I swear the Shadowland should come with a health warning. I'm seriously considering complaining to the Mediator council about the whole thing. I don't actually think there is a Mediator Council, but whatever.

Then of course there's the whole Buffy the Vampire Slayer thing. I mean, why should she get a council and not us Mediator's? Granted her council turned out to be corrupt and evil, but still.

I stared around in annoyance. Madam Zara was really starting to piss me off now. First she drags me out of a perfectly good nights sleep. Then this.

She smiled at me sadly, her eyes filled with infinite regret.

"Hello Sweetheart." She whispered softly. I felt my insides turn to water as an instant chill swept over me. There was something wrong. Something very wrong with the way she was looking at me.

"Um, hi." I replied intelligently. She gave me another grave smile as she moved closer. I sucked in an involuntary breath.

"Don't be afraid child." She whispered just as softly as before.

"Excuse me. But you just possessed the body of my headmaster's secretary in order to suck me into this hell hole. If I want to be afraid I will be."

"This isn't hell." she answered me. Totally disregarding my anger and instead looked at me thoughtfully.

"It is what you make it." She told me.

"I beg your pardon?"

"This place. The shadowland as you call it. It isn't reality, so therefore it has no true form. It appears as you wish to see it. I showed you that the first time I called you up here."

I stared at her in disbelieve. What the hell is it with people and cryptic messages?

"I…..when me and Jesse came up here before, we both saw the same thing." I told her uncertainly.

"No you didn't. You both were very afraid of something you had no control over. You would have had different approximations of it. Yet, you both feared the same thing. For your life, Susannah. So maybe your Shadowland is similar to his after all."

She seemed to consider her theory for a moment before I broke my confused silence.

"So you're saying, this isn't how everyone sees the Shadowland?"

She let out a short cackle, and threw me another un-nerving smile.

"Of course not child. Are you saying that Mr Slater never told you that?" she asked with humour. I however did not see the funny side. Paul was so dead when I got my hands on him.

"No. Paul seemed to have missed out that part. Hey, how'd you know him anyway?" she looked suddenly serious as she turned away from me.

Another chill swept the room as she turned her cold gaze back on me. I felt like I was trapped in a freezer. The whole room went cold. The mist beneath my feet swirled faster. She was way scarier than even I'd realised. She had the whole look-at-me-and-die-a-painful-death thing down pat.

"This isn't going to be easy for you to understand. But please try to." She muttered almost to herself. I nodded slowly.

"When you came to me that day, I knew you had the gift. I felt it in your aura. I also knew you'd be a powerful Shifter some day. I couldn't tell you that though. It would have affected your history later on."

"How?" I asked, pushing my hair out of my eyes. I was kind of thrown by the fact she thought I was powerful. Go me!

"It would have affected how you reacted to Mr Slater. And whether or not you brought Mr De Silva back from the Shadowland. Lots of things." She answered impatiently.

I nodded dumbly. I didn't understand at all, but I was listening anyway.

"When I told you about your 'love to last till the end of time' I was foolish. I with-held information from you because of your friend. I did not wish to reveal your secrets to someone you had not yet shared it with. So I didn't tell you."

"Didn't tell me what?" I asked confused again.

"Every path in destiny has choices attached to it. Fate does not have one option. It merely guides us along the path of many. You had two options. You still have two options." She looked at me with her disturbingly clear eyes.

"I don't understand."

"You don't have to. It has been set. You cheated death many times, meaning your fate must soon reveal itself. You are on borrowed time and it is running out. You have been given the most basic of options. The light or the dark."

"I still don't get it." I said shaking my head. She was mad, and I had to find a way to get away from her.

"Your choices were set many centuries ago by the Shifters of old. You must now choose: Mr Slater or Mr De Silva."

I shook my head. I couldn't believe this. It was really starting to freak me out again. I was scared, but at the same time strangely curious. I felt an urge to understand it all. After all it was my destiny.

Then what she said sunk in. Jesse or Paul? Well that wasn't difficult. I already knew who I loved. Jesse.

She gave a small laugh.

"I'm afraid it isn't as simple as who you are in love with. You could love them both, don't deny the fact. It was meant to be that why. Yet Mr De Silva is the man you have chosen. I am pleased to say he loves you as well. Maybe even more so than you realise. Unfortunately fate has rules."

I swallowed. Can she read minds or something? This was getting kind of creepy.

"What rules?" I asked in a slightly shaky voice. She didn't seem to notice however. She brushed down her lilac top with one wrinkled hand before looking back up at me.

"There are many rules that bind fate. Many are too complex for you to ever even try to understand. But yours are simple. Choose Mr Slater and live your life in the darkness with every treasure you could wish for. Choose Mr De Silva and live in limbo. You will never be able to leave this earth once you die. Which will come swiftly from the hands of his rival."

"Are you saying if I choose Jesse then I'll be killed by Paul?"

The whole thing seemed far too far-fetched for me. She was obviously mad. So what was I doing hanging around?

I tried shifting out of there.

It didn't work.

"You can't get out of here without my say so." She told me with a soft smile. But even as she said it, I felt the same tug as before. Pulling me backwards this time. Further and further away from her.

When I woke up I was spread out on the floor. The secretary beside me was sobbing softly as I lifted my head to look at her. I whipped my head around half expecting to see Madam Zara lurking in a corner somewhere.

But all I saw was the floor covered in files and papers. She'd screwed up the office but good. I put a hand to my head feeling dizzy. Like I'd gone round on the merry-go-round too many times.

"She's breathing again Jesse! Thank God!" I looked up to see Father Dom pulling a fluffy rug around me. I shivered. I did not feel good right now. I felt incredibly weak. Like all the life had been drained out of me. Next I felt someone's arms wrap around mine.

"Susannah!" Jesse said pulling me towards him, "I thought I told you to never do that to me again?"

Is it just my imagination or does Jesse sound…..well scared? He pulled me against him protectively. If only I could stop shivering.

"What happened?" he asked weakly. I gulped.

"Jesse. There's something that I've got to tell you."