Author's note: My dear Irish friend sheerio4ever, this one is for you. As it always happens with your ideas, I had so much fun writing this, and I hope you'll have fun reading it too.

I'm also sorry for not updating for almost two months, but I had to try to save my semester, and I actually managed to do it. Love you all, and hope you're not as disappointed with the real TFH as I am.

(All characters belong to Richelle Mead)

"What the hell, Sage?" I shouted as soon as I saw her. I was supposed to be able to control myself because of those mood stabilizers, but this time my reaction was totally understandable.

Sydney was standing in front of me, and her right eye was bruised.

Someone hit her and gave her a black-eye.

"Calm down, calm down," Sydney said as she looked at me with knowing eyes. "Nobody hit me. I did it to myself."

Yeah, right. I walked over to her and hugged her tightly, trying to reassure myself that whoever hit her wouldn't be able to do it anymore because she was now safe in my arms.

"Adrian, I'm serious," Sydney said in a muffled voice, trying – and failing – to free herself from my grip. "I hit myself in the eye with that spell book Ms. T. gave to me. Zoe just suddenly came into the room and while I tried to get to the closet with it, I accidentally hit myself. I knew you'd freak out."

I raised an eyebrow. "You actually expect me to believe that?" I said, trying to control myself. "You had a meeting with Marcus today, and by the way, you didn't let me go with you, and I'm crazy because I actually listened to you…"

I trailed off as Sydney put her finger to my lips. "Could you just calm down for a second? Marcus didn't hit me, Adrian."

Damn those pills, I thought to myself. I can't even see her aura to decide if she's lying or just trying to calm me down.

"I'm refusing to believe a book hit you," I said firmly. "So who was it, then? You don't even have to explain why – I don't care. Nobody can hit you and get away with it."

Sydney put her head in her hands. "The book is over 2000-page-long," she said in a near-whisper. "And believe me, it hurt. So if you want to go and burn it – and destroy any chance of finding a cure for spirit darkness, then go ahead."

I took a deep breath. She hurt herself because she was trying to find a way to help me. Of course. I could believe that. I still had a feeling she was lying, but it was Sydney, after all, and I was just a half-crazy vampire.

"Sydney," I said in a small voice and pulled her into my arms. "I'm okay. You don't need to find a cure or anything. I can live like this. My sanity is fine, and even though spirit is gone, I'd rather be without it than without my mind. You said that yourself."

Sydney sighed. "But if there's something, anything that can help, I need to find it. You said spirit was an important part of you, and I don't want you to be without it."

I just shook my head and hugged her more tightly, knowing I wouldn't be able to convince her that a cure didn't exist. She was the only person that cared for me enough to be ready to read thousands of books for me. I never had that before, so the only way to thank her was at least to heal the wounds she got because she was trying to help me.

And then a thought hit me. "I can't even heal you," I whispered as I gently touched her bruised eye. "And I'll be damned if I let you walk out of here looking like that."

I could feel Sydney rolling her eyes. "If you have a spirit user in your closet, then I'll let him heal me, but since I know you don't…"

"Not a spirit user, but I have something just as good," I said as I let go of her, a very amusing and creative thought occurring to me. Sydney was looking at me with furrowed eyebrows, and I winked at her as I started walking towards the bedroom.

Oh, she was going to like this. And probably kill me afterwards.

"Are you crazy?" she shrieked as soon as she realized what I was doing.

But, since I was a vampire, I managed to bandage her head before she managed to escape my evil plan.

"Do you realize this looks even worse now? Now everyone is going to ask me what happened!" she said in a desperate voice.

"And you'll be able to lie and say that you had an eye surgery because there was something wrong with the tear canal or something," I said in what was supposed to be a calm voice.

But no, I couldn't keep a calm face. I was laughing because Sydney was looking ridiculous with bandages, gauze around her head and an eye patch.

"You kind of remind me of Wolfe now," I said mockingly, "The only difference is that he changes eye patches all the time. Sometimes it's the right, and sometimes the left eye."

I hoped she wouldn't look as miserable if she laughed a bit, and I actually succeeded in it. She laughed, hit me in the arm, and after a few minutes of making out and reassuring her she was even more beautiful with an eye patch, she was out of my reach again, and I sighed, deciding to distract myself by trying to paint her with the eye patch.

Was there a one-eyed Greek goddess or something? I actually sent a text to Sydney asking her about it. Perhaps if I merged her image with an image of an ancient god, the painting would actually look like something. Ever since I started taking the pills, my painting talent decreased. I needed something to reassure me I wasn't that bad in that segment, too.

No, but Homer, the writer of Iliad and Odyssey was blind. Does that help?

I shook my head, trying not to laugh. Yeah, a blind Sydney was a good idea. Perhaps I'd make her look like Cyclops, with X-ray vision. I'd finally be able to capture the gold in her eyes then.

There was still the problem of why I was mocking my own girlfriend and her vision, and I had to finally clear it out. There was only one person who'd be able to tell me if Marcus hit Sydney or not.

Castile.

So I called him, logically.

What I didn't expect was for a high-pitched voice to be on the other line. "Eddie is unavailable right now, so-"

"Jill?" I said in disbelief. "Why the hell are you answering Castile's phone? Aren't you two supposed to be in the 'I'll think about it' phase?"

Jill giggled. "No, we're in the making-out phase right now, so get the message and call later."

In any other situation, I would've let it go, but not now. I mean, I wasn't too thrilled about the fact that an 18-year-old guy was making out with an underage who just happened to be my shadow-kissed bondmate and a sister, but I knew he made Jill happy, so I moved away from them, knowing their relationship was far more important.

But, now, I had to focus on important things. This was Sydney, and a minute of waiting wouldn't cause the doomsday to begin, right? "No, actually, this is important," I said firmly, knowing Jill would be serious now. "Do you happen to know why Sydney has a black-eye?"

There was a long pause. I knew Jill wouldn't lie to me, but it was suspicious. "Yes. She told me she hit herself with a book or something this morning," she finally said.

"Oh," I tried to say in a voice full of relief. Thank God the bond wasn't working now, or Jill would've been able to tell I was just acting. "Thank God. She didn't want to tell me, so I figured it was because Marcus hit her or something."

Jill laughed nervously. "No, of course not, nothing like that," she said in a suspicious tone. "Don't be ridiculous. So, if that's it, I'm going to go now…"

"No, actually, give me Castile," I interrupted her. "I need to ask him something."

"Adrian, I already told you-" Jill warned.

I actually rolled my eyes. "Jailbait, I promise I won't ask him about Sydney. It's a… a question only men can understand. And since you were in my head for a while, you know just how awful those questions can be. If you want, I can tell you to ask him-"

"No, thank you," Jill said quickly in a horrified, disgusted voice. Exactly what I expected. "Eddie, Adrian wants to ask you something you men talk about."

I deserved a Nobel's prize for acting, that's for sure.

"Yes?" Eddie said, his voice not the usual one guardians always used. Huh. So Jill managed to break the guardian and free the Romeo inside of him.

"Castile, not that I don't want to have this major talk with you about Jailbait and everything I'm going to do to you if you even touch her improperly," I started smoothly, "But there's something more important than that right now. You're an honorable man, you'll tell me the truth – did Marcus hit Sydney? Why does she have a black-eye?"

"Oh, that!" Eddie immediately answered. "I thought you knew. I accidentally punched her this morning while we were training."

He said it so nonchalantly, as if nothing was wrong. "What?" I asked in disbelief. "Wait, you said you were training? What, martial arts or karate or something like that?"

Seeing that Eddie was a guardian, my question was a bit irrational.

But, well, could you blame me? Sydney, training? With a dhampir? Was she crazy?

"She told me she wanted to learn more about self-defense," Eddie said, sounding uncomfortable. "And she said not to be gentle. Of course, I tried to be as gentle and as slow as possible, but I'm a dhampir, after all, and she just didn't move fast enough… so I accidentally hit her. I'm sorry, and if you're angry I completely understand, but you know I'd never hit her on purpose."

I heard Jill say something like, "Why do I even trust him?" but it didn't amuse me.

I put a hand over my eyes, trying not to yell at Eddie. He wasn't Marcus, which was a positive thing. He was an honorable guy who told me about this, which was another positive thing. He was Eddie, the guardian who was madly in love with my bondmate, the guy who'd never purposely hit Sydney, which was a thing that actually managed to calm me down.

"Okay, Eddie. We'll talk about this later but for now, just don't hit anyone else."

I shut him off, knowing I was acting like a jerk, but I had the total right to do so. If I hit Jill – accidentally or not – I'd be in the hospital now.

But why did Sydney lie to me? Because she knew I'd be mad? Because she thought I wouldn't like her going to self-defense classes with Eddie?

There was only one way to solve this, and to hell with Zoe and her suspicions.

"Adrian? Is everything okay?" Sydney said, sounding as if she'd been running for miles.

"No, it's not," I said, sounding like a 2-year-old child. "You lied to me!"

Sydney groaned. "I thought you were calling to tell me an army of Strigoi was coming for Jill, or that you're hearing aunt Tatiana again, and you're risking Zoe finding out about us because of this. By the way, you have no idea what ridiculous lie I had to tell her. It was something about Trey hitting me in PE and him insisting I go to the ambulance."

We both laughed. "You're becoming a good liar," I said.

"Well, you know how much I hate doing that, but it's necessary," she said, still panting.

I raised an eyebrow. "Sydney?" I asked uncertainly. "Why are you sounding like Usain Bolt after a race?"

She laughed, but only for a second, and then she began panting again. "I think… that this dress is too… small…"

Now both of my eyebrows rose. "Did you just say the word dress? Do you even know how that word influences me?" The image of Sydney in that amazing red dress, or in that beautiful black-and-blue dress she wore to the wedding came to my mind, and I smiled to myself. Yeah, dress was definitely an important word. Even more important than khaki pants.

"I think I'm going… to need… help," she continued, sounding as if she was choking.

I rolled my eyes. "Okay, Sydney, I guess that the whole lying thing isn't that important, anyway. I'll call Jill and we'll talk later, when the coast is clear."

I shut her off, not feeling so angry, frustrated or betrayed anymore. These pills were really making me feel more stable, more in control of the situation. No matter how much I loved spirit, the rush of it and the feeling of having a purpose after saving someone's life, I still loved my sanity and my identity more.

Not wanting to sink into these thoughts any further, I decided to distract myself by calling Jill.

"Adrian, seriously, we're busy-" Jill started in an exasperated voice.

"Yeah, yeah, I get it, but this is an emergency, and only you can help," I interrupted. "Sydney's choking upstairs, she has some problems with a dress, I don't know what exactly, but you need to go and help her now. She probably just tried to fit into one of her anorexia-appropriate dresses and got stuck."

Jill groaned. "You have got to be kidding me. It's like you're purposely sabotaging this." Her voice wasn't angry, but she sounded like a 5-year-old who was denied the right to eat as much ice cream as she wants. Yeah, she sounded exactly like that.

"Jailbait," I said softly, "Don't be ridiculous. It's not my fault that Sydney wants to learn kung-fu, and it's definitely not my fault that she's trying out small dresses. And trust me, you and Castile are going to have a lot of time to do those things. More than Sydney and I will probably have in a few years, if Zoe stays."

"Adrian-" Jill tried, obviously realizing how selfish she was being, but I didn't want to have this conversation.

"Sydney," I interrupted again. "She's the priority. And report immediately when you solve the problem."

I shut her off, sighed deeply and threw myself on my bed, trying not to think about anything.

Okay, so Jill's dhampir boyfriend hit my girlfriend in the face. I could survive it, since it happened accidentally, and I believed Eddie when he said that. My girlfriend couldn't talk to me because her puppy sister was following her around. I could somehow survive that, too, or so I thought when Sydney called me and told me Zoe arrived.

Life wasn't fair. The problem was, neither Sydney nor I had any idea where this was going. We both knew we were madly in love, and we didn't want to end this. But Zoe would stay here until God knows when, and even after she was gone, the mission would still have to end one day. And what would happen then? Would I follow Sydney around the state, or would she decide to stop being James Bond and do what Marcus did?

To be honest, I didn't like what she was doing, not at all. It was too dangerous. She still hadn't broken that tattoo, yet she was still trying to uncover the Alchemists. Her sister was breathing down her neck and aside from being boring, she was very dangerous – one call, and it'd all be over. I supported her because I knew how much it meant for her, but this wasn't a game. She'd be sent to that brain-washing centre if she made a single mistake.

My ringing phone stopped my track of thoughts.

"Agent Jailbait," I started seriously, "Report the situation immediately."

Jill giggled. "Well, Sydney and Zoe have identical blue dresses. She obviously took the wrong one, because it was…" she paused for a second. "To say it was too small is an understatement."

I laughed. "You're kidding me. Did you film it?"

Jill started laughing with me. "It didn't cross my mind," she said in a disappointed voice. "I was too busy cutting the dress off her to think about it."

"Wait," I said in disbelief, "You cut the dress? Zoe's dress? Don't you think it was a bit extreme? Couldn't you just get it off her somehow?"

"Zoe wears my size," Jill said in a cold voice. "But if you're so enthusiastic about keeping the dress unharmed, you should've come here yourself and try it."

"Well, it's not a bad idea," I muttered. "Why didn't I think of it myself?"

Jill groaned. "I forgot you're Adrian Ivashkov. Okay, okay. I've got to go now, there's a guy waiting in my room."

I shook my head and lay back down.

Well, this definitely wasn't one of Sydney's best days. She got an additional accessory on her face, almost suffocated herself and cut her sister's dress.

But it was just another day of our lives. And we'd get through it all, together. What would happen when it all ended? I didn't know, but I knew I never felt this way in my life before, and I didn't want to stop feeling this way. I loved Sydney, and if we had to deal only with everyday problems, I knew we'd survive.

And hopefully, one day this would all end and we'd run away from everything and live together in love and peace and happiness.