A month outside the gates (a VA fanfic)ON HOLD

Chapter 45

RPOV
It was week four of field experience, and I'd been spending Sundays with Dimitri. Commandeering Liss and Chris' hideout to research into my shadow kissed state and its side effects.

Oh, had they been pissed when they walked in on Dimitri and I pouring over age-old books. I'd known it was a risk we ran. So, I'd made sure Dimitri and I stayed as professional as possible. It wasn't like they'd walked in on a make out session, but Liss still jumped to that conclusion because the attic's atmosphere created an intimate air. Especially for those two, between those two.
"Relax, Liss!" I laughed at my speechless friend.
"What the hell?!" Christian screeched.
"Oh- Settle Firecrotch!" I snapped half-heartedly.
"Atrocious Hathaway " My charge shook his head at my bravado failure.
"Unfortunately, I know the plan. So," I turned to Dimitri. "Out we go, Comrade! The library awaits." I grabbed my stuff and headed towards the door. With Liss mentally apologising profusely for jumping to conclusions. "Oh, settle sister!" I engulfed her in a hug. "This your place." I whispered in her ear. That worked, after she got over the shock that I'd been pulled in when they'd been together in here.
"Come on, Rose. We've got work to do." Dimitri gripped my wrist and pulled me through the door and down the stairs. "What was that about?" he whispered before we reached the sanctuary, the active place of prayer.
"That's 'their place'. Their hideout, their special sanctuary, their go to place."
"You mean?" he raised a brow, while one hand was holding the door shut.
"Yes. That's their version of the showers and the cabin."
"No wonder they were peeved."
"How we're keeping straight faces while discussing our charge's sex lives, I'll never know."
"We're trained to. Now, love, let's get to the library. But not without a stop by the cafeteria, first. I can hear you're hungry." got whispered in my ear before the door was opened.

That happened the first Sunday. The following ones I made sure to pull the timings from Lissa's mind. We didn't have those run ins again, but both pairs got what was needed out of that attic. I got info I needed, but didn't want, while Lissa got her perfect love and sex life.

I hated what the research was turning up. It wasn't just scaring me. It was terrifying me. Liss had been off her med's for a week and I was taking her instability. My freak outs were diffused with one look from Dimitri (one that said 'not while I'm around, my love'). And thank god they could be diffused at all.

On the Sunday before week four began, Dimitri snuck me out to the cabin. It was my eighteenth birthday and he wasn't going to miss it. He also wasn't going to let me forget I was now an adult, one who was cherished and loved. And he'd done as requested... Not spent money on me. God. I loved him, and it felt amazing to finally be legal- age-wise. We still had months until grad and society's removal of 'student' and 'teacher'.

Dimitri and another dozen guardians sprang a test on me on the Sunday night that marked week five was about to start. It was prime-time entertainment for those around. And it was over far too soon for everyone else's liking. I'd managed to take out all thirteen of them in under twenty minutes. Any Novices around who tried to help were shoved out of the way. Eddie and Mason included. Shane was so damn drunk I assigned Mase a guard for him. The Novices had been useful as distractions, but it was more dangerous if they weren't removed so I could 'finish off' whichever 'Strigoi' I took over fighting. My longest battle, unsurprisingly, was Dimitri. That took up about five minutes compared to the average of one to two.

"Excellent Rose." Dimitri beamed when no other 'Strigoi' came.
"Huh?"
"Take a look around you, notice any familiar faces?" he raised a brow. I got the hint.
"Not funny, Dimitri! Not fair, either."
"Oh? When you just excelled against the ones you didn't stand a chance against a few short months ago? Not fair having that kind of excellent mark on your record?"
"Hey! Not cool." I huffed. "The whole school doesn't need to know what went down-or didn't- the night you dragged my ass back." Like I could speak when I was continuing the conversation about said night.
"You can talk!" Emil laughed before the others all went off at the other Novices.

Dimitri, however, dragged me to the cabin. We escaped the prime-time drama unnoticed.
"What the hell?!" I quietly giggled when the trees got thick enough.
"You have no clue just how beyond brilliant that was."
"And you have no clue how unfair that was. Not that field experience has a scratch on the real world."
"No. It doesn't. Come, my love." I was pulled into his side.

My Strigoi alarm bells rang just as Dimitri was about to sweep me off my feet. I placed a finger over his lips before stepping out of the embrace. I took a couple steps towards the cabin and it strengthened, four steps straight back, and it weakened. A lap around had me suspecting the source wasn't inside the cabin. I ventured towards the wards, and it picked up. I stepped over the wards and was overwhelmed by the nausea and the ghosts. The second I was behind the wards the ghosts disappeared. So. The wards were working to keep the restless dead, and the undead, out.

I kept pacing a stretch of the perimeter, the wards, wondering 'what the hell?!'. I was totally confused. And so worried, my proper stake was in my hand. It was as if the Strigoi were lying in wait. They were waiting for something, an opportunity, an 'invitation' to attack. It was as if they were waiting for the Moroi to slip up. It was as if they weren't going to actively break this Academy's wards, despite having the lure of the last Dragomir.

They had issues with the security on this campus. 'Me.' I realised with a start. I was so freaked out, I was tempted to lock eyes with Dimitri and pull strength from him. Yet, it was that same realisation that had me doing everything but. I had just turned eighteen, yet was the cause of preservation issues among the Strigoi.

I could sense those damn monsters lying in wait. Well, coming nearer, really. Something was going to go down, and it was going to go down tonight. And I had no clue how to stop it. Other than send the school into lockdown. But I wasn't allowed to do that until the wards were down. Said wards weren't showing signs of breaking any time soon.

"Speak to me, Rose. What's going on in your head? What's happening on the other side of those wards?"
"Strigoi. Coming closer, and increasing in number. They're waiting. They're waiting for the Moroi to break the wards."
"That could happen at any time, why tonight?"
"I don't know, Dimitri. I do know they aren't going to proactively come after this campus. Even though Liss is a major lure. I'm here, and I'm a cause for concern- the preservation type. But it is tonight. There has to be over a hundred on their way."
"Call it. Call the lockdown."
"No. Even I know that can't be done until the wards are down."
"You don't know the other lockdown, do you? They didn't teach you 'groza' in Russia, by any chance?"
"'Thunderstorm'? Yeah. I was taught that one." It was the code to send the school into lockdown while a band of Guardians manned the perimeter. It wasn't supposed to used, since we had the wards. It hadn't been called since the wards inception. It was a lockdown still taught, just never used.
"Call it. Call it, or I will. This pacing is worrying me, it isn't you."
"Fine." I pulled my phone out and speed-dialled Alberta. The second she picked up "Groza." was out of my mouth.