Disclaimer: Don't own TVD.

AU

Damon and Elena


A Sinner Before the Gates of Heaven

Chapter Three: Deadly Arise

Elena used to think, before she lived in New York and long before she decided to ignore curfew, that nothing about Mystic Falls could surprise her.

The small town she had lived in until the age of eighteen was one of the most terrifying, unpredictable places to live with the violence of the night residents coming in ebbs and flows and so much of that violence occurring when she was in her late teens. In those last few years she had lived in Mystic Falls, it had become a place where the deadly arose only minutes after curfew, where it wasn't uncommon for hikers, who had ignored the warnings to be inside by sundown, to be found violently murdered every two, maybe three days.

She remembers; curled onto her side on the huge bed Damon had left her in minutes, maybe hours, earlier, how that violence had taken her best friend from her when she was only seventeen.

She remembers too, that they had blamed the man who she had awoken to find in the shadows.

Damon Salvatore, it has been whispered, had been the person who had torn open the throat of Caroline Forbes and then, in a twist of fate afforded to so few, had turned her into one of those the town feared.

She knows now that Mystic Falls has just thrown a curveball at her that's caught her in the stomach, knocked the breath from her lungs and her feet from under her.

Damon Salvatore isn't just the reason she lost her best friend when she was seventeen nor is he just one of the reasons she got the hell out of Mystic Falls when she turned eighteen and was accepted into NYU.

Damon Salvatore is the legend behind the town of Mystic Falls, the legend behind curfew and the murders of townspeople and an almost massacre of the founding families. He's the vicious vampire, who was turned in 1864 and had stayed to haunt the town, turning those when he felt like it and then allowing them to roam free in the town after sunset.

And for twenty, nearly twenty-one, years, Elena's believed that he was simply a legend.

Apparently, that isn't true.

Apparently, Damon Salvatore exists.

Apparently, not only does Damon Salvatore exist but, in an action so contrary to the legend, he saved her from the monster whose hand she can still faintly feel around her throat.

Lying on that bed, facing the windows, her eyes tracing the moonlight that's lovingly outlining the gnarled branches of an sturdy oak tree, Elena's not exactly sure how to process the information her mind is sorting through simply because there so much of it her mind wants to reject.

In the fashion of a student of history, her mind is demanding more than proof. It wants the legend, word for word, in detail and not a vague recollection of it from a parent some ten, twelve years ago. It also wants the evidence that backs the legend, the small sliver of information that started a legend spanning a hundred and forty-five years and it's demanding proof that the man she had woken up to was, truly, Damon Salvatore in the flesh.

But that's only one part of what her mind is asking.

Her mind, the ever curious mind that led her to being a history major, is asking about the supernatural. It's asking how she could possibly believe that Damon Salvatore is who he says he is and how only after accepting it a moment ago, she accepted that not only is he Damon Salvatore but he's also a vampire.

The second part to that question, Elena muses, is quite easy. She believes he's a vampire simply because while everyone else in the world needs an action, a specimen of experimentation to prove that the supernatural exists, she needs the opposite.

To believe in the supernatural – vampires, witches, and werewolves – is as natural as knowing that she has to look both ways when crossing the road. It's a sliver of information drilled into the head of every child raised in Mystic Falls and it never truly leaves their psyche. Elena knows because even though she was living in New York, even though living there had relaxed her enough for it to only be a passing thought, the lessons of childhood had ever really left her. The belief in the fantastical beings so many assumed where simply myths, she knows, will never really leave her.

To not believe in the supernatural, Elena knows, someone would have to disprove the hauntings of Mystic Falls. They would have to capture the specimen of experimentation that would prove to the world that they existed and use it to prove that Mystic Falls needn't have lived in terror for a hundred and forty-five years.

And because she knows all of that's never going to happen, Elena knows that the man who had been in the room with her was, in fact, a vampire.

If he was Damon Salvatore, well, she's not sure.

Huffing because she feels like her mind is going around in circles, she moves, pushing over to settle on her back and stare up at the shadowed ceiling.

Irritation at herself is slowly starting to well and chip away at the disbelief that's been coating her since Damon – if it was Damon – had shut the door earlier.

She's irritated because, logically, she should be terrified. She has no idea what he has planned for her, she's not sure if she's ever going to leave this room again or if she's to be the next meal for the vampire who had left her in a state of disarray.

Instead, she's attempting to figure out if the man who had left her room was in fact, Damon Salvatore.

There must be something wrong with her, she decides, because no-one in their right mind spends time wondering if their captor is who he says he is.

Then again, Elena thinks, maybe she's just trying to distract herself from the uncertainty of the coming hours.

As her eyes adjust to faded light that's making the intricately designed seem shadowed and slightly intimidating, Elena wonders if maybe she's just curious.

It makes sense.

Contemplatively, Elena allows the face of the man to float into her mind and finds herself appreciating the memory of the five o'clock shadow, the smirk twisted to sit on just this side of smug, the incredible blue eyes that were watching her carefully.

With a soft sigh, Elena turns over again, returning to her side.

Those eyes, she thinks drowsily. They were so blue, so deep, almost fathomless and so utterly familiar.

She's sure as she slowly drifts towards a sleep that she hadn't known was coming; that she's seen those eyes before. That those eyes have smiled at her before and she's been just as curious about them as she is now.

She's sure of it as she begins to dream.


The fog has come from nowhere.

At nine, with an almost pure belief in everything her parents have ever told her, Elena knows that the fog isn't a good thing. In fact, she's sure that it's a very bad thing.

But this fog is different.

It's daytime and curfew, she's sure, isn't for a few more hours. She knows because she promised her parents that she and Caroline would be careful to be home from the edge of the woods well before the bell rang in warning and the deadly chose to arise.

The fog, she knows, only comes after curfew and it only comes a few times every month. It never, ever comes during the day, though.

Biting her lip, Elena steps forward and hears a branch crunch beneath her worn sneakers.

Maybe, she thinks, as she looks around at the swirling grey, playing hide and seek hadn't been a very good idea, especially when she's the one hiding. Caroline, she knows, isn't a very patient seeker and she's been known to give up when all the obvious places have been discovered.

Her hiding place isn't exactly obvious but it isn't a hard place, either. She's standing behind a wall of rock that she's sure has been used before and then realizes that in fog this thick, her friends not going to be able to find the rocks, let alone her.

Taking a deep breath, Elena somehow knows that she needs to step away from the rocks and find her way back to her friend.

"Caroline?"

Another branch crunches under her shoes and the sound echoes sharply and Elena draws in a deep breath, thinking about running but not being sure where to run too.

No-one's ever told her what to do when fog comes up so suddenly. She's pretty sure even the big kids don't know what to do.

Carefully, she takes another step and calls out for her friend again.

"Caroline? Can you hear me?"

Taking another step away from the rocks and looking around carefully, Elena wonders if she's going to see anyone around her.

Serious thoughts of running start to demand attention and she draws in a deep, terrified breath and cautiously takes another step only to hear a branch crack behind her.

She wheels around at the sound, her heart hammering, knowing that the branch cracking hadn't come from beneath her shoe again.

Standing behind her, leaning nonchalantly against the rocks she had been hiding behind stood a man dressed all in black. He's watching her carefully and his eyes flick to behind her momentarily before returning to her own.

She opens her mouth, vague thoughts of screaming echoing inside her head when he raises a finger to his lips and shakes his head.

Numbly, she does what she's told because it never occurs for her to do otherwise.

His eye – blue, Elena notes, really, really blue – flick behind her again and his lips twist into a sneer as another branch snaps behind her and the echo races through the forest.

His eyes flick back to hers and it doesn't take a genius for Elena to realize he wants her to stay put. She's not a genius but she is one of the smartest people in her whole year and though he doesn't explicitly indicate to, she squeezes her eyes shut, too, and doesn't move.

In a matter of seconds, she hears a sickening crunch and she knows that it isn't from someone standing on a branch. She's not sure what it's from but she doesn't want to open her eyes and find out so she keeps them squeezed shut and tries to listen instead.

There's not much more to hear, though and she starts thinking about opening her eyes when she hears a voice, one she's sure doesn't belong to the man who had been standing in front of her before.

"She smells so pure. Tell me you don't smell it."

The voice is cold and ruthless and she wonders, only briefly, what he's talking about but hears nothing else as the other man growls out something that's in a different language.

It sounds a little bit like a curse word and Elena wants to giggle at it but she doesn't because she knows the man in black wants her to stay still and she will because she thinks he's trying to help her.

"There's a reason we're known as night creatures. We don't come out during the day."

The other man says lowly, almost like he doesn't want her to hear and then there's one more thud, the crack of branch being snapped in half and then another curiously sickening crunch before only absolute silence.

Elena stands there for only a moment longer before she becomes curious about what's happened and why she's starting to feel the warmth of the sun on her face again.

Opening her eyes in curiosity, the man in black is standing in front of her again and he looks a little irritated. Kind of like what her Daddy looks like when he has to keep explaining himself over and over before she understands it. He looked like that this morning, she remembers, when he had to explain to her why it was a bad idea for her to stay over at Caroline's tonight.

Something about her being special, but she doesn't really remember.

"I would advise you against playing in the woods from now on." He says before she can ask anything or even turn around and she blinks.

"Why?"

"Because, apparently, you're all nitwits who aren't aware some of us can walk at midday."

Elena frowns a little at that. She doesn't think she's a nitwit. In fact, she knows she's not and glares up at him. "I'm not a nitwit. I'm the third smartest person in my grade."

For a moment, the man stares at her and then he chuckles, his smile reaching his eyes and making them even bluer then before.

"I suppose I'll have to remember that." He says and she nods once, imperiously before gracing him with an impish grin.

"Who are you?" She asks curiously and his eyebrows rise only slightly at the question.

Before he can reply, though, Elena hears a crunch of leaves and Caroline's worried voice calling out for her.

"Elena! Where are you? Your Daddy's worried!"

Instinctively, Elena turns in the direction of her friend's voice before glancing behind her. The man who had been standing in front of her before is gone.

Frowning, Elena stares at the spot where he once stood and then jumps when she hears her father's frantic voice. He hadn't answered her question and she wonders why. She wonders, narrowing her gaze at the spot he had been standing, who that man was and why he had made her stand still for those few seconds she'd been surrounded by fog.

Before she can think further on it or even come up with a reasonable explanation for it, Elena hears her daddy's voice and discovers, curiously, that the sound of it makes her knees shake in relief.

She looks down at them and can't help but wonder when she felt scared in the last few minutes.

"Elena Gilbert! Where are you?"

With one last curious thought about the man who had told her to stay quiet and stand still and what he had done or even meant, Elena turns and runs in the direction of their voices.

Deciding that it's probably wise not to tell her father exactly what had just happened near the rocks during the day. He worries, she knows, enough as it is.

"Daddy, I'm here!"


He's standing near those rocks as he remembers the gangly little girl with skinny legs much too long for her age and hair down to her waist and connects her to the girl he left in his bedroom nearly an hour ago.

He'd given no thought to staking that vampire behind the little girl with knobbly knees twelve years ago simply because it had to be done.

Both to save the life of the girl who had stood in front of him and complied so easily to the demands he had communicated too her and to save one of the only food sources Mystic Falls could supply to him and the rest of the supernatural population.

God bless hikers who didn't believe in the supernatural or frighteningly consistent animal attacks, Damon thinks with a smirk as he picks up the sounds of a small camp only a few hundred feet from where he's standing.

The hikers were going to be his dinner when he had realized exactly where he was standing.

The memory, Damon considers, isn't important because he chose to kill one of his kind. No, the memory is important because Elena Gilbert is involved with it and in both the memory and the events a few hours ago, she had smelled pure.

Damon wonders how he hasn't picked that memory straight away based simply on the claim of how pure she smelled and then realizes that in both, he was too busy saving her life to really appreciate he scent that wafted from her.

But it's enough to wonder about and enough to consider, exactly, how he has ended up saving that girl again.

If he was younger, perhaps if he hadn't lived for a hundred and forty-five years, Damon knows he might not believe in coincidence.

It might be a coincidence that he has ended up saving that girls life twice. It might be a coincidence that it's occurred in roughly the same way. It might be a coincidence that both vampires who had been intent on attacking her told him about the way her blood smelled.

It might also be a coincidence that Caroline Forbes has appeared both times after the danger has passed.

The thought causes Damon to wince slightly because he knows without a shadow of a doubt that when he returns, she will be waiting to lecture him. On one of the many faults she has discovered in the last few years that she doesn't approve of.

The momentary distraction doesn't stop his mind from continuing to mull over the sudden coincidences that have presented themselves and Damon finds that maybe it's not a coincidence.

He would like to believe that twice saving this girl is just a coincidence and that he will leave her locked in that room until the sun rose before letting her go and never thinking of her again but, somehow, he doesn't think that there's much coincidence in it.

Somehow, he doesn't think someone whose scent was so pure could fall into his path twice in their lifetime without something else being at work and he'd rather know for sure then assume the hands of fate are screwing with him.

The sounds of laughter break his concentration momentarily and he flicks a glance towards the oblivious hikers. For a moment, he considers feeding – knowing that it had been his intention when he left the Boarding House – and then dismisses the idea.

The memory has unsettled him and he needs to know whether or not it's a coincidence before he decides what to do with the girl in his room.

Turning his back on the cheerful hikers, Damon slips back into the shadows, deciding that tomorrow night one of the other deadly arising after curfew can teach them why it's a bad idea to be out of Mystic Falls at night.

His lesson plan tonight has changed.

Now, he thinks, it's time to visit some witches.


A/N:...so, interesting? My muse deserted me for a while after the second chapter. Not in regards to the whole story but in regards to this chapter. I couldn't figure out how to link it all up and this became quite a transitional chapter for the story because we explain Elena's thinking, Damon's as well and well, we're going to visit witches next. That being said, it is a transitional chapter into the story and the start of the storyline in regards to these two, so it's going to be fun to play around with it in the coming chapters, I hope you enjoyed it!

To everyone that reviewed, thank you! It's really awesome to hear from all of you, I really enjoy reading them!

Special mention to mchriste22, though, because I'm so glad you've got Bat Out of Hell in your head when you're reading this and I have to say, there are so many lines in the song I love - title included - but 'Oh baby, you're the only thing in this whole world that's pure and good and right' is what stuck in my head when I came up with the plotline!

I hope you guys did enjoy chapter three and, once again, thank you for the reviews!

Cautiously, she takes another step and hears a branch crack from behind her.