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Eight
Christian
I adjusted my suit and tie in the mirror and held in a sigh. So Rose had finally gotten me to admit it; had seen straight through me.
It wasn't really too surprising.
Lissa was getting ready behind me. I was still sharing a room with Rose at Court, but we thought it easier to get ready in different rooms. Eddie and Rose were sitting about in some standard Guardian uniforms whilst I had to spend an hour watching Lissa straighten her hair and apply makeup.
It took me approximately five minutes to give my hair a ruffle and slip into some clothes.
When she was finally finished, Lissa stood next to me, looping her arm through mine. "Okay, let's go."
Rose and Eddie were waiting outside the door to escort us.
I tried not to look at her too hard. She wasn't even wearing anything glamorous, just a pair of black slacks and a white blouse, and yet I was far more inclined to stare at her than the beautiful girlfriend I had on my arm.
It was stupid.
But spending time with Lissa was even harder after mine and Rose's near miss at the party.
Now it was real. Tangible. She felt it too.
She wanted to fuck as badly as I did.
And that meant every second was filled with tension.
I almost let myself believe the logic that it would have been better to just get it out of our systems. Fuck once and be done with it. Liss would never have to know.
Then I remembered that I wasn't a complete asshole, and shoved that late night idea to the back of my mind, and tried to will away my erection.
In the ballroom, the put off stares at me were negated by the excitement to meet and speak to Liss. I stayed quiet, shaking hands and introducing myself just as Christian before letting Liss work her magic.
Rose was stood against the back wall, and more than a few times we caught each other staring.
It was a stupid game they were playing.
A game they wouldn't be playing at all if it weren't for the field experience.
Liss started pushing her agenda they second they got in there. "I was thinking about our discussions at the ski lodge again the other day," she said to a silver-haired man I didn't recognise. "About the importance of using our magic for the greater good. For using it offensively."
I longed to join in, to give the same rhetoric Tasha gave. I had it memorised off by heart, the way she said it, the words she used.
But I'd make Lissa look worse. She could handle it alone, stand tall and gain the respect that she needed.
The Queen looked just as unimpressed by Lissa's performance tonight as I'd expected. She was gracious, of course, and no one could deny that Lissa was the one steering the room in terms of conversation, but the conversation wasn't what the Queen wanted at all.
I stayed out of it, and longed to go and speak to Rose.
She'd been alert at the beginning, but now she just looked ready to drop to sleep, gaze focused on one point on the opposite side of the room and unblinking.
By the time it was all over, everyone had had enough. Even Lissa. The crowd had been small, and it meant talking to the same people over and over again. There'd been champagne that I'd had to force myself to avoid, otherwise there would have been no controlling my mouth.
I'd seen Rose eyeing the waiters who carried the trays of flutes around with them, too.
Unsurprisingly, Liss and I had been put in room on opposite sides of Court. Liss's accommodation was situated near the Royal residency, and mine and Rose's near the outskirts, in one of the less pretty buildings.
I didn't care. It meant as soon as we left the building, we split up. Liss placed a quick peck on my lips, and I realised I should have been the one doing that. My romantic notions towards Liss were all forced now.
Nothing seemed to come naturally there.
We split, and Rose and I were left to walk side-by-side back to our room. "I'm impressed you didn't touch the champagne," Rose said, rubbing her hands up and down her arms. The blouse wasn't very thick, but I didn't have a suit jacket on to offer her.
I definitely couldn't just wrap an arm around her shoulder and bring her into the side of my body like I wanted.
"Me too. When that awful Lazar woman talked for twenty minutes about Lissa's dress I so nearly caved. It would have been a very bad downward spiral, though."
"Yeah, you definitely would have ended up swearing at the Queen, and I don't think there would have been any coming back from that."
We both laughed, hurrying our pace to get out of the cold.
In the lobby, the woman on reception stopped us. "Ah, Mr. Ozera. You've got a letter waiting here."
All our laughter died as the woman handed over an envelope with the scrawled words Christian Ozera on it. I thanked her in a mumble, and Rose and I walked back to our room in silence.
Inside, we both perched on the end of the double bed.
I didn't waste any time, and ripped the envelope open, revealing more pictures. My mom, drinking blood, in all of them. There was no scenery, nothing to identify where they might be, just gore. Just humans, Dhampirs and Moroi being drained, and probably turned.
I could have been sick.
Rose pressed a hand to her mouth from where she sat beside me, and shook her head. "That's horrific."
I shoved the pictures to the side. This one didn't even come with a note.
"For fuck sake," I said, turning them upside so I definitely wouldn't catch another glimpse. "I just want it to be over and done with."
My memories of my mom were already bad, but slowly the times I remember her brushing my hair, reading bed time stories to me, were slowly fading. It was impossible to think of her without seeing blood. Her mouth at someone's neck. The small part of my childhood that had been good dissolved more with every note I got.
I wanted to rip them up, but Kirova would need to see them.
"I know," Rose said as I laid back, staring up at the blank ceiling, my heart pounding. I didn't even know what I felt. Rage. Disgust. A deep, dark sadness that pulled at my motivation to do anything.
"I don't know why it feels so bad. I know what she is. I've known what she is nearly all my life. The fact I have these good memories that I try and hold onto is stupid anyway, because they're not real. She was evil, even when she was kind to me. It's just… I don't know."
Rose stared at me, and the indecision was clear on her face. There was sympathy there, too, but not the overbearing type that riled me in Liss. It was bleak on Rose. More sad than sympathetic.
"I don't know what to say," she finally said, a long sigh leaving her mouth. "I don't…" she stopped, voice catching, and I blinked, pushing myself up on my elbows.
"You okay?"
"I mean, not really. Everything is shit."
I laughed, laying back down. "Yeah, I guess it really is."
We laughed together for a minute, both a bit hysterical.
She lay down beside me. We didn't touch, just lay, and stared at the ceiling, together. "Do you want me to start checking your mail so you don't have to see them? I feel like, as your Guardian, that could definitely be part of my duties."
I chuckled. "That's okay. I'll deal with it." I doubted Rose wanted to see them anymore than I did.
"This room has no distractions," I complained, grabbing the TV remote from the bedside table and turning it on. It was barely big enough to see from where I moved to sit against the headboard.
"And no second bed," Rose complained. "I'm in full-belief that the Queen did this to spite me, so that I had to sleep on the floor."
"So spite her back and sleep in the bed." I rolled my eyes as I said it, the reality of what I was saying barely even registering until it was too late. This wasn't just Rose my hate-friend. This was Rose the girl who I'd almost kissed the other night.
But I didn't take it back.
She laughed, though, crawling up to join me against the headboard. "Probably a bad idea. I kick in my sleep and I'm definitely stronger than you. You'd be better of actually setting up a bed on the floor if you want to go that route."
Whilst we bantered, I realised I'd been wrong.
There was a distraction in the room.
Rose was the only distraction I needed.
