this is a way shorter chapter and i apologize for the wait.

Rose POV

It has been two days since I had that talk with Adrian in the garden and each time I think back to the moment he told me about his family, I couldn't help but feel sympathetic towards him. Adrian's dad was a complete jerk the way he treated Adrian's mother. I haven't seen Adrian since then as he had to go away for a few days on a Royal trip with the Queen and I was curious as to what that trip would be like. Tasha had been the only person I had really spoken to in the last two days, we talked mostly about Dimitri. Tasha had asked what had happened and why I had to kill him, she completely understood why I did what I did even though she had loved him.

Lissa had been busy with Royal stuff as well and since she was the last Drogimir, she had to represent the Drogimir family at each Royal meeting. Christian had been busy doing stuff with Tasha as well as avoiding her when he and Lissa were supposed to be at a meeting. Christian still hadn't told her about the break up and he was trying to warm up to her so she wouldn't get angry with Lissa.

Basically I was stuck at Court with nothing to do but let my mind wander. I went to the Court's garden a lot, it was peaceful there and no one was ever there. I still had to sleep in Adrian's room since everyone thought we were still together, but I didn't mind since he wasn't there. I had spent a lot of my time watching T.V since I was alone most of the time and it was pretty boring.

I woke up this morning and went out to the Court's lounge to see if anything exciting was happening. I noticed as soon as I walked out of Adrian's room that there was people everywhere. When I had entered the lounge it was overcrowded with Moroi and Dhampirs. Something bad had happened and I knew it.

Since then, I had found out that the Queen had been attacked by a bunch of Strigoi. The Queen's guards had protected her and Adrian but one of the Dhampirs had been killed. When I looked around I saw Adrian standing near the Queen, I quickly ran up to him to see what was going on.

"What happened?" I asked him before he could even see me. He turned to me and gave a grim smile that didn't suit his face, no matter what the circumstances were.

"Well, while we were visiting some of our cousins we were attacked by Strigoi." He shrugged, turning back to face the Queen.

I grabbed his hand and forced him to look at me. "Are you okay? Did you get hurt?" he shook his head and looked down to me for the first time today.

"I'm fine Rose. One of the Strigoi got away though; they're planning to attack the Court." I opened my mouth to speak and then closed it a second later. I didn't know what to say. I thought it was impossible for the Court to be attacked, they had wards up everywhere, which was why it was so nice and peaceful here, and I didn't need to wear the ring Oksana had given me while I had been in Russia.

"There's so many Guardians here it would be impossible for the Court to be attacked." I said, shaking my head at the same time. Sometimes it felt as if the Queen had been taking away all the Dhampirs away from their charge for her own protection, that was how many Guardians there was here.

"They have an army of Strigoi, Rose. An army. How are all the Dhampirs in the world supposed to protect her from that?" truth be told, I had no idea how we could protect the Queen from an army of Strigoi. It's not like we could take her some place she'd never be found.

So, instead of saying of telling him some ridiculous answer I said, "The wards will protect us." The wards, however, can be taken down by humans that work with the Strigoi and I know that that has been done before and so did Adrian.

"No they won't. They can be taken down one way or another, you know that." I took a deep breath in and let it out slowly.

"What are they planning to do?" I wasn't sure what could be done, if we didn't have wards to protect us, we were pretty much screwed.

"I don't know. They're planning a meeting to see what can be done." I frowned, nothing could be done. An army was coming after the Queen and if she stayed here we'd all be dead. We could get more guardians to come here and help us out, but in the end there would be no point. The only thing we'd be able to do was fight our hardest and kill as many of them as we could.

"Adrian, nothing can be done. It's an army coming not a dozen. We won't be able to protect everyone, there's not enough Guardian's here."

"You don't think I know that? You don't think I know that if the army of them do come, nothing is going to be able to stop them from killing the Queen." Adrian shouted, which was unusual from him since he always acted like he didn't care but as he had been shouting Moroi that were in earshot noticed Adrian's outburst and were now staring at him.

"Adrian, no ones going to kill her. We'll find a way to protect every one of us, okay?" I said softly to him, trying to calm him down. People were scared enough as it was, they didn't need Adrian running around yelling 'We're all going to die'.

"How? What do you suppose we do since you're so damn smart?" Adrian said harshly. It surprised me to see him so upset; I never thought he actually liked the Queen. The fact that he was acting like a jerk wasn't helping the situation either.

"I suggest that you shut up for five seconds and listen to what people have to say. You're not the only one that's scared Adrian. Look around you, everyone's terrified and you running your mouth isn't helping one bit. Instead of standing there yelling at the only person who is trying to help you think about what can be done for your precious majesty's safety." That was a little harsher that I intended it to be but if he's just going to sit there he might as well be thinking of ways to solve the damn problem.

I walked away from him, shaking my head. The Court was like a circus, I soon realized as I stepped around one of the hallways corners. Everyone was either running around or looking entirely freaked out.