The Vampire Diaries #9: Moonsong (The Hunters #2)（2012）

Moonsong is the second book in The Hunters trilogy and the ninth book in The Vampire Diaries novel series. It was released March 13, 2012.

Summary

Life is better than ever, Elena and her friends can’t wait to attend Dalcrest College. But when students start to disappear from campus, suddenly every new acquaintance is a potential enemy. Then Elena uncovers a long-hidden secret, one that shocks her to the core, and realizes that the darkness has followed her from Fell’s Church. But will it be Stefan or Damon who catches her when she falls?

In stores March 13, 2012. L. J. Smith said she wanted this book to be about the group going to Dalcrest College. Damon would help Meredith to control her bloodlust, although that seems to have been resolved in the ghostwritten books. In an email, L. J. Smith wrote:

"I wanted to write Moonsong, and give Bonnie an admirer who is just as sweet and even more naïve than she is—a pure white wolf with radiant blue eyes, who happens to be a werewolf with moonlight colored hair and the same blue eyes when he’s human. I wanted to show Damon’s surprising reaction to Xander the good werewolf (not at all happy about it—so much that he “accidentally” almost kills the poor innocent wolf).

I also wanted to show how Damon rescues Bonnie from a vicious wolf-pack attack, and then let her fly away with him. And I wanted to show how Bonnie, who knows a little medicine from her sister Mary, helps Damon deliver Caroline’s twin babies when she goes into labor deep in the woods. But that’s one scene that I would have had to fight tooth and nail for, because even the glow that Damon and Bonnie share at seeing new life come into the world wouldn’t be enough for them to call it decent. They would undoubtedly have tried to make me cut it. But I still want to write it, so badly.

The main antagonist of this book was Ethan Crane.


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Epilogue

Ethan gasped, sucking in a long breath of air, and coughed his way awake, his whole body shaking.

Everything hurt.

Gingerly, he patted himself down, finding that he was sticky with half-dried blood, covered with a score of small injuries. Reaching up, he felt the already healing indentation in his back with delicate fingers. The stave the girl had thrust into him had brushed his heart, but it hadn't pierced it.

A half centimeter to one side, and he would have been dead. Really dead, this time, not undead.

Grabbing hold of a velvet-covered chair with one hand, Ethan pulled himself to his feet and looked around. His lieutenants in the Vitale Society, his friends, lay dead on the floor. The Salvatore brothers, and the girls who were with them, had escaped.

Nervously, he felt in one pocket and sighed in relief as his hand closed on a small vial. Pulling it out, he looked at the thick red liquid within. Stefan Salvatore's blood. He fished in the same pocket and drew out a cloth bearing a long reddish-brown stain. Damon Salvatore's blood.

He had what he needed.

Klaus would rise again.

Chapter Forty-Two

Elena, Stefan, and Damon headed toward Elena's dorm together, and tension thrummed sharply between them.

Elena had taken Stefan's hand automatically as they walked, and he had stiffened and then gradually relaxed, so that now his hand felt natural in hers.

Things weren't back the way they had been between them, not yet. But Stefan's green eyes were full of a shy affection when they looked at her, and Elena knew she could make things right. Something had shifted in Stefan when Damon came to rescue him, when Elena untied him and told him how sorry she was. Maybe Stefan just needed to know that whatever was between her and Damon, he was first for her. No one was shutting him out.

Elena unlocked her door, and they all went inside. It had been only a few hours since she was last there, but so much had happened that it seemed like somewhere from a long time ago, the posters and clothes and Bonnie's teddy bear all relics of a lost civilization.

"Oh, Stefan," Elena said, "I'm so glad that you're safe." She reached out and wrapped her arms around him and, just like when she took his hand, he tensed for a moment before hugging her back.

"I'm glad that both of you are safe," she amended, and looked at Damon. His black eyes met hers coolly, and she knew that, without their having to discuss it, he understood that things weren't going to go on the way they had been.

She loved Stefan. She had chosen.

When Stefan told them of Ethan's plan to take both of the brothers' blood and use it to resurrect Klaus, she was horrified. Not just because of the danger Stefan had been in, or because of the terrifying idea of Klaus alive again, and no doubt vengeful against them, but because of the trap Ethan had laid for Damon. He had planned to take the best of Damon - the reluctant, often marred, but still strong love he had for his brother - and use it to destroy him.

"I'm eternal y glad you're both okay," she said again, and reached out to hug Damon, too.

Damon came into her arms willingly, but, as she squeezed him tightly, he winced.

"What's wrong?" Elena asked, puzzled, and Damon frowned.

"Ethan cut me," he said, the frown turning into a grimace of pain. "I'm just a little sore." He tugged at his shirt, fingering a torn edge, and pulled it up, exposing a swath of pale taut skin. Against the white skin Elena saw the long cut was already healing.

"It's nothing," Damon said. He shot Elena a wicked smile. "A little drink from a willing donor and I'll be as good as new, I promise."

She shook her head at him reprovingly, but didn't answer.

"Good night, Elena," Stefan said, and brushed her cheek gently with the back of his hand. "Good morning, really, I guess, but try to get some sleep."

"Are you going after the vampires?" she asked anxiously. "Be careful." Damon laughed.

"I'll make sure he takes care with the nasty vampires," he said. "Poor Elena. Normal life isn't going so Well, is it?" Elena sighed. That was the problem, wasn't it? Damon would never understand why she wanted to be an ordinary person. He thought of her as his dark princess, wanted her to be like him, to be better than ordinary people. Stefan didn't think she was a dark princess; he thought she was a human being.

But was she? She thought briefly of telling them about the Guardians and the secrets of her birth, but she just couldn't. Not right now. Not yet. Damon wouldn't know why it upset her. And Stefan was so pale and tired after his ordeal with the vervain-soaked ropes that she couldn't bring herself to burden him with her fears about the Guardians.

As she thought this, Stefan staggered, just a fraction, and Damon reached out automatically to steady him.

"Thank you," Stefan said, "For coming to save me. Both of you."

"I'll always save you, little brother," Damon said, but he was looking at Elena, and she heard the echo of when he had said the same words to her. "Even though I might be better off without you," Damon added.

Stefan gave a tired smile. "Time to go," he said.

"I love you, Stefan." Elena brushed her lips against his softly.

Damon gave her a brief nod, his face neutral. "Sleep Well," he said.

Then the door was closed behind her, and Elena was alone. Her bed had never looked more comfortable or inviting, and she lay down with a sigh, looking up at the soft light that was beginning to break through the window.

The Vitale Society was gone. Ethan's plan had been stopped. The campus was safer, and a new day was dawning. Stefan had forgiven her, and Damon didn't leave, didn't turn against them.

It was, for now, the best she could hope for. Elena closed her eyes and fell willingly asleep at last. Tomorrow would be another day.

Chapter Forty-One

It seemed like he and Bonnie had been waiting forever in the tiny back office of the library, Matt thought. They had strained to catch a sound, to try and learn anything at all about what was happening down there. Bonnie paced, wringing her hands and biting her lips, and he leaned against the wall , head lowered, and kept a good grip on Samantha's stave. Just in case.

He knew about all the doors and passages and tunnels down there, many of which he had no idea where they led, but he didn't realize the soundproofing was so good. They hadn't heard a thing.

Then suddenly the trapdoor was pushing up, and Matt tensed, raising the stave, until he saw Elena's face.

Meredith, Elena, Stefan, and Damon climbed out, covered in blood, but basically fine, if the eager way Elena and Meredith were telling Bonnie what happened, their words tumbling over each other, was any indication.

"Ethan's dead," Stefan told Matt. "There were some other Vitales down there in the fight, but none of the pledges. He'd sent them out to hunt."

Matt felt sick and weirdly happy at the same time. He'd pictured them dead at Damon and Stefan's hands, Chloe, all his friends from pledging. But they weren't. Not dead, not real y. But transformed, vampires now.

"You're going to hunt them," he said, aiming his words at Stefan and Damon, and at Meredith, too. She nodded, her face resolved, and Damon looked away.

"We have to," Stefan told him. "You know that." Matt stared hard at his shoes. "Yeah," he said, "I know.

But, if you get a chance, maybe talk to some of them? If you can, if they're reasonable and no one's in danger? Maybe they could learn to live without killing people. If you showed them how, Stefan." He rubbed at the back of his neck.

"Chloe was ... special. And the other pledges, they were good people. They didn't know what they were getting into. They deserve a chance."

Everyone was silent, and, after a moment, Matt looked up to find Stefan regarding him, his eyes dark green with sympathy, his mouth pulled taut in lines of pain. "I'll do my best," he said kindly. "I can promise you that. But new vampires - vampires in general, real y - can be unpredictable. We might not be able to save any of them, and our priority has to be the innocent. We will try, though." Matt nodded. His mouth tasted sour and his eyes burned. He was beginning to realize just how tired he was.

"That's about the best I can expect," he said roughly. "Thank you."

"So there's a whole room full of dead vampires down there?" Bonnie asked, wrinkling her nose in disgust.

"Pretty much," said Elena. "We chained the doors closed again, but I wish we could close the chamber off more permanently. Someone's going to go down there eventually, and the last thing this campus needs is another murder investigation, or another gruesome legend."

"Ta-da!" Bonnie said, grinning brightly and pulling a little bag out of her pocket. "Finally something I can do." She held the bag up. "Remember all the hours Mrs. Flowers made me spend studying herbs? Well, I know spells for locking and warding, and I've got the herbs to use right here. I thought they might come in handy, as soon as Matt told us we were going to a secret underground chamber." She looked so pleased with herself that Matt had to smile a little despite the heaviness inside him at the thought of Chloe and the others somewhere out in the night. "They might not work for more than a day or two," she added modestly, "but they'll definitely discourage people from investigating the trapdoor for that long."

"You're a wonder, Bonnie," Elena said, and spontaneously hugged her.

Stefan nodded. "We can get rid of the bodies tomorrow," he said. "It's too close to dawn to do it now." Bonnie got right to work, sprinkling dried plants across the trapdoor. "Hyssop, Solomon's seal, and damiana leaves," she said when she saw Matt watching her. "They're for strengthening of locks, protection from evil, and general protection. Mrs. Flowers drilled me on this stuff so much I finally got them all down. It's too bad I didn't have her helping me with my homework in high school. Maybe I would have learned some of those French verbs." Damon was watching them, his eyes half hooded. "We should look for the new vampires, too," he said. "You know vampires aren't pack animals. They won't hunt together for long. Once they split up, we can pick them off," he told Stefan.

"I'm coming, too," Meredith said. She looked at Damon challengingly. "I'll just walk Matt home and then meet up with you both."

Damon smiled, a peculiarly warm smile that Matt had never seen him direct at Meredith before. "I was talking to you, too, hunter," he said. "You've gotten better." After a second, she smiled back, a humorous twist of her lips, and Matt thought he saw something that might be the beginnings of friendship flickering between them.

"So the Vitales were definitely behind all the murders and disappearances?" Matt asked Stefan, feeling sick.

How could he have spent so much time with Ethan and not suspected that he was a murderer?

Bonnie's face went so white that her few freckles showed like little dark dots on plain paper. And then her color came flooding back, her cheeks and ears turning a bright pink. She climbed unsteadily to her feet. "I should go see Zander," she said.

"Hey," Matt said, alarmed, and moved to block the door.

"There's still a whole bunch of vampires outside, Bonnie. Wait for somebody to walk you over."

"Not to mention that you have other commitments," Damon said dryly, looking meaningfully at the herbs scattered across the trapdoor. "After you work your witchy mojo, then you can go see your pet."

"We're sorry, Bonnie," Meredith said, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to another. "We should have trusted you to know a good guy when you saw one."

"Right! All is forgiven," Bonnie said brightly, and plopped down in front of the trapdoor again. "I just need to say the spell ." She ran her hands through the herbs. "Existo signum," she muttered. "Servo quis est intus." As she scooped some of the herbs back into her bag, Bonnie kept smiling, and stopping, and staring into space, and then bouncing a little. Matt smiled at her tiredly. Good for Bonnie. Someone ought to have a happy ending.

He felt a strong, thin hand take his and turned to see Meredith beside him. She smiled sympathetically at him.

Nearby, Elena laid her hand tentatively on Stefan's arm, and they both had their eyes on Bonnie. Damon stood still , watching them al with an almost fond expression.

Matt leaned against Meredith, comforted. No matter what happened, at least they were together. His true friends were with him; he had come home to them at last.

The sun was low in the east when Bonnie climbed up the fire escape, her feet clanging on each step. As she came over the side of the building, she saw Zander sitting with his back against the rough concrete wall at the edge of the roof. He turned to stare at her as she came toward him.

"Hi," she said. She'd been so excited to see him on her way over here, enough so that Elena and Meredith got over their guilt and started to laugh at her, but now she felt weird and uncomfortable, like her head was too big. It was, she realized, totally possible that he wouldn't want to talk to her.

After all , she'd accused him of being a murderer, which was a pretty big mistake for a girlfriend to make.

"Hi," he said slowly. There was a long pause, and then he patted the concrete next to him. "Want to sit down?" he asked. "I'm just watching the sky." He hesitated. "Full moon in a couple of days."

Mentioning the full moon felt like a challenge, and Bonnie settled next to him, then squeezed her hands together and jumped right in. "I'm sorry I called you a killer," she said. "I know now that I was wrong to accuse you of being responsible for the deaths on campus. I should have trusted you more. Please accept my apology," she finished in a little rush. "Because I miss you."

"I miss you, too," Zander said. "And I understand it was a shock."

"Seriously, though, Zander," Bonnie said, and shoved him a little with her hip. "You just tell me you're a werewolf?

Did you get bitten when you were a kid or something?

Because I know getting bitten is the only way to become a werewolf without killing someone. And, okay, I know you're not the killer now, but Meredith saw you with a girl who'd just been attacked. And ... and you had bruises, really bad bruises everywhere. I think I had every right to think something was hinky with you."

"Hinky?" Zander laughed a little, but there was an edge of sadness to it, Bonnie thought. "I guess it's kind of hinky, if you want to put it that way."

"Can you explain?" Bonnie asked.

"Okay, I'll try," Zander said thoughtful y. He reached down and took her hand, turning it over in his and playing with her fingers, pulling them lightly. "As you apparently know, most werewolves are created either by being bitten, or by having the werewolf virus in their family and activating it by killing someone in a special ritual. So, either a terrible attack, which usually screws the victim up, or a deliberate act of evil to grab the power of the wolf." He grimaced. "It kind of explains why werewolves have such a bad reputation. But there's another kind of werewolf." He glanced at Bonnie with a sort of shy pride. "I come from the Original pack of werewolves." Original. Bonnie's mind raced. Immortal, she thought, and remembered Klaus, who had never been a human. "So... you're real y old, then?" she asked hesitantly.

It was fine, she guessed, for Elena to date guys who had seen centuries go by. Romantic, even. Sort of.

Despite the crush she'd had on Damon, though, Bonnie always pictured dating someone close to her own age.

Even Meredith's cute, smart Alaric seemed kind of old to her, and he was only in his twenties.

Zander snorted with sudden laughter and squeezed her hand tight. "No!" he said. "I just turned twenty last month!

Werewolves aren't like that - we're alive. We live, we die.

We're like everybody else, we just..."

"Turn into superstrong, superfast wolves," Bonnie said tartly.

"Yeah, fine," Zander said. "Point taken. Anyway, the Original pack is like, the original family of werewolves. Most werewolves are infected by some kind of mystical virus. It can be passed down, but it's dormant. The Original pack is descended from the very first werewolves, the ones that were cavemen except during the full moon. It's in our genes.

We're different from regular werewolves. We can stop ourselves from changing if we need to. We can learn to change when the moon's not full , too, although it's difficult."

"If you can stop yourself from changing, do some of you stop being werewolves?" Bonnie asked.

Zander pulled her closer. "We would never stop being werewolves, even if we never changed at all . It's who we are. And it hurts to not change when the moon is full . It's like it sings to us, and the song gets louder and clearer the closer it gets to being full . We're aching to change by the time it happens."

"Wow," said Bonnie. Then her eyes widened. "So, all your friends are members of the Original pack, too? Like, you're all related?"

"Um," Zander said. "I guess. But the relationship can go back pretty far - it's not like we're all first cousins or anything."

"Weird," Bonnie said. "Okay, Original pack, got it." She snuggled her head comfortably against Zander's shoulder.

"Tel me the rest."

"Okay," Zander said again. He pushed his hair out of his eyes and wrapped one arm around Bonnie. It was getting a little cold sitting on the concrete, and she nestled gratefully against the warmth of his side. "So, Dalcrest is on what's sort of a hot spot for paranormal activity. There's these things called ley lines, see..."

"Already know it," Bonnie said briskly. "Go on with your part."

Zander stared at her. "O ... kay," he said slowly.

"Anyway, the High Wolf Council sends some of us to Dalcrest every year as students. So that we can monitor any dangers. We're kind of like watchdogs, I guess. The original watchdogs."

Bonnie snorted. "The High Wolf Council." Zander poked her in the ribs.

"Shut up, it's not funny," he said. "They're very important." Bonnie giggled again, and he elbowed her gently. "So, with all the disappearances and attacks, things have been bad on campus this year," he continued, sobering. "Much worse than they usually are. We've been investigating. A pack of vampires in a secret society on campus is behind it, and we've been fighting them off and protecting people when we can. But we're not as strong as they are, except at the full moon, even if we change. And so the bruises. And your friend seeing me guarding a girl who'd just been attacked."

"Don't worry. We took care of the Vitale Society tonight," Bonnie said smugly. "Well, the leader at least, and some of the others," she amended. "There's still a bunch of vampires on campus, but we'll get rid of them." Zander turned and stared at her for a long moment before he spoke. "I think," he said at last in a carefully neutral voice, "that it's your turn to explain." Bonnie wasn't actually that great at properly organized, logical explanations, but she did her best, going back and forth in time, adding side notes and remembering things as she went along. She told him about Stefan and Damon, and how everything had changed when the vampire brothers came to Fell's Church last year and Elena fell in love with them. She told him about Meredith's sacred duty as a vampire hunter, and she told him about her own psychic visions and her training as a witch.

She left a lot of stuff out - everything about the Dark Dimension, and Elena's bargain with the Guardians, for instance, because that was really confusing, and maybe she should tell him about it later so he didn't just overload -

but the telling still took a long time.

"Huh," Zander said when she was finished, and then he laughed.

"What?" Bonnie asked.

"You're a weird girl," Zander said. "Pretty heroic, though."

Bonnie pushed her face into his neck, happily breathing in the essential Zander smell of him: fabric softener, worn cotton, and clean guy.

"You're weird," she said, and then, admiringly, "and the real hero. You've been fighting off vampire attacks for weeks and weeks, to protect everybody."

"We're quite a pair," Zander said.

"Yeah," Bonnie said. She sat up and faced him, then reached out and ran her hand through his soft pale hair, pulling his head closer to her. "Still ," she said, just before their lips touched, "normal is overrated."

Chapter Forty

Damon was moving fast, and Elena and the others had to almost race to keep up with him as they headed for the library. "Typical Stefan, sacrificing himself," he muttered angrily. "He could have asked for help when he realized something was going on." He stopped for a second to let the others catch up and glared at them all . "If Stefan can't handle a few newly made vampires by himself, I'm ashamed of him," he said. "Maybe we should just leave him after all . Survival of the fittest."

Elena touched his hand lightly, and, after a moment, Damon hurried on toward the library. She didn't for an instant believe he would leave Stefan a captive. None of them did. The taut, strained lines of his face showed that Damon was entirely focused on the danger his brother was in, their rivalry temporarily forgotten.

"It's not just a few vampires," Matt said. "There are about twenty-five of them. I'm sorry, you guys, I've been a moron." He swung the stave Meredith had given him -

Samantha's stave - determinedly in one hand.

"It's not your fault," Bonnie said. "You couldn't have known your frat - or whatever - was evil, could you?" If anyone had spotted them as they crossed the campus, Elena was sure they would have been an alarming sight: she and Bonnie were clutching the large, sharp hunting knives Meredith had given them only half concealed under their jackets. Matt was holding the stave, and Meredith had her own stave in one hand. But it was past midnight, and the path they were following was deserted.

Only Damon wasn't carrying a weapon, and he clearly was a weapon.

His human façade seemed to have lifted, and his angry expression could have been carved out of stone, except for the glimpse of sharp white teeth between his lips and the seemingly bottomless darkness of his eyes.

When they reached the closed library, Damon didn't pause, forcing its metal doors open with the grinding sound of splitting metal. Elena glanced around nervously. The last thing they needed was campus security showing up. But the paths near the library were dark and empty.

They all followed Damon down to the basement and into the hall ways of administrative offices. Finally, he stopped outside the door marked Research Office where he and Elena had once met Matt. "This is the entrance?" he asked Matt and, at his nod, efficiently broke the lock on the door.

"You're all staying up here. Just Meredith and I are going down." He looked at Meredith. "Want to kill some vampires, hunter? Let's fulfil your destiny, shall we?" Meredith slashed her stave in the air, and a slow smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. "I'm ready," she said at last.

"I'm coming, too," Elena said, keeping her voice steady.

"I'm not waiting up here while Stefan's in danger." Damon drew a breath, and she thought he was going to argue with her, but instead he sighed.

"Al right, princess," he said, his voice gentler than it had been since Matt told them what had happened to Stefan.

"But you do what I - or Meredith - tell you."

"I'm not waiting up here," Matt said stubbornly. "This is my fault."

Damon turned on him, his mouth twisting into a sneer.

"Yes, it is your fault. And you told us Ethan can control you. I don't want to get your knife in my back while we're fighting your enemies."

Matt dropped his head, defeated. "Okay," he said. "Go down two flights of stairs, and you'll see the doors to the room they're in." Damon nodded sharply and pulled up the trapdoor.

Meredith followed him down the stairs, but Matt caught Elena's arm as she headed after them. "Please," he said quickly. "If any of the pledges still seem rational, even if they're vampires, try to get them out. Maybe we can help them. My friend Chloe..." In the grim lines of his face, his pale blue eyes were frightened.

"I'll try," Elena said, and squeezed his hand. She exchanged a glance with Bonnie, then followed Meredith through the trapdoor.

When they reached the entrance to the Vitale Society's chamber, Meredith and Damon pressed their backs against the elaborately carved wooden doors. Watching, Elena could see a similarity for the first time between them.

Now that they were facing a battle, Meredith and Damon were both wearing eager smiles.

One ... two ... came Damon's silent count ... three.

They pushed together. The double doors flew inward, and the chains that had held them closed went flying.

Damon stalked in, still smiling a vicious gleaming smile, Meredith erect and alert behind him, her stave poised.

Dark figures rushed at them, but Elena was looking past them, searching for Stefan.

Then her eyes found him, and all the breath rushed out of her. He was hurt. Tied firmly to a chair, he raised a pale face to greet her, his leaf-green eyes agonized. From his arm, dark red blood dripped steadily, pooling on the floor beneath his chair.

Elena went a little mad.

Charging across the room toward Stefan, she was only half aware of one of the hooded figures leaping at her, and of Damon catching it in midstride, casually snapping its neck and letting the body fall to the floor. Absently, she registered the smack of wood against flesh as Meredith caught another attacker with her stave so that it fell in convulsions as the concentrated essence of vervain from the stave's spikes hit its bloodstream.

And then she was crouching next to Stefan, and, for a moment at least, nothing else mattered. He was shaking slightly, just the faintest tremors, and she stroked his hand, careful of the wound on his forearm. Raised red ridges ran around his wrists below the rope, spots of blood on their surface. "Vervain on the ropes," he muttered. "I'm okay, just hurry." And then, "Elena?" Below the pain in his voice, a dawning note of joy.

She hoped he could read all the love she felt in her eyes as she met his gaze. "I'm here, Stefan. I'm so sorry." She took out the knife Meredith had given her and began to saw at the ropes that held him, careful not to cut him, trying not to pull the ropes any tighter. He winced in pain, and then the ropes around his wrists snapped. "Your poor arm," she said, and felt in her pockets for something to staunch the blood, final y just pulling off her jacket and holding it against the cut. Stefan took the jacket from her. "You'll have to cut through the rest of the ropes, too," he said, his voice strained. "I can't touch them because of the vervain." She nodded and went to work on the ropes holding his legs. "I love you," she told him, concentrating on her work, not looking up. "I love you so much. I hurt you, and I never wanted to. Never, Stefan. Please believe me." She finished cutting through the ropes around his knees and ankles and chanced a glance up at Stefan's face. Tears, she realized, were running down her own face, and she wiped them away.

The thud of another body hitting the floor and a screech of rage came from behind them. But Stefan's eyes held hers unwaveringly. "Elena, I..." he sighed. "I love you more than anything in the world," he said simply. "You know that. No conditions."

She took a long, shuddering breath and wiped the tears away again. She had to be able to see, had to keep her hands from shaking. The ropes around his torso were looped and twisted together. She pulled at them, finding where there was enough give to start cutting, and Stefan hissed in pain.

"Sorry, sorry," she said hurriedly, and began to slice through the rope as rapidly as she dared. "Stefan," she began again, "the kiss with Damon - Well, I can't lie and say I don't feel anything for him - but the kiss wasn't anything I'd planned on. I didn't even mean to be with him that night, it just happened. And when you saw us, that kiss, he'd just saved my life..." She was stumbling over her words now, and she let them trail off. "I don't have any real excuses, Stefan," she said flatly. "I just want you to forgive me. I don't think I can live without you."

The last of the ropes parted, and she eased them from around him before she looked up, frightened and hopeful.

Stefan was gazing at her, his sculpted lips turning up in a half smile. "Elena," he said and pulled her to him in a brief, tender kiss. Then he pushed her to the wall . "Stay out of this, please," he said, and limped toward the fight, still weak from the vervain, but reaching to pull a vampire away from Meredith and sinking his own fangs into its neck.

Not that she needed his help. Meredith was amazing.

When had she gotten so good? Elena had seen her fight before, of course, and she'd been strong and quick, but now the tall girl was as graceful as a dancer and as deadly as an assassin.

She was fighting three vampires, who circled her angrily. Spinning and kicking, moving almost as fast as the monsters she was fighting, despite the fact that their speed was supernatural, she knocked one off his feet, sending him flying, and, in a smooth follow-up blow, bashed another in the face, leaving the vampire staggering backward with his hands up, half blinded.

There were bodies littered across the floor, evidence of Meredith's skill and Damon's vicious rage. As Elena watched, Stefan tossed down the drained body of the vampire he had been fighting and looked around. Only Ethan and the three vampires surrounding Meredith remained on their feet.

Damon had Ethan on the run, backing nervously away as Damon stalked toward him, peppering him with sharp open-handed blows. "... my brother," she heard Damon muttering. "Insolent pup. You think you know anything, child, you think you want power?" With a sudden, violent movement, he grabbed Ethan's arm and jerked. Elena could hear the bone snap.

Stefan passed Elena, heading toward Meredith again, and paused for a moment. "Ethan was laying a trap for Damon," he told her dryly. "I don't know why I was worried.

Clearly, he didn't know what he was trying to catch." Elena nodded again, suppressing a grin. The idea of any brand-new vampire getting the better of Damon, with all his experience and cunning, seemed ridiculous.

Then the tide of the battle suddenly turned.

One of the vampires Meredith was fighting dodged her blow and, half bent over, flung itself at her, knocking the slender girl into the air. There was an endless moment where Meredith looked like she was flying, arms akimbo, and then she slammed headfirst into the heavy altarlike table at the front of the room.

The table wobbled and fell over with a heavy thud.

Meredith lay still , her eyes closed, unconscious. Elena ran to her and knelt down, cradling her head in her lap.

The three vampires Meredith had been fighting were worse for the wear. One had blood steadily streaming down his face, another was limping, and the last was doubled over as if something had been injured inside her, but they could still move fast. In an instant, they had surrounded Stefan.

As Damon growled and turned, shifting his stance to help his brother, Ethan saw his chance and launched himself at Damon. Faster than Elena's eye could follow, his teeth were gouging at Damon's throat, bright spurts of blood flying up. He had a knife in one hand and was trying to cut at Damon at the same time as he bit.

With a cry of pain and shock, Damon clawed at Ethan, trying to fling him away. Elena picked up her knife again and rushed toward them.

But two of the remaining vampires were on Damon in a split second, pulling his arms back. One caught Damon's midnight dark hair in his hand, yanking the older vampire's head back to expose his throat more fully to Ethan's teeth.

Off balance, Damon staggered backward and for a moment caught Elena's eye, his face soft with dismay.

Terrified, Elena grabbed at the back of one of the vampires, and it threw her to the floor without even looking at her. Stefan, meanwhile, was caught in a struggle with another vampire, desperate to get to his brother. Damon was a better and a more experienced warrior than any of the vampires attacking him. But if they pushed their momentary advantage, used their superior numbers, they might bring him down before he could recover.

She clutched her knife tighter and jumped to her feet again, knowing in her heart that she'd be too late to save him but that she needed to try.

A snarling blur shot past her, and Stefan, free of his adversary, slammed into Ethan, throwing him across the room, sending his knife flying. Without pausing, he ripped one of the other vampires from Damon's arm and snapped his neck. By the time the body hit the floor, Damon had neatly dispatched the other one.

The brothers, both panting, exchanged a long look that seemed to carry a lot of unspoken communication. Damon wiped a smear of crimson blood from his mouth with the back of his hand.

Suddenly an arm was around Elena's throat, and the knife was wrenched out of her hand. She was being dragged upward. Something sharp was poking her in the tender hollow at the bottom of her neck.

"I can kill her before you could even get over here," Ethan's voice said, too loud by her ear. Elena flailed an arm backward, trying to grab at his hair or face, and he kicked viciously at her legs, knocking her off-balance, and pulled her closer. "I could snap her neck with one arm. I could stab her with her own knife and let her bleed out. It would be fun." He was holding her knife, Elena realized, pressed against her throat. His other arm hung loose, and curiously bent. Damon had broken it, Elena remembered.

Stefan and Damon froze and then very slowly turned toward Elena and Ethan, both their faces shuttered and wary. Then Damon's broke into a rictus of rage.

"Let her go," he snarled. "We'd kill you the second she hit the ground."

Ethan laughed, a remarkably genuine laugh for someone in a life-or-death standoff. "She'll still be dead, though, so I think it might be worth it. You're not planning to let me leave here anyway, are you?" He turned to Stefan, his voice mocking. "You know, I heard all about the Salvatore brothers from some of Klaus's other descendants. They said you were aristocratic and beautiful and terribly hot tempered. That Stefan was moral, and that Damon was remorseless. But they also said that you were both fools for love, always for love. It's your fatal flaw. So, yeah, I think my chances are a lot better when I've got your girlfriend in my power. Whose girlfriend is she, actual y? I can't tell ." Elena flinched.

"Wait a second, Ethan." Stefan held out his hands placatingly. "Hold on. If you agree not to bring back Klaus and let Elena go safely, we'll give you whatever you want.

Get out of town, and we won't come after you. You'll be safe. If you know about us, you know we'll keep our word." Behind him, Damon nodded reluctantly, his eyes on Elena's face.

Ethan laughed again. "I don't think you have anything I want anymore, Stefan," he said. "The rest of the Vitale Society, including our newest initiates, will be coming back soon, and I think they'll tip the scales back in my favor." He tightened his arm around Elena's throat. "We've killed so many students on this campus. Surely one more won't be missed."

Damon hissed in rage and started forward, but Ethan called out, "Stop right there, or - "

Suddenly, he jerked, and Elena felt a sharp, stinging pain in her throat. She squeaked in horror and grabbed at her own neck. But it was only a scratch from the knife.

As Stefan and Damon stood helpless and furious, Ethan's arm loosened from around her throat. He made a hideous gurgling noise. Elena yanked away as soon as his grip weakened.

Blood was running in long thick rivulets from Ethan's torso, and his mouth opened in shock as he clutched at himself and slowly fell forward, a round hole in his chest filling with blood.

Behind him, Meredith stood, hair flying, her usually cool gray eyes burning like dark coals in her face. Her stave was coated in Ethan's blood.

"I got him in the heart," she said, her voice fierce.

"Thank you," Elena murmured politely. She was feeling... real y ... very peculiar, and it wasn't until she was actual y starting to fall that she thought, Oh no, I think I'm going to faint.

Blurrily, she saw both Damon and Stefan rushing forward to catch her, and when she came to a moment later, she was held tightly in two pairs of arms.

"I'm okay," she said. "It was just ... for a second, I was..." She felt one pair of arms pull her closer for a moment, and then they released her, shifting her weight over to the other set. When she looked up, Stefan was clutching her tightly to him. Damon stood a few feet away, his face unreadable.

"I knew you'd come to save me," Stefan said, holding Elena but looking at Damon.

Damon's lips twitched into a tiny, reluctant smile. "Of course I did, you idiot," he said gruffly. "I'm your brother." They looked at each other for a long moment, and then Damon's eyes flicked to Elena, still in Stefan's arms, and away. "Let's put out the torches and go," he said briskly.

"We've still got about fourteen vampires to find."

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Stefan hadn't had a plan when he agreed to stay in Matt's place. He just knew he had to save Matt, and now he hoped Damon would come for him. Stefan's wrists ached with a dull , throbbing insistent pain that was almost impossible for him to ignore. He tried once more to pull against the ropes that were holding him to the chair, turning his hands from left to right as far as he could to try and loosen his restraints, but it was hopeless. He couldn't shift them.

He looked around dazedly. The room looked both serene and mysterious again now, as it had when he first kicked in the door. A good place for a secret society.

Torches burned brightly, flowers were arranged around the makeshift altar. The Vitales had taken the time to clean up after binding him and killing the pledges.

The ropes were crossed over his chest and stomach and wound around his back; his ankles and knees were tied to the chair legs, his elbows and wrists to the arms of the chair. He was Welltrussed, but it was the ones around his wrists that hurt most, because they lay against his bare skin. And they burned.

"They're soaked in vervain so that you'll be too weak to break free, but I'm afraid it must sting a bit," Ethan said pleasantly, as if he was explaining an interesting element of the secret chamber's architecture to his guest. "See, I may be new at this, but I know all the tricks." Stefan rested his head against the back of the chair and looked at Ethan with fervent dislike. "Not all of the tricks, I suspect."

Ethan was cocky, but Stefan was pretty sure he hadn't been a vampire for very long. If Ethan was still human, if he had never become a vampire, Stefan guessed he would look more or less the same as he did now.

Ethan crouched down in front of Stefan's chair to look up into his face, wearing the same warm, friendly smile as when he'd tried to convince Stefan to join them. He looked like a pleasant fellow, someone you wanted to relax with and trust, and Stefan glared at him. The smile was a lie.

Ethan was a killer whose mask was less obvious than those of the other Vitale vampires, that was all .

"You're probably right about that," Ethan said thoughtful y. "I imagine there are all kinds of tricks you've picked up in, what is it, more than five hundred years?

Tricks that I don't know yet. You could be very useful to me in that way, if you decide to join us after all . There are lots of things you can teach us about all this vampire stuff." He flashed that appealing smile again. "I've always been a good student."

Vampire stuff. "What do you want from me, Ethan?" Stefan asked wearily. It had been a long night, a long few weeks, and the vervain-soaked ropes were hurting his arms, muddying his thoughts.

Ethan knew how old he was. Ethan knew what to offer him when they first talked about the Vitale Society. It wasn't a coincidence that he was the one in this room, then; Ethan wasn't looking for just any vampire. "What's your plan here?" Stefan asked.

Ethan's smile grew wider. "I'm building an invincible vampire army, of course," he said cheerful y. "I know it sounds a little ridiculous, but it's all about power. And power's never ridiculous." He licked his lips nervously, showing a flash of thin pink tongue. "See, I used to just be one of the ordinary little people. I was just like everyone else on campus. My biggest achievements were good grades on exams or the fact that I had the leadership of some secret college club. You wouldn't believe how lame the Vitale Society used to be. Just white magic and nature worship." He made a little self-deprecating grimace: See how silly I was once. I'm telling you something embarrassing about myself, so trust me. "But then I figured out how to get some real power."

One of the black-clad figures came up behind Ethan, and Ethan held up a finger to Stefan. "Hang on a sec, okay?" He rose and turned to talk to his lieutenant.

After tying Stefan up, Ethan had efficiently gone back to draining the pledges, one after another, dropping the bodies as soon as he finished with them. They had all gone through their transitions now and were back on their feet.

They seemed irritable and disoriented, growling and snapping at one another and gazing at Ethan with undisguised adoration.

Typical new vampires. Stefan eyed them warily. Until they had fed thoroughly, they would hover on the brink of madness, and it would be easy for Ethan to lose control of them. Then they would be even more dangerous.

"The pledges need to eat," Ethan said calmly to the robed woman behind him. "Five of you should take them out and teach them how to hunt. You lead the hunting party and pick whoever you want to go with you. The rest will stay here and help guard our guest."

Stefan watched as the Vitales sorted themselves out.

Eight of Ethan's fol owers remained, stationing themselves by the sides of the room. Stefan had managed to kill one other during the fight, ripping her throat out, but the body had been tidied away somewhere.

Stefan gave a little involuntary moan. It was hard to think straight - he was so tired, and the vervain was starting to hurt him all over, not just on his aching wrists, but anywhere the ropes touched him through his clothes. Damon, please come quickly. Please, Damon, he thought.

"You're going to unleash nine newly made vampires on the campus?" he asked Ethan, his mind snapping back to the matter at hand. "Ethan, they'll kill people. People who were your friends, maybe. You'll draw attention to yourselves. There are already police all over campus.

Please, take them to the woods to hunt animals. They can live on animal blood." He heard a pleading note enter his own voice as Ethan only smiled absently at him, as if he was a child begging to go to Disneyland. "Come on, Ethan, it hasn't been very long since you were a human, too. You can't want to stand by and have innocent students murdered."

Ethan shrugged, patting Stefan lightly on the shoulder as he started to walk over to confer with another of his henchmen. "They need to be strong, Stefan. I want them at their peak by the next equinox. And we've killed plenty of innocent students already," he said over his shoulder.

"Equinox? Ethan," Stefan shouted after him in frustration. He looked frantically at the door by which the pledges and their escort had left. It would take them a while to select victims. Not as many students were walking the campus alone at night these days. If he could get free, if Damon came now and freed him, they could still stop the slaughter. If all these brand-new vampires were allowed loose on campus, there would be a massacre.

Ethan couldn't have changed the rest of the Vitale Society all at once, he realized. The number of murders they would have committed newly made as a group would have been impossible to disguise as a few disappearances. This must have been the first mass initiation. And who had made Ethan? he wondered. Was there an older vampire somewhere on campus?

Damon, where are you? He had no doubt that Damon would come if he could.

Despite their rift over Elena, things had changed enough between him and Damon that he knew he could rely on his brother to rescue him. He had saved him before, after all , when they fought Katherine, when they fought Klaus. There was something rock solid between them now, something that wasn't there a year ago, or in the hundreds of years before that. He closed his eyes and heard himself give a dry, painful chuckle. It seemed like an inopportune moment to start having revelations about his own family issues.

"So," Ethan said chattily, returning to his side and pulling up a chair, "we were talking about the equinox."

"Yes," Stefan said, an acid bite to his tone.

He wasn't going to let Ethan see how he was yearning toward the door, expectant. He needed to keep his cool, so that Damon could have the element of surprise on his side.

He should keep Ethan talking, keep him distracted in case Damon came, so he fixed an expression of interest on his face and looked at Ethan attentively.

"At the time of the equinox, when day and night are perfectly balanced, the line between life and death is at its most weak and permeable. This is the time when spirits can cross between the worlds," Ethan began dramatically, moving one hand in a wide sweep.

Stefan sighed. "I know that, Ethan," he said impatiently.

"Just cut to the chase." He might have to keep Ethan distracted, but surely he didn't have to feed his ego.

Ethan dropped his hand. "You remember Klaus, don't you?" he asked. "The originator of your bloodline? We're resurrecting him. With him at the head of our ranks, we'll be invincible."

Everything went still for a moment, as if Stefan's slow-beating heart had final y stopped. Then he sucked in a breath. He felt as if Ethan had punched him in the face. He couldn't speak for a moment. When he could, he gasped,

"Klaus? Klaus the vampire who..." He couldn't even finish the sentence. His mind was full of Klaus: the Old One, the Original vampire, the mad man. The vampire who had controlled lightning, who had bragged that he had not been made, that he just was. In Klaus's earliest memories, he had told Stefan, he carried a bronze axe; he was a barbarian at the gate, among those who destroyed the Roman Empire. He claimed that he began the race of vampires.

Klaus had held Elena's spirit hostage and tortured innocent Vickie Bennett to death for fun. He turned Katherine, first into a vampire, then into a cruel doll instead of a person, changed her until she was vicious and mindless, eager only to torment those she once loved.

Stefan, Damon, and Elena killed him at last, but it was nearly impossible, would have been impossible without the spirits of a battalion of unquiet ghosts from the Civil War tied to the blood-soaked battlegrounds of Fell's Church.

"Klaus who made the vampire who made you," Ethan said cheerfully. "It was another of his descendants who I found in Europe this summer on my trip abroad. I convinced her to turn me into a vampire. She taught me some tricks, too, like how to use vervain, and how lapis lazuli can protect us from the sun. I put lapis lazuli in the pins we wear now, so all the members have it on them at all times. She was very helpful, this vampire who changed me. And she told me all about Klaus." He smiled warmly at Stefan again. "See, you should like me, Stefan. We're practically cousins." Stefan shut his eyes for a moment. "Klaus was insane," he tried to explain. "He won't work with you, he'll destroy you."

Ethan sighed. "I really think I can work it out with him, though," he said. "I'm very persuasive. And I'm offering him soldiers. I hear he likes war. There's no reason for him to turn us down; we want to give him everything he wants." He paused and looked at Stefan, still smiling, but there was a note now in that wide smile that Stefan didn't like, a false innocence. Whatever Ethan was going to ask Stefan now, he already knew the answer. "Does this mean you're not interested in joining our army, cousin?" he asked with mock surprise.

Gritting his teeth, Stefan strained against the ropes once more, but they didn't budge. He glared up at Ethan. "I won't help you," he said. "Never."

Ethan came closer, bent down until his face was level with Stefan's. "But you will help," he said lightly, a trace of self-satisfaction in his eyes. "Whether you want to or not.

See, what I need most of all to bring back Klaus is blood." He ran his hands through his curls, shaking his head. "It's always blood for this kind of thing, have you noticed?" he added.

"Blood?" asked Stefan uneasily. Young vampires were never sane, in his opinion - the initial rush of new senses and Powers were enough to bewilder anyone. He was starting to think, though, that Ethan's grasp on sanity might not have been that strong to begin with. He'd convinced someone to turn him into a vampire?

"The blood of his descendants, specifically." Ethan nodded smugly. "That's why I was so delighted to find that you were right here on campus. I made a hobby of tracking down the descendants of Klaus this summer, after I'd talked the first one I met into changing me into what she was.

Some of them gave me blood willingly, when they heard what I wanted to do. Not all of Klaus's descendants are as ungrateful as you. I only need a little more, and then I'll have enough. Yours, of course," and his eyes flicked up toward the door that Stefan had been surreptitiously watching all this time, waiting for Damon, "and your brother's. I assume he'll be here any minute?"

Stefan's heart plummeted, and he stared openly at the door. Damon, please stay away, he thought desperately.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Bonnie didn't have her keys. She knew exactly where they were, but that didn't do her much good: they were lying on the bedside table next to Zander's neat plain single bed.

She cursed and kicked at the door, tears running down her face. How was she going to get any of her stuff back?

Some guy opened the front door of the building for her.

"Jeez, relax," he said, but Bonnie had already pushed past him and was running up the stairs to her room.

Please let them be here, she thought, clinging to the banister, please. She had no doubt that Elena and Meredith would comfort her, would help her, no matter what she had said to them during their fight. They would help Bonnie figure out what to do.

But they might be out. And she'd have no idea where to find Meredith and Elena, no idea where they spent their free time these days.

How had she grown so far apart from her best friends?

Bonnie wondered, wiping her hands across her cheeks, smearing away her tears and snot. Why had she treated them so badly? They were just trying to protect her. And they were right about Zander; they were so right. She snuffled miserably.

When she reached the top of the stairs, Bonnie banged on their room door with her fist, hearing quick movement inside. They were home. Thank God.

"Bonnie?" Meredith said, startled, when she opened the door, and then, "Oh, Bonnie," as Bonnie threw herself, sobbing, into Meredith's arms. Meredith hugged her, tight and fierce, and, for the first time since she had jumped away from Zander and run for the fire escape, Bonnie felt safe.

"What's the matter, Bonnie? What happened?" Elena was behind Meredith, peering at her anxiously, and part of Bonnie noticed that Elena's own white and startled face was marked with tears. She was interrupting something, but Bonnie couldn't focus on that now.

Past Elena, she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her hair stood out around her face in a wild red cloud, her eyes were glassy, and her pale face was smeared with dirt and tears. I look, Bonnie thought with a semihysterical silent laugh, like I was chased by werewolves.

"Werewolves," she wailed as Meredith pulled her into the room. "They're all werewolves."

"What are you - " Meredith broke off. "Bonnie, do you mean Zander and his friends? They're werewolves?" Bonnie nodded furiously, burying her face against Meredith's shoulder. Meredith pushed her back and looked carefully into her eyes. "Are you sure, Bonnie?" she asked gently. She looked to Elena, and they both turned and glanced out the window at the sky. "Did you see them change? It's not the full moon yet."

"No," Bonnie said. She tried to catch her breath, taking harsh sobbing gulps of air. "Zander told me. And then - oh, Meredith, it was so scary - I ran, and they chased me." She explained what happened, on the roof and on the lawns of the college.

Meredith and Elena looked at each other quizzically, then back at Bonnie. "Why did he tell you?" Elena asked.

"He couldn't have thought you would have a good reaction to the news; it would have been easier to keep hiding it." Bonnie shook her head helplessly.

Meredith arched an ironic eyebrow at her. "Even monsters can fall in love," she said. "I thought you knew that, Elena." She glanced at her hunting stave, leaning against the foot of her bed. "When the full moon comes, now I'll know what to look for."

Bonnie stared at her in horror. "You're not going to hunt them, are you?" It was a stupid question, she knew. If Zander and his friends really were behind the murders and disappearances on campus, Meredith had to hunt them. It was her responsibility. All of their responsibilities, really, because if they were the only ones who knew the truth, they were the only ones who could keep everyone else safe.

But Zander, something inside her howled in pain. Not Zander...

"None of the attacks occurred during a full moon," Elena said thoughtfully, and Meredith and Bonnie both blinked at her.

"That's true," Meredith agreed, frowning as she thought back. "I don't know how we didn't realize that before.

Bonnie," she said. "Think carefully before you answer this question. You've been spending a lot of time with Zander and his friends. Did anything about them make you think they might hurt someone, really hurt them, when they're not in wolf form?"

"No!" Bonnie said automatically. Then she stopped and thought and said, more slowly, "No, I don't think so.

Zander's really kind, I don't think he could fake that. Not all the time. They play rough, but I've never seen them fight with anyone except one another. And even with one another, they're not really fighting, just more sort of messing around."

"We know what you mean," Meredith said dryly. "We've seen it."

Elena tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. "The disappearances weren't during the full moon, either," she said thoughtfully. "Although I guess they could have been taking people and holding them prisoner, planning to kill them when they were in wolf form later, but that doesn't - I mean, I don't have much werewolf experience besides Tyler, but - it doesn't sound very wolfy to me. Too sterile, sort of."

"But..." Bonnie sank down on her bed. "You think there's a chance Zander and his friends might not be the killers?

Then who are the killers?" She felt bewildered.

Meredith and Elena exchanged a grim glance. "You wouldn't believe some of the stuff that happens on this campus," Elena said. "We'll fill you in." Bonnie rubbed her face with her hands. "Zander told me he was a good werewolf," she said. "That he didn't hurt people. Is that possible? Is there even such a thing as a good werewolf?"

Meredith and Elena sat down next to her, one on each side, and wrapped their arms around her. "Maybe?" Elena said. "I real y hope so, Bonnie. For your sake." Bonnie sighed and cuddled closer to them, resting her head on Meredith's shoulder. "I need to think about all this," she said. "At least I'm not alone. I'm so glad I have you guys. I'm sorry we fought."

Elena and Meredith both hugged her more tightly.

"You've always got us," Elena promised.

A wild hammering came at the door.

Elena glanced at Bonnie, who tensed visibly on her bed but kept her hands over her face, and then at Meredith, who nodded firmly to her and climbed to her feet, reaching for her stave. It had occurred to both of them that, if Zander wanted to talk to Bonnie, he knew exactly where she lived.

Elena flung open the door, and Matt tumbled in. He was wearing a long black hooded robe, and his eyes were frantic as he gasped for breath.

"Matt?" she said in surprise, and looked to Meredith, who gave a tiny shrug and put her stave back down.

"What's the matter? And what are you wearing?" He grabbed Elena by the shoulders, holding her too tightly. "Stefan's in danger," he said, and she froze. "The Vitale Society - they're vampires. Stefan saved me, but he can't fight them all ." He quickly explained what happened in the secret chamber below the library, how Stefan came to his rescue, then sent him to get help. "We don't have much time," he finished. "They're killing - they're changing all the pledges into vampires. I don't even know what Ethan's got planned for Stefan. We have to go back. And we need Damon."

Meredith picked up her stave again and, grim faced, was taking her satchel of weapons from her closet. Bonnie was on her feet, too, fists clenched, jaw firm.

"I'll call Damon," Elena said, picking up her phone.

Damon had dropped her off at the dorm after walking her back from James's house, but he was probably still nearby.

Stefan in danger. If he ... if anything happened to him, if something happened while they were apart, while he was still hurt and it was her fault, Elena would never forgive herself. She wouldn't deserve to be forgiven.

Guilt was like a knife in her stomach. How could she have hurt Stefan like that? She was attracted to Damon, sure, even loved him, but she'd never had any question that Stefan was her true love. And she had broken his heart.

She'd do anything to save Stefan. She'd die for him if she had to. And, as she listened to the ringing on the other end of the line and waited for Damon to pick up, she realized that there was no question in her mind that Damon would do anything to save Stefan, too.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Ethan had Chloe, was holding her tightly in his arms like a parody of a lover's embrace. Matt moaned deep in his throat and strained toward her, but he couldn't move, couldn't even open his mouth to shout. Chloe's large brown eyes were fixed on his, and they were filled with terror. As Ethan bent his head to her neck, Matt held her gaze and tried to send Chloe a comforting message with his eyes.

It's okay, Chloe, he thought. Please, it won't hurt for long. Be strong. Chloe whimpered, frozen, her eyes on Matt's as if his steady gaze was the only thing keeping her from falling to pieces.

Keeping his eyes on hers and his breathing slow, Matt tried to emanate calmness, tried to soothe Chloe, as his mind worked frantically. Including Ethan, there were fifteen Vitales. All of them vampires. The other Vitales were watching quietly from behind the altar, letting Ethan take the lead and sire the pledges.

The bodies of four of the pledges lay at Ethan's feet now. They'd be out of the picture for several hours at least, their bodies going through the transition that would take them from corpses to vampires. Including Matt and Chloe, there were six pledges left. The longer Matt waited to fight back, the worse the odds would get.

But what could Matt do? If only he could break this involuntary still ness, if only he weren't a helpless prisoner.

He tried again to move, this time focusing al his strength on lifting his right arm. His muscles tensed with effort, but after about thirty seconds of trying, he stopped in disgust. He was exhausting himself, and he wasn't moving an inch.

Whatever held him was strong.

But if he could figure out a way to get free, then he'd be able to grab a torch from the wall , maybe. Beneath his robe, his pocket knife weighed heavily in his pants pocket.

Vampires burned. Cutting off their heads would kill them. If he could just hold the vampires off long enough to pull Chloe and whichever other pledges he could grab out of the room, then he could come back later with reinforcements and fight them with a chance at winning.

But if he couldn't break this spell or compulsion that was holding him in place, any plan he came up with would be useless.

Ethan raised his head from Chloe's neck, his long sharp teeth pulling out of her throat, and licked gently at the red blood trickling from the wound in her neck. "I know, sweetheart," he murmured, "but it's only for a moment. And then we'll live forever." Chloe's eyes glazed over and fluttered shut, but she was still breathing, still alive. There was still a chance for her.

At Ethan's feet, Anna stirred and moaned. As Matt watched in horror, her eyes snapped open, and she looked up at Ethan, her expression confused but adoring.

No! Matt thought. It's too soon!

As if he had caught the thought, Ethan turned to Matt and winked. "The herbs in the mixture you all drank worked to thin your blood and speed up your metabolism," he said, his voice as casual and friendly as if they were chatting in the cafeteria. "I wasn't sure if it would work, but it looks like it does. Makes the transition go a lot faster." His smile widened. "I'm a biochem major, you know." Ethan's mouth was smeared with blood, and Matt shuddered but couldn't look away from the golden eyes that held his.

It's possible, Matt thought for the first time, that I might not survive this. His stomach rolled with nausea. He really didn't want to become a vampire.

If the newly transformed pledges were waking up so soon, the already slim odds would quickly become impossible. New vampires, he remembered from Elena's transformation back in the winter, awoke vicious, unreasoning, hungry, and fanatically committed to the vampire who had changed them.

Ethan lowered his head to bite at Chloe's neck again, as Anna climbed to her feet with a fluid, inhuman grace. On the other side of the altar, Stuart was now beginning to stir, one long leg shifting restlessly against the dark wood of the floor.

His throat burning with unvoiced sobs of frustration, Matt felt his last flame of hope begin to flicker and die. There was no escape.

Suddenly, the door at the far end of the chamber burst inward, and Stefan swept in.

Ethan looked up in surprise, but before he or the other vampires could move, Stefan flew across the chamber and ripped Chloe from Ethan's arms. She fell flat in front of the altar, blood running down her neck. Matt couldn't tell if she was still breathing, still clinging to life as a human, or not.

Stefan grabbed Ethan by his long robe and slammed him against the wall . He shook the curly-haired vampire as easily as a dog might shake a rat.

For a moment, the terrible fear that held Matt in its grip loosened. Stefan knew what was happening, Stefan had found him. Stefan would save them all .

The other Vitales were racing toward Stefan now as he struggled with Ethan, their long robes flowing behind them as they smoothly came forward, moving as one.

Stefan was without a doubt much stronger than any of them. He flung a black-clad female vampire - the one who had handed him the goblet, Matt thought - away from him easily, and she sailed across the chamber as if she was no heavier than a rag doll , landing in a crumpled heap against the opposite wall . Smiling viciously, Stefan tore at the throat of another with his teeth, and she fell to the ground and lay still .

But there were so many of them, and only one of Stefan.

After just a few minutes of watching the fight, Matt could see that it was hopeless, and his heart sank. Stefan was much older, and much stronger, than any other vampire in the room, but together they outweighed him. The tide of the battle was turning, and they were overwhelming him through the sheer strength of their numbers. Ethan was free of him now, straightening his robes, and four of the Vitale vampires, working together, pinned Stefan's arms behind him. Anna, her eyes shining, snapped at him viciously.

Ethan grabbed a torch from the wall behind him and eyed Stefan speculatively, absently licking at the blood on the back of his hand. "You had your chance, Stefan," he said, smiling.

Stefan stopped struggling and hung limp between the vampires holding his arms. "Wait," he said, looking up at Ethan. "You wanted me to join you. You begged me to join you. Do you still want me?"

Ethan tilted his head thoughtfully, his golden eyes bright.

"I do," he said. "But what can you tell me that'll make me believe you want to join us?"

Stefan licked his lips. "Let Matt go. If you let him leave safely, I'll stay in his place." He paused. "On my honor."

"Done," Ethan said immediately. He flicked his fingers in the air without taking his eyes from Stefan, and Matt staggered, suddenly released from the compulsion that had held him in place.

Matt sucked in one long breath and then ran straight for the altar and Chloe. Maybe it wasn't too late. He could still save her.

"Stop." Ethan's voice cracked commandingly across the room. Matt froze in place, once again unable to move.

Ethan glared at him. "You do not help. You do not fight," he said coldly. "You go."

Matt looked imploringly at Stefan. Surely he wasn't just supposed to leave, to abandon Chloe and Stefan and the others to the Vitale vampires. Stefan gazed back at him, his features rigid. "Sorry, Matt," he said flatly. "The one thing I've learned over the years is that sometimes you have to surrender. The best thing you can do now is just leave. I'll be okay."

And then, jarringly intrusive and sudden in Matt's head was Stefan's voice. Damon, he said fiercely. Get Damon.

Matt gulped and, as Ethan's compulsion released him once more, nodded slowly, trying to look defeated while still signaling to Stefan with his eyes that his message had been received.

He couldn't look at the other pledges. No matter how much he hurried, some or all of them would die before he returned. Maybe Stefan would be able to save some of them. Maybe. Maybe he would be able to save Chloe.

His heart pounding with terror, his head spinning with fear, Matt ran for the exit and for help. He didn't look back.

Chapter Thirty-Six

When he opened his door and saw Elena, James's face crumpled, just for a fraction of a second, and he stepped backward, as if he was considering closing the door in her face. Then he seemed to think better of it, and he opened it wider, his face creasing into its familiar smile.

"Why, Elena," he said, "My dear, I hardly expected a visitor at this hour. I'm afraid this isn't the best time." He cleared his throat. "I'd be delighted to see you at school, during office hours. Mondays and Fridays, remember?

Now, if you'll excuse me." And, still smiling gently, he shuffled forward and did try to close the door in her face.

But Elena swung her hand up and stopped him. "Wait," she said. "James, I know you didn't want to talk to me about the pins, but it's important. I need to find out more about the Vitale Society."

His bright black eyes glanced toward her and away, as if embarrassed. "Yes, Well," he said, "the problem is of course that unchaperoned solo visits from a student - any student, you understand, my dear, no reflection on you personally - to a professor's home are, er, frowned upon.

The wicked world we live in, you know," and, with a soft chuckle, he pushed firmly against the door. "There are times and places."

Elena pushed back. "I don't believe for a minute that you're trying to make me go away because my visit is inappropriate," she said flatly. "You can't get rid of me that easily. People are in danger, James.

"I know you and my parents were part of the Vitale Society," Elena continued doggedly. "I need you to tell me whatever it is that you've been hiding about those days. I think the Vitale is tied to the murders and disappearances on campus, and we have to stop it. You're my only lead at this point, James." He hesitated, his eyes watering with emotion, and Elena fixed him with her gaze. "More people are going to die," she said harshly, "but you might be able to save them. Will you?"

James visibly wavered and then seemed to give in all at once, his shoulders dropping. "I don't know if anything I can tell you will help. I don't know anything about the murders.

But you'd better come in," he said, and led the way down the hall and through his house. The kitchen was shining clean, with spotless white surfaces. Copper pots, woven baskets, and cheery red dishcloths and towels hung from hooks and were arranged on top of cupboards. Framed prints of fruits and vegetables hung on the walls at intervals.

James sat her down at the table, then busied himself with making her a cup of tea.

Elena waited patiently until he finally settled across from her, with cups of tea in front of them both. "Milk?" he asked fussily, handing her the jug, without meeting her eyes.

"Sugar?"

"Thank you," Elena said. Then she leaned across the table and placed her hand on his, keeping it there until he raised his eyes to look at her. "Tell me," she said simply.

"I don't know anything about the murders," James said again. "Believe me, I wouldn't have kept this secret if I thought anyone was in danger from it." Elena nodded. "I know you wouldn't," she said. "Even if there isn't a connection, if the secret is about my parents, I deserve to know," she told him.

James sighed, a long breathy sound. "This was all a long time ago, you understand," he said. "We were young and a bit naive. The Vitale Society was a force for good, back then. We worshipped natural spirits and drew our energy from the sacred Earth. We were a positive force in the community, interested principally in love and peace and creativity. We served others. I hear that the Vitale Society has changed since those days, that darker elements have taken it over. But I don't know much about them now. I haven't been involved with the Vitale for years, not since the events I am about to recount to you."

Elena sipped her tea and waited. James's eyes flew to her face, almost shyly, then fixed back on the table. "One day," he said slowly, "a strange man came to one of our secret meetings. He was - " James closed his eyes and shivered. "I had never seen a being of such pure power, or one who radiated such a feeling of peace and love. We, all of us, had no doubt that we were in the presence of an angel. He called himself a Guardian." Involuntarily, Elena sucked a breath through her teeth, hissing. James's eyes snapped open, and he gave her a long look. "You know them?" At her nod, he shrugged a little. "Well, you can imagine how he affected us."

"What did the Guardian want?" Elena asked, her stomach dropping. She had met Guardians, and she hadn't liked them. It was Guardians who had, coldly and efficiently, refused to bring Damon back to life when he had died in the Dark Dimension. And it was Guardians who had caused the car accident that killed her parents in an attempt to kill Elena so that they could recruit her to their ranks. All the Guardians she'd met were female, though; she hadn't even known there were male Guardians as Well.

Elena knew that, lovely as the Guardians appeared to be, they were not angels, were not on the side of Good or, for that matter, the side of Evil. They just believed in Order.

They could be very dangerous.

James looked at her briefly, then fiddled with the tea cup and napkin in front of him. "Would you like a scone?" he asked. She shook her head and stared at him, and he sighed again. "You have to understand that your parents were very young. Idealistic."

Elena had the sinking feeling that she was going to find out something deeply unpleasant. "Go on," she said.

Instead of continuing, though, James folded his napkin into tiny, precise squares, smaller and smaller, until Elena cleared her throat. Then he began again. "The Guardian told us that there was a need for a new kind of Guardian.

One who would be a mortal, on Earth, and who would possess special powers that she would need to maintain the balance between good and evil supernatural forces on Earth. Over the course of his visit, Elizabeth and Thomas, who were young and brilliant and good and deeply in love, and who had bright futures ahead of them, were chosen to be the parents of this mortal Guardian." He let the napkin unfold itself in his hands and looked at Elena meaningfully. It took her a moment to catch on.

"Me? Are you kidding? I'm not - " She shut her mouth. "I have enough problems," she said flatly. She paused as something he said sank in. "Wait, why do you think my parents were being naive?" she asked sharply. "What did they do?"

James drank a swallow of tea. "Frankly, I think I need a little something in this before I continue," he said. "I've kept this secret for a long time, and I still have to tell you the worst part." He got up and rummaged around in one of the cupboards, eventually pulling out a small bottle full of amber liquid. He held it out to Elena questioningly, but she shook her head. She was pretty certain she would need her head clear for the rest of this conversation. He poured a generous amount into his own cup.

"So," he said, sitting down again. Elena could tell that he was still anxious, but also that he was beginning to enjoy telling the story. He was a natural gossip - the way he taught history was as gossip about the past - and this was even more familiar for him, because it was gossip about Elena's parents, people they both had known. "Thomas and Elizabeth were both terrifically flattered, of course."

"And..." Elena prompted.

James laced his fingers across his stomach and watched her, his eyes shadowed. "They agreed that, when the child was twelve years old, they would give her up. The Guardians would take her away, and they would never see her again."

Elena was suddenly very cold. Her parents had raised her intending to give her away? She felt like all her childhood memories were shattering. In an instant, James was at her side. "Breathe," he said gently.

Gasping, Elena shut her eyes and concentrated on inhaling and exhaling deep breaths. That her parents, her beloved parents, had taken her on as some kind of temporary project, was devastating. She had never doubted their love until now.

She had to know the whole truth.

"Go on."

"Honestly, that was the end of my friendship with your parents, and the end of my involvement with the Vitale Society," James said, taking another long drink of his whiskey-laced tea. "I couldn't believe that no one else in the Society saw the problem with raising a child to the cusp of adolescence and then giving her up forever, and I couldn't believe that your parents - who I knew to be loving, intelligent people - would agree to such a plan. We graduated and went our separate ways, and I didn't hear from your parents again for more than twelve years."

"You heard from them then?" Elena asked quietly.

"Your father called me. The Guardians had contacted them, ready to take you away. But Thomas and Elizabeth wouldn't let you go." James smiled sadly. "They loved you too much. They didn't think you were ready to leave home -

you were only a child. They realized that they had agreed too quickly to the Guardians' plan, that they didn't really know what was in store for you, and that they couldn't let their daughter go without knowing for certain that it was the best thing for her. So Thomas asked for my help protecting you. They knew I had dabbled in sorcery when I was in college" - he waved his hand modestly when Elena looked up at him - "only small magics, and I had mostly given them up by then. But he and Elizabeth were desperate. So I gathered what knowledge I could, intending to help them." He paused, and a gloom settled over his face.

"Unfortunately, I was too late. A few days after our conversation, before I even set out for Fell's Church, your parents were both killed in a car accident. I checked up on you over the years, but it didn't seem like the Guardians had gotten their hands on you. And now, here you are. I don't think it's a coincidence."

"The Guardians killed my parents," Elena said dully. "I knew it, but I didn't know... I thought it was an accident." She was struggling to wrap her mind around the secrets of her childhood. At least in the end her parents hadn't been able to give her away. They had loved her, as she had thought.

"They tend to get what they want," James said.

"Why didn't they take me then?" Elena asked.

James shook his head. "I don't know. But I think there's a reason you're at Dalcrest now, where it began for you and for your parents. I think that some kind of task will arise here, and you'll come into your Powers."

"A task?" Elena asked. "But I had Powers once, and the Guardians took them away." They had mercilessly stripped her of her Wings and al her abilities. Were they going to return them when the time was right?

James sighed and shrugged helplessly. "Plans sometimes have curious ways of presenting themselves, even those that are fated from the start," he said. "Maybe these disappearances are the first sign of it. I don't know, though. As I told the class, Dalcrest is the hub of a lot of paranormal activity. I tend to think that, when your task presents itself, you'll know."

"But I'm not..." Elena gulped. "I don't understand what this all means. I just want to be a normal girl. I thought I could now. Here."

James reached across the table and patted her hand, his eyes deep Wells of sympathy. "I'm so sorry, my dear," he said. "I didn't want to be the one to burden you with this. But I will give you any help I can. Thomas and Elizabeth would have wanted that."

Elena felt like she couldn't breathe. She had to get out of this cozy kitchen, away from James's avid, concerned eyes. "Thank you," she said, hurriedly pushing her chair away from the table and getting up. "I have to go now, though. I do appreciate your telling me all this, but I need to think."

He fussed around her all the way to the front door, clearly unsure of whether to let her go, and Elena was almost ready to scream by the time she reached the porch.

"Thank you," she said again. "Good-bye." She walked quickly away without looking back, her shoes clacking against the cement of the sidewalk. When she was out of sight of James's house, Damon slipped from the shadows to join her. Elena held her head high, blinking away the tears that had pooled in her eyes. For now, this secret would be hers.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Initiation night for the newest members of the Vitale Society had arrived at last. The cavernous room was lit only by golden candlelight from long tapers placed around the space and by the fire of high-flaming torches against the walls. In the flickering light, the animals carved in the wood of the pillars and arches almost seemed to be moving.

Matt, dressed in a dark hooded robe like the other initiates, gazed around proudly. They'd worked hard, and the room looked amazing.

At the front of the room, beneath the highest arch, a long table had been placed, draped in a heavy red satin cloth and looking like some kind of altar. In the center of the table sat a huge deep stone bowl, almost like a baptismal font, and around it roses and orchids were set. More flowers had been scattered on the floor, and the scent of the crushed blossoms underfoot was so strong that it was dizzying. The pledges were lined up, evenly spaced, before the altar.

As if she'd picked up on his pride at how everything had turned out, Chloe pushed her dark hood back a bit and leaned toward him to mutter, "Pretty fabulous, huh?" Matt smiled at her. So what if she was dating someone else? He still liked her. He wanted to stay friends, even if that was all there could be between them.

He tugged at his robe self-consciously; the fabric was heavy, and he didn't like the way it blocked his peripheral vision.

The current masked members of the Vitale Society wove silently among the pledges, handing out goblets full of some kind of liquid. Matt sniffed his and smelled ginger and chamomile as Wellas less familiar scents: so this was where the herbs had been used.

He smiled at the girl who gave it to him, but got no response. Her eyes behind the mask slid over him neutral y, and she moved on. Once he was a full member of the Vitale Society, he would know who these current members were, would see them without their masks. He sipped from his goblet and grimaced: it tasted strange and bitter.

The soft rustlings of cloaked figures moving across the floor were silenced as the last of the goblets was handed out and the masked Vitales quietly retreated under the arch behind the altar to watch. Ethan stepped forward, up to the altar, and pushed back his hood.

"Welcome," he said, holding out his hands to the assembled pledges. "Welcome to true power at last." The candlelight flickered over his face, twisting it into something unfamiliar and almost sinister. Matt twitched nervously and took another swallow of the bitter herbal mixture.

"A toast!" Ethan called. He raised his own goblet, and before him, the pledges raised theirs. He hesitated for a moment, then said, "To moving beyond the veil and discovering the truth."

Matt raised his goblet and drained it with the other pledges. The mixture left a gritty feeling on his tongue, and he scraped it absently against his teeth.

Ethan looked around at the pledges and smiled, locking gazes with one after another. "You've all worked so hard," he said affectionately. "Each of you has reached his or her personal peak of intelligence, strength, and leadership ability now. Together, you are a force to be reckoned with. You have been perfected."

Matt managed to politely restrain himself from rolling his eyes. It was nice to be praised, of course, but sometimes Ethan was a little too over the top: perfected? Matt doubted it was even possible. It seemed to him that you could always strive to be a little more, or a little less, something.

You could always wish to be better. But even if he could, after al , be perfected, he suspected that it would take more than a few obstacle courses and group problem-solving exercises to do it.

"And now it is time to at last discover your purpose," Ethan continued. "Time to complete the final stage in your transformation from ordinary students into true avatars of power." He took a clean and shining silver cup from the altar and dipped it into the deep stone bowl in front of him.

"With every step forward in evolution, there must be some sacrifice. I regret any pain this will cause you. Be comforted by the knowledge that al suffering is temporary. Anna, step forward."

There was a slight uneasy stirring among the pledges.

This talk of suffering and sacrifice was different than Ethan's usual emphasis on honor and power. Matt frowned.

Something was wrong here.

But Anna, looking tiny in her long robe, walked without hesitation up to the altar and pushed back her hood.

"Drink of me," Ethan said, handing her the silver cup.

Anna blinked uncertainly and then, her eyes on Ethan, tipped back her head and drained the cup. As she handed it back to Ethan, she licked her lips automatically, and Matt tried to peer more closely at her. In the flickering candlelight, her lips looked unnatural y red and slick.

Then Ethan led her around the side of the altar and into his arms. He smiled, and his face twisted, his eyes dilating and his lips pulling back in a snarl. His teeth looked so long, so sharp. Matt tried to shout a warning but realized with horror that he couldn't move his lips, couldn't draw the breath to call out.

He knew, suddenly, that he had been a fool.

Ethan sank his fangs deep into Anna's neck. Matt strained, trying to run toward them, to attack Ethan and throw him away from Anna. But he couldn't move at all . He must be under some kind of compulsion. Or perhaps something in the drink, some magic ingredient, had made them al docile and still . He watched helplessly as Anna struggled for a few moments, then went limp, her eyes rolling back in her head.

Unceremoniously, Ethan let her body drop to the ground. "Don't be afraid," he said kindly, gazing around at the horrified, frozen pledges. "All of us" - he gestured toward the silent, masked Vitale behind him - "went through this initiation recently. You must brace yourself to suffer what is only a small , temporary death, and then you will be one of us, a true Vitale. Never growing old, never dying.

Powerful forever."

Sharp white teeth and golden eyes shining in the candlelight, Ethan reached out toward the next pledge as Matt struggled again to shout, to fight. Ethan continued,

"Stuart, step forward."

Elena smelled so good, rich and sweet like an exotic ripe fruit. Damon wanted to simply bury his head in the soft skin at the crook of her neck and just inhale her for a decade or two. Snaking his arm through hers, he pulled her closer.

"You can't come in with me," she told him for the second time. "I might be able to get James to talk to me because it's a question about my parents, but I don't think he'll tell me anything if someone else is there. Whatever the truth is about the Vitale Society and my parents, I think he's embarrassed about it. Or afraid, or ... something." Without paying attention to what she was doing, Elena shifted her grip and held on to Damon's arm more firmly.

"Fine," Damon said stubbornly. "I'll wait outside. I won't let him see me. But you're not to walk across campus at night by yourself. It's not safe."

"Yes, Damon," Elena said in a convincing imitation of meekness, and rested her head on his shoulder. The lemony scent of her shampoo mixed with the more essential Elena smell of her. Damon sighed with contentment.

She cared for him, he knew that, and Stefan had taken himself out of the picture. She was still young, his princess, and a human heart could heal. Maybe, with Stefan gone, she would final y see how much closer she was, mind and soul, to Damon, how perfectly they fit together.

In any case, she was his for now. He lifted his free hand and stroked her head, her silky hair pliant beneath his fingers, and smiled.

The professor's house was barely off campus, just across the street from the gilded entrance gates. They'd almost reached the edge of campus when a familiar presence that had been lurking nearby at last came very close.

Damon wheeled to scan the shadows, pulling Elena with him.

"What is it?" Elena said, alarmed.

Come out, Damon thought with exasperation, sending his silent message toward the thickest shadows at the base of a crowd of oak trees. You know you can't hide from me.

One dark shadow detached itself from the rest, stepping forward on the path. Stefan simply gazed at the ground, shoulders slumped, his hands loose and open by his sides. Elena gasped, a small hurt sound.

Stefan looked terrible, Damon thought, not without sympathy. His face seemed hollow and strained, his cheekbones more prominent than usual, and Damon would have bet that he wasn't feeding properly. Damon felt a twinge of disquiet. He didn't take pleasure in causing his brother pain. Not anymore.

"Well?" Damon said, raising his eyebrows.

Stefan glanced up at him. I don't want to fight with you, Damon, he said silently.

So don't, Damon shot back at him, and Stefan's mouth twitched in a half smile of acknowledgment.

"Stefan," Elena said suddenly, sounding like the word had been jerked out of her. "Please, Stefan." Stefan stared down at the path under his feet, not meeting her eyes. "I sensed you were nearby, Elena, and I felt your anxiety," he said wearily. "I thought you might have been in trouble. I'm sorry, I was mistaken. I shouldn't have come."

Elena stiffened, and her long dark lashes fell over her eyes, hiding, Damon was almost sure, the beginnings of tears.

A long silence stretched between them. Finally, irritated by the tension, Damon made an effort to ease it. "So," he said casually, "we broke into the campus security office last night."

Stefan looked up with a flicker of interest. "Oh? Did you find anything useful?"

"Crime scene photos, but they weren't very helpful," Damon said, shrugging. "The folders were marked with black Vs, so we're trying to figure out what that means.

Elena's going to talk to her professor about the Vitale Society, see if it could have anything to do with them."

"The... Vitale Society?" Stefan said hesitantly.

Damon waved a hand dismissively. "A secret society from back in the day when Elena's parents were here," he said. "Who knows? It may be nothing."

Drawing a hand across his face, Stefan seemed to be thinking hard. "Oh, no," he muttered. Then, looking at Elena for the first time, he asked, "Where's Matt?"

"Matt?" Elena echoed, startled out of her wistful contemplation of Stefan. "Um, I think he had some kind of meeting tonight. Football stuff, maybe?"

"I have to go," Stefan said tightly, and was immediately gone. With his enhanced abilities, Damon could hear Stefan's light footsteps racing away. But to Elena, he knew, Stefan had been nothing but a silently vanishing blur.

Elena turned to Damon, her face crumpling in what he recognized as a prelude to more tears. "Why would he follow me if he doesn't want to talk to me?" she said, her voice hoarse with sorrow.

Damon gritted his teeth. He was trying hard to be patient, to wait for Elena to give him her heart, but she kept thinking of Stefan. "He told you," he said, keeping his voice even. "He wants to make sure you're safe, but he doesn't want to be with you. But I do." Firmly recapturing her arm with his, he tugged her lightly forward. "Shall we?"