a/n: thank you to koryandrs, KyKat, springbreakers, and Ironmanlover13 for reading and reviewing the last chapter of this fic c: I'm hoping to get back into this fandom, so feel free to PM me and become my friend—I like people ;3

Disclaimer: I do not own Bloodlines.

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"But I don't want to go among mad people."

— Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland.

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Sydney blinked her golden eyes open to heavy hands and blinding lights, both dazed and confused. She felt as though she were still inside the burning building, and she felt as though she were still in a terror that made her hands shake and heart beat too quickly.

"Dad?" She was slightly confused that her first question was a call for her father, but it made some sense—he was the last person she saw before she fell unconscious, and was therefore the final thing on her mind, "Where are you?"

She waited for a moment for her eyes to adjust to the lights before looking about the room with some confusion, finding only three bodies. Two of the bodies were unfamiliar, and one held the figure of her father, "Dad?"

Her golden eyes flickered down to her hands, and she was surprised to find them covered in thick gloves, too tight around her wrists for her to pull off. She grimaced, tugging at the uncomfortable fabric to no avail. Her eyes went back to her father, still tugging at the fabric, and waited for her father's response.

"We're trying to put together what happened back there." Sydney gave her father a curious look, "Sydney, that was not natural. Do you understand that?"

"I understand that…fire shooting from my hands isn't an everyday thing, but it wasn't me. I know it wasn't. It isn't possible—only a moroi fire user can maintain that ability, and I'm not moroi, or anything. I'm not even an alchemist." Her hand went up to her cheek as though hoping that a golden lily had bee tattooed on her cheek while she was asleep, but her face remained as bare as it had been all her life.

"If you were an alchemist it would make no difference." The words from the tallest man were spoken with a defensive tone, and Sydney cringed at his words. "We have no access to any supernatural abilities."

"Then what was that?"

"We don't know," Though Sydney's father was not a gentle-spoken man, his words were like a blanket in comparison to the ones of the tall man, "We were deliberating ways to figure out before you woke."

"You don't need to stop for me." Sydney spoke quickly—she was afraid of the solution going unsolved, and knew it would keep her awake at night for many nights if she could not piece together the puzzle.

"Mrs. Sage, it may be better for you to step outside for a moments time." Sydney nearly cringed at the second misuse of the title "Mrs," but she refrained again from mentioning it to the short stranger who had been quiet since she had spoken.

"You're forcing me away? This is more my issue than yours, and I need to find out what you're planning," Sydney pulled again at the tight gloves, "Or why you put these on me while I was asleep."

Sydney's father spoke a few short words to the shorter man, someone she distinguished to be "Mr. Barnwell", and she continued to tug at the gloves that were beginning to make her feel claustrophobic.

"We decided that those gloves may help restrain your…magic."

She visibly revolted at the term, associating magic with demonic powers and inhuman vampires in her mind. Though she had never met a moroi, she hadn't heard the best of things about the species, and wasn't looking forward to her first encounter with one.

"I don't have any magic, Mr. Barnwell," Sydney's golden eyes narrowed, "The mattress was flammable. Something happened, but it wasn't me."

"It was you," the taller man who she had yet to identify took a step closer to the blonde girl, "And you know it."

He's trying to provoke me.

He thinks something will happen if he does.

"I don't know anything, and neither do you. You weren't present at the time of the fire. You are speaking off words from another, not a primary source. Unless you can find a way to make me…levitate a chair, or something of the sort, you don't know anything."

"Sydney, enough!"

The voice cracked through the air like a whip, and she turned to see her father glaring at her with impossibly cold eyes and a harsh face. She quieted her prepared argument and watched her father carefully, bringing her golden eyes up to his face with an obvious question in her eyes.

"Dad, I—"

"You know something happened back there. You screamed, and you couldn't stand straight. You looked in the mirror and ran away as though you had looked into the eye of a beast. You can't pretend that nothing happened, Sydney."

The eyes of the three men were on her with hard precision, watching her as though she would either get up and flee or set the room on fire. She was unsure as to why they were watching her so carefully, and curious as to what they would do if she did either of the two.

"Something happened, but I don't know what. I—"

"Sydney, give us a little time." Sydney's father spoke only moments after the small confession, and she blinked in surprise as to how fast he had spoken, "Please."

The golden-eyed girl could only bob her head up and down in a display of obedience, the only emotion she had truly mastered. Following was easy; paving her own path was unthinkably difficult.

Sydney slipped out of the room, shutting the door and looking away. She was unsure what they were speaking of, but the sickening feeling in the base of her stomach told her that it was most likely not the best thing.

Or maybe the magic had brought in unwelcomed paranoia.

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"Something needs to be done."

"She could be sent to a reeducation center."

"No, that won't work—whatever she has won't be removed by simple reeducation."

"There isn't much of a better option, is there?"

Jared Sage was watching silently as Mr. Barnwell and Mr. Sullivan went back and forth about his daughter's punishment, a conversation he had been silent in thus far. He didn't speak because he couldn't grasp a suitable solution for Sydney's residence, but the other men looked to him frequently, expecting him to offer a solution.

"She can't be sent to reeducation—she isn't an alchemist yet. The ink didn't take. I don't think it will take in the future, either." Jared finally supplied, only bringing more confusion to the men.

Neither of them knew what to do with the girl—all they knew was that something had to be done to contain her until further information was provided on the subject matter. The power revealed in the girl was something they believed to be dangerous, and her strange power was something the alchemists wanted to investigate further, the how of it a clear unknown.

"She can't be left alone with . . . whatever she has." Mr. Sullivan voiced the thoughts of the three men, thoughts obvious enough to go unvoiced, but he didn't seem to care that his observation was obvious, "She needs to be contained in some way."

"What way do you have?" Jared questioned, "When the only idea you've provided is sending her to a place to brainwash alchemists, something my daughter is not?"

"Mr. Sage, please don't be defensive—"

"I'm not defensive; I'm logical. The suggestion can simply not be passed, and until a better idea is provided, there's nowhere to send Sydney," The two doctors were both unconvinced that Jared Sage's argument was for the sake of logic rather than his daughter, but the men didn't know Jared Sage.

He was a father, but he was different than most men with the title.

The title "daddy" was one used by young girls to the iconic man in their life, but he was never that man to Sydney—or any of his daughters, for that matter. He was a father, but he wasn't a dad—he never tossed them in the air in a way that made his wife scream and he never danced his daughters around a room while they spun and laughed in ecstasy. He was always busy working, and busy planning for his daughter's futures, futures that involved working with alchemists in his mind.

His devotion to his work made his daughters scared of him when they were young, and he never developed the father-daughter bond that many little girls spoke of. He never loved his daughters in the way an ordinary father would, and in turn, his daughters treated him with more respect than love.

This lack of love was the reason he didn't shelter his daughters, and the reason the next words passed his lips:

"Send her to Saint Vladimir's Institution."

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"Ms. Sage, you can come back in now."

Sydney Sage had always been the girl to follow rules, and she had always been the one who blindly obeyed anyone's requests. For this reason, she hadn't eavesdropped on the conversation only a door away, and was both nervous and agitated for whatever her father and the men would say to her.

"I think you're going to want to sit down, Ms. Sage." Sydney gave Mr. Sullivan a strange look, but she obliged, and slowly led herself to the chair that seemed to be more for decorative purposes than actual function. She winced at the strange angle the chair held her back at, pressing her lips together so that she could focus on the three men in the room.

"Why am I sitting down?" The question was ill formed, but she couldn't bring herself to care about the wording her father would reprimand her for—she was scared, and she was curious.

"Well, Mrs. Sage," Sydney smiled lightly at the finally correct title, "We were deliberating your location for the time being."

The blonde girl's smile dropped, "My location? What do you mean by that?"

Mr. Sullivan looked at her as though she had interrupted him by screaming about elephants, but he dismissed the annoyance, "Ms. Sage, you will need to be relocated to a safe place while the alchemists study your condition."

"I don't have a condition."

"You do, and we're attempting to figure out what your condition is." Sydney cringed lightly, but he continued, "We discussed sending you to a reeducation center, but you aren't an alchemist, and we are unsure as to how our methods would cure you."

She bit back a second interruption about how she had no need to be "cured" but again bit her tongue instead, sighing softly. She waited for Mr. Sullivan to continue, but she observed slowly that he was waiting for her response, "I don't understand your conclusion to this—are you going to let me go home?"

"Not home, but you will be able to go back to your regular living space within a year or two, and—"

"A year? You're dragging me away from my family for a full year?" This time, the golden-eyed girl didn't care about interrupting, and she didn't care about watching the sharp look her father gave her for being impolite.

"Sydney, let Mr. Sullivan finish." Jared's voice was as toneless as steel, and Sydney sighed, but she quieted herself down.

"As I was saying, we decided that sending you to a place of partial isolation would be best. Leaving you with humans wasn't an option with your knowledge, so we opted for the next-best solution."

"I'm going with alchemists?"

"You're going with the moroi and dhampirs of Saint Vladimir's Institution."

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question of the day:

What are your otp's? Mine are Klaroline, Malec, and Mtydia — Sydrian and Jeddie for this fandom, though the ship name bugs me (why does Eddie get all the letters? come on, dude—share with Jill.)

Drop a review in the box below—he's waiting for you ;)