It was easy enough to get Lissa out of Jackie's house on the pretense of leaving her and Sydney to catch up. We were going to spend a pleasant day exploring the area and then meet her back at the hotel that night.

At some point I was going to have to bring up the charm the humans were making for us, but Lissa was so excited about having matching tattoos and it was so much like just hanging out with my best friend again, I kept putting it off.

We didn't do anything all that special that day, but it will always be one of my favorite memories. We just wandered around the city, taking in all the sights and pretending that we didn't have the weight of the world on our shoulders. If Lissa had suggested running away, I might have gone for it.

The fact that I was seriously considering abandoning all of my responsibilities just to be on good terms with Lissa again is a pretty good indication of how strained things had become between us. Several times she seemed about to say something, and I'm pretty sure she was thinking about how far off track we'd gotten too. But neither of us wanted to end our little reprieve from reality, so we continued to ignore the cloud hanging over us.

Several times I thought I saw the same man following us, but I didn't give it much thought, since he was human. In all probability I was imagining things, but even if it really was the same guy, he was most likely just doing the sightseeing thing too.

We decided to buy dinner off of a vendor's cart, continuing the facade that we were two normal college students and not the queen of the Moroi and her lifelong bodyguard. Just as we were turning away from our food, a man stumbled into Lissa, knocking her tacos to the ground. I instinctively wedged myself between them, guaranteeing that all three of us ended up covered in rice and beans.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," the man kept apologizing. "I just wasn't watching where I was going. It's all my fault, I'm so stupid."

"No, it's no problem, really." Lissa assured him. She tried to reach around me to help brush some of our food off of him, but I refused to budge.

I could have sworn that this was the same man I'd been seeing all day. Standing in front of us reeking of cheap Mexican food and stumbling over his apologies, he seemed harmless enough, but I had a bad feeling about this.

"Here, let me replace your dinner at least." The man reached for his pocket. I stiffened aggressively, and didn't relax when he pulled out his wallet. He gave me a wide eyed stare as he inched around us to get to the vendor. I turned with him so that Lissa stayed behind me.

"You're scaring him," she whispered in my ear.

I glanced over at her. "Just stay back."

"Here you are," the man said, thrusting paper baskets of food at us. "And I added an extra order of nachos as an apology."

"You didn't need to do that," Lissa told him. Ignoring my glare, she stepped up to take the food. "Thank you so much."

"It was the least I could do." He stood there for another moment, awkwardly looking between Lissa and I. Lissa was beaming at him. I wasn't. "Well. Have a nice evening." He finally walked off.

I watched him go, still feeling that bad itch between my shoulders. "Come on," I started shepherding Lissa down the sidewalk the other direction. "Let's eat down here."

We walked until we found a nice bench to eat at. Lissa immediately sat down and dug in. I remained standing, scanning the area for any potential threats.

"Would you relax, Rose?" Lissa tugged on my hand. "Sit down and eat, okay? Accidents happen. Not everything is part of some evil plot."

"Everything that happens to us is," I muttered darkly. Still, I sat and ate. After a couple of bites I frowned over at her. "Does this taste funny to you?"

"We bought it off a taco truck, what were you expecting?" She nudged the other basket towards me. "Try the nachos, they're pretty good."

I nibbled on a couple, and they weren't bad. The thick cheese made it hard to taste anything else. I brought my taco back up and gave it a sniff. "Seriously, Liss, I don't…" I trailed off as Lissa let out a little giggle and slumped over. "Lissa!"

I jumped to my feet and my knees buckled under me. I reached out to take Lissa's pulse. For one panicked second, I couldn't feel it, and then I realized that I couldn't feel anything. My hands were numb. I tried to push myself up, but instead just fell over. I saw a pair of shoes coming towards us, but before I could roll my head enough to see who it was, everything faded to black.


When I woke up, the first thing I saw was Lissa's back, allieviating the worst of my panic. Things were still pretty bad. We had been drugged, kidnapped, and were now currently tied up in an unknown place. But Lissa was with me, so I could work with this.

"Lissa? You awake?" I asked softly.

"Oh thank goodness," she replied, flopping around to face me. "I thought you'd never wake up."

"Any idea who took us or where we are?"

She shook her head. "No one's been in here since I woke up. I think someone's standing at the door, but I can't tell what or who."

I levered myself up awkwardly with my hands behind my back. I flexed my fingers. Even though the bands holding them together cut into my wrists painfully, I relished the sensation. If I wasn't numb anymore, that would make getting out of here much easier.

"It looks like a dungeon," I commented, taking in our surroundings. "Or Jackie's shed." There was a variety of weapons hanging on the walls, all of them looking very old.

"Maybe we're in one of those old Spanish Missions," Lissa suggested.

I shrugged; it was as good a guess as any. Struggling to my feet I turned around to get a look at the rest of the room. "Is that a canon?" I asked incredulously.

Lissa looked at it and shuddered. "I don't like this."

"I'm getting kind of used to it by now," I told her. The sound of footsteps moving towards the door filled me with dread, but it wasn't just the noise that made me afraid. It was the wave of nausea that swept through me. "I really hope that's just the cheap Mexican food," I muttered. Lissa shot me a questioning glance, but before I could explain the door swung open and my worst fears came true. The Master stepped into the room.