I thought I was dreaming until I seen blonde hair fall into my face. Lissa was getting ready for bed, but she felt sick. She was sitting up in her bed covered in sweat. Christian sat next to her in only his boxers rubbing her back and offering her water. Lissa took the water gratefully, her head and now mine, was throbbing and her throat was dry.

She got off the bed and went into the bathroom. She dug through the trash bin next to her sink and took out the pregnancy test she used earlier.

Negative.

Lissa was getting worried because moroi don't get sick, and she had felt sick for the past couple of days. She groaned in exasperation. Christian appeared at the door and looked at Lissa wide eyed. "What the fu...?" He knelt next to Lissa and and took the test out of her hand. Lissa started to explain but didn't get to finish before he read the test and relief washed over his features. He looked at Lissa with an expression I've never seen on him. "Why didn't you tell me?" Lissa looked sheepish.

"Because I knew you would do that." She gestured to nothing referring to the little melt down he almost had a moment ago. "And I didn't want to worry you if it was nothing." Christian didn't say anything for a while he looked at nothing in particular with a puzzled look. He started to talk but stopped himself, then he tried again apprehensively.

"What if it's wrong?" Lissa looked horrified, as of her worst fears had been realized. She shook her head rapidly.

"It can't be, we've been safe, and I can't be a mother. I need to help Rose and regain my family's control in court, and..." She was cut off by aloud knock at the door. Lissa composed herself and took her robe off the bathroom door. She shoved Christian back into their bedroom gesturing for him to put on clothes. Lissa creeped downstairs to find Eddie already at Christians door. Eddie turned to face Lissa

"Guardians, they need to talk to Christian." He looked confused, but he opened the door wider and two guardians where standing at the door. Christian appeared behind Lissa at the base of the stairs. "Christian the have to talk to you." Christian looked worried.

"How can I help you?" He sounded unsure of himself, a rare occasion for him. The tallest of the two cleared his throat and handed him a envelope.

"We're sorry we have to interrupt your evening, but your aunt, Natahsa Ozera has been killed in Tarasov. The situation is under investigation and on your own time you can read over the information on the case. Good night." They both did a bow of some sort before turning and leaving. Eddie closed the door and looked behind Lissa. He looked worried.

Lissa was dumbfounded, I had no idea what word I could use to label the thoughts going through her head, but when she turned around all she felt was pain. Christian was sitting on the stairs with his head in his hands. Lissa wrapped he arms around him and he began to cry. I had never seen Christian look so vulnerable. After a while, he looked at Lissa and kissed her. "You know I forgave her for what she did to Rose, even though it wasn't my place, because she's all I had left. I'm all alone now." He didn't cry again, but his silence was heartbreaking.

"You're not alone, you have me, you'll always have me. And Rose, Eddie, Dimitri, Adrian, we all love you. I love you" Christian leaned into Lissa while she stroked his hair.

I was woken up.

Dimitri was kneeling in front of me. The lights where on and the door was closed. I sat up and looked around for a moment. "They just told Christian about Tasha." As if a damn just broke, I started to sob, I felt so bad. Christian lost his last family member twice because of me. Dimitri came and pulled me into him. I cried for Christian and Lissa, Trying to be happy and me just getting in the way of it. I didn't want to admit it to myself, but Lissa had to be pregnant, the feelings I got while in her head where too familiar.

I calmed myself after a while and I sat against the wall zoning out intentionally, until I felt it again. At first it was little but then I felt movement in me full force. I gasped silently, before taking Dimitri's hand and placing it right where I felt my little baby nudging me. If I could live forever watching one moment in time it would be this one, the look on Dimitri's face was of pure happiness. Dimitri kissed me and we sat there. I interrupted our silence with a thought that popped into my head.

"This baby is gonna be the best thing in my life I think." Dimitri kissed me again. Before getting up and turning off the lights.

"Try to get a little more sleep, I don't want you tired tomorrow." I groaned.

"Can you please sleep up here? I know is small but I don't want to leave my own head again." Dimitri came onto the bed and although it was small I wasn't uncomfortable. I knew Dimitri wouldn't say anything if it bugged him. So I asked. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm happy if your happy." It was very Dimitri thing to say but, I just snuggled into him before falling into a dreamless sleep.

When I woke up the sun was barely up and I still felt Dimitri's arms around me. I decided to slip back into Lissa's head, but she was asleep. When I focused on my surrounding again I noticed the door was open and Yeva was standing there staring at me. I mustered all my strength to not fall out of the little bed in horror. She left without saying anything but I had a feeling I was supposed to follow her. I carefully got out of bed, and slipped out of the room. Lying to a groggy Dimitri saying I had to pee, a not so rare occasion recently.

When I went downstairs the clock only read 6:00, early much. The old woman was waiting for me at the front door. I slipped on some not so weather appropriate flip flops and Dimitri's duster before following her outside. The duster was so big on me, but that didn't do anything to stop the morning cold air from getting to me.

I hiked wordlessly behind her for at least 2 miles in the cold. She made Dimitri's line drills seem like child's play. I had to stop several times, but she got irritated and I kept going. Finally we approached a house a little smaller than the Belikov's, but built in the same style. Yeva knocked on the door and a women answered. I instantly identified her as a Moroi. She was I little short, but slim built and slightly pale so she was easy to recognize. "Oh Yeva, good to see you dear, was this the girl you were talking about yesterday?" She didn't seem to be saying it in a mean way but I found it offensive to hear she was taking about me. Regardless I followed her inside and found a man sitting on the couch in front of a lit fire place. Was everyone here a morning person?

Although a little older, I recognize this man was a dhampir. He was tall and even though he had a little extra weight on him, he was still toned in some places. His first words weirded me out a little. "Oh yes dear, I already found it." The man didn't even look in our direction before talking, he help up a silver ring. The man groaned." I'm not being rude, this is me simply testing her. The man got up and came up to me. Shook my hand. "Sorry, I'm Mark." I was confused but greeted him anyways.

"I'm Rose, I'm not sure why I was brought here but it's nice to meet you." I smiled but arched my back because of the discomfort the walk in the cold gave me. The woman who brought me in invited us to the kitchen. She told me to sit at the counter with Yeva, while she prepared breakfast. Yeva began actually talking to me about the locals but every so often I would watch the couple behind the counter. Then it dawned on me.

"You're shadowkissed." Mark nodded.

"I was wondering when you were going to figure it out." The moroi woman nudged him.

"Excuse me, I don't talk much, aloud that is. I'm Oksana, and yes mark is bonded to me. Yeva told us about you yesterday evening, I just wanted to meet you before we leave tomorrow, and give you this. "It helps with the madness, that's why he wears thode silver dog tags."

"Darkness?" Mark nodded. "You could call it that, we don't really have a dictionary for these things." Oksana nudged him.

"You probably have plenty of questions for us so go ahead we can share what we know." The woman was well spoken and kind. Mark was a bit childish but still nice. So I started with basic questions like what happened, and what their bond was like. But soon I started to ask more specific things. Like a question that popped into my head that I later regretted asking.

"Did you guys ever think about having children?" They looked at each other nervously before Oksana started answering.

"We did, and a little over five years ago I was pregnant. But I... I miscarried." She looked at the floor and Mark continued for her.

"Half way through the pregnancy, a small group of strigoi attacked Baia while we were in church. The local dhampirs, including myself were able to stake most of them. Some ran into the woods. Not before they did some damage. They bit a lot of people, not completely draining anyone, but there was this one girl. We found her outside the church bleeding heavily and crying about being violated. She was probably no older than you. Oksana healed her, but she used a lot of her energy. Later that evening she began bleeding, by the time we got to a hospital it was too late."

"I'm sorry." I couldn't say anything else because I was suddenly absolutely terrified. The grandfather clock in their living room began dinging. Yeva said it was time we went home, so I thanked the couple before wordlessly following Yeva home.

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