Vampire Academy: Last Sacrifice (Dimitri's POV)

Chapter Six

I had to think fast before she got too far ahead of me. If I was Rose, where would I go? Pondering that decision, I came to the conclusion that Rose would follow the road. But, being Rose, she knew that I would think she would go there. It may sound like a piece of Rose-logic, but it made sense to me, so I shot off into the forest to find her.

It was pitch black and I couldn't see a thing. The wind ruffled my hair and it was quite a chilly breeze. I sprinted after her, knowing that my long strides always outrun her. After about ten minutes, I glanced up into the sky. It was clear and there was a brilliant moon staring down at me. I pinpointed the correct constellation, the Big Dipper, and followed the trail of stars to the end. I looked over at the North, which didn't look very promising, but neither did any other direction.

All around me, bugs hummed and sung. I could feel pine needles brushing against my duster and the scattered stars looked perfectly placed. I decided to head north in the hopes that I'd somehow find Rose in a random food shop several miles away. I continued jogging along and wondered what she could possibly be doing. Running off was not going to help her. Surely she would realise that. As I wound my way through the trees, I felt a sudden wistful longing for my hometown of Baia.

Russia was such a wonderful place. The language, the beautiful domes. And, although it sounds stupid coming from a 24 year old guardian, I missed my family. Especially my mother. I imagined the scent of bread filling the house and took pleasure in it. I even missed my sisters, although I still resented them for forcing me to play dolls. I was only four; I didn't know better.

I still watched where I was going, but I let my mind wander to the situation back at Court. It had been ages since we'd left. Were they being interrogated? Had they already done that? If I was interrogating that lot, I'd have a difficult job on my hands.

The guardians would surely have realised it was caused by C4, and not Christian or Tasha, but still. They were huge suspects in my eyes. I hoped Tasha was okay. We'd been friends forever and it would be horrible to see anything bad happen to her. Not that I'd actually see it. By the looks of things, the next six months of my life will be spent trying to find Rose.

If we even live that long. I doubted that Lissa would even dare to use compulsion on the guardians. We have a strong resistance to it and, even though hers is extremely powerful, I didn't believe she'd be able to take on many at a time. Only Moroi and humans were that weak. Besides, compulsion could be detected by many people.

My mind was whirring so much that I ended up getting distracted. Sometimes I brushed past something that looked like a silhouette, but turned out to be a tree. And I couldn't stop thinking about the kiss. It was awful of me, and my inner voice chastised me. I tried to shake it out of my head, but I just couldn't.

The last time we'd kissed, I'd been a Strigoi. I dreaded even thinking about those times, and they weren't really considered life experiences. As I'd said to Rose, everything around you seems more alive. And, although it was a simple statement, her reply was so wise: yeah, but you're dead. I hadn't realised that Strigoi had a heart beat, but I guess many people didn't go through what I did.

So, the time before that had been a week before her birthday in late March. Over three months ago. How awful. I hadn't realised quite how much I'd missed her, but I knew it was wrong. She was just using it as a technique. For all I knew, she'd been using it on Strigoi for the past few months. I couldn't have her. Because she was with Adrian. And because I didn't deserve her. She couldn't waste her life with somebody like me.

If she was ever to get her name cleared, which would hopefully happen sometime soon, she might possibly be pardoned with a guardian status to some low-ranking Moroi. She couldn't waste her life with stupid old me then. I set my heart on it. I wouldn't allow her to. Ever. She would meet somebody, or maybe she already had, that would be able to care for her and be strong enough to go through things without making a total fool out of themselves like I do. Maybe she'd found that person in Adrian. All I'd heard was his reputation, and I should know well enough not to listen to that too much. Although it was his own fault.