Vampire Academy is all Richelle Mead's!

Catherine woke him.

"Get up."

He sat up, instantly alert, heart pounding too hard. Voices coming out of the blackness – even the blackness of his sleep – were not welcome.

She turned on the lights and tossed clothes on the bed. She turned away, opening cabinets and making other movements he couldn't follow. She spoke to him without turning around. "You'd better hurry. You'll be late for the assembly."

He leaned forward for his shirt automatically, but stopped mid-reach, heart still racing, head crowded with half-formed questions.

She glanced back. "Your clothes were too bloody. Those are from the discard closet. They're clean."

He struggled to keep up. Her actions were professional and almost kind, but her voice was harsh and she nearly shook with suppressed anger.

She glared at him expectantly and he moved to take off his scrubs top. Satisfied he was following directions, she turned away and returned to her movements in the cabinets. He changed quickly, self-consciously, glad that the clothes fit – at six foot six he was taller than some of his professors, even taller than some Moroi – and glad that the mock-turtleneck covered the Strigoi bite and bandaging. He watched Catherine carefully as he dressed, trying to understand her anger.

Catherine closed the cabinets, stopping just short of slamming them shut. "Your shoes are under the bed," she said without looking at him. "Doctor Scherpova is finishing rounds on the Moroi floor and will be down to discharge you soon. Go straight to the auditorium when she's done with you."

Dimitri chose his words carefully, afraid that he suspected the answer and cautious about triggering more of Catherine's anger. "Why is there an assembly on Saturday?"

She turned back to him. "You know why. But no one else does, and the professors and guardians want to keep it that way. I only know because someone forgot to tell me not to come into work this morning. I saw Malina first."

One of his questions was answered - Catherine was there because she was one of the student aides for the infirmary – but the sparse information she gave only made his other questions multiply. One important question rose to the top. He asked it before he could stop himself.

"Is she okay?"

Catherine paused, narrowing her eyes and assessing him coldly. "She's fine. But you need to leave her alone. She told me what happened. I'll give you credit for not screwing her when she was obviously vulnerable. She doesn't see it that way but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that's what happened. But then you accuse her of tricking you into liking her? That doesn't even make sense. It was cruel and unnecessary and she deserves so much better than that."

"I messed up," he admitted. He surprised himself by saying it out loud, but Catherine's assessment was painfully accurate.

"Then fix it."

"How?" he asked. She wouldn't have been his choice of advisor but he had no one else to talk to – and he was grudgingly impressed by her blunt honesty.

"If you don't know I don't think anything I say is going to help," she shrugged. "You've been treating her like crap, and not just last night. If you go anywhere near her again you need to do better. If you can't I really think you should leave her alone."

He was saved from having to reply by the arrival of the Moroi doctor. She entered and Catherine left the room without a word or backward glance. "How's our dhampir hero this morning?" she asked cheerfully. "Any dizziness, heart palpitations, pain?"

He stared after Catherine but shook his head in answer to the doctor's questions. She checked his bruises and the Strigoi bite, and ran him through a brief set of range of motion exercises to check his formerly dislocated shoulder. "Looks good," she pronounced. "Let me change those bandages and I'll get you out of here in time for the assembly."

"What assembly?" he risked asking.

She smiled and pulled down the tray Catherine had assembled out of his line of sight. "Shirt off," she said briskly, gesturing with one long-fingered hand. He complied and she draped a sheet over his uninjured shoulder and across his body. "Your activities last night have caused quite a stir," she said conversationally, removing the bandaging and cleaning the wound.

"Am I in trouble?" he asked. He would have been more cautious, but her manner invited his questions. He ignored the burn of disinfecting the bite as much as he could.

"Not exactly," she answered, "but the guardians would prefer you and Malina keep last night's events to yourselves." Dimitri knew without asking – from Catherine's comments and from over a decade of training - that the guardians' "prefer" was akin to an order.

"Luckily for them," she continued, "the Strigoi bit low on your carotid. Not luckily for you - he was apparently interested in inflicting the most pain - or possibly, delivering the most endorphins. The artery is quite deeply seated here," she touched around the wound, gently, "so he had to bite through a great deal of fascia and muscle. I'd expect a normal bite to heal in a day or so; this one may take quite a bit longer."

He absorbed the physiology lesson, trying not to think too hard about the damage the Strigoi had done. He followed the implications of her explanation. "They also want me to keep the bite covered and not draw any attention to it."

She smiled. "Smart boy. I'm not saying I agree with them, but in this arena they are in charge. And like I said, luckily for them, the placement of the bite makes it possible to cover without too much difficulty." She pointed to the high neck of the shirt Catherine had given him. He made a mental note to find more like it in his wardrobe.

She finished dressing the wound and gestured for him to put his shirt back on. "The guardians are busy at the assembly and elsewhere." Her voice took on a more formal cadence. "To be clear: you are not to talk to anyone about your encounter last night or reveal your injuries in any way until such time that the guardians allow it. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Good," she answered, immediately informal once again, "I should caution you, though, that the guardians cannot be everywhere at once, and more people than they expected are already aware of last night's circumstances."

"Ma'am?" he questioned, not sure that she was saying what she seemed to be saying.

She paused for a beat and looked away, busying herself with disposing the discarded bandaging and supplies. "Just be careful who you talk to."

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