They didn't trust him at first. More importantly, he didn't trust himself.

That's why we were sitting here now, side by side, as close as he'd let me in this little jail cell. Not to mention the guardian the posted outside the door, the steel handcuffs securely clasped around his wrists, and the nearly two and half foot mile that seemed to stretched between us.

When I had come in, he had been mumbling to himself in Russian. My trip wasn't long enough to make me fluent, but it was long enough for me to pick up a few things.

"..name.. Dimitri Belikov… Baia, Russia... turned Strigoi... Princess Vasilisa Dragomir restored me. I'm dhampir. I'm dhampir. I'm dhampir..."

Now it was just silence. Two days ago, he was staring me down with red-rimmed eyes, and now Dimitri couldn't even bear to look at me, it seemed.

"Dimitri?"

He didn't speak, and only the steady rise and fall of his shoulders told me he was even breathing.

"Can you please...just say...something? Anything? Just let me know that I made the right choice in coming to see you."

He scoffed. Well, I guess it was better than nothing.

"That's the thing, Rose. I'm not sure you did. I'm not really sure of anything right now."

"Well, maybe I could clear some things up for you. I know I wasn't there for everything, but I was around for a lot in the past nine months. Just ask me, and I'll tell you if it's real or not."

I hated the skepticism in his eyes, as if he couldn't tell whether or not to trust me, but with no other option he took a deep breath and turned to face me.

"You attacked me when we first met."

"Real. And you kicked my ass."

He didn't have any reaction at all, simply staring at the open air between and considering his next question.

"I became your mentor..."

"Real, though I don't exactly know why."

"I saw potential in you. You deserved better, even if you had made a reckless decision with the princess." There was a small flash of annoyance, the same one that shown when I had gotten mouthy during out early lessons and I realized I had cut him off earlier. "I became your mentor and that's how we became close. When did we become more?"

"Honestly, I'm not sure. It just sort of...happened. I mean, you were attractive, but it wasn't like I set out for this. Neither of us did. I'm sorry, that's a hard one."

"Then how about something easier? A few people found out, real or not real?"

"Real." I answered, much more confidently than before. "Victor Dashkov for one, that's how he caught us in the lust charm. Alberta and Adrian also figured it out along the way too. Granted, I think a whole lot more suspect something since I ran off to find you after the battle."

It was quiet for a long time after that. Probably for only ten minutes or so, but it was long enough for me to start getting restless and start to wonder if I should leave. Just as I was about to say something, perhaps to break the tension and excuse myself for the day, he spoke again, much quieter than before.

"We..." He looked away for a moment, gathering strength, "we had a moment, together, before I was awak- turned. Real or not real?"

I couldn't help but smile, even if the memory would always be coated with a bittersweet afterglow of losing him. "Yes, that was real. I was hurting. I lost myself to the Spirit Darkness and you managed to pull me back. I think we finally just realized that we needed one another." I shrugged timidly, trying to act nonchalant about something that meant the world to me once I realized his eyes were searching for the same connection to the memory and coming up short. It wasn't there for him, and whatever he could see and feel obviously didn't affect him the same way it affected me.

Whatever thought was on his mind, he buried it for them moment, opting for another question instead.

"And after...did we.."

"No," I asserted instantly, wanting to reassure him. "You wouldn't allow it. At least not proper sex. There was some more minor stuff here or there but it was mostly only when you bit me."

I knew it was an unconscious reaction to my words on his part, but Dimitri's tongue ran along the phantom shadow of his fangs, no longer present in his restored Dhampir form, but the act sent a longing shiver down my spine that I knew he still saw. I regretted it instantly.

"Nothing about that can be considered 'minor'. I fed from you daily, or at least as often as I could. Real or not real?"

He was right. Dimitri had basically forced himself on me the first time in that gilded prison, taking me by surprise and attacking me until I gave into him and the effects of the endorphins. After I was hooked, it didn't take much more than his smile to leave me begging for his bite. Dimitri only relented once I asked him to spare me a few days right before I ended up escaping. It had taken all my control not to succumb to him again during that time, and as much as I hated to admit it to myself (and I could never say it to him, ever) there was a part of me that still longed for the rush of his teeth breaking the skin of my neck as his skilled hands explored my skin everywhere else.

"Real," I answered simply.

"I wanted to turn you."

"Real."

"And when you refused, I wanted to kill you." His voice wasn't just filled with shame, but almost disbelief. "I tried to kill you multiple times."

"Well to be fair, I did try to kill you too."

"This isn't a matter to joke about!"

The sound of Dimitri's raised voice and him jumping up from the flimsy cot was enough to alert the guard.

"It's fine, Jackson. I promise." Eli eyed Dimitri skeptically, but eventually took my reassurance. As soon as Dimitri relaxed and he and I had relative privacy again, I apologized.

"Real, Dimitri. This isn't something to make light of, I know."

"No, you don't know, 'cause the worst part is that I wouldn't have cared for more than a second or two. Even then I wouldn't have mourned the woman that I once trusted more than anything and would have given my own life to protect. I would have been significantly more upset about the fact that I lost a strong ally that I could control and a..." he bit his lip, as if the next words were physically painfully for him to say before spitting them out quickly, tearing off the Band-Aid in one quick motion, "a plaything."

I won't lie. It hurt to hear him call me those things, but it seemed to hurt him almost as much.

"That's all I thought of you as, Rose. Yes, I was obsessed with you. I had to have you, but I didn't actually care about you. Not like I once did. I just wanted you. For my own power, for my own lust, for my own selfish reasons. There wasn't a single moment while you were in that horrible prison where I actually cared what happened to you as long as it worked in my favor."

I found my arms folded against my body, as if it would somehow protect me against his horrible words. They weren't a sufficient shield though. And really, I don't think I was surprised. Part of me knew, even while I was there in that Russian compound, that Dimitri wasn't the same man I had loved. That's why I had set out to kill him in the first place. But...I failed. In the end it worked out – I found an impossible miracle and he had been restored to a dhampir – but the damage done to him, to us both...

"And now?" I asked.

"Excuse me?" The question seemed to take him by surprise.

"Would you care now? If anything happened to me?"

It was quick, so quick that I almost thought it was a trick of the low light, but I knew that look in his eye so well from months of hidden glances in early morning practices and too-long stares over the Academy grounds.

"Of course, Roza. I'd rather die myself than let something happen to you. I care about you. I do."

My cheeks burned, not from a blush but from the extreme effort it took not to smile like a fool. Roza. It hurt my heart nearly as much to keep from hoping.

Instead, I started small, reaching out to take his hand. It was the first physical contact that either of us had initiated since his restoration, and while he flinched slightly, he did accept it.

"See, you aren't the same as you were on that bridge. I know you did things you weren't proud of over the past few weeks; things that you, Dimitri Belikov, never would have done in your right mind. That wasn't you."

"But it was. That monster wasn't something that possessed me. It lived there before, it was just allowed to come to the surface uninhibited. That person is still in me somewhere." The fear there was familiar, too familiar. "What if it comes back? I don't want to become that thing again."

"I understand. The darkness is the same. It comes from Lissa, but it feeds on what's already there, Dimitri. My fear, or my sadness, or my anger. That all starts with me."

"How do you fight it?"

"Day by day, some more successfully than others. And I have help. You've helped me in the past."

"The cabin...before..." His eyes implored me questioningly, somehow still unsure.

"Real." I gave his hand a quick squeeze or reassurance. "You have people who want to help you too. There are people who want to see you get better. You deserve to be happy. We care about you, Dimitri."

His hand pulled away from mine forcefully, rubbing at his face as he shook his head. "You shouldn't. You shouldn't. You shouldn't."

"Shh." It wasn't until I was literally kneeling in front of him that I was able to recapture his attention.

"I hurt you."

"It's okay. I forgive you."

"I'm a monster."

"No. You aren't."

"You should hate me."

"Never. I love you."

"You..." Whatever argument he planned on throwing at me next died instantly. "You love me? Even after everything I did to you? You still love me...Real or not real?"

"Real, Dimitri. Always real." Because no matter what, that would never change.

"Guardian Hathaway!" Eli called from outside the cell again, slightly echoing around the cinderblock walls. "Hans is looking for you. Plus, visiting hours ended five minutes ago and someone's gonna call me on it here soon."

"Thanks Eli." I knew he was trying to give us as much privacy as possible by staying out of sight behind the wall, but there was only so much he could do. Still, I appreciated the effort and it looked like Dimitri did too. "I should probably be going."

"Wait," Both of Dimitri's hands sprang forward, still bound together by the steel cuffs. "You'll come back tomorrow?"

"Real."

He smiled as I left, and as I walked away, I could hear the faint sounds of him talking to himself, this time in English:

"My name is Dimitri Belikov. I was born in Baia, Russia. I was turned Strigoi against my will. Princess Vasilisa Dragomir restored me. I'm dhampir again. And somehow...Roza still loves me. She still loves me. I'll be okay. She loves me."

Author's Note

This short was inspired by, and is dedicated to, Doubtthestarsarefire. She wrote a post a short while ago comparing Dimitri's restoration to Peeta who had his own difficult struggles in the third book of the Hunger Games series. For those of you who have read Mockingjay, I'm sure you have noticed some VERY obvious similarities, so thank you to Suzanne Collins for her wonderful story and inspiration as well. I hope you all enjoyed the story.

Please be sure to follow Buria Campaign on Tumblr (as well as my personal tumblr: gigi256, and my VA tumblr: VAfiction) and if you liked this story, share and reblog from there! Thank you so much for reading!