounded weary, "I know, Miryam. I know. WE can't hide forever. But Mellisa-"

Suddenly, the sound of ancient chantings echoed around us, a melodic tune like that of a prayer ringing loud and clear in our ears.

"They're here." My mother whispered, terror seizing her tone, "No no no."

Father swore but as mother began growing hysterical, his command boomed, "Miryam, hold yourself together! Wake Mellisa up. Tell her to run."

Mother whimpered as if she knew what was going to happen, as if she knew the doom I'd inflicted on them and the price they'd pay.

The chanting grew louder, closer.

"Miryam, hurry!"

-

Hands, those were hands on my shoulders, shaking me vigorously.

"Melly!" Somewhere, someplace faraway someone called out through a tunnel.

"Melly Jelly! Wakey wakey!" It was loud, obnoxious. It was familiar. It was-

Joshua.

Joshua was hovering over me like a reaper, shaking me as if his life depended on it, as if there were assassins here to kill us.

Life depended on it.

Assasins here to kill us.

I jolt awake with a heavy, alarmed breath. I could feel my eyes switch and glow a vibrant blue, feel my fingertips heat with luminescent blue flames, feel my energy erupting in waves dropping the temperature around me-

Joshua blinks in surprise when I look at him before those brown orbs soften considerably, "Hey, relax. It's not anything threatening."

I just stare blankly at him, my eyes like razors scanning the place for any signs of danger.

"Gosh, Melly. Calm the eggshell down and get your ass moving." Joshua gives me another rigorous shake, "It's Shadow King Interrogation time, decision changed to early meeting in the middle of the night for some unfathomable reason. You barely even slept an hour!"

With a disapproving shake of his head, Joshua pulls me to my feet as if I were a soulless doll. I let him arrange my hair and pat my cheeks like a mother hen while my sight zeroes in on every object around, hunting for a threat.

"While I definitely despise the idea of you meeting Thanatos, least of all alone since he clearly informed his hunter outside 'no trailing companion', but I know you can handle it like a champ. Besides, the sight you will be granted of Emerick's six feet of pure male hotness on your way to the meetup, is probably worth it." He beams, all sunshine and rainbows.

A frown marks my face as he starts pushing me towards the door, urging me forward with unparalleled excitement.

But it's concern I hear in his next words that halts me from my robotic accessing of every atom in sight,

"They're not here, Melly. They'll never be anymore." He grips my shoulders, gives it a squeeze and flashes me a bright smile, "Now go kick Thanatos' sexy ass for throttling me yesterday and gather your Intel with your irresistible charms."

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For all of Joshua's illogical excitement, Emerick and I barely conversed a word as he led me up the stairs to the second floor. When we reached the familiar wing I'd been roaming yesterday, he'd simply gestured to a wooden door.

"This is Master Thanatos' bedchambers. You're to be queried here." He'd gently frowned for a moment before blinking it away, "I wish you luck."

Then without another word, the shadow hunter was gone.

Which brings me to the present, standing alone in the hallway, staring at the stupid door in front of me.

A silver carving of an eerie goblin's face is engraved on the wood, it's lips stretched into a disturbing grin.

Ofcourse, this is Thanatos' chamber door. Why he chose his room for the query though was beyond me.

Shaking my head, my knuckles nearly tap on the goblin's face when the door swishes open on its own.

"Come on in, darlin'." The sensous midnight voice purrs from somewhere within the darkly lit room.

I consider stabbing him again for simply calling me that, but realizing how childish it would be and that I need to know about this supposed query just as much to figure out what he wanted from me, with a sigh, I step in.

Thanatos' heady musk scent hits me in waves, stronger than ever and impossible to ignore in the closed confines of his chambers cast in nothing but moonlight.

The enormous size of his room is but a few scrapes of dark wood furniture and a king-sized bed in the utter darkness. I doubt he even owns a bed lamp, so at odds with the overly elaborate clothing he adorns himself in.

Although the male in question is nowhere to be seen. On cue,

"In here." The Shadow King calls out from a distance.

I follow the sound out towards the open space of the huge balcony where moonlight shone the most.

Wind carressed my skin like a lover's embrace, cold and chilly but calming. The sky was a dark purple and midnight blue hue, the moon bright and the stars like diamonds scattered around it.

Below, beyond the towering brick fence of the castle, a city lay in all its night glory, buzzing with energy. Town markets, beautiful houses with puffing chimneys, busy boisterous streets, children roaming about, men and women chatting among their friends and peers, there seemed to be more life out there than I'd ever expected Shadowlands to possess.

"The Shadow City. It's beautiful, isn't it?" My host asks, his voice silky smooth as ever yet there's a hitch in his tone, a slight slur of emotion before its gone.

I take a deep breath, avert my gaze to the man in question, not admitting to him it truly is beautiful.

Thanatos lounges on a plush velvet black settee, his head tipped back against the open night sky, a glass of wine in hand and eyes strewn shut.

He gestures with his free hand for me to take a seat, somehow knowing where I stood without even a glance.

I force my feet to move, force myself to take a seat far farthest away adjacent to him at the 'C' shaped settee, reminding myself over and over again that I had to know what he wanted for Lys and Eli's sake, that I couldn't harm him before he expressed his motives.

"Tell me, is wanting to live such a waste of a wish?" He questions out of nowhere, eyes still shut, lips humming a strange gloomy melody.

I didn't know what the hell he's on about, didn't particularly have the patience either.

"What did you want to ask-"

"The answer is, yes. It is. Because I kill them anyways. They shouldn't bother with the wishes." He swirls the content in his glass absent-mindedly.

My fists clench on my lap, disgust coating my being. The disdain in my words are clear when I say, "If you're done with your talk about wishes and killing, I would like to know about your query. So we're done with it and you could enjoy your own company."

"Company? Never had it." He tsks, takes a sip of his wine and pauses, "Fancy a wine?"

My silent glare is answer enough.

Thanatos shrugs as if he could feel the glare without even looking.

"About the query," Those blue and green pair of eyes flutter open, the silver flecks in them seeming to shine brighter like stars under the moon as they fix on me, "There's two versions of the prophecy you're part of, chosen one. Three, if you include the one Dyrk is obsessed with—the one no one knows about except him."

"Dyrk?" My brow raise in question.

"The Master Manipulator's name." Thanatos tilts his head, "Not the real one. But middle name. A shadow creature, including half-blood shadow hunters, never reveal their true first name to anyone. Even on their deathbed."

This wasn't the topic I was here to discuss, yet I find myself asking, "Why?"

He sets his wine flute on the glass table, "Our kind can be controlled by our first names. It's bound to our life force from the moment it's given to us. Highest of powers can be bought down by a single whisper of our names, we can be used like puppets to do anything the knower of our name wants us to. After birth till we die, our parents are the only ones who know our name beside ourselves. Not even siblings are allowed to know of each other's first names. Such is the terms of our shadowy world. To willingly tell someone our first name is considered an intimate act of trust. And we shadow creatures are a distrusting lot, you see."

That's. . . .

I didn't even know. So if I just knew Thanatos' or Dyrk's first name, I could control them? Like how compulsion works?

But something clears from his declaration.

"So this master manipulator is a shadow creature? I thought you said he was a psycho-kinetic?" The bite in my voice is very much present.

"Can't he be both?" Twinkling blue-green eyes peer at me, "He's a shadow creature with psycho-kinetic powers. A rarity among our kind, infact only one survivor of psycho-kinetic ability holder is alive now. Dyrk's late parents were both psycho-kinetics, powerful ones. So their child was expected to be indestructible." A faraway look crosses his features for a minute then softly, "I suppose he is."

"What does he want from me?" A frown grows between my brows.

"Ah, that." Leaning back against the plush black velvet settee, his sensous mouth stretches into a slow smile, "You tell me."

"How would I know?" I was playing on eggshells, urging him to reveal more of what he knew. It wasn't like I knew anything about Dyrk's motives either ways.

"Well, well." He drawls, "You want to know why I've been looking for you?"

A blank stare in retort.

Thanatos gazes up at the starry sky, "It's because the master manipulator is so desperate to find you. I wanted to know why. After reading the letter you showed me the other day, it had me more suspicious. Dyrk had never went out to kill anyone by himself. Let alone leave a letter behind. He has his cronies to do his dirty work." A reluctant pause, a flash of emotion, appearing than dissapearing.

He continues, "Yet he did all of it and for what? He didn't even have anything to do with your mate or childlings. Didn't he want you? Then why not just take you? What need is there for all the dramatics of abducting and killing and waiting? Makes one curious. I thought by bringing you here first, I'd find out what it is he craved from you and figure out his motives but turns out, you're as clueless as me, if not more."

I've been thinking about that too. For as long as I can remember. Why wait for me? He'd known my location four years back. He could've taken me then. Why wait for me to approach him? Why take Lys and Eli? Why bring Ryan into it? I am clueless indeed.

"What does the prophecy mean?" Thanatos is now staring at me, his body turned to mine, no longer slumped against the couch.

I blink then whisper, "I don't know."

His lips twist, "Whatever it is he wants you for, it has to be connected with the prophecy and your powers. There's no way he'd have mentioned the chosen one part in the letter otherwise. We need to know what the prophecy means."

That curious gaze settles on me as he muses, "What are you, by the way? Certainly not a normal hybrid. I sensed more than four sources of powers from you when I touched you the other day, all different, ancient. It's a wonder how you're still intact and haven't exploded into cinders or gone insane with that much powers inside of you."

Expression steeled to a blank one that gives away nothing, my gaze lifts to observe him, taking in his mind considering possibilities, "What does any of this have to do with you?"

Thanatos pauses, then smiles, "Let's just say Dyrk and I have a debt going on. He did something for me centuries ago and I refuse to do my part of the bargain."

I try my best to not show the incredulity on my face, "So you want to what, kill him-" I reconsider my words, "-Capture him because you don't want to do what he asks of you in return of your debt?"

A vigorous nod, "Yes, that and I don't particularly like him."

This man was insane.

"What could be that hard to return?"

Thanatos' mismatched eyes are unreadable, but his smile is bright as the oncoming sun, "Maybe I'm just petty and don't want to listen to him?"

Done. I was done with him.

"You said there's two versions of the prophecy. I know only one passed by my ancestors, what's the other?"

"Ah, I've never been particularly interested in these prophetic things but I know someone who is well-versed with the another version," He rests his head back on the velvet couch, the blue and green streaks of his hair the only colour among the black of his hair and the furniture, "She's a mystic. Might be a bit crazy too."

"Might be? What do you mean?"

"You ask so many questions, darlin'. I thought I was to query here." Those eyes shut again, but the ever-present smile is still intact on his lips. Like they were permanently plastered to his face.

"Where can we find this mystic?" I pose yet another question, not giving a damn how he called me out.

Thanatos' smile stretches so wide, those dimples appear on his cheeks. For a moment he looks. . . too beautiful not to stare.

His dark, thick lashes frame his face, his skin a smooth pale under the moonlight and those tresses of his triple coloured dark hair add to his ethereal beauty.

My sight lingers on his face, slides slowly down his sharp jawline. The column of his throat is bared as if in offering. He'd been wearing a black overcoat with the colar up to his jaw but because of his head stretched and tipped back, the side of his neck is exposed enough for me to see. . .

"Why do you have stitches on the stab wound on your neck? Didn't it heal?" I don't know why I even bother to ask, but the red, angry gash where his skin had been sealed by haggard, rough stitches was swollen. It looked near ready to get infected which was. . .odd.

Supernaturals didn't conjure such wounds because we healed in time. We're usually tended by salves to keep the bleeding at bay and then the wound is let to heal, the skin let to patch on its own.

Thanatos' smile almost drops, before he frowns a little pulling the colar of his shirt up as discreetly as possible.

Smiling wider then before, those eyes flutter open, "You'll find Esmeralda and Emerick in the fighting arena in the basement floor of the castle. Tell them I commanded to take you to the mystic and they'll take you."

"But-"

"The mystic leaves before sunrise, I suggest you hurry if you wish to meet her, darlin."

Before I could ask about his wound again, he grabs the entire wine decanter from the table, takes a long swig and rises from the settee.

His tall height towers over my sitting form, eyes unreadable but that overly bright smile intact, "Goodluck with the crazy mystic."

Then Thanatos is gone in a swirl of smoke and shadows and black mist.

All the while I sit there stranded in the balcony and wonder,

Why didn't he heal?

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Whatcha hiding Thanatos?👀

Any guesses on what Mellisa's dream is about?👀

Got theories on what Thanatos' end of the bargain is?👀