They're in Caroline's room, cuddled up on her bed after Stefan helped her up the stairs, still weak from the mystery ailment she has yet to come clean about. Her head rests on his chest, as his fingers play idly with her hair, both silent for a few moments just breathing each other in. He thinks about Bonnie's question again, how his answer plays out before him, but this feels like neither the time nor place to make such a declaration.

He takes a deep breath, mentally preparing to spill years worth of secrets kept bottled up, and gives her shoulder a light squeeze before it all comes out.

Even when he was little, Stefan knew his family was different from most others. Their vagabond lifestyle, coupled with an odd juxtaposition of military discipline not withstanding, but that even some of his first memories are ones of uneasiness. He doesn't remember a time where mom and dad were happy. Not with each other, and certainly not with their two boys, born so far apart he had always wondered the circumstances that lead to his conception.

One thing Stefan did have was his brother. Damon always doing a fine job of sheltering him from from the misery of two people who didn't love each other, but for some reason, never split apart. One day, shortly after he turned ten, mom wasn't in the picture anymore. No reason was given, other than she had died under circumstances that were deemed classified by their father. A reason that soon became such a practiced excuse, for any emotion the General would rather compartmentalize than deal with outright.

For awhile, things were better, even if the ten year old version of himself felt so guilty for even thinking it. Dad kept himself busy with his duties, pretty much leaving Damon in charge of raising little Stefan, until he had enlisted himself at eighteen. (Partly to shut the old man up, and mainly to get out while he could.)

Then on the day Stefan turned fifteen, with Damon on leave to celebrate, their mother shows up at the front door as if they hadn't thought her dead. Shows up this twisted, wicked thing, thirsting for revenge on their father. Dad of course, hadn't been home, and whatever monster their mother had turned herself into, didn't seem to mind the idea that his sons blood would serve as payback just as well as his own.

He honestly doesn't remember much of what happened, some kind of post traumatic memory block dad was more than willing to let stay that way, other than waking up in the hospital having suffered massive blood loss. What he does know from the events of that day, is Damon offered himself as a sacrifice. She could have him, willingly, if she let Stefan go. He hasn't seen either of them since. Doesn't know of his brother is dead, or became what she was.

Caroline's hand clutches at his shirt during the tale, her empathy radiating in waves, and Stefan knows that if she were able to do anything about the circumstances of his life, she would.

"How are you not afraid of me?" she wonders aloud. "I don't understand it. After all of... that. I think you'd hate vampires more than anything."

"I wasn't afraid of her," he admits. "I think, I mean, I let her in. I invited her in, even though she'd been dead for years. I didn't even question it. It was my birthday, my mother was alive and I..."

"She tried to kill you."

"Yeah."

She's silent a moment.

"I'm sorry," is whispered into his shirt. "That is so messed up, I can't even begin to rationalize how okay you seem to be with it."

"Sometimes it's just a movie in my head," he allows. "With so many scenes missing, it kind of feels like it happened to someone else, you know?"

Her fingers trace circles on him.

"Well adjusted Stefan," she teases. "So cool and calm in the face of calamity."

He kisses the top of her head.

"I'm in love with a vampire," he shoots back. "How well adjusted can I be?"

She stills at his statement, and for a moment he wants to take them back. It's too soon. She's not ready.

"You love me?"

He doesn't hesitate with an answer.

"More than anyone before," he assures. "Or anyone to come."

She twists to face him, something in her eyes telling that she has not heard such words in a long, long time. Inching upward, her lips meets his in the whisper of a kiss, and he wants to let it stay at that. She's still weak, still recovering, but when her mouth parts to deepen it, resistance is a task far too difficult to follow through.

/\

Late afternoon, they're still in bed, having not moved from the mornings activities. Stefan wonders when the Sheriff will return, and if his presence needs to be elsewhere. Also, he's curious as to how a vampire would come to be in a living situation with a parental figure.

"I'm seventeen," Caroline answers. "I'll always be seventeen. It was a lot easier to be on my own a hundred years ago, but these days legal purposes mean I need a guardian. Besides, she's not really my aunt. It's just easier to call her that."

"Then what is she?"

"A relative, though technically not even that. Her ex husband Bill is actually the one I share a bloodline with, but he blew town a few months before I came back."

"And she knows? What you are?"

"It's founding family business to know such things," she replies. "But I am my family's best kept secret."

"Founding family?"

"Oh, right," Caroline concedes. "You haven't been back here that long, and from what you say about your dad, he sure wouldn't tell you."

"What are you talking about?"

"This town was founded by five families," she continues. "Fell, Forbes, Gilbert, Lockwood, and Salvatore."

"Gilbert like-?"

"Elena and Katherine? Yup."

"Lockwood as in Tyler?"

"Right again."

"You're a Forbes."

"Also, true."

"And I'm...?"

"Guilty by association."

"Wow. And they all know about, I mean-"

"Their parents do, I have no doubt about that. But initiation into the council is voluntary, and not allowed until all of them are eighteen."

"What about Bonnie?" he asks. "You didn't say her families name."

"You can blame that on bigoted southern culture," Caroline fills in. "The Bennett's were just as important to the creation of this town as the other five ever were, but you can guess why they're left out."

"She knows what you are."

"She does."

"How did she find out?"

"She's a witch."

A witch, Stefan thinks. Said so matter of fact. Like that's just something people are.

"And you're a vampire."

"Sharp as a tack, aren't you?"

He strokes the skin along her upper arm.

"Are you ever going to tell me what happened to you?"

Her sigh is telling, in that she would have evaded the question as long as she could.

"Werewolf drama," she answers vaguely. "Not a big thing, really."

"Those are real too?"

"Stefan sweetie," she starts, looking up at him and reaching a hand to his cheek. "I want you to think about how much you want to know. How involved you're willing to be."

He doesn't have to think about it.

"Tell me everything."

/\

Stefan skips school for the second time in a row, justifying it to himself as a mental health day. It's not like dad is going to be home to pick up any calls from the office about his absence, and he'd been signing his own excuse slips since fifth grade anyway.

Though the idea of the supernatural is one he finds easily acceptable, the magnitude of it transitioning from myth to fact, is still a lot to process. Also, he's curious to find more information on his lineage, something he'd never really felt an inclination to do. Even when the first day spent in this ridiculously huge house was in the library, he was more interested in the first editions that lined the shelves, rather than family history.

Now he pours over record books, mainly of the old timber business, and finds that Caroline wasn't exaggerating when telling him the Salvatores built this town. There's nothing more intriguing than nineteenth century business savvy, sadly, and he gives up looking for any secrets among the pages after a few hours.

The feeling that something his hidden within the walls is one he can't shake, and proceeds to spend the rest of the day nosing through room after room. Around three, the doorbell chimes, and he heads for the stairs cursing so much wasted effort for a big fat goose egg.

Matt is on the other side of the door, as is Elena, and Katherine too.

"Hey," he says cautiously. "What's going on?"

"Told you he wasn't sick," Katherine pipes up.

"All I said was that he could be," Elena replies.

"Yeah, but you still brought him soup," Katherine says, pointing at the paper bag in her sisters hand.

"I did," Elena admits, holding it up. "I did bring you soup. So, um, here."

Stefan takes the bag, confusion awash on his face, looking to Matt for some kind of clarity.

"You get used to it," he says, giving Stefan a pat on the shoulder, and making his way inside.

Elena follows, but Katherine pauses in the doorway, reaching a hand up to examine his bruised face.

"Guess that's on me," she offers instead of an apology. "But it does make you look even more ruggedly handsome."

"Katherine," he replies, hands pulling hers away. "You and me? It's not gonna happen."

He turns and follows his friends, leaving her in the doorway, stunned.

/\

Caroline drops by in the evening, and Stefan wonders why skipping school seems to have the opposite effect on his social life, not having had any visitors to his house the entire time he's lived here. She marches straight into the library, pours a drink from the bottles near the window, and Stefan opens his mouth to warn her he doesn't know how long they've actually been there.

"Looks like you're feeling better," he says instead, noticing the much improved spring in her step.

"You'd be surprised," she replies. "How a B positive attitude works wonders."

It takes a second for the double entendre to register, and her eyebrows lift to his resulting smirk, moving down the steps and taking a seat next to her.

"Don't tell me you played hooky just to spend all day in your giant house by yourself," she states, twirling a finger around.

"I spent it snooping actually."

Her face conveys mock shock.

"Looking for anything in particular?"

"Family secrets."

She fans herself.

"How scandalous."

Stefan's laugh is hallow.

"If you consider my great, great grandfather fixing timber prices back in 1864 scandalous."

"It was actually," she replies, suddenly in all seriousness. "He built the town's first hospital just to save face."

That gets his attention, as Caroline sips her bourbon.

"He threw a ball in this very house to celebrate its opening. He was so fond of those, always competing with the Lockwoods, he and George constantly trying to outdo each other. All us fair citizens reaping the glamorous benefits."

"You were there?"

She looks away.

"Not for that one, no."

"Why not?"

She takes another drink.

"Because I was dying in that hospital."

Stefan's hand covers hers.

"You don't have to tell me."

"Thrown from a horse," she goes on as if he hadn't said anything. "I was such a good rider, too. Father was always so proud. My bed chamber, covered wall to wall in blue ribbons, but one day I get tossed like I'd never sat in a saddle. My insides crushed by my beloved appaloosa. Everyone I knew, dancing in this room, and my last breaths smell of blood and sawdust."

"Caroline..."

"I wasn't ready," comes out softer than the rest of the story. "I was seventeen, I had only left the confines of this backwater town just once, so I prayed. I prayed so hard for a miracle to come."

She looks at him them, tears shimmering in her eyes, but they will not spill.

"And it did. Funny thing though, my miracle had a face, one I knew well. Alexia Branson, my best friend."

He listens intently, taking note at how her voice changes talking about way back when, her words and manner of speaking that appear so old fashioned.

"She'd been a guest in our home for just a few months, but we were fast friends, growing to call each other sister. It pained her to watch me suffer. So much that she offered to take that suffering away. Of course I said yes. I said it without a second thought, so desperate to cling to my life, I didn't even blink at the sudden change of her face. Or that she gnashed her wrist open with teeth she should not have possessed, offering me the blood that spilled."

He gives her hand a squeeze.

"I remember," she laughs brokenly. "I remember her kissing my forehead when I was finished. Giving all assurances that I would be better come the morning. She couldn't have known it was too late for me, I was mere minutes from death when she appeared by my beside, the blood she gave never having a chance to heal. But it did change me. The next night I awoke in a dank room with a white sheet covering my face, surrounded by the others that had died, with a salacious hunger I had no idea how to control."

Her thumb strokes gently across the back of his hand.

"When you become a vampire, it amplifies all that you are, so what do you think happened to the spoiled brat of a southern belle I was?"

Stefan doesn't have an answer.

"I ripped this town apart. I made it rain blood. I wanted revenge on all those who attended that ball. People I'd known my entire life, I felt had been dancing upon my grave. John Gilbert. Honoria Fell. I wanted to drain George Lockwood, given the chance. Your great, great grandfather. The other founding families. I would have killed them all. Only Lexi could stop me, and she did, but not before I took one last victim that haunts me to this day."

She takes a breath.

"I bet you were named after him. It's too much of a coincidence not to be true. Stefan Salvatore, the sweetest boy a girl could know."

Stefan looks startled at the revelation, yet another fact about his family he is unaware.

"The kind of person you could always speak to, one who never judged. His empathy was a gift. We had known each other all our lives. Grown up together. I think one day we might have even..."

She quickly wipes an escaped tear from her cheek.

"I was ravenous, those first few nights of being a vampire. I didn't care who I killed, as long as I'd fed, and Stefan had the misfortune of coming across me while taking a taste of his mother. I was no longer the girl he knew. The way he looked at me then, how he said my name, both as vile as the monster I'd become. It angered me, so much, and all I'd wanted was for him to stop. So I made him, that only way I knew how."

Caroline pulls her hand from his.

"The thing about secrets, Stefan." She warns. "Is that once you find them, they can never be put back."

/\

Stefan sits in his father's office, eyes scanning the walls, taking in all the military themed art. Battles dad, no doubt, wishes he could have participated in. Framed commendations. Certificates of valor. Various medals he'd earned mounted in small shadow boxes.

His knee shakes nervously, mind racing as to why dad had called him here, knowing that it couldn't be for something so petty as missing two days of school. A new deployment wasn't likely either. Not so soon, anyway. Dad's posts last at least a year, and they've only been in Mystic Falls two months. Also, Dad wouldn't tell him to come all the way to the base for that kind of news.

He hopes it's not some kind of recruitment thing. His eighteenth birthday is next year, and though they've never discussed it directly, Stefan has a feeling his father is aware that a soldier's life is not for him.

His knee won't stop shaking.

Whatever this is, has to be big.

The door opens, and Stefan stands at attention on instinct, old habits dying hard. Dad circles his desk, hat tucked neatly in his arm, and takes the time to gently hang it on a hook mounted to the wall. They share eye contact for a few awkward beats, and Stefan thinks the man is kind of proud that he will not sit without permission.

"Stefan," he says in greeting. "Thank you for coming."

It sounds so formal, which causes his anxiety to spike, the only time dad ever says thank you are the rare times they share a meal and asks to be passed the salt.

A nod of the older man's head, and Stefan finally retakes his seat.

"You're probably wondering why I called you here," he begins, as he takes a seat as well.

"Y-yeah," Stefan stutters. "I mean, yes sir."

The corner of his father's mouth quirks the slightest bit, and now Stefan is really nervous as to what is going on.

"You're a good kid," Dad continues. "You've been on your own most of your life, and it's been rough I know that, but I've never had to worry about you. You don't make trouble. You don't step out of line."

"Have I stepped out of line?" he can't help but interrupt, then immediately regrets it off the stern look received.

"Like I was saying," Dad goes on. "You don't make waves, so I leave you and your personal life well enough alone."

It takes all of Stefan's will power to keep his knee from shaking.

"But I'm afraid something has been brought to my attention. Something I simply can't look the other way on."

It can't be about missing school, he thinks desperately. His brain scrambling for something, anything, he'd done recently to be worthy of getting the third degree.

"Caroline Forbes," Dad states.

Stefan has never thought her name could sound so ugly.

"I understand the two of you have become... acquainted?"

Be cool, Stefan thinks. Be calm. Be the new kid.

"She's my friend," he replies.

"Son," Dad emits in a low tone. "She's a little more than that."

Stefan clears his throat.

"We-uh-are dating. I mean, she's my girlfriend."

Things have been weird since her admission, that much is true, but it hasn't changed anything for him. He still feels the way he feels, and it appears, she does too.

Dad nods, this being knowledge he already possesses.

"Are you aware of what she is? What she's done?"

Give him nothing, Stefan begs his body. No reaction. Not a tick. Not a blink.

"Don't you mean who she is? And what do you mean? What has she done?"

He knows, his mind screams. 1864. The founding families. How she decimated ours. He knows.

Dad leans back in his chair.

"I know we don't talk about your mother."

Never, Stefan doesn't dare say. About how she died. About how she didn't. About what she became. About what she did.

"About what... happened. But I know you remember more than you admit. Which is fine, I won't pry. But we both know, she wasn't human anymore. Just like your little girlfriend isn't."

Stefan's heart beats wildly in his chest, threatening to betray the practiced stoicism he exudes.

"Whatever she is to you, she isn't. That ends now. You don't see her anymore. You don't say a word. She'll be dealt with soon enough."

His stomach drops at the implication.

"Dad..."

"Dismissed."

"But dad-"

"Don't make me repeat myself."

Stefan rises from the chair, exiting the office without another word, and once he feels far enough away reaches for his cell phone and calls Caroline.

"Hey," he says off her greeting. "We have a problem."