She turned to me then, "you must be Rose", she gave me a hug then as well, but the only thing I could think about was that in a few minutes or so I would be telling them about Dimitri.

"It's nice to meet you, I'm Inessa," She smiled and then began to usher me and Matt into the house. "Come on you two get out of the cold, the foods almost done!"

I began to look around and immediately fell in love with the place. It was sort of small, but in a good homey sort of way. When you first entered you could see the fireplace directly to the right of the small hallway, it lit the living room up and showed off the furniture that had, I'm sure homemade knitted blankets draped over them.

"Come this way Rose and you can meet the rest of the family."

We moved down the hallway and entered into the kitchen which had an older style stove that probably ran on some sort of gas. The Refrigerator stood against the other wall, a microwave near the stove and in the middle one of those sort of island things people sometimes have. It was only now that I seen the enormous amount of foods that had been made and were still being cooked. Homemade breads lined the counters, with numerous delicious smelling meats and vegetables, plus some of the most delicious looking deserts I'd ever seen.

Matt caught me staring at it all, "Inessa's one of the best cooks in Russia."

"Oh Matt about half the women in this country can cook the same way if not better," she said as she bustled around checking what was still being prepared. "Ok the rest of us are in the dining room this way!"

She led the way into a dining room it had an old style long table with plates already sat, and even more food already sitting on it. In three of the chairs sat two younger looking girls a little younger than me I would guess and an elder woman who resembled Inessa quite a bit.

Everyone looked up when we entered and the two girls came running towards Matt and knocked him to the ground in a hug. "Matty! We missed you so much!" "why don't you visit more!!" the other said and punched him in the arm. I immediately smiled.

"Now you two calm down and let Matt up, we have another guest remember"

They both looked up at me as they were getting up and smiled. "Hi I'm Darya" She was a few inches shorter than me; her eyes were a bright emerald green and had hair exactly like Dimitri.

The other then stepped forward, "I'm Elena" She was actually an inch or two taller than me, and had some of the blondest hair I had ever seen, but also the prettiest brown eyes.

"I'm Rose" I was about to say something else when Darya cut me off, "Wait Rose as in Rose Hathaway?"

"Umm...yes"

Darya whispered into Elena's ear and then she stared at me "We kind of thought you'd be older."

I just stared for a moment in confusion. They must have noticed this so Elena explained, "Dimitri wrote to us and mentioned you in his letters, but of course we had concluded you to be older…"

"Oh..." I immediately blushed, I hadn't known Dimitri wrote about me and it kind of made me wonder what exactly he said.

"Now now you two it doesn't matter how old she is, well she's older than the both of you so it doesn't matter she is our guest. Ok over here is my mother Larisa."

I turned to the elder women who now was studying me, she had long grey hair braided and pinned to her head and had the same eyes as Darya. She got up then and came to shake my hand, "It's nice to me you Rose."

"Ok you've met the family, well their brother Marcus, is not here, he's off working with other Guardians, but anyway the food is all done so now we can eat!"

Elena and Darya helped their mother bring in the rest of the food and my eyes just went huge when I seen all of this.

I turned towards Matt, "Do you guys always make this much food?"

He just laughed, "No only when guests come, and on holidays"

"I see."

We all began to pass around plates piled with foods I had never seen before, and I glanced towards Matt who just nodded in encouragement to try it all. He was right of course, it was all wonderful.

"So Rose when will you be returning to the U.S.?" Darya asked between bites.

I finished my last bite, "In about a week, I'm staying here for a few days and then heading back to Europe to catch a flight.

"Rose how close were you to Dimitri?" Elena cut in.

I wasn't exactly expecting that and I hadn't planned on telling everyone the particular detail just yet. "I…"

"Elena don't be rude, we're eating dinner and if Rose wants to tell us anything, she will later."

I glanced at Inessa to thank her, and she just nodded.

Once everyone had finished we all headed off to the living room, before entering I pulled Matt off to the side. "Should I tell them now or wait or…"

"Now as good a time as any, but do it when you want."

I nodded and entered the living room, Elena and Darya were sitting on the floor near the fire place, Larisa reclined in a chair and Inessa sat on the couch and began knitting. Matt and I took a seat on the couch opposite to her.

We all just sat on silence, and I began to look around the room. Just now I noticed all the pictures that adorned the walls and mantel piece. Quite a few were actually of Dimitri as a child. He was adorable as a baby with round chubby cheeks and little tuffs of hair on top of his head. He looked so short as a little kid, and then his teenage pictures showed off his growing gorgeousness. There was a recent picture of him he looked peaceful and I got up to go look at it. He looked like he did before he was taken, his hair tided back, and his eyes softly staring back at you.

I turned around to find everyone staring at me but Matt.

I realized I should tell them now, they needed to know and keeping what happened from them wasn't right.

I took a deep breath, "Umm…there are some things that I need to tell you…about Dimitri..."

Everyone sat up and stopped what they were doing.

"Elena you asked at dinner how close I was to Dimitri and your answer is very close. I loved him actually, and he loved me, he was my mentor which of course meant way too old for me, but it didn't matter we couldn't avoid our feelings, but did try to keep them a secret. We were going to somehow make it work by both working at the Royal Court."

"However, then the accident happened, I was there when he was taken by the Strigoi, I wanted to go back for him but couldn't. They didn't find his body and as Matt told me you were told that he had died. This is true in a way, but undead, he was a strigoi."

Darya gasped and I could see tears begin to form in her eyes. "A while back, Dimitri and I had made a promise, that if either of us would become a strigoi then they would want to be killed because to live the life of a monster wasn't worth living."

"I planned to keep this promise. So I dropped out of school and hunted him down. Upon my travels I met Matt, who helped me to find him by taking me here and showing me where to look. He was here. I followed him and he was outside your house. I ended up running away and led him in the woods. He tried to fight being what he was, he tried to fight the blood lust that had engulfed him but it was so difficult for him. He had asked me to end it and told me he would always love me and to come and visit his family."

"I got a single cut and the smell of my blood drove him mad, he nearly killed me and Matt, but I wouldn't let him die a monster. I was the one that ended his torture and his last words to me were thank you."

"I didn't want to come here and make you upset or hurt you or anything. But I promised I would visit I thought it right for you to know what happen. If you don't want me to stay I'll understand..I…"

I was cut off when Inessa came up to me and hugged me. "Thank you." She whispered.

Hey everyone, so I am sorry for not updating in a while. I planned on writing more over spring break, but I got busy then school took over my life, but it's a long weekend with barely any homework so I had time, and I should be able to start writing more soon cause school only has a couple more weeks.

Anyway I would like to thank all of you who reviewed and gave me any ideas, you guys are great!! =D