"Ow…" I muttered, rubbing the back of my head, discovering I had a huge lump there. What the hell happened to me? I thought I'd just…what did I do? Faint? Pass out? I didn't think I'd hit anything, or been hit…

"And so sleeping beauty awakens," Adrian chuckled at his own joke. I hadn't missed him much…even know I really did owe him what ever 'success' I had. After all, I wouldn't have made it anywhere without the money he gave me.

"Rose!" Lissa breathed, wrapping her arms around me. "I'm so glad you're okay!" her voice trembled, and I was almost sucked into her head with all of the mixed emotions pouring through.

"Hey Liss…what happened to me? And how long was I out…?" I should've known that little dream was too good to be true. How stupid could I be, to think that I'd actually get to keep Dimitri once I found him? Not stupid, desperate. Killing him was going to kill me, so hunting him down was practically suicide.

She pulled back, grabbing on to my hand and releasing the rest of me. "No-one really knows…Alberta and Alina said you just sort of blacked out after throwing a fit, when you collapsed you hit the door pretty hard…" well, that explains the lump. "And you've been out for about four days now,"

"Shit," I muttered at myself. "I'm never gonna find him at this rate!" I went to stand up, but I wobbled on my feet and collapsed back onto the bed. "Ow…" my head was spinning and my sight was all blurry.

"You need to rest," a gentle but wise voice chanted into my ear. She scared the absolute shit out of me.

I spun around to face her, ready to start screaming again. "Who are- oh, hey." It was Alina, and she was looking very concerned. "What's wrong?"

She seemed surprised that I asked her what was wrong. But why? "How can you see that?..." she mumbled, looking at me with a dazed expression.

"You look a lot like…your uncle, when you're upset; it kind of gives you away." I couldn't say his name aloud, so I settled for the term she used earlier.

"Right. Well it's nothing really, it's just he was right about you, which surprises me. I thought he was exaggerating…"

"Who? And what'd they say?"

"Uncle Dimka…w-when…after, after he was changed…he came to see me, and he told me I must come here, come here and become a guardian. And he told me I had to take care of you…that I had to make sure you didn't get yourself hurt. He said it would be hard because of your personality, because he knew how determined you were. But when I got here they told me you were gone…I failed him."

Well, that wasn't what I was expecting… "No, you didn't fail him. I did." I'd almost forgotten why I was here, jeez. "Which is why I need your help…I was told that you could help me find him, can you?" I stared at her with what I suspected was a very desperate expression.

"I…but you'll…you'll kill him though, won't you? That's why you're looking for him, isn't it?" she looked very sad and hopeless as she said that, and it set my heart on fire to see it.

"What else can I do? It's what he would want. We talked abut it once, and he said he'd want me to kill him if that happened to him, just as I would. I-," I was crying now, and it made me feel so weak…I couldn't look at her while I was like this, I felt too shamed out. So I turned away, closing my eyes and letting the tears flow.

I hand brushed the back of my hair while another one picked up my hand. I felt a light tingling sensation, and then it was over. I wasn't in pain anymore, but tears still stained my cheeks. I thought Lissa must have healed me at first, but I would have felt the brightness of the life that flowed through her come through to me. Plus, when I opened my eyes I realized it was Alina holding my hand and not Lissa.

"Thanks," I mumbled. I forgot she specialized in spirit as well…

"Roz- err, I mean Rose. I…I think I might be able to...bring him back. But, I've never tried it before, and I don't know if I can. So I'll make you a deal…you bring me with you and let me try and bring him back, and I'll tell you were to look. If I can't help him then…then you can do what you have to…but I just need to try. I can't let you kill him when there's still hope. I just can't…" she started crying, and I quickly brushed the tears back.

I nodded. "I know. Trust me on this one, I know. But what if you can't? What if I get you…killed? I'm a strigoi target now, and being with me is the exact opposite of safe. I couldn't risk getting you killed…" I was trying to do the right thing, but frankly I wanted her to come, I wanted her to try. But Dimitri wouldn't have wanted me putting his niece (in a way) in danger. If I let her get killed, then I would have failed him again.

She snorted. "Well that's my problem then, isn't it? Besides I can help you kill them. I specialized in fire, too ya know. It'll be easy. So whata' ya say? Are we a team?" she stuck her hand out, looking very confident about it.

It was probably the most stupid and reckless this I'd done in a while, but I grinned and grabbed her hand. "We're a team,"

"Hey," Eddie interrupted, "What about us? You can't just leave us here. I wanna' come to. I'll keep count of all the strigoi we kill so we know how many molinja marks we need," he was both joking and serious at the same time. Serious about coming, joking about keeping count.

"Well," I perked up, trying to look smug. "I'm already about fifty strigoi ahead of you, so you'd better get to work.

All eyes widened when I said fifty, and Eddie's mouth dropped open. "Fifty? I thought you were just looking for one strigoi!"

"What did you expect? That I'd just go kill…him and ignore the rest? I had to get some practice in anyway…plus fifty was just agues, I stopped counting after I got to half of that. After the first week I think," I'd probably killed a hell of a lot more then fifty strigoi, but there was no need to boast.

"Shit, you're not going to have enough neck left to fit anymore tattoo's. They'll have to make you another special one." Eddie was in awe, while the other were simply stunned. I didn't really think much about killing them anymore, so it took me a moment to remember that even if I was still at school that I wouldn't have even graduated yet and that I'd already slaughtered more strigoi then most of the people here would even see.

"It's no biggy. But um… I don't want to sound impatient or anything…but could we leave now? Cause' I'm fine thanks to Alina, and I'm already kind of behind on my training…"

"Training? You still train?" Eddie frowned in confusion.

"Yeah, the other strigoi I kill, you know the ones that aren't him. That's all they are." I stood up and trotted over to the door, they followed.

"I'll go get some clothes backed up, and then I'll meet you at the gates. Is Eddie coming?" Alina said as she peeked up at Eddie after she squeezed through the door.

"I…do you really want to? It really isn't safe being seen with me, I'm on the strigoi hit list." I said, turning to look at Eddie.

He blinked twice, then all but yelled "Hell yeah!" with more enthusiasm then necessary.

"What about me and Christian? We're coming too!" Lissa declared, but I wasn't having that.

"No. you're both staying here, okay? It'll be hard enough sneaking these two out and taking care of them outside. I'm not risking you like that Liss, no way in hell." I turned to Christian and shrugged. "I don't mind if he comes, we can use him as bait or something."

His eye literally twitched, and he started muttering things to low for me to hear. Everyone else started laughing, including Lissa.

"Lissa, once this is all over, I'll come back. I'll come back and I'll graduate and me and you'll be living it up at the royal court," I flashed a confident smile and snatched her up into a tight hug. "I promise." I whispered solemnly into her ear, and I felt the belief swell up inside of her. Man I hated lying to Lissa, but I knew that was probably the only real way I was gonna get out of here without her following along.

***

It was way easier then I thought it would be to sneak Eddie and Alina out, cause she had super awesome compulsion skills just like Lissa and Adrian. All she had to do was firmly and clearly state a demand and they moved aside, opening the gates wide. She didn't even need to make eye contact, nor stop walking.

"Well, that wasn't as hard as I'd expected. I had plans and everything. I was gonna knock them both out and figure out how to bust the gate down before we were swamped with guardians. And if we were swamped I was gonna hold a stake to you're-" I nodded towards Alina, "Throat and threaten to kill you if they didn't let us pass."

They both laughed at this, and Eddie murmured something along the lines of "Same old Rose," while Alina chuckled "All the stories were true," which hurt a bit, because I didn't know if she meant Dimitri's stories or the legends at school.

"So, where exactly are we headed? I thought he'd be somewhere in Russia, but I could never find him no matter where I searched." I frowned, annoyed at my lack of progress.

"Yeah he's in Russia. But he knew you'd be looking for him so he keeps moving. He lives by himself in a nice big house, and he feeds off the humans there. The towns name is Balashov, he's house is practically on top of the Khopyor River."

I grimaced. "I was in that town about a week before I showed up here, why didn't I find him? I found a house on the river that smelt like strigoi and I found three of them living in it. Sure, they're dead now but they didn't know anyone by the name of Dimitri. Or so they said…" shit! I should've known better then to trust a strigoi. Oh well, there dead now anyway. That thought made me smile a little.

"You killed Anton, Boris, and Georgy? But they were centuries old…I didn't think it was possible, but you're better then the stories say. Whoa, and that's saying something." Her eyes were wide as the scanned me, looking for some hint of a lie. "Oh and yeah, whenever he here's you're heading his way he takes off, goes into hiding. Apparently he saw you once, when he was hiding in a cave with a few other strigoi. He saw you get caught…" she sneezed and rubbed her nose.

"But then he saw you use a deodorant bottle to set the guy on fire or something, after you finished talking to him. He said the guy was trying to convince you to turn, but that he wouldn't, even know he promised that if he did that you'd be back with Dimitri… he was about to jump in to try and help, but he was scared that the memory that you would have of him would be of the monster he is now. He was happy when you burned the guy." She looked up and smiled. "He still loves you; you're the reason he's able to go on searching."

"How the hell do you know all this? Do you like meet up with him frequently or something?"

"He writes to me…he's not a monster yet Rose. He still has his humanity, but he's too afraid that he'll give in, so he doesn't want you to see him. I tried telling him to come see me so I could try and help him, but he thinks that he'll kill me, because I'm technically a Moroi." She scowled, clearly not pleased with this. "I think I'm more dhampire then Moroi, if I didn't have the magic then I would be. I don't need blood, which is pretty weird but I think it's cool. I tasted it once though…it was an accident though." she pursed her lips at the memory, frowning at something in the distant past.

"How do you accidently bite someone?" Eddie wondered, joining in the conversation.

"I was in the middle of…a make out session we'll call it. The dipstick I was kissing crushed my foot and I went t clench my teeth, almost took off his lip. It taste pretty good, but it's not necessary, soi don't waste the supplies. Makes me stronger too, but oh well." She shrugged it off like this was all old news to her, mean while I almost hit a tree from laughing so hard.

"You bit a guy while you were making out?" I managed to choke out between my cackles. She blushed deeply and crossed her arms in a very stubborn matter, turning her head away to stare out the window.

The nauseous feeling slapped me in the face and I pressed down on the peddle at me foot. "Shit!" there was a loud screeching noise as one of the strigoi started clawing at the side of the car.

"Rose what the fuck is that!?" Eddie was panicking now, gripping his stake tightly and sitting over Alina in a very defensive matter.

"I told you it wasn't safe! They know my number plate! Stay the fuck down and keep her under you!" I roared, hitting the accelerator until it almost smashed through the floor. I swerved down the first road I saw, not giving a shit where it lead. It was the biggest mistake I'd made. Two more strigoi were standing in the middle of the road, bracing themselves for the impact. There was no point in swerving, so instead I pulled on my 'special' gloves, and pulled my stake out."You stay in the car no matter what, got it? The instant I'm out of the car you drive Eddie, get her away from here!"

"But Rose you-" he began protesting.

"Don't bother Eddie, I can take them. You just get her safe," I tossed him a radio, and he nodded. "I'll call when you can come pick me up. But you keep driving." With that I smashed the front windscreen; I leapt out onto the front of the car. When we were about 10 meters away from the strigoi ahead of us I jumped.

I would have called it cool if it wasn't so suicidal.

The instant I made contact with the first strigoi I pulled it out of the way, knocking the other one off to the side in the same movement. I definitely caught them both by surprise, and I didn't criticize them for it. What sort of suicidal freak jumps at two blood thirsty monster off a moving car? Not to mention the fact I was hopelessly outnumbered. Having the element of surprise was very, very good though, and I managed to stake the first one with no restraint at all. The second was almost as easy, but the nausea remained.

I threw myself to my feet and braced myself for the next lot. I didn't know how many they were, but I was still pretty confident I could take them all.

"Calm yourself little dhampire. We just wish to talk to you…" the phrase little dhampire caught me off guard, and I found myself being pinned to the ground by two strigoi while another strutted up to start some sort of conversation. A fourth walked over, but his face was cloaked.

"Get your dirt undead hands off me!" I growled, thrashing against there holds on my arms. If I could just land a punch with these gloves on, then I'd be able to 'knock' one out. I had them made especially for this kind of situation. The gloves I had on were –like a stake- fused with magic from each of the four elements. They weren't as deadly as a stake, but that knocked strigoi out for a good ten minutes.

But kick and struggle I may, they didn't flinch even once. "You said TALK not PIN ME DOWN AND FEED!" I roared, thrashing harder against their holds. All of them seemed to be enjoying themselves quite a bit. All of them except for the guy in the cloak. The set of his lips – which I could only just get a glimpse of – was set in a sad grimace.

"You were right," the speaker mock punched the cloaked guys arm. "She is a fighter." He turned back to me and cleared his throat; even know it was totally unnecessary. "Well Miss Hathaway, you truly are just as all of the rumors said. Strong, fast, brave, dangerous… and mostly, you're quite beautiful. We did you reject Allan when he offered to let you become immortal?"

"Let me go dickwad or I'll rip your fucking head off!" I screamed, and at that moment, I managed to get a hand freed. They didn't seem to panicked as to this, but I grinned in triumph as I smashed the bitch that lost grip on my arm hard in the face, sending her flying backwards screaming 'it burns'. I started laughing. "Oh you're fucked now," I grinned, swinging my still-free-fist around to knock the other one off my arm.

The cloaked guy actually seemed happy to see me freed, but at the same time he looked very nerveous.

"Rose, you still alive?" Eddie's anxious voice came through in a buzz.

"Yeah, don't distract me though!" I quickly pressed the reception button so he'd get the message.

"Why aren't they getting back up?" the speakers voice was slightly panicky as I started advancing towards him in battle mode with my stake gripped tightly and pulled back into my chest.

I smiled my sweet-but-evil smile, and started wiggling my fingers. "My gloves have been fused with the elements; your buddies are already dead. Why not come along quietly?" my voice was menacing innocent as I purred the words.

"We honestly just wanted to talk to you! We've got a message from Belikov!" the cloaked guys head twitched as he mentioned Dimitri's name, and I straightened up to listen. I didn't let my guard down, though.

"Okay then talk. Where is he and why is he running?" I demanded, advancing another step.

He flinched back slightly from my close proximity, and I smiled slightly at seeing an ancient strigoi actually fear a 'little dhampire'. "Well-"

"Err, hold on," I backed away from him and then started jogging backwards towards the first one I punched, never taking my eyes off them. I staked her then started side steeping towards the other one, still watching him. "Sorry, they would've woken up if I waited to long." I steeped back towards him. "Please, continue." I waved my hand, indicating he was free to talk now.

He scowled, but continued. "First of all he sends his love," another little piece of my heart crumbled off at the sides when he said that, but I was 99% that I didn't give anything away. "Second he wants you to go back to Lissa, and third he gave me a few questions for you. Are you willing to answer?"

"There's really no point," I took another step towards him, crouching back into attack mode. "Because once you're finished talking I'm going to kill you, so you won't be able to tell him the answers. Unless of course, I might give you a message to return to him, then you'd be of use. I think that's fair, don't you? Go ahead and ask away."

"…Well, he wants to know how you are, and how you're coping with life." He paused, waiting for my answers.

"I guess…I should probably pass those, I don't want to make him unhappy by telling him the only reason I can carry on living is because I still have to kill him, like he once told me he'd want me to if he turned strigoi. and I probably should tell him that killing him is just like committing suicide, but…woops…" I pointed my stake at him, inching closer. "You say a word of what I just said and I'll pry your eyes out with my claws, got it?"

He nodded once. "Next question, if-"

Eddie's voice coming through the radio made us all jump. "Rose you still alive?"

"Yes Eddie, I'm still alive. Didn't I tell you not to distract me? If I don't contact you that means I'm dead. If I'm dead, you take Alina straight back to the academy. So stop bugging me I'm trying to talk!" I sighed and looked back up at the dazed strigoi. "Sorry about the interruption, please continue."

"Right," he shook his head in a clearing motion. "He would like to know this: if you find him, will you go back to the academy and finish your life the way you are supposed to, or commit suicide?" he glanced over at the cloaked guy, he seemed to be anxious.

"I promised Lissa I'd go back, so I'll be going back once i've either killed him, or my friend saves him." I turned at thecloak guy, scowling. "There's something weird about you, but I don't know what. Were you that guy that bailed out on his mates in the cave back in Sponkane?" he ignored me, but I don't think it was intentional. "Hey you there, the cloaked wonder," he turned to face me, but seemed to be facing the ground. "Are you that guy that bailed out on his mates in the cave back in Sponkane?" I asked again.

He shook his head. "We haven't met," he mumbled so low I could hardly hear him. That voice sent chills down my back.

"Right… well I guess you'll never meet anyone again anyway." I crouched down, preparing to spring. " I honestly couldn't be bothered with-"

"can we come get you yet?" Eddie's voice buzzed again.

"Oh my god Eddie fuck off!" I screamed and he went quiet. When I turned back to see the two strigoi that I'd been talking two, they were both retreating into the forest. "Damn it!" I roared. I pressed the reception button, preparing to start screaming at Eddie for making me let the other two get away.

"Ugh! You just totally screwed this up, Eddie! They got away while I was distracted! They knew Dimitri…" there was something very creepy and weird about the guy with the cloak, but I let it go.

"We're already on our way back to get you, o just keep your eyes open."

"Drive fast and be careful. They could come after you. I'll start running to meet up with you," I started jogging in the direction that they'd sped off. "See you soon." I muttered.

I could tell that cloak boy and big mouth were still close because I could still feel the slight nausea. "I know you're out there big mouth! Stop perving on me and either confront me or go tell Dimitri what you know!" jeez, strigoi were getting less and less scary with every kill. It used to be me running away from them, now it was them running away from me, which was just ridiculous. "I can't believe the Moroi live in fear of pussy's like you!" I called out to them, hoping I'd piss them off and they'd come at me.

I could just make out faint Russian voices in the trees, and because I was concentrating so hard on them, I ran straight into the car. "Ow…" I mumbled, dragging myself around to the passenger seat. "You could've beeped or something." I complained accusingly at Eddie, who was laughing that hard that he was crying. "Shut up and drive," I ordered in a harsh tone. "They're watching us so there's still danger. If they attack again I'm throwing you out as a distraction." My threat had him speeding along the road without hesitation.

"How to you know they're still out there?" Alina asked with curiosity evident in her voice.

"I…I don't really know. I can just sort of feel them in my stomach. I just have a gut feeling. I get all nauseous with the closer they get." I explained, and she frowned in confusion before leaning back in her seat.

"How many were there?" Eddie asked.

"Six. I killed four but two got away." I sent him a murderous glare. "The old guy had information. I was gonna get it out of him and then send the freaky cloaked guy off to go give Dimitri my message." I pursed my lips. "Lots of people seem to know him…" I sighed, leaning back into my seat. "Wake me up when we get there." I said, and less then I minute later I was unconscious.

And then Adrian showed up.

We were out in the sunlight, walking through a meadow. I wore an almost see through white tank top and some very short denim short shorts. I black boots that went to just under my knee, and around my thigh I hade two silver stakes strapped down, one on each leg. I was wearing my elbow length silky black gloves, - the ones that were deadly against strigoi. There were straps that went across the front part on my body, and on my back was a very sharp looking axe and a can of gas that had a lighter attached to the front: a flame thrower. One of the straps that ran over my body wrapped around my waist, and in it was yet another silver stake, and some very small silvery looking knives.

I looked deadly.

"Man I wish I had shit like this," I muttered, checking out all my gear.

Adrian grinned. "I thought you'd like that, you look like one of them soldier babes off those assassin movies. It's hot."

I chuckled, "Why don't you mail me stud like this? I'd probably be nicer to you then…" I suggested, but I was only kidding.

Adrian's expression turned sheepish all of a sudden. "Well err…there might be a couple of packages waiting for you when you wake up at the hotel…" he scratched the back of his head, trying –and failing- to look innocent.

"No way! Are you serious!?" I was all but jumping up and down with excitement. I'd be absolutely lethal with that sort of shit.

"Yeah, Eddie helped me pick the stuff out a while ago now. I got him a set two. But I got you three different sets, incase they get broken and stuff. I ordered a pair for Alina yesterday two, so they should be at the Balashov hotel when you wake up. Lissa helped me pick out sizes."

I couldn't hold myself back. I jumped at him and he all but shat himself, obviously thinking I was attacking him. I wrapped my arms around him and squeezed hard. When he realized I was hugging him he chuckled, wrapping his arms around my waist. "Thank-you sooooo much!" I squealed, sounding very much like a very immature two year old.

He chuckled, hugging me tighter. "You are nicer when I buy you presents. You have to go wake up now, but we'll talk again soon. Bye," his voice faded out as my eyes fluttered open.

"She's awake," Alina called to Eddie.

He rushed over, grinning widely. "Sur-" he began, but I cut him off.

"No surprise, where are the presents Adrian sent me?" I sat up glancing around the room. He gave me a look that said 'what the fuck?' and I chuckled. "He told me in my dream, and he told me you helped or something so thanks, but where are they?" he pointed down towards his feet where three large boxes sat.

"No strigoi will ever mess with you again," he grinned widely, helping me rip the top off the first box.

"They don't mess with me now. Get geared up, I want to go find Dimitri." I brushed him off as I turned to Alina. "Did you get…?" I didn't need to finish my question because she was already dragging a box over towards me. "Right, let me help." I jumped up and went to help her.

"Thanks," she said smiling. "We're gonna look so wicked in this stuff," she giggled as we ripped the top off her box.

"Hell yeah!" I shouted as I started pulling items out of the box.

The first item I picked out was the boots. They were just as awesome looking in reality as they were last night, but this time I noticed I tiny little lump on the bottom of the boot near the toe. I tried to push it back in, thinking he'd sent me damaged goods, but as I pushed it a very flat knife stuck out of the toe and almost took out my left eye. "Shit, that's gonna be wicked cool in a fight," I beamed, pushing the lump little button again.

***

Once we were all fully geared up we realized we had a slight problem: we looked to conspicuous.

"We need cloaks or really long jackets," Alina mumbled, annoyed that we couldn't just strut down the street looking both deadly and sexy at the same time.

My grim expression brightened up at that. "Hey, yeah. Let's get some cloaks! That'd be pretty cool, and we wouldn't be as noticeable." I'm pretty sure we all felt like total badass movie character's in the gear we had on. And just like in all the movies, as soon as she mentioned cloaks all I could do was picture: me, strutting into a bit house full of strigoi in a long black cloak, ripping it off and going on a killing spree.

"But then we have to take it all off…" Eddie mumbled. It took him a lot longer then it took Alina and me to get ready. In the end we had to help him put everything where it was supposed to go.

"No we don't," Alina perked up as she eyed the computer sitting on the desk to the east of the room. "We can order them!"

***

An hour later we'd finished scanning the internet, and we had a trolley boy knocking on our door with our recently purchased super cool cloaks. We'd also ordered in some small handguns, simply because there was two little spaces left on the straps across the back that looked like they'd fit perfectly in there.

We'd scared the hell out of the trolley boy when we opened the door. He took one look at us, dropped the box and ran.

"Thanks!" I called back after him, chuckling as I stepped through the door.

"Alright, so Alina you're gonna show us the way, then we're all gonna go in through different sides of the house just incase there's more then Dimitri living there, if there is then I'll be able to tell you. If you se a strigoi don't hesitate to set it on fire, because they won't hesitate to rip your throat out. You kill every strigoi you see unless it's Dimitri. If it's Dimitri signal me with your radio's, got it?" I was running through our plan one last time as we walked down the hotel heading for the new car we'd had to buy, seeing as the strigoi busted up my last one.

"Got it." Hey both said at the same time. The new car we had was better looking then the last one, and it had a badass sound system.

"This is really it…" I mumbled as we slid into the car. "Well, hopefully at least." I turned to Alina, and she nodded.

"There's gonna be at least six of them…" she pursed her lips, annoyed at this.

Shit. Could they handle this? "I…Are you sure you guys can handle this? I mean you haven't even graduated yet Eddie, and you're just finishing up your elementary school time."

I started the car and took off while Alina mumbled directions.

"We can take this, right Alina?" Eddie was clearly worried that I'd drop them off here and take off on my own, and I didn't blame him for worrying about that, because that's exactly what was running through my mind.

"Yeah," she said.

I contemplated that for several moments before deciding. "Okay fine. You can still come, but there's a change in plans. You two are going to go in the front together, when I give the signal. Or you can wait exactly one minute before following after. Take your pick."

They frowned, not very happy about being left out of the action.

"Okay then fine. I got a better plan. We'll all go through the front door. Its daylight so if we need to we can bunk outside until it's safe. Deal?" I gave them the third option, and they seemed to be sucking it all in happily.

They glanced at each other. "Deal," they said.

When we arrived at the place Alina had directed me to, we stopped the car. I ran the plan through them again.

"Rose?" Eddie muttered once we got out of the car and pulled out or flame-thrower can things in one hand, while gripping silver stakes in the other. "If…If I die… you've got to promise me that you'll tell my parents I loved them, okay?"

It hurt me to think that he thought I'd let him die under my watch. I frowned. "I won't let you die, Eddie. But yeah I promise. But you have to promise me that if I tell you to run, that you'll run, and that you'll take Alina with you. Promise me." I stared him down, hoping I looked as fierce and determined as my mother and Dimitri used to.

He frowned, but nodded. I could see that it hurt him to say that he'd abandon me, and I prayed that he wouldn't do what Mason did… "I promise."

I glanced at Alina, and she gave me a nervous smile. The sunlight shining off her hair showed that she had very faint crimson streaks in her hair. I frowned in confusion. "You're Moroi, aren't you?" I asked her.

She looked puzzled. "I guess so, why?"

"Doesn't the sunlight hurt you?" I raised my eyebrows.

"Oh, no. that's another thing that I think makes me more dhampire then Moroi." She smiled again.

"Oh, right. Okay you ready?" She nodded one firm bob of her head, and gripped her stake tighter. The nausea grew worse and worse with the closer we got.

An awesome course of action occurred to me when I spotted how big the windows were. Sure they were all tinted, but they couldn't keep out the sun if we broke them. I pulled out one of my pistols and shot out each of the windows, scaring the shit out of both Eddie and Alina.

"What the hell Rose?" Alina hissed.

I chuckled. "I was letting in a little sunshine. Then we'll have safe spots that we can stand without being ripped to shreds."

Eddie beamed. "Brilliant, Rose. Truly brilliant."