I watched silently as Lissa dealt with some stuck-up Royal Moroi. As-usual she seemed nothing other than calm and helpful towards the man, but through the bond I could tell that she was becoming frustrated. Finally, after about half-an-hour of complaining the royal left, apparently satisfied with Lissa's solutions. Lissa sighed and fell back into her arm-chair. I felt sorry for her when she had to deal with such irritating people. But, as Queen she also had some decent perks- like having me as one of her many Guardians.

She looked over at me and smiled, "Don't you have somewhere to be? I thought you promised to be home early today?" She looked pointedly at the antique clock hanging on the wall. I glanced at it. 5am.

"Shit," I mumbled under my breath as I ran out of the room, only stopping to hug Lissa and mutter a quick goodbye. I ran across court as fast as I could to my house, knowing that I was already 15 minutes late. Man was I in trouble. I took my keys from my jacket pocket making sure I shook them loudly. I opened the door dreading what would meet me.

"Surprise!" Nearly everyone I knew chanted. I smiled and pretended to look shocked. There were, however, two reasons that I wasn't:

I was a Guardian; pretty much nothing surprised me.

Although Lissa had been trying her hardest not to think about my birthday party, I had become curious about what she was hiding a delved deep enough into her mind to get the information needed.

The first person to run over to me was Adrian. He kissed me and then smiled showing off his fangs.

"Happy 35th Little Dhampir" he said quietly.

"Ugh, don't say that. It makes me feel old," I complained.

"You'll always be perfect to me" He said staring me straight in the eye. I laughed and kissed my husband again before moving on to greet the next guests.

The door behind me opened to reveal Lissa and Christian with their children, Grace and Jayden. All of them greeted me with a hug and a "happy birthday" before Gracie presented me with my gift. I carefully unravelled it to reveal a silver necklace with a charm hanging at the bottom of a guardian angel. The angel was carved out of diamond. I gasped, "Wow, guys I really can't accept this. It must have cost more than my house!" I exclaimed.

Lissa smiled at me "Nonsense. After what you do for me on a daily basis; it's practically nothing." She said using her natural charisma against me. I could feel through the bond that she meant what she said. The bond. That reminded me; "How did you manage to hide this from me?" I asked, curious.

"Well, I made a list of birthday presents that we could get you and then told Christian to get you one of them without me knowing which one it was." She smiled triumphantly, clearly pleased that she had hidden the necklace from me successfully.

"Okay, I'll allow you to spend big this time but next year I'll be content with some wine. Or vodka, depending on how depressed I am at being old." I joked. Christian laughed and Lissa shook her head at me chuckling. With that, they went off so that I could greet some more guests.

My fourteen-year-old son Caleb was the next in line. He gave me a lazy smile and hugged me. God he was so much like Adrian, and not just in personality. He had his Dad's emerald green eyes and lean build. He stood at almost 5.8ft so was taller than me already.

"What, no gift?" I said in mock hurt. He grinned at me.

"Daisy has it." He said.

"Oh, and who paid for that?"

He looked sheepish. "I'm paying Violet back, okay?"

"I'll forgive you for now" I said and hugged him.

I looked around the room, pleasantly surprised at how many people had come. Nearly everyone I worked with was there; some were on Guardian duty but still looked like they were involved in the celebrations. Even some of my old school friends had come; Meredith was one of the working Guardians and I thought I had seen Jill chatting to Eddie earlier. I saw Mia and her husband talking to Christian and Lissa while both sets of children chatted to each other. As I searched further I saw Alberta and my mother standing within a group of guardians. My Mom and I had become quite close since I had had my own children to look after and Alberta liked to check-up on me every few months to see how I was going. She had still kept that mentor role in my life even after I had finished school. Thinking about mentors made my heart ache. Ache for the man who had taught me how to fight and defend myself. Ache for the man who was missing. Ache for the man that I had never stopped loving. An ache for Dimitri. Yes, I loved Adrian; he was my husband and the father of two of my kids. But Dimitri was my first love, my soul-mate, and the father of my oldest daughter, Violet.

I was so lost in thought that I didn't notice my daughter Daisy running up to me. As my youngest child she was the most enthusiastic and loving. Luckily I still had three years before she became a teenager and started to disown me like her elder siblings.

"Happy Birthday Mommy!" She exclaimed jumping at me hugging me tightly.

"Thank you sweetie," I said into her head then kissing her bronze hair.

"I have your presents Mom," She said presenting me with a Scarlet gift bag. I opened it carefully and pulled out the first present, opening it carefully. It was a silver bracelet with little charms hanging off of it. I looked closer and saw that the charms all had meanings. One was a small stake representing my career, and then there were 6 figures. A small female one, representing Daisy, a larger male figure, representing Caleb, another female figure slighter bigger than Caleb's, made for Violet, then one for Adrian, one for me and one very tall figure, Dimitri. I looked at Daisy confused as to why Dimitri was incorporated into my gift. None of my kid's had even met him; he had been turned before I even found out that I was expecting Violet. Daisy shrugged, "Violet suggested it because he was her Dad and then Daddy said that you would like that, so we put him on."

I smiled overcome with emotions; happiness, sadness, pride of the thoughtfulness of my children. Just then Violet walked over to us smiling. "Have you opened all your presents yet?" She asked.

"Only one so far," Daisy replied pointing at the bracelet that I had placed on my wrist.

"Do you like it?" Violet said grinning.

"I love it," I said giving them both a hug.

Violet reminded me a lot of Dimitri, she always kept her emotions hidden and would fiercely protect those that she loved. She could be reckless like me and was one of the bravest people that I know. In looks she mainly took after her farther. She had most of Dimitri's features except for her hair and figure which were both mine. She was beautiful, probably even more pretty than I had been when I was her age. I loved spending time with her as it reminded me so much of the days I spent with Dimitri.

"Open the rest," Daisy said eagerly. She too reminded me of her own Dad. She was always friendly and confident. And was probably the most charismatic non-spirit user that there ever was. All three of my kids were novices and were pretty bad-ass. Violet was by far the best novice in her year group and would become an amazing Guardian one-day. Just like both her parents.

I reached into the bag and pulled out a large, fairly flat box. After un-ravelling the wrapping paper I carefully opened the box. Inside was a beautiful Red dress. I pulled it out so that I could look closer. It was full length and was one shoulder.

"Wow," I breathed.

"That one's from Daddy," Daisy said, clearly happy with my response.

"Well I figured that you'd come home in your uniform so I wanted to buy you something nicer to where" Adrian said from behind Daisy.

I shook my head "I'm not going to wear it tonight. I'm going to wear it to Guardian ball." I said, suddenly even more excited for the yearly Guardian ball.

Adrian smiled "I can't wait." He said.

"You finished opening the presents yet?" Asked Caleb, suddenly reappearing.

"One more," Daisy replied. I once again reached into the bag and pulled out an un-wrapped present. It was a giant collage of pictures. All put into one huge frame. There were pictures of practically everyone in the room. There were ones of Lissa and me at St. Vladmirs. Pictures of us now, pictures of my family, pictures of her family, pictures of Dimitri, pictures of my Mom pictures of my Dad, pictures of Adrian's parents. Even pictures of Tatiana (who died 5 years previously). I looked at it trying my hardest to keep from crying. It was probably the best present anyone could have given me.

"This is from everyone. We all put pictures forward and then me and Dais' just put it all together" Violet said, admiring her work.

"Thank you. Thank everyone so much! This is the best present I have ever had!" I exclaimed, overjoyed.

Everyone in the room clapped and I finally went around the room greeting everyone and saying my thank yous whilst they wished me a Happy Birthday. Then Adrian lit a gigantic cake and everyone sang while I blushed and then blew the candles out.

Later, everyone was dancing and having a good time when there was a knock at the door. I had been dancing with Violet so we went over to see who it was together. I opened the door and gasped. Not entirely sure of what I saw. How was it possible? Violet stood frozen beside me.

It was Dimitri. And he was a Dhampir.