A.N:Hey !!

Here chapter 17.…it's getting closer of the revealing can't you feel it?? Lol,

Anyways thank you so so much for your kind words. It means a lot to me.

And don't forget to review ok? I absolutely love reading you!!

Take care

Love you all

Steffy

Chapter 17:

Adrian stumbled almost crashing on the floor but I caught his arm and held him up before he touched the floor. I let go of his arm and took a step back.

Adrian looked at me, his hand on his cheek, but I knew him well enough to notice that it was only sadness in his eyes.

Ben took a step toward us, probably to throw Adrian out, but I raised a hand to stop him and he froze on the spot.

Adrian could pretend to be smug, but it didn't work with me.

"Come now," I said trying to sound calm. "Let's talk," I added walking to him to take his arm, but he brushed me away.

"You know if it's a sex thing, I'm pretty good at that too. I won't mind… You can be my blood whore." He said dryly.

I saw Ben flush with anger and I knew it wouldn't be long before he lost the little control he had left.

I looked at him. "You better go, for now." I said apologetically to Ben. I knew drunk Adrian and I knew hurt Adrian.

"But…" He looked confused.

"It's ok. I can handle Adrian," I said taking a step to stand beside Adrian. "Just go… I'll see you in the morning." I said trying to sound calm and detached.

Ben nodded warily but left.

"Finally together," said Adrian, not able to stand straight I caught him before he fell and he threw up at the same time.

I groaned. "That just peachy!" I said really annoyed now. "I'm the one supposed to be broken and I take care of you!" I said starting to unbutton his shirt doing my best to ignore the vomit. I was lucky not to have a weak stomach

"Well, you did hurt all of us, and we're not giving you shit about that do we?" He said almost incomprehensibly.

This hurt more than a punch. He knew where to hit.

"Come on," I said fighting the tears helping him to the bedroom. Even if I hated him right now I was sure that the dose of alcohol in his blood was scarily high and I wanted to keep an eye on him since, as upset as I was at the time being, I didn't want him to choke in his own vomit.

I sat him on the edge of the bed, found a champagne bucket and gave it to him.

"If you want to vomit it goes in there." I said in a threatening tone while I was looking around for a shirt for him to wear.

I did, finally, find a very large black shirt that Lissa and I won at a fair back during our runaway days. It said " Devil's child" in red in the front.

"Very fitting," I whispered helping him into it. I noticed some vomit fell onto his pants and sighed, but I was really surprised I didn't get one of his witty comments as I gently laid him on the bed and removed both his shoes and pants.

Once I helped him under the covers, I went to fill a glass of water and forced him to drink a bit.

I put the glass on the nightstand and sat beside him for a while trying to sooth him while stroking his hair.

We'll talk about that tomorrow, I thought still angry but feeling bad at the same time.

"I don't need your pity!" He mumbled looking at me with only one eye open. "I know you get a kick of my pain." He added seriously. I quickly removed my hand from his hair as if it was on fire.

"Excuse me?" I asked not able to hide the hurt.

"I love you, but you hurt me… You keep hurting us you're selfish!" He added sleepily. "You didn't care of dying when we were ready to every sacrifices to help you." He shook his head slowly. "You don't love us. You are only good to hurt us… We'll be better off without you hanging around to hurt us…hurt me even more." He mumbled again before started to snore slowly.

I looked at him, mouth wide open with shock. I knew I was rotten for them but hearing it from Adrian hurt so bad, much more than expected. I even started to cry.

Crying over Adrian! I thought, wanting to slap myself.

I settled to spend the rest of the night in the armchair in the far corner of the room so I could keep an eye on him and be sure he was breathing okay.

I drifted in and out of sleep for a while. As soon as it seemed reasonable enough to believe that he would be fine and that it was not too early, I went to take a very hot shower as my chest was still aching over Adrian's words.

I wore a bare red tank top a pair of jeans and tightened my hair into a high ponytail.

I didn't want to go in the common room for breakfast. I wanted to avoid the Academy students as much as I could so I prepared a coffee and ate a muffin of the basket someone left in my room.

I didn't even bother to read the card, as it was probably one hell of butt licker. I decided to go and see my mom as soon as Adrian was up.

She didn't have to hide. God knows we all made mistakes and whatever she did 18 years ago she probably had her reasons.

Wow… I am growing up, I thought. I hear Adrian waking up and put a cup of coffee and two Tylenol on the little bar, as I was sure he had a killer headache.

He walked into the room confused looking around.

"Oh, hello…" he said wincing as he heard his own voice.

"Killer headache huh?" I asked. Good!! I thought nastily.

He nodded and walked to the bar looking at the coffer cup with envy.

He looked at me sheepishly.

"I've got to go now," I said trying to sound detached. "I went to your room and found some cloths," I said pointing to a pair of jeans and shirt on the sofa.

"Here, you have a coffee and tablets for your head." I added avoiding his eyes.

"I want you gone when I come back," I said finally looking at him.

My eyes must have looked cold because he raised his eyebrows in surprise.

"I don't know what I said yesterday, but I'm -"

"You said nothing that I didn't already knew," I said frostily cutting him off. "I think we should avoid each other for a little while, maybe 5 or 10 years." I added taking my keys. "Leave as soon as you can."

And I left, jogging to the guardian dorms, as I needed to talk to my mother.

When I made it to the guardians' building, I saw Stan coming down. He hugged me.

A hug from Stan? That was the scariest thing in the world. I thought strangely hugging him back.

"Looking for your mother?" He asked with a smile.

Stan can have a genuine smile? I wondered shocked.

I nodded smiling back to him.

He gave me her room number and padded my shoulder. "It's so good to have you back," he said without any sarcasm.

"Wow… Talk about another dimension," I muttered walking to my mom room.

When she opened the door after my light knock, I could see in her eyes that I was probably the last person she expected to see.

"Hey!" I said as cheerily as I could. "Can I come in?"

"Hey," she said stepping aside to let me in. Her room was as tidy and military style than I expected.

"You know Rose about Ibrah-" she started and I could feel the discomfort in her voice.

I took a deep breath and turned to face her. "I'm sorry," I said cutting her off.

"YOU are sorry?" She asked really taken aback as she probably expected some kind of my well known childish fit. I would have probably done something like that before that was sure, but not now…not anymore. I was a different person.

"You don't have to explain anything and you did what you had to do back then. I'm not one to judge your decisions." I leaned to be half sat on her desk. "And because of me you had to take a trip back to memory lane… Face a past that…" I looked trough the window not really looking for anything. "That was probably painful to some level and…" I sighed. "You did it all because of me." I was rotten for them… Adrian was right on that one.

"Oh no Rose!" She said on such a gently tone that I, almost, thought it was someone else talking. I looked at her and she didn't have her professional mask on. She was looking almost like a mother. She reached for my hand and made me sit beside her on the bed.

"I won't lie what you did was reckless and silly, but at your age?" She smiled a bit "I would have done the exact same thing and, well, I believed that what you shared with…with Dimitri," she said and I appreciated her effort to connect with me on that. "Was very powerful, special… So much love apparently." She smiled. "Kashka talked to us," she added as she saw my confusion.

"You shouldn't feel guilty that what you did, made me contact Ibrahim. I had other options!" She added and I knew she was trying to make me feel better.

"Now you are being nice... It's scary," I said smiling.

She chuckled. "And I should have talked to you about that." She said seriously. "I was often overreacting with you and I should have told you why."

"No you didn't have to do that! It's your life -" I started.

"Yeah, but my life has incidentally an impact on yours and I was trying to lecture you…" She shook her head. "Imposing you a code of conduct without explaining you why." She said angry against herself.

I looked at her and took her hand. She looked at our hands locked together for a little while and finally concentrated her eyes on me again.

"I was 18 and I was a novice at the Academy in Scotland." She said the eyes unfocused and she was unfolding her youth to me for the first time. "I was pretty famous at the academy you know for being a smartass 'know-it-all,'" she said with the smile. "In case you were wondering where you got that from," she added with a wink.

I chuckled as she continued.

"Anyways it was about 2 months before graduation when they organized a sort of seminar you know about how non royal could make it too and this kind of stuff." She grimaced to show how pointless she still thought it was. "And he was there. He was a 28 year old super successful moroi and he concentrated all his interest on me." She said slightly blushing. "I felt so special…" She added with a snort.

Wow he was 10 years older than her! I guess the attraction to older men was genetic too, but I could understand why she freaked out when she saw the attention I've got from Adrian. It probably tasted like 'déjà vu'.

"He gave me presents, complemented me and everything. I was young and so naïve then that I fell in love with him and I felt blessed when he requested me as his guardian." She added looking away. "We were together for almost 2 years and we kept our relationship a secret he said it was 'for now', but I probably already knew back then that he would never make it official even if a part of me dreamt he would marry me."

She squeezed my hand and I squeezed right back to invite her to continue.

"When I found out I was pregnant, I didn't know how to tell him. I was about to come clean when I found out he was organizing his wedding with a moroi woman." She stood up, "so, I left him and never told him about you," She added but I could hear in her voice that she was not regretting her choice.

"Don't worry it doesn't change anything." I said standing up too. "He could have easily find out about me if he wanted to and well…" I shrugged "I don't want him in my life anyways."

My mom was looking to me with apprehension so I smiled to her.

"I'll talk to him as well…" I shrugged. "I owe him that much for his help but after 'bye-bye,'" I added mimicking the sign with my hand.

"You don't have to do anything you don't want to do." She said nicely.

"Oh but I want to!" I said taking a deep breath and hugging her. "Thank you," I said to her ear as I really didn't know what to say that would convey my gratitude.

"You are really welcome Rose," she added rubbing my back before breaking our embrace. She quickly looked at the clock.

"You need to go?" I asked

"Yeah I've got a class but… You can join me if you want." She added politely.

"No, that's fine mom. Thank you. I didn't sleep well. I think I'll go back to bed."

She nodded and we both left in separate ways.

As I walked to my room I took the decision to graduate anyways. I knew it was what Dimitri would have wanted and I needed to make my mom proud, as I owed her that much.

I grimaced walking into my room, but Adrian left as I asked him to. I found a little note folded in two and read it.

I don't know what I did or said last night but I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt you.

I love you

A.

"Didn't mean to hurt me? Well you did screw up then," I whispered throwing the piece of paper in the trash and almost sleep walking to the sofa. I'll have to change the bed before sleeping in it, as it probably smelled like vomit and alcohol.