I had been bunched up in my room for days. Crying and crying and crying. There was just so much pain.

I knew that God and I didn't exactly have a great relationship. I was agnostic. I figured God probably existed, but I didn't want to put the extra effort in believing in him. I used to go to church sometimes, but that was only to see Lissa or Dimitri. But surely, that wasn't worth this. Surely that was nowhere near bad enough to earn this much pain.

It had been four days since it happened, and the memory was still playing over and over in my mind, wrapping around me like a blanket—suffocating me.

Adrian sat beside me on the couch of Lissa's suite. Our fingers were intertwined and my head rested on his shoulders. We were on the loveseat by the window as Christian, Lissa, Tasha and Jill sat on the chair in front of us.

We were all laughing at Tasha's story about the guy on her plane that sat in front of her that kept falling asleep on the beautiful woman next to him. Apparently he was a drooler. But suddenly, alarms started going off throughout the whole court. Guardians busted through the door to protect the queen, but by then it was too late.

The window was shattered as chunks of glass hit my back. There were three Strigoi. The nausea that always let me know Strigoi were around, rolled through me a second too late. There were three. Two were going for Lissa, Christian, Jill and Tasha, but one was poised for Adrian and I.

That was a truly difficult predicament. The hardest decision of my life, perhaps. I was Lissa's main guardian. But Adrian was—well Adrian was Adrian. I loved him so incredibly much. I had about a millisecond to evaluate my situation.

There were four Moroi across from me along with two Strigoi and eleven guardians, and Tasha was pretty good with combat. They…they could have fought the Strigoi off, I knew they could have. But I was Lissa's guardian. Who was more important? Adrian Ivashkov or Queen Vasilisa Dragomir?

The answer was obvious, but I still could not bring myself to leave Adrian unprotected. Decision time is now, Rose, I told myself. I turned from Adrian, quickly grabbing the stake from my jacket and threw a kick to the nearest Strigoi.

It was a male, obviously a Moroi before, and he stumbled from the contact. Another one of Lissa's guardians was handling the other one, so I continued to fight the one in front of me. This Strigoi clearly wasn't very powerful, probably just a minion sent to do the dirty work for whoever the leader of this operation was.

He reached out to grab me, but I ducked out of his arms. I shot back up and landed a punch to his jaw. Guardian Melrose took down the other Strigoi, who was a female. The one I was battling turned to look at his dead partner and that was my opportunity to strike. I aimed my stake, and as I was about to plunge I heard Adrian grunting beside me.

"Help him!" I screamed as loud as I could to the other guardians. In my peripheral I saw two running towards the Strigoi behind me. I heard mumbled nos. And horrible gasps. Those same two guardians ran back towards Lissa only seconds later, and I knew in that instant what had happened.

I didn't let it register, though. Not yet. My Strigoi was looking at me now, ready to pounce. But I didn't give him the chance. He left his chest vulnerable and I used as much force as I could and drove the steak through his heart. His eyes rolled behind his head and the life drained from his features.

I turned around in circles, assessing the room, confirming that there were no more Strigoi. There were two dead bodies on the ground but other than that the room was empty of undead creatures.

I ran to Lissa and hugged her. "Are you alright?" I asked between heavy breaths.

Her eyes were filled with horror as she nodded. "I'm fine."

I looked at Tasha, Christian and Jill. "You guys good?"

They all nodded or mumbled something. Finally I forced myself to turn around. I saw the beautiful red velvet couch that Adrian and I were cuddling on only moments before. It had glass shards splayed across it and it had a long tear on the left cushion.

But there was no third dead Strigoi. No Adrian.

I hit my knees and began to hyperventilate. I didn't care about the chunks of glass that dug into my skin as I struck the carpet. I didn't feel it. The only pain was the ache in my heart. "No," I cried. The hot tears rolled down my face and everyone watched as I sobbed. So what? They saw my cry. What did it matter? Adrian was gone. He was gone! Who knew what the Strigoi were going to do with him?

"No!" I shouted it this time, repeating it over and over again. No. Adrian couldn't have been gone. He couldn't have been taking. He just couldn't have.

I felt a pair of small fragile arms wrap around me. I tore myself away from Lissa and buried my face in my hands. My chest was heaving and my brain was clouded with Adrian's face.

All I could see were his dazzling green eyes and his stylishly disheveled hair. I saw his soft lips and I remembered what his fingers felt like laced with mine. Adrian was gone now.

Now, back in my room, people tried to visit me. Lissa knocked several times, she even came in once to try to comfort me. Nothing helped. I just kept bawling.

Adrian and I had been together for three years now. After Abe saved me from being executed, and Dimitri and I figured out that Jill was Lissa's half-sibling, Dimitri had decided to go back to Russia. He admitted he still loved me but said he needed time to think. He told me that being away from me was the only way he could do so clearly. So he left and never came back.

After that I was glad to be with Adrian. I realized that he would never do anything to hurt me, as Dimitri continued to do so. My heart still ached for Dimitri a lot, but nothing compared to what it used to. In fact, my love for Adrian over powered that after about a year, and I was finally happy.

Lissa became the queen after Dimitri left, and I became her main guardian. Eddie was technically Adrian's guardian but since Adrian was always with me Eddie mostly stayed with Lissa's entourage.

Christian was assigned a pretty shitty guardian who died only a few months after in a Strigoi fight. I killed the Strigoi that killed him. Lissa, of course, didn't assign that guardian to him. Queen Tatiana had listed him—Joshua Lambert—as his guardian before Ralf Sarcozy had murdered her.

Lissa continuously offered Christian new guardians but really, he didn't need them. He had her guardian, me, and of course his fire.

Adrian and I were so happy together. He loved me as much as I loved him. And at nights he showed it for hours at a time. We often talked about our future together. I was only twenty-one, so I wasn't ready for marriage or anything serious like that, especially while I was guarding Lissa. He understood, and told me that one day we would get married though. I told him he was right.

We talked about kids. Adrian said that it wasn't a big deal and that he never really liked them much anyways. I told him that I wanted them one day, probably when Lissa retired her throne. He liked that idea a lot, because as much as he loves me he was never going to be Mr. Mom.

Sometimes we even talked about Dimitri. Every time this subject was brought up, I would remind him that that was my past and that Adrian was my future. I made sure he realized that Dimitri Belikov no longer consumed my heart. Sometimes when we discussed Dimitri, though, Adrian would get angry and he would vent on how much he hated Dimitri for hurting me for so long. He knew that if I was never crushed several times then he and I wouldn't be together.

He still hated it, and said that if he could he would get revenge on Dimitri for every ounce of pain that the man caused me. I liked the idea and knew that it could never happen. Unless of course he gained some sort of miraculous physical strength, or he turned Strigoi…

For the first time in four days my tears stopped.

Adrian wasn't dead…he was gone. They had taken him away. No, they hadn't. One Strigoi had. And it wasn't like he had fed earlier, I knew how to tell by a Strigoi's face after spending so much time with Dimitri when he was a Strigoi. So if he wasn't saving him for a later snack because he was full, why else would he take my Adrian away?

There was only one answer and the realization hit me like a harsh wave.

I felt dizzy and my heart was racing. I no longer felt like crying. I wanted to hunt down every Strigoi and kill them all until I found the one that had had taken Adrian. But I didn't get a good enough look to know who it was.

I stood up and marched to my door. I was pissed off. There was no way Adrian was going to remain a Strigoi. No, not while I was still breathing.