"I must ask," Kate stated as she pushed the doors to the gym open, revealing her figure to Dimitri, "Are you an alumni of the Academy? Because your accent is too strong for you to have attended this Academy." 

Dimitri turned to Kate, not at all surprised with her curiosity, but surprised that despite the very long and taxing first day, she was still full of energy and not at all complaining about still having to train with him.

"Нет. (No.) I attended St. Basil's Academy, in Russia." Dimitri replied, his Russian accent coming forth heavily as he mentioned his Academy, as he finished setting up the exercices that Kate would be doing, and as he did so, he missed the look of familiar realization that flashed across Kate's face.

"After I graduated, I was a guardian for a Zeklos Lord. He was killed recently." He added, his face growing dark, which Kate could see as she slowly approached him "I was stationed here because they needed extras on campus. And when the Princess turned up, the Queen assigned me to her, since I'd already be around. Not that it matters until she leaves campus."

"Did this Lord die on your watch?" Kate inquired curiously, although her tone was very apologetic, wringing her hands in front of her body, to show how uncomfortable she was prodding into Dimitri's life.

"No. He was with his other Guardian, I was away, visiting my family ." he replied, turning his head back to Kate and giving her a small grim smile, letting Kate know that wasn't a topic he wanted to talk about.

"I kind of get how you feel, I lost my twin brother the same night I lost my mom." Kate started, feeling the need to tell him something equally as personal, "I mean we were joint to the hip in everything but somehow that night I was able to get out and he wasn't. It kills me to know that, as a twin, I wasn't able to save him." 

There was no resentment in Kate's words, which showed that through the years that she'd been without her twin, she'd allowed herself to grief and grow.

"The boy from the picture?" Dimitri inquired curiously, successfully moving his mind from his sad past. He appreciated the fact that she was willing to share something personal of hers with him so that he wasn't the only one wallowing in self-pity and remorse.

A smile grew on Kate's lips as she crossed her arms under her bust, "Yeah, we were the worse set of twins around, troublemakers to the core. Drove mom and aunt Diana mad crazy. Kit was always running around and I was always hiding." Kate replied, thinking back to the happy past she remembered with her family.

Dimitri nodded slowly and took in this information before asking "Kit is short for?" This piece of information could be a clue to see from which Moroi family Kate was descended from.

"Christopher, but as a toddler I couldn't say Christopher so I called him Kit and it stuck, while he called me Kat, meaning that for the longest time we were known as Kit-Kat, like the chocolate. But eventually after their deaths I started insisting on going by Kate." Kate replied earnestly.

Dimitri nodded, smiling softly as he watched Kate continue to smile, leaving him to wonder if one day, he would be able to not blame himself for not being there for his charge, before he proceeded to explain to Kate what she had to do, it was a rather mundane excercise but he wanted to tire her before they moved on to attacking and defense.

So as Dimitri watched Kate complete the exercises his mind reeled back to when he looked through her wallet for information about the Dhampir he'd brought with him to the Academy, the two pictures in there being the first things that came to mind.

One picture was of the Princess and her Dhampir in England, which had brought a small smile to his face when he first saw it, the Princess was curious about something and Katherine was looking ahead with a cautionary look, accessing the scenery. A typical trained Guardian attitude.

The other picture, however, had struck him more and he couldn't place his finger on the reason why, it was just a simple picture of a mother and her children, yet he couldn't think of why it messed with his mind.

"What's on your mind?" Kate wheezed out as she crouched during her touch and go's, showing how even her infinite energy did seem to run out.

Dimitri turned his dark eyes to Kate's figure, watching how she moved fluidly, with ease, even if her body was feeling heavy and tired. He couldn't help but see so much potential in Kate, that if nurtured the wrong way could be the Dhampir Community's downfall, but in the right could make her the next most important Dhampir in the World.

"Мысли. (Thoughts.)" Dimitri replied plainly in Russian, like he usually did with the other Guardians, only to be met with an annoyed glare from Kate.

"Pislik. (Asshole.)" Kate muttered in a language that Dimitri was very familiar with, one that wasn't Russian or English, but fell from her lips with such ease that it made Dimitri believe that it was the language that Kate initially grew up around.

However, before the Promised Guardian could say anything, Kate returned to her exercises, which left Dimitri to momentarily contemplate his choice of words. In honesty, it wasn't that Kate was actually angry with Dimitri, but that she believed that she was building a sort of rapport with him, and for him to suddenly close himself off, even though Kate also did it, had her feeling offended.

"Your birthday is coming up." Dimitri said after a few moments, as if he was suddely trying to return to the openess in which they'd been speaking in, "Any plans for it?"

"Pray." Kate replied curtly, emulating what Dimitri had done previously, pettily showing how he wasn't the only one that could choose to close themselves off to the other. This side of Kate was much more like the teens that Dimitri was used to dealing with, and it showed that she was indeed in a way still a teen, even if she was was forced to grow up too quickly. 

"Won't you party with the Princess? It will be your 18th birthday." Dimitri frowned, only to see Kate crouch down to touch the cone he'd set.

"Listen, you don't want to talk about your last charge, good, I won't bring it up. Now don't bring up my birthday." Kate stated, her face flushed from running from one spot to another. Her clear boundarie set, acknowledging his while firmly stating hers, leaving Dimitri only to agree.

"Are you finding any of your classes overly difficult?" Dimitri questioned, trying another approach, trying to know if there was anything he could do to help Kate reach her potential as one of the most promising up-and-coming Dhampirs.

"If I did, I wouldn't tattle to a teacher." Kate countered, smirking almost dryly at Dimitri, showing how the previous openess that they'd been talking was gone, at least for the night.

There were times in which Dhampirs were more emotional than Morois, and most of those times in which they were emotional were when talking about charges and fellow Dhampirs that they'd lost.

Author's note:

-> I know this is a little shorter than the previous ones but I just had to add this part as it was in the original version of this book, and it shows more of Kate's compassion and the building budding connection between Dimka and Kate.