Sorry there is no prologue. I didn't feel the need to have one. Sorry, it might be a little bit long. R&R

Russia… one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. But also the home of Dimitri, the love of my life who is now a strigoi. I was here to destroy him… like I promised him all those months ago.

As it turns out, October is one of the warmest months in Russia. So I was taking a jog up to the mountain creek at night where it was rumored there were labyrinths of caves underground. It sounded like a good place to start looking in his hometown.

I was in my old sweats with my bank card from Adrian in one pocket and a bag of cheerios in the other. Being one of the only American breakfast cereals in Russia, cheerios had become my addiction as well as fruit rollups and Ritz crackers. I was running up the path that led to the creek when it hit me.

The nausea that used to scare me to death was now my good friend in my search for my Dimitri. I whirled around and saw what I never expected to see.

The blonde boy that I was fighting on the day of the attack was standing in front of me. He was smiling slightly with his head tilted to one side. His eyes glowed red not only with the fact that he was a strigoi but also with thirst.

I shook my head slowly. This could not be happening. Someone had to have killed him on the way to the moroi dorm back at campus.

"Hello Rose," he said politely.

I shook my head again but this time I was getting ready. I reached to my side for my stake.

"It's been a while since I saw you. How is the Dragomir girl… Lissa? Yes her. I was thinking-"

He didn't have the chance to finish his sentence before I ran at him with full speed and staked him right in the heart. He twitched slightly before he laid still for the last time.

My heart was beating fast in my chest and my hand was covered in blood. Mine or the strigoi's, it didn't matter. I wiped it off on the body's shirt and dragged him to one of the nearby trees. I didn't have time to get rid of the body. I closed his now blue eyes and leaned him against the trunk. I covered the hole in his chest with his arm so and positioned him so he looked like he was sleeping. He was still smiling, somehow, so it looked like he was dreaming.

Remembering his eyes, deep red, that turned blue after he was killed… there was still a part of him that was alive… maybe there was a way to bring about that piece of aliveness.

There was no way to do that, I reminded myself. Many people had tried and failed. But then again not everybody had Lissa…

Then it hit me like a lightning bolt in the rain. There was a way. Spirit magic. Spirit brought life and strigoi were living dead. There was still a part of them that was alive so that meant they could be revived! Why hadn't I thought about this all those months ago, before I had left Lissa and Adrian? There was no way they could both forgive me…

I let my mind seep into Lissa's.

She was crying as usual. Christian had his arms around her and was whispering comforting words to her. Lissa could tell he was getting tired of this.

"Why did she have to leave me?" She whimpered.

"She loved guardian Belikov more than anyone else. Even you, Liss. I'm sorry. I'm sure she loved you second best."

Pain broke through sadness making a heart wrenching combination. Lissa almost collapsed.

Anger broke through the pain. Furiousness. She would never forgive me, I could see that now. But I had to make her. It was Dimitri's only chance. She was his only chance.

Lissa reached for Christian. She wrapped her hands around his neck and began to kiss him. That's when I drew the line.

I ripped myself from her brain and back to my own. I started sprinting back to my hotel as fast as I could. I knew now that Dimitri would never come back to his home town. It would bring back too many emotions which was exactly what strigoi didn't want. They would stay as emotionless as possible for as long as possible. I should have known that.

As soon as I got back to my hotel, I grabbed all my stuff including my backpack full of clothes, my new cell phone which I never used unless it was to get an update from Adrian, and my extra stake which I had gotten from an old lady who I ran into at the airport while traveling to Russia.

The old woman had recognized me somehow by my figure and said, "You need this more than I do, sweetheart." She hadn't even been a dhampir or moroi. Just a human. It had been one of the weirdest moments of my life. Ok, well that's not true. I had had some pretty weird moments.

I went to the lobby of the hotel and checked out, asking for the nearest airport. After I had received directions, I left the building and sat down on the bench by the bus stop.

Mason, my former friend and guy who had been crazy about me materialized to my left. After he had been killed by a strigoi, he repeatedly came to me giving me directions and advice. I almost never followed them and went my own way but he was good company.

"What, Mason?" I hissed quietly.

"Lissa not forgive you," he commented. Ever since the morning after… the cabin, I had let him talk to me and not tried to push him away like I had done before. He still couldn't talk in full sentences though. It took too much effort that he just didn't have in him.

"I know that already, Sherlock." His face turned down even more than it had already been. I immediately felt bad. "I'm sorry. But now that I know what to do, she has to."

At that, Mason frowned and whispered something illegible. Then he said, "Rose, Adrian will help." And with that, he dematerialized, leaving me alone to wait for the bus.

Lissa's 'cousin' as he called it had a gigantic crush on me ever since I met him. He was more than willing to give me what I wanted whenever I wanted it. But what confused me was what was he going to help me with? He could use spirit magic too but not very well. He obviously wasn't going to revive Dimitri. So was he going to help me get Lissa to do it? As much as she probably hated me now, she would do it for 'Guardian Belikov' if she really wanted to.

I chuckled internally at the name. Never in my life had I called him that and I never would. The only names I ever called him besides Dimitri was Dimka (rarely), his Russian nickname and Comrade, his nickname from when I first met him.

My heart ached fiercely at that moment. I never thought about him for long periods of time if I could help it. It only made the heartache worse.

My bus appeared at the corner of the street and I readied my things. Once the bus pulled up to me, I got in and handed the driver my bus pass who looked like he really shouldn't be driving or for that matter standing he was so old.

I got in a seat near the front and waited for a good thirty minutes before we got to my stop: the airport.

I rushed out of the bus and into the crowded luggage area. I ran past all of the people in a rush, shoving people who got in my way.

When I got to the service area, I had to skid to a stop before I ran into the desk.

"May I help you?" The lady asked with a slightly surprised face with the thickest accent I heard since I got to Russia.

"Uh, yeah, you can. I need one ticket on the next plane to Montana in America."

She questioned me for a long time about the location on my destination and all that crap before we got to the juicy stuff.

"Okay, now finally, what is your name, miss?" The lady asked politely.

"Rosemarie Hathaway."

"Good, good. Now would you like an in-flight meal?" Okay maybe not entirely juicy.

"Uh, sure. You got steak?"

When my ticket was paid for and given to me, I rushed to my gate before the lady behind the desk could even say 'Have a nice day.'

They were calling up the last of the rows by the time I got there. I was lucky enough to slide past a few people and hand my ticket to a frustrated looking scanner person. He took my ticket and scanned it then gave it back to me and I was on the plane in a second. I didn't know why I was in such a rush. The plane didn't leave until it did and nothing I could do was going to make it go any faster. Or could I?

Instead of going to my seat like I was supposed to, I handed my ticket and bag to a flight attendant who looked at me with dislike before I slid in the pilots cabin.

The pilot and co-pilot looked at me with disinterest. "Can I help you ma'am?" They asked, obviously bored. I wondered then why almost every Russian person I met spoke English. But that was not important right now.

"Do you think you could speed this process up a little? I'm in a big hurry," I added with a slight smile.

"I'm sorry ma'am but I can't help you there. Your just going to have to wait patiently," the co-pilot told me.

I shook my head. "How much will it take?"

"Excuse me?"

"How much money?"

"No amount can make this plane go any faster."

I started spitting out amounts of money I knew I still had in my account. They stared at me, their eyes huge.

"That last one," the pilot told me.

"Great. Ten minutes then?"

They both nodded simultaneously as I handed them a check and left the cabin. I heard the pilot talking into a talkie while the other started up the plane. I smiled to myself. All there was left to do now was relax. This was going to be a great plane ride now that I knew the solution to strigoi's and that I could save Dimitri. The only problem was getting Lissa to help me. Yep, this was going to be great.

That was, until I found out my seat was right next to the bathroom.

How was it? Horrible? Wonderful? Needs work? Please read and review people!