Mason’s sad and restless spirit returns to St. Vladimir’s, sending the already grief-stricken Rose into a panic. At first, Rose can’t figure out why Mason is back or if he’s even really there at all. Part of her suspects that maybe she’s just seeing things . . . It could be that her guilt over Mason’s death is causing her to have visions or that Lissa’s spirit darkness is beginning to overwhelm her. Eventually, Rose realizes that Mason is truly visiting her. On several occasions, he even tries to get a message across, but it’s difficult for him. When he finally is able to say a few words (“They’re . . . coming . . . ”), they’re enough to warn Rose that the wards around the school have been tampered with, allowing Strigoi to pass over them and attack.
Just before Mason’s finally able to move on from this world and find peace, he confirms to Rose that Dimitri has been turned into a Strigoi.
EDISON “EDDIE” CASTILE
DHAMPIR | Novice guardian | AGE: 17
HAIR: Sandy blond, messy | EYES: Hazel
“This is . . . well, it’s something that could ruin everything for you. Get you in big trouble. I can’t do that to you.”
That half smile vanished. “It doesn’t matter,” he said fiercely. “If you need me, I’ll do it. No matter what it is.”
—Spirit Bound, page 104
Best friends with Mason, Eddie is a friendly and funny dhampir who is training to become a guardian at St. Vlad’s. But things begin to change for him when he goes with Mia and Mason to hunt Strigoi in Spokane. After they’re kidnapped, he’s repeatedly fed on by a Strigoi. He becomes dazed and weakened from the endorphins and loss of blood. When Mason is killed, Eddie feels a great deal of blame for not being able to save his friend. He never fully recovers from this tragedy.
Eddie is also one of the kidnapped victims taken during the Strigoi attack on the school but is later rescued from the caves. His harsh experiences make him a very serious and determined guardian and a loyal friend who will help Rose without question. When asked, he goes with her and Lissa to break Victor Dashkov out of prison in Alaska. He then continues with them on their quest to Vegas to find Robert Doru, only later becoming angry when he realizes the reason behind it all is to try to save Dimitri. To Eddie, Strigoi are supposed to be killed, not saved.
Regardless, Eddie’s first impulse is to protect his friends, so when an attempt is made on Lissa’s life at Court, Eddie ends up staking the person responsible. But because the individual in question is a Moroi, not a Strigoi, he finds himself in very hot water.
JANINE HATHAWAY
DHAMPIR | Guardian | AGE: 37 | | HEIGHT: 5’ |
HAIR: Cropped, curly auburn | EYES: Brown | FAMILY: Rose, daughter
“So, what?” I asked. “This is your way of making up for maternal negligence?”
“This is my way of making you get rid of that chip on your shoulder. You’ve had nothing but attitude for me since I arrived. You want to fight?” Her fist shot out and connected with my arm. “Then we’ll fight.”
—Frostbite, pages 79–80
A guardian with a stellar reputation, the Scottish-born Janine is dwarfed by most dhampirs but holds her own in a fight and has the molnija marks to prove it. While she has excelled at being a guardian, she hasn’t always been the best mother. And Rose feels a great deal of resentment toward the woman she feels abandoned her to the Academy’s care and only gave birth to her in the first place in order to help replenish the well of potential guardians.
While she might not be winning any “Mother of the Year” competitions, Janine feels great affection for her daughter, and their relationship begins to improve after Rose returns to St. Vladimir’s. There is strong evidence that Janine didn’t just have a child to further the dhampir race but that she was actually in love with Abe at the time of Rose’s conception. For Christmas, Janine gives Rose a gift that was once given to her by Abe—a nazar, an eye-like pendant meant to protect anyone who wears it.
IBRAHIM “ABE” MAZUR
MOROI | NICKNAME: Zmey (the serpent) | AGE: 40ish
HAIR: Black; goatee | FAMILY: Rose, daughter
“Ah, my daughter,” he said. “Eighteen, and already you’ve been accused of murder, aided felons, and acquired a death count higher than most guardians will ever see.” He paused. “I couldn’t be prouder.”
—Last Sacrifice, page 64
Powerful and wealthy but non-royal, Turkish-born Abe meets Rose during her trip to Siberia to find and kill Dimitri. Although Rose doesn’t immediately recognize Abe as her father, he tries to convince her to return to the States, where she will be safe. His nickname is Zmey, the serpent, and despite the flamboyant way he dresses, with colorful scarves and gold earrings, he seems like the kind of guy who breaks kneecaps of the people who cross him.
Even though Abe succeeds in scaring Rose, everything he does—even the extreme stuff like issuing veiled threats and later blackmailing Rose by agreeing to help Dimitri’s troubled sister only if Rose agrees to leave Russia—is in her best interest. It isn’t until Rose’s return to the Academy that she comes to the stunning realization that Abe is her father.
When Rose is accused of Queen Tatiana’s murder, Abe acts as her lawyer—despite not actually being a lawyer—and he promises her that she’ll never stand trial for this crime. And he’s right about that. He masterminds Rose’s breakout—explosions and all.
JILLIAN “JILL” MASTRANO DRAGOMIR
MOROI | ELEMENT: Water | AGE: 14
HAIR: Long, light brown curls | EYES: Jade green
NICKNAME: Jailbait FAMILY: Emily Mastrano, mother; Eric
Dragomir, father; Lissa Dragomir, half-sister
“I knew it! I can’t even imagine that—I’d be freaking out all the time around him. I’d never get anything done, but you’re so cool about it all, kind of like, ‘ Yeah, I’m with this totally hot guy, but whatever, it doesn’t matter.’”—Jill, impressed by Rose’s teacher-student relationship with Dimitri
—Shadow Kiss, page 126
Jill is an awkward Moroi teen in ninth grade at St. Vlad’s when she first meets the infamous Rose. At Rose’s suggestion, she starts learning defensive magic with Christian and gets to occasionally hang out with his super-cool friends, including Adrian, on whom she quickly develops a big crush. Lissa reluctantly brings Jill along to Court so she can meet Mia, a fellow water user.
When Rose’s search for Eric Dragomir’s illegitimate child leads her directly to Jill, she suddenly becomes much more than a tall, skinny teenager—she becomes incredibly important to the future of the Moroi race. It takes some convincing for Jill to accompany the others to Court to help gain Lissa the family standing she needs for a vote on Council, but she ultimately agrees to go because she knows it’s the right thing to do. Jill joining Rose and her friends proves to be more important than anyone could have guessed—it also gives Lissa the opportunity to be voted in as the new queen.
Jill’s safety is now a priority. If anything happens to Lissa’s half-sister, the young queen’s position is at grave risk by those who might wish to see her removed from the throne.
Talk about being critical to the future of the Moroi race.
SYDNEY SAGE
HUMAN ALCHEMIST | AGE: 18 | HAIR: Dark blond
EYES: Brown | DEFINING FEATURE: Gold tattoo of flowers and leaves on her lower left cheek
P.P.S. Just because I like you, it doesn’t mean I still don’t think you’re an evil creature of the night. You are.
—From Sydney’s goodbye letter to Rose
—Blood Promse, page 168
Sydney, an Alchemist who speaks five languages, works hard to keep the existence of Moroi and dhampirs hidden from the rest of the world. The tattoo on her cheek—made from gold ink, Moroi blood, and elemental magic—has given her good health and a long life, but it also prevents her from revealing the secrets of her job to those who are not part of the vampire world.
While interning in Russia, Sydney meets Rose and assists her in finding the village of Ba
ia. While Sydney is strictly religious and believes vampires—including dhampirs—are evil creatures of the night, she forms a strong friendship with Rose.
After making a mysterious deal with Abe, Sydney gets transferred to New Orleans but is required to help hide Rose when she’s accused of murder. She accompanies Rose and Dimitri on the search for the missing Dragomir—Jill. Little does Sydney know, Jill will play a key role in her future . . .
NATASHA “TASHA” OZERA
MOROI ROYAL | ELEMENT: Fire | AGE: Early 30s
HAIR: Jet black | EYES: Pale blue
DEFINING FEATURE: Scarring on one side of her face
FAMILY: Christian Ozera, nephew
“We run and hide behind the dhampirs and let the Strigoi go unchecked. It’s our fault. We are the reason those Drozdovs died. You want an army? Well, here we are. Dhampirs aren’t the only ones who can learn to fight.”
—Frostbite, page 169
Tasha protected her nephew Christian from his Strigoi parents so that he could live a full life as a Moroi. But she was scarred in the process—emotionally and physically—which drove her to become a fighter. She now teaches martial arts, which is a very unusual occupation for normally peaceful, passive Moroi.
Tasha is romantically interested in Dimitri and wants him to become both her official guardian and the father of her children—a rare choice for a Moroi woman, who typically will only want to have purebred Moroi children. But he turns her down because he’s in love with someone else.
Tasha works very hard to try to make the queen and other Moroi see that fighting defensively against Strigoi is the best solution for the continued survival of the Moroi race, but she’s met with great opposition, especially when she suggests that Moroi learn to harness their elemental magic. She comes out strongly against the queen’s age decree and argues for change at all levels.
Tasha is ultimately revealed to be Queen Tatiana’s murderer and to have framed Rose as the prime suspect. Tasha isn’t evil per se; she committed these heinous crimes out of anger over the queen’s politics and figured that with Rose out of the way, she’d be able to win Dimitri back. All she ends up winning is an arrest for high treason.
VICTOR DASHKOV
MOROI ROYAL | ELEMENT: Earth | AGE: Early 40s
HAIR: Thin and graying before being healed, thick and black afterward | EYES: Jade green
“The greatest and most powerful revolutions often start very quietly, hidden in the shadows.” He eyed me. “Remember that.”
—Vampire Academy, page 318
Victor Dashkov was next in line to the throne before he became ill with Sandovsky’s syndrome. Now, instead of being in the running for king, he’s headed toward death, thanks to the debilitating disease.
But Victor isn’t one to simply succumb to the hand fate dealt him. He kidnaps Lissa—a girl who has been like family to him—and has her tortured until she finally agrees to use spirit to heal him. Victor knows that Rose will be on high alert the second she senses that Lissa’s in trouble, so he devises yet another twisted plan. He gives Rose a lust charm that heightens the desire between her and Dimitri, thereby distracting them from everything but their intense passion. Fortunately, Victor’s attempts prove to be in vain—Rose and the other guardians rescue Lissa just in time. Later, Victor uses this episode to taunt Rose and Dimitri about their forbidden romance.
When Victor’s captured and imprisoned, he convinces his daughter Natalie to turn Strigoi to help in his rescue. Much later, it becomes evident he did this believing that she could be restored to her previous Moroi self—but it was a risky gamble that didn’t pay off when the dangerous Natalie is killed.
A few months after being found guilty and sentenced to life in Tarasov Prison, Rose and Lissa break him out of jail. They’re desperate to learn the secrets of restoring a Strigoi to life, and they’ve been told that Victor’s half-brother, Robert Doru, has prior experience in this area. Victor takes them to his brother, who does indeed tell the girls his secrets.
But Victor’s turnaround isn’t exactly long-lasting. He’s protective of his brother Robert, who’s half-mad and very weakened from his own use of spirit, and escapes with him at the first opportunity.
After appearing to Rose in several spirit dreams, Victor and his brother join her search to find the missing Dragomir. But again, Victor double-crosses them. He kidnaps Jill, wanting to use Lissa’s half-sister to gain power over Lissa. Unfortunately for him, he doesn’t make it too far this time. In a moment of spirit-darkness rage, Rose kills Victor to protect the Dragomirs.
OTHER CHARACTERS
NATALIE DASHKOV (MOROI)
Unpopular Natalie becomes Lissa’s roommate when the girls return to school for the first time. Natalie shies away from the social scene at St. Vladimir’s and is seemingly naive and innocent. But she also has some tricks up her sleeve . . . Just like her father, Victor Dashkov, Natalie specializes in earth magic. She helps her father plant dead animals to test Lissa’s use of spirit. Ultimately, Natalie chooses to become an evil Strigoi to help rescue her father. Natalie doesn’t last long as a Strigoi, however—she’s quickly staked by Dimitri.
MIA RINALDI (MOROI)
A former sexual conquest of Lissa’s deceased brother, Andre, the very young-looking, blond Mia hates Lissa on sight and sets out to destroy her and Rose at school. She’s now dating Aaron, Lissa’s ex, and will stop at nothing to get revenge—going so far as to sleep with both Jesse and Ralf to get them to help ruin Rose’s reputation. Lissa fights back, using compulsion and charm to get back in the popular royal clique’s good graces. She encourages them to shun the non-royal Mia and even goes so far as to steal Aaron back, leaving Mia socially destroyed and with a broken nose (courtesy of Rose).
After Strigoi kill her mother, Mia comes to build a grudging friendship with both Lissa and Rose. She’s part of the kidnapping by Strigoi in Spokane because the grief-driven Mia accompanies Mason and Eddie to hunt the Strigoi responsible for her mother’s death. Ultimately, Mia saves Rose’s life using her water magic. After they escape and return to St. Vlad’s, she leaves school for good to live with her father at Court. There, she secretly trains in self-defense with some guardian friends she’s made.
AARON DROZDOV (MOROI)
Aaron is Lissa’s popular and gorgeous but fairly boring ex-boyfriend. He gets another chance to date the princess during her attempt to get back into the royal students’ clique and destroy Mia’s social standing. But Lissa ends up dumping Aaron—again—for the guy she really likes, Christian. Later, a meaningless, drunken kiss between Lissa and Aaron at Court will cause big problems between her and Christian—now that they’re dating.
JESSE ZEKLOS (MOROI)
A really hot Moroi royal, with bronze-colored hair and dark blue eyes, Jesse gets in trouble with Dimitri when the guardian catches him fooling around with Rose. Later, he becomes part of Mia’s plan to destroy Rose’s reputation by spreading the rumor that she’s a blood whore. Jesse proves that he’s truly an elitist jerk when he helps form the Mână, a group of Moroi students who want to use compulsion to get whatever they want. When this leads to Lissa’s forcible initiation—more like torture—Lissa uses super-compulsion to torture him back, after which he is almost beaten to death by a magically enraged Rose. Lissa manages to heal his injuries—whether he deserves it or not.
RALF SARCOZY (MOROI)
Jesse’s best friend and part of Mia’s original plan to destroy Rose’s reputation, fire-user Ralf is only royal on his mother’s Conta side. He’s a bully, evidenced by his participation in the Mână.
CAMILLE CONTA (MOROI)
Prim, beautiful, and perfectly groomed, Camille is the self-appointed leader of the Academy’s royal Moroi cliques and was close friends with Lissa before she and Rose ran away.
ABBY BADICA (MOROI)
Abby is a St. Vlad’s student with a lot of bad luck. Not only is she abused in the Mână initiation tests—her bruises become one of Rose’s first clues that something nas
ty is going on at St. Vlad’s—but she’s also unfortunate enough to be kidnapped by Strigoi during their attack on the school. Luckily, she’s successfully rescued from the caves.
ST. VLADIMIR (MOROI)
St. Vladimir, the fourteenth-century patron saint of the Academy, used his spirit magic for good, healing the sick and helping crops to grow. Although he suffered greatly from depression and madness caused by his use of spirit, with help from his bondmate, Anna, he lived to a very old age and died of natural causes.
ANNA (DHAMPIR)
After St. Vladimir brought her back to life as a child, Anna became his shadow-kissed guardian and was always with him to defend him from Strigoi. She also helped take Vladimir’s darkness and madness away, absorbing it into herself, which led her to commit suicide shortly after his death.
ALBERTA PETROV (DHAMPIR)
In her fifties but wiry and tough, Alberta is the captain of St. Vladimir’s guardians and wears a pixie cut to show off her promise and molnija marks.