Author's note: Hmm. Okay, this may sound kinda weird, but others of you who write may be able to relate (or you may just think I'm nuts; it could go either way): Even though you spend a lot of time plotting a story and being inside a character's head space, sometimes they still surprise you. Elijah took this whole thing a little harder than I expected him to. I didn't anticipate that tonal shift. As always, though, I'm anxious to see where he takes me. :-)
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Blood.
It was the first thing that crept into his awareness. His throat convulsed on it, cold and thick, and a little stale to the taste. But it jump-started his heart, filling and soothing the dry, ragged veins as it flowed through his system. Six swallows, seven, then he pushed it away and sat up, opening his eyes.
He was back in the Salvatore house, once again on the basement floor. And he wasn’t alone.
Andie Starr crouched next to him, holding the blood bag from which she'd just fed him. “More?” she offered.
Before she could blink, he had her pinned to the wall with a hand on her throat and his body weight pressed against hers, knocking the bag out of her hand to splash on the floor a few feet away. She held herself still, even relaxed, making no effort to struggle lest she risk inciting him further. Letting the wall and his hand support her weight, she returned his gaze calmly, and waited.
“Explain,” he growled, his face close to hers.
Andie rolled her eyes down to his forearm, then back to his face, and raised an eyebrow. Elijah relaxed his grip, but didn’t let go of her completely.
She cleared her throat. “Easy, tiger. If I weren’t here to help you, I wouldn’t be feeding you, and I wouldn’t have pulled that out.” She tilted her head to indicate the dagger, lying on the floor next to the spot where his body had lain.
Reluctantly conceding the point, he removed his hand from her and stepped back a couple of paces, careful to keep himself between her and the weapon. Andie rubbed at her neck and slid along the wall toward the door, which had something hanging from it.
“How long?” he rasped out.
“Two weeks, or thereabouts.” She grabbed the thing from the door as he stifled an oath. “There’s a lot to catch you up on." Her tone brightened considerably. "But first, maybe you’d like to, oh, I don’t know, put some pants on or something?” She held up what turned out to be a garment bag. “Not that I don’t enjoy the view…”
Elijah glanced down. He was naked. He took stock of the room as he accepted and unzipped the bag. Charred remnants of what he presumed to have been his clothing littered the grey stone. That, and the flamethrower propped in a dark corner of the room, gave him a pretty good indication of what had occurred. He had a guess as to who had wielded it; his dark sense of humor asserted itself as he imagined Damon Salvatore’s expression when he had realized that Elijah’s corpse wouldn’t burn.
“Are we alone?” he asked, with a glance toward the ceiling.
She gave him a look of mock flirtation. "Why, what did you have in mind? You Originals must have quite the powers of recovery, if you can go right from being a stiff to having a – "
"Andie..." He warned.
“Fine! Jeez. Watch where you aim that look. You could hurt someone." She leaned against the door frame and crossed her arms. "Yes, we're alone. No one should be back for at least a few hours.”
“Then I’m taking a shower.” Before heading out of the room, he made it a point to retrieve the dagger.
“There are seven of them upstairs. Take your pick.”
He paused next to her in the doorway on his way out the door. What had Jenna said about men being territorial? “Which one is Damon’s?” he asked.
She chuckled approvingly. “Follow me.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Ten minutes (and the shedding of layer upon layer of grime that he didn’t care to name) later, Elijah rejoined Andie in the library. She held a brandy out to him. “Or, there’s more blood downstairs if you'd prefer,” she offered.
Elijah wrinkled his nose in distaste. “That stuff is vile. I prefer it warm, and a whole lot fresher.”
She held up a hand. “Don’t look at me, pal. I gave at the office.”
Accepting the brandy, Elijah withdrew the dagger from the inside jacket of his pocket. “Where is the rest?”
“Huh? Oh!” Andie opened the liquor cabinet and withdrew an ornate wooden box. Opening it, she grabbed the antique bottle of white oak ash, and passed it to him. Elijah pocketed it along with the dagger and seated himself in one of the overstuffed chairs flanking the fireplace, gesturing her toward the other. “All right. Talk. You can start by explaining who you are. Clearly, you're no reporter.”
“Hey! The 8% hike in ratings since I joined the station would argue otherwise, thank you very much.” She took a sip of her own brandy. “But that’s not why I’m here, no.”
“So why are you here?”
“Guess.”
He eyed her speculatively. “You’re a witch.”
Andie smiled at him and raised her glass in a mock toast. “Got it in one.”
“So this… thing with Damon…”
“Was an act. I needed to keep track of what he – what they – were up to. And I could do that best by being his compulsively dedicated little – ”
“Chew toy?” Elijah flicked a glance toward the bite marks, now uncovered, along her neck. “Brava. You’re dedication is outstanding.”
“You have. No. Idea.”
“Oh, I think I have some.” He sipped at his brandy. “So, a witch. One of Klaus’s, I presume.”
“Nothing wrong with your brain.”
“Nothing at all. Which is why I don’t believe for a moment that Klaus would want me reanimated. I presume he’s now aware of…” Of Elena. “…of the doppelganger?”
“Elijah, Klaus has been aware of her almost since the moment you have.” She relaxed back into the chair, tucking her feet underneath her. “Did you really think he had just let you run off in a tiff, without having someone – several someones – keeping an eye on you?”
He hardly thought a profound difference in world view, and the future of humanity in it, qualified as “a tiff,” but he let it slide. “Where is he, then? Why wait? Why not crash in here and snap her out from under my nose?”
“Why do all the work locating the moonstone, securing a werewolf, etc., when he can sit back and let you do it for him?”
Yes, he thought bitterly. That sounded like Klaus. Always leaving him to do the dirty work, then swooping in at the last minute to collect the spoils.
“Besides, he hoped that, if he left you out there on the front line, so to speak, you’d draw the dagger out of hiding. Which you did. All very neat and tidy." She waggled a finger at him. "You’re dead and removed as a threat, same with the dagger, all of the components to break the curse are in place…”
“And now he can come waltzing into town with everything at the ready.” Elijah nodded. Pure, vintage Klaus.
“I sent him the all clear signal myself.” She shook her empty snifter at him.
Elijah gamely took the glass from her and refilled it at the bar. “Which means that you’re now working off-script.” He handed her the drink and sat, leaning forward, elbows on his knees. “This would be the part where you start explaining why, and just exactly what your stake in all this is.”
Andie drained the glass in two swallows, as though to steel herself. “Simple. I want a deal.”
“A deal.”
“You know, one of those arrangements where I do something for you, you do something for me…”
“I’m familiar with the concept,” he said drily.
“You need a witch, I – ”
“I have a witch.”
She lifted her eyebrows, then looked down and away. “Yeah… about that…”
Elijah let the silence sit, charged, as his mind raced over the possibilities, none of them good. “I think you’d better bring me up to date,” he said grimly.
Andie sighed, then squared her shoulders. “The Martins are dead.”
Dead. The Martins. Plural.
“Stefan tried to talk to them, to get them to work with him and Damon, but… Jonas didn’t go for it.”
“What happened?” Elijah asked softly, dead calm.
“I wasn’t here, so I don’t know exactly, but from what I’ve been able to gather, they took an astral walk to locate you. Jonas wanted you resurrected.” Andie started fidgeting with a loose thread along the arm of the chair. “They found you, here, but instead of leaving it at that and coming back when no one was around, Luka tried to take the dagger out – ”
“Luka did?”
“He was the one being projected. He wouldn't have had the skill or power to anchor the spell. Jonas would have had to do it and send Luka.” She worked another thread loose. “Anyway, Katherine – who I'm not supposed to know is staying here, by the way – saw the dagger moving, and…”
Katerina. Damn it! With him dead, of course she'd be free to leave the tomb. And wreak God only knew what havoc with her particular brand of chaos.
“And?” he whispered.
She shifted in the chair, went back to worrying at the fabric. “Damon… Damon grabbed the flamethrower, and…” Andie straightened in the chair and met his eyes, reluctantly. “How much do you know about the mind/body link when it comes to this kind of magic?”
“Enough.” Enough to realize, with a sick feeling opening a chasm in the pit of his stomach, just what would have happened to the boy when the flames swept over his spirit form.
“Jonas…” Andie lifted her hands, let them drop into her lap. “He went off the reservation, Elijah. He showed up at the Grille, hollering for Elena. He set it on fire, he stabbed some busboy in the neck, threw a bunch of people around… and then he went after Elena at her house. They had to kill him to keep him from taking her. He just... went crazy.”
“His child was dead,” he murmured, his own words rising like gorge to coat the back of his throat in bitterness: The boy need not do anything other than make friends at his new school. Surely there's no harm in that?
Elijah’s scalp began prickling until the whole of it felt electrified. Sparks sprouted in his chest and ignited flames that pushed outward to limn his nerves in fire, all the way to the ends of his extremities. His lungs heaved, dragging in air in great gulps even though he had no real need to breathe. A rushing sound roared into his ears on the tide of a rapidly increasing heart rate, as the veins around his eyes engorged and turned them red.
He had long ago drawn the conclusion that, with strength and power such as he possessed, the sheer devastation that he could cause by indulging in a fit of pique was seldom in proportion to whatever had provided its catalyst in the first place. Consequently, Elijah very, very rarely lost his temper.
He lost it now.
Outdoors, with no real sense of how he’d gotten there save through the imperative to flee the confines of the house, he tore into the treeline and lay waste to whatever he found in his path. Trees, brush, boulders, a small shed… all were pulverized as he shredded, tossed, or crushed whatever came to hand as he whipped through in a blind rage.
And why not? Hadn’t he been making as big a mess out of everything he’d laid hands to since he’d left Manhattan? Always scrambling to get one step ahead, misjudging one situation after another… all in some vain and futile attempt to get something – anything – over on Klaus? And when had he ever been able to do that? Instead, he’d done all of Klaus’s prep work for him and played right into his hands, and what in hell did he have to show for it?
Nothing. Nothing but a dead boy, and a grief-maddened father who had followed him through the gates of death, seeking to answer for such an affront. Nothing but a hole through his heart that still bled from the betrayal that had pierced it. Nothing but a cold certainty that, despite his efforts and whatever they had cost him, Klaus would have his way again, just as he always did.
“Are you finished?” Andie asked quietly, from a little distance away.
Elijah turned his head to look at her, seeing as he did so the scope of the destruction he’d left in his wake, and climbed wearily to his feet from where he’d dropped to his knees. Was he finished? Was there any point left in fighting it? He could walk off this property, leave town, let Klaus have his ritual and break his curse, go hole up someplace quiet and solitary and just watch the world go by.
Whatever would be left of it.
The witch stood still, facing him, arms crossed as she waited to see what he would do.
“This deal,” he said at last, his voice hoarse. “What do you want?”
Evidently deciding he was through dealing violence for the time-being, Andie led him out of the carnage and back toward the house. “Klaus may make a big show out of hating technological advancement, but he’s the first to latch onto anything that he can twist to his advantage. He’s developed quite an obsession with genetics. All these centuries of stealing witches and locking them up, never finding one who had enough strength combined with the innate talent… I guess he decided, if he can’t find the perfect witch, he’ll figure out a way to breed one.” Andie paused at the open terrace door, and turned to face him, full on.
“I want the same deal you offered Jonas. I help you kill Klaus. In return,” she said, “you help me get my son.”
Whatever he'd been expecting, it wasn't that. “Your son?”
“Yeah. My son.” She held her hand out to him. “Do we have a deal?”
Because that’s working out so swimmingly. Bloody hell. Here he stood, the blood of one child still slick on his fingers, and she wanted to thrust the fate of another into them? How dare she? How dare he? Hadn’t all of this demonstrated quite profoundly that he wasn’t up to the task? That Klaus always had, and always would, come out on top? What did he have to give him any hope whatsoever of snatching victory from the jaws of this most resounding defeat?
Well, actually…
He had the dagger. He had one of Klaus’s witches, one who was obviously both skilled and trusted enough that he had chosen her for this particular assignment. Through her, and her surveillance of Damon, he had the location of the burial ground. He would have knowledge of Klaus’s movements, of his arrival in town. He had Jules on a nice, tight leash somewhere; he needed only to call her to heel.
And he would, by all that was holy or unholy, have the doppelganger – one way or another.
Elijah nodded slowly and extended his hand, clasping Andie’s in his own.
“Deal.”
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
What's At Stake, Part Nine
Woo! Finally up to the point where we left off for the hiatus (well, where Elijah left off, anyway). Next section, the fun REALLY begins. :-D
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Elijah’s cell phone beeped just as he was pulling into the Salvatore driveway. He checked the display and took the call. “Jonas.”
“Hey. Any luck with the property search this morning?”
“It’s difficult to say. There are a couple of areas that might correspond, but I’ll need your expertise to tell me if what we need is there.”
“I marked some possibles in an atlas that I wanted you to look at; I figured you’d stop by last night.”
Elijah parked and exited the car. “I did. From the yelling, it seemed an inopportune time. More teenage drama?”
“Don’t even get me started.”
“I’ll stop over later. Right now I’m attending a dinner party at the Salvatore house.”
“Um…”
“Exactly. Later.” Elijah slid the phone into his pocket and rang the doorbell. Damon answered in short order. “Good evening,” Elijah greeted him.
“Thank you for coming. Please, come in.” Damon plastered a smile on his face and stepped to the side to motion him in.
“One moment.” Elijah ran his fingers down the wood of the door frame. “Can I just say that, if you have less than honorable intentions about how this evening is going to proceed, I suggest you reconsider.”
“No, nothing dishonorable," he said, perfectly innocent. "Just, uh, getting to know you.”
Someone was certainly putting on the good, little, cowed vampire act. Elijah didn’t believe it for a second. “Hmm. Well that’s good.” Stepping through the doorway, he stopped next to Damon, speaking quietly. “Because, you know, although Elena and I have this deal, if you so much as make a move to cross me, I’ll kill you and I’ll kill everyone in this house. Are we clear?”
Damon’s smile faltered infinitesimally. “Crystal.”
Jenna stepped out into the foyer at that moment. She had spurned the blouse and jeans she’d been wearing earlier in favor of a form-fitting cocktail dress in midnight blue. The material along the sleeves and collar bones was sheer, giving him a tantalizing glimpse of what was under the denser fabric below. “Jenna! Wonderful to see you again,” he called, holding his hands out and touching her shoulders as he drew near. “How are you? You look incredible.”
“Oh, this old thing…” she said, blushing and obviously pleased by the compliment.
They made their way into the large living room, where Andie Starr was standing in front of the fireplace, talking with a man Elijah recognized as John Gilbert, Elena’s ersatz uncle and biological father. Saltzman stood a little off to the side, idly flipping through a leather-bound book and looking daggers at Elijah as he stepped into the room with Jenna, one hand resting lightly on the small of her back as he gestured her ahead of him with the other.
“Ric! You made it. I’m pleased to see you were able to free yourself up after all.” Elijah's smile made it plain he was anything but.
“I’m sure you are,” Ric smiled back, just as sincere.
“Elijah!” Andie motioned John to follow and came over to take his hands in greeting. “John Gilbert, Elijah Smith,” she said, by way of introduction. The two men shook hands and made the requisite mouth noises at each other, in keeping with the pretense that each didn’t know full well who – and what – the other was.
“Yeah,” Jenna turned toward him and stage-whispered, “We don’t know why he’s here either.”
Damon came in through a smaller door at the other end of the room, carrying two bottles of wine and some glasses. Passing the latter around, he peeled the label from the first bottle of wine and popped the cork. “Let’s get this party started!”
~~~~~
By the time they sat down to dinner – a Tuscan herbed chicken, roasted red potatoes, asparagus, a pear and spinach salad, and bread with dipping oil – they had consumed three bottles of wine and were well into the fourth. The spirits had made Jenna flushed and even more prone to giggling than usual, a fact that probably wouldn’t have charmed him so much if it weren’t for this nagging predisposition to find everything the woman did charming.
In sharp contrast to her joviality, Alaric was quiet, as was John Gilbert, save for the occasional barbed volley shot back and forth between the two. Elijah was certain he was missing part of the story there, but whatever the reason, it was clear that the two shared a profound dislike of one another.
Andie played the roll of hostess to the hilt, making sure everyone’s glasses remained full and keeping the conversation going whenever a lull threatened. Elijah could have done without her cloying and near constant displays of affection toward Damon. Between the adolescent-like infatuation and the conspicuous scarf around her neck, he suspected that she was Damon’s chew toy as well as his bedmate, though she lacked that caged look behind the eyes that one typically saw in victims of chronic compulsion. He wondered suddenly if Damon were ignorant of the technique of applying a little of his own blood topically to close a bite wound, or if he merely enjoyed having a visual display of his dominance over his playthings. Given that he was sired – and immediately abandoned – by Katerina Petrova, Elijah assigned even odds to either possibility.
“I hate to break it to you, Damon,” Jenna said, following a discussion of various Founder’s Day activities, “but according to Elijah, your family is so not a founder of this town.”
“Hmm, do tell.” The younger vampire eyed him speculatively.
“Well, as I mentioned to Jenna earlier, a faction of settlers migrated from Salem after the witch trials in the 1690’s. Over the next hundred years they developed this community where they could feel safe from persecution.”
“Because they were witches,” Jenna announced, as though the concept were prurient and slightly wicked.
“You know, there is no tangible proof that there were witches in Salem.” This from Andie, who didn’t appear to have had anywhere near as much wine as Jenna.
“Andie’s a journalist. Big on facts,” Damon explained, unnecessarily.
“Well, the lore says there was this wave of anti-witch hysteria," Elijah continued. "It broke out in a neighboring settlement. So these witches were rounded up. They were tied to stakes in a field together and burned. Some say you could hear the screams for miles around as they were consumed by the fire.” He remembered it all quite fondly, actually. Good times. “Could you pass the…” he gestured toward the wine.
“I wouldn’t repeat this to the historical society,” Jenna cautioned.
“Sounds a little like a ghost story to me.” John looked skeptical, though that could have been a cover for a familial knowledge passed down through the generations of the Gilbert family. The first John Gilbert had been ridiculously troublesome, always digging at things better left alone.
“So, why do you want to know the location of these alleged massacres?” Damon asked, sipping his wine.
“Oh, healthy historian’s curiosity, of course.”
“Of course.” Damon’s expression made it plain that he believed no such thing. He wasn’t stupid, Elijah would give him that. More and more, he found himself hoping that Damon Salvatore didn’t do anything that would necessitate him having to kill him. He appreciated a quick mind.
With everyone apparently done eating, Andie rose and starting stacking the plates. “The gentlemen should take their drinks in the study,” she suggested, a little too brightly. Elijah wondered anew just how much the woman was under Damon’s compulsion, especially after the ‘good girl!’ look he shot her.
“I have to say, the food was almost as wonderful as the company,” Elijah complimented her.
“I like you!” she said, flirty and charming. And not looking at all compelled.
Elijah mulled it over as he followed Damon to the study. There was no way the young vampire could be that skilled at manipulation, not at a mere 145 years old. Perhaps the journalist was one of those driven, career women who liked to play the dominance-submission game at home. It was moot anyway, he decided, running his hands over the mahogany wood of the banister. One didn’t ask another vampire impertinent questions about his 'toys'. It simply wasn’t done.
“So let me guess,” Damon said, pouring a deep, richly colored brandy into two crystal snifters. “In addition to the moonstone, the doppelganger, the lion, the witch and the wardrobe, you need to find this witch burial ground.”
Quick, and perceptive. “Because I feel we’ve grown so close, Damon, I’ll tell you: yes.” He studied him for a moment. “Do you know where it is?”
“Maybe.” Damon handed him one of the brandies. “Tell me why it’s so important.”
“Not that close.” At least not until such time as he could be assured of a certain amount of loyalty from the younger vampire.
Elijah turned his attention to the shelves lining the room. Floor to ceiling, leather-clad spines abounded. He recognized many of them. The classics, history, military history, philosophy… “It’s quite the collection you have here,” he said, impressed.
“Mmm.”
“Here’s a funny thing about books: Before they existed, people actually had memories.”
Before he could ruminate further on that thought, Alaric entered the study, Andie following closely on his heels. “Ah, gentlemen, we forgot dessert.”
“Elijah?” Andie flirtily held her hand out to him.
“Miss Starr,” he drawled, playing along. He took her hand and spun her out of the room, startling a laugh out of her.
“I bet you would cut quite a figure on the dance floor. Hmm?” She eyed him speculatively.
“I’ve been known to dance, a time or two.”
“Well we’re just going to have to try that out sometime.”
“There’ll probably be an opportunity for that if you’re in town long enough, Elijah, what with all the fundraisers and festivals Carol has us throwing,” Jenna said, poking her head out of the kitchen for a moment and handing Andie a coffee pot. “Sorry guys. Dessert is taking longer than I thought. I usually just unwrap food.”
She slipped back into the kitchen as Alaric and Damon filed out of the study, joining him and John at the table while Andie poured the coffee. “So, I know this is a social thing,” Andie said, once she’d sat down, “but I would really love to ask you some more questions about the work that you’re doing here.”
She was persistent. “I’d love to answer,” he capitulated, if only to pass the time.
“Great! That’s great. Alaric, would you hand me that notebook out of my bag?” The schoolteacher went to go fetch.
“Elijah,” Damon said, apropos of nothing, “did John tell you that he’s Elena’s uncle-slash-father?”
“Yes, I’m well aware of that.” And apparently there was no love lost between he and Damon, understandably so. Which made the man’s presence all the more perplexing.
“Of course, she hates him, so there’s absolutely no need to keep him on the endangered species list.”
“No Ric, it’s in the front pocket, on the… You know what? Excuse me guys, sorry.” Andie jumped up to go retrieve her notebook, a task apparently beyond Alaric.
Ignoring Damon, John leaned forward, elbows on the table. “What I’d like to know, Elijah, is how you intend on killing Klaus?”
So was that the purpose of this little gathering? They’d all break bread together, have a few glasses of wine, and he’d just open up and unroll his entire plan before them? Suddenly weary of the whole charade, Elijah lowered his voice, dead serious. “Gentlemen, there are a few things we should probably get clear right now.” He pointed his fork at Damon. “I allow you to live solely to keep an eye on Elena. I allow Elena to remain in her house, living her life with her friends, as she does, as a courtesy. If you become a liability, I’ll take her away from you and you’ll never see her again.”
Notebook finally in hand, Andie reclaimed her seat across the table. “Okay, my first question is… when you got here to Mystic Falls…”
The pain that suddenly tore like lightning through his chest was absolute agony. He cried out as his heart erupted into a white-hot ball of flame, sending boiling acid pulsing through his veins with every weakening pulse. Gulping for breath – to say what, he didn’t know – he saw, through his graying vision, the point of a narrow dagger protruding from his chest. He had just long enough to realize what it was before he no longer felt or thought anything.
~~~~~~
When he could feel and think again, he was lying on a cold stone floor. A small amount of light, enough for him to see by, filtered in through the window and under the door. The room looked to be in a basement. There was a heavy-looking wooden door with a high, barred window, not that he expected it would so much as slow him down if he wanted out.
Listening, he heard voices upstairs, the same voices with whom he’d so recently been conversing. They took it out! That could mean one of two things: either they had had no intention of killing him, and just wanted to make a – heh – point; or, and this was the more likely scenario, they didn’t know.
Yet they had the dagger. No one – no one – had known its whereabouts for the last two centuries. There had been any number of stories, rumors, theories, etc., but none had borne any fruit. God knew Klaus had looked high and low for it, to no avail. And now, here it was. Had the Gilbert family kept it squirreled away all this time? Had the first Jonathan Gilbert been that lucky in his endless research? Somehow he doubted luck had had as much to do with it as the presence of one Katerina Petrova, here in Mystic Falls as a contemporary of Gilbert's.
And just what did Elena Gilbert know? Damon had said she’d gone away with Stefan for a little R&R, and to get away from the werewolf threat. Was that true, or had she simply put herself out of his immediate reach in case this attempt on his life had gone awry?
Oh, it had most assuredly gone awry.
Getting silently to his feet, Elijah weighed his options. He could do as he had threatened Damon: he could go upstairs and kill each and every one of them, up to and including Jenna, leaving nothing but a pile of broken and lifeless bodies in his wake. They would all be dead before any of them even realized that he had awakened. Or, he could make an object lesson out of just one of them… he wracked his brain for a moment, trying to recall just who had been where. Damon had been at one end of the table, John at the other. Andie was sitting across from him… that left just Jenna and… Alaric.
But what if Elena hadn’t known? What if Damon, or John, or Alaric had dreamt this whole thing up while she was away, without her knowledge or approval? He’d given his word to her – to her – that he would protect her loved ones from harm. Could he in good conscience slaughter over half the people on that list, no matter how viciously provoked, without first knowing?
She isn’t Katerina.
And that thought, above all else, really left him with only one option. He had to get to Elena.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Not wanting to alert them to his resurrection by driving away in his car, Elijah ran, at speed, through the woods until he reached town and the Martins’ apartment complex. Taking the stairs two at a time, he burst into the apartment without knocking, startling both Jonas and Luka where they sat at the table.
Jonas took in the state of his torn, dirty and bloodied clothing. “What happened?!”
“I need you to find Elena. Now.”
"What did they – "
"Now!"
Jonas swallowed the urge to say more and turned toward the cupboard, rummaging inside for the items he had stolen from Elena. "Luka, get the candles ready," he instructed his son.
The boy didn't move, just sat staring at Elijah, as he had since he'd burst into the room.
"Luka!" Jonas raised his voice to get his attention.
"I'm sorry," Luka murmured.
"What?" Jonas stood up, hands on his hips.
"I'm sorry, Dad. I didn't mean to. I don't even know... I'm sorry!"
Elijah stepped toward the table. Luka shrank back in his chair. "Jonas, do the damn spell," Elijah gritted out. Easing himself into the chair across from Luka, he tried for a calm, even tone. "Luka, what are you sorry for?"
To the horror of all three of them, Luka burst into tears.
Jonas would have left off preparing the spell again and headed toward his son had Elijah not looked him off with a particularly vicious glare. He took a deep breath to get himself under control before turning back to the boy.
"Please," Luka begged, before Elijah could say anything. "Please, I'm sorry, I didn't mean say anything, but they did something, I don't know what, and I must have told them something." Luka swiped his sleeve across his face. "Just don't take it out on Dad and Greta, okay?" Another sob shook the boy. "It's my fault, don't take it out on them. Help him get Greta back. Please!"
Elijah rose from the chair and walked around the table.
"Is that why you were so late last night, Luka?" Jonas asked. "Did Bonnie Bennett do some kind of a spell on you?"
"I'm s-s-s-sorry, Dad." He wiped at his face again, then buried his face in his hands. "Punish me, it's okay," he said to Elijah, his words muffled, "just help Dad find Greta."
Elijah took Luka by the shoulders. The boy stiffened under his hands, and he saw, out of his peripheral vision, Jonas start to move toward them, then hesitate. "Luka, look at me," he said softly. Luka drew in a shuddering breath, sniffled, and did as he was told. "I gave your father my word that we would go and get Greta as soon as Klaus is out of the way. I have no intention of breaking it because that Bennett girl used magic on you to try and obtain information that you don't even possess. You couldn't have told her anything of importance."
"What if I t-told her about the doppelganger? That you plan to k-k-kill her?"
Was that what had set this evening's chain of events in motion? Elijah doubted very much that that would be news to Elena. To her friends, perhaps, but not to her. And if he had his way, it was old news at that. "Luka. You did nothing wrong. Everything will be fine." Elijah straightened, giving Luka's shoulder a pat as he released him. "Go on. Let me speak to your father." Luka nodded and went to his room, shutting the door behind him.
Elijah turned to Jonas. "Find Elena, and then – for Christ sake! – get your ass over there and do something about that little witch!"
~~~~~~~
He parked Jonas's car well away from the house on the lake, wanting to keep his approach a secret for as long as possible. Stefan Salvatore worried him not at all, but he didn't want to take the chance that Elena would bolt and injure herself, or worse, running through the woods at the water's edge in the dead of night. As he walked quietly down the driveway, he could see lights on in the house, and hear movement. He suspected they were waiting for him.
Crouching down, he scooped up a handful of rocks from the driveway, shifting them from hand to hand as he contemplated both the windows and the door.
“He’s here,” he heard Stefan say.
So much for the element of surprise. Elijah drew his arm back and aimed the stones at the door. They shattered it on impact, taking it completely off its hinges.
“You need to go," Elena told Stefan. "I have to talk to him alone.”
“Elena -- ”
“Stefan, it’s okay. He can’t come in the house.”
“You know, I might not be able to enter this house, but I’m a very patient man,” he called, stepping onto porch. “I’ll wait you out.”
Elijah heard footsteps, and Elena shuffled around a corner, into view, her arms crossed protectively in front of her. “They shouldn’t have done with they did.”
Indeed. “The deal is off.” He needed to make that clear to her; whether she'd known beforehand or only learned of it afterward, she needed to understand that, as far as he was concerned, the others were now fair game.
“I’m renegotiating.”
“You have nothing left to negotiate with,” he reminded her.
Elena uncrossed her arms to reveal a knife, though what she thought she might accomplish with such a paltry weapon, he didn't know. “I’d like to see you lure Klaus into Mystic Falls after the doppelganger bleeds to death.”
A hollow threat. “Stefan won’t let you die.”
“No, he won’t. He’ll feed me his blood to heal me, and then I’ll kill myself and become a vampire just like Katherine did. So unless you want that to happen again, promise me the same as before. Promise me that you won’t harm anyone that I love, even if they’ve harmed you.”
She isn't Katerina. Katerina had used Rose and Trevor mercilessly to insure such a fate for herself, never caring what became of anyone else. But Elena... Elena cared. It was in her eyes as she pleaded with him, in her voice, in her hand that trembled even now, holding the knife. She might threaten to harm herself, yet even as she did so, she begged for the lives of her loved ones. She wouldn't put them all at risk by turning now and drawing Klaus's ire down on the whole lot of them.
“I’m sorry, Elena," he told her softly. "I’m going to have to call your bluff.”
He saw her swallow once, hard, and look down at the knife in her hand. She turned it a little, and took a deep breath as though to brace herself. Elijah had a split second to watch the resolve harden in her eyes, to realize that he had misread her; then her arm came up, and she plunged the knife into her abdomen.
“NO!!!” He roared, surging forward, only to slam up against the barrier of the threshold. Elena writhed in pain, dropping the bloodied knife to the floor as she curled in upon herself, upon the pain. He looked around wildly, trying to gauge how much of the house he might have to tear apart before that barrier gave way and he could reach her, could save her. Too long. Too long! “Yes!" he capitulated. "Yes, you can have your deal. Let me heal you!”
She moaned, gritting her teeth against the pain. “Give me your word!”
“I give you my word,” he agreed.
Elena staggered toward him, popping free of the threshold and into his waiting arms. Relief flared quickly – and died just as suddenly as fire once again exploded in his chest. Shock mingled with the agony, an agony magnified a thousand-fold by virtue of whose hand had dealt it. He clung to her still as his flesh started to grey and his knees gave out, unable to believe how badly he had misjudged her, seeing what he had wanted to see instead of what was there...
And thus, I die a fool.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Elijah’s cell phone beeped just as he was pulling into the Salvatore driveway. He checked the display and took the call. “Jonas.”
“Hey. Any luck with the property search this morning?”
“It’s difficult to say. There are a couple of areas that might correspond, but I’ll need your expertise to tell me if what we need is there.”
“I marked some possibles in an atlas that I wanted you to look at; I figured you’d stop by last night.”
Elijah parked and exited the car. “I did. From the yelling, it seemed an inopportune time. More teenage drama?”
“Don’t even get me started.”
“I’ll stop over later. Right now I’m attending a dinner party at the Salvatore house.”
“Um…”
“Exactly. Later.” Elijah slid the phone into his pocket and rang the doorbell. Damon answered in short order. “Good evening,” Elijah greeted him.
“Thank you for coming. Please, come in.” Damon plastered a smile on his face and stepped to the side to motion him in.
“One moment.” Elijah ran his fingers down the wood of the door frame. “Can I just say that, if you have less than honorable intentions about how this evening is going to proceed, I suggest you reconsider.”
“No, nothing dishonorable," he said, perfectly innocent. "Just, uh, getting to know you.”
Someone was certainly putting on the good, little, cowed vampire act. Elijah didn’t believe it for a second. “Hmm. Well that’s good.” Stepping through the doorway, he stopped next to Damon, speaking quietly. “Because, you know, although Elena and I have this deal, if you so much as make a move to cross me, I’ll kill you and I’ll kill everyone in this house. Are we clear?”
Damon’s smile faltered infinitesimally. “Crystal.”
Jenna stepped out into the foyer at that moment. She had spurned the blouse and jeans she’d been wearing earlier in favor of a form-fitting cocktail dress in midnight blue. The material along the sleeves and collar bones was sheer, giving him a tantalizing glimpse of what was under the denser fabric below. “Jenna! Wonderful to see you again,” he called, holding his hands out and touching her shoulders as he drew near. “How are you? You look incredible.”
“Oh, this old thing…” she said, blushing and obviously pleased by the compliment.
They made their way into the large living room, where Andie Starr was standing in front of the fireplace, talking with a man Elijah recognized as John Gilbert, Elena’s ersatz uncle and biological father. Saltzman stood a little off to the side, idly flipping through a leather-bound book and looking daggers at Elijah as he stepped into the room with Jenna, one hand resting lightly on the small of her back as he gestured her ahead of him with the other.
“Ric! You made it. I’m pleased to see you were able to free yourself up after all.” Elijah's smile made it plain he was anything but.
“I’m sure you are,” Ric smiled back, just as sincere.
“Elijah!” Andie motioned John to follow and came over to take his hands in greeting. “John Gilbert, Elijah Smith,” she said, by way of introduction. The two men shook hands and made the requisite mouth noises at each other, in keeping with the pretense that each didn’t know full well who – and what – the other was.
“Yeah,” Jenna turned toward him and stage-whispered, “We don’t know why he’s here either.”
Damon came in through a smaller door at the other end of the room, carrying two bottles of wine and some glasses. Passing the latter around, he peeled the label from the first bottle of wine and popped the cork. “Let’s get this party started!”
~~~~~
By the time they sat down to dinner – a Tuscan herbed chicken, roasted red potatoes, asparagus, a pear and spinach salad, and bread with dipping oil – they had consumed three bottles of wine and were well into the fourth. The spirits had made Jenna flushed and even more prone to giggling than usual, a fact that probably wouldn’t have charmed him so much if it weren’t for this nagging predisposition to find everything the woman did charming.
In sharp contrast to her joviality, Alaric was quiet, as was John Gilbert, save for the occasional barbed volley shot back and forth between the two. Elijah was certain he was missing part of the story there, but whatever the reason, it was clear that the two shared a profound dislike of one another.
Andie played the roll of hostess to the hilt, making sure everyone’s glasses remained full and keeping the conversation going whenever a lull threatened. Elijah could have done without her cloying and near constant displays of affection toward Damon. Between the adolescent-like infatuation and the conspicuous scarf around her neck, he suspected that she was Damon’s chew toy as well as his bedmate, though she lacked that caged look behind the eyes that one typically saw in victims of chronic compulsion. He wondered suddenly if Damon were ignorant of the technique of applying a little of his own blood topically to close a bite wound, or if he merely enjoyed having a visual display of his dominance over his playthings. Given that he was sired – and immediately abandoned – by Katerina Petrova, Elijah assigned even odds to either possibility.
“I hate to break it to you, Damon,” Jenna said, following a discussion of various Founder’s Day activities, “but according to Elijah, your family is so not a founder of this town.”
“Hmm, do tell.” The younger vampire eyed him speculatively.
“Well, as I mentioned to Jenna earlier, a faction of settlers migrated from Salem after the witch trials in the 1690’s. Over the next hundred years they developed this community where they could feel safe from persecution.”
“Because they were witches,” Jenna announced, as though the concept were prurient and slightly wicked.
“You know, there is no tangible proof that there were witches in Salem.” This from Andie, who didn’t appear to have had anywhere near as much wine as Jenna.
“Andie’s a journalist. Big on facts,” Damon explained, unnecessarily.
“Well, the lore says there was this wave of anti-witch hysteria," Elijah continued. "It broke out in a neighboring settlement. So these witches were rounded up. They were tied to stakes in a field together and burned. Some say you could hear the screams for miles around as they were consumed by the fire.” He remembered it all quite fondly, actually. Good times. “Could you pass the…” he gestured toward the wine.
“I wouldn’t repeat this to the historical society,” Jenna cautioned.
“Sounds a little like a ghost story to me.” John looked skeptical, though that could have been a cover for a familial knowledge passed down through the generations of the Gilbert family. The first John Gilbert had been ridiculously troublesome, always digging at things better left alone.
“So, why do you want to know the location of these alleged massacres?” Damon asked, sipping his wine.
“Oh, healthy historian’s curiosity, of course.”
“Of course.” Damon’s expression made it plain that he believed no such thing. He wasn’t stupid, Elijah would give him that. More and more, he found himself hoping that Damon Salvatore didn’t do anything that would necessitate him having to kill him. He appreciated a quick mind.
With everyone apparently done eating, Andie rose and starting stacking the plates. “The gentlemen should take their drinks in the study,” she suggested, a little too brightly. Elijah wondered anew just how much the woman was under Damon’s compulsion, especially after the ‘good girl!’ look he shot her.
“I have to say, the food was almost as wonderful as the company,” Elijah complimented her.
“I like you!” she said, flirty and charming. And not looking at all compelled.
Elijah mulled it over as he followed Damon to the study. There was no way the young vampire could be that skilled at manipulation, not at a mere 145 years old. Perhaps the journalist was one of those driven, career women who liked to play the dominance-submission game at home. It was moot anyway, he decided, running his hands over the mahogany wood of the banister. One didn’t ask another vampire impertinent questions about his 'toys'. It simply wasn’t done.
“So let me guess,” Damon said, pouring a deep, richly colored brandy into two crystal snifters. “In addition to the moonstone, the doppelganger, the lion, the witch and the wardrobe, you need to find this witch burial ground.”
Quick, and perceptive. “Because I feel we’ve grown so close, Damon, I’ll tell you: yes.” He studied him for a moment. “Do you know where it is?”
“Maybe.” Damon handed him one of the brandies. “Tell me why it’s so important.”
“Not that close.” At least not until such time as he could be assured of a certain amount of loyalty from the younger vampire.
Elijah turned his attention to the shelves lining the room. Floor to ceiling, leather-clad spines abounded. He recognized many of them. The classics, history, military history, philosophy… “It’s quite the collection you have here,” he said, impressed.
“Mmm.”
“Here’s a funny thing about books: Before they existed, people actually had memories.”
Before he could ruminate further on that thought, Alaric entered the study, Andie following closely on his heels. “Ah, gentlemen, we forgot dessert.”
“Elijah?” Andie flirtily held her hand out to him.
“Miss Starr,” he drawled, playing along. He took her hand and spun her out of the room, startling a laugh out of her.
“I bet you would cut quite a figure on the dance floor. Hmm?” She eyed him speculatively.
“I’ve been known to dance, a time or two.”
“Well we’re just going to have to try that out sometime.”
“There’ll probably be an opportunity for that if you’re in town long enough, Elijah, what with all the fundraisers and festivals Carol has us throwing,” Jenna said, poking her head out of the kitchen for a moment and handing Andie a coffee pot. “Sorry guys. Dessert is taking longer than I thought. I usually just unwrap food.”
She slipped back into the kitchen as Alaric and Damon filed out of the study, joining him and John at the table while Andie poured the coffee. “So, I know this is a social thing,” Andie said, once she’d sat down, “but I would really love to ask you some more questions about the work that you’re doing here.”
She was persistent. “I’d love to answer,” he capitulated, if only to pass the time.
“Great! That’s great. Alaric, would you hand me that notebook out of my bag?” The schoolteacher went to go fetch.
“Elijah,” Damon said, apropos of nothing, “did John tell you that he’s Elena’s uncle-slash-father?”
“Yes, I’m well aware of that.” And apparently there was no love lost between he and Damon, understandably so. Which made the man’s presence all the more perplexing.
“Of course, she hates him, so there’s absolutely no need to keep him on the endangered species list.”
“No Ric, it’s in the front pocket, on the… You know what? Excuse me guys, sorry.” Andie jumped up to go retrieve her notebook, a task apparently beyond Alaric.
Ignoring Damon, John leaned forward, elbows on the table. “What I’d like to know, Elijah, is how you intend on killing Klaus?”
So was that the purpose of this little gathering? They’d all break bread together, have a few glasses of wine, and he’d just open up and unroll his entire plan before them? Suddenly weary of the whole charade, Elijah lowered his voice, dead serious. “Gentlemen, there are a few things we should probably get clear right now.” He pointed his fork at Damon. “I allow you to live solely to keep an eye on Elena. I allow Elena to remain in her house, living her life with her friends, as she does, as a courtesy. If you become a liability, I’ll take her away from you and you’ll never see her again.”
Notebook finally in hand, Andie reclaimed her seat across the table. “Okay, my first question is… when you got here to Mystic Falls…”
The pain that suddenly tore like lightning through his chest was absolute agony. He cried out as his heart erupted into a white-hot ball of flame, sending boiling acid pulsing through his veins with every weakening pulse. Gulping for breath – to say what, he didn’t know – he saw, through his graying vision, the point of a narrow dagger protruding from his chest. He had just long enough to realize what it was before he no longer felt or thought anything.
~~~~~~
When he could feel and think again, he was lying on a cold stone floor. A small amount of light, enough for him to see by, filtered in through the window and under the door. The room looked to be in a basement. There was a heavy-looking wooden door with a high, barred window, not that he expected it would so much as slow him down if he wanted out.
Listening, he heard voices upstairs, the same voices with whom he’d so recently been conversing. They took it out! That could mean one of two things: either they had had no intention of killing him, and just wanted to make a – heh – point; or, and this was the more likely scenario, they didn’t know.
Yet they had the dagger. No one – no one – had known its whereabouts for the last two centuries. There had been any number of stories, rumors, theories, etc., but none had borne any fruit. God knew Klaus had looked high and low for it, to no avail. And now, here it was. Had the Gilbert family kept it squirreled away all this time? Had the first Jonathan Gilbert been that lucky in his endless research? Somehow he doubted luck had had as much to do with it as the presence of one Katerina Petrova, here in Mystic Falls as a contemporary of Gilbert's.
And just what did Elena Gilbert know? Damon had said she’d gone away with Stefan for a little R&R, and to get away from the werewolf threat. Was that true, or had she simply put herself out of his immediate reach in case this attempt on his life had gone awry?
Oh, it had most assuredly gone awry.
Getting silently to his feet, Elijah weighed his options. He could do as he had threatened Damon: he could go upstairs and kill each and every one of them, up to and including Jenna, leaving nothing but a pile of broken and lifeless bodies in his wake. They would all be dead before any of them even realized that he had awakened. Or, he could make an object lesson out of just one of them… he wracked his brain for a moment, trying to recall just who had been where. Damon had been at one end of the table, John at the other. Andie was sitting across from him… that left just Jenna and… Alaric.
But what if Elena hadn’t known? What if Damon, or John, or Alaric had dreamt this whole thing up while she was away, without her knowledge or approval? He’d given his word to her – to her – that he would protect her loved ones from harm. Could he in good conscience slaughter over half the people on that list, no matter how viciously provoked, without first knowing?
She isn’t Katerina.
And that thought, above all else, really left him with only one option. He had to get to Elena.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Not wanting to alert them to his resurrection by driving away in his car, Elijah ran, at speed, through the woods until he reached town and the Martins’ apartment complex. Taking the stairs two at a time, he burst into the apartment without knocking, startling both Jonas and Luka where they sat at the table.
Jonas took in the state of his torn, dirty and bloodied clothing. “What happened?!”
“I need you to find Elena. Now.”
"What did they – "
"Now!"
Jonas swallowed the urge to say more and turned toward the cupboard, rummaging inside for the items he had stolen from Elena. "Luka, get the candles ready," he instructed his son.
The boy didn't move, just sat staring at Elijah, as he had since he'd burst into the room.
"Luka!" Jonas raised his voice to get his attention.
"I'm sorry," Luka murmured.
"What?" Jonas stood up, hands on his hips.
"I'm sorry, Dad. I didn't mean to. I don't even know... I'm sorry!"
Elijah stepped toward the table. Luka shrank back in his chair. "Jonas, do the damn spell," Elijah gritted out. Easing himself into the chair across from Luka, he tried for a calm, even tone. "Luka, what are you sorry for?"
To the horror of all three of them, Luka burst into tears.
Jonas would have left off preparing the spell again and headed toward his son had Elijah not looked him off with a particularly vicious glare. He took a deep breath to get himself under control before turning back to the boy.
"Please," Luka begged, before Elijah could say anything. "Please, I'm sorry, I didn't mean say anything, but they did something, I don't know what, and I must have told them something." Luka swiped his sleeve across his face. "Just don't take it out on Dad and Greta, okay?" Another sob shook the boy. "It's my fault, don't take it out on them. Help him get Greta back. Please!"
Elijah rose from the chair and walked around the table.
"Is that why you were so late last night, Luka?" Jonas asked. "Did Bonnie Bennett do some kind of a spell on you?"
"I'm s-s-s-sorry, Dad." He wiped at his face again, then buried his face in his hands. "Punish me, it's okay," he said to Elijah, his words muffled, "just help Dad find Greta."
Elijah took Luka by the shoulders. The boy stiffened under his hands, and he saw, out of his peripheral vision, Jonas start to move toward them, then hesitate. "Luka, look at me," he said softly. Luka drew in a shuddering breath, sniffled, and did as he was told. "I gave your father my word that we would go and get Greta as soon as Klaus is out of the way. I have no intention of breaking it because that Bennett girl used magic on you to try and obtain information that you don't even possess. You couldn't have told her anything of importance."
"What if I t-told her about the doppelganger? That you plan to k-k-kill her?"
Was that what had set this evening's chain of events in motion? Elijah doubted very much that that would be news to Elena. To her friends, perhaps, but not to her. And if he had his way, it was old news at that. "Luka. You did nothing wrong. Everything will be fine." Elijah straightened, giving Luka's shoulder a pat as he released him. "Go on. Let me speak to your father." Luka nodded and went to his room, shutting the door behind him.
Elijah turned to Jonas. "Find Elena, and then – for Christ sake! – get your ass over there and do something about that little witch!"
~~~~~~~
He parked Jonas's car well away from the house on the lake, wanting to keep his approach a secret for as long as possible. Stefan Salvatore worried him not at all, but he didn't want to take the chance that Elena would bolt and injure herself, or worse, running through the woods at the water's edge in the dead of night. As he walked quietly down the driveway, he could see lights on in the house, and hear movement. He suspected they were waiting for him.
Crouching down, he scooped up a handful of rocks from the driveway, shifting them from hand to hand as he contemplated both the windows and the door.
“He’s here,” he heard Stefan say.
So much for the element of surprise. Elijah drew his arm back and aimed the stones at the door. They shattered it on impact, taking it completely off its hinges.
“You need to go," Elena told Stefan. "I have to talk to him alone.”
“Elena -- ”
“Stefan, it’s okay. He can’t come in the house.”
“You know, I might not be able to enter this house, but I’m a very patient man,” he called, stepping onto porch. “I’ll wait you out.”
Elijah heard footsteps, and Elena shuffled around a corner, into view, her arms crossed protectively in front of her. “They shouldn’t have done with they did.”
Indeed. “The deal is off.” He needed to make that clear to her; whether she'd known beforehand or only learned of it afterward, she needed to understand that, as far as he was concerned, the others were now fair game.
“I’m renegotiating.”
“You have nothing left to negotiate with,” he reminded her.
Elena uncrossed her arms to reveal a knife, though what she thought she might accomplish with such a paltry weapon, he didn't know. “I’d like to see you lure Klaus into Mystic Falls after the doppelganger bleeds to death.”
A hollow threat. “Stefan won’t let you die.”
“No, he won’t. He’ll feed me his blood to heal me, and then I’ll kill myself and become a vampire just like Katherine did. So unless you want that to happen again, promise me the same as before. Promise me that you won’t harm anyone that I love, even if they’ve harmed you.”
She isn't Katerina. Katerina had used Rose and Trevor mercilessly to insure such a fate for herself, never caring what became of anyone else. But Elena... Elena cared. It was in her eyes as she pleaded with him, in her voice, in her hand that trembled even now, holding the knife. She might threaten to harm herself, yet even as she did so, she begged for the lives of her loved ones. She wouldn't put them all at risk by turning now and drawing Klaus's ire down on the whole lot of them.
“I’m sorry, Elena," he told her softly. "I’m going to have to call your bluff.”
He saw her swallow once, hard, and look down at the knife in her hand. She turned it a little, and took a deep breath as though to brace herself. Elijah had a split second to watch the resolve harden in her eyes, to realize that he had misread her; then her arm came up, and she plunged the knife into her abdomen.
“NO!!!” He roared, surging forward, only to slam up against the barrier of the threshold. Elena writhed in pain, dropping the bloodied knife to the floor as she curled in upon herself, upon the pain. He looked around wildly, trying to gauge how much of the house he might have to tear apart before that barrier gave way and he could reach her, could save her. Too long. Too long! “Yes!" he capitulated. "Yes, you can have your deal. Let me heal you!”
She moaned, gritting her teeth against the pain. “Give me your word!”
“I give you my word,” he agreed.
Elena staggered toward him, popping free of the threshold and into his waiting arms. Relief flared quickly – and died just as suddenly as fire once again exploded in his chest. Shock mingled with the agony, an agony magnified a thousand-fold by virtue of whose hand had dealt it. He clung to her still as his flesh started to grey and his knees gave out, unable to believe how badly he had misjudged her, seeing what he had wanted to see instead of what was there...
And thus, I die a fool.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
What's At Stake, Part Eight
I had hoped to just have to do one more section before delving into new territory, but it was going to be way too long; Jenna keeps wanting screentime, and she gets so little on the actual show that I hate to begrudge her here. So, next up after this: The Dinner Party. Of Doom!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Elijah was waiting by the roadside at a little after sunrise, two coffees in hand, when Jenna pulled up and parked her Mini Cooper behind him. She waved and started fishing for something in the back seat. It appeared it was being recalcitrant; Elijah was treated to a rather nice view through the windshield as she turned full around and leaned over the back of the seat to reach whatever it was she was searching for.
No distractions, he reminded himself firmly, then wondered exactly how long it had been since he’d… been distracted. Decades, at least. It wasn’t an urge that pestered him overmuch anymore. There were only so many anatomical possibilities, after all, and he had long since exhausted that rather extensive list. Still, every now and again someone piqued his interest, and right now it was piquing over Jenna Sommers. It surprised him more than a little to realize that it had everything to do with the woman herself and not her tertiary relationship to Elena Gilbert.
Jenna finally recovered what she was after and climbed out of the car, juggling several tubes that he supposed contained property maps. He hustled over to relieve her of the armload, laying them on the hood of his own car. “I didn’t realize there were so many in the archive; I could have come and helped you with all this.”
“Oh, it’s fine. I wasn’t sure where we’d end up going from here, so I just grabbed everything.” She eyed the coffee like a starving wolverine eyeing a T-bone steak. “Please tell me one of those is for me.”
A few strands of her hair had fallen forward and were stuck in her lip gloss. He handed her one of the coffees and pushed the hair back, his attention lingering a little longer than he liked on her lips. No distractions. “Hazelnut, extra cream, three sugars.”
“You remembered my coffee order?” she asked, blushing a little as she raked her hair back behind her ears.
“There are certain things a man should always remember when it comes to a woman: birthdays, anniversaries, and how she likes her coffee.”
“Wow. How is it you’re still single?” Jenna took a long swallow of coffee, and closed her eyes in pleasure. “Mmm,” she sighed, low in her throat. “Perfect.”
No! Distractions!
Elijah cleared his throat. "I guess I just haven't found the right girl, yet." He started sorting through the cylinders, checking the archive label of each until he found the correct one for the area they were in. Removing the parchment from the tube, he spread the age-stained map out along the hood for them to study as they finished their coffee.
Jenna hitched one hip on the car and looked back and forth from the map to the field in front of them. “Right there, that stone wall,” she said, gesturing with her empty cup as she shielded her eyes from the sun with her other hand. She turned back to the map and pointed at a boundary line.
“Excellent. We have our reference point.” Elijah rolled the map back up and tucked it under his arm while Jenna tossed the rest into a canvas bag that she slung over her shoulder.
They set off down the embankment and followed the old stone wall, out of the early morning sunlight and into the dappled shade at the edge of the woods. Dried, fallen leaves skittered around their ankles as they walked, remarking in whispers upon their passing. A squirrel dashed along the top of the stones, its plume of a tail streaming behind it as it dove headlong into dense foliage; occasionally a bird cried out overhead, startled from its perch by this sudden invasion into their world. The trees – some saplings, some ancient – kept a silent vigil over it all. It was no mystery why magic was drawn to gather in such places.
The wall ended perhaps thirty or forty feet into the trees. Elijah consulted the map again. “It looks like the property continued about another fifty yards or so, to a small stream. Do you have any idea if it’s still there?”
“The stream? Yeah, I think so. It’s probably pretty low this time of year.” Jenna forged ahead as he re-rolled the parchment. “At the risk of sounding clueless, what exactly are you hoping to find by walking these old property lines?”
Elijah picked up a stick, idly peeling bark from it as they walked. “At the time the area was settled, many of the people would have put up some sort of hasty shelter to get them by before until they had a firmer foothold on the land. Sometimes you can find the remnants of these old cabins and such.” They rounded a copse of trees, looping back toward the road, and came to a clearing around a small, dilapidated house.
"Like this?" Jenna pointed at the structure.
"Hmm... no, this looks newer, and probably larger than what the settlers would have begun with."
“That makes sense. I never really thought about it, but yeah, I guess all those antebellum mansions didn’t just spring up overnight. Though I’m sure if you ask any of the founding families they’ll tell you their ancestors never set foot in a one-room cabin. Speaking of which,” Jenna pointed. "...the old Fell property actually starts just beyond that fence."
“Ah, the Fells. One of the ‘founding families’.”
"Why do you say it like that?"
Following the fence line, they headed back toward the cars. "My research showed me that this area was actually settled almost two full centuries earlier. There was a migration of townsfolk from the northeast. Um, it was Salem, to be precise."
"Massachusetts? As in the witch trials?"
Elijah nodded. "Which means the ever-lauded founding families didn't actually found anything."
Looking up, he saw a third car parked along with theirs. He tossed the stick and stuffed his hands in his pockets as he watched a figure approach: the history teacher Elena had spoken of. The one Jenna was currently dating. She hadn't spotted him yet.
"Well, I bet it was the men who made a big deal about being founders back in 1860," she said. "Men are very territorial."
"Yes," he agreed ruefully. "They are."
Jenna glanced in the direction he was staring and watched the teacher approach as well, looking surprised to see him; she didn't seem to have been expecting him. "Ah, Elijah, this is my... friend, Alaric Saltzman," she introduced, not sounding terribly thrilled about it. And wasn't that just interesting?
"Yeah, I got your, uh, your message about walking Elijah here through the old property lines. I thought I would, um, tag along, you know, being a history buff and all." Saltzman looked from one of them to the other, a false smile plastered across his face. "Where to next?"
History buff, my ass. Elijah half-expected the man to start marking trees. "I'm pretty curious about the freed slave property owners," he answered. "Some say, you know, the descendants of the slaves are the true keepers of American history."
"Well, I only brought the surveys. I've got that bit in the car. Just give me a sec." Jenna headed toward the vehicles without waiting for an answer. Giving herself a moment to absorb this new development?
Elijah turned his attention from her fleeing figure to the man before him. "Alaric Saltzman," he drawled. "You're one of those people on Elena's list of loved ones to protect."
"Yeah, so is Jenna."
Irritation warred with amusement at this mere human bristling in front of him. "You don't have to be jealous," he said, cutting to the heart of the matter. "I rarely pursue younger women." Though, if the timing were different, he would be sorely tempted to do just that. Saltzman didn't answer. Elijah just shook his head. "It's a joke, Ric," he said, clapping him on the shoulder as he passed him to go help Jenna at the car. "Lighten up."
Elijah rejoined Jenna, leaving Saltzman to catch up. What the man sought to accomplish with this fool's errand, he didn't know. As if he had any intention of harming Jenna! And even if he had, what exactly did the schoolteacher think he could do about it? Surely he wasn’t so foolish as to think that one of his homemade stake-o-matic contraptions posed any threat to him. No, more than likely it was his own romantic interests Saltzman sought to preserve, not Jenna’s safety. Elijah wondered how much Jenna introducing him as a ‘friend’ had rankled.
“According to this list," she said, as he drew even with her, “we’ll have to go down the road a few miles and cross the river, then up the hill to the old Reilly property.”
“What exactly do you hope to find on those properties now?” Alaric asked, joining them.
“Well, that's the beauty of it. One never knows what one might stumble across when he starts exploring the unplumbed depths of the past," he replied airily. "But I'm sure you can relate to that. You know, being a history buff and all.”
“Right. Yeah. Yay, discovery." Saltzman made an inane little rah-rah gesture.
“There's no sense taking three cars,” Jenna pointed out. "Since I've got everything in here anyway, we may as well take mine."
"Of course." Elijah went around the passenger side. Opening the door, he flipped the front seat forward, then stepped back, gesturing to Saltzman – several inches taller than him, and with much longer legs – to climb into the tiny car's miniscule back seat.
The teacher gave him a faltering smile and, with some effort, got himself folded into the car. Elijah pushed the seat back, where it banged against Saltzman's knees. He declined to pull the seat forward as he got in himself and fastened his seatbelt, smiling at Jenna. "Lead on, milady," he said, laying a British accent on thick and making her giggle.
Saltzman grunted in the back seat, hitting his head against the roof as the car bounced onto the road and drove away.
****************
Jenna breathed an audible sigh of relief as Alaric got into his own vehicle and drove away. They had spent the better part of four hours, the three of them, touring the properties on Jenna's list. During that time, Elijah had witnessed an increasing annoyance on Jenna's part with her erstwhile suitor, and a corresponding increase in desperation on the part of the schoolteacher. Weak attempts at wit had been met with withering silence, and the whole mess had devolved into a rather charged and awkward silence.
Elijah was delighted.
"So – " Jenna began.
"That – " Elijah said at the same time.
Jenna laughed, breaking the tension. "Sorry. You first."
"I was just going to thank you for a lovely morning."
She lifted an eyebrow at him. "Really?"
"Uh, no." He screwed his mouth up into a rueful expression, making her laugh again.
"I am so sorry. I had no idea he was going to just appear like that."
"No, don't apologize. I take it the two of you are..."
Her breath came out in a huff. "I don't know what we are right now, honestly."
Elijah leaned back against the car, crossing his arms and his ankles. "Trouble in paradise?"
"Paradise. Hah! It's... He... I..." Jenna raked her hair back in frustration. "I don't know. I like him, we have a great time together... I just... Sometimes it just feels like he's hiding things from me, and I don't know what to do with that."
"Another woman?" Plant a little seed, see what grows...
"Not exactly." Jenna leaned against the car alongside him, mirroring his posture, her hip brushing his. "He was married once, and she died. There were 'mysterious' circumstances..."
"Such as?"
"That's just it! I don't know. He doesn't want to talk about it, and I get that, but... What if he isn't really over her? Or..."
"Or?" he prompted.
Jenna shook her head, as though to clear it. "Nothing."
She's wondering if he had something to do with it. "Perhaps he just isn't ready yet."
"Yeah. Maybe." She slapped her palms lightly against her thighs and pushed off of the car. "Anyway, that's enough of 'Jenna's Travails With The Opposite Sex.' Did you at least get anything out of the search you can use?"
"Oh, everything proves useful in one way or another." He caught her hand as she turned to gather the maps and lists. "Let me take you to lunch. It's the least I can do after you traipsing all over hell and beyond with me."
She seemed to consider for a moment, then tilted her head and smiled. "I would love to have lunch with you, Mr. Smith." She paused. "Why does that always sound like an alias?"
Elijah raised his hands in mock surrender. "That's it, you've found me out." He made a show of looking all around them before leaning down to whisper, in a deliberately bad Russian accent, "I'm really Russian spy, sent to find evidence of the lost Tsar amongst the slave populace of the American South." Sliding a hand into his breast pocket, he withdrew a pencil. "This is my link to the former Soviet satellite system..."
Jenna shoved him playfully, laughing. "Get in the car, comrade."
*************
This is a mistake, Elijah thought to himself, even as he walked into the Grille with Jenna. If he was trying to remain free of distraction, he was going about it in the most wrong way possible. He had research to do. He had plans to draw up with Jonas. He had a sacrifice ritual to plan in such a way as to render the actual sacrifice unnecessary. What he did not have was time to be... playing with some human woman. Even one as endearing as Jenna Sommers. Especially one as endearing as Jenna Sommers.
Despite being distracted, Elijah noticed Damon, Alaric and Andie Starr the moment he entered, and smiled to himself when he heard Damon announce to Saltzman, "Look, there's Jenna with her new boyfriend." Damon raised his hand and waved them over. Elijah followed Jenna to their table.
"So," Damon said, "I hear you two had quite the meeting of historical minds today." Elijah merely raised a brow at him.
"Yeah, I guess you could say that," Jenna answered.
Alaric rose from the table. "Well, as much as I'd like to continue this, I have papers to grade."
"You know what?" Andie said, sitting up straighter. "We should continue this. Let's have a dinner party."
Damon looked immediately taken with the idea. "Ooh, my girl! Full of good ideas. I'll be happy to host," he volunteered. "Say, tonight maybe?"
"It's good for me," Andie agreed readily. "Jenna?"
Alaric shook his head. "Nah, I don't know if tonight works – "
"Yeah, I'm free," Jenna broke in. She looked up at Elijah questioningly.
"It would be a pleasure," he agreed.
"Great!" Damon enthused. He and the girls conferred on the details of food and drink for a few moments while he and Alaric stood by, Alaric looking slightly dyspeptic at the idea of the whole thing. Elijah resisted the sophomoric urge to taunt him further. Once they'd arrived at a suitable time, the teacher beat a hasty retreat from the restaurant, retiring the field. The arrangements thus made, Elijah escorted Jenna to an open booth.
And wondered just what the devil Damon Salvatore was up to now.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Elijah was waiting by the roadside at a little after sunrise, two coffees in hand, when Jenna pulled up and parked her Mini Cooper behind him. She waved and started fishing for something in the back seat. It appeared it was being recalcitrant; Elijah was treated to a rather nice view through the windshield as she turned full around and leaned over the back of the seat to reach whatever it was she was searching for.
No distractions, he reminded himself firmly, then wondered exactly how long it had been since he’d… been distracted. Decades, at least. It wasn’t an urge that pestered him overmuch anymore. There were only so many anatomical possibilities, after all, and he had long since exhausted that rather extensive list. Still, every now and again someone piqued his interest, and right now it was piquing over Jenna Sommers. It surprised him more than a little to realize that it had everything to do with the woman herself and not her tertiary relationship to Elena Gilbert.
Jenna finally recovered what she was after and climbed out of the car, juggling several tubes that he supposed contained property maps. He hustled over to relieve her of the armload, laying them on the hood of his own car. “I didn’t realize there were so many in the archive; I could have come and helped you with all this.”
“Oh, it’s fine. I wasn’t sure where we’d end up going from here, so I just grabbed everything.” She eyed the coffee like a starving wolverine eyeing a T-bone steak. “Please tell me one of those is for me.”
A few strands of her hair had fallen forward and were stuck in her lip gloss. He handed her one of the coffees and pushed the hair back, his attention lingering a little longer than he liked on her lips. No distractions. “Hazelnut, extra cream, three sugars.”
“You remembered my coffee order?” she asked, blushing a little as she raked her hair back behind her ears.
“There are certain things a man should always remember when it comes to a woman: birthdays, anniversaries, and how she likes her coffee.”
“Wow. How is it you’re still single?” Jenna took a long swallow of coffee, and closed her eyes in pleasure. “Mmm,” she sighed, low in her throat. “Perfect.”
No! Distractions!
Elijah cleared his throat. "I guess I just haven't found the right girl, yet." He started sorting through the cylinders, checking the archive label of each until he found the correct one for the area they were in. Removing the parchment from the tube, he spread the age-stained map out along the hood for them to study as they finished their coffee.
Jenna hitched one hip on the car and looked back and forth from the map to the field in front of them. “Right there, that stone wall,” she said, gesturing with her empty cup as she shielded her eyes from the sun with her other hand. She turned back to the map and pointed at a boundary line.
“Excellent. We have our reference point.” Elijah rolled the map back up and tucked it under his arm while Jenna tossed the rest into a canvas bag that she slung over her shoulder.
They set off down the embankment and followed the old stone wall, out of the early morning sunlight and into the dappled shade at the edge of the woods. Dried, fallen leaves skittered around their ankles as they walked, remarking in whispers upon their passing. A squirrel dashed along the top of the stones, its plume of a tail streaming behind it as it dove headlong into dense foliage; occasionally a bird cried out overhead, startled from its perch by this sudden invasion into their world. The trees – some saplings, some ancient – kept a silent vigil over it all. It was no mystery why magic was drawn to gather in such places.
The wall ended perhaps thirty or forty feet into the trees. Elijah consulted the map again. “It looks like the property continued about another fifty yards or so, to a small stream. Do you have any idea if it’s still there?”
“The stream? Yeah, I think so. It’s probably pretty low this time of year.” Jenna forged ahead as he re-rolled the parchment. “At the risk of sounding clueless, what exactly are you hoping to find by walking these old property lines?”
Elijah picked up a stick, idly peeling bark from it as they walked. “At the time the area was settled, many of the people would have put up some sort of hasty shelter to get them by before until they had a firmer foothold on the land. Sometimes you can find the remnants of these old cabins and such.” They rounded a copse of trees, looping back toward the road, and came to a clearing around a small, dilapidated house.
"Like this?" Jenna pointed at the structure.
"Hmm... no, this looks newer, and probably larger than what the settlers would have begun with."
“That makes sense. I never really thought about it, but yeah, I guess all those antebellum mansions didn’t just spring up overnight. Though I’m sure if you ask any of the founding families they’ll tell you their ancestors never set foot in a one-room cabin. Speaking of which,” Jenna pointed. "...the old Fell property actually starts just beyond that fence."
“Ah, the Fells. One of the ‘founding families’.”
"Why do you say it like that?"
Following the fence line, they headed back toward the cars. "My research showed me that this area was actually settled almost two full centuries earlier. There was a migration of townsfolk from the northeast. Um, it was Salem, to be precise."
"Massachusetts? As in the witch trials?"
Elijah nodded. "Which means the ever-lauded founding families didn't actually found anything."
Looking up, he saw a third car parked along with theirs. He tossed the stick and stuffed his hands in his pockets as he watched a figure approach: the history teacher Elena had spoken of. The one Jenna was currently dating. She hadn't spotted him yet.
"Well, I bet it was the men who made a big deal about being founders back in 1860," she said. "Men are very territorial."
"Yes," he agreed ruefully. "They are."
Jenna glanced in the direction he was staring and watched the teacher approach as well, looking surprised to see him; she didn't seem to have been expecting him. "Ah, Elijah, this is my... friend, Alaric Saltzman," she introduced, not sounding terribly thrilled about it. And wasn't that just interesting?
"Yeah, I got your, uh, your message about walking Elijah here through the old property lines. I thought I would, um, tag along, you know, being a history buff and all." Saltzman looked from one of them to the other, a false smile plastered across his face. "Where to next?"
History buff, my ass. Elijah half-expected the man to start marking trees. "I'm pretty curious about the freed slave property owners," he answered. "Some say, you know, the descendants of the slaves are the true keepers of American history."
"Well, I only brought the surveys. I've got that bit in the car. Just give me a sec." Jenna headed toward the vehicles without waiting for an answer. Giving herself a moment to absorb this new development?
Elijah turned his attention from her fleeing figure to the man before him. "Alaric Saltzman," he drawled. "You're one of those people on Elena's list of loved ones to protect."
"Yeah, so is Jenna."
Irritation warred with amusement at this mere human bristling in front of him. "You don't have to be jealous," he said, cutting to the heart of the matter. "I rarely pursue younger women." Though, if the timing were different, he would be sorely tempted to do just that. Saltzman didn't answer. Elijah just shook his head. "It's a joke, Ric," he said, clapping him on the shoulder as he passed him to go help Jenna at the car. "Lighten up."
Elijah rejoined Jenna, leaving Saltzman to catch up. What the man sought to accomplish with this fool's errand, he didn't know. As if he had any intention of harming Jenna! And even if he had, what exactly did the schoolteacher think he could do about it? Surely he wasn’t so foolish as to think that one of his homemade stake-o-matic contraptions posed any threat to him. No, more than likely it was his own romantic interests Saltzman sought to preserve, not Jenna’s safety. Elijah wondered how much Jenna introducing him as a ‘friend’ had rankled.
“According to this list," she said, as he drew even with her, “we’ll have to go down the road a few miles and cross the river, then up the hill to the old Reilly property.”
“What exactly do you hope to find on those properties now?” Alaric asked, joining them.
“Well, that's the beauty of it. One never knows what one might stumble across when he starts exploring the unplumbed depths of the past," he replied airily. "But I'm sure you can relate to that. You know, being a history buff and all.”
“Right. Yeah. Yay, discovery." Saltzman made an inane little rah-rah gesture.
“There's no sense taking three cars,” Jenna pointed out. "Since I've got everything in here anyway, we may as well take mine."
"Of course." Elijah went around the passenger side. Opening the door, he flipped the front seat forward, then stepped back, gesturing to Saltzman – several inches taller than him, and with much longer legs – to climb into the tiny car's miniscule back seat.
The teacher gave him a faltering smile and, with some effort, got himself folded into the car. Elijah pushed the seat back, where it banged against Saltzman's knees. He declined to pull the seat forward as he got in himself and fastened his seatbelt, smiling at Jenna. "Lead on, milady," he said, laying a British accent on thick and making her giggle.
Saltzman grunted in the back seat, hitting his head against the roof as the car bounced onto the road and drove away.
****************
Jenna breathed an audible sigh of relief as Alaric got into his own vehicle and drove away. They had spent the better part of four hours, the three of them, touring the properties on Jenna's list. During that time, Elijah had witnessed an increasing annoyance on Jenna's part with her erstwhile suitor, and a corresponding increase in desperation on the part of the schoolteacher. Weak attempts at wit had been met with withering silence, and the whole mess had devolved into a rather charged and awkward silence.
Elijah was delighted.
"So – " Jenna began.
"That – " Elijah said at the same time.
Jenna laughed, breaking the tension. "Sorry. You first."
"I was just going to thank you for a lovely morning."
She lifted an eyebrow at him. "Really?"
"Uh, no." He screwed his mouth up into a rueful expression, making her laugh again.
"I am so sorry. I had no idea he was going to just appear like that."
"No, don't apologize. I take it the two of you are..."
Her breath came out in a huff. "I don't know what we are right now, honestly."
Elijah leaned back against the car, crossing his arms and his ankles. "Trouble in paradise?"
"Paradise. Hah! It's... He... I..." Jenna raked her hair back in frustration. "I don't know. I like him, we have a great time together... I just... Sometimes it just feels like he's hiding things from me, and I don't know what to do with that."
"Another woman?" Plant a little seed, see what grows...
"Not exactly." Jenna leaned against the car alongside him, mirroring his posture, her hip brushing his. "He was married once, and she died. There were 'mysterious' circumstances..."
"Such as?"
"That's just it! I don't know. He doesn't want to talk about it, and I get that, but... What if he isn't really over her? Or..."
"Or?" he prompted.
Jenna shook her head, as though to clear it. "Nothing."
She's wondering if he had something to do with it. "Perhaps he just isn't ready yet."
"Yeah. Maybe." She slapped her palms lightly against her thighs and pushed off of the car. "Anyway, that's enough of 'Jenna's Travails With The Opposite Sex.' Did you at least get anything out of the search you can use?"
"Oh, everything proves useful in one way or another." He caught her hand as she turned to gather the maps and lists. "Let me take you to lunch. It's the least I can do after you traipsing all over hell and beyond with me."
She seemed to consider for a moment, then tilted her head and smiled. "I would love to have lunch with you, Mr. Smith." She paused. "Why does that always sound like an alias?"
Elijah raised his hands in mock surrender. "That's it, you've found me out." He made a show of looking all around them before leaning down to whisper, in a deliberately bad Russian accent, "I'm really Russian spy, sent to find evidence of the lost Tsar amongst the slave populace of the American South." Sliding a hand into his breast pocket, he withdrew a pencil. "This is my link to the former Soviet satellite system..."
Jenna shoved him playfully, laughing. "Get in the car, comrade."
*************
This is a mistake, Elijah thought to himself, even as he walked into the Grille with Jenna. If he was trying to remain free of distraction, he was going about it in the most wrong way possible. He had research to do. He had plans to draw up with Jonas. He had a sacrifice ritual to plan in such a way as to render the actual sacrifice unnecessary. What he did not have was time to be... playing with some human woman. Even one as endearing as Jenna Sommers. Especially one as endearing as Jenna Sommers.
Despite being distracted, Elijah noticed Damon, Alaric and Andie Starr the moment he entered, and smiled to himself when he heard Damon announce to Saltzman, "Look, there's Jenna with her new boyfriend." Damon raised his hand and waved them over. Elijah followed Jenna to their table.
"So," Damon said, "I hear you two had quite the meeting of historical minds today." Elijah merely raised a brow at him.
"Yeah, I guess you could say that," Jenna answered.
Alaric rose from the table. "Well, as much as I'd like to continue this, I have papers to grade."
"You know what?" Andie said, sitting up straighter. "We should continue this. Let's have a dinner party."
Damon looked immediately taken with the idea. "Ooh, my girl! Full of good ideas. I'll be happy to host," he volunteered. "Say, tonight maybe?"
"It's good for me," Andie agreed readily. "Jenna?"
Alaric shook his head. "Nah, I don't know if tonight works – "
"Yeah, I'm free," Jenna broke in. She looked up at Elijah questioningly.
"It would be a pleasure," he agreed.
"Great!" Damon enthused. He and the girls conferred on the details of food and drink for a few moments while he and Alaric stood by, Alaric looking slightly dyspeptic at the idea of the whole thing. Elijah resisted the sophomoric urge to taunt him further. Once they'd arrived at a suitable time, the teacher beat a hasty retreat from the restaurant, retiring the field. The arrangements thus made, Elijah escorted Jenna to an open booth.
And wondered just what the devil Damon Salvatore was up to now.
Thursday, March 17, 2011
What's At Stake, Part Seven
I dunno, you guys. This one was grueling. Not too thrilled with it, but I wanted to touch on events to date to get Elijah's take on them. Once I get through the next section and up to the daggering, THEN I can have fun without the constraints of what has already happened. Hang in there with me!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Snap the neck of that one with the right hand while ripping this one's heart out with the left. Whirl around 150 degrees. Tear the spine out. Toss this one against the wall to crush bone and speed over to block that group from escaping through the door. Throw the serving fork to spear the one crouching in the corner before she escapes out the back exit –
"...in Richmond for your book? There's such a wealth of history."
Elijah left off amusing himself with possible ways to liven up this absurd tea party and focused his attention back on Carol Lockwood. "Oh, no, I'm focusing mostly on the smaller regions of Virginia, doing lots of research. It's strictly academic," he answered inanely.
"That's fascinating," she said, stepping into his personal space for the fourth or fifth time during the conversation. He wondered idly just how long she had been widowed; he was rather unaccustomed to being the prey in the equation.
Glancing toward the archway, he saw Damon Salvatore make an entrance, greeted with reserve by Jenna Sommers and with a bit more enthusiasm by a woman who looked vaguely familiar. Shaking her loose, he approached.
"Damon!" Carol stepped away from him and turned toward the other vampire.
"Carol," Damon greeted her back warmly, clasping her outstretched hands.
"What a surprise! Hi! Elijah, I want you to meet Damon Salvatore. His family is one of Mystic Falls' founding families."
"Mm-hm. It's such a pleasure to meet you." Damon said, and extended his hand, wearing much the same look as he had when he was ramming a pole through Elijah’s heart and killing him.
Elijah held the eye contact and gripped Damon’s hand back, perhaps a little harder than strictly necessary. "No, the pleasure's mine."
"Oh, there's Mrs. Atwood. I should introduce you!" Carol went to attach herself to some old woman in a ridiculous hat who had just entered the room.
Damon freed his hand and gestured toward a closed door across the room. "Why don't we slip into the study for a moment."
This should be amusing. Elijah nodded briefly and wove his way through the crowd of women. He preceded Damon into the room, waiting until the latter had closed the door and crossed the room before speaking. "What can I do for you, Damon?"
"I was hoping we could have a word."
"Where is Elena?"
"Safe, with Stefan. They're laying low. You know, we've had a bit of a werewolf problem."
Elijah ran his fingers over the back of the leather sofa. "Oh yeah, I heard about that," he said, playing along. Jonas had filled him in on the previous evening's festivities. Since he very much doubted that the mongrels had taken the advice to 'flea' town, both he and the warlock remained on alert.
"I'm sure you did, since it was your witch who saved the day," Damon sing-songed.
"You are welcome."
Damon perched on the large desk. "Which adds to my confusion. Exactly why are you here?"
He was obnoxious, to be sure, but at least this one thought to ask the pertinent questions. "Why don't you just stay focused on keeping Elena safe, and leave the rest to me." He turned toward the door, only to find it suddenly blocked.
"Not good enough," Damon said, going toe-to-toe with Elijah.
Elijah gave him a hard stare for a moment. The next second, his left hand was wrapped around Damon Salvatore's throat and he had the younger vampire slammed up against the wall. Damon reached his right hand up to grip his neck in response. Elijah peeled it off, crushing the bones in Damon's wrist as though they were made of fragile glass. "You young vampires... so arrogant." He pushed the broken limb down to dangle at Damon's side. "How dare you come in here and challenge me?"
The Salvatore brother, though so clearly overpowered, still glared at him, defiant. "You can't kill me, man. It's not part of the deal," he gritted out.
Unfortunately, that much was true. "Silence," he told him softly. Reaching down with his right hand, Elijah grabbed a wooden pencil from the desk and stabbed it into Damon's larynx, pitching him forward over the desk.
The younger man clawed at it as Elijah whipped a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped blood from his hand. "I'm an Original," he said mildly. "Show a little respect." He held he bloodied cloth out to Damon, who snapped it out of his fingers and held it to his bleeding neck, wisely remaining silent. Or perhaps he just couldn't speak around the wood still embedded in his throat. "The moment you cease to be of use to me, you're dead," Elijah advised him, heading toward the door. "So," he smiled, "you should do as I say. Keep Elena safe."
Elijah exited the office, closing the door behind him to allow time for Damon to heal and to clean himself up enough to be once again seen in public. Jenna and the other woman he'd seen earlier waylaid him between there and the archway. "Elijah, this is Andie Starr," Jenna began. "She's a reporter for the local news station."
So that's why she looked familiar. "Miss Starr," Elijah said, taking the woman's outstretched hand.
"Mr. Smith. It's nice to meet you. I was hoping to do a feature on the book you're writing. Do you have a few moments to talk?" The reporter smiled at him hopefully.
"Oh, well, that's very flattering," he demurred, "but I'm afraid I'm only in the very beginning stages of my research. There's very little to tell, yet. Perhaps another time, when the project draws closer to fruition?"
"Actually, I think people here will be very interested in the whole process, and more than willing to help, if they know how. What types of information are you looking for?"
"Nothing very newsworthy, I'm afraid, Miss Starr. Family histories, property ownership, all very mundane things. It was a pleasure meeting you, though," he said dismissing her with a smile.
The reporter looked slightly disappointed, but acquiesced. "Fair enough. Maybe we can revisit this with an interview when the book comes out." She glanced around the room. "And, I should probably try and find my boyfriend. Did you see which way Damon went, Jenna?"
"Damon Salvatore?" Elijah asked, before Jenna could answer. "I believe I saw him head out toward the gardens a moment ago with some acquaintance of Mayor Lockwood's."
"Oh, good. Perhaps we'll meet again soon," she said, heading toward the french doors that led out to the terrace.
Elijah turned toward Jenna and gave her a charming smile. "I'm glad you're here, Jenna. This has been..." He let his eyes wander the over the flocks of women strewn about the room, grouped more or less by age and by how expensive their outfits and accessories were, and no doubt remarking on how expensive those of the other groups were. He turned back to her. "I'm glad you're here."
She laughed. "Yup. I've seen that look. You've been 'Caroled'."
"She's quite the social..." Terrorist? Nazi? Barracuda? "...Planner, isn't she?"
"You have. No. Idea. Fundraisers, galas, historical reenactments, town celebrations... It's like there's an event every week." Jenna took his arm conspiratorially. "I should get you out of here before she drags you to the portrait room."
"There's a portrait room?"
"Oh yeah. And if you survive that, it will be a full, guided tour of the gardens."
Elijah feigned horror. "Not that!"
"And if you still haven't escaped, it will be an invite for dinner, an assignment to some committee or ten, and then... You, um, didn't tell her you were single, did you?"
Elijah winced and nodded.
Jenna looked around, then leaned in and dropped her voice. "It look's like Mrs. Fell has her cornered for the moment. You wanna make a break for it?"
"And leave you to her mercy? I wouldn't dream of it." He made a show of steeling himself, as though for battle. "At least not without first making my apologies. And not without you agreeing to go have coffee with me afterward," he added.
Jenna surveyed the room again, as though looking for someone. Someone she didn't find. "You know what? That's the best offer I've had all day."
*************
His self-imposed embargo on ‘distractions’ notwithstanding, coffee with Jenna had extended into dinner, and it was dark by the time he took his leave of her and headed out toward the Salvatore boarding house. According to Jonas, the werewolves did not appear to have departed town, and Elijah rather expected another attempt on the Salvatores. He hoped that Elena was indeed safe with Stefan, wherever they were, and wasn't attacked while they were divided from the others.
Elijah rather thought that he’d prefer to have Elena in Damon’s company, all things considered. Damon was still a very young vampire, but Elijah thought he showed potential. There was evidence of cunning in him, and a calculated ruthlessness to go with it. Couple those things with an acceptance of – if not a delight in – what he was, and Elijah could see Damon as a power player down the road, if only his impulsivity didn’t lead him to do something lethally stupid over the next few centuries.
Then again, he thought ruefully, he’d done his share of rash and ill-conceived things when he was younger; they’d taught him some lessons, albeit the hard way, that he may otherwise not have learned. Perhaps when all this with Klaus was over he would consider employing Damon in some capacity – provided, of course, that the young vampire didn’t drive Elijah to murder him himself between now and then.
Stefan Salvatore, though… Elijah didn’t like that one’s odds, long term. From what he had gathered, the younger Salvatore still clung to the semblance of a normal human life. Not that there was anything wrong with playing the part for others; that was only smart. But he suspected that Stefan was deceiving himself as well, and that particular charade didn’t bode well for his long term survival. There came a time when a vampire either accepted what he was and learned to live within those new parameters, or he was dragged under by the chains that still bound him to a humanity he no longer truly possessed. Elijah feared that Stefan’s time, though not yet quite expired, was drawing perilously close to its end. He would soon have to choose a side, because he would no longer be able to span the gap in between without snapping.
Elijah parked about a quarter of a mile away from the house, off of the road and in a spot where the car would be camouflaged by trees. Walking silently from there toward the boarding house, he heard voices from inside, and the unmistakable clank of chains. He sped the rest of the way down the driveway, quiet as the grave as he stole into the foyer.
“Where's the moonstone?" he heard Jules say, from a room off to the left. It figured. He had half expected the were-bitch to go off script. He only hoped his upcoming demonstration would convince her that she better get back with the program.
“Get over it, honey. You're never going to get it.”
Elijah crossed his feet at the ankles and leaned casually against the door casing, sliding the moonstone from his pocket. “Are you looking for this?” The five werewolves turned and watched as he walked over and placed the moonstone on a table behind the sofa. Damon was chained to a chair in front of the fireplace, with a metal collar around his neck, wooden spikes on the inside jabbing into his neck and sending the occasional rivulet of blood down his throat. He looked almost as nonplused as the werewolves to see him.
Stepping back a couple of paces, Elijah gestured toward the rock. “Go ahead. Take it,” he invited. One of the pack made a dash forward. Elijah was faster. He caught the man and punched into his chest cavity, pulling out his heart, then eased the body down onto the sofa in one smooth motion. Two more broke for the moonstone; he stopped one with each hand, ripping their hearts out as well and earning an approving look from Damon. Elijah locked eyes with Jules, who cut and ran for the door. He would ‘discuss’ this breach of behavior with her later.
The sole remaining werewolf squatted down on the floor and pulled his collar up around his head. Elijah had to pause a moment and marvel at how completely ludicrous it was. “What about you, sweetheart? Hmm?” he asked. Strolling over, he pulled the boy up by his jacket, sliding one hand inside, over the heart. “Want to take a shot? No? Yes? No?” Elijah made a show of looking around the room. “Where’s the girl?”
“I don’t know,” Damon replied, glancing around.
“It doesn’t really matter.” He pulled his hand out of the young werewolf’s jacket, only to draw his fist back and give him a neck-snapping right-cross. He was dead before he hit the floor. Elijah left him in a heap and went to stand in front of Damon.
Admiration warred with suspicion for supremacy over Damon’s expression. Elijah smirked as he bent and broke the chain pinning Damon’s arm to the chair, then took a firm grasp on the loops of chain around the younger vampire’s stomach and snapped those. Stepping back, he shook hair out of his eyes. “You realize this is the third time I've saved your life now,” he reminded him.
Damon wisely remained silent. Elijah recovered the moonstone from the table and left, leaving behind the four dead werewolves for the Salvatores to deal with.
*************
Once he reached his car, he took his phone out and dialed Jonas, wondering where the warlock was and, more importantly, whether there were still more out there on Elena’s tail. The call went to voicemail. Frowning, Elijah ended the call and dialed again. Again it rang six times and then went to voicemail.
Pulling out onto the road, he dialed Jules’s number. That too went to voicemail, though he’d been expecting that from her. Once the pre-recorded message finished and he heard the requisite beep, he spoke: “Someone’s been a very bad dog. I suggest you collect the Lockwood boy and remove yourselves from town until your presence is required. Because if you don’t? I will kill you along with any other werewolf I find in Mystic Falls. I hope I’ve made myself clear.”
He disconnected and drove over to Jonas’s. The warlock’s car was in the lot, so Elijah ascended the stairs toward the apartment. As he drew near the landing, he heard the sounds of shouting coming from the Martins’ apartment. “… I said I’m sorry! Jesus!”
“You were supposed to be home three hours ago!” Jonas shouted. “Where the hell have you been?!”
“I was at the Grill!”
“With Bonnie Bennett?”
“Yes. No! I don’t know!!”
“What the hell do you mean you don’t know?!”
Having assured himself that the argument was a father-son squabble and not a more sinister conflict, Elijah turned back down the stairs and left. He could wait and speak with Jonas in the morning.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Snap the neck of that one with the right hand while ripping this one's heart out with the left. Whirl around 150 degrees. Tear the spine out. Toss this one against the wall to crush bone and speed over to block that group from escaping through the door. Throw the serving fork to spear the one crouching in the corner before she escapes out the back exit –
"...in Richmond for your book? There's such a wealth of history."
Elijah left off amusing himself with possible ways to liven up this absurd tea party and focused his attention back on Carol Lockwood. "Oh, no, I'm focusing mostly on the smaller regions of Virginia, doing lots of research. It's strictly academic," he answered inanely.
"That's fascinating," she said, stepping into his personal space for the fourth or fifth time during the conversation. He wondered idly just how long she had been widowed; he was rather unaccustomed to being the prey in the equation.
Glancing toward the archway, he saw Damon Salvatore make an entrance, greeted with reserve by Jenna Sommers and with a bit more enthusiasm by a woman who looked vaguely familiar. Shaking her loose, he approached.
"Damon!" Carol stepped away from him and turned toward the other vampire.
"Carol," Damon greeted her back warmly, clasping her outstretched hands.
"What a surprise! Hi! Elijah, I want you to meet Damon Salvatore. His family is one of Mystic Falls' founding families."
"Mm-hm. It's such a pleasure to meet you." Damon said, and extended his hand, wearing much the same look as he had when he was ramming a pole through Elijah’s heart and killing him.
Elijah held the eye contact and gripped Damon’s hand back, perhaps a little harder than strictly necessary. "No, the pleasure's mine."
"Oh, there's Mrs. Atwood. I should introduce you!" Carol went to attach herself to some old woman in a ridiculous hat who had just entered the room.
Damon freed his hand and gestured toward a closed door across the room. "Why don't we slip into the study for a moment."
This should be amusing. Elijah nodded briefly and wove his way through the crowd of women. He preceded Damon into the room, waiting until the latter had closed the door and crossed the room before speaking. "What can I do for you, Damon?"
"I was hoping we could have a word."
"Where is Elena?"
"Safe, with Stefan. They're laying low. You know, we've had a bit of a werewolf problem."
Elijah ran his fingers over the back of the leather sofa. "Oh yeah, I heard about that," he said, playing along. Jonas had filled him in on the previous evening's festivities. Since he very much doubted that the mongrels had taken the advice to 'flea' town, both he and the warlock remained on alert.
"I'm sure you did, since it was your witch who saved the day," Damon sing-songed.
"You are welcome."
Damon perched on the large desk. "Which adds to my confusion. Exactly why are you here?"
He was obnoxious, to be sure, but at least this one thought to ask the pertinent questions. "Why don't you just stay focused on keeping Elena safe, and leave the rest to me." He turned toward the door, only to find it suddenly blocked.
"Not good enough," Damon said, going toe-to-toe with Elijah.
Elijah gave him a hard stare for a moment. The next second, his left hand was wrapped around Damon Salvatore's throat and he had the younger vampire slammed up against the wall. Damon reached his right hand up to grip his neck in response. Elijah peeled it off, crushing the bones in Damon's wrist as though they were made of fragile glass. "You young vampires... so arrogant." He pushed the broken limb down to dangle at Damon's side. "How dare you come in here and challenge me?"
The Salvatore brother, though so clearly overpowered, still glared at him, defiant. "You can't kill me, man. It's not part of the deal," he gritted out.
Unfortunately, that much was true. "Silence," he told him softly. Reaching down with his right hand, Elijah grabbed a wooden pencil from the desk and stabbed it into Damon's larynx, pitching him forward over the desk.
The younger man clawed at it as Elijah whipped a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped blood from his hand. "I'm an Original," he said mildly. "Show a little respect." He held he bloodied cloth out to Damon, who snapped it out of his fingers and held it to his bleeding neck, wisely remaining silent. Or perhaps he just couldn't speak around the wood still embedded in his throat. "The moment you cease to be of use to me, you're dead," Elijah advised him, heading toward the door. "So," he smiled, "you should do as I say. Keep Elena safe."
Elijah exited the office, closing the door behind him to allow time for Damon to heal and to clean himself up enough to be once again seen in public. Jenna and the other woman he'd seen earlier waylaid him between there and the archway. "Elijah, this is Andie Starr," Jenna began. "She's a reporter for the local news station."
So that's why she looked familiar. "Miss Starr," Elijah said, taking the woman's outstretched hand.
"Mr. Smith. It's nice to meet you. I was hoping to do a feature on the book you're writing. Do you have a few moments to talk?" The reporter smiled at him hopefully.
"Oh, well, that's very flattering," he demurred, "but I'm afraid I'm only in the very beginning stages of my research. There's very little to tell, yet. Perhaps another time, when the project draws closer to fruition?"
"Actually, I think people here will be very interested in the whole process, and more than willing to help, if they know how. What types of information are you looking for?"
"Nothing very newsworthy, I'm afraid, Miss Starr. Family histories, property ownership, all very mundane things. It was a pleasure meeting you, though," he said dismissing her with a smile.
The reporter looked slightly disappointed, but acquiesced. "Fair enough. Maybe we can revisit this with an interview when the book comes out." She glanced around the room. "And, I should probably try and find my boyfriend. Did you see which way Damon went, Jenna?"
"Damon Salvatore?" Elijah asked, before Jenna could answer. "I believe I saw him head out toward the gardens a moment ago with some acquaintance of Mayor Lockwood's."
"Oh, good. Perhaps we'll meet again soon," she said, heading toward the french doors that led out to the terrace.
Elijah turned toward Jenna and gave her a charming smile. "I'm glad you're here, Jenna. This has been..." He let his eyes wander the over the flocks of women strewn about the room, grouped more or less by age and by how expensive their outfits and accessories were, and no doubt remarking on how expensive those of the other groups were. He turned back to her. "I'm glad you're here."
She laughed. "Yup. I've seen that look. You've been 'Caroled'."
"She's quite the social..." Terrorist? Nazi? Barracuda? "...Planner, isn't she?"
"You have. No. Idea. Fundraisers, galas, historical reenactments, town celebrations... It's like there's an event every week." Jenna took his arm conspiratorially. "I should get you out of here before she drags you to the portrait room."
"There's a portrait room?"
"Oh yeah. And if you survive that, it will be a full, guided tour of the gardens."
Elijah feigned horror. "Not that!"
"And if you still haven't escaped, it will be an invite for dinner, an assignment to some committee or ten, and then... You, um, didn't tell her you were single, did you?"
Elijah winced and nodded.
Jenna looked around, then leaned in and dropped her voice. "It look's like Mrs. Fell has her cornered for the moment. You wanna make a break for it?"
"And leave you to her mercy? I wouldn't dream of it." He made a show of steeling himself, as though for battle. "At least not without first making my apologies. And not without you agreeing to go have coffee with me afterward," he added.
Jenna surveyed the room again, as though looking for someone. Someone she didn't find. "You know what? That's the best offer I've had all day."
*************
His self-imposed embargo on ‘distractions’ notwithstanding, coffee with Jenna had extended into dinner, and it was dark by the time he took his leave of her and headed out toward the Salvatore boarding house. According to Jonas, the werewolves did not appear to have departed town, and Elijah rather expected another attempt on the Salvatores. He hoped that Elena was indeed safe with Stefan, wherever they were, and wasn't attacked while they were divided from the others.
Elijah rather thought that he’d prefer to have Elena in Damon’s company, all things considered. Damon was still a very young vampire, but Elijah thought he showed potential. There was evidence of cunning in him, and a calculated ruthlessness to go with it. Couple those things with an acceptance of – if not a delight in – what he was, and Elijah could see Damon as a power player down the road, if only his impulsivity didn’t lead him to do something lethally stupid over the next few centuries.
Then again, he thought ruefully, he’d done his share of rash and ill-conceived things when he was younger; they’d taught him some lessons, albeit the hard way, that he may otherwise not have learned. Perhaps when all this with Klaus was over he would consider employing Damon in some capacity – provided, of course, that the young vampire didn’t drive Elijah to murder him himself between now and then.
Stefan Salvatore, though… Elijah didn’t like that one’s odds, long term. From what he had gathered, the younger Salvatore still clung to the semblance of a normal human life. Not that there was anything wrong with playing the part for others; that was only smart. But he suspected that Stefan was deceiving himself as well, and that particular charade didn’t bode well for his long term survival. There came a time when a vampire either accepted what he was and learned to live within those new parameters, or he was dragged under by the chains that still bound him to a humanity he no longer truly possessed. Elijah feared that Stefan’s time, though not yet quite expired, was drawing perilously close to its end. He would soon have to choose a side, because he would no longer be able to span the gap in between without snapping.
Elijah parked about a quarter of a mile away from the house, off of the road and in a spot where the car would be camouflaged by trees. Walking silently from there toward the boarding house, he heard voices from inside, and the unmistakable clank of chains. He sped the rest of the way down the driveway, quiet as the grave as he stole into the foyer.
“Where's the moonstone?" he heard Jules say, from a room off to the left. It figured. He had half expected the were-bitch to go off script. He only hoped his upcoming demonstration would convince her that she better get back with the program.
“Get over it, honey. You're never going to get it.”
Elijah crossed his feet at the ankles and leaned casually against the door casing, sliding the moonstone from his pocket. “Are you looking for this?” The five werewolves turned and watched as he walked over and placed the moonstone on a table behind the sofa. Damon was chained to a chair in front of the fireplace, with a metal collar around his neck, wooden spikes on the inside jabbing into his neck and sending the occasional rivulet of blood down his throat. He looked almost as nonplused as the werewolves to see him.
Stepping back a couple of paces, Elijah gestured toward the rock. “Go ahead. Take it,” he invited. One of the pack made a dash forward. Elijah was faster. He caught the man and punched into his chest cavity, pulling out his heart, then eased the body down onto the sofa in one smooth motion. Two more broke for the moonstone; he stopped one with each hand, ripping their hearts out as well and earning an approving look from Damon. Elijah locked eyes with Jules, who cut and ran for the door. He would ‘discuss’ this breach of behavior with her later.
The sole remaining werewolf squatted down on the floor and pulled his collar up around his head. Elijah had to pause a moment and marvel at how completely ludicrous it was. “What about you, sweetheart? Hmm?” he asked. Strolling over, he pulled the boy up by his jacket, sliding one hand inside, over the heart. “Want to take a shot? No? Yes? No?” Elijah made a show of looking around the room. “Where’s the girl?”
“I don’t know,” Damon replied, glancing around.
“It doesn’t really matter.” He pulled his hand out of the young werewolf’s jacket, only to draw his fist back and give him a neck-snapping right-cross. He was dead before he hit the floor. Elijah left him in a heap and went to stand in front of Damon.
Admiration warred with suspicion for supremacy over Damon’s expression. Elijah smirked as he bent and broke the chain pinning Damon’s arm to the chair, then took a firm grasp on the loops of chain around the younger vampire’s stomach and snapped those. Stepping back, he shook hair out of his eyes. “You realize this is the third time I've saved your life now,” he reminded him.
Damon wisely remained silent. Elijah recovered the moonstone from the table and left, leaving behind the four dead werewolves for the Salvatores to deal with.
*************
Once he reached his car, he took his phone out and dialed Jonas, wondering where the warlock was and, more importantly, whether there were still more out there on Elena’s tail. The call went to voicemail. Frowning, Elijah ended the call and dialed again. Again it rang six times and then went to voicemail.
Pulling out onto the road, he dialed Jules’s number. That too went to voicemail, though he’d been expecting that from her. Once the pre-recorded message finished and he heard the requisite beep, he spoke: “Someone’s been a very bad dog. I suggest you collect the Lockwood boy and remove yourselves from town until your presence is required. Because if you don’t? I will kill you along with any other werewolf I find in Mystic Falls. I hope I’ve made myself clear.”
He disconnected and drove over to Jonas’s. The warlock’s car was in the lot, so Elijah ascended the stairs toward the apartment. As he drew near the landing, he heard the sounds of shouting coming from the Martins’ apartment. “… I said I’m sorry! Jesus!”
“You were supposed to be home three hours ago!” Jonas shouted. “Where the hell have you been?!”
“I was at the Grill!”
“With Bonnie Bennett?”
“Yes. No! I don’t know!!”
“What the hell do you mean you don’t know?!”
Having assured himself that the argument was a father-son squabble and not a more sinister conflict, Elijah turned back down the stairs and left. He could wait and speak with Jonas in the morning.
Monday, March 14, 2011
What's At Stake, Part Six
This got kind of long. Sorry.
A note: If you're wondering where a couple of references in this story are coming from, they go back to my one-off, "Don't Look". I'm using that as the emotional backdrop/landscape for Elijah, so if something hasn't made sense, that may clear it up.
Aaaaaaaand, in this installment (actually, in all of them, pretty much), the part of The Exposition Fairy will be played by Jonas.
As always: Feedback, please!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Assured that the warlocks would have the containment spell broken before evening's end, Elijah ended the call with Jonas and pulled up another number on his speed dial as he walked from the Gilbert house to his Lexus, parked a little way down the street. His conversation with the doppelganger had given him a lot to think about, but that would have to wait until he had attended to more pressing details.
The woman answered on the third ring. He could hear snippets of various conversations in the background, along with music and the intermittent crack of one billiard ball striking another. "Where are you?" he asked, without introduction or preamble. He assumed none was necessary.
"I'm in town. Some restaurant."
"Did you speak with the mayor?"
"Yeah. And the sheriff. They're opening up an investigation."
Elijah checked the coordinates on his GPS and pulled away from the curb. "And the boy?"
"Met him briefly, but we didn't have a chance to talk. The conversation may be a little more meaningful after tonight, anyway."
"The information I provided was useful, then?"
"Yeah." Elijah could hear irritation and the beginnings of impatience in the woman's voice. Werewolves – so touchy during the full moon. "Which I guess begs the question: What do you want, Elijah?"
"There are a number of elements that, though innocuous in and of themselves, are highly potent when gathered in combination. Vampires, werewolves, witches... a certain little white rock..." he drawled. "I think you know what I'm getting at. I have interest in the Lockwood boy."
"He’s one of us. What makes you think I'm going to just hand him over to you?"
"The weather has been particularly nice in Ocala as of late," he said, conversationally. "Your mother has been working on the front flowerbeds. She finally pulled out that overgrown rhododendron and planted some peonies." At the prompting of the GPS he turned left, heading out of the village area proper and toward the more wooded areas of the old church property. "Oh, and your niece... Jasmine, is it? She won the district spelling bee. There's a regional competition just next week..."
"Okay, fine! I get it," she growled into the phone. "What do you want?"
"Merely to insure that I have a werewolf when and where I need one." Elijah turned onto a gravel road, overgrown to barely a car's width. "I'm assuming you'd rather it not be you, Jules?"
He heard the woman sigh sharply, and wondered just what ill-advised retort she'd bitten off. "I'll be in touch," she said tersely.
The call ended abruptly. Elijah smiled as he killed the engine, turned off the headlights, and waited for Jonas's text to tell him the deed was accomplished.
**********
Elena had been something of a surprise to him. She'd been frightened, to be sure, and no doubt horrified that he'd managed an invitation into the house, but she hadn't panicked and raised the alarm, not once he had shushed her with a gesture.
Her room had offered a fascinating glimpse into her mind. It was well-ordered, and suited to a girl on the cusp of womanhood. Relics of a childhood so recently passed kept company with articles of adulthood, like the small stuffed animal standing guard over make-up and beauty products where they lay carelessly on her vanity. As had been the case downstairs, there were family photos and photos of friends on the shelves and the bureau. A soft blanket and a book left open on the window seat whispered of a penchant for curling up there in the sun to read, or perhaps to write in the journal that he had noticed peeking out from the under the cushion when he'd shifted those items to seat himself. What he'd give to read it and gain further insight into the young woman.
Elijah had been prepared for pleas of mercy, for desperate but impossible vows of aid if spared, but Elena hadn't offered those things. Instead, she had been surprisingly astute – tripping right away to the fact that he didn't know Klaus's current whereabouts, weighing his actions to date against the words he offered, smartly questioning how he might accomplish the things he promised. She was a clever girl.
Clever, and brave. She had recognized that he did not guarantee her safety as he did that of those she loved. He was sure he'd seen that understanding flash through her eyes. It hadn't stopped her from accepting his deal, though, not once she was assured of her friends' and family's safety, which to all appearances was of more paramount concern to her than her own. She had even negotiated for the younger Salvatore's release. Nothing about the meeting had been quite as he had expected.
It had been so very different with Katerina.
***********
Mere weeks had passed since Klaus had returned from a visit to his southern holdings, but already his new mistress had caused untold upheaval in the household. Elijah had been careful to keep his distance, allowing the shock and the pain of her sudden appearance to dissipate somewhat before attempting direct contact with the woman.
Even from afar, though, it was not difficult to ascertain the effect her presence there was having. None but he and Klaus knew of Katerina's true destiny and purpose; to the rest she was simply the utterly spoiled and entitled mistress to the master of the house, a role she played with evident relish. Nor did she yet know the true nature of the company she kept. Elijah suspected she would not so much be horrified as intrigued by the contemplation of eternal youth and beauty, vain creature that she was.
Katerina flaunted the new gowns and sparkling gemstones Klaus showered upon her under the noses of the other women, using her sharp tongue to prod them to jealousy when her baubles were insufficient to the task. Klaus's lavish attentions were apparently not enough for her, though; she bedeviled the men with her flirtations, causing rift upon rift between men and their wives and betwixt close friends who strove to be first in her affections.
Frightened as they were of Klaus, no man dared press himself upon his mistress, and she used that fact to entice them almost beyond bearing. After Elijah had broken up his third fight that week between grown men – vampires! – who should damn well have known better, he had had enough.
With Klaus away for a couple of days, Elijah expected that Katerina's games would ramp up to new levels of deviousness, and he was thus unsurprised when she returned to her chamber so late at night. He had been waiting there, in the dark, for hours when she finally made her appearance. He sat motionless, hearing the rustle of her clothing as she worked the laces loose from the velvet. Once he heard her step free of the dress and pad toward the bed, he struck flint and lit the candle waiting beside him on the table.
"Good evening, Katerina."
Katerina shrieked and whirled around, eyes wide. Though her shift covered everything of import, her arms still crossed protectively over her breasts. He continued to sit, and when he made no move toward her, she let them drop, quickly growing bold as she recovered from being startled.
"You're Elijah. Klaus's second-in-command."
"Yes."
"I've seen you, here and there about the estate." She tilted her head in what he supposed she thought was a fetching manner. "You've been watching me."
"I have."
"Yet you wait until now, when Klaus is away, to make formal introduction, and in such a... provocative manner." She stalked in a slow circle around the far side of the table, drawing to a halt behind his chair. Putting a hand on his shoulder, she leaned in toward him. "To what do I owe this pleasure?" she purred.
Elijah slid his hand up to take her wrist, drawing her around in front of him. "You're proving to be quite a distraction to my men."
"Am I?" she demurred.
"Mmm. But I think you know that." He stroked his thumb idly over the pulse on the inside of her wrist.
"Perhaps your men lack discipline; could it be that your training lacks the proper efficacy?" she suggested, stepping closer so that she stood with her knees touching his. Her free hand brushed hair back from his face.
"A general's firmest hand often proves unequal to the softest of caresses from a wanton woman."
“Am I wanton?” Katerina settled herself on his lap and slid her wrist from his fingers to intertwine her own with them, brushing her thumb across the base of his. "I bet your... hand is very firm," she said. She brought their joined hands to her lips and, when he didn't resist, drew one finger into her mouth.
"What game do you think you're playing, Katerina?" he asked, his voice a low warning.
"Why?" she said, her tongue stroking over his fingertips. "Do you want to play with me?"
One moment she was draped across him, languid and suggestive. A split second later, she was flat on her back on the table, Elijah's hand tight around her throat, eyes gone wide with fright to find herself in that predicament with no real sense of how she'd gotten there.
He bent forward so his lips were close to her ear. "Listen very carefully, Katerina; I will not repeat myself: You will stop parading yourself in front of my men like a bitch in heat. You will cease causing trouble between the women, and between the women and their men. You will comport yourself with whatever modicum of class you can conjure… And you will never, ever, touch me again. Have I made myself clear?"
She nodded as best she could with his hand on her neck. He released her as suddenly as he had pinned her, and took a step back. Katerina pulled herself upright. Though tears gathered in her dark eyes, none yet fell. Elijah saw her throat and jaw work as she straightened her shift and let her temper rise. Her intent was plain well before her arm moved.
Elijah caught her wrist again as her hand came up to strike him. "You bastard!" she began, in Bulgarian. "Klaus will – "
"Klaus will allow me to do to you whatever I wish, so long as I leave you alive at its surcease." With his other hand he grabbed a handful of her hair and forced her to look up at him. Catching her gaze, he rolled his will over her, and with it unleashed a cavalcade of images as to just how much torture could be committed upon someone without it killing them.
Her eyes gone wide and blank with terror, Elijah didn't release her until her body sagged, held up only by his grip on her hair, and he smelled the sudden, sharp scent of urine. She fell back onto the floor once he no longer held her up, and scrambled backward until her back fetched up against the bed.
Elijah squatted down so that his eyes were level with hers. "Are we clear?" has asked again, softly.
The tears that hadn't escaped before ran freely down her cheeks. "Y-y-y-yes," she stuttered, her voice trembling along with her body.
"Good," he said, tone friendly, as though none of the preceding had taken place. Giving her a pat on the head, he rose and exited the chamber, leaving her crying and shaking on the floor.
**************
Having heard the noise of the tomb's door being moved, the two vampires came around the corner. The younger Salvatore looked confused; Elijah had, after all, been dead the last time he had seen him, and apparently no one had disavowed him of that notion. Katerina gasped and backed up when she saw who visited. "Elijah!"
"Good evening, Katerina," he said, enjoying the sight of her – dirty, hungry, afraid. "Thank you for having the good sense to be frightened." He turned toward Stefan Salvatore. "Your release has been requested."
"By who?" Stefan asked, obviously still off guard.
By whom, Elijah mentally corrected. "The lovely Elena drives a hard bargain. However, we reached a peaceful agreement, she and I." He stepped back and motioned to Stefan. "Please, come."
"I can't."
"Yes you can," he explained, as though to a particularly dimwitted child. "I've had the spell lifted." This was the one to whom Elena Gilbert showed preference? He would have guessed the elder brother. At least she didn't appear to partake of them both, unlike the woman standing before him.
Stefan crept cautiously toward the entrance, where the spell's embrace had so recently held them prisoner. When he didn't encounter that resistance, he pushed forward and cleared the threshold.
Elijah had been watching her and waiting for it, so he was ready when Katerina broke for the entrance at speed. Faster than her, he barred her way with his body, backing her up without needing to lay hands on her. "As for you, however..." Elijah caught her eyes with his and compelled her. "You should not exit until I say so. When Klaus comes he'll want to know exactly where you are."
He released her gaze as quickly as he'd caught it and stepped back out into the antechamber. "You're free to go," he told Stefan. "Elena will explain the arrangement to you. If she keeps her word, I'll keep mine."
Elijah gave Katerina one last, hard stare, and left the tomb. As he walked away he could hear her pleading with the Salvatore brother not to leave her there, and smiled to himself when he heard Stefan tell her good-bye.
****************
Luka was still up when Elijah arrived at the Martins'. Father and son sat at the table, about halfway through a rather greasy looking pepperoni pizza. A bag of potato chips and either a soda or beer (age depending) rounded out the meal. He refused Jonas's offer of food but accepted the beer this time, seating himself. "Hello, Luka," he said, taking a sip of the micro-brew.
"Hey."
Ah, yes, the monosyllabic response of adolescents. "How are you doing at your new school?"
The boy shrugged. "Okay." He glanced at Jonas, who gave him a small shrug. Elijah set the beer down and leaned forward slightly. "I know that this has probably been quite a disruption to your life. I want to thank you for your help with regard to securing the moonstone, even if the method of its procurement sits ill with you."
Luka shrugged and reached for another slice of pizza. "I want my sister back. So, whatever we have to do, we have to do."
Elijah watched the grease ooze and pool on the paper plate; Luka dumped more chips out of the bag to go with the slice. "You are a physician, are you not?" he said to Jonas.
"I didn’t exactly have time to prepare a soup, salad, and entree course, what with the running around breaking containment spells and all," he said pointedly.
Elijah took another swallow of beer and addressed Luka again. "I know you feel badly for deceiving someone you would like to call a friend, but the moonstone is critical. And really, when all is said and done, we all desire the same outcome."
"Yeah, that’ll sell. Whatever." The boy rose and discarded his empty plate, polishing off his soda as he went to the kitchen. "I'm going to bed, Dad. 'Night."
The bedroom door closed, and moments later they heard some sort of rap or hip-hop music, Elijah could never keep straight which was which. He propped one foot up on Luka's abandoned chair. "I thought that went well."
Jonas chuckled. "Welcome to my world."
"So," Elijah said, finishing off the beer. "I spoke with Elena Gilbert today."
"I hope that conversation was more successful than this one." Jonas rose and went to the refrigerator, returning with two more beers.
"It was. We've reached an accord, she and I." Elijah accepted the second bottle and popped the top off. "She will live her life and stop seeking one of Klaus's men to end it, and I – meaning we – will protect her loved ones."
"But not her."
“About that…” Elijah scratched at the label on the bottle with his thumbnail. "Do you recall a discussion we had before we knew of the doppelganger's existence, regarding the possibility of using a witches' death ground to achieve the power necessary to overcome Klaus?"
"Yeah, I recall. But that was more a hypothetical or theoretical discussion. Why?"
"Between your research on bloodlines and a cursory glance at some of the more obscure records here in Mystic Falls, I think there may be such a site in or near this town." He discarded one strip of damp paper on the table in front of him and started on another section of the label. "If I'm reading between the lines correctly, I believe a substantial number of witches may have been burned there."
"Isn't Klaus supposed to be weakened after the sacrifice of the doppelganger?” Jonas pulled a piece of pepperoni from the remainder of the pizza. “We may not need to find the site.”
"Or, perhaps, we can lure Klaus in with promise of a doppelganger, only to use the grounds to pull enough power to finish him." He freed the last of the label from the bottle. "In which case, the sacrifice would be unnecessary."
The warlock took some time to consider. “I don’t like the idea of murdering a young girl. If we can pull this off without the sacrifice then great, I’m all for it. But.” Jonas sat forward, his elbows on the table. “My daughter is my first priority. If we can’t find the grounds, or if I don’t think we can do this without the sacrifice, then I will bleed her myself if that’s what it’s going to take to bring Greta home.”
“Understood. In the meantime, I think it might behoove us to provide a demonstration to Miss Gilbert of our intent and ability to protect her loved ones from harm.” Elijah drained the bottle and set it beside the first. “Are you up for a little werewolf wrangling?”
"Wait, what?" Jonas paused with his beer halfway to his mouth.
"The Lockwood boy. He's reportedly triggered the family curse. In fact, he should be turning tonight as we speak."
"And he… needs to be wrangled?”
"Not him, no. But I passed along some information regarding him – and the disappearance of his uncle – to a particular werewolf bitch who has proven useful in the past. She’s here to see the boy."
"I’m still not following.”
"Werewolves are nothing if not predictable. And predictably stupid. She’ll take the boy under her wing, then she’ll figure out readily enough that it was the local vampires who disposed of the uncle. She’ll whistle for the rest of the pack, they’ll converge on Mystic Falls, and they’ll try to take care of the vampire problem.”
“They’ll go after the Salvatores.” Jonas nodded, catching on.
“And we will of course rush to their defense, as per my agreement with Miss Gilbert.” Elijah propped his other foot on the chair and leaned back, arms behind his head, one eyebrow raised at Jonas.
The warlock lifted his beer in a gesture of salute, and drank. “Let’s wrangle some werewolves.”
A note: If you're wondering where a couple of references in this story are coming from, they go back to my one-off, "Don't Look". I'm using that as the emotional backdrop/landscape for Elijah, so if something hasn't made sense, that may clear it up.
Aaaaaaaand, in this installment (actually, in all of them, pretty much), the part of The Exposition Fairy will be played by Jonas.
As always: Feedback, please!
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Assured that the warlocks would have the containment spell broken before evening's end, Elijah ended the call with Jonas and pulled up another number on his speed dial as he walked from the Gilbert house to his Lexus, parked a little way down the street. His conversation with the doppelganger had given him a lot to think about, but that would have to wait until he had attended to more pressing details.
The woman answered on the third ring. He could hear snippets of various conversations in the background, along with music and the intermittent crack of one billiard ball striking another. "Where are you?" he asked, without introduction or preamble. He assumed none was necessary.
"I'm in town. Some restaurant."
"Did you speak with the mayor?"
"Yeah. And the sheriff. They're opening up an investigation."
Elijah checked the coordinates on his GPS and pulled away from the curb. "And the boy?"
"Met him briefly, but we didn't have a chance to talk. The conversation may be a little more meaningful after tonight, anyway."
"The information I provided was useful, then?"
"Yeah." Elijah could hear irritation and the beginnings of impatience in the woman's voice. Werewolves – so touchy during the full moon. "Which I guess begs the question: What do you want, Elijah?"
"There are a number of elements that, though innocuous in and of themselves, are highly potent when gathered in combination. Vampires, werewolves, witches... a certain little white rock..." he drawled. "I think you know what I'm getting at. I have interest in the Lockwood boy."
"He’s one of us. What makes you think I'm going to just hand him over to you?"
"The weather has been particularly nice in Ocala as of late," he said, conversationally. "Your mother has been working on the front flowerbeds. She finally pulled out that overgrown rhododendron and planted some peonies." At the prompting of the GPS he turned left, heading out of the village area proper and toward the more wooded areas of the old church property. "Oh, and your niece... Jasmine, is it? She won the district spelling bee. There's a regional competition just next week..."
"Okay, fine! I get it," she growled into the phone. "What do you want?"
"Merely to insure that I have a werewolf when and where I need one." Elijah turned onto a gravel road, overgrown to barely a car's width. "I'm assuming you'd rather it not be you, Jules?"
He heard the woman sigh sharply, and wondered just what ill-advised retort she'd bitten off. "I'll be in touch," she said tersely.
The call ended abruptly. Elijah smiled as he killed the engine, turned off the headlights, and waited for Jonas's text to tell him the deed was accomplished.
**********
Elena had been something of a surprise to him. She'd been frightened, to be sure, and no doubt horrified that he'd managed an invitation into the house, but she hadn't panicked and raised the alarm, not once he had shushed her with a gesture.
Her room had offered a fascinating glimpse into her mind. It was well-ordered, and suited to a girl on the cusp of womanhood. Relics of a childhood so recently passed kept company with articles of adulthood, like the small stuffed animal standing guard over make-up and beauty products where they lay carelessly on her vanity. As had been the case downstairs, there were family photos and photos of friends on the shelves and the bureau. A soft blanket and a book left open on the window seat whispered of a penchant for curling up there in the sun to read, or perhaps to write in the journal that he had noticed peeking out from the under the cushion when he'd shifted those items to seat himself. What he'd give to read it and gain further insight into the young woman.
Elijah had been prepared for pleas of mercy, for desperate but impossible vows of aid if spared, but Elena hadn't offered those things. Instead, she had been surprisingly astute – tripping right away to the fact that he didn't know Klaus's current whereabouts, weighing his actions to date against the words he offered, smartly questioning how he might accomplish the things he promised. She was a clever girl.
Clever, and brave. She had recognized that he did not guarantee her safety as he did that of those she loved. He was sure he'd seen that understanding flash through her eyes. It hadn't stopped her from accepting his deal, though, not once she was assured of her friends' and family's safety, which to all appearances was of more paramount concern to her than her own. She had even negotiated for the younger Salvatore's release. Nothing about the meeting had been quite as he had expected.
It had been so very different with Katerina.
***********
Mere weeks had passed since Klaus had returned from a visit to his southern holdings, but already his new mistress had caused untold upheaval in the household. Elijah had been careful to keep his distance, allowing the shock and the pain of her sudden appearance to dissipate somewhat before attempting direct contact with the woman.
Even from afar, though, it was not difficult to ascertain the effect her presence there was having. None but he and Klaus knew of Katerina's true destiny and purpose; to the rest she was simply the utterly spoiled and entitled mistress to the master of the house, a role she played with evident relish. Nor did she yet know the true nature of the company she kept. Elijah suspected she would not so much be horrified as intrigued by the contemplation of eternal youth and beauty, vain creature that she was.
Katerina flaunted the new gowns and sparkling gemstones Klaus showered upon her under the noses of the other women, using her sharp tongue to prod them to jealousy when her baubles were insufficient to the task. Klaus's lavish attentions were apparently not enough for her, though; she bedeviled the men with her flirtations, causing rift upon rift between men and their wives and betwixt close friends who strove to be first in her affections.
Frightened as they were of Klaus, no man dared press himself upon his mistress, and she used that fact to entice them almost beyond bearing. After Elijah had broken up his third fight that week between grown men – vampires! – who should damn well have known better, he had had enough.
With Klaus away for a couple of days, Elijah expected that Katerina's games would ramp up to new levels of deviousness, and he was thus unsurprised when she returned to her chamber so late at night. He had been waiting there, in the dark, for hours when she finally made her appearance. He sat motionless, hearing the rustle of her clothing as she worked the laces loose from the velvet. Once he heard her step free of the dress and pad toward the bed, he struck flint and lit the candle waiting beside him on the table.
"Good evening, Katerina."
Katerina shrieked and whirled around, eyes wide. Though her shift covered everything of import, her arms still crossed protectively over her breasts. He continued to sit, and when he made no move toward her, she let them drop, quickly growing bold as she recovered from being startled.
"You're Elijah. Klaus's second-in-command."
"Yes."
"I've seen you, here and there about the estate." She tilted her head in what he supposed she thought was a fetching manner. "You've been watching me."
"I have."
"Yet you wait until now, when Klaus is away, to make formal introduction, and in such a... provocative manner." She stalked in a slow circle around the far side of the table, drawing to a halt behind his chair. Putting a hand on his shoulder, she leaned in toward him. "To what do I owe this pleasure?" she purred.
Elijah slid his hand up to take her wrist, drawing her around in front of him. "You're proving to be quite a distraction to my men."
"Am I?" she demurred.
"Mmm. But I think you know that." He stroked his thumb idly over the pulse on the inside of her wrist.
"Perhaps your men lack discipline; could it be that your training lacks the proper efficacy?" she suggested, stepping closer so that she stood with her knees touching his. Her free hand brushed hair back from his face.
"A general's firmest hand often proves unequal to the softest of caresses from a wanton woman."
“Am I wanton?” Katerina settled herself on his lap and slid her wrist from his fingers to intertwine her own with them, brushing her thumb across the base of his. "I bet your... hand is very firm," she said. She brought their joined hands to her lips and, when he didn't resist, drew one finger into her mouth.
"What game do you think you're playing, Katerina?" he asked, his voice a low warning.
"Why?" she said, her tongue stroking over his fingertips. "Do you want to play with me?"
One moment she was draped across him, languid and suggestive. A split second later, she was flat on her back on the table, Elijah's hand tight around her throat, eyes gone wide with fright to find herself in that predicament with no real sense of how she'd gotten there.
He bent forward so his lips were close to her ear. "Listen very carefully, Katerina; I will not repeat myself: You will stop parading yourself in front of my men like a bitch in heat. You will cease causing trouble between the women, and between the women and their men. You will comport yourself with whatever modicum of class you can conjure… And you will never, ever, touch me again. Have I made myself clear?"
She nodded as best she could with his hand on her neck. He released her as suddenly as he had pinned her, and took a step back. Katerina pulled herself upright. Though tears gathered in her dark eyes, none yet fell. Elijah saw her throat and jaw work as she straightened her shift and let her temper rise. Her intent was plain well before her arm moved.
Elijah caught her wrist again as her hand came up to strike him. "You bastard!" she began, in Bulgarian. "Klaus will – "
"Klaus will allow me to do to you whatever I wish, so long as I leave you alive at its surcease." With his other hand he grabbed a handful of her hair and forced her to look up at him. Catching her gaze, he rolled his will over her, and with it unleashed a cavalcade of images as to just how much torture could be committed upon someone without it killing them.
Her eyes gone wide and blank with terror, Elijah didn't release her until her body sagged, held up only by his grip on her hair, and he smelled the sudden, sharp scent of urine. She fell back onto the floor once he no longer held her up, and scrambled backward until her back fetched up against the bed.
Elijah squatted down so that his eyes were level with hers. "Are we clear?" has asked again, softly.
The tears that hadn't escaped before ran freely down her cheeks. "Y-y-y-yes," she stuttered, her voice trembling along with her body.
"Good," he said, tone friendly, as though none of the preceding had taken place. Giving her a pat on the head, he rose and exited the chamber, leaving her crying and shaking on the floor.
**************
Having heard the noise of the tomb's door being moved, the two vampires came around the corner. The younger Salvatore looked confused; Elijah had, after all, been dead the last time he had seen him, and apparently no one had disavowed him of that notion. Katerina gasped and backed up when she saw who visited. "Elijah!"
"Good evening, Katerina," he said, enjoying the sight of her – dirty, hungry, afraid. "Thank you for having the good sense to be frightened." He turned toward Stefan Salvatore. "Your release has been requested."
"By who?" Stefan asked, obviously still off guard.
By whom, Elijah mentally corrected. "The lovely Elena drives a hard bargain. However, we reached a peaceful agreement, she and I." He stepped back and motioned to Stefan. "Please, come."
"I can't."
"Yes you can," he explained, as though to a particularly dimwitted child. "I've had the spell lifted." This was the one to whom Elena Gilbert showed preference? He would have guessed the elder brother. At least she didn't appear to partake of them both, unlike the woman standing before him.
Stefan crept cautiously toward the entrance, where the spell's embrace had so recently held them prisoner. When he didn't encounter that resistance, he pushed forward and cleared the threshold.
Elijah had been watching her and waiting for it, so he was ready when Katerina broke for the entrance at speed. Faster than her, he barred her way with his body, backing her up without needing to lay hands on her. "As for you, however..." Elijah caught her eyes with his and compelled her. "You should not exit until I say so. When Klaus comes he'll want to know exactly where you are."
He released her gaze as quickly as he'd caught it and stepped back out into the antechamber. "You're free to go," he told Stefan. "Elena will explain the arrangement to you. If she keeps her word, I'll keep mine."
Elijah gave Katerina one last, hard stare, and left the tomb. As he walked away he could hear her pleading with the Salvatore brother not to leave her there, and smiled to himself when he heard Stefan tell her good-bye.
****************
Luka was still up when Elijah arrived at the Martins'. Father and son sat at the table, about halfway through a rather greasy looking pepperoni pizza. A bag of potato chips and either a soda or beer (age depending) rounded out the meal. He refused Jonas's offer of food but accepted the beer this time, seating himself. "Hello, Luka," he said, taking a sip of the micro-brew.
"Hey."
Ah, yes, the monosyllabic response of adolescents. "How are you doing at your new school?"
The boy shrugged. "Okay." He glanced at Jonas, who gave him a small shrug. Elijah set the beer down and leaned forward slightly. "I know that this has probably been quite a disruption to your life. I want to thank you for your help with regard to securing the moonstone, even if the method of its procurement sits ill with you."
Luka shrugged and reached for another slice of pizza. "I want my sister back. So, whatever we have to do, we have to do."
Elijah watched the grease ooze and pool on the paper plate; Luka dumped more chips out of the bag to go with the slice. "You are a physician, are you not?" he said to Jonas.
"I didn’t exactly have time to prepare a soup, salad, and entree course, what with the running around breaking containment spells and all," he said pointedly.
Elijah took another swallow of beer and addressed Luka again. "I know you feel badly for deceiving someone you would like to call a friend, but the moonstone is critical. And really, when all is said and done, we all desire the same outcome."
"Yeah, that’ll sell. Whatever." The boy rose and discarded his empty plate, polishing off his soda as he went to the kitchen. "I'm going to bed, Dad. 'Night."
The bedroom door closed, and moments later they heard some sort of rap or hip-hop music, Elijah could never keep straight which was which. He propped one foot up on Luka's abandoned chair. "I thought that went well."
Jonas chuckled. "Welcome to my world."
"So," Elijah said, finishing off the beer. "I spoke with Elena Gilbert today."
"I hope that conversation was more successful than this one." Jonas rose and went to the refrigerator, returning with two more beers.
"It was. We've reached an accord, she and I." Elijah accepted the second bottle and popped the top off. "She will live her life and stop seeking one of Klaus's men to end it, and I – meaning we – will protect her loved ones."
"But not her."
“About that…” Elijah scratched at the label on the bottle with his thumbnail. "Do you recall a discussion we had before we knew of the doppelganger's existence, regarding the possibility of using a witches' death ground to achieve the power necessary to overcome Klaus?"
"Yeah, I recall. But that was more a hypothetical or theoretical discussion. Why?"
"Between your research on bloodlines and a cursory glance at some of the more obscure records here in Mystic Falls, I think there may be such a site in or near this town." He discarded one strip of damp paper on the table in front of him and started on another section of the label. "If I'm reading between the lines correctly, I believe a substantial number of witches may have been burned there."
"Isn't Klaus supposed to be weakened after the sacrifice of the doppelganger?” Jonas pulled a piece of pepperoni from the remainder of the pizza. “We may not need to find the site.”
"Or, perhaps, we can lure Klaus in with promise of a doppelganger, only to use the grounds to pull enough power to finish him." He freed the last of the label from the bottle. "In which case, the sacrifice would be unnecessary."
The warlock took some time to consider. “I don’t like the idea of murdering a young girl. If we can pull this off without the sacrifice then great, I’m all for it. But.” Jonas sat forward, his elbows on the table. “My daughter is my first priority. If we can’t find the grounds, or if I don’t think we can do this without the sacrifice, then I will bleed her myself if that’s what it’s going to take to bring Greta home.”
“Understood. In the meantime, I think it might behoove us to provide a demonstration to Miss Gilbert of our intent and ability to protect her loved ones from harm.” Elijah drained the bottle and set it beside the first. “Are you up for a little werewolf wrangling?”
"Wait, what?" Jonas paused with his beer halfway to his mouth.
"The Lockwood boy. He's reportedly triggered the family curse. In fact, he should be turning tonight as we speak."
"And he… needs to be wrangled?”
"Not him, no. But I passed along some information regarding him – and the disappearance of his uncle – to a particular werewolf bitch who has proven useful in the past. She’s here to see the boy."
"I’m still not following.”
"Werewolves are nothing if not predictable. And predictably stupid. She’ll take the boy under her wing, then she’ll figure out readily enough that it was the local vampires who disposed of the uncle. She’ll whistle for the rest of the pack, they’ll converge on Mystic Falls, and they’ll try to take care of the vampire problem.”
“They’ll go after the Salvatores.” Jonas nodded, catching on.
“And we will of course rush to their defense, as per my agreement with Miss Gilbert.” Elijah propped his other foot on the chair and leaned back, arms behind his head, one eyebrow raised at Jonas.
The warlock lifted his beer in a gesture of salute, and drank. “Let’s wrangle some werewolves.”
Friday, March 11, 2011
What's At Stake, Part Five
This section expands on two scenes: the scene between Jonas and Elijah after he saves Elena from the vampires at Slater's loft; and the scene with Jenna before Elena discovers him in the house.
I love feedback; please take a moment and comment if you can.
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Jonas didn't appear to be at home when Elijah let himself into the Martins' apartment. The deep, steady breathing coming from behind Luka's closed door told him that the boy was sound asleep. Odd, given the early hour. He stepped into the kitchenette and washed his hands, giving them the thorough scrubbing he hadn't truly been able to avail himself of in what the gas station attendant had delusionally referred to as a rest room. Back in the living room, he noted the knife and the pilfered items Jonas had used earlier for the shadow spell still sitting on the small dining table. He stationed himself at the window and offered up a silent thanks to whichever Fate had urged them to try that spell when they had.
He hadn't thought to return to Slater's loft once the younger vampire was dead and his information extracted, but when he'd seen the girl there he knew that there was no time to waste. If she'd located Slater, that meant that she was working up the same chain of communication that had led to him, and he couldn't have that. Everything hinged on keeping the doppelganger's existence a secret from Klaus. The more she poked at that series of contacts, the more likely it was that she'd eventually encounter someone who was in touch with Klaus. Or that they'd encounter her.
And just what in the nine hells was the girl doing, anyway? Trying to get herself killed? She'd certainly seemed hell-bent on remaining free of Klaus when he had tried to take her from the mansion. And wherever she went it seemed a Salvatore stood nearby, waiting to save her. Why poke the nest, just to see if any more hornets flew out of it?
Footsteps drifted up the inner staircase, and Jonas entered the apartment. He didn't seem particularly surprised to have company. "Where's Luka?" Elijah asked, knowing where but hoping to learn why the boy would be abed so early.
"Asleep." He didn't elaborate.
Elijah shrugged slightly. "Your shadow spell was successful. I was able to track that girl. However I did have a little run-in with one of the brothers that killed me."
"I assume he didn't live to tell about it," Jonas ventured.
"Actually, I spared him." Elijah shook his head. "He'd die for her. They both would. She'll be kept safe."
"For now." The warlock sounded dubious.
"That's precisely what we need her to be." Elijah turned away from the window to face him. "Safe."
Jonas hung his keys on a hook near the door and went to the refrigerator, pulling out a beer and some leftover Chinese food. He held the beer up questioningly.
Elijah declined with a shake of his head and perched against the counter opposite while Jonas dumped the congealed mass of... whatever it was onto a plate and stuck it into the microwave to heat. "It's a little early for Luka to be asleep, isn't it? Is he unwell?" he asked.
Jonas tossed the empty container in the trash can. "He had a rough day. Bonnie Bennett pulled him into a spell earlier. Gave him a nosebleed and a hell of a headache."
"I thought you said she was untrained." Elijah leaned back and crossed his arms in front of him.
"Mostly. Apparently Luka took it upon himself to give her a lesson in channeling. And then, because that wasn't stupid enough, he left his dogtags with her after showing her how to use them to draw energy away from him."
"Well, on a positive note, that should take care of his little crush on her."
Jonas snorted. "You'd think, but no. He's pissed at me."
Elijah quirked a brow at the warlock. "Because...?"
"Because he's a teenager?" Jonas opened the silverware drawer and took out a fork. It took a couple of tries to slide it back in without catching. "Complex rituals, archaic curses, astral projection? Piece of cake. But adolescence? That's a mystery for the ages."
Elijah looked from the drawer to the faded wallpaper, from the wall to the corner of the floor, where the linoleum had started to peel. "Isn't this place a little... lowbrow, for a doctor?"
"It's what was available on short notice, and it didn't require a lease." Jonas removed the plate from the microwave after it dinged and went over to the table, pushing aside the photo of Elena Gilbert, still smeared with Elijah's blood. He gestured toward it with his fork. "So where was she? You took off out of here pretty fast."
Elijah pulled a chair out across from the warlock and sat. "Slater's loft."
Jonas glanced up from his makeshift meal, eyebrows raised. "What was she doing there?"
"I wish I knew." He scraped idly at the dried blood on the glass with his thumbnail. "There were three other vampires there when I arrived. Cody was one of them. He said he was there to collect the doppelganger and bring her to me, for Klaus."
"I guess he hadn't heard that the two of you broke up?"
"No. Klaus speaks to so few directly now. I imagine it isn't exactly common knowledge."
"So how did Cody know the girl was there?"
I probably should have inquired about that before I killed him. "I don't know." Elijah leaned back and ran a hand through his hair. He hated this feeling of being two steps behind, unaccustomed as he was to it. It seemed that was how he'd been operating since leaving Manhattan and driving south. He needed to do something to get back on an even keel.
"Does anyone else know about her?" Jonas pushed the empty plate away and took a couple swallows of beer.
"According to him, no."
Jonas studied him across the table. "What are you going to do?"
Elijah lifted the photo, studying it. "I think it's time Miss Gilbert and I had a talk."
~~~~~~~~~
Elijah glanced down at the address Carol Lockwood had given him and compared it to the numbers on the white house. The home was modest, but well-kept, with a swing gracing the front porch and a few flower pots here and there adding color and character. Making his way up the steps, he rang the doorbell and waited.
Footsteps pounded down a set of stairs, and a woman, looking barely older than Elena herself, opened the door, still trying to get her right foot all the way into the shoe she had obviously slipped on in a hurry. “Miss Sommers?” Elijah said, extending his hand to her.
“Oh please, it's just Jenna. You must be Mr. Smith.” She shook his hand, a little awkwardly.
“Elijah is fine.”
“Please, come in,” she invited, backing up a step to let him through the door.
Elijah smiled and crossed the threshold. “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me, Miss – Jenna. I hope Mrs. Lockwood didn’t strong-arm you too badly.”
“No, it’s fine! I was just making some coffee. Would you like some?”
“That would be lovely. Thank you.” Elijah followed her to the living room. While she went to the kitchen to fetch the coffee, he examined the photos on the mantle. Family photos, all of them; Elena and a younger brother at various ages, sometimes together and sometimes solo, others showing a family of four. One shot, obviously taken during some long ago holiday, showed the younger Gilbert children with Jenna, who looked to have been around Elena's age now when it was taken.
“’The Gallery,’” Jenna said, nodding toward the photos as she came back in, a tray balanced precariously in one hand and a box held to her hip with the other. Elijah took the tray from her and set it on the coffee table. “Thanks. My sister was nuts about taking pictures. I’d be amazed if there are more than five undocumented minutes of Elena and Jeremy when they were little.”
“Mrs. Lockwood mentioned that you’re raising your niece and nephew now. That must be quite an undertaking.”
She gave a quick laugh. “That… would be putting it mildly.” Sitting on the sofa, she poured coffee from a carafe into the two mugs. “How do you take yours?”
“Black is fine.” He took the proffered cup and seated himself in the overstuffed chair. “I imagine it must have been a difficult adjustment, for all involved.”
“Uh, yeah.” Jenna stirred a generous amount of cream into her own coffee and added a spoonful of sugar. Scooting back into the cushions, she folded her legs up underneath her and cradled the warm mug between her hands. “I still have days when I wake up and can't believe that this is my life now.”
He took a sip of the coffee. “What were you doing before?”
“Going to school. Partying. Drinking too much, smoking things I shouldn’t have been. The usual,” she said ruefully. “And now here I am, telling my sister’s kids not to do those same things, and feeling like the world’s biggest hypocrite.” She tucked her hair behind her ear and settled a throw cushion idly on her lap, looking for all the world like a teenager herself. “I mean, the idea of me being totally responsible for two other human beings? Is totally ridiculous."
She's cute, he thought, apropos of nothing. Elijah leaned back in the chair and crossed his legs. “I’m sure you’re doing the best you possibly can under the circumstances. They're at a difficult age. Teenagers: a mystery for the ages,” he said, echoing Jonas's words.
“Definitely. You’d think being a grad student in psychology would help, but it actually just makes me realize how much I don't know…" She shrugged. "Do you have kids?”
He shook his head. “No. I… lived with someone once, someone who was orphaned and left to care for her younger siblings. It’s not an easy situation; I think you’re to be commended for what you’re doing.”
She blushed and tucked her hair back again, obviously a nervous habit. “Family. What’re you gonna do?” Leaning forward, she pulled the box over to her and started removing what looked to be old journals or photo albums. “But I’m sure you didn’t come over here to listen to me whine about being the 'loco' in in loco parentis. Carol said you're writing a book on small towns in Virginia?"
Elijah smiled at her and nodded. "Yes. I'm particularly interested in the 18th century settlements in this area. So much has been written about the 19th century, but there were people here well before that."
Jenna flipped through a couple of the albums. "I think these photos and articles here are mostly 1880 and after. I know Miranda had boxes and boxes of stuff from the Historical Society's archives, though. Let me see what I can dig up."
Elijah made a show of flipping through the albums he was ostensibly there to examine while Jenna rose and started combing through the hall closet. "I'm not sure you're going to find much pre-1800. Mystic Falls was founded around then," she called. "The Lockwoods arrived in 1811 I think, the Fells at around the same time, the Gilberts a couple years later, and – eek!"
Hearing the sound of something heavy starting to slide, Elijah sped to the hall and was there to reach over her head and catch the large box of ledgers. She turned and squeaked again to find him standing mere inches behind her, and blushed once more as she pushed at her hair. "Why don't I set this on the table?" he said, smiling down at her.
"Um, yeah. Good catch," she said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. Cute, and easily flustered. How unfortunate that this was no time to get distracted.
He saw her bend to pull some more boxes from the floor as he turned toward the dining room. The box he carried looked to contain ledgers of births and deaths, something that may prove useful down the road. As he flipped through the worn, leather-bound books, he heard the front door open, and Elena's voice as she spoke to her aunt. His smile turned predatory, in anticipation of her shock at finding him there. Inside of her house.
"Hey, what are you doing?" she asked.
"Oh, good timing," Jenna answered. He heard the sound of a box being transferred from one to the other.
"Whoa! What is this stuff?"
"Your mother's files from the historical society. I got roped into helping Mrs. Lockwood. Aaaand, by roped, I mean very excited to participate." Jenna stood and closed the closet door, revealing Elijah standing behind it.
"Hi," he said, smiling as the girl jumped and stared at him in horror. "I'm Elijah."
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jonas didn't appear to be at home when Elijah let himself into the Martins' apartment. The deep, steady breathing coming from behind Luka's closed door told him that the boy was sound asleep. Odd, given the early hour. He stepped into the kitchenette and washed his hands, giving them the thorough scrubbing he hadn't truly been able to avail himself of in what the gas station attendant had delusionally referred to as a rest room. Back in the living room, he noted the knife and the pilfered items Jonas had used earlier for the shadow spell still sitting on the small dining table. He stationed himself at the window and offered up a silent thanks to whichever Fate had urged them to try that spell when they had.
He hadn't thought to return to Slater's loft once the younger vampire was dead and his information extracted, but when he'd seen the girl there he knew that there was no time to waste. If she'd located Slater, that meant that she was working up the same chain of communication that had led to him, and he couldn't have that. Everything hinged on keeping the doppelganger's existence a secret from Klaus. The more she poked at that series of contacts, the more likely it was that she'd eventually encounter someone who was in touch with Klaus. Or that they'd encounter her.
And just what in the nine hells was the girl doing, anyway? Trying to get herself killed? She'd certainly seemed hell-bent on remaining free of Klaus when he had tried to take her from the mansion. And wherever she went it seemed a Salvatore stood nearby, waiting to save her. Why poke the nest, just to see if any more hornets flew out of it?
Footsteps drifted up the inner staircase, and Jonas entered the apartment. He didn't seem particularly surprised to have company. "Where's Luka?" Elijah asked, knowing where but hoping to learn why the boy would be abed so early.
"Asleep." He didn't elaborate.
Elijah shrugged slightly. "Your shadow spell was successful. I was able to track that girl. However I did have a little run-in with one of the brothers that killed me."
"I assume he didn't live to tell about it," Jonas ventured.
"Actually, I spared him." Elijah shook his head. "He'd die for her. They both would. She'll be kept safe."
"For now." The warlock sounded dubious.
"That's precisely what we need her to be." Elijah turned away from the window to face him. "Safe."
Jonas hung his keys on a hook near the door and went to the refrigerator, pulling out a beer and some leftover Chinese food. He held the beer up questioningly.
Elijah declined with a shake of his head and perched against the counter opposite while Jonas dumped the congealed mass of... whatever it was onto a plate and stuck it into the microwave to heat. "It's a little early for Luka to be asleep, isn't it? Is he unwell?" he asked.
Jonas tossed the empty container in the trash can. "He had a rough day. Bonnie Bennett pulled him into a spell earlier. Gave him a nosebleed and a hell of a headache."
"I thought you said she was untrained." Elijah leaned back and crossed his arms in front of him.
"Mostly. Apparently Luka took it upon himself to give her a lesson in channeling. And then, because that wasn't stupid enough, he left his dogtags with her after showing her how to use them to draw energy away from him."
"Well, on a positive note, that should take care of his little crush on her."
Jonas snorted. "You'd think, but no. He's pissed at me."
Elijah quirked a brow at the warlock. "Because...?"
"Because he's a teenager?" Jonas opened the silverware drawer and took out a fork. It took a couple of tries to slide it back in without catching. "Complex rituals, archaic curses, astral projection? Piece of cake. But adolescence? That's a mystery for the ages."
Elijah looked from the drawer to the faded wallpaper, from the wall to the corner of the floor, where the linoleum had started to peel. "Isn't this place a little... lowbrow, for a doctor?"
"It's what was available on short notice, and it didn't require a lease." Jonas removed the plate from the microwave after it dinged and went over to the table, pushing aside the photo of Elena Gilbert, still smeared with Elijah's blood. He gestured toward it with his fork. "So where was she? You took off out of here pretty fast."
Elijah pulled a chair out across from the warlock and sat. "Slater's loft."
Jonas glanced up from his makeshift meal, eyebrows raised. "What was she doing there?"
"I wish I knew." He scraped idly at the dried blood on the glass with his thumbnail. "There were three other vampires there when I arrived. Cody was one of them. He said he was there to collect the doppelganger and bring her to me, for Klaus."
"I guess he hadn't heard that the two of you broke up?"
"No. Klaus speaks to so few directly now. I imagine it isn't exactly common knowledge."
"So how did Cody know the girl was there?"
I probably should have inquired about that before I killed him. "I don't know." Elijah leaned back and ran a hand through his hair. He hated this feeling of being two steps behind, unaccustomed as he was to it. It seemed that was how he'd been operating since leaving Manhattan and driving south. He needed to do something to get back on an even keel.
"Does anyone else know about her?" Jonas pushed the empty plate away and took a couple swallows of beer.
"According to him, no."
Jonas studied him across the table. "What are you going to do?"
Elijah lifted the photo, studying it. "I think it's time Miss Gilbert and I had a talk."
~~~~~~~~~
Elijah glanced down at the address Carol Lockwood had given him and compared it to the numbers on the white house. The home was modest, but well-kept, with a swing gracing the front porch and a few flower pots here and there adding color and character. Making his way up the steps, he rang the doorbell and waited.
Footsteps pounded down a set of stairs, and a woman, looking barely older than Elena herself, opened the door, still trying to get her right foot all the way into the shoe she had obviously slipped on in a hurry. “Miss Sommers?” Elijah said, extending his hand to her.
“Oh please, it's just Jenna. You must be Mr. Smith.” She shook his hand, a little awkwardly.
“Elijah is fine.”
“Please, come in,” she invited, backing up a step to let him through the door.
Elijah smiled and crossed the threshold. “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me, Miss – Jenna. I hope Mrs. Lockwood didn’t strong-arm you too badly.”
“No, it’s fine! I was just making some coffee. Would you like some?”
“That would be lovely. Thank you.” Elijah followed her to the living room. While she went to the kitchen to fetch the coffee, he examined the photos on the mantle. Family photos, all of them; Elena and a younger brother at various ages, sometimes together and sometimes solo, others showing a family of four. One shot, obviously taken during some long ago holiday, showed the younger Gilbert children with Jenna, who looked to have been around Elena's age now when it was taken.
“’The Gallery,’” Jenna said, nodding toward the photos as she came back in, a tray balanced precariously in one hand and a box held to her hip with the other. Elijah took the tray from her and set it on the coffee table. “Thanks. My sister was nuts about taking pictures. I’d be amazed if there are more than five undocumented minutes of Elena and Jeremy when they were little.”
“Mrs. Lockwood mentioned that you’re raising your niece and nephew now. That must be quite an undertaking.”
She gave a quick laugh. “That… would be putting it mildly.” Sitting on the sofa, she poured coffee from a carafe into the two mugs. “How do you take yours?”
“Black is fine.” He took the proffered cup and seated himself in the overstuffed chair. “I imagine it must have been a difficult adjustment, for all involved.”
“Uh, yeah.” Jenna stirred a generous amount of cream into her own coffee and added a spoonful of sugar. Scooting back into the cushions, she folded her legs up underneath her and cradled the warm mug between her hands. “I still have days when I wake up and can't believe that this is my life now.”
He took a sip of the coffee. “What were you doing before?”
“Going to school. Partying. Drinking too much, smoking things I shouldn’t have been. The usual,” she said ruefully. “And now here I am, telling my sister’s kids not to do those same things, and feeling like the world’s biggest hypocrite.” She tucked her hair behind her ear and settled a throw cushion idly on her lap, looking for all the world like a teenager herself. “I mean, the idea of me being totally responsible for two other human beings? Is totally ridiculous."
She's cute, he thought, apropos of nothing. Elijah leaned back in the chair and crossed his legs. “I’m sure you’re doing the best you possibly can under the circumstances. They're at a difficult age. Teenagers: a mystery for the ages,” he said, echoing Jonas's words.
“Definitely. You’d think being a grad student in psychology would help, but it actually just makes me realize how much I don't know…" She shrugged. "Do you have kids?”
He shook his head. “No. I… lived with someone once, someone who was orphaned and left to care for her younger siblings. It’s not an easy situation; I think you’re to be commended for what you’re doing.”
She blushed and tucked her hair back again, obviously a nervous habit. “Family. What’re you gonna do?” Leaning forward, she pulled the box over to her and started removing what looked to be old journals or photo albums. “But I’m sure you didn’t come over here to listen to me whine about being the 'loco' in in loco parentis. Carol said you're writing a book on small towns in Virginia?"
Elijah smiled at her and nodded. "Yes. I'm particularly interested in the 18th century settlements in this area. So much has been written about the 19th century, but there were people here well before that."
Jenna flipped through a couple of the albums. "I think these photos and articles here are mostly 1880 and after. I know Miranda had boxes and boxes of stuff from the Historical Society's archives, though. Let me see what I can dig up."
Elijah made a show of flipping through the albums he was ostensibly there to examine while Jenna rose and started combing through the hall closet. "I'm not sure you're going to find much pre-1800. Mystic Falls was founded around then," she called. "The Lockwoods arrived in 1811 I think, the Fells at around the same time, the Gilberts a couple years later, and – eek!"
Hearing the sound of something heavy starting to slide, Elijah sped to the hall and was there to reach over her head and catch the large box of ledgers. She turned and squeaked again to find him standing mere inches behind her, and blushed once more as she pushed at her hair. "Why don't I set this on the table?" he said, smiling down at her.
"Um, yeah. Good catch," she said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. Cute, and easily flustered. How unfortunate that this was no time to get distracted.
He saw her bend to pull some more boxes from the floor as he turned toward the dining room. The box he carried looked to contain ledgers of births and deaths, something that may prove useful down the road. As he flipped through the worn, leather-bound books, he heard the front door open, and Elena's voice as she spoke to her aunt. His smile turned predatory, in anticipation of her shock at finding him there. Inside of her house.
"Hey, what are you doing?" she asked.
"Oh, good timing," Jenna answered. He heard the sound of a box being transferred from one to the other.
"Whoa! What is this stuff?"
"Your mother's files from the historical society. I got roped into helping Mrs. Lockwood. Aaaand, by roped, I mean very excited to participate." Jenna stood and closed the closet door, revealing Elijah standing behind it.
"Hi," he said, smiling as the girl jumped and stared at him in horror. "I'm Elijah."
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