I Never Told You I Love You - Complete

Chapter 72 - Sleep On It

"Rose told me you were worried about making contacts for an allocation," Dimitri said to Vika out of the blue as they were doing cool down exercises after their morning training session on Friday.

Vika shot Rose an angry look.

"What? I didn't realize it was a state secret," Rose said with a shrug.

"I hope you didn't tell him anything else," Vika said meaningfully.

Ignoring their bickering, Dimitri continued. "It brought to mind the house fights they do at St. Basil's. They're not just to help with the final grades, they also give the Royal Moroi a chance to see Novices in action with a view to thinking about allocations. Now we'd never be able to get a full competition up before graduation, but what if I tried to arrange a more casual contest? We could run it Saturday afternoons as an extension of the outdoor training sessions we talked about. On the lawn, if it's fine, in the gym if it's wet."

Dimitri looked to his sister and Eddie to see whether they appeared interested. He didn't need to check with Rose. Even though he'd not mentioned the idea to her previously, Dimitri knew if it involved sparring in public she'd be all for it.

"Say four or eight Novices and one Guardian? The Novices would spar in pairs, then the victors of each fight would spar, and then the ultimate victor takes on a Guardian? If your combat teacher sells it right, I reckon most of the Novices will want to take part, perhaps even more than once. We could run it for 6 weeks? I reckon I could get six Guardians to agree to a one-off spar. Your Mom would probably do it, Rose, and I'm sure either Pavel or Hughes would agree if they're still around in a week or two. Emil and Matthews could probably be convinced to take part, and I'd do one of the final weeks."

Eddie nodded. "That's actually a great idea! The Moroi don't get to see us fight much, so they have no idea who's any good. Do you two want to be getting any more allocation requests, though?" he asked Dimitri and Rose.

"Where there're multiple requests, the Guardians usually get some input. Given my ranking, I should get more say than most. Looks like we're already going to get a few from assholes just trying to keep us apart – we might get some more genuine ones together if people see us fight?"

Dimitri didn't say it, but Eddie knew Rose was far and away the best in their class and would show particularly well. And it wouldn't hurt for the Moroi to see what a God Dimitri was in action, either.

"What ranking are you anyway, dude?" Eddie asked. "I've always wondered."

"My husband's a badass, Eddie. As in Blood Master Seven badass," Rose boasted proudly.

Dimitri smiled at Rose. He didn't mind Eddie knowing – in fact, given Eddie was going to be dating his sister he probably wanted him to know. But Dimitri didn't like talking about it himself as it seemed conceited. Eddie paled a little, looking even more petrified of the Russian God. Rose looked at her man and mentally rolled her eyes as she noticed the subtle look of satisfaction on his face. Oh, he was enjoying frightening Eddie.

"So what do you think?" Dimitri asked. "If you think it's a good idea, I'll run it by Alberta and then your combat teacher today, and we can do the first one tomorrow. I'm on general guarding all day, but have 4.00 – 6.00 am off for training so we could run it then? It will be light enough outside by 5.00 am we won't need lighting, but still dark enough so Moroi can sit outside watch."

The four of them talked it over but agreed it was a good idea. Dimitri counseled the three Novices not to take part until the later weeks – the idea being they wanted the maximum audience to show their skills to.