Richelle Mead

But my other words at the Mastranos’ had betrayed me: I have fun with him. Now, you should have fun with the one you love, but that shouldn’t have been what first came to my mind. I should have said, We strengthen each other, or, He makes me want to be a better person. Perhaps most importantly, He understands me perfectly. But none of that was true, so I hadn’t said those things.

“She was right about something else too,” Dimitri said after a long pause. My back was to him, but there was a strange quality to his voice that made me turn around. “What’s that?” I asked. “That I do still love you.” With that one sentence, everything in the universe changed. Time slowed to one heartbeat. The world became his eyes, his voice. This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t real. None of it could be real. It felt like a spirit dream. I resisted the urge to close my eyes and see if I’d wake up moments later. No. No matter how unbelievable it all seemed, this was no dream. This was real. This was life. This was flesh and blood..

“You’re beautiful in a battle”, said Dimitri. His cold voice carried to me clearly, even above the roar of combat. “ Like an evening angel come to deliver the justice of heaven.” “Funny”, I said, shifting the hold on my stake, “That’s kind of why I’m here.” “Angels fall, Rose.”

"Why?" I asked softly. The word was carried away on the wind, but he heard. "Because I want you." I gave him a sad smile, wondering if we'd meet again in the land of dead. "Wrong answer." I told him. I let go.

Both Christian and Adrian had worried there would be some piece of Strigoi left in him, but their fears had been about violence and bloodshed. No one would have guessed this: that living as a Strigoi had hardened his heart, killing any chance of him loving anyone. Killing any chance of him loving me. And I was pretty sure if that was the case, then part of me would die too.

"I will always love you." Then plunged the stake into his chest. It wasn's as precise as I would have liked, not with the skilled way he was dodging. I struggled to get the stake deep enough to his heart, unsure if I could do it from this angle. Then, his struggles stopped. His eyes stared at me, stunned, and his lips parted, almost like a smile, albeit a grisly and pained one. "That's what I was supposed to say.." He gasped out. Those were his last words.

It was like one of these moments when people talked about their lives flashing before their eyes. Because as we stared at one another, every part of our relationship replayed in my mind’s eye. I remembered how strong and invincible he’d been when we first met, when he’d come to bring Lissa and me back to the folds of Moroi society. I remembered the gentleness of his touch when he’d bandaged my bloodied and battered hands. I remembered him carrying me in his arms after Victor’s daughter Natalie had attacked me. Most of all, I remembered the night we’d been together in the cabin, just before the Strigoi had taken him. We’d known each other only a year, but we’d lived a lifetime in it.

“What did you see?” I shook my head, unable to look at her either. “A nightmare,” I murmured. “ My worst nightmare coming true.”

I would never forget Dimitri, not for the rest of my life. And this time, I wouldn’t forget his lessons. With a speed he wasn’t ready for, I struck out and plunged the stake through his chest. My strength was there- sliding the stake past his ribs and straight into his heart. And as I did it, it was like piercing my own heart at the same time.

And it was memories like that that made it so hard to comprehend this quest to kill him, even if he was a Strigoi. Yet.. At the same time, it was exactly because of memories like that that I had to destroy him. I needed to remember him as the man who’d loved me and held me in bed. I needed to remember that that man would not want to stay a monster.

"Are you lost, little girl? The elementary school's over on west campus."

My mother slapped me, the pain snapping me out of my daze. “Run!”, she yelled at me. “He’s dead! You are not going to join him!” I saw the panic on her own face, panic over me- her daughter- getting killed. I remembered Dimitri saying he’d rather die than see me dead. And if I stood there stupidly, letting the Strigoi get me, I’d fail both of them. “Run!”, she cried again. Tears streaming down my face, I ran.