Dimitri's POV in Vampire Academy (Fanfic)

Chapter 21

Wrought with worry and suspense, I waited outside of the clinic.

Luckily, I didn't have to wait long. I was sitting on a bench, resisting the urge to tap my leg when Lissa ran up, her hair in disarray and Christian tight on her heels.

'Rose?' she demanded.

'She's inside,' I said, my voice tight.

Lissa's face was all determination. 'I'm going to heal her.'

And I found I couldn't stop her. I was too frightened over Rose's injury, and too selfish. Just this once, I allowed myself to be.

They kept her in the clinic for a couple of days. In those couple of days, things turned back to normal. Alberta and her team had, on the way to the detention centre, caught some commotion at the wall of the academy, and luckily looked close enough to see that it was prince Dashkov himself trying to escape the grounds. They'd locked him up again, with double the security.

To mine and Rose's intense relief, Lissa was prescribed medicine for her depression. She seemed happy whenever I chanced to see her, and Christian and Rose were never far from her side.

Rose's own situation also improved. I never heard the words blood whore uttered anymore, and Rose was always surrounded by friends. Mason was one of them, and almost certainly closer than the rest, but I reminded myself that's how it had to be. I could only be glad that Rose had something to distract her from what she now understood was an impossible relationship.

So life went on. We trained together, she bantered, I listened, she provoked me into more 'zen' lessons (as she called them), than I could count, and when she was annoyed by something, she readily opened up to me about what was bothering her. Our relationship settled into the more normal lines of a mentor-student relationship.

Seeing her safe and happy calmed the storm in my heart, and I settled into an inner peace I hadn't felt in months. Sure, the occasional dream or two troubled my nights, and I still felt something inside me yearning, but nobody said life was perfect. Those issues would always be present in my life. Guardian duty allowed for little pleasure, and what few moments of it I got I cherished. What mattered most was that Rose remained in my life. I didn't think I could stand day in and day out of guarding classrooms without those moments we shared together. She was like a sun, bringing with her laughter and energy and passion. She had walked into my life and altered it forever, and I could only be grateful and content with my lot.

But sometimes, when our eyes met at a special moment, when neither of us were focused on something else, that life we might have shared, if things had been different, would flash before my eyes. I could tell in those moments that the same was true for her. But save those few times when my gaze lingered for a few seconds longer than normal, everything was as it should have been.

And I was happy.

THE END