I had to hand it to the Mason and Eddie – since my pregnancy had become public knowledge I was never left alone. I'm pretty sure they'd worked out a roster, because there was always someone walking me between classes, to meals, or suggesting a study session. Celeste was with me from 6 pm. She'd spin past my dorm, and we'd walk together to morning training, then up to breakfast before heading to my morning combat lessons then lunch.
After lunch, I was with Eddie, Mason, Chelsea, Angela, Meredith or some combination thereof. Chelsea, Meredith, and Angela had been wonderful including me in their activities as though I'd always been a part of their group. From the first study night, they'd just accepted me. They'd not asked a thing about Junior's father, although Meredith must know there was at least some truth to the speculation that there'd been something going on between Dimitri and me.
Along with Eddie and Mason, the six of us now sat at 'our' table – regularly being joined by other Dhampir. It was funny; the whole pregnancy had brought out a previously latent Moroi/Dhampir schism. The Moroi and the Royal Moroi, in particular, saw a pregnant Dhampir girl as a source of amusement and derision. Dhampir, on the other hand, saw this as an unfortunate reality of what happened in our community and almost universally banded together to support me, even the Guardians. Not that I wasn't super grateful. I don't think I would have made it through the first few days without their help; the teasing and lewd comments from some of the Moroi were almost unbearable.
Alberta and I had eaten lunch privately in her office on Saturday, and I'd brought her up to speed on what had happened. She was beyond furious with Tasha and wasn't overjoyed with Lissa, Christian, or Brandon for the parts they'd played either.
"I can't throw Tasha off campus until she does something," Alberta said with annoyance. "But if she's this blatant about things, it will only be a matter of time. In the meantime, I've asked the dorm matron to make sure she doesn't enter the Dhampir dorms, and I'd like you to make sure you're always with someone else when you travel around campus."
Tasha had stayed the weekend, flitting from Moroi group to group spreading gossip and rumors about me. First of all, she claimed I was a slut, a fact all the Moroi guys agreed with although when pressed no one seemed to be able to name a single guy who'd actually slept with me. Then she told everyone I was a blood whore. Things were getting completely out of hand by Monday.
Over the weekend I'd suddenly 'popped.' Only the tiniest little swell, it could easily have been explained away had everyone not already known the truth. But I was feeling particularly self-conscious about my body, so Celeste and I had finished our session five minutes early so I could shower and be dressed again by the time the other girls hit the change rooms after Weight Training and Conditioning.
We were coming back out to the gym when we saw Tasha standing near the change rooms looking at the batch of students training and trying to locate me. She'd been trying to catch me alone all weekend, but as per Alberta's warning, I was always accompanied. Tasha must have realized that a one-on-one wasn't going to happen, because when she spotted me coming out of the change rooms beside Celeste, she squared her jaw and hissed, "Stop spreading lies about my Dimka. He wouldn't look twice at a whore like you."
"Tasha he's not your Dimka, and he never was. He did choose to be with me, and we're very much in love. He's never felt that way about you, and from what I've been told, neither did Ivan. You need to stop obsessing over men who just don't want you."
I knew she was going to try something physical as soon as I said that, and she didn't disappoint. She roared and jumped towards me, aiming punches at my head. The students finishing their lesson with Guardian Martinez at the other end of the gym spun around in time to see me jumping back defensively and Celeste deftly putting Tasha into a headlock as the latter tried to attack me.
"Lady Ozera, please control yourself," Celeste said in an impassive voice that was still loud enough to be heard clearly by our impromptu audience. "I'm going to let you go now, but I'll be forced to restrain you again if you continue trying to attack a student." Celeste looked at me with the slightest twinkle in her eyes.
She started to release Tasha, who did look as though she might behave herself, when I turned my back so the students couldn't see me when I whispered, "And Dimitri's amazing in bed…"
Tasha roared, completely losing it. She lunged at me again, her fist flying towards me, but as it was anticipated, I easily stopped it. Celeste immobilized her a second time.
"Hathaway, go wait for me at Guardian Petrov's office. Martinez? Can I have a hand with Lady Ozera here?" Celeste requested in a weary tone of voice.
I grabbed my bag and took myself to the Guardian block. Once I was there, I outlined to Alberta what had happened.
"I might have kind of provoked her a little, especially the second time," I admitted, chewing on my thumbnail.
Alberta sighed with exasperation. "What did you say?"
"Trust me you don't want to know, but it was nothing but the truth," I promised.
Alberta told me to sit on one of the chairs outside her office.
"I'm going to go grab a snack. I'll be back in about three minutes," she said innocuously, closing the door to her office and disappearing in the direction of the Guardian lounge.
"Hathaway? Where's Guardian Petrov?" Martinez asked a few minutes later as Tasha walked between him and Celeste towards Alberta's office. I shrugged.
"Is there a problem?" Alberta asked with raised eyebrows, coming down the hallway seeing the four of us waiting outside her office.
"I'm afraid so, Guardian Petrov. There was a problem in my Weight Training and Conditioning class," Guardian Martinez said. "Could we…?" he gestured to Alberta's office.
"Please step inside," Alberta invited, opening the door to her office. "Hathaway? Wait outside."
Not that there was much point excluding me – I could hear every word from where I was sitting. Martinez did most of the talking, outlining what he'd seen – Tasha apparently lying in wait for Celeste and I. Celeste then repeated verbatim what Tasha had said.
"And when Hathaway asked her to step back, Lady Ozera tried to attack her," she concluded.
"That's not what happened! That bitch said she and Dimitri were in love and all other sorts of nonsense," Tasha snarled. "She's been going around telling everyone Guardian Belikov is the father of her baby!"
"Yes, I've heard that rumor, although the people I've spoken to have all claimed you were the one who'd told them that. Of course, it's all rather far-fetched – two Dhampir…" Alberta said in a tone of disbelief.
"Of course it's a lie!" Tasha bellowed.
"Well, as I said, I'm yet to have anyone report to me Hathaway has made any such claim. By all accounts, she's refusing to name the father. It all sounds like a silly case of Chinese Whispers to me, but the fact remains you twice tried to attack a student of this school, and two Guardians and over twenty Novices witnessed you doing so. I know your nephew attends St. Vladimir's, so I'd hate to have to restrict your visiting access, but you're not leaving me a lot of choices. I understand with your… interest… in Guardian Belikov, it's a distressing time for you, but it would save a lot of paperwork, and avoid me having to involve the Guardian Council if you decided to return to your home within the next twenty-four hours and refrained from visiting again until graduation."
"You're telling me to leave campus?" Tasha shouted aggressively.
"Lady Ozera, I am telling you no such thing. I am suggesting given your conduct today it might be easier for everyone if you decided of your own volition to return to your home. Don't be concerned about stupid high school gossip. In my experience, the truth will out," Alberta concluded sagely.
I was hugely relieved the next day when a quick peek into Lissa's mind while I was showering proved Tasha had reluctantly taken Alberta's advice and left campus. What was surprising was the relief Lissa felt. Tasha's visit had been difficult for her, too.
Without Tasha there to continually incite discord, a lot of the overt harassment about my pregnancy died down, although there was still a vocal minority who wasted no opportunity to remind me they knew about it. Jesse Zeklos being one of them. Thinking back to the night my Russian God had caught me with my top off making out with Jesse, I felt revolted. I'd do anything for Dimitri not to have seen or known about that. Actually, I'd prefer it had just never happened. As far as experiences went, it hadn't been much of one, but I would still rather all my experiences had been with Dimitri.
It had been eleven weeks since Dimitri left. There'd still been no news. And today I was due to attend my first meeting with the counselor Deirdre. I wasn't looking forward to it. Recalling what Alberta said, the purpose of the sessions with Deirdre were two-fold; trying to work out a future for Junior and me, and discussing my feelings about Dimitri. And both were complicated.
Fronting up to the counseling area in the administrative building, I was met by a young looking blonde Moroi. She looked way too young to be counseling students, but the degrees on her wall said otherwise. I flopped down onto the chair in front of her desk. She started by presenting me with paperwork to sign, explaining that what we spoke about was completely confidential. Alberta had encouraged me to be fully honest about Dimitri, pointing out that strictly speaking no Academy rules had been broken; the weekend Dimitri and I spent in Missoula he had been on his own time between allocations. While there might be ramifications for a student having a sexual relationship with a staff member, the same was not true for a former staff member. It was a specious argument, but it hardly mattered now. Because after seventy-seven days, I was quickly coming to the conclusion that Dimitri wasn't going to be coming back to me, and that the only consequence of our love was nestled in my abdomen.
"So what do you want to discuss first?" Deirdre asked. "I've prepared some information about options going forward, but it might be useful also to look at the events which have led up to where we are right now."
"I don't have time to look back," I said with a brittle voice. "I need to make some decisions. I am going to be homeless and penniless in fourteen weeks at seven months pregnant. I need a game plan. It will probably save a lot of time if I tell you I have no family, no connections and the baby's father is not going to be a part of this."
Reaching into the drawer of her desk, Deirdre pulled out various brochures.
"Well there's not a lot out there," she started, pushing the first flyer across to me, "but St. Agatha's offers a good adoption program for Dhampir children. They'll usually take you from eight months pregnant, but given your age and circumstances, we might be able to get you in earlier."
"Adoption?! Nooo… I plan on keeping my baby. What I need is help to find some way to support us since I won't be able to work as a Guardian, at least at first. I need information on accommodation, childcare, and employment."
Deirdre looked at me as though I'd grown a second head.
"You plan to raise the child yourself?"
"Yes of course," I said. "I'm its mother. I know support in the Moroi world might be hard to come by, so I was considering the human world at least at first. Are there any programs out there? For young mothers? I don't have a social security number, so that will complicate things. I was thinking maybe somewhere in Pennsylvania? If I were close to Court, it would make it easier later when I tried to get work as a Guardian. I don't have any money to move, but most of my friends will be heading to Court at least at first, so there's a good chance I can catch a ride with someone and find a floor to sleep on until I find somewhere more permanent to stay. Oh – and I need information on hospitals or midwives, too. I need to work out where to have this baby without the medical bills costing me a fortune."
Deirdre was scribbling on a pad.
"I'll have a look and see what I can find," she promised. "In the meantime can we talk about the father? Are you certain he can be of no practical help? Even if he's unwilling to be a part of the child's life, he might be able to be of financial assistance? Or his family?"
"No. That won't be happening. The father is away and unlikely to come back. And I doubt his family would believe me even if I told them about the pregnancy."
"What makes you so sure? Accidents do happen you know," she said with an indulgent smile.
"Because he's Dhampir," I snapped, silencing her. "I don't know why or how, but the father is Dhampir. A Guardian. We were very much in love but were only together briefly. He's been reallocated and is not expected to return. He doesn't know."
"What if you tried to contact him?" she asked. "He might put in for reallocation if he knows he's to be a father?"
"I have no way of contacting him," I murmured. "And he's been reallocated on a mission. When I say he is not expected to return, I mean the mission is dangerous, and he is not expected to survive it."
We spoke for another half an hour until I called it a day. The whole thing had been a waste of my time. Until she had some practical information for me, all this was doing was filling in hours when I could be training and getting signed off on my combat skills. I was cutting through the Guardian building on my way to lunch pondering how someone so useless became a counselor when a thought struck me. I'd said I had no way of contacting Dimitri, but that wasn't true. I knew someone who could at the very least get him a message.
I stopped short, another conversation suddenly coming back to me. The conversation I'd had with Dimitri about my mother. He'd said that when a Guardian was a parent, they weren't sent on dangerous missions. Maybe a baby on the way would be good enough?! Maybe if they knew Dimitri was going to be a father, they'd bring him home?
I ran through the building like a woman possessed, racing into Alberta's office. She was sitting with a Dhampir mother and a shamefaced Junior Novice. Having been on the receiving end of them often enough, I recognized a disciplinary meeting when I saw one.
"Hathaway – can you give me half an hour, please?" Alberta said, taking in my flushed face and edgy look.
"Sure," I said, trying not to jump out of my skin with excitement. I can't believe this hadn't occurred to me earlier. I went to the cafeteria to kill time, thinking I should probably eat to settle the butterflies in my stomach. I was almost hugging myself with anticipation. If this went as I hoped, my Russian God would be coming home!
Jesse Zeklos was sitting at a table with Brandon and Christian.
"Hey Hathaway, why are you looking so happy? Has your baby daddy given you something to smile about?" he jeered crudely. "I want it noted I've been in class all morning, so it wasn't me!"
"Jesse the entire universe knows it wasn't you," I replied contemptuously. "I wouldn't touch you with someone else's ten-foot pole."
"Oh, poles… You'd know all about them wouldn't you Rose?" Brandon lewdly implied.
"Yep. I've seen a few. Although some were particularly underwhelming," I said, stopping and flicking my eyes to Christian meaningfully. "Tell me what you need to hear, and I'll say it," I said giving him a particularly spiteful look.
The other two looked at me in confusion, but Christian looked stricken. It's what he'd said to Lissa in the church the first time they'd had sex; the time I got stuck in her head and nearly saw way much more of Christian than I ever wanted to. It was a nasty thing to do. I knew he was aware that I could be sucked into Lissa's head - but I'd never let him know I might have been there during any of their intimate moments. Still, thanks to his big mouth and crazy Aunt, the entire school knew I was pregnant, so I wasn't feeling particularly remorseful.
I tossed my hair and left them gaping as I stood in line. I got my usual fruit salad - one of the health concessions I'd made since discovering I was pregnant - but decided a chocolate doughnut was also in order. Getting them to go, I stalked back past a now silent Christian and crew, heading back to Alberta's office. She was just finishing up with the mother and son, so I waited outside until she called me in.
"Rose?"
"Alberta – I need to get a message to Dimitri. He needs to know he's going to be a father!"
"But there's no way to contact him, Rose. You know that" she replied, looking at me sadly.
"But that's not true. There is a way. Guardian Schoenberg knows how to get in touch with him," I explained, a huge smile on my face.