Chapter 5
Montana winter had a way of stealing your breath and sapping your energy. Even the sturdy pair of shoes I had chosen aren't enough to protect me from the elements. I shiver, burrowing deeper into my coat. The cold is biting and I am almost grateful for the sting.
I have too much time to think as I walk. I am desperately trying to think of anything but her- reciting poems we learned in English class, multiplying numbers together and then dividing them apart, but I can't stop it. My mind plays and replays the memories so vividly it's like I am there again.
I blink and I am sitting in my room again. Someone behind me is gently working the knots out of my hair. Christian's troubled face appears in view, dabbing at my face with a tissue. I touch my cheeks, shocked to find them wet. I don't remember starting to cry. Something scratches against my shoulders as I shift, and I realize I am in a cap-sleeve dress that is not mine. I itch my arms roughly, hoping the pain would bring me back to reality. The brushing stops and someone is speaking in quiet tones, but I can't process what they're saying. Red hair and black mixes and blurs as my eyes fill with tears again.
The wind howls and I startle, afraid. I laugh quietly to myself.
When I was seven, I had seen one in the garden, slithering towards where I had been playing. I was so frightened that I ran inside and hid under my covers. My mother was unable to coax me out for dinner, despite her best efforts. She tried all the usual techniques, like telling me that snakes were much more afraid of me than I was of them. Nothing worked. Frustrated, she brought in the big guns- my father. "There are much worse things to fear than snakes," he had said.
There certainly were much worse things, I thought, stepping over yet another log, than a snake. How foolish I am to be afraid of the wind when the true terror lies before me. What to do I have to be afraid of more than my destination? More than the empty rest of my life without her?
The trees were thinning, showing the morning light behind the trees. It wouldn't be long now. I rubbed the beads of the Dragomir chotki between my fingers, noticing a crack in one of the beads. I traced the tiny canyon of it. Father Andrew had pressed it into my hands before the viewing and I had nearly vomited picturing them prying it off her wrist.
Eventually, I reached a clearing. The caves were much larger than I had imagined, a sprawling expanse of yawning mouths. It was easy to determine which one had Strigoi occupying it by the mess the guardians had left behind–deep tire tracks in the mud and streaks of blood from the wounded dragged out of the cave. I tried not wonder who the blood belonged to.
I stepped forward into the entrance of the bloodiest cave, summoning the last of my energy and courage.
"Is it true?" I asked into the blackness. "Is it true that being Strigoi turns off the magic?"
"Who's asking?" a voice hissed out of the shadows. "You smell… delicious." A snarl echoed across the cave. There were at least two of them melted into the darkness.
"I need to know if becoming Strigoi will turn the magic off. If it will make it stop."
"You wouldn't be the first to choose this path. And you won't be the last either." With a shiver, I realized this new voice had a Russian accent, like Dimitri's.
"If I turned Strigoi…would the magic go away? All of it? For good?" My words were quiet, but I knew the group of Strigoi in the darkness could hear me. I counted my breaths, struggling to slow them down.
"Yes," a voice answered from the darkness. "One of the great joys of being awakened. Have you felt burdened by your magic, child? Is it a weight that settles deep within you? You could be free, you know. Free of the magic."
Free of the magic. Free of terrifying spirit outbursts that would no doubt land me in some sort of prison or insane asylum if I returned to the Academy. I was a danger, both to myself and to others. I couldn't control myself–I had killed Ralf.
I wasn't afraid of the possibility that I might die. By all rights, I should be dead already. The car accident. Victor. The Strigoi attack. Almost everyone I loved was dead–Rose was dead, Mom was dead, Dad was dead, and Andre was dead. I had no one left anymore, except Christian. But it was only a matter of time before I hurt him too.
"Such beautiful hair." As I whirled around, I noticed a long-haired Strigoi behind me.
He reached out, twisting a lock of my hair around his fingertip. "We don't allow just anyone to be Strigoi. It is an honor bestowed upon a chosen few. What do you offer to us?"
"I am the last Dragomir."
He smiled, then attacked.
