"When are we going to get to learn how to fight?" yelled Eric, the brown haired, dorky looking student in our 16-17 year old class which was our fourth and final class of the day. This is the second week now of just running and weight training and they definitely have improved since we first started.

Alberta supposedly broke the news to Kirova who took it as we expected. She was pretty pissed about me being in another country but Alberta negotiated with her that if the students we trained here ended up being in the top rankings for graduation class in eight months, then I could graduate with them. It would prove that I was a valuable asset to the community. It was definitely going to be a long eight months considering how far behind these student were but if I could do it. Then so could they.

"Yeah!" Shouted a couple other students as they ran their 12th lap. I knew how exactly how they felt. Running in circles, feeling like your not learning anything. Little did they know.

"Tell you what. If you all finish this last mile in six minutes or less... We will start to teach you basic combat." I called. The students immediately put on their game faces and picked up the pace. Dimitri dropped the 90 pound weights he was lifting and strutted over to me.

"Should we start with a demonstration of what an actual fight looks like as well as the rules?" I asked him.

"Of course, Roza." he said with a wink

"Roza huh? To what do I owe for earning your affection right now?" I asked with an innocent look on my face.

"It's just wonderful to see how much you have grown to take on the responsibility to teach in the last couple of weeks without wanting to rush it."

"Well, let say I appreciated your teaching techniques." I said with a smirk plastered across my face, holding back the urge to brush his hair out of his eyes. The students had no idea of our relationship. Even though we were not ashamed about it, Dimitri thought it would be best for them to see us as teachers, so they would focus on the training. Not on our relationship.

One by one the kids crossed the finish line gasping for air all under the 6 minute mark. I nodded in approval.

"Very good." Dimitri said praising them "What do you do if you find yourself in a situation where you are out numbered, without weapon or without proper fight training?" He asked.

"Run." The class answered all together.

"As fast as you can. That's right. We will now start to teach you the basics for fighting. These are the rules: No stepping outside the red lines or the box. Do not throw punches that could potentially knock out the other person and avoid the face, unless you are in a field experience. No hair pulling and no biting. Understood?" he said while walking over to the mat were I was standing. The students nodded in compliance.

"Also if you don't want your hands to look like an 80 year old farmers hands then I suggest you get yourselves a pair of training gloves as soon as possible." I added

"Right now we are going to demonstrate how an actual fight looks like. We will not be holding back during this and I suggest you scoot back just a bit." Dimitri said with a smile on his face. I looked at the students seeing the girls totally checking my Dimitri out. I looked back at him to see what they found so attractive. I mean sure, he's ripped and tall..and handsome and wonderful and beautiful.

"Rose wipe the drool of your face." I believe Samuel called.

"I was just thinking about all the ways I could take him down." I snapped back glaring at him. The kid shrugged his shoulders with his hands up as if saying, whatever you say.. but I don't believe you. I began to circle around Dimitri.

"No holding back huh?" I double checked with him.

"Nope." he grinned and lunged forward. The kids around us cheered. It had been a while since we sparred at full strength meaning I was most definitely going to have some major bruising. Every blow I blocked and made sounded like a brick smashing into a wall. Sure felt like it too. I estimated about 15 minutes went by before Dimitri once again found purchase in my footing and brought my down the same way as last time. The kids went wild as Dimitri announced me dead.

"Again." I growled lunging towards him. This time I focused on my footing making sure not to make the same mistake as last time. I managed to bring him to his knees trying hard to find an opening to "stake" him. Without much success I cartwheel over him using his shoulders as support to then shove him forward onto his stomach. He immediately flipped over and used his weight to his advantage throwing me off him and then pinning me down with his body. I bought up my elbow and delivered a solid blow to the side of his face hoping it would not leave a bruise. The impact was enough for him to loosen his grip on my shoulder. I grabbed his arm bringing over my head to flip him over so he was on his back and brought my hand down.

"Dead."

"THAT WAS AMAZING." Eric yelled fist pumping.

"How can you even move that fast?" A girl named Jasmine asked wide eyed.

"When will we be able to do that?" Asked another. I flipped over onto my back and just laid there catching my breath. Dimitri stood up and looked down at me.

"You okay?" he offered his hand to help me up.

"Yeah, I really got to pay more attention to my feet." I said taking his hand and standing up.

"You see how she recognizes her mistakes? You all need to be able to do that. Do not let pride get in the way of improvement." Dimitri said in full Zen mode. Of course he would turn that small statement into a lecture. He could turn anything into a lecture. I could say that I love the donuts and he probably would say something like, they are bad for you. You know what else is bad for you, locking your knees during a fight.

I rolled my eyes.

"How come the fight lasted for so long?" Rachel asked.

"We are equally matched because we have just trained so much. It wont be like that with an actual Strigoi though. Generally they are are muscle and no combat skill, unless they were guardians at one point.

"Partner up with someone and we will practice how to properly deflect a blow."

"Dimitri will you be my partner!" Shouted a young blonde curly haired girl with blue eyes. She was a total barbie in the making and I hated her. Not because of the way she looked but because of the way she was always getting "hurt" and whined a lot. She also wore the tiniest shorts ever and made sure guys were looking before she started to stretch. Not like there was anything there to see. She had a very ill shaped body due to genetics and not lifting enough weight, so I definitely did not feel threatened. I just hated how much she craved the bad attention.

"Sure, Rachel." he said. She practically skipped to the front.

"Eric you will be mine." I said a little harsher than intended. The kids jaw dropped as he looked at me. "Close your mouth or you will catch fly's." I snapped

"Just slap her butt Eric. I am sure she would love that." Rachel called narrowing her eyes at me.

"Wha- I would never Rose, I mean Ms. Hathaway, I mean ma'am." Eric stammered out glancing nervously at Dimitri who was warning him with his eyes. Word got around quickly about what happened to the last guy that did that to me.

"If you got into a real fight with Strigoi, Rachel... Those shorts would not be enough to distract them. In fact they would probably capture you and keep you around as their personal bloodwhore. Seduction does not work on Strigoi. We are in class, not at a club" I snapped back as her face turned deep red in embarrassment. The class whispered as she pulled down on the hem of her shorts nervously. Dimitri shot me a cool it down look which I quickly returned with an innocent, What? He then went on to show the class how to absorb an impact from my direction that could potentially knock you off your feet.

"Rachel, try to knock me over." he said beckoning her forward. She hesitated looking around for approval of some sort. Dimitri laughed seeming to find something funny.

"What's so funny?" she asked him

"Oh it's just if you had been Rose, I probably would not have been able to finish asking her to attack before she did." he said laughing. The class and I joined him in a light laughter.

"You never ever waste an opportunity to kick your instructors ass." I said defensively.

"Language Rose or you will get to run until class is over." Dimitri said narrowing his eyes at me. The students laughed even harder probably thinking he was joking but I, I knew he was being serious.

"Come on Rachel, just charge at me and try to move me." he said returning to the demonstration. She took a couple steps back and ran as fast as she could towards Dimitri using her shoulder to make contact with his waist. He used her own momentum against her turning ever so slightly to the right to allow her shoulder to unhook from his stomach, leaned his right leg forward so she would trip on it and finally grabbed her shoulders to fling her off to the side not having moved an inch. She hit the floor with a loud thud.

"This is why I hesitated." she said trying to catch the breath she lost upon impact. I smiled, completely pleased with what just happened.

"With this same movement you can repeat it on any side. You use their momentum against them." The student nodded their head in understanding. "Okay now get practicing."

"Eric, are you ready?" I asked preparing to charge at him. "Don't worry I will go slow the first couple of times." He gulped loudly and nodded. I ran at him a lot slower than I usually would making sure I could stop quickly if he got hurt. I slammed into his shoulder. His feet were correctly placed but he forgot to turn his shoulder and took the full brunt hit. He grunted as I heard his shoulder pop out of place. Apparently I was not going slow enough Sorry kid. I braced my self for the scream.

Right on cue he stared yelling but was also was making an attempt to suck it up and make a scene which was unsuccessful.

"Hey, you saw. I was going slow, he put his shoulder in a bad place." I told Dimitri who made his way over to us.

"You all keep practicing." He ordered the spectating students as he bent over to check his shoulder.

"It's just out of the socket." I said eyeing the slight deformity he had going on.

"I can see that." he nodded taking the kids arm and shoulder in his hands. With a quick twist there was another loud pop. This time swearing followed the sound.

"Take some Ibuprofen and you will be fine." Dimitri said roughly, not wanting to coddle the kid. "Go sit on the bleachers at watch."

"Who wants to be my partner?" I asked. At least 4 kids took a step back and the others made themselves look busy with the partner they currently had.

4 concussions, 2 dislocated shoulders and at least 5 students with major bruising later, the bell rang.

"Roza, you need to be more careful with them." Dimitri said after all the student left for the day. He wrapped his arms around my waist resting his head on my shoulder. I twisted around to face him

"Do not go gentle into that good night."

"So your a poet now?" he smiled taking my breath away. He brushed some hair out of my eyes and leaned down to kiss me. "Rage against the dying of light." he whispered breaking away for the deep kiss.

"Now that is sexy." I grinned bringing his lips back down to mine. Who knows how long we stood like that, all I know is that it could have been forever and I would not have noticed.

"Would you like to visit my family this weekend?" he asked suddenly pulling back. I kept my eyes shut.

"What?" I asked not willing to come out of my lovey dovey mood just quite yet.

"Would you like to visit my family?" he asked again. I opened my eyes to see his sparkling with excitement. Visit his family? My stomach knotted in anxiousness. "I at least want to see them this weekend. You don't have to come with me." he added seeing my hesitation.

"No. I want to go. I just am worried what they will think of us being together." I admitted

"They already know quite a bit about you. I am sure our relationship wont faze them at all." he said but his eyes betrayed him.

"Who will it bother?"

"It's no one Roza. She's old and does not like very many people."

"Sounds like a grandmother to me."

Dimitri sighed in defeat. "Yeva. Don't worry about her though, she will love you once you get to know her."

"Fine. I will go." I said in defeat after a few seconds of silence.

"They live about an hour from here so we should go pack an overnight bag." he said pulling my hand towards the door.

"Wait I thought you said we would go over the weekend." I stated flipping the lights off and shutting the door behind us. We started across the the field of green grass on our way to OUR home.

"It's Friday tomorrow."

"Oh."

Well this was definitely going to be interesting.

I love reading your reviews! Thank you so much for the support! Let me know what you would like to see more of and if I am doing okay grammar wise! I have a kiddo running around the house so I can never really sit down and edit my work in peace! Do you think that I am doing a good job keeping their personalities from the books or does Rose need to be more... Rose?