A/N Hello! I am extremely tired, mostly because I had to cram an entire report into one night, but it's okay, because I'm now on a weeks holiday! So hopefully I can get a few chapters up. We'll see…
Disclaimer: I own many things, most that don't really enrich my life at all (cougholdmathsbookscough), but Vampire Academy is not one of them. I own all of my characters, however.
Coffee sounded really good right now. Coffee smothered in whipped cream with extra calories even more so. Which was why I was glad that the café we were in was pretty much like Starbucks, but without the iconic Starbucks sign. We were all squashed onto two tables in the corner. I was kind of sad we weren't by a window. I like people watching.
Lissa seemed put out that she couldn't drink full coffee, staring sadly at Christians Latte. Rose, noticing this, told her she was being silly, especially because she'd never been a big coffee drinker. To which Lissa replied, it wasn't the coffee she missed, it was the fact that it was prohibited. I understood. I didn't like being told I couldn't drink something either.
Christian snorted. "Liss, you know why you can't drink coffee. Do you really want the baby to come out a caffeine addict? I don't."
"Hey!" I said, insulted. "A lot of my friends are caffeine addicts, and they're perfectly fine." Cass practically exists on Coke. I swear she'd die without it…
"Yeah, but a baby who's addicted to caffeine isn't normal." Adrian pointed out.
"Alright, that's true." I conceded, and went back to my drink. Mmm… White Chocolate Mocha…
Lissa stared at my cream-drenched drink. "It's not fair!" She whined. "I want one." Christian sighed, and put his arm around her.
"I'm sorry Liss, but you can't. I take full responsibility. You can even punch me if you want too." She did, weakly, and he laughed, pulling her towards him so he could kiss her. It stung, seeing them able to flaunt their relationship like that. I wasn't allowed to. For God's sake, I'd been dragged away from my home so I couldn't do that. A huge wave of longing for Alex washed over me. I was good at compartmentalizing, but not that good. I wanted to go home. It had barely been a day and I was desperate to go home. I was getting pathetic.
The door of the café swung open, letting a blast of cold air in. I looked up to see a tiny Moroi woman make her way over to our table. She was smaller than me, and that was saying something. Her hair was that golden blond coveted by bottle-blondes the world over, and she wore a cute blue dress.
"Mia!" Rose exclaimed happily. So this was Mia? "How are you?"
"Good, good." She replied. "I was just training with the Guardians again. I'm getting better! I actually took down Guardian Johnson today!" She looked really pleased with herself.
"Amazing!" Lissa joined in. "Well, I'm glad you're here. Mia, I'd like to introduce you to Zanna. Zanna, Mia." I stood up and shook her hand. It was a weird sensation, towering over someone. I'm used to being dwarfed by tall people.
"It's nice to meet someone smaller than me for once." I joked. "I'm sure we'll get along fine."
"Yes, I'm sure." She replied, smiling at me pleasantly. She sat down in the seat Eddie got out for her, murmuring her thanks. Adrian offered to get her a drink, seeing as he was "Gagging for a new one" as he put it.
"So, we just went to see the queen." Rose started. "She was delightful, as usual."
Mia's eyes widened. "Oh, I pity you." She breathed. She turned to face me. "Was this your first time?" I nodded sadly. I was still mentally scarred. "Oh, I am so glad I'm not you. She terrifies me. She's so…creepy."
"I totally agree with you. She's also a nasty bitch." I said, reaching for one of the cakes on the table.
"And rude." Rose chimed in.
"Mentally unstable" Said Adrian.
"As if you're one to talk about mental instability." Christian laughed. "But she is practically insane."
"Doesn't she actually have a history of periods of extended mental illness?" Dimitri put in. We all stared at him shock.
"Really?" I blurted out. "How'd she become queen then?"
"And how did you find that out?" Rose asked. He shrugged.
"I've got contacts, you know that." He told us. We stared at him incredulously again.
"Well, I still want to know how she got her skinny arse on the throne." I grumbled. It was suspicious. How could someone with a history of mental illness get on the throne? It didn't seem right, when there were plenty of (relatively) sane candidates.
"Compulsion?" Suggested Mia.
"Sexual favours?" Adrian answered with that. Thanks for the mental images, Adrian!
"Neither." Lissa interrupted. "She was always going to be queen, apparently. They fixed it, because she was the only one good enough to rule."
"Uh huh, about that. What psycho thought that woman could rule?" I asked. Surely no one was that stupid… I mean, I'd be a better queen than her, and I was a dhampir, not to mention I can't be trusted with power. Don't let me get into the story of what happened when I got put in charge of security at Chloe's birthday party…
"Well, she's very intelligent, and she's prepared to do most things others wouldn't I guess they thought she'd be strong enough to lead the Moroi forward." Lissa said thoughtfully.
"As opposed to what? Lying around doing nothing and fucking an endless amount of blood whores? Oh wait, that is what she does. I think that kind of failed, didn't it?" I said, my eyebrow raised.
Rose laughed. "Yeah, and to be fair, I actually think Tatiana was better than her. And I hated Tatiana." A flash of fury crossed her face, and I knew it was because of the horrible situation Tatiana had put her in. Rose had been charged with her murder, falsely, and she'd almost been put to death.
"It is very odd." Adrian agreed. "I mean, she doesn't have any limits at all. I'm not exactly a model of the perfect citizen either, but I'm better than her. It's like she doesn't know the difference between right and wrong."
"She's a psychopath?" I asked, curiously.
Lissa shook her head. "No, it's more like she's…amoral. She just doesn't think like we do. It's unnerving. And she's really interested in the baby." She said worriedly, her hand unconsciously going to her stomach. My gaze dropped to her hand. She didn't look pregnant yet, but I couldn't exactly say that I was an expert on pregnancy. The way to get pregnant, however, you could say I had a lot of experience in that…
I could feel my forehead crinkling. "Why? She can't be that much of a baby person. At least, I hope she's not." The queen just gets weirder and weirder…
Lissa bit her lip. "It's not like that. I can't explain it. It's more like…an interest in the baby as a…science experiment, almost. Christian, Rose, you get where I'm coming from, don't you?" She looked at them.
Christian nodded. "It's creepy." He told me, tightening the arm he had around Lissa. "I don't like it. It's not her baby-I don't think she should be this interested." This was getting very interesting. Perhaps I wouldn't be as bored as I thought.
"Rose, tell her about that time the queen came up to you." Lissa said. We all perked up. Everyone loves a good story.
Rose smiled secretively, and sat up straighter. "Well, it was a cold, stormy night, and as I walked up to the queen's crypt-" Dimitri gave her a disbelieving look and Lissa nudged her.
"Tell the truth, Rose!"
"Alright, I was only going to make the story a little more interesting. I'm allowed to exaggerate. It's my story, Liss!" We all looked at her again, impatiently waiting for the story to go on. "Okay, well, one time, after the queen had finished speaking to Liss, she asked me to stay behind, so I did. Liss waited outside with Dimitri and Christian, and the queen got all…intense. She told me that I had to keep Lissa safe, or she'd bring up the charges from…before again." She looked haunted, and Dimitri put a comforting arm around her. She snuggled more deeply into his embrace, taking strength from it, and carried on. "I told her she had no grounds, and that, anyway, I'd do my best to protect Lissa because she was my best friend. She gave me a dirty look, and then said, 'That child is of the utmost importance, do you understand?' I kind of just backed away, and said I did. As I left she started muttering odd things about how the baby was really special, and something about a prophecy."
"O…kay." I responded. "Well, we all knew the queen was wacko. This just proves it. Has she mentioned anything else about it?"
Rose shook her head. "Nope. I think she was just being scary. I'm pretty sure it's nothing."
If it was nothing, why had a sense of foreboding suddenly crept over me? And why did I want to leave as fast as I could? I knew I shouldn't have come…
A/N Sorry it's so short, but I felt I had to leave it there. So what's going on? Well, you'll have to carry on reading and reviewing to find out… Mwahahahaha *cough splutter* I'm not very good at the evil thing…
Shout outs:
Candigal
MaggieChauvin
miti1
talkygirl
Abbie
Thanks for the love, guys! (It makes my world go round )