Vampire Academy: Spirited Offspring

Fear

I was used to fear.

I was a guardian and fear was something we learned to deal with at a young age.

Fear for myself was never a problem, I could take care of myself... And well, if I had to let myself get hurt to protect those I loved I was ok with that too.

Something that had always irked me though was when people threatened to hurt others to get to me. I had feared for Lissa plenty of times, and Dimitri. All of my family and friends.

But I had always been able to do something. I had been able to throw myself in the path of danger so they'd be ok, I was usually able to protect them by letting myself get hurt. That was what a guardian was supposed to do, what I knew I had to do. I had to keep those I loved safe.

But what was I suppose to do when the one I wanted so badly to keep safe... Well our lives were intertwined.

Because sitting here in this stark basement with shackles around my wrists wasn't really helping my mood, or my growling stomach. I was starving, and I bet the baby was too.

I'm not sure how long I've been stuck down here. No ones come to check on me, which I can't decide is good or bad. But all I can keep replaying through my head is that last moment before I blacked out.

Olena was strigoi by now, I was positive of it... And Yeva was dead.

I refused to let myself cry over any of this, keeping myself steered towards escape. I had to get back to Dimitri.

And poor Art. Would Olena the strigoi leave Art in the house and flee? That was the best we could hope for, the poor little guy might be scared for a few hours... Or maybe Dimitri and Viktoria were home already.

I hated not knowing how long I'd been down here.

I dozed off into naps that weren't a deep enough sleep to enter any spirit dreams, and my head still hurt from whatever the strigoi had hit me with.

I'd been right in the middle of trying to get into a deep enough sleep to have a spirit dream when the door creaked open.

I braced myself.

DIMITRI'S POV

I stepped on the gas, and I faintly heard Viktoria yelling at me to slow down. Instead I sped up.

I didn't understand how Viktoria was so calm. Sydney had called us, sounding frantic and saying that strigoi were at our house. Where Viktoria's only son was. Where Rose was. Where my unborn child was.

I stepped on the gas harder.

When we finally pulled up to the house a gut wrenching feeling took me over. It was dead silent.

I took out my stake and Viktoria followed my lead as we slowly opened the door and went inside.

I could hear Art screaming from somewhere upstairs. I nodded in the direction of the stairs.

"Go get him." I whispered and she nodded, taking off in her sons direction.

I moved towards the kitchen.

I froze for a half a second before I threw myself forward.

There was a strigoi in here!

But then I froze again. It... It was my mother, and her eyes were ringed in red.

"Mo-Mother?" I asked, my voice scraping out of my throat. She didn't answer, her eyes were straight ahead on something I hadn't noticed yet.

Then I did one of the stupidest things I could do, I took my eyes off the strigoi (my mother or not, she was a strigoi) and looked to where she was staring.