Chapter One

Lissa was hiding something from me, and I didn't like it. No one likes being kept in the dark. When secrets require psychic exertion beyond what most people are capable of, it's really bad. Lissa wasn't above putting this much effort into planning a surprise birthday party for me, but my birthday was months away. No, whatever had her blocking our bond for such long periods of time lately, it wasn't good.

To make matters worse, I couldn't talk to anyone else about this. After finally taking down the Master last year, Lissa and I had agreed to keep the fact that our bond was reestablished a secret. She thought it would be a political advantage to not let everyone know about us. I just didn't want to admit to Dimitri that I had died, again. So much for the third time being the charm.

You would think being bonded would bring us closer together than ever. But we had continued to drift apart. It seemed like we couldn't talk about anything without fighting. Sometimes I felt like I'd never know what she was really thinking if it wasn't for the fact that I could read her mind.

I suppose it's possible that she wasn't keeping a specific secret from me. With how strained our relationship was, she might not want me in her head at all anymore. I almost would have preferred some cataclysmic secret plan to that, though. At least I knew what to do in a crisis. But every time I tried to repair our friendship, I only ended up damaging it further.

"Earth to Rose!"

I shook my head and smiled. "Hey, Eddie." Whenever I had some free time I found a quiet corner and tried to force my way past Lissa's block on our bond. Unfortunately, that gave me a rather spaced out look that was starting to make people worry about me.

"You want to go beat up some noobs?"

"Dimitri made me promise to give them today off." Since I wasn't spending nearly as much time with Lissa anymore, I'd started filling my days by training with the new guardians who had just graduated from the Academy. A bruise from Rose Hathaway was a mark of pride for many of them. Some of them had a lot of pride. Dimitri always stepped in whenever he thought I was channeling a little too much of my frustration into them.

"I don't remember you getting too many days off when he was the one training you," Eddie pointed out.

I laughed. "Neither do I. Near death experiences didn't even get me out of it."

"That old Russian must be getting soft." Eddie joked.

I stood up and started stretching. "You want to go a couple rounds?"

He took a step back. "You're wound a little tight these days. I'll wait until the graduates take the edge off."

"Dimitri's not the only one getting soft," I teased him.

"Who's getting soft?" a Russian-accented voice demanded.

I turned to watch Dimitri stride towards us. "Eddie thinks he can take you now," I told him.

"I never said that!" Eddie protested.

Dimitri looked him up and down. "I'll give you a thirty second head start," he offered.

Eddie took off. I laughed as I watched him go. After thirty seconds I looked back at Dimitri. "Not going after him?"

"Looking over his shoulder the rest of the day should be punishment enough," he answered.

"A mean streak. I must be rubbing off on you."

"And here we all hoped it would work the other way around."

I laughed and started to lean into him. And then, suddenly, I got a flash from Lissa. She was in her rooms with Christian and I knew exactly what they were talking about. "Son of a bitch!" Joking with Eddie and Dimitri fled my mind in an instant. "I can't believe she'd do this!"

"Rose?" Dimitri looked down at me with concern.

"I need to go to Lissa," I announced.

He fell into step beside me. "Is she in trouble?"

"Oh, like you wouldn't believe," I told him.