"Christian!"
The group in front of us stopped and looked back at me and Adrian. "Yeah?" Christian asked.
"I need to take a detour - or rather, we do since I can't go anywhere without you. We need to go to the church."
His eyebrows rose in surprise. "What, you need to confess something?"
"Don't ask questions. Please. It'll only take a few minutes."
Concern crossed Lissa's face. "Well, we can all go - "
"No, we'll be fast." I didn't want her there. I didn't want her to hear the answer I was certain I'd get. "Go to the dorm. We'll catch up. Please, Christian?"
He studied me, expression oscillating between wanting to mock me and wanting to help. He wasn't a complete jerk, after all. The latter emotion won out. "Okay, but if you try to get me to pray with you, I walk."
He and I split off toward the chapel. I moved so fast that he had to scurry to keep up.
"I don't suppose you want to tell me what this is about?" he asked.
"Nope. I appreciate your cooperation, though."
"Always glad to help," he said. I was certain he was rolling his eyes, but I was more focused on the path ahead.
We reached the chapel, and the door was locked, unsurprisingly. I knocked on it, staring anxiously around to see if any lights shone through the windows. It didn't look like it.
"You know, I've broken in here before," said Christian. "If you need inside - "
"No, more than that. I need to see the priest. Damn it, he's not here."
"He's probably in bed."
"Damn it," I repeated, feeling only a little bad about swearing on a church's doorstep. If the priest was in bed, he'd be off in Moroi staff housing and inaccessible. "I need to - "
The door opened, and Father Andrew peered out at us. He looked surprised but not upset. "Rose? Christian? Is something wrong?"
"I have to ask you a question," I told him. "It won't take long."
His surprise grew, but he stepped aside so we could enter. We all stopped and stood in the chapel's lobby, just outside the main sanctuary.
"I was just about to go home for the night," Father Andrew told us. "I was shutting everything down."
"You told me that St. Vladimir lived a long life and died of old age. Is that true?"
"Yes," he said slowly. "To the best of my knowledge. All the books I've read - including these latest ones - say as much."
"But what about Anna?" I demanded. I sounded like I was on the verge of hysteria. Which I kind of was.
"What about her?"
"What happened to her? How did she die?"
All this time. All this time, Lissa and I had worried about Vlad's outcome. We'd never considered Anna's.
"Ah, well." Father Andrew sighed. "Her end wasn't as good, I'm afraid. She spent her whole life protecting him, though there are hints that in her old age, she started growing a little unstable too. And then..."
"And then?" I asked. Christian was looking between the priest and me, completely lost.
"And then, well, a couple months after St. Vladimir passed on, she committed suicide."
I squeezed my eyes shut for half a second and then opened them. This was what I'd been afraid of.
"I'm sorry," Father Andrew said. "I know how closely you've followed their story. I didn't even learn this about her until reading it recently. Taking one's life is a sin, of course...but, well, considering how close they were, it's not hard to imagine how she may have felt when he was gone."
"And you also said that she was starting to go a little crazy."
He nodded and spread his hands out. "It's hard to say what that poor woman was thinking. Many factors were probably involved. Why was this so pressing?"
I shook my head. "It's a long story. Thanks for helping me."
Christian and I were halfway to the dorm before he finally asked, "What was that all about? I remember when you guys were looking into this. Vladimir and Anna were like Lissa and you, right?"
"Yeah," I said glumly. "Look, I don't want to get between you guys, but please don't tell Lissa about this. Not until I find out more. Just tell her ... I don't know. I'll tell her that I suddenly panicked because I thought I had more community service scheduled."
"Both of us lying to her, huh?"
"I hate it, believe me. But it's also best for her at the moment."
Because if Lissa knew that she might potentially make me insane ... yeah, she'd take that hard. She'd want to stop working her magic. Of course, that was what I'd always wanted ... and yet, I'd felt that joy in her when she used it. Could I take that away from her? Could I sacrifice myself?