Elena knew herself to be a captive, but she was treated as a valued guest. This was Klaus' influence, she knew, as her encounters with Elijah had never led her to feel anything but prey. She was given excellent food, provided plush accommodations, given beautiful clothing to wear. The jewelry alone—most of which she couldn't bring herself to wear—must have cost a fortune.

But there was never a moment when she was left alone, not really. While they were in transit, it was one of the vampires near her—Klaus himself, more often than not, for reasons she couldn't fathom. While she slept or showered or changed, it was one or more of their female servants, humans clearly compelled into absolute obedience. She was grateful for that, though it puzzled her.

Klaus always respected her privacy, though she'd felt his presence more than once as she drifted off to sleep. He had never once tried to compel her or use his physical strength to his advantage. But he clearly had no problems with compelling humans to serve him. Why allow her to keep her will, now that she was in his hands?

She asked him as much when he sat beside her on their longest flight yet—first class, of course, the entire cabin bought out for the eight of them.

His smile was enchanting, as always. "Would you rather I kept you chained or mindless?"

"No," she said, privately wondering if it might be easier to be unaware of what was happening. Whoever said that knowing the end was coming was better than sudden death had clearly never experienced either. "But it would be safer, wouldn't it? How can you guarantee that I won't escape or do…something…to stop the ritual?"

He studied her. "I suppose I can't. It's better this way, though."

She looked at him skeptically and couldn't help softening in response to his quick flash of a grin. "I've lived a long time, Elena. Longer than you can imagine. And, yes, I have all of the powers of my kind, more than most. I could compel any human—and many vampires—to do anything I wanted—live, die, kill. And it's useful, ensuring loyalty, keeping meals quiet…I could compel you to stay with me. Even that lovely necklace you're wearing wouldn't stop me if that's what I wanted. But it grows rather tiresome to be able to do anything, I've found. The important things in life are really better when things are real." He tilted his head, never taking his eyes from hers. "Do you think you can understand that?"

Elena thought back to a time when Damon told her something similar. "I think I can. It's a risky decision, though." She mentally slapped herself. Taunting the bad guy wasn't the smartest idea in the world.

His face darkened for a moment, then smoothed out. "My dear Elena, I trust your word and your knowledge of what will happen if you break it. I trust you." Klaus managed to make it a threat and a caress all at once. He'd mastered that skill, she'd found.

"Did you trust Katherine?" She couldn't help but ask it, even as she braced for the response.

For long moments, he stayed silent, looking out into the plane, into nowhere or the past. Elena was looking out the window again when his soft voice returned. "Katerina was…skilled…at deception, at…making men believed what they wanted to believe." His eyes focused on hers then. She found she couldn't look away. "Yes, I trusted her. I was…mistaken in that, among other things." The corner of his lips rose in a wry smile. "And here we are because of it."

Elena couldn't think of what to say to that. She focused again on the shapeless clouds outside. That side of things hadn't occurred to her. If Katherine hadn't escaped Klaus, turned herself into a vampire, Elena wouldn't be needed for the sacrifice. She could have lived her life. But, then, she never would have met Stefan—come to think of it, she would have died that night at the bridge. Died even younger than she would now, but died knowing that the world was a simple place, where people lived and died and the supernatural was merely a bedtime story. At this moment, she couldn't tell which end she preferred.

Klaus seemed to sense the direction of her thoughts. He reached those beautiful fingers out and gently turned her face back to his. "Elena. It's best not to dwell on what might have been. Believe me, I've lived long enough to know that. We all live; we all die. I suspect that even I will, someday. But you and I—we have a chance for more; we have the chance to fulfill a destiny ages in the making! Think of that, darling; think of what you are, and what you can do!" His eyes lit with fire; they seemed to glow with a passion rarely seen in those who had seen and done it all.

And Elena wanted that fire, wanted to believe his words, that this wasn't just surrender, something dark and desperate designed to achieve something darker. "But you want to kill me!" she managed to say.

Klaus, his hands still caressing her jawline, nodded. "Yes."

She ripped her face away and felt the tears come—again. "You want to bleed me to break a curse that you don't even need to break; you can walk in the day just fine! What good is there in this—what pride or purpose is there in that?" God, she wanted that answer, wanted something to make this inexorable waiting mean something.

He merely watched her break down, his face tinged with something like curiosity. After a while, when she'd wiped away her tears and was staring resolutely away again, she heard him murmur, ever so softly, "You don't know everything yet."


Bonnie and Caroline couldn't seem to stop crying. It was annoying, really. And entirely unhelpful. Not that the boys were any better: Matt and Tyler were talking lowly in the corner, blanket statements like "we'll stop this" audible every now and again, but it couldn't be clearer that they didn't have any ideas and were somewhat relieved that it was over, as much as they cared about Elena. And Jeremy—he was sitting against the wall staring off into a space only he could see. He hadn't spoken since the phone call earlier. Damon found it in himself to feel sorry for the kid, who'd lost the one person in the world who meant most to him.

But, then, so had Damon.

Okay, yes, Damon admitted to himself, as he passed Stefan in their relentless pacing within the shadowy warehouse, Stefan was mildly important. But for the life of him, he didn't think he'd ever get that barnacle off his back. He fully believed that, daunting as it was, he and Stefan would have an eternity to work out their issues.

Elena was different. She was fragile, precious. She was all too easy to break, and she was far too brave for such a vulnerable body. She would die—because she was just that stubborn. And he couldn't live with himself if he let that happen.

The trouble was, he couldn't figure out a way around it.

"We could go back to the house—maybe they left something that would tell us—"

"What? Exactly what their plan is? You think they've left detailed instructions somewhere? Get real." Damon scoffed at Stefan's suggestion. Besides, he'd already thought of that.

"Then what? We're just supposed to sit here and wait for the all clear? She could be dead already, Damon." Stefan's voice broke at that last. He'd had a haunted, deadened look about him ever since they'd left that house.

Damon had seen his brother at his best and his worst over long years of exploring just how bad things could get—before they got even worse. As much as he'd never admit it out loud, Stefan's best was with Elena. His worst appeared to be when he'd lost her. Stefan looked like he would break, truly and irrevocably this time. The part of Damon that hated his brother wanted to see it, to taste that victory. The part that loved him would never let that happen. That girl didn't know the power she held.

"She's not dead," he muttered.

"That's the point, isn't it?" Stefan's voice dripped with the sarcasm he fled to when he was in pain. "We don't know that. We don't know anything."

Damon shoved his brother up against the wall. Stefan didn't even fight back. "We'd know this." He let Stefan go.

"But what we don't know is where she is. We can start with that. Hey, judgey," Damon called over to the corner where Bonnie and Caroline were collapsed together.

The nickname perked her up slightly. Annoyance has a way of doing that. She just looked at him. Stefan watched them, hopeless and despairing.

"You need to do a spell—a locating spell. Find Elena."

"But—she could be anywhere by now. And we don't know what sorts of protections they have around them. Plus, even if we found her, what we would do? What can we do?" Bonnie's tearful objections were many. The frustrating part was that they were all reasonable.

Damon sighed. He ran his hand over his face. "I don't care how you do it. You've done it before; you can do it again. Find her. We'll take it from there."