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A stiff nod from the Duke. “We’d expecting your timely welcome at the party.”

A jab at his lateness, so the King said, very slowly, “I am afraid this is as much as you will see of me if your sentences aren’t carefully worded.”

The Duke cleared his throat again, and in a lower voice, he said, “We would be honored if you join us to welcome the guests at the party, your Majesty.”

“Thank you, and if I can’t make it, my Commander General will see to the orderliness of the event. “, the Duke blanched at that, Neera’s eyes widened. Zavian held out his hand to her, and all eyes settled on Neera.

The meeting could not have gone any worse, so there was no topping it. Scraping the rest of the damages, Neera reached out to his hand, and Zavian gave a bow to his guests.

“Please excuse us, ” he said. They both left the room, a wake of murmurs following them. As they turned a corner, Neera heard something smash against the wall from the room they had just come from, and voices began to rise. She pulled Zavian’s hand to a stop, glancing at the direction of the dining;

“Why’d you do that?” She asked.

“Cut off their disrespect on our Castle grounds?”

.....

“You shouldn’t have said anything.”

“I am the King,” Zavian said. “And anytime they get away with that, they take a chip, and another, and if I don’t put them in their place, they have power over you. It’s a demon thing, you’ll soon come to understand.”

Neera clamped down on her words as a maid passed by, eyes rising from beneath her bonnet to look at them both before hurriedly fixing it back on the ground and going her way. With the number of maids working in the palace, it was not safe to discuss anywhere.

Neera pushed down the handle of a door behind her, and it opened into a small room. She pulled Zavian inside, and the smell of fresh daisies floated into her nostrils. It was for the many guests staying over, the bed small and tucked against a wall, a window above it, and a table and chair pressed against another corner.

Neera let go of Zavian’s hand. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Zavian looked at her in question, and she proceeded, “About those humans, about what happened to them.”

She heard him curse under his breath, a jumble of words in her ears. He yanked at his hair furiously, but his locks fell back to his face, unruly and stubborn. Neera reached behind her hair, untied her strings, and her hair parted and fell back, calm, and tamed.

Zavian took the string and tied back his hair. “What do you know?” He asked.

“No, you tell me everything Zavian, don’t hide anything from me.”

He fixed his hands on his waist and puffed out a breath of air. The aches in his legs and arms begged to sleep off, and he rolled back his shoulders, wincing as a pain shot through his right one. Knights from far and wide had been summoned, and even the best hunters with senses sharpened for hunt, had not been able to sniff out a lead.

And the humans did not stop disappearing. The village had been the worst hit, and now, humans were handpicked from various kingdoms; a trader returning home late at night was suddenly not seen anymore, two friends running an errand but never got back, a mother stepping out to call her child but doesn’t find him anymore. The news hadn’t spread with panic yet, but a curfew was going to be placed for their safety.

“We don’t know why people are disappearing, “, Zavian began. “And we are still looking, but they vanish without a trace.”

“And are there no eyewitnesses?”

“Very few, but we have asked, checked, hunted, nothing.” He sighed. “It is as if they are off the face of the earth.”

The foreboding swept its icy hands across her back, casting cold deep into her bones at once. Neera had to sit to stabilize herself. Her people were disappearing, and she was seeing a creature. Something told her the two were connected, intertwined with something evil just waiting to overtake.

“I told you I had a really bad feeling…”, her words fizzled off.

Zavian took one knee before her. The damp smell of forest soil and leaves clung unto him. “We will get to the root of this, I promise, ” he raised and kissed her forehead, and Neera shivered.

“Have you… seen anything? Something similar to what I saw? Has anyone you met seen such?” She asked.

Zavian shook his head. “No, and if anyone has, we would have heard of it by now.”

“And how come your wife knows about all of this, and I don’t?”

“Neera,” his hand was light against her cheek. “Jasmine’s father is a Duke. She was bound to know. Anything additional was what she asked of me, but I wouldn’t purposefully choose to tell you and make you even more worried.”

Neera rose. “You wouldn’t have told me? These are humans, Zavian! They all need to know that someone or something is after them, and they need to be prepared. Protecting me isn’t hiding things like these from me, Zavian.”

“I know,” Zavian shed off his black tunic and folded it over an arm. “And I am sorry, truly I am. Can we please go to sleep for now? I am exhausted.”

“But…” she wanted to say something but there was a thud behind the door. Someone was there.