She had been lying out there for hours. She knew she probably needed to move, but she didn't know where to go. Everything hurt and the only person who could make it better was on a plane to Court. It was peaceful here, and right now she could use some peace. Dimitri's words were cartwheeling around her mind, and all she wanted was silence. For her mind to feel as numb as her body.
The crunching of snow underfoot alerted her to the imminent presence of another person. Rose didn't look up. Whoever it was she didn't want to speak. If she spoke, it might make this real. So she lay still hoping they would pass.
"Rose? You'll get frostbite if you stay out here."
It was Alberta. Probably the only person on campus Rose could stand to be around right now. When she didn't reply, the older woman sat beside her at the edge of Mason's grave.
"I come here to think, too," Alberta said, her hand smoothing some flyaway hair back from Rose's face. "It's peaceful, and… well… I remember them."
Rose hadn't thought about that before. She'd lost Mason, but he wasn't the only person buried here. As Captain of the guard at St Vladimir's, it stood to reason Alberta would have known most of the guardians and novices who shared this final resting place.
Helping Rose sit up, Alberta passed her a pair of warm gloves and a jacket. Both were from Rose's room, so she knew Alberta must have visited there.
"I thought you might be upset with Guardian Belikov leaving," she started. "I know you and he were good friends."
Rose looked at the kindly older guardian, hardening her heart towards Dimitri. Towards everyone.
"I thought we were. I thought I knew him so well. It turns out I didn't know him at all."
Something about Rose's voice frightened Alberta. She'd anticipated tears or maybe hysteria, but not this. Rose's calm was unnerving. Alberta shivered, standing up and holding her hand out to the younger dhampir.
"You've been working too hard lately. Why don't you take the day off?" Alberta said uncertainly.
"Sure. I have to study for Precalculus anyway," Rose said in that strangely dead yet breathy voice.
The two walked side-by-side back towards the Academy buildings.
"If you give me a few days, I'll assign you a new mentor," Alberta suggested.
"Don't bother," Rose said dismissively. "I have my reps all set up. I know what to do."
"Well, let's give it a few days and then we'll talk," Alberta replied.
"Thanks for the gloves and jacket," Rose said by way of farewell, branching off onto the path that led to the Novice dorms. It was only when she was almost at the building that Alberta noticed the younger woman hadn't put either of them on.
It was 4 pm the next day when a guardian patrolling the grounds looked through the windows and noticed a dark haired Novice inside in the Guardian Lounge. It was Novice Hathaway, of course. That girl was always up to trouble. Moving unseen across to the windows he saw the Novice take several wrapped sandwiches and juice from the Guardian buffet. The cafeteria was open from 5 pm to 10 am every day, but with guardians scheduled on shifts twenty-four hours a day, there was always a selection of prepackaged foods in their lounge.
Hathaway had a history of escaping campus, and stealing food was a good sign that she didn't intend to be around for breakfast or lunch. She was also rugged up in warm pants, gloves and a hiking jacket, which didn't bode well. But he didn't want to wake Alberta needlessly. Their usually equanimous Captain had been decidedly pissy the last few days, and he didn't want to be the cause of further displeasure. So he covertly followed the Novice as she headed towards the outer edge of campus.
Using his guardian issue binoculars he watched her walking straight towards the Academy graveyard, and he was thinking that's where she was going to stop, but she didn't. She walked a few meters past it, stepping outside of the wards. He was about to radio it in, Alberta's wrath be damned, when she suddenly sat, opening her backpack, throwing down a plastic-backed travel tarp and fishing out a pack of sandwiches and juice. She slowly ate, sitting in the sunshine.
She was outside the wards, but it was still sunny out. Besides, there hadn't been a Strigoi actually on campus in years. The place was just too well defended. And the spot where she was sitting had lawn surrounding it. Even were a Strigoi to breach the walls, she'd simply have to step back behind the ward line, and she'd be safe. Still, something about the lonely figure sitting on the snow worried him, so he devoted the rest of his shift to monitoring that part of the grounds, surreptitiously watching her through the binoculars.
Rose had intended to sit at Mason's gravesite to eat her breakfast, but somehow eating there seemed disrespectful. Like feeding her body was tasteless when he was lying cold in the ground beneath his snowy blanket. So her feet carried her a little further out. Almost unconsciously she stepped over the ward line, setting out the tarpaulin she'd brought before seating herself to eat her stolen breakfast.
She couldn't face anyone. She didn't want to. And while she'd have to go to class, at least she could have breakfast and dinner out here.
The light reflecting off the snow was almost blinding. She should have brought sunglasses. Maybe tomorrow. Out of the corner of her eye, she kept seeing weird flashes, but as soon as she turned her head, they would disappear. She focused on eating her sandwich. It tasted like sawdust in her mouth, but it was from the Guardian Lounge, so hell knows how old it was. As she ate, she could see the flashes solidifying in her periphery, but she intentionally ignored them.
She drank her juice, the tartness of the orange assaulting her tongue. How long had it been seen she'd eaten? She hadn't yesterday; she knew that. Discarding the question along with the other nugatory thoughts she was being bombarded with, she finished her juice, carefully packing the glass bottle back into her knapsack with cardboard packaging from the sandwich.
With a deep breath, she resolutely turned to stare where the flashing lights had been assembling on her right-hand side.
"Mase?" she gasped, looking at an ethereal manifestation of her best male friend. The one who'd died less than a month before.
He smiled.
She shook her head trying to clear her thoughts, but he was still there.
"Mase? Is it you? Why can I see you? Am I going crazy?"
He shook his head, flickering as he came closer, sitting in front of her in the snow. Well, not sitting so much as kind of lowering his semi-transparent form to the ground. The form she could see straight through.
"Can you talk to me?" she asked.
"What do you want me to say?" he asked but with a twinkle in his eye.
"Ducky!" she wailed. "I'm so sorry! About what happened. With the Strigoi. Between us. I fucked everything up! Are you ok? Did it hurt?"
"It didn't hurt," he said. "One minute I was there, and then I was here."
"And where is here?" Rose asked. "Why can I see you?"
"I don't know where here is exactly. It's like a place before we keep going. God's waiting room, maybe?" Mason joked. "I think it's a place to stay until I'm ready to move on. Maybe you can see me because you've been here before?"
"When I died?"
"It's just a guess," he said shrugging his shoulders.
"Does that mean we could bring you back?" Rose gasped.
"I don't think so. I need to move on, Rose. I can only stay here a limited time. But I'm glad I've got to see you. You're my unfinished business."
"I'm so sorry, Mase. I was so confused, and by the time I came to talk to you, you'd already gone. I'd do anything to have that time over. Not to make the same mistakes again!"
"The mistakes were mine, Rose. I was stupid. I shouldn't have been there. None of us should have been. I don't want you to blame yourself. I'm just glad the rest of you got out; I want you to lead long happy lives."
Rose was crying. She'd missed Mason so much. He'd always just accepted her; been there for her without making demands.
"What's wrong, Rosie?" he asked, his opaque features clouding with concern.
"I miss you, Mason. I can't talk to anyone, and everything hurts so much. He left me. Dimitri. I thought he loved me. I love him so much, but he left."
"It was him, wasn't it? At Christmas? That's why you could never give me a look in."
She nodded, wiping her running nose with her sleeve, before telling him the whole sordid tale. And he listened, letting her pour her broken heart out.
"I'm sorry. This must be painful for you to hear," Rose said, suddenly realizing she was telling the guy who'd died in a misguided attempt to protect her all about her heartbreak at the hands of another man.
"It's ok, Rose. I want you to be happy. It's all I've ever wanted for you," he said, smiling at her.
The warning bell was ringing in the distance. Classes would be starting in ten minutes. She'd been here hours, yet it seemed like minutes.
"I don't want to leave you," Rose said, looking at Mason mournfully. "I miss you so much!"
"I don't have to leave here yet," he consoled her. "Come see me again. Come as often as you want. I'll be just hanging out," he teased.
"I love you, Ducky," she said, tears pouring down her face.
"Love you too, Rosie," he laughed. "Now go kick Eddie's ass for me, ok?"
Rose stood up, collecting her mat and bag before walking back to the ward line.
"I'll be back as soon as I can," she promised, even as Mason's form was disintegrating in front of her.
She made it to her first class on time. She was so preoccupied she didn't notice Guardian Townsend excuse himself to radio in to Alberta that she'd appeared. Back in her office, Alberta breathed a huge sigh of relief. One of the day shift guardians had reported Rose stealing food from the Guardian Lounge and taking it outside the wards to eat. Apparently, she'd sat there for hours, moving only when the warning bell rang. News of Dimitri's departure hadn't spread yet, and she didn't want anyone to connect Rose's behavior with his absence in any case, so Alberta had asked Rose's teachers to report to her after each class, citing ongoing concerns after Spokane.
On his second account to Alberta, Townsend reported Rose hadn't said a word all class, doing exactly what she was asked but without making contact with anyone. Alto told the same story; there on time, she sat down and said nothing. Fernandes said he thought she looked a bit teary while she was using the equipment in Weight Training and Conditioning, but she didn't engage with anyone. In Senior Language Arts she spoke when spoken to but volunteered nothing. "I think you're right to be worried," her teacher had said. "I can't put my finger on it, but she just seemed... I don't know… Lost?"
Alberta sighed. She was an expert on managing guardians, not guiding teenagers through heartbreak. She was hopeful spending some time with Lissa would help, but lunchtime saw Rose headed in a different direction. She walked purposefully to the campus chapel, seeking out Father Andrew. In fact, she spent her whole lunch break there, speaking with the priest.
"What did she want to know about, Father?" Alberta pressed him when he'd rung her in concern. "I'm very worried about her – anything you can recall will give us insight into how she's feeling."
"Well, she was asking mostly about ghosts or souls lingering after death. I outlined how our faith believes souls can stay for three to forty days after death before moving on."
"Did she say why she was interested in this?" Alberta asked. She'd assumed Rose's questions would be more to do with love than faith or theology, but it had been less than a month since Mason had died; she couldn't be expected to be over it already. "Did that idea seem to upset her?"
"No. That's what worried me. She looked pleased. Almost relieved."
Lissa looked comforted to see Rose when she walked into Animal Behavior and Physiology in fifth period.
"Where have you been?" she demanded, reassured but also a little annoyed. She hadn't seen Rose lunchtime Monday, and it was now Wednesday. She'd been starting to worry.
"Around," she said evasively, dumping her books on her usual desk.
"You weren't at lunch?" Lissa pressed.
"Things to do," Rose said, grateful when their teacher came in and started the class.
She was spared an interrogation in sixth period as Lissa didn't take Precalculus, but the informal study groups in seventh period, Moroi Culture, gave Lissa the perfect opportunity to continue.
"So where have you been? You can't have been training now Guardian Belikov has been reallocated."
Rose's heart stopped. Lissa knew. But of course she did. Tasha was Christian's aunt – she would have heard from him.
"I still have to train, Lissa. Even without a mentor."
Lissa picked up on her defeated tone of voice, but she attributed it to Rose's commitment to catching up with her studies, not any sadness about Dimitri's departure.
"Of course," Lissa acknowledged. "It would have been better if Guardian Belikov could have stayed until graduation, but I suppose at least this way I'll get to know my new guardian before we have to leave campus," she mused.
Rose felt the rage building within her. Lissa was speaking as though guardians were interchangeable. Pieces of Lego that could be swapped in and out as required. Sure one might be white, another green but at the end of the day they served the same purpose, and they were replaceable; not worthy of any real contemplation beyond their purpose in protecting Moroi.
Gripping the edge of the table so hard her knuckles turned white, Rose managed to mutter, "Well I'm sure he had his reasons."
"Of course he did!" Lissa laughed with a cheeky intonation. "He wanted to get it on with Tasha as soon as possible! Christian said Tasha made him an offer to be her 'guardian with benefits' at Christmas time, but I guess they put it on hold after everything Christian went through at Spokane. I have to say, I never picked Guardian Belikov as the romantic type; he always seemed so serious and career focused, but it just goes to show!"
Rose was close to losing it. She could feel anger rising within her; her muscles tensed the way they did before a fight. She was doing everything she could to fight it and push it back down. Fortunately, Lissa was oblivious and turned in her chair to speak with Camille about a get together planned in the Moroi dorms that evening.
"Sorry, Rose," she whispered after she turned back, "I'd invite you, but it's royals only… I won't go for long – just drop by with Christian and Adrian."
"That's fine," Rose snapped, holding onto her temper by a thread. Lissa was offended. It wasn't her fault the party was Royals only; there was no need for Rose to be a bitch about it. She would have invited her if she could! The two of them sat side by side working in silence until the bell rang. Both stood, wordlessly parting; Lissa heading off to see Christian in her next subject while Rose hit study hall.
Usually Rose would spend the period doing as little as possible, counting down the minutes until she was free to go to afternoon training with Dimitri, but today Rose knuckled down and completed her homework. Now she was counting down the minutes until she could go to see Mason. When the bell rang, she headed across campus in the direction of the cemetery. At 4 am it was still dark enough that provided she skirted the well-lit areas, she could head to her destination unobserved.
Slipping across the ward line, Mase materialized almost instantly.
"Woah! I can see you more clearly now!" Rose enthused.
"You're clearer to me, too!" Mase said, blessing her with a grin.
They talked about her day, and Mason tried to answer her questions about where he was. He described it as more of a feeling than a place. Kind of like floating around in warm, soft cotton wool.
"I'm not upset or angry," he explained. "I'm alone here but not scared, and I haven't seen anyone until you came along."
"Can you see the campus?"
"I can only see about a yard in any direction surrounding you."
Rose outlined what Father Andrews had told her about death and spirits lingering and, Mason confirmed that's what it felt like.
"I can't describe why, but I know I have to move on from here. I can't stay here forever. It's like something is calling me, but I can't hear it, I feel it," he said, touching his heart by way of explanation.
"You're not scared?" Rose asked, worried for her longtime friend.
"No," he said decisively. "It's peaceful, and there's no pain. More and more I want to go there."
They talked about old times, jokes and pranks they'd pulled over the years. By mutual agreement, they didn't speak about Dimitri, beyond Rose telling him about her conversation with Lissa, and how Lissa thought she was angry that she wasn't invited to some royal party.
By 7 am Rose had been sitting in the cold and dark for hours and as the first rays of sunshine broke over the horizon, she was starting to feel hungry. She'd skipped lunch, but she still had a pack of sandwiches she'd pilfered from the Guardian Lounge earlier in the day. She ate it as they chatted, not even noticing what it was she consumed. It was 8 am when a guardian spotted her while he was walking the wards, angrily demanding she get back behind the ward line and head back to the campus buildings. He radioed the incident through to Alberta, wondering why his Captain uttered such a colorful phrase when she heard his account.