I never understood why my parents were so terrified of me.

            My mother never hugged me or kissed me good night. My father refused to look at me in the eyes. I felt like some kind of unwanted disease. I thought they hated me. As a child, I was sad. Depressed, even. I was never a sociable kid, so I didn't have a friend I could depend on. I spent my days drowning in the black ink of my old journal. I still kept it in my drawer.

            My daily activities included being locked in the room, unless I was out to the bathroom. I ate in silence, alone in my room. I thought I grew a bit claustrophobic until later in my life. At one point in time, I was scared of the dark and enclosed space. I started talking to myself, just to make sure I wasn't insane. I drew pictures on the walls. I wrote, and I read. But that was as far as I could go.

            Another time I was obsessed with inflicting pain upon myself. But the wound never lasted longer than a minute. I liked the feeling of pain. I kept a knife by my side. By feeling the pain, I felt alive. I knew I hadn't died yet. I wished I were. No one understood how lonely it was inside the room. No one knew how many times I cried because nobody wanted me. 

            I was fed well and alive, but often, I would hear my mother and father's hushed whispers in the middle of the nights. They were always talking about something I couldn't hear. Until one day I found out that they were talking about throwing me away to the streets. It was either I was thrown away or they would run away from the house.

            Both options were not fair. I had no idea why they loathed me so much. I felt betrayed. Angry. These burdens were maddening; the sound of my heart beat louder than the worldly noise. So that faithful night, a few days after Christmas, I ran. I had no directions, I just knew I wanted to be out of the house and away from people who didn't want me there.

            They said at one point in time, a person became numb when too much pain became unbearable. Maybe. I couldn't numb the pain. I could only bite back the tears that threatened to appear whenever I thought of them. These tears weren't tears of anger anymore, they were of anguish, madness... and perhaps longing.

            I longed to belong somewhere. Or someone. A place or a person; it never really mattered.

            For years, almost thirty years, in fact; I wandered around the streets. I was only a girl. There was only so much I could do. Sometimes I begged for food and money. Often I stole from the nobles when they visited the village to flaunt off their wealth. In no time, I became very good in what I was doing. Money, food, jewelries; I could steal anything without anyone knowing.

            When I was forty years old, I confirmed my suspicion and realized that my face hadn't aged one day since I was eighteen. The surface of my skin was still smooth and baby-like, wrinkle-free and blushing red. I was terrified of myself, especially when I looked at my own reflection and saw the unchanging beauty I had. At the same time, I was overjoyed. I was going to live with this face until I died.

            But then.

            Fifty years old was how old I was when I first met Jinki. It was a cold, winter night. I was always bitter about winter. Every bad memories that I had happened in winter night. Except for Jinki. He taught me to think against all prejudices. He caught me on the street, and his first sentence to me was, “I found you.”

            Jinki introduced me to this Other dimension I never knew existed. It was a world called the Shadows where all creatures of mythology and fairy tales existed. He became my mentor, the sole person I depended on and trusted. He also told me that I had a purpose in life, and it was a debt my parents had yet to pay.

            He told me the reason why I would never age was because I was an Immortal. When I was a child, my parents made a promise to the Great Demon himself, a deal I had to repay in their stead. I had a distant memory of what happened when I was a child. Every time I tried to remember something from my past, there was a lock that prevented me from doing so.

            As a result of that promise, the Great Demon mixed his blood with mine. And I was given eternal life.

            I would stay young forever. But that didn't mean that I was invulnerable. I could die if my body suffered certain chemical. Jinki taught me how to fight and survive. Before long, I had gotten this ability. I could steal others' abilities, and that made them so fearful of me. My touch became lethal. My gift was a terrible curse.

            “She is sleeping,” I heard Baekhyun's rough voice nearby. It was the Lord talking to someone. My body was sour. I was knocked out and dreamt about my past. How inconvenient. He must have managed to bring me back while I was unconscious. I wondered why he went through so much trouble just to have me back by his side. It wasn't like he liked me or anything...

            “I never thought she'd be the type to listen,” Jinki chuckled. I had been away from Jinki for so long. I thought I had forgotten how he sounded like. His voice was the same comforting, velvety tone. “She doesn't seem all too happy to be back.”

            My eyes were still closed, and I calmed the heart beat down, so that I could listen to their conversation. These two Demons didn't bother to keep their voices down, considering that it was just three of us in that enormous house.

            “Of course not,” The Lord chuckled, “She was about to run away.”

            “I can imagine,” Jinki must have looked my way and I shifted my sleeping position into that of a fetus. “This girl can be a real trouble when she wants to be. But I guess she still listens to you, even just for a bit. She doesn't listen to just anyone, you know.”

            “How is that even counted as 'listening'? I merely knocked her down for good,” I heard My Lord scoffed. He wasn't annoyed. He sounded partly amused, partly curious. I was imaging him with a small smile tugging on my lips. He must be folding his hands, a wide grin decorating his luscious red lips. Correction: Baekhyun's red lips.

            “You should know she is not obedient like Joo Ri.”

            Hearing her name suddenly irritated me. I didn't want to be compared to Joo Ri ever again. If I was going to hear her name for the next few millenias, I would rather just die.

            “Do not say her name in front of me,” My Lord spat, his voice growing cold and distant. He was being extremely sensitive right now. Jinki sighed and stepped closer to him. My smile turned to a frown. They were whispering. Words and curses. Among those words, I heard my name, as if they were fighting about it, and they said it somewhere along the line,

            “Then why do you bring her back? She's fine out there on her own!” It was definitely Jinki. He sounded mad. I too, should have been mad. He didn't seem to like the fact that I was here right now. I moved a bit, just enough to let them assumed I was still sleeping soundly. Now my mentor scoffed, “She can fight. I have been with her on countless battles, and she can hold her own against hundreds.”

            There was a long, amicable silence. The world was still. My heart beat calmed down a bit, almost as if it wasn't beating at all. I didn't hear anything at all; not even the sounds of winds or rustles of the trees. I began to question their presences, but I hadn't heard them walking away, so they must be there.

            “The reason why I bring her here is because the Vampires have allied themselves with the Faeries to start a search party,” The Lord finally spoke up, in a softer tone, though his voice was still on the edge. “They have started to recognize her face.” He stopped again, thinking. “And the leader for this search party is Ara. And the two Faery Princes.”

            Lady Ara. Her name was as famous as her secretive nature. It hadn't been very long since she created the chaos in my house. And destroyed it, too.

            The two Faery Prince of the Courts. Prince Kyungsoo from the Winter Court had come and accompanied Lady Ara during her visit to my house. I knew Baekhyun was terrified of him. He seemed like a trouble to begin with. I had seen his parents during a Shadow festive. They were frightening.

            I had only ever seen the Summer Prince from pictures. I had heard of him from rumors. His twin sister was killed during the last War with the Vampire Elders. Pity. In the Shadow world, the union of twins were very rare. They held incredible power. But when one died and the other lived on, I didn't know what could possibly happen.

            To think that the whole Shadow world was on a hunt for me was horrifying, yet exciting. I had always lived in the dark. I tried not to show up to anyone because of my rare bloodline. Whenever people heard about the Demon clan, they only thought about bad things.

            And besides, I was sure no one would want to see this face. This face of mine was a remembrance to the terror they had in the past. Not many of the Shadow creatures remembered what Joo Ri looked like, but I was sure their Elders would know.

            Another thing about me was that I couldn't seem to live without shedding bloods of others. Troubles came and go. I always had missions and that involved taking away lives of many. I didn't like it, but I never hated it, either. Those who had met me said I had an incurable blood lust. But that wasn't true. I killed out of necessity to survive.

            Okay, maybe that wasn't entirely the truth.

            I might have killed someone out of annoyance... once or twice.

            “When did you hear this?” Jinki questioned. He must have calmed down after hearing the reason.

            “Not long ago,” My Lord answered discreetly. There was something authoritative about him; mysterious, secretive and strong. But that didn't mean that I trusted him completely. He was my leader, not my friend.

            “And you didn't tell me about that?”

            There was no reply no matter how long I waited. I figured out that the Lord wouldn't answer this question. After what seemed like hours of waiting, he walked away in silence. Only the sound of his heels echoed in the dark hallway, and for that split second, I thought about what he could possibly think of and feel for that very moment.

            I never got my answer.