We sat in a comfortable silence for about an hour before I noticed Eddie's eyes drooping dangerously towards sleep. I slid myself back against the headboard so we were sitting side by side on the bed.
"How are you feeling?" I asked Eddie, reaching out to touch the bruise forming along his cheek.
"Never better," he smirked back at me, flinching when my hand made contact. I gave a sigh and left the room to grab Sydney's first aid kit. I wasn't sure anything would actually help, but I felt the need to keep my hands occupied. I tore open an alcohol wipe and got to work on the various scrapes and stains I noticed on him.
"I'm glad you made it out of there, Castile. You had me worried for a second," I started, feeling vulnerable in the aftermath.
"Yeah, good thing we have Christian with us. Without him..." he trailed off. We both knew what would have happened. Eddie would have been killed. There was no telling if the rest of us would have made it out alive. "What the hell happened back there? I thought we had them all..."
"It seems like we got a bit more than we bargained for back there, huh? The strigoi must have had some extra visitors or something... There ended up being seven in total," I explained, remembering he was knocked out for the last half of the fight.
"I should have never let my guard down. I just thought we'd gotten them all, and look what happened. I put everyone at risk," Eddie said, turning his head from my reach. He blushed slightly, embarrassed. I felt another piece of my heart flake off seeing my friend so hurt, and for something that wasn't his fault.
"You didn't do anything wrong. None of us could have known what was out there waiting for us. It just proves we can't be too confident in our plans, that's all," I tried to reassure him. I could tell he wasn't convinced, so I continued, "Seriously, Eddie. You can't let this get to you. We all made it out alive, and that's the only thing that matters. Everything else is just unnecessary detail," I shrugged.
"If you say so," he shook his head at me as he responded.
"I do say so, and I'm technically your boss. That means you have to listen to me!" I teased.
"Of course you would pull the boss card on me Hathaway! I can't believe it's taken you this long!" He threw back at me. We both laughed, breaking the tension in the room. I finished my first aid application shortly after that, and we stayed up for a few more hours before I let Eddie get some sleep.
Despite the fatigue I was feeling, I wouldn't allow myself to get any rest. I kept replaying the night's events in my mind. I was stuck on the strigoi who seemed to know me. I kept replaying that interaction, trying to see if I remembered him from anywhere. I couldn't place him, but that didn't mean much. If hundreds of strigoi were looking for me, some would have to know what I looked like. The conclusion didn't exactly make me feel any better.
I was still pondering this question when the others started to wake up. Christian was up first, and he looked way better than he had the night before. Rest had helped, but I knew he would still be weak until he got a feeding in. I looked him over once again and decided I had never been more thankful for my fire magic friend.
"Great thinking last night, Sparky. You really saved the day," I told him.
"I should have done more. I just panicked when I saw him go down, you know? I went into defense mode," he answered in the same self deprecating way Eddie had earlier.
"You did perfect. You couldn't have done anything more without seriously hurting yourself. I'm really glad you're here with us, Christian," I said honestly. I hoped he took my compliment seriously.
He nodded, and I told him we would go see a feeder once Sydney woke up. In the meantime, we took a look at the breakfast room service menu. We ordered several meals to be brought to the room while we waited for everyone else to wake up.
It didn't take too long after breakfast arrived for the others to join us. The smell of pancakes and bacon surely helped, and I was glad for the little sliver of happiness food could provide for us after last night. We ate in comfortable silence, no sound besides five mouths chewing. None of us felt the need to speak just to fill the room.
After breakfast we got ready and packed our things before heading to the feeders. Sydney was apprehensive to leave when our mission went sideways, but I wanted to get home so I could relay what happened to Court. Although Sydney didn't technically work for me, she defaulted to my judgment in the matter. I couldn't wait to leave this town behind.
When we pulled up to the house I noticed a few cars in the driveway. A man in his thirties opened the door and let us in, and I could see a moroi and a guardian in the living room with a human woman. I wasn't sure who the feeder was, but I hoped we wouldn't have to wait too long for Christian to take his turn.
I discovered that both humans worked as feeders, which was kind of surprising to see in a couple. We made pleasant greetings and the man offered to let Christian feed right away. They disappeared to the other room with the woman and moroi, and the guardian turned his attention on us.
"Hello, I'm Guardian Roland. Are you all new here? I haven't seen you around," he asked, looking at each of us closely. I saw Mikhail stand in front of Sydney protectively. I was thankful, realizing an alchemist might look out of place with us.
"Just checking out the school for now," I answered smoothly. Guardian Roland nodded.
"I hope your charge likes it. It would be nice to have a few extra guardians around. We've been having some... issues here lately," he said.
I hesitated in responding. I had never worked in the field before, and I wasn't sure if it was normal to exchange this kind of info between guardians, or if this guy was seriously oversharing. My eyes flicked to Mikhail, full of questions. He gave me a short nod and I took that as a signal to continue.
"What kind of issues?" I asked him.
"A few strigoi have decided to make the town home. The college is pretty well warded, but other areas in the town aren't. It's caused a lot of fear in the charges," He responded. It made sense why they were targeting downtown.
"How many do you think there are?" I asked, feigning innocence. I couldn't tell if it was working.
"Between two and four, by our best guess. Though I think it's probably closer to two. If there were four, I'm sure we'd have some casualties by now," he said thoughtfully.
I couldn't help myself. I laughed out loud, long and humorless. The guardian went from somewhat relaxed to completely rigid. I cursed myself, wishing I hadn't had a classic Rose Hathaway moment to make this guy suspicious of us. Thankfully, Eddie stepped forward and came to my rescue.
"We ran into some last night. More than two," he said, puffing himself up. I could tell he was putting his injuries on full display. Guardian Roland nodded, taking a closer look at Eddie.
"So you're saying the problem's been taken care of?" He asked, brows raised. I hesitated before making a decision.
"I hope so. I wouldn't let your guard down, though. There were more than we were expecting," I took a beat, "if you find the problem hasn't gone away, give us a call," I replied. I turned to Sydney, knowing she was the only one who had a phone. She stepped forward and quickly rattled off her number, shooting me a look of disapproval as she did so. He saved it in his phone without asking any more questions.
Christian came back at that moment, and I was thankful we were able to leave. After saying a quick goodbye, we departed from town and made our way back to West Virginia.
Once we got home, we agreed to debrief right away. I was anxious to get the report off to Court. I knew I wouldn't be able to rest until I had it done.
I wouldn't need as much input from the others this time, seeing as we had stuck together for the majority of the mission. I really just needed Eddie and Christian to go over what had happened for the little bit we had split up. I also wanted to make sure to get any observations that I might have missed. Christian agreed to take notes for me again, and I wanted to keep things short and sweet. I had some colorful words for the Queen that I knew would leave her with no questions.
As he was turning the page to start writing, I noticed a page in his notebook with all of our names on it.
"What's that?" I asked Christian, leaning over the table to see what it was. He looked shy as he responded.
"I'm keeping track of everyone's kills. So you have an accurate number when you get your molnija marks."
"Hmmmm... I never discussed that with anyone. I'm not sure if we'll be getting marks for these. It's not really typical guardian work," I shrugged.
"We should design our own. Maybe something we could all get," Eddie suggested. I looked around and everyone's faces were lit up with excitement. I wasn't sure if that was allowed, but I loved the idea anyway.
"I don't know guys, it'll take us a long time to convince Sydney to agree to that," I laughed as the attention turned to her. She blushed bright red as everyone started to tease her about it. She agreed to think about it, but I knew that was just to keep spirits in the room high. I proposed we have a little design contest, and we'd meet back up later to choose a design. Everyone agreed, and even if we didn't end up going through with it, it would be a nice distraction for us.
I ended the meeting shortly after and immediately pulled out my laptop. I set to the keyboard at a furious pace, letting the Queen and Guardian Croft know exactly what I thought of their miscalculations and what it could have cost us. As I was typing, I realized just how lucky we were to get out of that mission with only minor injuries. Someone should have died. If we didn't have Christian, someone would have.
"I feel like I should remind you to be respectful. This message is going to your Queen," Sydney said from across the table. She didn't look up from her own report as she spoke. I rolled my eyes, though I knew she didn't see.
"And our Queen loves a little passive aggression. I'm sure she'll appreciate the message," I replied.
"Rose," Sydney scolded, dragging her eyes from her screen and onto me.
"What? It's better than active aggression," I defended myself.
"Thank God for that," Sydney sighed and went back to her report.
I fired off the email soon after that. I knew I should probably wait until I was less worked up to go over the report and maybe edit some choice words, but I couldn't help it. Tatiana needed to know the severity of the situation. I didn't want to censor myself too much.
After sending the email I made my way to bed, exhausted after the sleepless mission. I made a note to myself to check in with Lissa when I woke up, knowing she would be meeting with the Queen to chat about my report.
It turns out I didn't need to make that mental note. I woke with a start a few hours later, feeling fear and anger surge through the bond. I was quickly pulled into Lissa's mind to witness the showdown between her and Tatiana.
"I would like to start this email by applauding the source of your information. The number of strigoi was significantly higher than we were told, which almost doubled our final kill count. This caused significant injury among the team."
Lissa was reading directly from my report, and I got a thrill out of the look on the Queen's face. It was pinched in displeasure as Lissa threw my words across the room at her. It was almost comical how unnatural the words sounded coming out of Lissa's mouth. Hans sat there stone faced as ever, not letting his mask slip as she continued on. She only made it through another paragraph before Tatiana interrupted her.
"That's enough, Princess. I've read the report for myself," she said firmly.
Her eyes flicked to Dimitri, the look in his telling her to stand down. I sucked in a sharp breath, remembering all the times he had given me that same stare. It really wasn't getting any easier to see him, despite how distracted I remained most of the time. Getting over him was quickly becoming my life's greatest challenge. I would just have to push myself further into this work to forget him.
"It's unfortunate that the Guardians stationed there misjudged the number. I don't feel good about that, Princess Dragomir," Hans explained to Lissa. He let his mask slip ever so slightly, and I could tell he really meant that.
"I insist you send them extra hands," Lissa demanded. Hans looked at her sharply.
"We don't have any other available guardians, Princess. If we did, I would gladly send them over. It's just not possible," he responded.
"I didn't say we had to send them guardians. We know how powerful offensive magic is. Just reading the report we can see how helpful Lord Ozera is to the team. If we sent more moroi, they could be an asset," Lissa said confidently, directing her speech to Tatiana.
"I know where you are trying to take this, Princess. There is no way we are sending the last living Dragomir to participate," Tatiana responded sharply, trying to end the discussion.
"I wasn't going to suggest that at all. I know at least two other moroi interested in offensive magic. I'm sure either would love to help," Lissa said. I could tell by the disappointment she felt that she was going to suggest herself. She kept chanting in her inner monologue, "wait, it's not the right time."
"I'll keep that in mind. First, I'd like to see how they do on another mission. Hans, make sure to give them an easy one," the Queen said.
"I thought this one was supposed to be easy," Lissa responded.
"Guardian Hathaway and her team completed the mission in a satisfactory way. That's all that matters,"
I could feel the darkness swell up in Lissa. She was reaching a breaking point with the politics, and I knew I had to do something before she said something she would really regret. I concentrated hard on her, and managed to pull away much of the darkness. My mood instantly soured, but I could feel her relax through the bond. She soon excused herself and ran out of the throne room, Dimitri close behind.
I pulled myself from the bond, sitting up quietly in my bed as I did so. There was no way I would be able to get back to sleep. I threw some work out clothes on and went to blow off some steam in the basement, needing to let some of the darkness out. I knew it was dangerous, but I couldn't help it. Even though I was states away, I was still putting Lissa first.