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Again thanks to all of you who take the time to read the story and if you feel like review then that would be great!

-Val

Chapter 12

I received a call during the middle of the night –at least middle of the night for vampires –from Rose's matron who said Rose insisted that she speak to me and that it was some sort of emergency. I dressed as fast as I possibly could and ran to her, when I reached her, one look told me everything.

"Lissa." I said.

Rose nodded back.

Without a word, I turned around and started back down the stairs, conscious that Rose was following me. We walked across the quad in silence towards the Moroi dorms. It was day-time for vampires and sun shone. I missed the sun, Moroi could be out in the sun for short periods of time, but it weakened them. Strigoi couldn't be in the sunlight at all or they would burn. Dhampirs however, didn't have any problem with the sun at all. Our human genes took care of that.

When we reached the Moroi dorms Lissa's hall matron gaped at us, but I quickly walked past her, refusing to get deterred.

"She in the bathroom," Rose told us.

The matron tried to follow Rose inside the bathroom but she stopped her, "She's too upset. Let me talk to her first."

I considered this and told the matron, "Yes. Give them a minute."

Rose then pushed the door open. I heard a soft sob as she opened the door.

After a minute, I knocked, "Rose?" I asked.

"Just a sec," she called back.

"We're coming in," said the matron.

I realized as I came in that Rose had taken off the hooded sweater she had been wearing and Lissa was slipping it on. I took one look at Lissa and instantly raced to her side; there was blood on her face.

"It's not mine," Lissa said quickly. "It's… it's the rabbits."

I assessed her for a minute, just to be sure and then accepted her word.

"What rabbit?" I asked.

With shaking hands, Lissa pointed to the trash can. "I cleaned it up so Natalie wouldn't see."

I walked over to where Lissa had pointed and Rose followed. I noticed Rose pulled herself back immediately, there was blood everywhere and it smelled horrible.

I shifted closer to Lissa then, looking at her eye levelly, "Tell me what happened." I handed her some tissues.

"I came back about an hour ago. And it was there. Right there in the middle of the floor. Torn apart. It was like it had….exploded. I didn't want Natalie to find it, didn't want to scare her…so I cleaned up. Then I just couldn't…I couldn't go back." Lissa began to cry.

"No one should be able to get into those rooms!" exclaimed the matron. "How is this happening?"

"Do you know who did it?" I asked as gently as possible, Lissa looked so fragile right now.

She reached for her pajama pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. It was soaked in blood. It read, "I know what you are. You won't survive being here. I'll make sure of it. Leave now. It's the only way you might live through this."

Who could have sent such a thing?

"I'm getting Ellen," the Matron quickly informed, that was Headmistress Kirova's first name.

"Tell her we'll be at the clinic," I told her, realizing Lissa needed to rest but I doubted that she felt like going back to her room right now.

When she left I told Lissa, "You should lie down."

She didn't move but Rose linked arms with her and urged, "Come on, Liss. Let's get you out of here."

Slowly, she started walking towards the clinic. The nurse there offered to wake one of the doctors, but I assured her it wasn't necessary, "She just needs to rest."

The minute Lissa laid down, however, the Headmistress walked in, immediately going into full on interrogation.

Rose thrusted herself in front of the Headmistress and yelled, "Leave her alone! Can't you see she doesn't want to about it? Let her get some sleep first!"

"Miss Hathaway, you're out of line as usual. I don't even know what you're doing here," responded Headmistress Kirova.

I felt bad that Lissa was getting questioned like that because I could see she was still very upset so I asked the Headmistress if I could speak with her in the hall. Knowing Rose, the tension could escalate very quickly if the two of them were in the same room for too long.

"Headmistress, please allow the Princess some rest, she's upset."

"Guardian Belikov, we need to get to the bottom of this," she told me coldly.

"I know and we will, just wait until tomorrow. I'll personally find out what happened."

She hesitated for a moment, but I put on a harsh look.

"Fine, but get Rose out of there."

"But Vasilisa needs her right now, she's very upset."

"Fine," she said stiffly, "But if Rose causes any trouble –this is on you."

With that, she walked back into the room and said to Rose, "You may stay with her for a little while. We'll have janitors do further cleaning and investigation in the bathroom and your room, Miss Dragomir, and then discuss the situation in detail in the morning."

"Don't wake Natalie," Lissa whispered, "I don't want to scare her. I cleaned everything in the room anyway."

The Headmistress looked doubtful but we all retreated, leaving the two girls alone. I knew Rose would be able to comfort her.

Back in my room, I was trying to figure out who would do such a thing. I know that Lissa and Rose didn't exactly get along with everyone, but wasn't the traditional thing to just go spread rumors about them, not kill little furry animals.

Some puzzle piece was missing and I was pretty sure Rose and Lissa were keeping something from me.

The next day there were rumors going around about what had happened in Lissa's room last night but later, I wasn't hearing Lissa's name said so much as Roses'.

It was weird –like they were all over something new now.

Eventually, I heard some girls discussing it.

"Oh my god. Did you hear what Rose did?" I heard a Moroi girl say, my head shot up when I heard her name.

"No. What did she do now?" asked her friend.

"She screwed with Jesse and Ralf." I cursed in Russian silently. I knew her actions with that idiot would have repercussions. Stupid Moroi boys.

And Ralf. What the hell was that about?

"—Oh my god are you serious? Jesse's hot but Ralf –eww."

"Wait –it gets worse." How could it get worse?

"What she had sex with the basketball team?"

"No –worse." What could possibly be worse? Then I thought of it. Oh no.

"She let them drink from her while they had sex. She's a freaking blood whore."

"No! Are you serious?" This was bad, really, really bad.

"Yeah, I heard Rose get in Ralf and Jesse's face in my last class. Rose was all like, what the hell do you think you're doing to Ralf, and he was all like we didn't do anything you didn't want us to do. Start a fight and Kirova will kick you out to live with the other blood whores."

"I don't believe it."

"No she did it. She did it with Lissa too while they were away –that's how they got blood. She's a freaking addict blood whore. She should just drop out and go live in one of those communes." I repressed the urge to say anything.

They're just little girls Dimitri, I told myself. They don't know any better.

"So what did Rose do to them for telling?" Uh oh.

"Nothing –she walked away. So of course she did it." Thank God. Although I wouldn't exactly blame her for hurting them –honestly, I wanted to. Fury was building inside of me.

"Wow. I would just kill myself if I was her, I mean, I always knew she was a slut but jeeze she hit a new low with this one."

"I know."

"I don't even know what guys see in her, she's just a blood whore."

It was bad… really bad. I walked away. But I heard the same similar story everywhere. I knew Rose hadn't done any of those things but that didn't matter.

It was obvious that Lissa had drank from her, how else had they gotten blood.

I wasn't even surprised about hearing it, it was exactly what I had warned Rose that night when I caught her with Jesse.

A Moroi dating a Dhampir was a bad thing –they liked to brag –and lie.

And there was nothing I could do about it.

Later that day I saw Rose at practice, she looked like a zombie. She ran into the gym pretty fast, I gave her a puzzled look but decided it was best not to ask questions.

I had to go ask Lissa some questions later that day about the rabbit incident. She told me basically the same thing that she had said last night.

After I asked her, "Princess."

"It's Lissa, Dimitri. You're going to be my guardian so you need to get used to it."

"Sorry. Lissa. I noticed Rose was very upset today. I sort of overheard the rumors."

"Oh god, they're awful. You know she wouldn't do that right."

"Yes, of course I know that."

"I can't believe Jesse and Ralf. They're horrible. I wish I could do something to them."

"Yes –me too."

She looked up surprised. "Wow. I think Rose is growing on you. Authority usually doesn't respond well to her."

I laughed, "Yeah well she's not so bad. She'll make a great guardian someday. Anyway, I was going to ask you. I know the shifts change between Matrons in about twenty minutes. I could sneak you over there. Maybe you could console her. It wouldn't be for very long, but I know she's hurting a lot right now and seeing you would cheer her up."

"Yeah of course," Lissa responded eagerly.

"Alright, let me just check the halls then, and we have to be very careful. If Rose gets caught she'll be in a lot of trouble –hell I'll be in a lot of trouble. I'll be right back. When I come get you, I'll take you to this back stair wall, it's closed off to students and you can wait there. "

I checked the novice dorms then and waited until the matron left. Quickly, I hurried back to the Moroi dorms.

"Lissa, we have to go."

"Okay," she answered and followed me.

I left her behind the stair wall and went to get Rose. When I reached Rose's door, I knocked. I saw Rose then, she was in her pajamas and l looked at her face. It was very obvious she'd been crying. I looked away immediately, not wanting her to feel uncomfortable.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"It doesn't matter if I am, remember?" she said bitterly, looking at me then. My heart broke for her. Blood whore wasn't something you came back from.

"Is Lissa okay? This'll be hard on her." I couldn't believe she was actually worried about Lissa. The rumors weren't about her at all and I knew just how bad she was hurting right now.

I beckoned her to follow me and led her to a back stairwell, one usually locked to students.

"Five minutes," I warned.

Curiosity spread over her face as she opened the door.

I kept a close watch. Getting caught in this situation would look very bad on me.

But Rose needed this right now even though I didn't think Headmistress Kirova would exactly be sympathetic about it.

After about four minutes I stuck my head in, "You've got to back inside Rose, before someone finds you."

I noticed her shoot Lissa a panicked look.

Then I heard Lissa say, "I'll take care of everything this time Rose. Everything."

Rose then went back to her room and I walked out.

"What was that about?" I asked Lissa.

"That. It was nothing," Lissa said nonchalantly.

"Are you sure, Rose seemed a bit panicked?"

"I haven't seen Rose cry since she was in kindergarten."

That took me off guard.

"Yes, she's very upset isn't she?"

"Yeah, but don't worry about Rose. I'll have everyone kissing her feet by the end of the week."

I doubted that –once a blood whore, always a blood whore.