Building the Tension | ✔ | 18+

Chapter 28 - Preparing for the Inevitable

Author's Notes:

Mature content at the end of the last section. Read responsibly.

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Dimitri's POV:

Once I entered the guardian building, I was immediately ushered into the meeting room. The last time I'd been in this room was after the academy was attacked. This time, it was both further away and much, much closer. I didn't have all of the details yet, but there had been a Strigoi attack in the dhampir commune where Adrian Ivashkov had been sent.

And then there was Rose. Guardian Petrov had asked me not to tell Rose about the attack on the commune. I suspected it was more than just Rose's previous closeness to Adrian that had made her ask that.

Once the other guardians arrived in the room, Guardian Petrov began. "Good morning everyone," she said, "Some of you know part of why this meeting was called this morning. Others are going to have a very unpleasant surprise in store for you. Guardian Smith, could you please dim the lights?"

Guardian Smith walked over and turned off the lights as a computer projector fired up and broadcast a grizzly image across the screen in front of us. In it was the dead body of a girl with long, dark hair, laying naked in a bed with bite marks on her neck and thigh. "This is Lyla Simmons," Alberta continued, "Some of you may remember her from when she was a junior novice here last year. Ms. Simmons failed her qualifier at the end of the year and went to live with her mother in a camp in northern Michigan. Lyla was killed by Adrian Ivashkov yesterday. We believe it happened around 3:00 AM. You'll notice how similar she looks to Novice Hathaway. We believe, as you will later see, that this was a targeted kill because of her appearance. It appears that Ivashkov had sex with her and then drained her of blood. From the appearance of her bites, Ivashkov was still Moroi when he drank from her. After draining Ms. Simmons, Ivashkov went on a killing spree around the camp. In the process, he killed all six visiting Moroi on premises, which were all from royal families, and four other female dhampirs. We found a small dhampir child with a broken neck near the wards of the camp. There was a stake placed in the wards with the child's fingerprints on it. We believe that once he had his fill of blood, Ivashkov found the young boy, compelled him to stake the wards, and then killed him."

"We have reason to believe," she said, "that Ivashkov is going to try to come to St. Vladimir's and gain entry, with Princess Dragomir and Rose Hathaway being the intended targets. More guardians from Court will be on their way shortly. Due to the fear of spreading a panic about the risk it would put on the princess, and the nature of Ivashkov's relationship with the queen, it is imperative that this information does not leave this room."

Adrian Ivashkov. Who would've thought he would willingly become Strigoi? All the hours of Moroi defense training we'd gone through with him meant that he was even better prepared to be a ruthless killing machine than most young Strigoi. Not to mention that he had feasted on six royal Moroi and four dhampirs before he compelled a dhampir child to break the wards for him. The more Moroi and dhampir blood a Strigoi consumed, the stronger they would be. Royals, especially those in the Strigoi's bloodline, only added to the strength that they received. The fact that he had slaughtered my father - his uncle - meant that Adrian would be nearly unstoppable.

This was only made worse by the fact that Adrian had known so much about how Strigoi had penetrated the wards here at St. Vladimir's before - and had already proved that he could penetrate the wards at the commune when he left.

Guardian Petrov had stopped the projector and had someone turn the lights back on. She had begun doling out additional assignments and passed out a sheet of paper with additional postings scheduled for the next two and a half weeks. Once she was done, she called me over to her computer, drawing me out of my own thoughts. She clicked a button and another picture appeared on the screen. "This note," she continued, "was left at the scene with Ms. Simmons' body."