𝕁𝕦𝕤𝕥 𝕒 𝕡𝕖𝕖𝕜

14. We don't end in Blood

"Alex?" Thea called out, closing the door behind her.

"Dinning room." He shouted back.

The long rectangular wooden table was covered in old books filled with lore.
"Where did all of this come from? I know we have a bunch of books stacked around but not this many." Thea asked as she walked in the room.

"I got them, we have a safe house a few hours from here where all of our less-used hunting stuff is sorted." Kieth answered, handing her a glass of water. "You okay?" He asked more quietly, noting that she looked as if she had been crying.

She nodded before gulping down the cool water, she hadn't drank all day and was past the point of feeling thirst.

"I'm glad you're here." Alex said, sitting up from the table, his head popping out from the stacks of books on the table. "Tell me—your friends are certainly capable—What are they doing now?"

"They're trying to divert the wild hunt, I don't really understand it logically. But the darkness kind of fills in whatever holes in my intellect, which means I can't really explain—"

"It's alright." Alex said. "We know how it works. We assumed that the hellhound would come to that conclusion." He walked past his two kids headed for the kitchen. "Are you hungry? I got some leftovers in the fridge I can heat up."

"Famished." She replied.

"Good, I'm glad you can still..." Alex's voice trailed off, his head buried in the fridge.

"Feel hunger?"

"Yeah." He sighed, she couldn't she his face but the muscles in his back relaxed. He was clearly exhausted, he hadn't been sleeping properly since her mum was killed.
Thea forgot sometimes that she wasn't the only of grieving, Alex loved her mother. She was the only woman he ever truly loved.

A part of him blamed himself for her death Keith's mother had been killed by a monster and he hadn't been there to save her, now the same thing had happened with Lauren.
Thea and Kieth were the only things that kept him going anymore, they were his children, his purpose but they were also his great burden, constant reminders of how he had failed their mothers.
They looked so much like their mothers, and Keith acted just like his mother.
So kind and gentle at heart but forced into this violent world of hunting.
But Thea was more like him.
Though Lauren had confirmed that he was not Thea's father, a part of him always hoped he was really her dad but as time went on, he realised that he was her dad.
He taught her how to ride a bike, he cleaned up every scraped knee and brought her lunch to school when she forgot it. He had been there when her biological father hadn't, he was her dad in all the ways that counted.
But most of all, she had always been his daughter.
They had the same laugh and the same strong will, every part of him that he liked about himself he saw a bit of it in Thea.
When he took her out as a kid every stranger assumed they were father and daughter, and Thea never corrected them.
In her teens they grew further apart as most children and parents do, she began to remind him that he was just some guy who slept with her mother.
In reality he had been in love with her mother for decades, but he knew it must have been hard for Thea to not tell her father about the other man who slept in her parents bed when her father was away on business.
But even the , he loved her because she was still his daughter in his heart.
"Your cousins are upstairs," Alex spoke up again, breaking the nostalgic thoughts in his mind. "let them know I'm heating up an extremely late dinner. It should be ready in 30 minutes."

"Okay." She nodded, before walking upstairs.
"Cin? Marcus?" Thea walked into their empty room confused, before she could turn around to look for them a blinding white pain slammed into the back of her head.