AN: Katherine seems a little OOC in this chapter, but in my defence, it's a pretty unusual situation.


Katherine half-expected the house to have been modernised on the inside, but it looked exactly the same as the last time she had been here (minus the blood and the dead bodies). It might not have been open to the public, but it had been beautifully looked after.

She reached out to touch one of the chairs, obviously re-upholstered, but almost the same colour and fabric it had been when she was a child.

"My mother used to sit here and embroider." Katherine said absently. "I used to play by her feet. She taught me how to read." A smile crossed her face. "She used to hide the books under her sewing because Father didn't think women should be educated."

Damon snorted. "Now why doesn't that surprise me?"

A sudden thought crossed Katherine's mind, and she made her way up the stairs, wondering if anyone had found it over the years.

"You know, it's just occurred to me." Damon said, following her. "If your family was still here in 1492 … and obviously you never married, or you wouldn't have still been Petrova when you turned … what were you doing in England?"

"Pretending I didn't exist." Katherine said dryly, examining a book case. A quick glance at the floor told her that it hadn't been moved in a long time, possibly not since before her departure. In fact, a human would have had trouble moving it at all now, but her vampire strength made it easy to slide aside to reveal the wooden door it was concealing.

"Second question." Damon said, his frown audible in his voice. "Were your family in a habit of hiding rooms?"

"Only this one." Katherine muttered darkly, following the dark, winding staircase up into the attic. She emerged into a tiny room that brought back memories in a huge flood of emotion that she forced back.

This … This was the reason she had been anxious about coming home.

Casting a wary glance at the floorboards, which didn't look in the best condition, she skirted the edge of the room to reach the window, gazing out at the forest that shielded one side of the village.

"Katherine?" Damon asked gently. "What was this room?"

Katherine didn't respond for a few minutes. When she did, it wasn't to answer the question. "There was a man named Boyan who looked after the horses. He was about as old as my father, and I considered him a second father. He used to accompany me on rides, and I could talk to him about anything."

"This was his room?" Damon guessed.

Katherine smiled weakly. "No. When I was fifteen, I confided in him that I felt … Well, I felt alone. I was unmarried with few prospects."

"You were fifteen." Damon repeated. "And you? I doubt it."

"No prospects my father approved of." Katherine amended. "Delusions of grandeur, remember? And most girls were married off at around thirteen back then – as soon as we could bear children." She took a shaky breath. "He told me that he loved me and that any man would be lucky to have me as a wife …"

"And here I thought that line was modern." Damon growled, scowling. "I'm guessing he left you alone."

"Not quite alone." Katherine said softly, opening the chest beneath the window. Much of its contents had degraded over time, especially since this room had apparently never been found by the house's benefactors, but one blanket, which would have become her baby's first swaddling cloth, remained intact, and she pulled it out carefully, her fingers tracing the embroidered stitching.

"This was your room." Damon concluded. "They moved you here because you were pregnant."

Katherine nodded. "Father was determined that the child would remain a secret. That we could pretend it never happened, and he could marry me off still. I had a plan though. I was going to pass the baby to one of the maids, who would smuggle her out of the house, and then I'd make a rope out of sheets and climb out of the window. Then we'd find a cottage somewhere, and we'd be fine." She finally looked up at Damon, not entirely sure what to make of the expression on his face. "I'd spent enough time in the village – I knew a little about farming, enough to plant vegetables, and keep chickens, and … We could have done it, Damon. We really could."

Damon reached out and tucked a strand of hair out of her face. "She was stillborn, wasn't she?"

Katherine closed her eyes. "No. She was born perfectly healthy. But she … They took her. Mama delivered her, cleaned her up, and handed her straight out the door to my father, who took her away." She could feel tears burning at the backs of her eyes, and blinked rapidly, trying to get rid of them.

Damon's arm settled around her shoulders and she leaned into him gratefully. He was the only person in the world she would feel entirely comfortable breaking down in front of (if she could ever feel entirely comfortable breaking down, that is).

"Why do you never talk about her?" Damon asked.

"It was drilled into me that I couldn't." Katherine answered, almost monotonously. "I lost my baby, and then I had to pretend she never existed. And now … it hurts, Damon. It's been five hundred years – more – since I lost her, and it still hurts like it was yesterday."

His arms tightened around her, and she felt him press a kiss to the top of her head.

"She was happy. And she was healthy. And she was loved. Shouldn't that be enough?"

"Someone having a good life doesn't mean that you're not allowed to miss them." Damon said into her hair. "She was your daughter, Katherine, and you're her mother."

"I found her when she was eighteen." Katherine continued, clinging to him. "I watched her grow, marry, have children … and then on her death bed I went to her. She … She'd been told I died in childbirth, but she looked right at me and said, "Mama, have you come to take me home?"" Her voice broke, and she stopped trying to fight the tears that escaped her. "It was the only time I got to hold my baby and she died right there in my arms."

Tucking her head into his neck, Damon practically enveloped her in his arms, rocking her gently, murmuring soothing words against her skin.

They stayed that way for some time, until Katherine shifted slightly in his embrace, letting out a sigh. "I haven't really spoken about her for a while." She said quietly.

"You don't say?" Damon said, glancing down at her. "What was her name?"

"Anastasia." Katherine answered softly.

Damon nodded thoughtfully. "Is that why you avoided Pearl's daughter when you could?"

Katherine was quiet for a moment, before she chuckled. "I should've known you'd noticed that. Partly. I'd always called my daughter Ana in my head, and it was a little bit of a threat to the switch, but it was mostly because Anna rubbed me the wrong way. I never understood how Pearl ended up with her for a daughter – Anna was much more like me."

"You say that like it's a bad thing." Damon said, kissing her neck.

Katherine smiled wryly. "Like me at my worst. Ana – my Ana – was nothing like me, Damon, and I'm so grateful for that. It means she was happy."

"I won't bother being insulted." Damon said dryly.

Katherine rolled her eyes, feeling much better. "Present times exempt, my life has been pretty crap, admit it."

Reluctantly pulling herself from Damon's arms, she rose to stretch, rolling her shoulders, a frown crossing her face as she caught sight of a faded yellow scroll sitting on the desk on the other side of the small room. She crossed to it in a few strides, unrolling it to see her mother's faint handwriting. She had never bothered to enter this room all those centuries ago, when she found her family dead, but now she wished she had.

"What does it say?" Damon asked.

Katherine took a deep breath, taking a moment to translate the words into modern English. "My darling Katerina, it has now been three months since you left us, and I miss you more with each passing day. I can only hope that you are well and wish that I had the courage to bring you home. You may not have been forgiven in the eyes of our Lord, but you have in my heart. Your father wishes to shut away the memory of your child, but I could never ignore family, no matter the circumstance of her birth. I only wish I had had the strength to allow you to see her, Katerina, for she was such a beautiful child. Although I have no doubt that I can never take away the pain you feel at losing a child – the pain I too must live with – I wished to lessen it somehow, so I am sending you my latest secret, created both from memory, imagination, and a wish that it did not have to be so. I hope this letter and my gift finds you well and happy, and that one day you can forgive me and be forgiven. All my love, Mama."

"What does she mean by her latest secret?" Damon frowned.

"She painted." Katherine whispered. "It wasn't a past-time Father would have disapproved of, but she liked keeping it from him so he didn't dictate what she was to paint." She sighed heavily. "This was dated a few days before I found them dead. She never got a chance to send it."

"I wonder what happened to the painting." Damon said.

"I guess we'll never know." Katherine muttered, carefully folding the letter and slipping it inside her jacket. "Unless you can see a painting around here?"

Damon shook his head. "Maybe it was in one of the downstairs rooms and someone hung it or something."

"Maybe." Katherine conceded, crossing to the door. "We'll have a look before we leave."

Damon stood, recognising her need to leave the memories behind again, but reached into the chest by the window and retrieved the blanket she had pulled out earlier. And as Katherine disappeared down the winding staircase, he pulled the desk forward slightly and removed the object he had spotted when they entered the room, but that she had somehow missed – a rolled-up canvas that any artist would recognise as a stored portrait.

Now all he had to do was get it out of the house and back to the States without Katherine seeing it.