Adrian leaned against the porch's railing, glanced over, and did a double-take when he saw me. "Oh. Didn't expect to see you here." He smiled. "I was right. You are devastating when you're cleaned up."

Instinctively, I touched the skin around my eye.

"It's gone," he said.

Even without being able to see it, I somehow knew he was right. "You aren't smoking."

"Bad habit," he said. He nodded toward me. "You scared? You're wearing a lot of protection."

I frowned, then looked down. I hadn't noticed my clothing. I wore a pair of embroidered jeans I'd seen once but had been unable to afford. My T-shirt was cropped, showing off my stomach, and I wore a belly-button ring. I'd always wanted to get my belly button pierced but had never been able to afford it. The charm I now wore here was a little silver dangly one, and hanging at the end of it was that weird blue eye pendant my mom had given me. Lissa's chotki was wound around my wrist.

I looked back up at Adrian, studying the way the sun shone off his brown hair. Here, in full daylight, I could see that his eyes were indeed green-a deep emerald as opposed to Lissa's pale jade. Something startling suddenly occurred to me.

"Doesn't all this sun bother you?"

He gave a lazy shrug. "Nah. It's my dream."

"No, it's my dream."

"Are you sure?" His smile returned.

I felt confused. "I… I don't know."

He chuckled, but a moment later, the laugher faded. For the first time since I'd met him, he looked serious. "Why do you have so much darkness around you?"

I frowned. "What?"

"You're surrounded in blackness." His eyes studied me shrewdly, but not in a checking-me-out sort of way. "I've never seen anyone like you. Shadows everywhere. I never would have guessed it. Even while you're standing here, the shadows keep growing."

I looked down at my hands but saw nothing out of the ordinary. I glanced back up. "I'm shadow-kissed…."

"What's that mean?"

"I died once." I'd never talked to anyone other than Lissa and Victor Dashkov about that, but this was a dream. It didn't matter. "And I came back."

Wonder lit his face. "Ah, interesting…"

I woke up.

Someone was shaking me. It was Lissa. Her feelings hit me so hard through the bond that I briefly snapped into her mind and found myself looking at me. «Weird» didn't begin to cover it. I pulled back into myself, trying to sift through the terror and alarm coming from her.

"What's wrong?"

"There's been another Strigoi attack."

CHAPTER 12

I was out of bed in a flash. We found the entire lodge abuzz with the news. People clustered in small groups in the halls. Family members sought each other out. Some conversations were conducted in terrified whispers; some were loud and easy to overhear. I stopped a few people, trying to get the story straight. Everyone had a different version of what had happened, though, and some wouldn't even pause to talk. They hurried past, either seeking out loved ones or preparing to leave the resort, convinced there might be a safer place elsewhere.

Frustrated with the differing stories, I finally-reluctantly-knew I had to seek out one of the two sources who would give me solid information. My mother or Dimitri. It was like flipping a coin. I wasn't really thrilled with either one of them right now. I debated momentarily and finally decided on my mother, seeing as how she wasn't getting it on with Tasha Ozera.

The door to my mother's room was ajar, and as Lissa and I entered, I saw that a sort of makeshift headquarters had been established here. Lots of guardians were milling around, moving in and out, and discussing strategy. A few gave us odd looks, but no one stopped or questioned us. Lissa and I slid onto a small sofa to listen to a conversation my mother was having.

She stood with a group of guardians, one of whom was Dimitri. So much for avoiding him. His brown eyes glanced at me briefly and I averted my gaze. I didn't want to deal with my troubled feelings for him right now.

Lissa and I soon discerned the details. Eight Moroi had been killed along with their five guardians. Three Moroi were missing, either dead or turned Strigoi. The attack hadn't really happened near here; it had been somewhere in northern California. Nonetheless, a tragedy like this couldn't help but reverberate within the Moroi world, and for some, two states away was far too close. People were terrified, and I soon learned what in particular made this attack so notable.

"There had to be more than last time," said my mother.

"More?" exclaimed one of the other guardians. "That last group was unheard of. I still can't believe nine Strigoi managed to work together-you expect me to believe they managed to get more organized still?"

"Yes," snapped my mother.

"Any evidence of humans?" someone else asked.

My mother hesitated, then: "Yes. More broken wards. And the way it was all conducted…it's identical to the Badica attack."

Her voice was hard, but there was a kind of weariness in it, too. It wasn't physical exhaustion, though. It was mental, I realized. Strain and hurt over what they were talking about. I always thought of my mother as some sort of unfeeling killing machine, but this was clearly hard for her. It was a hard, ugly matter to discuss-but at the same time, she was tackling it without hesitation. It was her duty.

A lump formed in my throat that I quickly swallowed down. Humans. Identical to the Badica attack. Ever since that massacre, we'd extensively analyzed the oddity of such a large group of Strigoi teaming up and recruiting humans. We'd spoken in vague terms about "if something like this ever happens again …" But no one had seriously talked about this group-the Badica killers-doing it again. One time was a fluke-maybe a bunch of Strigoi had happened to gather and impulsively decided to go on a raid. It was horrible, but we could write that off.

But now…now it looked as though that group of Strigoi hadn't been a random occurrence. They'd united with purpose, utilized humans strategically, and had attacked again. We now had what could be a pattern: Strigoi actively seeking out large groups of prey. Serial killings. We could no longer trust the protective magic of the wards. We couldn't even trust sunlight. Humans could move around in the day, scouting and sabotaging. The light was no longer safe.

I remembered what I'd said to Dimitri at the Badica house: This changes everything, doesn't it?

My mother flipped through some papers on a clipboard. "They don't have forensic details yet, but the same number of Strigoi couldn't have done this. None of the Drozdovs or their staff escaped. With five guardians, seven Strigoi would have been preoccupied-at least temporarily-for some to escape. We're looking at nine or ten, maybe."

"Janine's right," said Dimitri. "And if you look at the venue…it's too big. Seven couldn't have covered it."

The Drozdovs were one of the twelve royal families. They were large and prosperous, not like Lissa's dying clan. They had plenty of family members to go around, but obviously, an attack like this was still horrible. Furthermore, something about them tickled my brain. There was something I should remember … something I should know about the Drozdovs.

While part of my mind puzzled that out, I watched my mother with fascination. I'd listened to her tell her stories. I'd seen and felt her fight. But really, truly, I'd never seen her in action in a real-life crisis. She showed every bit of that hard control she did around me, but here, I could see how necessary it was. A situation like this created panic. Even among the guardians, I could sense those who were so keyed up that they wanted to do something drastic. My mother was a voice of reason, a reminder that they had to stay focused and fully assess the situation. Her composure calmed everybody; her strong manner inspired them. This, I realized, was how a leader behaved.