He stood beneath the tall pine trees. The woods were abundant with them and with clearings that spread between the trees and bushes and old rubbled ruins that belonged to the founding families. If you tried to look past the woods you'd have a clear sight of view through the tall pine trees, almost like they weren't there. But they were everywhere with their pine leaves scattered amongst the ground and acorns accompanying them in lesser numbers beside the dry leaves of the large oaks.

There were many trees in the old woods, most tracing back hundreds of years, but trees wasn't all there was. Living things with a fresh flow of blood scoured these woods too.

As the boy stood still in the old woods, he could almost sense the flowing blood. But it was hard to determine where this blood was coming from. he knew it flowed through these woods, but where, he didn't know. He'd have to use the last bit of his power to determine where. He stood very still. His eyes closed. The place between his brooding eyebrows impregnated fine lines as he inhaled the scents brought in by the blowing winds. The winds were coming in strong, bringing in the leaves as it came and making the place cooler than it had already been due to the absent sun.

It wasn't really windy though, not in the woods, but the winds did come in strong intervals, and he, the boy in the woods, took as much of this help as he could get. as the winds came he inhaled its scents; the smell of subtle decay from fall, the smell of the chilly earth and the smell of smoke from chimney's and the dry crisp leaves were all brought by the wind. But this is not what he was looking for; he was smelling for the weak but needed blood. He was smelling for the bitter iron taste he was used to. He was smelling for the energy he needed.

But nothing came, and as he waited he began to grow frustrated. Not because he couldn't find the fresh blood, but because he realized how powerless he was and how fast his hunger lust was growing. He was vulnerable to his instincts, especially since it had been almost a week since his last feed.

After a few minutes he heard something. In microseconds his eyes shot open, the grey skies reverberating off of his green, predator like eyes. he shifted his head towards the noise of a heaviness against dry leaves, leaning his head closer to the direction he heard this from. there it was again, and the second time it came he didn't bother to check for it again, he was already headed towards the sound. He was fast against the dead earth and it felt good to him as his invisible movements crossed the wind, but after seconds of this inhuman speed he began to feel weak. He was always fast with a consistent flow of blood in him but when he got into these weak points, he felt sick. And the only thing that kept him headed to the moveable feast was the carnivorous hunger that was clamouring inside of him.

The sounds of the creature came louder and louder until he was in a small clearing of the old woods- he was very close to the highway, which meant closer to civilization. He peered through the trees until his sense of hearing became the sense of sight. he could now clearly see what had been been disturbing the the earth; a deer was prompt by one of the pine trees, its long neck leaning down towards the dying grass as it took bites from it.

The boy watched the deer for a second; he felt bad for it. He had always felt bad right before a feed and it hurt him, but he knew this was much more humane than feeding off of human prey, and in the end it was always this knowledge that gave him the wickedness to do what had to be done.

In seconds he was- inhumanly- racing past trees towards the deer, and before the deer had any chance of evading, the boy was latched onto the deers neck.

The deers innocent eyes fell closed as its entire life- past and present- was being taken. The boy could feel this happening. He could see the life of the deer in his thoughts. He could feel the deer, almost like the deer had inhabited his boy and was, just now, thinking about all the things that could be.

The boy always found it odd how every dying thing would think like this. he always thought that the thought of "what could have been" would haunt the creature more than the thought of the future and of what could be. the past was always a cruel memory and regrets are always haunting and the boy knew that well. he had spend years making mistakes for his minds demons and he knew the pain that came with the regrets that he longed to forget, and thats why he found this odd. And with all of this, his eyebrows came up in the middle, creating the fine lines between his eyebrows and his forehead, which came with the feeling of a melancholic empathy.

He dug his long white teeth deeper into the animal. he could feel- and hear- the blood flowing out of the animals jugular vein and into himself, feeding all the parts of his hunger that were left unattended for to long. longer than any vampire should allow themselves to go, and he knew it.

once he had drained the life out of the deer, dropping the limp body to its side, he looked out past the trees into the sky and smiled. he felt bad for taking the deers life, but it had been so long and all he could feel was good and happy. plus he felt all re-energized like set of batteries. he was bursting in places he had forgotten about. it felt to him like an electric current buzzing from one spot to the next and it didn't stop, it continued on. he finally felt his power returning and he smiled on.

A familiar voice behind him, maybe in front of him, or beside him, on one of his sides, far away, cut off his smile.

"Stefan," the familiar voice said.

it was a sweet voice, very soothing and nostalgic. it had the sound of soft, golden rays of sunshine in the fall and the faintness of the wind in the summer. He could hear it clear, especially with his strength back, but it was so faint and it had a void to it that it never had before.

The boy, stefan, listened, his hearing focused on the woods, like it was the woods that were speaking to him.

He heard his name again. this time it stayed, fading into the depth of the woods.

It couldn't be her, he thought. Stefan knew it couldn't be her. It couldn't be Elena, because elena is in the sleeping curse. But he knew her voice so well and he knew this was her voice.

"Stefan,"