"You are…quite talented, my dear."

Aro looked out of place in my room. Like computers in an old library or fire burning on the ocean. There wasn't any particular element of the room that caused this. It was more that I was used to seeing him in more regal or intellectual locations like his throne or at a chess table. Seeing him now, leaning over to examine my pencil drawings, almost required me to humanise him in a way I wasn't used to. It was the same readjustment I had to make when I found out he was in love with someone. It just did not seem to compute as compatible facts.

"You should see what I can do with some real paints."

He was no longer studying the details in my drawing. He had switched to studying the details in my facial expression as I admired my own work.

Art was the only thing I truly felt comfortable bragging about. My excellence in the field had been proven over and over again whenever my forgeries were 'confirmed' to be originals. From Rembrandt to Vermeer, I was able to see each brush stroke and break it down into my own mental formula. My recall wasn't great, but when something was right in front of me I could make an identical copy of it as if by magic. From art to pain, mimicry was innate to my core being — that was my thing. Some people can sing, others are natural-born athletes. I guess we all make do.

I hadn't slept since Alec and the others left for their mission. I hadn't been bothered, except for a few meals delivered if I hadn't ventured to the kitchen. Which I didn't. Instead, I'd spent my time using up the paper in another notebook Jane had given me and placing the semi-finished products on the floor, leaning up against the wall of my window.

I'd started by copying down the messages written on my chalkboard wallpaper, so that I could erase the wall for more space but still save the memories. From the curves of each letter to the signature of the owner, you would've thought it was copied down by the original author. I was used to living off very little, but while I had the space, I decided to log every detail I could. Because when things changed — and they always changed — I could look back and remember how it all started.

When I'd finished copying down each friendly yearbook style message, I had idly moved on to attempting recreations of the famous paintings. As I said, my recall was not the strongest and so half of these copies remained unfinished — The Starry Night had only scribbles in its sky and a few houses scattered along the bottom and I'd given the woman in Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1 features that reminded me of the Mother Abbess. I'd folded up and tossed the latter drawing over my shoulder, leaving it somewhere on the floor in the room. This was one memory I preferred not to memorialise.

"We shall see to it, then." He gave me his odd smile before moving right in front of me. I blinked quickly with the rush of air from the vampire speed and had little recovery time as Aro had already spoken again. "May I?"

I lazily handed over my hand before realising what I had done. I quickly raced through my mind, trying to remember what, if anything, I had been trying to hide from Aro. But apparently, I had nothing to worry about. Instead, Aro simply held my injured hand with both of his and examined it, removing the poorly wrapped t-shirt I'd forgotten I had put around it.

He didn't touch my skin - in fact he seemed to be taking great care not to. Aro usually never missed a chance to read my thoughts. But now, it almost seemed as if he were avoiding them. I almost couldn't imagine a scenario in this moment where he preferred to be blind than to have every detail of information in my head. The only possibility that popped into my head was that he was doing it for me, to keep my thoughts private, but again, I couldn't imagine why that might be the case.

I was about to ask him how he knew about my wrist, when he answered my unspoken question.

"Alec informed us of your…emotional distress…" That was one way to put it.

Damn it. I really couldn't get away with anything in this place. When Alec hadn't mentioned my hand during his goodbye, I had assumed he'd forgotten or not noticed. I had actually been silently smug about getting out of a lecture about being more careful and not hitting vampires. It was a lecture I could recite in my sleep after a decade of hearing it — although the vampire part would be a new addition.

"I am disappointed…" here we go, "that you felt unable to share this with us."

"I can manage." He ignored me.

"We would have given you the proper care at the time."

As if rehearsed timing, there was a knock on the door to which Aro granted entry. To my surprise, it was Prosper that slipped through the doors. He carried a medium sized, brown leather bag, the kind that physicians brought with them on home visits.

"Ah, Prosper." He turned back to me, "Saffiya, you remember Prosper, of course." I nodded in confirmation, then again to Prosper who did the same. He stood tall as a soldier, waiting for his next orders. "Wonderful! We believe that it would be advantageous to include Prosper on your detail, full time." I frowned at the news, more from confusion than any sort of disappointment. I liked Prosper, in the little time I'd spent with him. But I was confused by Aro's specifications of 'full time'.

"Until Alec returns?" Aro folded his hands together and I could tell he wasn't used to being questioned this much. If he gave me full responses, maybe I wouldn't have to ask so many questions.

I half expected him not to answer me before he finally did, "in addition to."

Of course, this only raised more questions from me. "I thought Prosper wasn't allowed to be my guard anymore." I spoke without thinking and it felt a little rude to be so blunt in front of said man, but Aro spoke slowly and I was hardly given enough information. But his response gave me no room to continue questioning his decisions.

"Prosper is more than capable of protecting you on his own. He will also provide you with the proper care for your injury." He stepped aside and waved the other man forward. "Sit." I did.

At a normal pace, Prosper stepped towards me and kneeled down in front of the loveseat. "Have you done anything for it?"

This wasn't exactly my first hurt wrist, so I couldn't help but sigh and answer him with a monotoned, experienced response. "Ice, compression, yada yada."

Thankfully, he didn't take any outward offence. "May I?" He repeated his Master's words and gestured to my hand. I nodded and he gently picked it up, bending and testing the muscles and bones or whatever. I had stopped paying attention and tried to subtly watch Aro out of the corner of my eye. He stood over us, watching with uninterested intensity. Prosper glanced up at me. "Are you feeling anything?" I raised my eyebrows and he cracked a small, shy smile before it disappeared. "Well, you may not feel it, but we should secure it for the time being." He set my hand on my knee and began rummaging through his bag.

"Splendid!" Aro clapped his hands together, impatient with the evaluation process. Clearly, he wasn't done with his little visit and I doubted he cared that much about my hand. There had to be a better reason for him to make the personal trip to me instead of just summoning me to wherever he was, as had become to usual.

"Aro, may I ask you something?" He waited for me to continue. "When you looked into…Zafir's mind…did you see what he knew about my father?"

He simply stared at me for a moment, creating a build-up of tension rather than the usual awkward atmospheric result of his behaviour. "He had hoped to lure you in so as to bring you harm." I could feel the disappointment creeping in as he continued, "Zafir knew nothing of your father." The way he said it made me feel silly, because of course that was the answer. I had hoped to make something out of nothing and Aro knew he was bringing me back to earth.

"Right," I nodded my head as if reassuring both of us that I wasn't so in the clouds. "Of course, I just—"

"I know, child."

And for a moment, it felt like he really did.

"I have a gift for you." Before I could turn down the idea or make another inappropriate comment, Aro pulled a well-loved notebook from inside his jacket pocket and handed it to me. "Do you know what this is?" It was phrased like a rhetorical question, but from the way he was looking at me I think he expected an answer. So, I accepted the leather-bound book.

The notebook itself was assumably several years —maybe even a decade — old. The pages had curled with water damage and time and it smelled like old parchment paper, but not the good kind. The kind that wafted through your noise and made it scrunch up while also somehow leaving a bad taste in your mouth.

While many of the older pages were illegible due to running ink, the newer ones seemed to have been written after the book had had its bath. The tops of each entry was marked with dates and locations. I riffled through the pages carelessly. Until one of the last few entries caught my eye. In the top left corner in the owner's messy handwriting, the date of this entry matched the one on the last letter my father had written me from years ago. It might've been a simple coincidence, only Aro's wide eyes and praying hands told me it was anything but.

May 4

Burgos, Spain

The Pirate has finally made a mistake. I am mere days from bringing him to justice. My career rests on the capture of this man and while I should be proud, I can't shake the feeling that I'm missing something...

My head snapped back up to Aro. "Who wrote this?" His lips curled up in a smile too genuine for me to believe, but still, I found my exterior somewhat softening to the caring perspective Aro had adopted today. He'd caught me off guard with this and he knew it, but I didn't dwell on it. I was more focused on his answer to my question.

"The inspector on your father's case." I tried not to ask how exactly Aro had gotten his hands on the journal — both because I knew I was pushing my question limit and I was almost positive that there was a less than desirable method that went into acquiring the item in my hands. "It is my wish, my dear, that this may give you the closure you need on your father's life." He placed a hand on my shoulder as I ran my fingers over the somewhat blurred writing, but I didn't miss his last clue… "and ease you into your new one."

I bit my lip. "I don't know what to say." I corrected myself, "thank you…"

"Family is…so precious." He patted my hair and with a few more words, he was gone.

Prosper remained silent as the door closed behind Aro. He had finished with my hand and was standing off to the side of the seating area Heidi had fashioned in the middle of the room. I closed the notebook with a gentler hand then before and set it beside me. All of a sudden, the thought of reading it made me nauseous.

I was so lost in the feeling that I almost didn't hear Prosper's diagnosis. "It's just a sprain. You should be fine in a few days."

"Huh," I commented, raising my hand and examining his work. "I expected it to be worse."

"How did it happen?"

"Aro didn't tell you?" He shook his head, moving to sit in the loveseat across from me. "I err…I hit Alec."

He chuckled and I was genuinely taken aback by the clarity in the sound and the reaction itself. I hadn't imagined Prosper could be so lively and certainly not so quickly. "You really aren't afraid of anything, are you?"

I played with the bandage on my wrist, slightly embarrassed. "Actually, I don't really have the same fear responses as normal people. You know what guns are, right?" It was his turn to raise an obvious eyebrow at me. "Right…so most people see a gun and they run away from it, yeah? Because they're afraid of getting hurt or dying." I started off, hoping what I was saying made sense. He nodded, and continued as if clarifying my words.

"You've never felt pain, therefore you never learned to fear it."

"I am, quite literally, fearless."

The vampire nodded in thought before he asked lightly, "how many times has that backfired?"

"I'm currently living in a house of vampires," I said with a playfully mocking tone. "What do you think?"

He chuckled again and I couldn't help but note that even for a vampire, his posture was immaculate. It was as if, even when he was sitting, he was still at attention. And I didn't miss the quick surveys he took of the room every few seconds or so. "Have you any other injuries that need seen to?"

I considered telling him that, yes, I just so happened to notice during my nightly check to make sure I didn't accidentally break or injure myself in some other place during my daily activities, I had discovered a few interesting things. Like the fact that the left loop on my jeans was ripped and there was a red swipe that looked like a rug burn along my hipbone as a result and if I showed him that one, he would no doubt notice the markings of the fingertips that had gripped either sides of my hips both to pull me close and keep me from falling when my knees went weak. I might get away with the large bruise above my elbow, on the back of my arm that I paired with the back of the chair in the library if I kept wearing long sleeves, but I pulled my consideration.

Mainly because telling Prosper all of this would require me sharing the fact that Alec and I had kissed. And that we'd done so in a way that may have been a little too intense for a vampire that lusted for my blood when he was simply in the same room with me, let alone so close. I remembered noting the control Alec had seemed to have had, but it seemed that the more I'd antagonised him the harder it must have been for him to remain vigilant and cautious of his strength. As much as I wanted to ask someone if kissing Alec had actually left me seconds from being exsanguinated and if so, why the hell anyone hadn't barged in sooner, none of these bruises needed medical attention. So, I kept my mouth shut.

"You're lucky your wrist is not worse." He responded to my earlier comment. "If you'd hit him straight on, it could have shattered the bones in your hand."

Despite his seriousness, my stubbornness decided to override his warning. "Would've been worth it." I declared.

He paused for a second before speaking again. "It is not my place to say, but if I may offer some thoughts?" It was a unique offer. Mainly, my friends either teased me or warned me about Alec. While it was two very conflicting views, it also did not help that none of them were particularly insightful in any way that was influential. Demetri had his moments, but my conversations with Heidi were always rather shallow and bland and Felix was…Felix. Jane would make casual or sarcastic remarks, but we had so many other topics and activities that Alec rarely came up when we were together. I nodded.

"I am not saying that he made the right decision to keep your…mateship, from you. But, I must say that I think I might have done the same in his position." My head tilted. I certainly hadn't expected him to approach anything involving Alec with such a genuine and equal comprehension. I let him continue. "Alec has a dark past. To him, you are light. This is not your world, not yet. I can understand why he would want to keep you in the light as long as he possibly could have."

I considered his words, but said nothing. I wasn't sure what I could say, but I don't think Prosper expected anything from me. Instead, he sent me a cheeky smirk.

"A kiss is bold however, I must say."

He said it so casually that I popped up from the back of the couch, leaning forward in surprise. "How did you—"

"I didn't." He grinned and I groaned as I realized my mistake. This entire castle was full of nosy peers that were probably dying to know what had happened in the empty space between Alec and I's angry words. Felix had sparked it and I should've seen it coming. His silly pride in his elegant trickster ability only made me glare at him before I covered my face as if it would lessen my embarrassment. I probably would've thrown a pillow or something at Felix or Demetri, but Prosper had done it so innocently that I couldn't help but laugh along.

But, I had to make sure. "Nobody else knows, right?"

He shrugged. "They have their suspicions. Your wrist will only increase their curiosity." I huffed, blowing a piece of hair out of my face. We settled into a simple silence, a comfortable one and after a moment, I felt solitary enough to say out loud what I'd been fighting against for weeks. No one else would understand and I had no risk of hurting Prosper's feelings by admitting,

"I don't want to be a vampire."

"Neither did I." He let out a short laugh at my shocked expression. "We did not all choose this life." For some reason, I hadn't considered this. Sure, none of them had been in my exact position, but how exactly did they become vampires? Were they chosen? Found in the woods? Or just a snack abandoned?

"I was born in Jerusalem during the religious wars — the Crusades. My mother married a frank, he was a physician dedicated to learning the intricacies of eastern medicine. As a boy, all I wanted was to fight. I was small, but much quicker than my peers. When I got older, because I spoke both languages, I became a messenger between the nearest encampments. Still, I wished to fight and when I got my chance — I discovered…that I hated blood."

I snorted, "what?"

"I couldn't stand the sight of it." He laughed with me, a fondness in his eyes as he nodded before continuing. "Eventually, I returned to England with my father and I became Prosper, the physician's son from the Holy Wars. We traveled across many towns and villages, sharing our acquired knowledge of eastern medicine. Which, thankfully, slightly lessened the amount of blood I had to be around.

"Not long after, I met Elizabeth. She was a lady-in-waiting for a young noblewoman. We married and had a daughter — Zara. She was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. We were not rich in material, but we were happy with each other." He was lost in his recollection, but he seemed to be recalling something less than actual memories. Almost like a story he'd heard or an old dream he couldn't quite remember.

"I was visiting a nearby town when I got word that my village had been attacked. With no survivors. I was distraught, naturally." I swallowed with a small unsettling feeling in my stomach. Because I knew how the story ended, but his retelling prompted images in my head that filled me with pity. "On my return, Elizabeth appeared to me in the forest, stunning - a vampire and she very nearly killed me."

He'd paused as if that were the end of the story, so abrupt, so missing in detail. "I thought new vampires didn't have that kind of control? Shouldn't she have killed you?"

He looked up at me, his eyes gaunt and very nearly hopeless. "If we were not mates, I believe she would have…and even then." He trailed off, collecting himself from his story. I leaned on my elbow, taking my time in processing everything he'd shared. But then, his eyes narrowed and I felt a raw guilt for asking my question because I'd never seen anyone look both simply sad and angry in such a way as he did in that moment. "So long as this enemy coven has Elizabeth, I am considered a liability in the field."

Of course, I wanted to know more of his story. If he knew where his daughter had ended up or his mother and I was curious about his time amidst the wars, but he'd had enough. So, I waited till he made eye contact again before I tried to help change the subject. "What is their mission, exactly?"

"Alec didn't tell you?" I shook my head. "That follower…Zafir's last known location of their base camp. It is unlikely that his leader is still there, but we may gain insight into their plans."

I had further questions, but he'd grown sad and I was reminded of his gentleness the more we spoke. I hated to admit it, but being away from Alec did leave me with an unsettling feeling. If I felt like this, I could only imagine what Prosper must be going through. However, while I had assumed it best to change the topic, he surprised me with the opposite.

"She would be very entertained by you."

I almost laughed as I recalled the various glares she had sent me in the brief interactions I'd had with her

"I thought she hated me."

He tilted this head as if to avoid agreeing with the statement. "She was angry with Alec." "Because he hurt you?" The scar Alec had given him was hidden under a wool coat jacket, but I still remembered the shock and disappointment that ran through me when I'd learned of its origin.

Prosper laughed softly. "She's quite protective. With your connection to Alec, it was natural of her to despise her counterpart in his life."

"Great. So, I'm going to get blamed for every bad thing Alec's ever done?"

"Once you are changed, it will be different." He noted. "You are an easy target as a human."

I scoffed. "Vampires need to stop being so cocky. There's like twenty different movies about people that hunt you guys."

He gave another clear, full-bodied laugh that filled the room. A weight seemed to be lifted along with it and I couldn't help but smile at his ability to find happiness in the simple things when his world seemed so dark.

It didn't last long and only a second later, he went still.

"They've returned."

My head whipped to the door and I pushed myself up to my feet. "Already?" I expected him to lead me out the door, but he was a blur as he moved from the ground to hold an arm between me and the exit.

"What's wrong?"

He wouldn't answer me for a minute and I kept quiet because he was definitely listening to conversations no doubt happening a few floors of stone below us. I swallowed back any anxiousness that the moment had started to inspire and ground my heels into the floor to wait patiently for my companion's next directive. Which was only easy for the first seven seconds.

"Prosper?"

While he didn't physically acknowledge me, eyes closed and head tilted towards the door, he did provide me with an answer. "There are others." It didn't help ease much of the room's confusion as I rolled my bottom lip between my teeth.

"How many others?"

Prosper shook his head, dropping his tone mysteriously. "I do not know."

"So, let's go down there and find out?"

His head turned to me faster than I'd seen him move before and his voice was so low his words almost sounded like a growl. "No. We wait."

I had several relevant questions and sarcastic responses to this, but with the way his body had tensed, I thought it best to do as I was told for once. It didn't bother me so much when Prosper ordered me around. At least, not so far.

Waiting, however, took less time than expected. Not a minute later did Prosper's arm appear around my waist and disappear a moment later, only for me to realise I'd been placed in the back of Heidi's dream closet. I blinked and his red eyes were staring into mine. A pale finger appeared over his lips in a silent shush and I nodded slowly. He vanished and I wrapped my arms around my knees, pulling them against my chest.

Quiet. I told myself. Don't make a sound. Then, I paused. If we were worried about vampires coming in, did it really matter what I did when they could hear my heart beating louder than any breath I took? Still, I convinced myself not to argue with Prosper's logic. Who knows. Maybe the extra distance it took to navigate through the gigantic closet would be the difference between my life and death. But who were we worried about, now?

Perhaps it wasn't the Volturi Guard that had returned at all, but really it was the enemy of the hour that called himself Razin, flanked by his army of nomads and newborns. Or perhaps it was the Guard, and they'd returned with said vampire as a captive. If so, what if Razin had gotten himself captured on purpose. The Guard will have simply walked him and his ranks in through the front door. Was it possible that only a few floors below, a deluded vampire believed he was seconds away from overtaking the Volturi?

And if this was correct, where were my friends? Present and unaware? Had they even returned with the rest of the company? The only possible way that Razin could expect to complete his mission was without fear of the twins. So, it came down to one of two questions: Had he already taken care of the twins or was Prosper's desperate attempt to hide me the last hope for the Volturi and their twins.

Bright red eyes shocked me back and my head bounced off of the wall. I'd gone weeks without so much as a paper cut and now all of a sudden the universe decided to play catch up on beating me up.

"Demetri?"

"'Ello, Fiya." He tapped my nose and I scrunched my face in response, but took Demetri's hand as the light was flipped on and he helped me up.

I yawned at the intrusion of light and mumbled, "what's going on?" From the entrance of the closet with his finger still on the light switch, Felix was grinning at me.

"Prosper's paranoid. Good to see he takes this new post seriously." The humour in his tone was hard to miss, mostly because I was clearly missing the setup to his punchline.

I moved past them and back into the room, not missing Felix pointing at Heidi's lingerie corner and sticking a finger down his throat mockingly. "He said you guys weren't alone." I quickly scanned my room as I exited the closet. "Where's he gone?"

Felix hid a laugh behind a cough, "hallway." I raised my eyebrows with a pointed expression to make it clear to him that I was indeed questioning his sanity.

"What's going on?"

"Nothing! We missed you is all." I eyed them suspiciously and found myself actually taking in their appearances. "You two look like you've spent a day in the trenches."

Demetri made light of it, but neither of them denied the accidental dark undertone of my comment. "Day and a half, maybe."

"What happened?"

"Nothing that you need to worry about." Felix patted my head and I swatted him away as we joined Prosper on the other side of my door. "Video game time."

Knowing that details of the mission would be less likely to slip, I gave in and began walking with them. I still didn't give up, though. "So…who are these people that came back with you? Felix get a girlfriend?"

Demetri fist bumped me while Felix pouted before correcting me, "first off, definitely not people and second, hurtful." I stuck my tongue out at him.

Off-hand and more to himself, Demetri commented, "can we truly consider them as vampires?" However, Prosper smirked a bit and Felix laughed and their reactions left Demetri with no choice but to explain himself to my questioning eyes. Which he did a piss poor job of, "they're vegetarians."

"Like…they drink leaf blood?"

They enjoyed that one so much we had to stop in the middle of the hallway. When they were finished laughing at my totally natural assumption — what was I supposed to think — Prosper started to explain.
"Animals. They prefer not to drink from humans."

"Don't vegetarians want to save animals or something? Wait — can you really do that?"

"We can survive off of it. It turns their eyes gold and allows them to interact more regularly with humans, if they so choose." My jaw dropped. Golden eyes had to be a lot more appealing than red ones, then again, if all vampires had gold instead of red eyes I imagine the human population would be pretty low in comparison. "It does have its limits," he noted with a shrug.

Felix picked up the explanation. "They're weaker than us. Animal blood doesn't provide the same…nutrients that human blood does."

"Care to test that theory?" The challenge was light-hearted in sound but was undermined by the appearance of its speaker. The three men around me tensed as two women appeared at the end of the hall in front of us. We halted, waiting as they approached us. One girl was tall, broad, and built like a volleyball player. It was her that had seemed to challenge Felix to a match and although she looked a bit brutish like Felix, she walked with an extra beat in her step that seemed to both feminize and lighten the aura around her. The woman next to her was almost her opposite in every way and her eyes, an odd light brownish colour, were focused directly on me.

In impulsive fashion, I stared right back. Like a moron.

"Raincheck," Felix responded with the same playful tone she had used, but he remained at the ready as the girl continued as if nothing was off.

"I was just showing Libby around the castle. It's been a few centuries since I was here last." She glanced down at Libby and took her hand. Instead of looking at me, as I expected because, you know, human, she looked to Prosper. "Swell to see you, Prosper. I was wondering where you were." She didn't ask about Elizabeth.

"Issa." He acknowledged her with a friendly tone, but he offered no insight into his whereabouts. "I see you've met your mate."

This dragged Libby's attention from me and Issa raised her mate's hand to her lips. "Hardly a century old." When she returned her attention to us, she continued talking. "We were about to rejoin our Mother." She didn't ask about me, and I wondered if she already knew who I was.

Her partner went back to staring at me, so Demetri spoke up. "Felix and I will escort you to her." Although his tone left no room for discussion, it was light-hearted and in any other situation without a human, I could see the history of camaraderie between Issa and the guys.

Issa's mouth moved and she said something quickly at a low volume to her partner. When her mate finally looked at her, she finally addressed me.

"You'll have to excuse Libby. She still struggles around humans."

"It's fine. I don't bite." The others got my joke, the girl however decided to bare her teeth at me.

"Funny, I do."

You know how you meet someone and automatically, you just know that they are a horrible human being? Well, apparently that doesn't stop at the species line. I could still feel the effects of her vampiric traits, but maybe I'd been surrounded by the vamp treats for so long that it wasn't effecting me as much. Or maybe I just had a one track mind because Prosper had to put a hand on my back and lightly push me forward. "Come, Saffiya."

Everyone but Prosper and I stood frozen as Libby and I kept eye contact. I'm not sure if they were waiting for her to attack me, but they definitely were not expecting my reaction — which was literally to bite the air in front of me as I passed by her. Impulsive was one word. Her eyes widened in surprise before a flash of her hair and the colour of her shirt blurred in front of me. I'm not even sure she was planning on attacking but either way she didn't lay a hand on me. Instead, Prosper had her in a chokehold on her knees before even Felix or Demetri could reach her. Her partner began to apologise for her, explaining again how she was sensitive around humans because of the new diet. The vegetarian thing?

"Enough." Prosper hissed at his old acquaintance, who immediately did as she was told. Then, knowing his place wasn't to give orders, Prosper looked to Demetri and Felix, who assumed the position. The chain of command around here honestly intrigued the hell out of me. I'm not sure I could ever take commands from anyone, at least not like they did.

"Aro will want a word." Demetri said and Prosper pulled the girl up to her feet by her throat and shoved her forward towards Demetri, who caught and restrained her. Felix moved to stand next to the other girl and he leaned down to say something in her ear. She nodded and walked dejectedly after Demetri and her mate.

Prosper returned to my side and I raised my eyebrows at him. "Little overqualified for a bodyguard, aren't we?"

"For the trouble you get into?" I ran a hand through my curls guiltily but he winked. "Come on, kid."

~•~•~•~

A/N: I've missed you all!

Thank you everyone for your patience. I promise, something good came out of it because I got into my #1 choice school! I did get into my school, yet I am still somehow insanely busy. But I think of this story and you guys all the time so thank you for your reviews, your favourites, everything. You have no idea how much they mean to me, especially now.

We're getting close to the end! Maybe 10 chapters till the end of this Part 1. And they are jam-packed so just you wait. Alec will be in the next one, but we've got a big conversation with Jane coming up so get excited :D I am already hard at work on it, so I do expect to get it out sooner than I have been.

seleneariel: You are a light.

lovefanfiction2021: Right!'

Guest1: I am super excited to see her as a vamp. With that temper! Whew

MandosGirl: Thank you! And I know, adorbs.

CrimsonFantasy: Can you imagine lmao

Louise: Yup! You will definitely get one and more of an understanding of his perspective in the next few chapters.

Guest: Thank you so much! You're too sweet.

Ariel: Thank you for all your comments! Thrilled me. Love the nickname idea! I had a few but ended up not liking any. Any thoughts?

By you,

Ro

p.s. Saffiya and Prosper's conversation is based off of one my friend (w/CIP) and I had a few years ago. But she is currently somewhere with no cell phone service and because there is so little research, I cannot completely confirm the details on fear experienced in patients with CIP. Any study on such topic may also be ethically ambiguous so we're just gonna go with this for now.