Characters belong to Richelle Mead, except for Kirill. He's mine. This is just a fanmade story by me.

I've always wondered how Alberta figured it out, that Rose and Dimitri were in love. It's been a real nagging thought, so, I decided to write down my take on it.

Enjoy! :)

Alberta's POV

A part of me was surprised when I heard of Rose's drop-out. Another part of me was upset – again we'd lost a great fighter, a girl nonetheless – but a third part wasn't surprised at all. Ever since Dimitri had "died", I had wondered how Rose would take it.

He'd been her mentor, and I knew they'd become friends in the process. And it had made me happy to see Dimitri more alive, more animated, because he was never very social among the other guardians. We'd been many times on duty at the same time, at the same place, and I knew he was one of the best, even if he was very young still. He was dedicated, and it made me especially happy to see it rubbing off on young Rose. Kirova had made a good decision that day in making Belikov her mentor.

I'd heard she'd been sitting alone in the chapel a lot since that awful day. She was rarely seen apart from those visits, not even at any of the mealtimes. She kept to herself, and it worried me, because I knew this must be very hard for her to process.

Sometimes I wondered if there weren't more to their relationship than just mere friendship. I'd seen him during and after the tragedy in Spokane a couple of months ago. He'd looked more concerned than he perhaps should have, but then again, I didn't know how well they knew each other.

Where did the lines overlap?

I walked briskly over the courtyard, on my way to the school counselor. Even though it wasn't any of my business, I wanted to talk to Deirdre. I knew Rose and her had been talking since we found out about her seeing ghosts, something she'd kept hidden from us for quite awhile. Regarding all that, I didn't know what to believe. She'd been through a lot already, and after losing a close friend like Ashford had been, she wasn't the same vivacious girl anymore. After having trained with Dimitri, she'd begun to be more tactful and cautious. But after the Spokane incident, she'd lost the spark in her eyes.

"Hello, Deirdre." I said politely, giving her a curt nod as I entered her office.

"Hello, Guardian Petrov." she replied, indicating for me to sit down in the chair in front of her desk. She'd been shuffling some papers when I walked in.

"You wanted to talk about Rosemarie?" she asked, laying the papers off to the side and folding her hands, as I took the seat in front of her desk.

I nodded. "I know her file is confidential, but in this case, I think we should make an exception."

She looked at me in surprise. "Guardian Petrov, you know I can't do that."

"This will, of course, stay between the two of us. No one else." I continued, and then paused for a second. "You know how she is. And you know who her mother is. If there is anything in her file that could help us look for her – you know her mother won't rest easy until she has a lead on where she might have run off to."

She sighed and didn't answer for a few minutes. Her expression was thoughtful.

"Okay," she conceded. "I will tell you a little about what we talked about during our sessions, but nothing too in-depth. And you have to promise me this stays between you and me."

"Of course." I nodded.

She got up and walked over to one of her cabinets, fingering the different labels with students and teachers' names alike. After a little while she came back with a file that had 'Rosemarie Hathaway' on it.

"We didn't touch Mr Ashford's death much," she admitted to my surprise, opening the folder as she sat back down.

Weren't they supposed to be doing that? It had been the cause of her sessions with Deirdre after all.

"Not with words at least." She explained as she, no doubt, saw the slight surprise in my face.

I nodded for her to go on. She shuffled among the papers inside.

"Were you aware of them dating?"

"Yes." I admitted. I knew Ashford had a crush on her – anyone could see that. Rose's feelings however... I didn't know what she was feeling. It was obvious that she cared a lot for him, but if it surpassed that... I didn't know.

"She told me it was difficult for her to get into it." she said matter-of-factually. "I thought she had a problem with intimacy at first... until she told me that there was someone else."

That peeked my interest. I had a feeling I knew who that person were.

"Did she tell you who it was?"

She shook her head slowly, tracing a finger along one of the papers in the journal. "No, only that he was unavailable."

Dimitri wasn't unavailable... he wasn't with Tasha anymore. He'd declined her offer. But then a thought struck me.

What if he-?

"Did she say anything else about him?"

"Well, he was the reason it didn't work out with Mr Ashford." she said. "They hadn't known each other long, only about six months, but they were still close."

She was brought back six months ago... so there was still some evidence that fell into the Dimitri-theory I had. "What else did you talk about?"

She looked up from the papers, her eyes scrutinized me. "You want to know why she left, don't you?"

"What?" Did she know?

"I've been wondering myself," she continued, looking thoughtful. "I got to know her some during our sessions, and she wouldn't run off without a good reason. She's a fighter, not a quitter."

I agreed. This wasn't like Rose at all. She wouldn't have left the princess without a very good reason.

"What's your theory?" I wondered.

And then she said something that I hadn't expected to hear, but also something that I had been thinking myself.

"She's gone after Guardian Belikov." she said simply.

I tried to keep my face straight as I asked, "What do you mean?"

"We talked about him, too. I knew he was her mentor; I was curious as to what her relationship to him was like as she had strong opinions of everyone else in her life."

Somehow I hadn't thought about that, but now, hearing the words out loud, it was obvious. Of course they would've talked about him as well. He was a part of her life; they trained together every day.

"What did she say?"

"It wasn't as much as what she said, more what she showed." Deirdre said, her eyes growing more distant, seeing things – remembering – I didn't. "Her eyes would lit up just a little when she talked about him. She had a lot of admiration for him."

I'd seen that, too. I'd even noticed Dimitri looking at her in a similar way a couple of times.

"I quickly made the connection – he was the unavailable guy." she concluded, and it surprised me to hear how casual she was about it. She didn't seem to find their relationship as something wrong, even if she knew their age-difference and that he'd been her teacher. There was no disapproval in either her eyes or voice, she was merely pensive.

I backtracked a little. "So you think she's gone after him, to what, kill him?"

She nodded sadly. "Like I said, she's a fighter."

I left shortly after that, pondering over everything Deirdre had shared with me. As much as I didn't want to believe it, it made sense. It was Sonya and Mikhail all over again. Although, Dimitri hadn't intended on being turned like Sonya had. I didn't know what was worse, to go after someone who wanted to be Strigoi or someone who's fate had accidentally taken a wrong turn (no pun intended).

I'd heard that Mikhail had recently returned to Court, which made me wonder if Rose would succeed in finding Dimitri. Mikhail hadn't found Sonya. But maybe it was for the best; who knew what that would have done to him? And who knew, if Rose did find Dimitri, and succeeded, what that would do to her?

Now that I knew, I understood why she had left. I didn't like it, by no means, especially as she'd left before graduation. Couldn't she have waited? It was only about three and half months left until then. She could have left after that, but with her decision she had given up on getting to be the princess' guardian altogether. That was what surprised me the most.

There was also the possibility of Rose not making it – did she have it in herself to destroy the man she loved? - if she did find him. She might die by his hand, or worse, be turned by him. It saddened me to know that something as awful as that had happened to them. They were both good people, and they hadn't deserved that twist of fate. So I wasn't mad that they kept it a secret, I understood why they had. Two guardians weren't supposed to be together, to fall in love, but it had happened to them.

And it had happened to me.

It'd been a long time since then, but I'd fallen for one of my classmates back when I was still in school. I went to St. Basil's in Russia, just like Dimitri had, and it was there that I met Kirill Davydov. He was a handsome dhampir with cropped black hair and beautiful blue eyes. Personality-wise we were polar opposites; he was a big flirt and I was the quiet girl who kept to herself. Despite that, what brought us together was the fact we were both highly dedicated to protecting Moroi. His flirtatiousness aside, he was one of the finest guardians-to-be in our year. He understood his responsibilities.

We dated for about a year and a half, but then graduation came and we were assigned to our different Moroi. We both knew we had to break it off then, and to this day I wished things had been different. I wished we could have stayed together, but both me and Kirill were duty first.

And if I knew them right, Dimitri and Rose were the same.

With a sigh, and a heavy heart, I walked back to my quarters to get some sleep before my shift started.

What did you think of my take on it? You like? :)

Kirill is my own character, so this isn't something that's been told in the books or revealed afterwards.

And I kind of fell in love with Kirill/Alberta - anyone agree? I might seriously write fanfics about them.

Would you read fanfics about young Alberta in school and her relationship with Kirill? ;3 Gah, fangirl-overloading over here...

Anywho, please do take a second to review! Just tell me if you liked it or not, I don't think that's too much to ask for - don't you agree? :)

PS: In Search of Peace will, hopefully, be updated tomorrow (Sunday). Same goes for Before It's Too Late. If you're not familiar with them; ISOP = Alternate version of VA#1 - where Lissa died in the carcrash as well, BITL = Rose/Adrian, Post-LS - she decides to chase after him and make him see that she never used him, that she really did love him, and still do. Feel free to check them out! ;3