For my nephews, Jordan and Austin 7 страница

Theoretically, I was. Until we'd met Adrian, we'd only known of two other spirit users. One was our former teacher, Ms. Karp, who'd gone completely nuts from spirit and become a Strigoi to stop the madness. The other person was St. Vladimir, the school's namesake. He'd lived centuries ago and had brought his guardian, Anna, back from the dead, just as Lissa had me. It had made Anna shadow-kissed and created a bond between them too.

Normally, Lissa and I tried to get our hands on everything we could about Anna and Vlad, in order to learn more about ourselves. But, as incredible as it was for me to admit, I had bigger problems right now than the ever-present and ever-puzzling psychic link between Lissa and me. It had just been trumped by a ghost who could possibly be pissed off over my role in his untimely death.

"Yeah," I said evasively, not making eye contact. "I'm interested…but I don't think I can get to it anytime soon. I'm kind of busy with all this…you know, field experience stuff."

I fell silent again. He took the hint and let me work on without further interruption. Dimitri never said a word throughout any of this. When we finally finished sorting, Father Andrew told us we had one more task before our work was done. He pointed to some boxes that we'd organized and repacked.

"I need you to carry these over to the elementary campus," he said. "Leave them off at the Moroi dorm there. Ms. Davis has been teaching Sunday school for some of the kindergartners and might be able to use those."

It would take at least two trips between Dimitri and me, and the elementary campus was a fair distance away. Still, that put me one step closer to freedom.

"Why are you interested in ghosts?" Dimitri asked me on our first trip.

"Just making conversation," I said.

"I can't see your face right now, but I have a feeling you're lying again."

"Jeez, everyone thinks the worst of me lately. Stan accused me of glory-seeking."

"I heard about that," said Dimitri, as we rounded a corner. The buildings of the elementary campus loomed up in front of us. "That might have been a little unfair of him."

"A little, huh?" Hearing him admit that thrilled me, but it didn't change my anger against Stan. That dark, grouchy feeling that had plagued me lately sprang to life. "Well, thanks, but I'm starting to lose faith in this field experience. Sometimes in the whole Academy."

"You don't mean that."

"I don't know. The school just seems so caught up in rules and policies that don't have anything to do with real life. I saw what was out there, comrade. I went right to the monster's lair. In some ways … I don't know if this really prepares us."

I expected him to argue, but to my surprise he said, "Sometimes I agree."

I nearly stumbled as we stepped inside one of the two Moroi dorms on the elementary campus. The lobby looked a lot like the ones on the secondary campus. "Really?" I asked.

"Really," he said, a small smile on his face. "I mean, I don't agree that novices should be put out in the world when they're ten or anything, but sometimes I've thought the field experience should actually be in the field. I probably learned more in my first year as a guardian than I did in all my years of training. Well… maybe not all. But it's a different situation, absolutely."

We exchanged looks, pleased over our agreement. Something warm fluttered up in me, putting the lid on my earlier anger. Dimitri understood my frustration with the system, but then, Dimitri understood me. He glanced around, but there was no one at the desk. A few students in their early teens were working or talking in the lobby.

"Oh," I said, shifting the weight of the box I held. "We're in the middle school dorm. The younger kids are next door."

"Yes, but Ms. Davis lives in this building. Let me try to find her and see where she wants these." He set his box down carefully. "I'll be right back."

I watched him go and set my own box down. Leaning against a wall, I glanced around and nearly jumped when I saw a Moroi girl only a couple feet away. She'd been standing so perfectly still, I hadn't noticed her. She looked like she could be mid-teens—thirteen or fourteen—but she was tall, much taller than me. The slimness of her Moroi build made her look even taller. Her hair was a cloud of brown curls, and she had freckles—rare among the normally pale Moroi—across her face. Her eyes widened when she saw me looking at her.

"Oh. My. God. You're Rose Hathaway, aren't you?"

"Yeah," I said with surprise. "Do you know me?"

"Everyone knows you. I mean, everyone heard about you. You're the one who ran away. And then you came back and killed those Strigoi. That is so cool. Did you get molnija marks?" Her words came out in one long string. She hardly took a breath.

"Yeah. I have two." Thinking about the tiny tattoos on the back of my neck made my skin itch.

Her pale green eyes—if possible—grew wider. "Oh my God. Wow."

I usually grew irate when people made a big deal about the molnija marks. After all, the circumstances had not been cool. But this girl was young, and there was something appealing about her.

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Jillian—Jill. I mean, just Jill. Not both. Jillian's my full name. Jill's what everyone calls me."

"Right," I said, hiding a smile. "I figured it out."

"I heard Moroi used magic on that trip to fight. Is that true? I would love to do that. I wish someone would teach me. I use air. Do you think I could fight Strigoi with that? Everyone says I'm crazy." For centuries, Moroi using magic to fight had been viewed as a sin. Everyone believed it should be used peacefully. Recently, some had started to question that, particularly after Christian had proved useful in the Spokane escape.

"I don't know," I said. "You should talk to Christian Ozera."

She gaped. "Would he talk to me?"

"If you bring up fighting the establishment, yeah, he'll talk to you."

"Okay, cool. Was that Guardian Belikov?" she asked, switching subjects abruptly.

"Yeah."

I swore I thought she might faint then and there. "Really? He's even cuter than I heard. He's your teacher, right? Like, your own personal teacher?"

"Yeah." I wondered where he was. Talking to Jill was exhausting.

"Wow. You know, you guys don't even act like teacher and student. You seem like friends. Do you hang out when you're not training?"

"Er, well, kind of. Sometimes." I remembered my earlier thoughts, about how I was one of the few people Dimitri was social with outside of his guardian duties.

"I knew it! I can't even imagine that—I'd be freaking out all the time around him. I'd never get anything done, but you're so cool about it all, kind of like, 'Yeah, I'm with this totally hot guy, but whatever, it doesn't matter.'"

I laughed in spite of myself. "I think you're giving me more credit than I deserve."

"No way. And I don't believe any of those stories, you know."

"Um, stories?"

"Yeah, about you beating up Christian Ozera."

"Thanks," I said. Now rumors of my humiliation were trickling down to the lower campus. If I walked over to the elementary dorms, some six-year-old would probably tell me she'd heard that I killed Christian.

Jill's expression turned momentarily uncertain. "But I didn't know about the other story."

"What other story?"

"About how you and Adrian Ivashkov are—"

"No," I interrupted, not wanting to hear the rest. "Whatever you heard, it's not true."

"But it was really romantic."

"Then it's definitely not true."

Her face fell, and then she perked back up a few seconds later. "Hey, can you teach me to punch someone?"

"Wai— What? Why would you want to know that?"

"Well, I figure if I'm going to fight with magic someday, I should learn to fight the regular way too."

"I'm probably not the right person to ask," I told her. "Maybe you should, um, ask your P.E. teacher."

"I did!" Her face looked distraught. "And he said no."

I couldn't help but laugh. "I was joking about asking him."

"Come on, it could help me fight a Strigoi someday."

My laughter dried up. "No, it really wouldn't."

She bit her lip, still desperate to convince me. "Well, it would at least help against that psycho."

"What? What psycho?"

"People keep getting beat up around here. Last week it was Dane Zeklos, and just the other day it was Brett."

"Dane …" I ran through my knowledge of Moroi genealogy. There were a gazillion Zeklos students around. "That's Jesse's younger brother, yeah?"

Jill nodded. "Yup. One of our teachers was so mad, too, but Dane wouldn't say a word. Neither would Brett."

"Brett who?"

"Ozera."

I did a double take. "Ozera?"

I had the impression she was really excited to tell me things I didn't know. "He's my friend Aimee's boyfriend. He was all bruised up yesterday—had some weird things that looked like welts, too. Maybe burns? But he wasn't as bad as Dane. And when Mrs. Callahan asked him about it, Brett convinced her it was nothing, and she let it go, which was weird. He was also in a really good mood—which was also weird, since you'd kind of think getting beat up would bring you down."

Somewhere in the back of my mind, her words tickled a memory. There was some connection I should be making, but I couldn't quite grasp it. Between Victor, ghosts, and the field experiences, it was honestly a wonder I could string words together anymore.

"So can you teach me so that I won't get beat up?" Jill asked, clearly hoping she'd convinced me. She balled her fist up. "I just do this, right? Thumb across the fingers and swing?"

"Uh, well, it's a little more complicated than that. You need to stand a certain way, or you'll hurt yourself more than the other person. There are a lot of things you need to do with your elbows and hips."

"Show me, please?" she begged. "I bet you're really good."

I was really good, but corrupting minors was one offense I didn't yet have on my record, and I preferred to keep it that way. Fortunately, Dimitri came back just then with Ms. Davis.

"Hey," I told him. "I have someone who wants to meet you. Dimitri, this is Jill. Jill, Dimitri."

He looked surprised, but he smiled and shook her hand. She turned bright red and became speechless for a change. As soon as he released her hand, she stammered out a goodbye and ran off. We finished up with Ms. Davis and headed back toward the chapel for our second load.

"Jill knew who I was," I told Dimitri as we walked. "She had kind of a hero-worship thing going on."

"Does that surprise you?" he asked. "That younger students would look up to you?"

"I don't know. I just never thought about it. I don't think I'm that good of a role model."

"I disagree. You're outgoing, dedicated, and excel at everything you do. You've earned more respect than you think."

I gave him a sidelong glance. "And yet not enough to go to Victor's trial, apparently."

"Not this again."

"Yes, this again! Why don't you get how major this is? Victor's a huge threat."

"I know he is."

"And if he gets loose, he'll just start in on his crazy plans again."

"It's really unlikely he will get loose, you know. Most of those rumors about the queen letting him off are just that— rumors. You of all people should know not to believe everything you hear."

I stared stonily ahead, refusing to acknowledge his point. "You should still let us go. Or"—I took a deep breath—"you should at least let Lissa go."

It was harder for me to say those words than it should have been, but it was something I'd been thinking about. I didn't think I was a glory seeker like Stan had said, but there was a part of me that always wanted to be the one in the middle of a fight. I wanted to rush forward, doing what was right and helping others. Likewise, I wanted to be there at Victor's trial. I wanted to look him in the eye and make sure he was punished.

But as time went on, it seemed less likely that that would happen. They really weren't going to let us go. Maybe, though, maybe they'd let one of us go, and if it should be anyone, it should be Lissa. She'd been the target of Victor's plan, and though her going alone stirred up that nervous idea about how maybe she didn't need me to guard her, I'd still rather take the chance and see him put away.

Dimitri, understanding my need to rush in and take action, seemed surprised by my unusual behavior. "You're right— she should be there, but again, it's nothing I can do anything about. You keep thinking I can control this, but I can't."

"But did you do everything you could?" I thought back to Adrian's words in the dream, about how Dimitri could have done more. "You have a lot of influence. There must be something. Anything."

"Not as much influence as you think. I've got a high position here at the Academy, but in the rest of the guardian world, I'm still pretty young. And yes, I did actually speak up for you."

"Maybe you should have spoken up louder."

I could sense him shutting down. He'd discuss most things reasonably but wouldn't encourage me when I was just being a bitch. So, I tried to be more reasonable.

"Victor knows about us," I said. "He could say something."

"Victor has bigger things to worry about with this trial than us."

"Yeah, but you know him. He doesn't exactly act like a normal person would. If he feels like he's lost all hope of getting off, he might decide to bust us just for the sake of revenge."

I'd never been able to confess my relationship with Dimitri to Lissa, yet our worst enemy knew about it. It was weirder even than Adrian knowing. Victor had figured it out by watching us and gathering data. I guess when you're a scheming villain, you get good at that stuff. He'd never made the knowledge public, though. Instead, he'd used it against us with the lust charm he'd made from earth magic. A charm like that wouldn't work if there wasn't already attraction in place. The charm just cranked things up. Dimitri and I had been all over each other and had been only a heartbeat away from having sex. It had been a pretty smart way for Victor to distract us without using violence. If anyone had tried to attack us, we could have put up a good fight. But turn us loose on each other? We had trouble fighting that.

Dimitri was silent for several moments. I knew he knew I had a point. "Then we'll have to deal with that as best we can," he said at last. "But if Victor's going to tell, he's going to do it whether or not you testify."

I refused to say anything else until we got to the church. When we did, Father Andrew told us that after going over some more things, he'd decided he really only needed one more box brought over to Ms. Davis.

"I'll do it," I told Dimitri crisply, once the priest was out of earshot. "You don't have to come."

"Rose, please don't make a big deal about this."

"It is a big deal!" I hissed. "And you don't seem to get it."

"I do get it. Do you really think I want to see Victor loose? Do you think I want us all at risk again?" It was the first time in a long time I'd seen his control on the verge of snapping. "But I told you, I've done all I can do. I'm not like you—I can't keep making a scene when things don't go my way."

"I do not."

"You're doing it right now."

He was right. Some part of me knew I'd crossed a line … but just like with everything else recently, I couldn't stop talking.

"Why did you even help me today?" I demanded. "Why are you here?"

"Is that so strange?" he asked. He almost looked hurt.

"Yes. I mean, are you are you trying to spy on me? Figure out why I messed up? Make sure I don't get into any trouble?"

He studied me, brushing hair out of his eyes. "Why does there have to be some ulterior motive?"

I wanted to blurt out a hundred different things. Like, if there wasn't a motive, then that meant he just wanted to spend time with me. And that made no sense, because we both knew we were only supposed to have a teacher-student relationship. He of all people should know that. He was the one who'd told me.

"Because everyone has motives."

"Yes. But not always the motives you think." He pushed open the door. "I'll see you later."

I watched him go, my feelings a tangle of confusion and anger. If the situation hadn't been so strange, I would have almost said it was like we'd just gone on a date.

CHAPTER 10

The next day, my guardian duties with Christian resumed. Once again, I found my own life put on hold for someone else's.

"How was your penance?" he asked as we walked across campus from his dorm.

I stifled a yawn. I hadn't been able to sleep well last night, both because of my feelings for Dimitri and because of what Father Andrew had told me. Nonetheless, I kept a sharp eye out. This was the location where Stan had attacked us twice before, and besides, the guardians were sick and twisted enough to come after me on a day when I was so exhausted.

"It was okay. The priest let us go early."

"Us?"

"Dimitri came and helped me. I think he felt bad about me being stuck with that work."

"Either that or he has nothing else to do now that he's not doing your extra sessions."

"Maybe, but I doubt it. All in all, I guess it wasn't that bad a day." Unless you considered learning about spiteful ghosts bad.

"I had a great day," said Christian, the smallest amount of smugness in his voice.

I repressed the urge to roll my eyes. "Yeah, I know."

He and Lissa had taken advantage of their guardianless day to take advantage of each other. I supposed I should be glad they'd held off until Eddie and I weren't around, but in a lot of ways, it didn't matter. True, when I was awake, I could block out all of the details, but I still knew what was going on. A bit of the jealousy and anger I'd felt from the last time they'd been together returned. It was the same problem all over again: Lissa doing all the things I couldn't do.

I was dying to go eat breakfast. I could smell French toast and hot maple syrup. Carbs wrapped in more carbs. Yum. But Christian wanted blood before we ate solid food, and his needs trumped mine. They come first. He'd apparently skipped his daily blood dose yesterday—probably to maximize his romantic time.

The feeder room wasn't crowded, but we still had to wait.

"Hey," I said. "Do you know Brett Ozera? You're related, right?" After my encounter with Jill, I'd finally put some pieces together. Brett Ozera and Dane Zeklos had reminded me of how Brandon had looked the day of Stan's first attack. The disaster of that attack had made me completely forget about Brandon, but the coincidences here suddenly stirred my curiosity. All three had been beaten up. All three had been in denial.

Christian nodded. "Yeah, in the way we're all kind of related. I don't know him that well—he's like a third or fourth cousin or something. His branch of the family hasn't had much to do with mine since … well, you know."

"I heard something weird about him." I then related what Jill had told me about Dane and Brett.

"That's weird," agreed Christian. "But people get in fights."

"Yeah, but there are some weird connections here. And royals aren't usually on the losing ends of fights—all three of these guys were."

"Well, maybe that's it. You know how it's been. A lot of royals are getting pissed off that non-royals want to change how guardians are assigned and learn to start fighting. That's the whole point of Jesse and Ralf's stupid little club. They want to make sure royals stay on top. Non-royals are probably getting just as pissed off and fighting back."

"So, what, some kind of vigilante is out making royals pay?"

"Wouldn't be the weirdest thing that's happened around here," he pointed out.

"That's for damn sure," I muttered.

Christian's name was called, and he peered ahead. "Look at that," he said happily. "Alice again."

"I don't get your fascination with her," I observed as we approached the old feeder. "Lissa's always kind of excited to see her too. But Alice is nuts."

"I know," he said. "That's what's so great."

Alice greeted us as Christian sat down beside her. I leaned against the wall, arms crossed over my chest. Feeling uppity, I said, "Alice, the scenery hasn't changed. It's exactly the same as last time."

She turned her dazed eyes on me. "Patience, Rose. You must be patient. And prepared. Are you prepared?"

The switch in subject threw me a little. It was like talking to Jill, except less sane. "Um, prepared how? For the scenery?"

In what had to be a prime moment of irony, she looked at me as though I were the one who was crazy. "Armed. Are you armed? You're going to protect us, aren't you?"

I reached inside my coat and pulled out the practice stake I'd been given for the field experience. "Got you covered," I said.

She looked immensely relieved and apparently couldn't tell the difference between a real stake and a fake one. "Good," she said. "Now we'll be safe."

"That's right," said Christian. "With Rose armed, we have nothing to worry about. The Moroi world can rest easy."

Alice was oblivious to his sarcasm. "Yes. Well, nowhere is ever safe."

I concealed the stake again. "We're safe. We've got the best guardians in the world protecting us, not to mention the wards. Strigoi aren't getting in here."

I didn't add what I'd recently learned: that Strigoi could get humans to break the wards. Wards were invisible lines of power that were composed of all four elements. They were created when four Moroi, each one strong in a different element, walked around an area and laid the magic in a circle upon the ground, creating a protective border. Moroi magic was imbued with life, and a strong field of it kept out Strigoi, since they were devoid of life. So wards were frequently laid around Moroi dwellings. Tons of them were laid around this school. Since stakes were also imbued with all four elements, driving a stake through a ward line in the ground pierced the ward and canceled out the protective effect. This had never been much of a concern because Strigoi couldn't touch stakes. However, in some recent attacks, humans—who could touch stakes—had served Strigoi and broken some wards. We believed the Strigoi I'd killed had been the ringleaders in that group, but we still didn't know for sure.

Alice studied me closely with her cloudy eyes, almost as though she knew what I was thinking. "Nowhere is safe. Wards fade. Guardians die."

I glanced over at Christian, who shrugged in a sort of what did you expect from her? kind of way.

"If you guys are done with your girl talk, can I eat now?" he asked.

Alice was more than happy to comply; he was her first hit of the day. She soon forgot about wards or anything else and simply lost herself to the ecstasy of his bite. I forgot about wards too. I had a one-track mind, really: I still wanted to know if Mason had been real or not. The priest's frightening explanation aside, I had to admit Mason's visits hadn't been threatening, just scary. If he was out to get me, he was kind of doing a half-assed job of it. Once again, I started putting more stock in the stress-and-fatigue theory.

"Now it's time for me to eat," I said when Christian finished. I was pretty sure I could smell bacon now. That'd probably make Christian happy. He could wrap it around his French toast.

We'd barely stepped out of the room when Lissa came running up to us, Eddie trailing behind. Excitement lit her face, though the feelings in the bond weren't exactly happy.

"Did you hear?" she asked, a little breathless.

"Hear what?" I asked.

"You have to hurry—go pack your things. We're going to Victor's trial. Right now."

There'd been no warning at all about when Victor's trial would even occur, let alone that someone had apparently decided we could go. Christian and I exchanged brief, startled looks and then hurried off to his room to gather our things.

Packing was a breeze. My bag was ready to go already, and Christian only took a minute to throw his together. In less than a half hour, we were out on the Academy's landing strip. Two private jets sat in attendance, one of which was fired up and waiting to go. A couple of Moroi hurried about, doing last-minute things with the plane and the runway.

No one seemed to know what was going on. Lissa had simply been told that she, Christian, and I were going to testify and that Eddie could come along to continue his field experience. There'd been no explanation as to why thingshad changed, and a weird mix of eagerness and apprehension crackled around us. We all wanted to see Victor locked away for good, but now that we were actually faced with the reality of the trial and of seeing him—well, it was kind of scary.

A few guardians lingered near the steps going up to the plane. I recognized them as the ones who had helped capture Victor. They were probably going to do double duty and serve as witnesses and as our protection. Dimitri hovered near the outskirts, and I hurried over to him.

"I'm sorry," I gulped out. "I'm so sorry."

He turned toward me, his face schooled to that perfect picture of neutrality that he was so good at. "Sorry for what?"

"For all the horrible things I said yesterday. You did it— you really did it. You got them to let us go."

Despite my nervousness about seeing Victor, I was filled with elation. Dimitri had come through. I'd known all along that he really cared about me—this just proved it. If there hadn't been so many people around, I would have hugged him.

Dimitri's face didn't change. "It wasn't me, Rose. I had nothing to do with it."

Alberta signaled that we could board, and he turned away to join the others. I stood frozen for a moment, watching him and trying to figure out what had happened. If he hadn't intervened, then why were we going? Lissa's diplomatic efforts had been shot down a while ago. Why the change of heart?

My friends were already on board, so I hurried to catch up. As soon as I stepped into the cabin, a voice called to me. "Little dhampir! About time you got here."

I looked and saw Adrian waving, a drink in his hand. Great. We'd had to beg and plead to go along, yet Adrian had somehow just glided on in. Lissa and Christian were sitting together, so I joined Eddie in the hopes of staying away from Adrian. Eddie gave me the window seat. Adrian moved to the seat in front of us, though, and might as well have been sitting in our row, as often as he turned around to talk to me. His chatter and outrageous flirting indicated he'd been sipping cocktails long before the rest of us had come aboard. I kind of wished I'd had a few myself once we were airborne. A wicked headache set in almost immediately after liftoff, and I entertained a fantasy of vodka numbing the pain.

"We're going to Court," Adrian said. "Aren't you excited about it?"

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples. "About which one? The royal one or the legal one?"

"The royal one. Did you bring a dress?"

"Nobody told me to."

"So … that's a 'no.'"

Дата добавления: 2015-11-05