Chapter 6-

(Catarina)

I dress in a blood red long sleeved blouse, black skirt to my knees, with black ballet looking shoes. I leave the ones I made in my room with my usual clothes. I pull my hair back in a bun then hurry to Shan. He takes one look at me and smiles, blushing slightly. "Look at you! You look...wow..."

I giggle. "Thank you. How do you feel?"

"Good," he replies.

Throughout the halls vampires greet him with a hand gesture called the death touch meaning 'Even in death may you be triumphant.' The vampires believe that the vampire gods look well upon vampires who face death without fear.

We gather in the cave and Shan is taken away to the top of the maze. On the way Mika surprises me by saying to him "May the gods bless you with the luck of the vampires."

I stand beside Kurda, Vanez, Gavner, and Mr. C. Arra is close by also.

We all count the passing minutes, hoping for Shan to emerge victoriously. Seventeen minutes pass and I know the maze is filled to the top with water now. I began to chant "Please, please, please..." quietly over and over again until Mr. C put his hand on my shoulder and stopped me. "Sorry," I mumbled.

We all watched silently...waiting and hoping...

And then finally a door opens in the maze and water floods out into a pool. Along with it Shan spills out onto the ground. We run to him. I splash through the water at full speed and throw my arms around him tightly. He coughs. "You did it Darren!" Mr. Crepsley shouts enthusiastically.

"I thought you'd had it! So much time had passed, I was sure you'd failed," Kurda tells him.

"Where am I?" he mumbles confusedly.

"He's disoriented, the poor boy."

"Who wouldn't be?" Mr. C responds. My arm is still around him and Mr. C is at his side to hold him up as they take the rock off of him. Then the men bring him to his room and he sleeps, exhausted.

A lot of vampires are in the halls, talking about Shan.

"You are soaked with water," Kurda tells me. "You shouldn't have run into the water like that while you were wearing such nice clothes."

"I could care less about these clothes. I care much more about Darren. He is my friend."

"We can all see that. We practically had to pry him from your arms," he chuckles.

I blush. "I've never had friends before. I didn't have anybody at all except for Jonathan but now even he is gone. Darren is all I have. He is very important to me for these reasons. And he is the only other young vampire I might ever meet. Surely, you must understand."

"We do," he assures me, patting my shoulder.

It is late the next day when Shan finally wakes up. I checked on him many times but he was still asleep for over fifteen hours. Finally he did awake and join us in the dining hall where everyone cheered and listened to his story about how he stayed in the water for a little over 20 minutes. Finally we all ate and I was able to get a word into him. Harkat told us more people were betting for him to succeed now.

I hug him and he smiles. "I remember you were the first person I saw when I finished," he tells me, taking big bites of bread and bat broth.

I blush lightly and so does he. "I was very worried about you," I admit.

"I told you I would be fine."

"Thank the Gods that you are," I smile.

"Did you ruin your clothes? You looked really nice and then you got them all wet because of me."

I laugh. "Don't worry about it."

The good mood only lasts so long because after a message that vampaneze were coming to destroy our race, one of the last vampires showed up here and said he had seen vampaneze tracks in the snow.

The next trial for Shan is the Path of Needles. It is a cave full of stalagmites and stalactites that he has to carefully go across. They are slippery and he could get seriously injured or killed. And if there is any noise or anything at all the ones can fall from the ceiling and spear him. I train with Arra for most of the day but then she goes to help Vanez with Shan. She says he has good balance which is a bit of a help to my faith in him. "Are you sure you're okay?" I ask him, running my hand gently over his cut up palm.

"Yes," he nods, blushing.

"Does it hurt?"

(Shan)

I shiver slightly at her touch. I can't help it.

(Catarina)

"No," he tells me. "It will be healed by tomorrow."

"Okay...get your rest Shan. Sweet dreams."

"You too."

"Good luck tomorrow. Don't break your promise."

"I won't. I'll do good."

"Okay," I kiss his healing palm then hug him before going to my own room.