Collateral Damage

- TWO -

16 YEARS LATER

I walked in the front door and shook off my coat. It has been cold here for the last few days, god I hate the winter. I placed my coat on the holder by the door and slipped on my beloved slippers. I pulled out a beer from the fringe and grabbed a shoe box from the top shelf in my bedroom. I sat at my kitchen table, rummaging through the box of things. Inside the old and tattered box is everything I owned that linked back to Matilda, her booties, some clothes, a bottle. I barely had anything for her when she was born because I knew from word go that I would be giving her to the academy.

Even though I hated living at the academy, not knowing my father and having an MIA mother, the academy was a pretty good family. Every year on her birthday I sit here drinking a beer looking at these things. I remember the night I got home after leaving her there I cried and cried looking at all of her belongings. She should have been my world, but she wasn't.

Today is her sixteenth birthday. It hurts knowing that today she would have read and probably reread the letter that I left in her bassinet when I left her at the Academy. I knew that she would at least have Lissa at the Academy to keep her safe.

I heard that Lissa and Christian had moved back to the Academy after they got married. I should have been there, I should have walked her down the aisle because I was the only family she had left. I should have been there to hold her children as they were bought into this world.

I was also told that Tasha Ozera, Christian's aunt, had broken whatever she and Dimitri had off. Can't say I'm surprised. Or disappointed. I loved Dimitri and he ripped out my heart. I was told that he took back his position as Lissa's guardian, I have been told that Matilda and he have grown close, that scares me but what can I do?

Dimitri and I only got intimate once, and the result of that intimacy was a child. It was a shock that I fell pregnant but I came to the conclusion that it was because I was shadow kissed. Occasionally I am pulled into Lissa's head, which is convenient so I can check up on Matilda, but I haven't been drawn into her mind in a long time, which I don't know whether or not to be grateful.

After I left Matilda I moved in with the midwife that delivered her, her family and later my bofriend. I cried on her shoulder numerous times and she understood. She was my Lissa stand-in. Her name is Louise and she's a moroi, which is convenient because I don't have to hide that I'm a dhampir. She has a son and a husband. Her husband's name is Chris, Chris is her guardian, and Louise has a 3 year old son whose name is Kane. Chris and Louise have an understanding that Chris would be Kane's sub-in father since the biological father took off. They remind me of Lissa's family before they died, perfect in every way.

We also live with my boyfriend Scott. He is like a mixture of Abe, Dimitri and Mason. He is tall with shoulder length brown hair like Dimitri's. He and Dimitri have the same sort of build, he cares like my father, Abe, he cares but he doesn't overwhelm you with how much he loves you. And he has Mason's humour. He finds all of the secret jokes I hide in our conversations and finds my sarcasm hilarious. He knew I had my heart broken by my ex. Sott doesn't know that my ex is the dhampir bought back from the dead, he doesn't know that my ex is the most skilled and godlike guardian on the planet. And he certainly doesn't know that my ex/father of my daughter is my old teacher from high school.

There is only one person from my old life who knows about Matilda and he has promised that he would look after her. He visits me in my dreams sometimes. Adrian Ivashkov. He is in love with me and has been for some time. He is a spirit user like Lissa and he comes to me in my dreams. That's how I keep tabs on the things that are happening at St. Vladimirs. He comes on Matilda's birthday every year and sometimes on mine.

I wandered back to my room after finishing my beer, I placed the shoe box on the top shelf of my cupboard and laid down on my bed. It had been a long day so before I knew it I was sleeping.