Kris paced the length of his room, clearly agitated. How could this have happened? He was watching her all the time, and when it wasn’t him, it was one of his pack. She was always under their watchful eye, so how did that thing manage to slip by undetected?

“Duizhang, you’re going to wear a hole in the carpet.”

“Tao, shut up.” Kris replied. But he stopped anyway, and let out a heavy sigh. “The council is going to want to see her, and I don’t think that she is going to be able to hold up against that. She freaked out when she woke up and…”

“She reminds you of your sister,” Tao said suddenly. “You said she reminded you of someone. That’s who.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, Tao,” Kris scoffed. “I don’t know what happened to my sister, but I can assure you, Jinri is not her. We don’t even have the same name. Please just stop talking.”

“Whatever you say,” Tao rolled his eyes. “In any case, I think she’s awake now. She’s moving around in her room.” Kris perked up at this, and headed towards the door.

“Let Luhan know,” he ordered as he left. He headed towards the room where Jinri was, and just as Tao said, she was moving around the room. He knocked and she paused. He could smell her anxiety, and he knew that she probably wouldn’t like it very much that he wasn’t Luhan, but he entered the room anyway.

“Jinri?” He asked, spying her sitting on the floor next to the bed. She looked up at him, her gaze blank. “I’m Kris. You know me, right?” She nodded.

“Where am I?” She asked, much to his surprise. “How… how did I get here?” Kris took her relative calm as a signal that he could fully enter the room.

“You’re safe here,” he said as he walked closer to her. She held out her hand and scooted away, shaking her head.

“That’s not what…I asked. Don’t…come any closer,” she warned. Her voice was halting, and she paused every so often as if gathering her words. “Where’s Luhan? Luhan was in…here. He was in my head before…after that thing.” She tapped the side of her head, and Kris frowned; she shouldn’t have been able to know that Luhan was in her head.

“Luhan is coming,” Kris assured her. “You don’t have to be afraid of me. I’m not going to hurt you.”

“I know, you’re the…leader. You…” She paused, her blank gaze meeting his concerned one. “You’re afraid too.”

“Jinri?” Luhan came into the room, saving Kris from having to answer to Jinri’s comments. “Jinri, you’re awake. Why are you on the floor?”

“It’s comfortable,” she responded, her attention now fully on Luhan. Gaze still blank, she tapped her head again. “You were…in my head. Don’t go in there again.” Luhan looked at Kris, just as surprised as he had been.

“Sorry, I won’t,” Luhan apologized. “Are you feeling okay?” Jinri shook her head and let out an emotionless laugh.

“I had… I had a demon possess me,” she pointed out. “There is never… going to be a time where I will feel…okay.” A silence fell, and Luhan came to sit beside her.

“You need to eat something,” he suggested, and she turned to look at him. “There’s food downstairs. Let’s go.” She let him help her stand without a word, and followed him out of the room, Kris trailing after them. He was shaken by the fact that she had read him so easily.

He was supposed to be levelheaded, but in the past two days he had been given over to the many emotions he kept from bubbling to the surface: anger, worry, fear. Jinri was an enigma to him; he was well aware of her importance, but the girl herself had a way about her. Like Tao had said before, sh