Richelle Mead's Vampire Academy - playing in her castles!

Malina stayed at Ivan's side, chatting too loudly about Moroi gossip and class assignments. Ivan answered quietly, his arm brushing her shoulder lightly just a few times as they went through the cafeteria line. Having Zeklos talk to her was bad enough, having him touch her, no matter how apparently innocently, was yet another rip in Dimitri's soul. He would have been anywhere else - facing a Strigoi would have been a pleasant alternative – but Katya linked her arm through his and made sure they followed.

She handed him a tray and he took it. They ate well: their choices stretched the length of the room. Moroi needed food as well as blood and the novices with their intensive training curriculum benefited from excellent nutrition. Dimitri would have left his tray empty so Katya selected his meal for him. She chose just a few things she knew he liked – a sweet bread that reminded him of home, beet and cabbage soup, and hot chocolate, a treat they didn't usually have. She snuck an extra packet onto his tray. She'd taught him the trick of adding an extra packet for more flavor.

"I don't know how you survive eating so little," Katya noted, adding a protein dish – a smoked salmon-like meat from Lake Baikal. "Aren't growing boys supposed to eat whole cows or something? And with all the extra workouts I'd think you'd be starving. I know I am." Her tray was piled high.

"I eat when I'm home."

"We need to get you home, then."

She pressed her tray into the small of his back, guiding him after Malina and Ivan. Zeklos had chosen the quiet corner where Dimitri sat had been sitting the first day Zeklos had arrived. The dark window next to them reflected their approach.

Zeklos greeted them warmly but Malina kept eating. Tension radiated from her as she barely acknowledged their presence. Katya set her tray across from Malina and pulled Dimitri down beside her. He almost resisted, but her grip was solid. She squeezed his fingers in gentle approval when he took his seat.

Zeklos watched them, openly curious. He reached across the table for Katya and held her hand briefly, letting his fingers linger on the inside of her palm. Dimitri turned his head.

"I'm not jealous but I'm envious," Ivan started, addressing Katya and inclining his head toward Dimitri. "You know each other so well; I keep seeing it when you're together. Should I be worried?" He smiled, showing only the slightest true concern.

Katya glanced at Dimitri with affection and only a little sadness. "We've been friends a long time."

"Maybe someday we'll know each other that well," Ivan said, his voice both cautious and intimate.

Dimitri turned sharply to stare at him and Malina nearly dropped her utensils. Moroi, especially Royal Moroi, simply did not plan long-term relationships with novices or guardians. They might father dhampir children, but they rarely had any kind of ongoing relationship with the women who carried and raised them. A relationship might develop unintentionally, like Malina's grandmother and her brother's guardian, or Dimitri's father's years of twisted interest in his mother, but planning to continue a Moroi-dhampir romance was deeply discouraged and rarely ever attempted. Even Malina, as much as she had pursued Dimitri, had predicated her interest with the understanding that graduation would almost certainly end be the end of whatever they cultivated in the meantime.

Dimitri recovered first, in a flash of understanding and anger. The hope that Katya would be safe after graduation vanished and his fear and protective instincts returned full force. Zeklos was simply grooming Katya for the future.

Dimitri kept his voice controlled but his anger permeated every word. "If you're looking for a bloodwhore you need to look somewhere else."

Katya kicked him, hard, and the crowded chairs clattered as Malina extricated herself. "Forget it. I'm not doing this."

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Zeklos hissed, attracting glances from students at nearby tables. Dimitri was oddly relieved to finally see a genuine, unrehearsed response from him.

Katya grabbed Malina's hand and spun on Dimitri. "You need to be quiet now." She turned back to Malina. "Stay. Not for him because I know he's being a jerk but for me. Please. Ivan's right: I know Dimitri really well, so I can say with absolute certainty that this is completely unlike him. What sucks is that he's been like this for the last two weeks so I think maybe he's been possessed. I don't know what has gotten into him -

"And it needs to stop," she glared back at him pointedly, "but once he gets his exorcism I know he'll go back to being the sweet, quiet, mysterious Dimitri we used to know and love. Please."

Fascinated in spite of himself, Dimitri watched the girls' silent exchange as Malina acquiesced. He hadn't realized they were friends.

Katya turned back to glare at him. "Ivan is being romantic, not creepy. And he knows as well as I do that we won't stay together."

Ivan started to speak, looking like he meant to argue with her. She smiled, and the sweet look she gave him belied her practical words. "We've got plenty of time until graduation. Don't worry about us."

Ivan squeezed her hand, but looked less certain than Katya. "There's plenty of time," he echoed. "We'll be fine." He seemed to consider his next words carefully. "I know you have more history, but she's important to me, too. I promise I only have the best intentions. You really don't have to worry."

"And I swear I will get Nikitin to put you on 24/7 monitoring duty if you don't find another way of dealing with your issues," Katya said. "So leave us alone or tell us what's wrong." Her tone softened. "You know I'll help if I can."

Dimitri shook his head, trapped between the temptation to tell Katya everything and Zeklos and Malina's scrutiny. He couldn't escape with the truth so he chose the most available lie, the one Katya had originally accused him of. "You were right. I'm jealous. I don't like seeing you with someone else." It was also easier to apologize with the lie. "I'm sorry. I'll deal with it."

Malina flinched, and he realized too late that she'd be hurt by the admission – however fabricated - that he was jealous of Katya.

Katya stared at him, and Dimitri had the distinct impression that she alone in their small group didn't believe him. "Then I guess we need to talk. But you –" she looked pointedly at both Ivan and Malina – "don't need to be worried, about either of us." She narrowed her eyes then made a show of shaking tension out of her shoulders. "Now how about a safer topic? In line Dimitri and I were just talking about home."

Emotionally whiplashed, Dimitri started eating his soup, confused and helpless, unable to do anything to fix Malina's hurt feelings or do any more to try to protect Katya. Ivan leaned back, affecting nonchalance, as if he was unaffected by Dimitri and Katya's exchange.

"That's interesting. While we were watching you practice, Malina and I were comparing notes about family. Belikov, how about you, where's your family?"

Zeklos would show his true colors someday soon, but for now he was on good behavior. Dimitri wasn't changing anything by trying to unmask him, and every attempt he'd made to protect Katya so far had backfired. For now, he needed to change tactics, needed to play along with Zeklos's game. Besides, he wanted to prove to Malina that he was better than Zeklos, prove he had better control, prove he wasn't an irrational, dangerous, misogynistic ass.

"What?"

"Your family," Zeklos prompted, carefully. "Mother, brothers, sisters?"

Dimitri paused a moment longer, considering. He instincts screamed to say nothing, to do everything he could to protect them, but Zeklos wasn't asking anything he couldn't find out elsewhere. And as long as he stayed far away from them, could it hurt to tell Zeklos about his sisters?

Dimitri shrugged and swallowed the hot liquid, forcing a casual tone. "Sonja and Viktoria are on the elementary campus. Sonja is a math whiz like Malina, and in her guardian workouts she's focused and she has great technique. Viktoria is strugging in her academic classes but she's strong. She'll make a very good fighter."

"Karolina?" Katya prodded. She squeezed his hand and smiled at him, encouragingly. When she and Dimitri had dated she'd gotten close with his older sister, and had continued the friendship even after ending her intimate involvement with Dimitri.

Dimitri almost looked away but made himself continue. Zeklos could hear about Karolina just as easily from Katya. Dimitri didn't agree with Karolina's choices, but he understood the reasons behind them. If he told Zeklos, maybe, if Zeklos had any true kindness, he would leave them alone.

"Karolina is two years older than me. Our family… has been through a lot. When Karolina graduated she decided she didn't want to leave our mother alone. Our grandmother moved in a couple years before, but Karolina decided it wasn't enough. So she took her name off the guardian roster, went home, got pregnant, got a job. She seems happy. Our mother seems happy too – for the first time in a long time – so for her it was the right choice."

He must have imagined it, but for a moment he almost believed he saw pain in Zeklos's eyes. Malina's foot brushed his under the table, not suggestively, but in sympathy. He looked at her in surprise. She didn't smile, but she did meet his eyes. "How old were you when your grandmother moved in?" she asked quietly.

She was making the connections in his history. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. He answered her honestly anyway. "Thirteen."

Zeklos sat very still. "Three sisters?" he asked tentatively.

Dimitri shrugged, feeling strangely awkward, and even more strangely, not angry. "Yes. And my mother, grandmother, and my nephew, Paul – he's two now, I think." He had an uncomfortable, disquieting realization. "How about you?"

Zeklos's eyes met his. "I have an older brother. We don't get along. My mother. Father is around but he travels a lot – I used to think that was a good thing." He seemed to be trying to tell Dimitri something. He sounded almost apologetic.

He and Ivan stared at each other. Katya broke the silence.

"Thank god," she said. "I knew Dimitri had it in him to have a polite, rational conversation.

"Malina," she turned to the Moroi girl, "I know he doesn't deserve it after how he's been acting, and I know I shouldn't stick my nose in your relationship but I'm going to anyway. If you don't have plans already, when you're done with dinner, go for a walk with Dimitri. He's got some explaining to do and you deserve to hear it first.

"Dimitri," she continued, "I'm glad to see you can be yourself again but whatever is bothering you isn't going away, and I don't think jealousy from our dead and gone relationship is the real explanation. Now you are going to talk to me sometime very soon whether you like it or not, but if you like Malina as much as I think you do, you will talk to her first. I want you to reassure her and tell her what is really going on and cut this shit out."

Zeklos looked at her, a cautious and worshipful expression on his face. "I love a strong woman," he grinned.

She grinned in return. "You do. Now if you don't have any other plans, I'd like to invite you back to my room to watch a movie." She glared at Dimitri, daring him to object. His usual screaming instincts were muted. He didn't feel the same need to protest.

Malina spoke up instead, studiously not looking at Dimitri. "Aren't the guardians tougher on the girl novices about Moroi in your rooms? Especially now?"

The complications of dhampir reproduction contributed to a clear but unspoken sexism in the way novice dhampir females were treated. Dhampir women in general were socialized to avoid birth control - the dhampir race was decreasing and every healthy birth was reason for celebration - but a pregnant novice was a waste of training and talent. Novice girls were encouraged to use birth control or stay abstinent, but if they were close with their non-guardian mothers and sisters they were often torn. Many novice girls only paired with other dhampirs – taking advantage of racial sterility – but some, like Katya, seemed to prefer Moroi.

Relationships like Dimitri and Malina's - Male dhampirs with female Moroi - were less complicated. Dhampir males generally accepted that they would not father children, although intentionally preventing pregnancy went counter to basic racial and personal interests. But few – if any – Moroi girls were willing to carry a Dhampir baby. The general health and disease resistance of both races meant that barrier contraception was less important than the use of birth control in general, but whatever method they chose, Moroi girls who did pair with Dhampir males were militant about birth control.

Adult guardians and Moroi faculty, possibly unfairly, were therefore stricter with novice girls, concerned with losing yet another dhampir girl from the guardian ranks. The changes and additions to the novice schedule only reinforced pre-existing rules and restrictions, so Malina's comment was inoffensive and likely accurate.

But even though she wouldn't look at him, Dimitri had the same feeling he'd had when Malina had stepped in front of him the first night at the party with Zeklos. Even angry at him, even hurt that he might still have feelings for Katya, even though his role was to protect her, she still seemed to want to protect him.

Katya ignored the possible subtext and took Malina's remark as a friendly caution. She eyed the room thoughtfully. "Good point. I think the majority of the guardians are either eating, on patrol, or monitoring at the moment. I don't think they're going to be watching the dorms or checking rooms until much later, like around curfew. Ivan, I'm sure I can sneak you out as long as you don't mind walking yourself back to your dorm." Moroi curfew remained in effect, but in an unexplained reversal, was now enforced less strictly than in the novice dorms.

"I don't mind," Ivan said, reaching back across the table to take her hand.

Katya barely glanced at Dimitri and Malina. She pulled Ivan to his feet. "Then I think we should leave now."

Author's note - a comment from Roix got me mildly obsessed with rationalizing Paul's age. Paul's age only works if Rose mis-guessed his age. When Rose met him she thought he was about 10, but she wasn't around kids much, so I think he *could * have been just 8. Roix pointed out to me that Karolina was two years older - we found her age referenced in Blood Promise during Rose's time in Siberia. So at the time of Vampire Academy Dimitri = 24, Karolina = 26, so she either had 10 year old Paul when she was in school at 16, or waited until she graduated and was 18, and Paul is only 8… I went with her having him after she graduated and Rose mis-guessing his age.

I am the Queen of Overthinking These Kinds of Things.

:-D