Tim was devastated by what he had unwillingly brought on. Unfortunately, he had no one to apologize to: Christian had taken off after his revelation, and Lissa had followed him even though after she had freed herself from her freeze and her corner position, he was nowhere to be seen.

"I'm so sorry," Tim said over and over again.

Dimitri sighed. "You couldn't know. And you didn't do anything."

"Yes," I said, still stunned. "Christian knew all along. Christian did it."

"He had to," Dimitri said calmly. "Some Strigoi had me tied down. He had to kill her or she would have killed him."

"Does he resent Lissa for wanting to keep this from him?"

"No. He keep it from her too."

"I can see why."

Silence enveloped up, in which Dimitri and I stared at the table, Tim stared into thin air in horror, and the waiting personnel stared at all of us, wondering what had made the queen take off in a cloud of dust from their diner. I think they advertised with it being Lissa's favorite and were worried her preferences might change.

I went back to Lissa and Christian's apartment later for duty, but they had shut themselves into their bedroom and it felt intrusive to knock. I didn't see or hear anything of them until the next morning, when Lissa called me on the phone as I was about to get ready.

"Liss. How… are things?"

She sighed. "Not easy. Listen, Rose. I know you had this crazy dance thing on today-"

"Forget about it. It was never important."

"It's not because of that."

"Then what?"

"I completely forgot to tell you yesterday. Sonya contacted me with an idea. She wants Sydney's help in creating a tattoo similar to the Alchemist one by using ink containing Olive's blood. I talked to Adrian – he and Sydney are flying in to help."

"That's great!" All thoughts about dance competitions were already out of my mind. Anti-Strigoi tattoo? Trumped dancing. "What will they arrive?"

"Um… in about half an hour."

"Oh. That is fast."

"I'm sorry, I meant to tell you sooner. Can you and Dimitri come over as quickly as possible?"

"Ten minutes."

"Good. And… don't mention… you know?"

"Sure. See you soon."

I filled Dimitri in, and we made good on my promise to be at the palace in ten minutes' time. Lissa, Christian, Sonya and the Sinclair sisters were already assembled in her informal meeting room, a cozy one with sofas all over the place.

It was nice seeing Adrian again – yes, even though I ditched him, I still cared for the guy – and that alone made up for the early start of the day. Greetings was pretty much the only thing that happened there and then, because all Sydney could do was to draw up a list of ingredients that she needed to create a tattoo.

After dropping Sydney and Adrian off at guest housing, I had to go to one of the Court's buildings that I had never visited before: a small lecture facility. It was the day of my first crowd management training.

The lecture hall was about half full by the time I arrived, which wasn't saying much. The hall hadn't been built with a significant increase of interest in education at Court in mind. I found Carl, a fellow queen's guardian, on the benches and went to sit down next to him.

"Hey Rose. How was the special mission?" Carl didn't know about Nina and Olive – we weren't sure yet whether Strigoi restorations should become public or not. The public hadn't reacted well to Dimitri's restoration.

"It went really well. Are you as excited about crowd management lectures as I am?" I meant that ironically, of course.

"Well, it's actually something that could be really useful to us. In those attacks on the queen, we might have been able to get to the perpetrators or get them faster if we had been able to make the spectators react faster."

"That's true," I admitted, though still not thrilled about the idea of more lectures. "Speaking of which, you're in contact with the investigations on the case. Did they find out their motives yet?"

We still had three Moroi water users in custody, which were being questioned for the reasons they attacked Lissa with water magic some time ago. There had been so many things on my plate that I'd almost forgotten about them. Carl had kept an eye on the proceedings for Lissa, so he was up to date.

"Well, it's a funny thing," Carl said. "They're still adamant in claiming that they haven't got a clue why they did it."

"They claim they don't know why they travelled to Court to hide out on a square and make an attempt on the queen's life? What do they say, that they just stumbled over that fountain and made the snap decision to try what they could do with it, and Lissa just happened to come along? Not likely."

"It sounds like the worst lie in the history of lies, I know. But I watched an interrogation session with each one of them. I'm telling you, the look they get when asked why they did it…" Carl frowned. "They get really desperate. The kind of desperate you get when your life is getting unhinged. It's crazy, but I really don't know what else to do but believe them. They just look so credible."

"They should put you into people skills classes," I told him testily. "They tried to kill my best friend. I'm not fooled by good acting."

Carl looked like he might say something, but the lecture started and we were trapped in two hours of the theory of a crowd's mind.

A familiar sight greeted me when I entered Lissa and Christian's apartment: Christian sitting on the sofa buried in papers, not seeming to see much of them. I knew Lissa was in an important meeting, one that she couldn't postpone or skip even though she would have liked nothing better than to be with Christian now. His face was carefully composed but still grim and stony.

"Don't be frightened," I said, coming in. "I'm going to hug you."

That did startle him, of course, but he didn't resist. I even felt him return the hug after a few seconds.

"I put a stake through Dimitri's heart when he was Strigoi," I told him when we broke apart. "Well, at least I thought so for a few weeks. You did the right thing."

He looked at me with something like surprise and reluctance. "Yeah, that's pretty much obvious."

"Then what's bothering you?"

I shouldn't have expected him to talk, really; it wasn't like Christian to chat away about his little aches and pains. But maybe just being frank and asking him was what opened him up.

"She said she did it voluntarily."

"Uh."

"Seems to run in my family after all."

"That's crap," I retorted flatly. He eyed me irritably. Okay, maybe that warranted more of an explanation; I didn't mean to say that I put it past Tasha to do it. I had remembered what Christian had said in the diner: The time for me to panic has arrived. Christian was afraid that there was some sort of hereditary liability running in his family that would one day make him turn Strigoi even though it was everything he opposed now.

"It's crap, Christian. You're your own person. You won't turn Strigoi just because other people do it, be they you're relatives or not."

"That's what Tasha used to say."

"Yes, but for one, you can't be sure she didn't only say that to taunt you, and also, she did other things you would never do."

"I can't be sure she didn't tell the truth, either."

"Sonya turned Strigoi, and she's one of the most moral people I know. I'm sorry to break this to you, Christian, but the world isn't all black and white."

"Thanks for the philosophy lesson."

"You're welcome."

"How's the tango coming along?"

"That was such a crude change of topic."

"Subtlety never was my forte."

Well, I guess touchy-feely time was over. "It's coming along splendidly, thank you very much."

"Are we still on next week?"

I grinned. "We are so on."

….

The huge breakfast buffet took up all the available tables in Lissa's little conference room and was very much to my taste. She must have asked the staff to stock up on doughnuts especially.

Sydney and Adrian arrived together from guest housing. I don't know what they'd been doing during the day, since they had already slept through the night. It would have to be expected that Sydney was a little tense amongst a society of evil bloodsucking monsters, and indeed, she looked a little shaken. Then I found out part of the reason for this, and Adrian's lack of discretion again amazed me to no end: There he really went and told Sydney about dabbling. No wonder she was boggled. She had just learned that Moroi did exactly what she and the Alchemist were afraid they were doing.

She concentrated on her work perfectly, of course. To be honest, things became a little boring then; Sydney worked away at her improvised lab, and the rest of us could do little more than watch and keep eating. And then, when she was done, she announced that we had to wait for a couple of hours. In other words, keep doing what we'd been doing for a few hours already. Sydney withdrew to her room, and the rest of us waited around, killing time.

Sonya was on tenterhooks the whole time. She was so excited at being this close to a potential vaccine against turning Strigoi. After a while, Mikhail passed by during his break from work, and managed to calm her a little. The actual act of giving the tattoo to Neil was suspenseful, but we couldn't expect anything to happen immediately. Neil would have to be bitten by a Strigoi in order to test the hypothesis that he now could not be turned.

I went to bed with Dimitri still talking about the dream of vaccinating people against turning Strigoi, and gossiping about Sydney and Adrian. Our theory that there was something between the two had taken a little setback at seeing them today. There had definitely been a rift between them.

With the intention of observing them closely, I went to the palace for another joint breakfast to see them off before they would catch their plane back to Palm Springs. Upon entering Lissa's rooms, I found them empty, except for Lissa leaning back in a chair tiredly.

"Where is everyone?" I asked.

Lissa raised her head briefly, then let it bump back down against the headrest again. "If by everyone you mean Adrian and Sydney, they're in a hotel about thirty miles away."

"Oh. Did we finally manage to creep Sydney out so much she fled Court?"

"No, it's a much longer story, and it kept me awake all day."

"Do tell," I said, settling down on the sofa beside her.

"Sydney was molested by a few douchebags who wanted to make her let them drink her blood. I had to get her away from Court immediately to salvage what I could from Alchemist-Moroi relations. There's a snowstorm out there, so they crashed their car – they're alright – and now they took refuge in a hotel close by. They didn't even manage to get far."

I was almost out of my sofa again. "First of all, what idiots! Idiots! Tried to make an Alchemist agree to a feeding? Do they realize that with anyone but Sydney, they could have damaged Moroi-human relations permanently?"

"One-time friends of Adrian's. And don't even get the idea of taking revenge on them. I'm having a hard enough time keeping Christian away from them."

"No need to worry!" Christian was strolling in, looking as tired as Lissa but wearing a smug smile.

Lissa groaned. "What did you do?"

"I told you, no need to worry. I didn't do anything."

"Then you wouldn't be smirking like this."

"I just payed those assholes a little visit in jail. Was all it took."

"Along with a few bluffs about coming after them when they were free, hu?" I guessed, trying to convey my appreciation by looks only so that Lissa wouldn't have a go at me, too.

Christian's smile turned a little malicious. "As I said, nothing done. Don't know what kept them awake all night…"

"Please, can you not make any more enemies?" Lissa said in an exasperated tone.

"Hey, I don't have so many!" Christian replied defensively. "True, Rose counts as ten, but I can manage the rest."

"Always knew I'm too much for you to handle, fireworks!" I chanted.

"Oh, you are too much for anyone to handle, Rosie dearest. You'd need your own containment facility."

"Okay, guys, stop the bickering. I've still got a lot of work to do that piled up from the last days, and this week's Court days are almost over. Can I please have a little more love and harmony in here?"

"Love and harmony?" I repeated after exchanging a malicious glance with Christian. "Can do, baby." Of course, Lissa would not have said this if she'd known what she'd make Christian and me do: we lunged at her in a full blown love-and-harmony cuddle attack.

…

The tension was up high. The competitors were lining the dance floor, rolling their shoulders in preparation and giving each other intimidating stares. The silence was breaking the nerves of everyone involved.

Which was only Dimitri, Lissa, Christian and me, of course. Everyone else had no idea about the epic battle that was taking place in the midst of them. The dhampirs were chatting with the various partners they had brought – wives, girlfriends, good friends or just female guardians who also had to take the class.

"Don't lose your confidence," I continued my pep talk for Dimitri. "We can beat them. We will beat them. We are simply better than them. Much better. So much better."

"Do you want to prepare me or make me nervous, Rose? I honestly can't tell," Dimitri said.

"Just focus. Concentrate. We can do it."

"Sure," he said resignedly.

And then, the music started. The time had come.

I saw Christian grinning at me over Lissa's shoulder from the other side of the improvised dance floor. I would wipe that smirk off his face.

Since we had missed the last lesson, this was only the second time the instructor saw our performance. Christian and Lissa had simply asked her whether they could take part in this session, and it had been no problem.

Dimitri and I started twirling over the gym's training mat in what I thought were acceptably graceful motions. Until suddenly, there was a foot of Dimitri's in my way, planted where it definitely had no business being, which send me flying a few feet in the wrong direction. Dimitri caught me in the last moment before I hit the mat, but the instructor had seen.

"Damn it," I hissed. "You should have caught me in one of those flashy backbending holds. That would have scored us points."

"And broken your spine," Dimitri said dryly.

From the other side of the room, a giggle reached my ears. I shot a devastating glance at our laughing opponents. From here, it looked like Lissa was mistaking this whole thing with an opportunity to get physical with Christian, because the two were pressed so close against each other that no tangoing should have been possible anymore. Somehow, they still managed to move.

"Let's do the leg thing," I commanded more than suggested.

Dimitri's hand was around my waist, mine around his shoulder. We tried the step that the instructor had shown us earlier today, a jumpy step that involved kicking a foot up in the air. Around us, the other couples were all throwing their feet around in their attempts to duplicate the move.

My first try ended up with my foot tangled in Dimitri's pant legs. Then I kicked a neighboring couple. Then I almost landed on my butt. Then I realized that our so-called dancing had brought us closer to Lissa and Christian, who were now almost next to us.

"They're having fun," Dimitri commented. It was true: I had no idea what part of what they were doing was actually tango, because they were lying in each other's arms laughing half the time.

"Are they laughing at us?" I asked suspiciously.

"I can't tell," Dimitri said.

"Are they any good?"

"Can't really tell either, but judging from the look the instructor is giving them, they're not doing much right."

At this moment, Lissa and Christian passed us in what looked like freelance dance moves, kind of graceful, at least on Lissa's part, but nothing like tango.

"Maybe we should improvise, too," I mused. I had no time to think it through, because then, Dimitri grabbed me and swirled me around so wildly that I lost all sense of up and down for a moment, but he somehow managed to land me on my feet. He smiled, holding me tightly.

"Now, that might make it fun," he said.

"Yes!" I exclaimed. "Do it again! No, wait. It's supposed to be tango!"

"Isn't tango the dance of the wild and spirited?" Dimitri asked. "Shouldn't it be flexible when we have wild and spirited new dance moves?"

"Honestly, I have no idea," I replied. Dimitri dissolved my worries by giving me another sweep through the air. I was disheveled and breathless when he set me down, but, inspired, started several fast spins that left me dizzy and even more disheveled. I heard a small laugh from Dimitri. I tensed my body when I suddenly felt myself flying backwards, and came to as sudden halt a few inches from the floor, stopped by Dimitri's strong hands. He was really getting the hang of this.

"I think this needs to be a little rounder," I said from almost on the floor. His hands lifted me up a little, and I bent my back to achieve the graceful arch they always did in dance shows.

Upside down, I could see Lissa twirling wildly, guided and secured by Christian's arms. The bright laughter that floated over the music was hers.

Then Dimitri pulled me up, and Lissa twirled again and barreled into me, knocking me off balance and sending me tumbling into Dimitri. He stumbled and narrowly avoided Christian, who had dived after Lissa to catch her fall in the last second.

When we had all righted and disentangled ourselves, we found the instructor had planted herself in front of our hilarious foursome. Lissa and Christian looked at her guiltily, though they hadn't entirely gotten rid of their exhilarated smiles. Lissa still looked a little dizzy from all the twirling she'd been doing, holding on to Christian to keep her balance.

"We're sorry if we disturbed anyone," Christian said candidly. "We got a little carried away."

"It's just because your lessons are so fun and inspiring," I added.

"We'll be more careful," Dimitri said.

"And we thank you for letting us participate," Lissa said politely.

Then we left quickly, so that no one would see up collapsing in a heap all over each other and laughing our hearts out.

Thanks for reading! Hope you liked the tango challenge:)