A/N: I felt a little bad that the last chapter was really short so I'm posting this tonight. I was saving it for tomorrow but like I said, the one before was really short. I hope you enjoy this and review!

Disclaimer: I own nothing. It belongs to Richelle Mead blah blah blah mooooooooooo!

Chapter Seven: Danger

On our way to the shopping mall, I stopped Viktoria. We needed to talk for a minute.

"I'm guessing you're not mad at me anymore?" I asked.

"Oh no Rose! Of course not. Sure I was mad at the time but the next day when I cooled down a little you were gone and I never got the chance to talk to you . . . Can you forgive me?" she asked.

"Of course I forgive you! I've missed you a lot Viktoria. I've been so afraid that you'd hate me!" I replied. We gave eachother a big hug after that.

"So how did you turn Dimka back? I've never heard of that being possible!" she asked with wonder in her eyes.

"It's a really long story." I replied.

"I don't care we've got a long way to walk to the mall." she said.

"Okay . . . Have you ever heard of the Moroi element called spirit?" I asked.

"Isn't that what Oksana can do?" she asked.

"Yes, it is. My best friend Lissa wields spirit and in my time here I figured out that there might be a way to turn a Strigoi back to its original state. I researched and did something I'm really not proud of but I figured it out after a while. You have to charm a stake with spirit and then a spirit user has to stab the Strigoi through the heart with the spirit stake. The healing magic of spirit heals the Strigoi's soul and it becomes whatever it was before." I explained.

"Wow . . . How did you find Dimka?" she asked.

"Well the night I left here, I met up with Denis, Artur and Lev and we went to Novosibirsk together. Each night, whenever I would feel a Strigoi-" she cut me off.

"What do you mean feel?" she asked.

"I guess I should've explained that too. I'll start at the beginning. Just over two years ago, I was driving in a car with Lissa and her family when her father lost control of the car and we crashed. Everyone but Lissa died. Even me." she gasped, but I continued. "Lissa didn't know anything about spirit back then, but that day, she brought me back to life because she panicked. It forged a psychic bond between us. I can feel her emotions and I can go in her head and see through her eyes. Up until the plane ride, I could only feel her emotions but now she can feel mine too and its how we talk now. I'm what they call shadow-kissed. It means I've gone to the world of the dead and come back from it. After I made my first two Strigoi kills in Spokane, Washington, my connection to the world of the dead was strengthened. If I let my mental walls down, I can see the ghosts in the in-between state. When a Strigoi is near, I get nauseous. It's like an early alarm system for me."

"Wow . . . So keep going with the Novosibirsk story." she urged.

"Ok. So whenever I would feel a Strigoi, we would pin it down and question it about Dimitri. Finally, one night when we were about to head back for the night, I sensed another one. It was lucky, becaause this one knew Dimitri. I told him to go and tell Dimitri that Rose Hathaway was looking for him." I responded.

"What happened next?" she asked in awe.

"Well a few days later, we were going to meet up with another unpromised girl that was working with us and Dimitri found me. I hesitated when I saw him; I knew I shouldn't have, but I did. Then he took the opportunity to whack me over the head. When I woke up, I had a concussion and I was in an unfamiliar room. Everything was beautiful and looked expensive. The thing about all the expensive stuff, nothing could be turned into a weapon and my stake was taken from me. I had nothing to use in case I was attacked. Dimitri held me prisoner for probably a little over a week maybe? I don't remember because he drugged me with vampire bites to keep me weak. I must say that was a well thought out plan. One day when he didn't visit all day, my mind started getting clearer and started to fight off the haze. I managed to postpone him from turning me just long enough to break a chair leg and stab him with it. I got the passwords for the doors from a human servant, and I was out. Or so I thought. I was attacked by another Strigoi, and the chair leg was still in Dimitri's chest. I managed to get the Strigoi locked in between the two doors and he didn't know the codes. I got another human servant to lead me to the vault where my stake was being kept and I escaped. Dimitri recovered from the chair leg and began to chase me. He caught up to me at a bridge, where I let down my mental walls and sent the ghosts after him. Ghosts hate Strigoi more than anything else, so they distracted him. The thing is, when I release the ghosts, I get a skull-splitting headache so I had to put my walls back up, letting Dimitri attack again. The bridge fight lasted a few more minutes, until I staked him and he fell off into the water."

"If you staked him, then how isn't he dead right now?" she asked.

"I guess I didn't get it in far enough. I returned to St. Vladimir's after that. That's when the first letter came." I replied.

"What letter?" she asked.

"Dimitri would send me letters telling me that there was no where I could hide. The first letter came with my stake." I explained.

"Wow . . . so how did you catch Dimka so you could turn him back?" she asked. At this point, we were sitting on a bench outside the mall.

"Well . . . I was in punishment at the Royal Court for something or other. Lissa was going to check out a college, and I was supposed to go with her but because of my punishment I couldn't. She took her ex-boyfriend Christian instead. They were out at dinner with Princess Priscilla Voda, and when they were leaving, Dimitri and his Strigoi friends attacked them. I saw this in Lissa's head. They killed Priscilla and most of the guardians with her and the others. Dimitri captured Lissa and Christian to use as bait for me because he knew I'd come to rescue them. I led the other guardians to the warehouse where they were being kept and I was ready to kill Dimitri. I had my stake lined up with his heart and was about to push it in when I was pushed out of the way. It was Lissa and Christian, and Lissa was holding a stake. Christian is a fire user, so he ringed Dimitri in fire. Lissa put her arm through the fire and after a few minutes of struggling, it hit his heart. I blinding flash of light filled the room, and Dimitri was a dhampir again. The magic that flowed Lissa was so powerful that our bond blacked out for about a day."

Viktoria was in awe. She was completely speechless for a few moments, an unusual feat for her. Finally, she murmured, "Amazing . . ."

"You should see the look on your face right now. It's priceless!" I chortled.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah . . . let's shop now!" she said enthusiastically.

Shopping with Viktoria was fun. I bought clothes for the both of us, seeing as Abe gave me so much money! That remided me that Viktoria didn't know that Abe was my dad.

"Hey, Viktoria?"

"Yeah Rose?"

"You remember Abe?" I asked.

"Yes . . . what about him?"

"When I got back home, I found out that Abe is my . . . father." I told her. To say that she was shocked was an understatement. She was completely floored.

"Are you serious?" she asked.

"Positive. My mother told me." I replied.

"Well I guess I see the resemblance. The eyes, the dark brown hair, the attitude . . ." she said with a smirk.

"Oh har har." I said. That's when the nausea hit. "VIKTORIA! GET DOWN!" I screeched. She obeyed out of shock. We were jumped by three Strigoi. "RUN VIKTORIA! RUN AND CALL YOUR BROTHER. DON'T YOU DARE LOOK BACK! JUST RUN!" I yelled. She ran away with tears streaming down her face. I ran into an alley, and the Strigoi followed. Fighting off three Strigoi on my own was not the easiest thing I've ever done. I was taking some pretty hard hits. One Strigoi grabbed my left arm and snapped it like a twig. I cried out in agony, and the Strigoi just laughed. Dimitri must've heard me, because there he was the front of the alley. He was too late though; another Strigoi grabbed me and bit my neck. I could feel the life flowing out of me, feeling blissful from the endorphins. Suddenly, someone picked me up and began to run.

"Roza! Please stay awake! I need you!" the voice said. I recognized it as Dimitri. He must be carrying me.

"But I'm so tired . . . goodnight . . ." I mumbled.

"No! ROZA! Please stay with me!" was all I heard before I blacked out.