Christian's phone rang.

He groaned as he rolled over and felt Lissa stir next to him. Her limbs were curled around his, a wonderful, tangled mess of skin and heat. He ran a hand down his face and stifled another more annoyed grumble as he looked at the clock. 2:37 a.m. He recognized the tune coming from his phone. The jingle pierced his hazy thoughts as a face is finally pulled to the front of his mind.

Adrian. Of course.

"Who is it?" Lissa looked over at the phone through sleepy eyes. She's laying across his chest.

"It's Adrian," Christian sighs. He picks up the phone. "Adrian, it's two thirty in the morning. If you need a ride home, you should remember I'm across the country-"

"It's not Adrian, Christian," a frantic voice says through the line, almost unfamiliar in it's lack of control.

"Sydney?" Christian exclaimed. He sat up immediately, Lissa following after his declaration.

"I... I wasn't sure who to call," she began, her voice crackling and hoarse. Where was she?

"It's no problem," Christian assured her. "Is everything okay out there? You're calling awfully late..."

Lissa's eyes are trained on him. Christian can feel her worry seep into the air and skimmed a hand through her hair, cupping her face. She leaned into his hand, worry and unease still lighting her eyes.

"Christian, is... I need to..." Sydney sounds choked, the words coming out wrong somehow. He tensed and waited for her to catch her breath. Christian dropped his hand, slicing his eyes to Lissa who now sits up.

Neither of them are remotely tired anymore.

"Sydney, what's happened?" Christian asked, his tone firm, but worried. "You sound awful."

"I need- talk- Vasilisa," Sydney kept cutting in and out of their phone conversation.

"Syd- Sydney? Can you hear me? Are you alright?" Christian spoke anxiously into the phone. "Where are you?"

"Christian- you need to send someone for me," Sydney's voice was breathless but strong this time. She sounded like she was running.

"Something's happened- I- I can't; something terrible..." her voice broke on another sob.

Christian began to feel sweat break under his arms and throughout his body while ice encased his stomach. He knew there was only one reason Sydney would be in such hysterics.

Christian cleared his mind of the fear and dread that was trying to tear his orderly thoughts apart.

"Sydney, what has happened?"

Christian heard her stop running, heard her stop breathing, and for a second her grief, so real, so palpable, came through the phone line and kicked him straight in the stomach.

"Syd-"

"Adrian. He's a Strigoi; he's gone. I lost him." Her voice is barely a whisper through the line but her words are like a cannon in his head, impossibly loud and horribly destructive.

"What did you say?"

"Adrian's a Strigoi now."

And then Sydney started running again.

I remember when I was younger my mother secretly took me to a local art exhibit. My father was out of town for the day with the Alchemists when she came into my room, with large eyes and a bright smile full of teeth. She put a finger to her lips as a gesture for my silence; I mimicked her, telling her I understood.

I remember giggles. I remember happiness. I remember my hand held tightly in hers, the sweat that slicked my palms. The reverberation of our footsteps off of the marble tile and stone walls that brought us to one painting in particular.

The main color of the painting was gray. The different shades ranged from pale to dark, each swimming in and out of the other. The gray was comforting the way the Alchemists had taught me to recognize and adapt to. The way I had been born into. It was uniform, solitary, constant; safe. There were harsh strokes and there were soft pats. I recognized a sad quality as it soaked itself throughout the canvas.

The colors, however, were what frightened me the most.

In the midst of the gray the artist had painted a mess of bright colors, tangling in and out of each other like a web of yarn. There were flashes of purple and green and red and orange as if someone had spit them onto the center of the canvas. The color black bled down the center, through the middle, up the sides, like loud and confused tears.

I felt the flicker of fear in my chest, squeezing and pinching my breath in my throat. The painting was dark despite it's brilliance. It gave me the impression of infinite loneliness, all of that brightness caught in a storm cloud of furious ache. The storm of emotion was shown loud and clear in the midst of the gray calm. The color rebelled against the gray, splashing everywhere and showing off like a peacock on display.

The painting was named Frailty in Balance.

Three Months Later

I haven't slept for more than 3 hours a night.

I haven't eaten a full meal.

I refuse to stop looking.

Since we were taken by the Strigoi, I refuse to stop looking for answers.

I was released by the Strigoi, as promised. With their gleeful smiles laced with cyanide and evil I wanted to throw up as they shoved me out of my cage. Adrian only gave me one warning before they separated us. Possibly forever. "Remember our promise. Run." His eyes full of scorching misery and determination, my throat sticky with words I never would choke out. He was the strong one; I was weak. I remember the Strigoi circling him as I was lead out. I remember my heart cracking through my body, tearing everything, shredding, ripping, my mouth clenched into a silent half scream-sob.

Being thrown into the dirt outside with nothing but my tears and a numbing ache.

I hit the ground running that night as fast and as hard as I could go. My fear and adrenaline carrying me as far away from the screams I could get.

But were they his or mine?

I don't remember anymore.

I was sweat soaked and tear stained when Eddie found me- I fought off anyone who came near me. That night there wasn't a difference between a Moroi and my nightmares.

They weren't Adrian.

They were demons of my own past come to haunt me. They were Strigoi. There was no difference that night.

I refuse to speak to anyone about the night they found me. Or about Adrian. I can feel them looking at me with burning eyes, question mark eyes, but I refuse to give in. They know the official report about what happened in the cave, in my cage, but none of them understand. It's a black scorch on my soul, a rip through a painting, a searing reminder I live with everyday.

I refuse to give up on.

I've woken up screaming a lot since that night. The dreams come swiftly and effortlessly whenever I close my eyes. They swarm my brain, consume my body, paralyzing me with it's mind numbing terror until I sit up gasping and choking on my own screams. I wake up to hear Adrian whispering my name, the voice growing fainter as I awaken. I cried at first; now I walk to the kitchen and make coffee with shaking hands, hoping to avoid sleep altogether.

I've been floating by on half truths and lies for the last three months. I can't remember the last time I looked up at the sky or tasted food. My clothes, once a perfect fit, hang slightly off of my bones. I would have been happy with this change but now I can't seem to drum up the enthusiasm. I don't have the inclination. The girl looking back in the mirror is a Sydney I don't remember. I stare at my reflection and wonder who the pale, skinny girl with the pinched mouth is.

I have decided to avoid mirrors.

The Alchemists are working to find Adrian under Vasilisa's express request. They would have given up weeks ago if it weren't for his blood ties to the crown and Vasilisa's position as queen. Most are angry to be playing politics with the vampires. If the Alchemists don't look for Adrian Ivashkov, it would look suspicious. Adrian's name is well known in the Moroi world and our world.

His last name in itself can't be swept under the rug and labeled another Strigoi tragedy.

I keep this in mind and try to breath with lungs that refuse air.

My mind is spinning with shades of gray and bursts of pain and color that penetrate the fog, the only thing reminding me I'm still human.

And still very much alive.

Sydney, remember, this is our secret

No one can know

Come-

"Sydney, wake up! You're going to be late for class."

I groggily open my eyes to green and brown. I feel my heart falter and shake before I realize it is Jill trying to wake me.

"Jill," I whisper. My throat feels raw. "What time is it?"

Jill's eyes tighten for a second, then widen again. "7:45. You're going to be late, Sydney."

I nod because that's what she wants me to do. I get up because that's what I need to do. I pick out clothes without seeing what my hands are touching. Hand to soft fabric. Repeat.

We're walking through the dormitory hallway to the exit. Jill has been silent the entire time I changed and gathered my things. "You should eat more, Sydney. He... He wouldn't want this."

I feel my spine stiffen. Suddenly the hallway shrinks into nothing and I'm clenching my hands, my nails biting into my palms. I feel my heart trying to beat but it's a futile attempt. I stopped feeling anything a long time ago.

I keep going as if Jill hasn't spoken and isn't trying to reach out to me. Her voice is a vague noise in the background compared to the hissing in my mind. I don't react to her. I can't react to her.

I walk out of the dormitory without her.

I'm sitting in my History class and I barely remember my quarrel with Jill. My thoughts criss cross and bury themselves under mountains of shadows and dust. I attempt to be normal for Jill and Eddie. Sometimes I even stretch my lips into a crippled version of a smile.

I don't think I'm fooling anyone.

Eddie keeps reminding me that they have the best Moroi and Alchemists looking for Adrian. Vasilisa is making sure of it. Even Adrian's father, Nathan Ivashkov, is taking part of the search. Apparently both Moroi and Alchemist search parties haven't been able to keep him out of their hair for very long. He started off by giving the vampires and Alchemists money for supplies but now Nathan has apparently been traveling around with different groups, trying to ascertain his son's whereabouts.

"He's been bossing them around like crazy," Eddie told me one day over lunch. "He keeps telling them what they're doing wrong or why they aren't searching here or there."

Eddie shook his head in amazement. Nathan Ivashkov was not known for fatherly affections and this is a shocking revelation for us all.

I float from one class to the other. I want to call the Alchemists for an update, but what can I say?

I need to know if you found him yet. I need his voice other than in my dreams. I'm haunted by a ghost, I'm chasing a dream, I'm running after an illusion. I need to know information, scraps, words, numbers, names, pieces.

It's been three months. And he is still gone from my life.

My body has pieces missing since he left. The past three months I've noticed my taste buds have stopped working, my arms have a chunk missing, my side is gaping, my ribs are a few less. I look down at my hands sometimes to make sure my fingers are still attached, legs still work, my voice, ears, still functional.

Adrian didn't just take himself, he took pieces of me with him. He didn't just take my heart, he took segments of me. And I kept nothing of him. Nothing except dreams and voices. Whispers at night that haunt and send me screaming into the darkness.

I know he is out there with my extra pieces, waiting for me to collect. To put me back together.

My heart is at a stalemate.