Dimitri's Point of View in Shadow Kiss (Vampire Academy) (Book 3)

Part 10

Chapter 10:

After the service and everyone had cleared out Rose lingered near the stage. She looked uncomfortable and stuck out. The way she looked around the room told me she didn’t want to be here and hoped no one saw her and took it as a sudden interest in religion. I shook my head at the thought. It could be something else.

My heart nearly leapt out of my chest when she glanced my way. Shock masked her features, and I was brought back to the first night I had saw her. She wore the same expression only fear was hidden somewhere beneath it. Only this time the fear was replaced by something I had come to consider and know. Love.

“What are you doing here?” She asked. Her voice echoed off the old wooden walls.

“Thought you might need some help. I hear the priest wants to do a lot of housecleaning.” I had heard this by eavesdropping on Alberta and Kirova from earlier.

“Yeah, but you’re not the one being punished here. And this is your day off too. We---well, everyone else---spent the whole week battling it out, but you guys were the ones picking the fights the whole time.” Her eyes narrowed, taking in the features of my face. I knew she was examining the bruises I had received this week. I didn’t have as many as the other guardians, partly because I was faster and stronger than most and didn’t go easy on the students.

Stan had the most out of all of us. And my confrontation with him last night had to leave a lot more damage than any novice could do. The thought of him calling Rose stupid made my pulse quicken in anger. The last time he had talked badly about Rose was the first day she had arrived back to the school. He had screamed and yelled at her over something as small as not knowing a lesson.

Back then I thought of his yelling as a lesson to her. And had agreed with it. But now, now I see it as cruelty and his enjoyment of picking on a student. Knowing they can’t do anything to him. Except for now, on the field experience, they could hit him and not get looked down for it. I silently encouraged Rose to beat the hell out of him.

I looked at her, keeping my face as stone like as possible. The priest was lingering behind her and if he saw just the slightest attraction I had for Rose I don’t know what I’d do. “What else would I do today?”

“I could think of a hundred other things,” she noted dryly. It was as if she didn’t want me there. My heart ached at her response. “There’s probably a John Wayne movie on somewhere that you haven’t seen.”

I tried to keep a straight face at her attempts of showing me up. I shook my head. “No, there isn’t. I’ve seen them all. Look---the priest is waiting for us.”

She turned around to see Father Andrew standing at the front, watching us. To Rose his look might seem creepy, but to me, it was like a stab in the back. He was watching us, seeing if his earlier theory was correct. My heart raced as I stared at him. His mouth twitched upward, I knew he heard it.

He’d taken off the rich robes he’d worn during the service and now stood in simple slacks and a button down shirt.

As Rose and I approached to get our assignments, I couldn’t help but wonder if it were a sin to love someone that didn’t belong to me. Surely somewhere in the bible God looked down upon falling in love with a girl underage. I just hadn’t found it yet.

“Thank you both for volunteering to help me.” Father Andrew smiled at us. “We aren’t doing anything particularly complex today. It’s a bit boring really. We’ll have to do the regular cleaning, of course, and then I’d like to sort the boxes of old supplies I have sitting up in the attic.”