Just to let you know, I have not abandoned this story! My computer crashed and it…well, pretty much fixed itself, I guess. I have a couple of chapters written and ready to be uploaded, so here you go! Hope that makes up for taking so long!

We had been in the house for an hour waiting on the guardians to get here to take us to court. I was forced to lay on the couch to rest, even though I felt fine. Dimitri hadn't left my side since I woke up, er, came back to life. He had laid down next to me and explained everything. It was weird to know that I had died and not even realized it at the time.

Maya nursed while we talked, making little sounds every now and then. It felt good to have my little girl wrapped in my arms again. Adrian was pacing back and forth in front of the couch, every now and then stopping to look at us with a painful look on his face. Lissa had offered to take Maya multiple times but I just couldn't let her go.

Christian and Lissa were in the kitchen. I could hear them talking but I couldn't make out the words. Part of the reason why I couldn't make out the words was because one of my ears was pressed up against Dimitri's chest and the other would be covered by his hand every now and then.

"I love you." Dimitri whispered.

I couldn't help but see Adrian stop pacing and go stiff for a moment. I felt so bad whenever something like that happened. I knew how much he loved me, and I loved him, too, but I loved Dimitri more. I knew how badly he wished that Maya was his. I couldn't help but think about how much easier things would be right now if she were.

"I love you more." I replied. Dimitri gave me a look that said he didn't want to start that game right then, and that he loved me more. Little did he know that I wasn't just referring to his loving me. I was referring to loving him more than I loved Adrian.

Dimitri got up and walked over to the coffee table. He picked up the TV remote and said, "I think we should watch something to take our mind off of things." He gave me a small smile as he turned the TV on and laid back down next to me.

Adrian walked as fast as he could out of the room and into the kitchen. I had to look at Maya right then. Something had changed in me. It wasn't like the first time I had died and came back. This time, I realized just how easily everything could be ripped away from me. Adrian was one of the people I didn't want to lose. I knew that it would be hard because I didn't love him the way he wanted me to, and it would take a toll on him. I was just waiting for him to start drinking and smoking again.

We watched the television for half an hour before the phone rang again. This time, Adrian ran to the phone and answered it. Dimitri turned the TV off as Lissa and Christian ran into the room. All of us – except Maya, of course – sat and waited for Adrian to get off the phone. Finally, after what seemed like hours, he did.

"That was my aunt." he said.

Dimitri rolled his eyes as he mumbled, "We knew that." Thankfully, Adrian didn't hear him, but I still elbowed him in the ribs.

Adrian fingered the cord to the phone as he said, "She said that the guardians who were supposed to come get us have gone missing. They were supposed to be here by now, and when she found out they weren't she tried to contact them. She got no answer. We're supposed to stay here tonight. In the morning, she will send a team to come get us."

"We can't just sit here like floating ducks!" Christian yelled.

Dimitri stood up then. I thought he was going to talk some sense into Christian, but he surprised me by agreeing with him. "Christian is right. We have to get out of here and get to town. The strigoi obviously know that we are here, and they will keep coming until they get us. We're are in the middle of the woods, so we are in the perfect position for attack."

"But, Dimitri, we can't go out there. You saw what happened to Rose. She's as good a guardian as you, but she almost died! Think about how hard it will be for two guardians to get three royal moroi and a baby out of here and into town. Besides, we don't even know where town is. We don't know where we are!" Lissa interjected.

"I know where we are." That was Adrian. He had the most serious look I had ever seen him use on his face. "Aunt Tatiana did think that one of us needed to know where we are just in case. It looks like she was right. I can take us into town. I have been sneaking out of the house for months now doing just that. I've made some friends in the town, and I'm sure that if I call them and tell them what's going on, they'll help us."

We all stood in shock looking at Adrian. How could he have known where we were this entire time and not told us? Also, I had been wanting to get out of this damn house since the first week we were here, and he had kept this from me? I saw just how "in love" he was with me.

"Great." Dimitri said. "Christian, I want you to go eat something and drink plenty of water. You will need a lot of energy for the trip. I am going to rely on you to set some strigoi on fire if we run into them. Okay?

"Lissa, start packing a couple of bags. You and Adrian are going to have to wear a couple of backpacks with food and water to keep Rose, Christian, and I replenished. You two will have to take turns holding Maya. Can you do that?" he asked the both of them.

Lissa nodded and took off into her bedroom. I assumed the backpacks were in her room. Adrian didn't nod. He just stood there looking at Dimitri.

"Adrian?" I asked, trying to get him to snap out of it.

"You really want us to do this? Put you and your baby at risk?" Adrian said to me. He then looked at Dimitri and said, "What kind of father are you? Your child is what they are after, and you're just going to take her out there – where they are – to make it easier for them? You don't deserve them!"

Dimitri stepped forward, right in Adrian's face. "Who are you to tell me what kind of father I am? I love my daughter with all my heart. She is one of the most important things in my life. And so is my wife!" he fought back, pulling me to his side. "Face it, Adrian. She chose me, and we have a child together, not you two."

Adrian's face turned hard as steel. "Fine. Have fun trying to find the town on your own." He turned and walked into the hallway. Dimitri and I stood there staring at the opening to the doorway until we heard a door slam.

I stepped out of Dimitri's arm and gave him a hard look. "Really? Why would you do something like that? Adrian is the only one who knows how to get to the town. We need him. Besides that, you know that Adrian is my friend and I care about him. You also know how he feels about me – obviously – and instead of being mature and dealing with it, you decided to act like a child and start a fight about it. There is no way that Adrian and I would ever be together, and even though he doesn't like that fact, he acknowledges it. Unlike you."

"Oh, so I'm the one in the wrong here? He stood there and said that I was a bad father, Rose! What was I supposed to do, stand there and take it? I don't think so." he replied.

"You could defend yourself without hurting him like that!" I yelled. I stopped and took a deep breath. "Know what? Forget it. If you want to fight with him, go ahead. I don't care anymore. Just leave me out of it."

I walked over to the basinet, which we had brought into the living room earlier, and put Maya in it. I turned to go into the hallway, but Dimitri stopped me by grabbing my arm. "Roza, I'm sorry." He paused for a second. "I was in the wrong, I know that now. It's just that… I know that it would never happen, but in the back of my mind I worry about you deciding that you don't want me anymore. That you would rather be with Adrian.

"I understand that it's irrational. We have a child together, a child that shouldn't even exist. But by some miracle, we did have a child together. A beautiful baby girl, and I love her just as much as I love you. Roza, I almost lost you once…I won't let it happen again."

I could feel the warmth behind my eyes, but I refused to cry at a time like this. I had been super emotional since I got pregnant, and I guess some of those hormones were still messing with me. I shoved myself into his chest, snuggling into him. I lifted my head up and he met me halfway. We kissed and kissed and kissed until I could no longer feel my body. It was vibrating with passion.

Dimitri felt wonderful. I had never known that I could love another person so much until I met him, and then we had our little girl and I learned how to love someone so much in a different way. We stayed in that embrace for a long time. It was like nothing else existed in the world.

"Hmm!" Someone cleared their throat, and Dimitri and I automatically broke away. We turned around to see Adrian looking at Dimitri. "Look, I don't like you. We both know that. And I meant what I said before, but I think that we should put our differences aside for now to get to town."

While Dimitri was still looking at Adrian, I smiled and mouthed "thank you" to him.

"I think you're right." Dimitri agreed. "Go help Lissa pack the bags, if you don't mind. I'm going to go check on Christian. Rose, wheel Maya with you and get our stakes from the room. We need to leave in the next few minutes."

I nodded and grabbed the side of the basinet. It had wheels attached to the bottom of the legs so that I could move it around with me. I was afraid that Maya would wake up from the movement, but all she did was let out a little sound and went right back into a peaceful sleep.

The sunlight that had come in through the windows as we slept had turned the dead strigoi in our room to ash. The one in the nursery was ash, too. That was a good thing because my stake was in the one in the nursery. I rolled Maya in the room next to the bed and got Dimitri's stake from his side-table. I left the basinet where I could see it from the nursery and went to retrieve my stake.

I decided that I would change Maya's clothes before we left, and grabbed a couple of blankets to keep her warm outside, even though it was summer. I was scared that taking her outside this soon after she was born would make her sick, but we really didn't have any choice. It was either take the chance of Maya getting sick, or take the chance of her getting killed. I would pick getting sick over getting killed any day.

As I was grabbing a couple of diapers, Maya started to cry. I immediately had a flashback of the strigoi looking at her in her basinet, but was relieved when I looked and saw that there was no one else in the room with her. I walked over to the basinet and picked Maya up. She had a dirty diaper.

I put her down on the changing table and started to change her. She didn't like the cold when I took her diaper off, so she cried even harder. "Shush, baby. Momma's here. I'm not gonna let anything happen to you."

"Rose!" Dimitri yelled from the living room.

"In here!" I yelled back. He ran into the room and started putting all of Maya's clothes and stuff in a bag. "What's going on?"

"We have to go. Now." he replied. I finished putting Maya's clothes back on her and wrapped her in a blanket. "There are strigoi right outside. Can I ask you a question?"

I picked Maya up and clung her to me. "What?"

"Why is it that you don't know when they are coming anymore?" he asked.

I thought about that for a moment and shrugged my shoulders. I had no idea why I didn't get the nausea anymore. It was strange. I didn't pay it too much attention, but it would be nice to have it in handy for the trip we were about to take.

We were just walking out of the room and into the living room when we heard Lissa scream. It was hard with Maya in my arms, but we both ran as fast as we could to the front door. Lissa was standing in front of the open door, looking down at a burning strigoi. Christian was right outside the door burning up strigois left and right.

Adrian came running right behind us. Out of nowhere, he pushed me out of the way and grabbed Lissa. He yanked her back into the house. "What were you thinking? You could've gotten yourself killed, Lissa. Don't be stupid."

Dimitri and I looked back and forth from each other back to Lissa and Adrian. Adrian saw us and said, "She was planning on going out there so that she could help Christian. She didn't want him getting hurt while she was standing here doing nothing." He pulled her left arm up and we saw the stake that was in her hand.

"Lissa!" I yelled at the same time Dimitri yelled, "Princess!"

Lissa yanked her arm away from Adrian and looked defiant. "I could've done it! Then, we could get information from the one I saved and they could help us get out of here. They could tell us where the strigoi are coming from, that way we would know which direction to watch."

Dimitri shook his head and ran out the door to help Christian out. I handed Maya over to Adrian and walked over to Lissa. "Liss, the problem with that plan is that you haven't been trained in staking. I understand that it looks easy, but it really isn't." I stopped when I noticed that she didn't want to hear any of that. I grabbed her face and made her look at me. "Lissa, we love you. More than you can ever know. We don't want you getting hurt, is all. If something were to happen to you…I don't know what I would do."

The defiant look went away and was replaced with one of affection. "Rose, you are always putting your life on the line for me. We almost lost you earlier tonight! I just wanted to show you that you don't always have to do that for me. I can do it for you, too."

I was about to tell her that it was my job to protect her and put my life in danger for her, but we heard Christian scream outside. "Wait here." I told her. I grabbed the stake and ran out the door. It was brighter than I thought it would be and I had to let my eyes adjust to it. When they did, I figured out why it was so bright. There were two strigoi running around on fire, and one burning on the ground.

I looked over to Christian. He was in a battle stance with a strigoi, and he was sweating a lot. He seemed like he was concentrating really hard, and I figured out what was wrong. He had used a lot of his energy on the other strigoi and now he needed more. When the strigoi had its back to me, I leaped forward and staked it. It went down instantly.

"Christian, get in the house and get some water and food. Let Dimitri and I take care of it for a little while." I said before running over to Dimitri, who was trying to take on two strigoi at once. Where were they all coming from?

I jumped in right beside Dimitri and it felt like old times. "Rose, go back inside!" Dimitri yelled at me when he saw me.

"I'm not leaving you alone out here, comrade." I yelled right back. He knew that I wouldn't change my mind, so we got back to back and starting fighting the strigoi. This time, I was much more lucky.

We wound up fighting five strigoi – not all at once, though – and we took them all down. I got back-handed by one at one point because Maya started crying and I automatically looked toward the front door to make sure she was okay. I knew the right side of my face had already started bruising just by the feel of it.

Dimitri and I backed up to the front door slowly, making sure that no more strigoi came out of the woods. When we were all in the clear, we went inside and locked the door, not that that would keep them out if they wanted to get in bad enough.

I leaned up against a wall in front of the front door. I could see how Christian was exhausted. I looked over to see Dimitri standing there, trying to catch his breath. At the same exact time, we both reached for each other. We stood in an embrace for a long time. It wasn't until we heard Maya let out another cry that we snapped out of it.

We ran into the living room, where the cry came from, and saw that Maya was in Lissa's arms. Lissa was trying to console her, but it wasn't working. Dimitri took Maya and she automatically went quiet. I didn't know what it was about Dimitri, but Maya never cried when she was in his arms. She didn't cry often in my arms, either, but she would every now and then.

"What time is it?" I asked, to no one in particular.

Before anyone got a chance to answer me, the phone rang. Adrian picked it up. A few moments later, he was off the phone and explaining to us what was going on. The queen told Adrian that she had just sent the group of guardians who were coming to get us, and that they would be here in about an hour and a half. They were going to take a jet instead of a car this time.

She had told Adrian that no one is to leave the house except under dire circumstances. Luckily, we caught a break. The next hour and a half went by pretty slowly, but we made it through it. There were no more attacks, which wasn't the only surprising thing. Maya had stayed up instead of going back to sleep in her daddy's arms.

We were all able to finally breathe as we saw the sun coming up. Fifteen minutes after that, a car pulled up, and four guardians got out to help us get into the car with all our stuff. Dimitri gave me Maya's car-seat as we got in the car and I strapped it in. He set her in it and she was asleep again in minutes.

The car ride was quiet. When we got to the jet, we all felt comfortable enough to sleep. That was exactly what I did, and I did in it Dimitri's arms with my baby girl in her car-seat in the seat next to me.

Life seemed calm and wonderful while I slept. On the outside, though, it was anything but.