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"Vasilisa?" Sonya lifted her eyes and stared off into space. I think she was digging through memories. In fact, despite her ramblings

now, I didn't believe she was quite as unstable as she'd been just before becoming Strigoi. We'd heard healings could lessen spirit's

madness, and I think Robert's transformation had lightened some of the darkness within her for now. "Yes, of course. Vasilisa has it

too." She turned to me in a panic. "Did you help her? Did you get her out of there?"

"I did," I said, trying to emulate Dimitri's gentleness. Lissa and I fled St. Vladimir's for a while, partly because of warnings from

Sonya. "We left and then came back and, uh, were able to stop what was hunting her." I didn't think it was a good idea for Sonya to

know that the thing—or rather, person—hunting Lissa was now sitting out in the living room. I took a step forward. "And you can help

Lissa too. We need to know if—"

"No," said Dimitri. No gentleness now in the warning look he gave me. "Not yet."

"But—"

"Not yet."

I shot him a glare in return but said no more. I was all for giving Sonya her recuperation time, but we didn't have forever. The clock

was ticking, and we had to find out what Sonya knew. I felt like Dimitri would have been able to give us this information immediately

after he'd been changed back. Of course, he hadn't been unstable beforehand, so he'd kind of had an edge. Still. We couldn't play

house in Kentucky forever.

"Can I see my flowers?" asked Sonya. "Can I go outside and see my flowers?"

Dimitri and I exchanged glances. "Of course," he said.

We all moved toward the door, and that's when I had to ask. "Why did you grow flowers when you were . . . like you were?"

She paused. "I've always grown flowers."

"I know. I remember. They were gorgeous. The ones here are gorgeous too. Is that why . . . I mean, did you just want a pretty garden,

even as a Strigoi?"

The question was unexpected and seemed to throw her off. I was about to give up on an answer when she finally said, "No. I never

thought about pretty. They were . . . I don't know. Something to do. I'd always grown flowers. I had to see if I still could. It was like . . . a

test of my skills, I guess."

I met Dimitri's eyes again. So. Beauty hadn't been part of her world. It was just like I'd told him. Strigoi were notoriously arrogant,

and it seemed the flowers had simply been a show of prowess. Growing them had also been a familiar habit for her, and I recalled

how Dimitri had read Western novels while Strigoi. Being Strigoi might cost someone their sense of goodness and morality, but old

behaviors and hobbies remained.

We took her out to the living room, interrupting a conversation between Victor and Robert. Sonya and Robert both froze, sizing each

other up. Victor gave us one of his knowing smiles.

"Up and around. Have we found out what we need yet?"

Dimitri shot him a look similar to what I'd received when asking about interrogation. "Not yet."

Sonya dragged her gaze from Robert and moved quickly toward the patio door, pausing when she saw our shoddy patch job. "You

broke my door," she said.

"Collateral damage," I said. In my periphery, I think Dimitri rolled his eyes.

Needing no guidance from us, Sonya opened the door and stepped outside. With a gasp, she came to a halt and stared upward.

The sky was a perfect, cloudless blue, and the sun had crossed the horizon now, illuminating everything in gold. I went outside too,

feeling the warmth of that light on my skin. Some of the night's coldness lingered, but we were in store for a hot day.

Everyone else came out too, but Sonya was oblivious. She lifted her hands upward, as though maybe she could grab hold of the sun

and wrap it in her arms. "It's so beautiful." She finally looked away and met my eyes. "Isn't it? Have you ever seen anything so

beautiful?"

"Beautiful," I reiterated. For some reason, I felt both happy and sad.

She walked around her yard, examining every plant and flower. She touched the petals and inhaled their fragrance. "So different . .

." she kept saying to herself. "So different in the sun . . ." Several especially caught her attention. "These don't open at night! Do you

see it? Do you see the colors? Can you smell that?"

The questions didn't seem to be for anyone in particular. We watched, all of us kind of hypnotized. At last, she settled into the patio

chair, happily gazing around, lost in sensory overload—in that beauty that had been denied to her as a Strigoi. When it became

obvious she wasn't leaving for a while, I turned to Dimitri and repeated Sydney's advice about him taking a turn at sleeping while we

waited for Sonya to recover. To my surprise, he actually agreed.

"That's smart. Once Sonya's able to talk, we'll need to move." He smiled. "Sydney's turning into a battle mastermind."

"Hey, she's not in charge here," I teased. "She's just a soldier."

"Right." He lightly brushed his fingers against my cheek. "Sorry, Captain."

"General," I corrected, catching my breath at that brief touch.

He gave Sonya a kind goodbye before disappearing into the house. She nodded, but I don't know if she really heard. Victor and

Robert brought out two wooden kitchen chairs and set them in the shade. I chose a spot on the ground. Nobody spoke. It wasn't the

weirdest thing I'd ever experienced, but it was certainly strange.

Sydney returned later with the groceries, and I briefly abandoned the group to check in with her. Victor's keys were lying back on the

counter, which I took as a good sign. Sydney unloaded an assortment of food and handed me a box of a dozen donuts.

"Hope that's enough for you," she remarked.

I made a face at her presumption but took the donuts anyway. "Come on outside when you're done," I told her. "It's like the barbecue

of the damned. Except . . . there's no grill."

She looked puzzled, but when she joined us later, she seemed to get what I'd been saying. Robert brought out a bowl of Cheerios,

but neither Sydney nor Victor ate. I gave Sonya a donut, the first thing that took her attention from her yard. She held it in her hands,

turning it over and over.

"I don't know if I can. I don't know if I can eat it."

"Of course you can." I recalled how Dimitri had regarded food uncertainly too. "It's chocolate-glazed. Good stuff."

She took a tentative, rabbit-sized bite. She chewed it a billion times and finally swallowed. She closed her eyes briefly and sighed.

"Such sweetness." Slowly, she continued taking more tiny bites. It took forever for her to get halfway through the donut, and at that

point, she finally stopped. I'd polished off three donuts by then, and my impatience to accomplish something was growing. Part of it

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was still the irritability from spirit, and part of it was just my continual restlessness to help Lissa.

"Sonya," I said pleasantly, fully aware of how pissed off Dimitri was going to be at me defying his instructions. "We wanted to talk to

you about something."

"Mm-hmm," she said, gazing at bees hovering around some honeysuckle.

"Is there a relative of yours . . . someone who, uh, had a baby a while ago . . . ?"

"Sure," she said. One of the bees flew from the honeysuckle to a rose, and she never looked away. "Lots."

"Articulate, Rosemarie," remarked Victor. "Very articulate."

I bit my lip, knowing an outburst would upset Sonya. And probably Robert too.

"This would be a secret baby," I told her. "And you were the beneficiary on a bank account that took care of the baby . . . an account

paid for by Eric Dragomir."

Sonya's head whipped toward me, and there was no dreamy absentmindedness in her blue eyes now. A few seconds passed

before she spoke. Her voice was cold and hard—not a Strigoi voice, but definitely a back off voice. "No. I don't know anything about

that."

"She's lying," said Robert.

"I didn't need any powers to figure that out," scoffed Sydney.

I ignored both of them. "Sonya, we know you know, and it's really important we find this baby . . . er, child. Person." We'd made

guesses on the age but weren't 100 percent sure. "You said you were worried about Lissa earlier. This will help her. She needs to

know. She needs to know she has another family member."

Sonya turned her attention back to the bees, but I knew she was no longer watching them. "I don't know anything." There was a

trembling in her voice, and something told me that maybe I shouldn't push this after all. I couldn't tell if she was afraid or on the verge of

rage.

"Then why were you on the account?" This came from Victor.

"I don't know anything," she repeated. Her voice could have made icicles form on the ornamental trees. "Nothing."

"Stop lying," snapped Victor. "You know something, and you're going to tell us."

"Hey!" I exclaimed. "Be quiet. You don't have interrogation rights here."

"You didn't seem to be doing a very good job."

"Just shut up, okay?" I looked back at Sonya, replacing my glare with a smile. "Please," I begged. "Lissa's in trouble. This will help

her. I thought you said before that you wanted to help her?"

"I promised . . ." said Sonya. Her voice was so low, I could barely hear it.

"Promised what?" I asked. Patience, patience. I had to remain calm. I couldn't risk a breakdown.

She squeezed her eyes shut and raked her hands through her hair violently, almost like a child about to have a tantrum. "Promised

not to tell. Promised not to tell anyone . . ."

I had the urge to run over and shake her. Patience, patience, I repeated to myself. Don't upset her. "We wouldn't ask you to break

your promise if it wasn't important. Maybe . . . maybe you can get in touch with this person . . ." Who had she promised? Eric's

mistress? "And see if it's okay to tell us?"

"Oh for God's sake," said Victor irritably. "This is ridiculous and getting us nowhere." He glanced at his brother. "Robert?"

Robert hadn't done much so far today, but at Victor's command, Robert leaned forward. "Sonya?"

Still obviously distraught, she turned to look at him . . . and her face went still.

"Tell us what we need to know," said Robert. His voice wasn't kind so much as smooth and lulling, with a faintly sinister touch. "Tell

us who and where this child is. Tell us who the mother is."

This time, I did jump to my feet. Robert was using compulsion on her to get the answers. Sonya's eyes stayed locked on him, but her

body began to shake. Her lips parted, though no sound came out. A tangle of thoughts swirled in my mind. Compulsion would get us

what we needed to know, but something told me, it wasn't right—

Sonya stopped me from any more pondering. She shot up almost as quickly as I had. She was still staring at Robert, but no longer

in that transfixed, hypnotized way. She'd broken the compulsion, and now . . . now she was pissed. The features that had been scared

and fragile earlier were filled with fury. I had no magical senses, but after being with Lissa, I knew raging spirit when I saw it. Sonya

was a bomb, about to explode.

"How dare you . . ." she hissed. "How dare you try to compel me?"

Plants and vines near Robert suddenly sprang to life, growing to impossible heights. They reached out, tangled themselves around

his chair's legs, and pulled. The chair toppled over, Robert along with it. Victor moved to help his brother, but Robert was already

taking matters into his own hands. Recovering remarkably fast, he narrowed his eyes at Sonya, and she went flying backward,

slamming against the wooden fence. Air users could do that trick sometimes, but this wasn't air blowing her back. This was spirit's

telekinetic abilities. He apparently possessed them outside of dreams too. Lovely.

I'd seen spirit users battle it out before, when Avery Lazar and Lissa had gone one on one. That hadn't been pretty, particularly since

more than this exterior psychic phenomena had occurred. Avery had actually dug into Lissa's mind—and mine. I didn't know Robert or

Sonya's full skill set, but this couldn't end well.

"Dimitri!" I yelled, springing toward Sonya. I didn't exactly know what I was going to do, but tackling her seemed like a sound plan.

From what I'd observed, a lot of spirit involved eye contact with the target.

And sure enough, when I managed to wrestle her to the ground, she struggled half-heartedly but mostly fought to keep her gaze on

Robert. He screamed in sudden alarm, looking down at his own body in terror. Sonya was planting visions into his head. His

expression hardened. He had to know it was an illusion, and a few moments later, he looked up, having broken her spell like she'd

broken his earlier compulsion.

Dimitri came tearing out the door at that point, just as Robert used his mind to fling one of the chairs toward Sonya. Of course, I was

on top of her, so the chair hit me in the back. Dimitri picked up pretty quickly what was going on and ran toward Robert, attempting the

same tactic as me. Victor, possibly thinking his brother was in physical danger, tried to pry Dimitri away, which was futile. More vines

began to reach toward Robert, and I realized constraining Sonya wasn't all that useful.

"Get him inside!" I yelled to Dimitri. "Get him away from her!"