Walking through the woods at the edge of campus, hand in hand, was one of the happiest times in my life. Everything had been blowing up lately – the trial, ghosts, Lissa, and now the Cabin Thing. All I needed was some peace. Quiet.

And – of course – when I got it, it didn't last very long.

What is your problem? Daemon roared, slamming the door to his room – where he and Alayah had been for a while – open. It's wrong, I told you, it's immoral, and illegal, and it goes against every rule of society! But do you listen to me? No! Of course not! I'm just your fucking conscience, here to prattle endlessly while you put that uncontrollable dick of yours inside that poor child!

Alayah flushed. Daemon!

I turn around for a second and what do you do? You finally lose it! Have you gone mad? THIS IS STATUTORY RAPE! Jesus, think of your mother. No, think of Viktoria! What would you do if some twenty-four-year-old freak was sleeping with her? Huh? I can't believe it. Kissing? Ok, yeah, that I can deal with. But actual penetration? You took her virginity! That's a fucking sin, you douche!

Oh, yeah? And what about what you just did with Alayah? I screamed back, noticing that her shirt was on backwards. You're not married – isn't that a sin?

He shook his head. We can't get married, because, in case you haven't noticed, THERE ARE NO MOTHER-FUCKING PRIESTS IN THIS PLACE!

Stop it! Why are you two being so pig-headed? Alayah shrieked, trying to tear us apart.

Ignoring her, I went on. Look, man, you understand, don't you? You guys are in love. You know what it's like –

It's different! We're the same age, we've lived through the same things! Daemon argued. And, in case you haven't noticed, we're fucking voices in your empty head! WE ARE NOT BREAKING DIVINE AND HUMAN LAWS!

Well, maybe the damned law is wrong! I yelled. She'll be eighteen in months! Months!

She needs to be with people her own age, not with an old son of a b –

SHUT THE FUCK UP! Alayah thumped us with her megaphone. Idiots! Christ, Daemon, stop being so narrow-minded! "Live and let live," ok? And you! Yeah, Dimitri, he gave in and fucked me senseless because he looooooves me. What are you gonna do? Jeez, you're both so childish!

I said nothing. Rose had stopped suddenly, hand across her stomach, looking like she was about to throw up. "What's wrong?"

"Do you see him?"

I tried to see what she was staring at so intently, but all I could make out was trees. "See who?"

"Mason." She breathed.

Shit. "Rose… we should go back…"

"What? What is it?" She asked the air. "Tell me!"

See? Daemon said, more gently this time. Rose, well, she has a lot of problems. She doesn't need a messed-up relationship making it all worse…

Alayah shook her head at him. Wow. You really don't understand, do you? It's his life! We're not even supposed to be here! If he makes Rose happy… just let them be. They'll figure it out – alone.

Rose turned to me, eyes frantic. "Dimitri, there are Strig–"

And then the awful thing was beside me, and between Rose seeing Mason and Daemon's speech, I was just so keyed up…

Which is the perfect way to be when you're trying to kill someone.

I got him in a minute.

Turning to make sure Rose was still there – she was – I let my eyes roam the darkness, sensing more evil lurking there.

"Rose, listen to me. Run. Run as fast and as hard as you can back to your dorm." I whispered, thankful for all those months spent watching her do circuits on the track. "Tell the guardians."

She nodded.

I was dying, right then, because, though I wanted to follow her and take her to safety, I couldn't sacrifice the lives of hundreds of students to do it.

So I clutched her forearms and looked her in the eyes. "Do not stop. No matter what you hear, no matter what you see, do not stop. Not until you've warned the others. Don't stop unless you're directly confronted. Do you understand?"

She nodded, and I tried to commit her to memory. If I died – and that possibility was very real, and not so improbable – I wanted her image with me.

"Tell them buria." The Russian word for 'storm' slipped off my tongue easily, and for a moment I wished for home.

Another nod.

I would've liked to tell her so many things, then. That I loved her, that she had to be careful because I would follow right after if she died – so many beautiful last messages in case I didn't see her again. But they would be useless.

So I said the only thing I could.

"Run."

I honestly don't know how I did it. There was a female when Rose was leaving, and then two men and another woman and Daemon and Alayah were freaking out, because this was massive – this was us, all alone, fighting Death come to life.

And then Jean appeared beside me, and I could've cried. Rose was alive. Rose was fine, and she'd run and she'd delivered her message, and now she was safe and I could finally focus, blocking out all the screaming.

It's all a blur, after that. They say the mind will go to great lengths to protect itself. I'd killed before, but never like this. I was still young. Maybe the horrors I lived through with Jean were just too much.

By the time the sun appeared, we'd gotten rid of every Strigoi in the woods – a few, Alberta informed me, had gotten into Lissa's dorm, but they had it under control. A lot of people, though no one knew the exact numbers yet, had died in the process, and Moroi and Dhampirs alike had been carried off.

So I set off for the elementary campus, where I'd heard a fire-user was decimating the last of the Strigoi with a novice.

Sure enough, I found Rose and Christian panting, sweaty, and surrounded by bodies. Rose was – not surprisingly – saying, "We gotta find another one."

That sounds so… bloodthirsty. Alayah shuddered.

Thank God.

"There are no others." Rose turned to look at me. "They're either dead or have run away."

Christian smiled a little. I took a deep breath. "What you two did –"

"Was stupid?" Rose guessed.

I shook my head. "One of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Half of those are yours."

Rose stared at the bodies, frowning. "There are more than just Strigoi bodies there."

"I know. We've lost a lot of people, in all senses of the word." I sighed.

"What do you mean?" Christian asked.

"The Strigoi killed some Moroi and dhampirs." I explained. "And some… some they carried away."

The next day, everything was organized chaos. Our schedule was switched to daylight, but I saw none of it – I was stuffed in a tiny office with other Guardians as we pored over a map.

Yuri was saying, "The elementary campus and all Moroi dorms should be our main focus. The eldest novices won't be attacked…"

Rose tugged on my sleeve and led me to a corner. I immediately began worrying. "What's going on? Are you ok?"

"I think we should launch a rescue mission." She stated.

Alayah raised an eyebrow. Daemon frowned. Completely bloodthirsty…

"You know we –"

" –don't usually do that. Yeah, yeah. And I know we don't know where they are… except, I might."

The important question came. "How?"

"Well, Mason was the one who told me about the Strigoi last night. Mason's locked out now because the wards are back up, but somehow… I think he knows where the Strigoi are. I think he could show us where they are."

I stared.

"Come on! You have to believe me after what happened!" Rose protested, desperate.

I shrugged. "I'm still having a hard time with that. But okay. Suppose this is true. You think he can just lead us? You can ask him and he'll do it?"

She nodded. "Yeah, I think I can. I've been fighting him all this time, but I think if I actually try to work with him, he'll help. I think that's what he's always wanted. He knew the wards were weak and that the Strigoi had been lying in wait. The Strigoi can't be too far away from us … they had to have stopped for daylight and hidden out somewhere. We might be able to get to them before the captives die. And once we get close enough, I can actually find them. I get kind of… nauseous when they're near. It's probably got something to do with being shadow-kissed, but as long as it works…"

By then, I was just rolling with the weird. "But Mason isn't here. You said he can't get through the wards. How will you get him to help us?"

"Take me to the front gates."

I told Alberta I'd be investigating something – which was technically not a lie – and hurried Rose to the campus' front, where the road was. It took some convincing, and Daemon didn't like it, but Stephen and Duke let us outside the wards and into the wind.

Rose's hands flew to her head, but she gritted her teeth. "Go away. I don't have time for you. Go."

Wow. Ok. That is so freaky. Alayah began.

Daemon nodded – he was still sulking, but apparently not mad enough to avoid a good quip. Just like Rose.

"You're okay?"

Rose nooded as she looked around. "Mason, I need you."

Nothing happened.

"Mason. Please. Come here." She begged.

I couldn't see the ghost, but I could see Rose's face, and she smiled a bit as she said, "Finally. You were making me look bad."

Apparently, no one appreciated the joke. "I'm sorry. I need your help again. We have to find them. We have to save Eddie. Can you show me where they are?"

She listened for a moment. "They came in… through the back of campus?"

She turned to me. "We need a map."

So, of course, I got her a map. Rose spread it out and pointed at it. "This is where they came in, isn't it? Where the wards first broke?"

I fidgeted, uncomfortable.

She listened again. "No, that's not right. It can't be. This stretch of woods by the mountain has no roads. They'd have to go on foot, and it'd take too long to walk from the school to this other road. They wouldn't have had enough time. They'd be caught in daylight."

I followed her gaze, agreeing silently. Rose stopped talking for a moment.

"They can't be there now." She repeated to the patch of drawn grass she was staring at. "It's outside. They might have come in through the back, but they had to have left through the front – gotten in some kind of vehicle and took off."

Mason clearly disagreed with her sound reasoning, because Rose huffed angrily, looking at me. "Is there any building or anything out there? He says they were going out to that road. But they couldn't have walked there before the sun came up, and he claims they're there."

I considered it. "Not that I know of."

But, just to check, I went back to ask Stephen, who was the only person I knew that was seriously obsessed with geography.

"Oh, yeah." He nodded. "There are caves, right there. It's only five miles away, actually. I think a group of novices even camped there, once. Awesome stalactites and stalagmites, let me tell you–"

But it didn't matter, because this confirmed it. Not stress. Not craziness. No darkness from Lissa. Just Rose Hathaway seeing ghosts.

I walked back to her in a daze.

"Rose… Stephen says there are caves right at the base of the mountain here."

"Are they big enough?"

"Big enough for the Strigoi to hide out in until nighttime? They are. And they're only five miles away."

The first thing to do was find out the cave's layout, and thankfully the library was one of the few buildings that had been cleared of Strigoi, so that was where I took Rose. Apparently, a long-ago teacher had decided it'd be fun to have maps of the caves, so we soon had everything we needed.

Next, we had to inform Alberta – something that took quite a while, actually – and she agreed to inform the other Guardians in the meeting.

"Do not interrupt them." I told Rose, standing in front of the door behind which the gathering would occur. "I know how you feel. I know what you want to do. But ranting at them isn't going to help you get your way."

"Ranting?" She hissed.

I ignored her. "I see it. That fire's in you again – you want to tear somebody apart. It's what made you so deadly in the fight. But we're not fighting right now. The guardians have all the information. They'll make the right choice. You just have to be patient."

And, though I hadn't really believed everyone would agree, slowly, they did. Maybe it was because, deep down, we all wanted revenge. Fifteen Moroi, most little more than children, had died. Twelve of our coworkers had followed. We had to rescue the thirteen that had been taken. We just had to.

Alberta finished counting the votes and sighed. "Well, then. We'll plan the logistics and head out. We've still got about nine hours of daylight to go after them before they leave."

"Wait." Janine Hathaway – who had been called, I knew, as a replacement for those who had been lost in the fight – stood up, calm. "I think there's one other thing we should consider. I think we should allow some of the senior novices to go."

"What?"

"No!"

"They're too young!"

"We need all the help we can get." Janine argued against the few that opposed her. "The novices can be backup – just in case something happens and a couple of Strigoi get past us. They're only a few weeks away from graduating, and we've trained them well. How can we eexpect them to protect Moroi outside these gates if we can't trust them with something as simple as this?"

Who could stand against that?

As soon as everyone quieted, Janine spoke again. "I think we should bring some Moroi with us."

Only Celeste stood, but eeveryone else began grumbling once more. "What? Are you insane?"

"No. We all know what Rose and Christian Ozera did." Janine answered proudly. "One of our biggest problems with Strigoi is getting past their strength and speed to go in for the kill. If we bring fire-using Moroi, we have a distraction that will give us an edge. We can cut them down."

"We're supposed to protect Moroi, not put them in danger's path and let them fend for themselves." Yuri argued.

"This is their battle, too." Hank shot back. "We've all lost people to Strigoi."

Jean nodded. "Moroi used to fight. Why can't they do it again?"

"Times have changed!" Celeste spat.

"Not that much." Alberta told her. "It's not that they can't. It's that they won't."

"Then who are we to force them?"

"This is not only about Moroi." Janine's eyes blazed. "Sure, they come first, but we die for them. Our race is constantly sacrificing itself for them! We're willing to give up our lives and fight for them. They should fight for their race, too."

This goes against everything we've been taught. Daemon marveled. They'll never agree.

Times are changing. Alayah smiled.

"You can't force them!" Katherine debated.

"We won't. We'll ask for volunteers." Alberta reasoned.

"They're being idiots." Rose informed me.

"No. Watch. Change is happening before your eyes. People are going to remember this day as a turning point."

Janine finally convinced everyone that they should let the Moroi teachers that could control fire come with us, and it was settled. We all went our different ways – most to call for reinforcements. I had to pacify Rose.

"We can't wait four hours!"

I sighed. "More guardians are coming."

"In four hours, the Strigoi could have decided to have a snack!" She protested.

"We need an overwhelming show of force. We need every edge we can get. Yes, the Strigoi could kill a couple more before we get there. I don't want that, believe me. But if we go in unprepared, we could lose more lives than that." I explained.

Rose huffed.

"Come on. Let's take a walk." I said.

"Where?"

I shrugged. "It doesn't matter. We just need to get you calmed down, or you'll be in no shape to fight."

She frowned. "Yeah? Are you afraid of my possibly insane dark side coming out?"

"No, I'm afraid of your normal Rose Hathaway side coming out, the one that isn't afraid to jump in without thinking when she believes something is right."

She stared. "Is there a difference?"

"Yes. The second one scares me." I joked.

Rose thought about it. "Won't they need you here?"

"No. Most of what they're doing now is waiting for the others, and they have more than enough people right now to help plan the attack. Your mother's leading that."

She finally gave in. "Okay. Let's go."

"You told me you had a theory about why the wards broke." I said as we walked.

"Jesse's group was doing their initiation right here by the wards. You know how stakes can negate wards because the elements go against each other? I think it's the same thing. Their initiation rights used all the elements, and I think they negated the wards in the same way." She explained.

"Magic is used all the time on campus, though. In all the elements. Why has this never happened before?"

"Because the magic isn't usually happening right on top of the wards. The wards are on the edges, so the two don't usually conflict. Also, I think it makes a difference in how the elements are being used. Magic is life, which is why it destroys Strigoi and why they can't cross it. The magic in stakes is used as a weapon. So was the magic in the torture session. When it's used in that sort of negative way, I think it cancels out good magic."

"Incredible. I never would have thought that was possible, but it makes sense. The principle really is the same as for the stakes. You've thought about this a lot." I praised.

"I don't know. It just sort of fell together in my head." Rose shrugged, then shivered.

"Let's get back inside." I suggested.

We'd come a long way, and suddenly, the cabin came into view, freezing the silence.

...

Well, this is awkward. Alayah added.

"Rose, about what happened–"

"I knew it." She groaned. "I knew this was going to happen."

Oh, so now she's psychic, too. Alayah rolled her eyes.

"That what was going to happen?"

"This. The part where you give me the huge lecture about how what we did was wrong and how we shouldn't have done it and how it's never going to happen again." She spat.

"Why would you think that?" I asked, though she was quoting the conversation we'd had before the Natalie Incident almost verbatim.

"Because that's how you are! You always want to do the right thing" She said, sounding a little hysterical. "And when you do the wrong thing, you then have to fix it and do the right thing. And I know you're going to say that what we did shouldn't have happened and that you wish–"

Whether I kissed her to shut her up or because she was being so adorably clueless remains unclear.

"I don't," I informed her, "think what we did was wrong. I'm glad we did it. If we could go back in time, I'd do it again."

Rose smiled at the promise, but it looked involuntary, like she just couldn't keep it in. "Really? What made you change your mind?"

"You're hard to resist." I answered, happy to compliment her, for a change. "And… do you remember what Rhonda said?"

"Something about how you're going to lose something…" She ventured, unsure.

I quoted the words that had been stubbornly fused in the back of my mind for days. "'You will lose what you value most, so treasure it while you can.'"

She blinked. "Wait. You think I'm going to die? That's why you slept with me?"

Daemon rolled his eyes, because of course she'd come to that conclusion.

"No, no, of course not." I assured her, rather hurriedly. "I did what I did because… believe me, it wasn't because of that. Regardless of the specifics—or if it's even true—she was right about how easily things can change. We try to do what's right, or rather, what others say is right. But sometimes, when that goes against who we are… you have to choose."

I stuttered, as Alayah grinned delightedly, "Even before the Strigoi attack, as I watched all the problems you were struggling with, I realized how much you meant to me. It changed everything. I was worried about you—so, so worried. You have no idea. And it became useless to try to act like I could ever put any Moroi life above yours. It's not going to happen, no matter how wrong others say it is. And so I decided that's something I have to deal with. Once I made that decision… there was nothing to hold us back."

'Us' sounds like an awful lot of people to me. Daemon grumbled.

"Well, to hold me back. I'm speaking for myself. I don't mean to act like I know exactly why you did it." Shit. I wrung my hands. I hadn't been so nervous about a girl since forever. Way to screw up, Dimitri. Now she probably thinks you're a controlling know-it-all.

"I did it because I love you." Rose said.

My laugh wouldn't be contained. "You can sum up in one sentence what it takes me a whole speech to get out."

"Because it's that simple. I love you, and I don't want to keep pretending like I don't." She shrugged.

"I don't either." I took her hand. "I don't want any more lies."

I would, I realized, have to call my mother and sisters after this mess was over. No more lies.

"Then what'll happen now? With us, I mean. Once all of this is done… with the Strigoi…"

"Well, as much as I hate to reinforce your fears, you were right about one thing." I admitted. "We can't be together again—for the rest of the school year, that is. We're going to have to keep our distance. After you graduate and are out with Lissa…"

"You're going to ask to be reassigned, aren't you? You won't be her guardian." Rose guessed.

"It's the only way we can be together."

"But we won't actually be together." Rose pointed.

"Us staying with her gives us the same problem – me worrying more about you than her. She needs two guardians perfectly dedicated to her. If I can get assigned somewhere at Court, we'll be near each other all the time. And in a secure place like that, there's more flexibility with a guardian's schedule." I explained.

"Well, we might actually see more of each other if we're guarding different people." She added optimistically. "We can get time off together. If we were both with Lissa, we'd be swapping shifts and always be apart."

I sighed and continued. "You'll be eighteen soon, but even so… When this comes out, a lot of people aren't going to be happy."

Rose batted it away. "Yeah, well, they can deal."

"I also have a feeling," I added. "that your mother's going to have a very ugly conversation with me."

"You're about to face down Strigoi, and my mother's the one you're scared of?" She asked, shocked.

"She's a force to be reckoned with. Where do you think you got it from?" I grinned.

Rose laughed. "It's a wonder you bother with me then."

I squeezed her hand. "You're worth it, believe me."

And she looked up at me so coyly I kissed her.

This was waaaaaay longer than usual, so I hope everyone's happy. There probably won't be more updates for around a week.

Also, check out my new fic, A LIGHT FROM THE SHADOWS! There's a new chapter up today!

Here's a great poem, for you!

what was that?

you asked. and I

whispered to you

a giant balloon full

of red paint just

bumped the horizon

and burst. look

out the window.

that sky is

how I love you.

- Joseph Pintauro

Tell me if you liked it and I'll start adding them in my ANs =D

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