Chapter ten
Caroline had left Enzo to his own devices after making him promise to call her if there was any more trouble from Augustine. She had to admit he was starting to grow on her. He wasn't so bad under the surface. She had no idea what state she would be in after 70 years of being locked in a cage, starved and tortured. So she had decided that all he needed was a compass to keep him on the right course. He'd gotten free and then hooked up with Damon who, in spite of his intentions, had the moral compass of a sociopath. Of course Enzo was going to go off the rails with Damon as his only friend. So she was going to be that compass for him.
However, at the moment she was much more interested in her upcoming date with Stefan. Okay it wasn't exactly a date. They were just friends going to have dinner together. But she really wanted it to be a date.
she changed clothes three times before settling on a pale green and white dress that made her eyes sparkle. she had just finished deciding on accessories when she got the text message from Elena.
*I told Stefan about Jace.*
"What? are you crazy? that's the last thing he needs!" She said aloud. *How did he take it?* she texted.
*Really well, I think they hit it off. Stefan was smiling when we left.*
Caroline sighed. "And when I see him tonight he's going to have crashed off that emotional high. Thanks Elena." *Good. He needs to smile more.* She wanted to strangle her could Elena be so smart and yet so stupid about this situation?
*Enjoy your date. I'll see you when you get home tonight. We're having dinner with Ric.*
"We?" She said, even though her friend couldn't hear her. "We? Now she's shoving him in Alaric's face?" *Its not a date.*
*Make it a date. You two are perfect for each other. Have fun.*
Caroline sighed and flopped onto the bed. *You too.* her arms dropped to the bed and the cell phone slid from her hands. She made a frustrated growling sound, wondering how to handle the Jace situation now. She really wished he had never shown up. Things were so much simpler before.
TVD
Alaric had no idea what kind of restaurant to take the kids to in order to stick with whatever healthy diet Jace was supposed to be on so he left the choice to Elena. Ric was still a burgers, pizza, chunky monkey kinda guy. He tried not to look out of place in the upscale bar and grill. He couldn't help but notice that upscale wasn't Jace's style either but they both put on a good front for Elena. She'd tried hard to find some where that was a compromise.
"So how did the meeting with Stefan go?" He asked Jace, while Elena had excused herself for a few minutes.
"It was alright." Jace said honestly. He still felt he could open up to Ric after the night before. It was strange but he was okay with that. It was by far the least strange thing that had happened over the last few days. "He was freaked even though he didn't say it and he was trying too hard."
"What about you?"
Jace laughed quietly. "Freaked out and trying too hard." He admitted."Elena thinks it went perfectly and that we're friends for life."
"That's because she wants it to be that way. And it may turn out that way, you never know. He's got to deal with Damon's loss and you have your own family baggage to deal with where the Salvatore name is concerned but you'll get there if you want to."
Jace's eyes widened "You mean you don't think everything falls into place all at once?" He asked in mock shock.
Ric grinned. "It can. Some people click instantly. Sometimes it takes work. " He shrugged "Stefan and Damon always took a lot of work each for their own reasons. I don't see that changing about Stefan just because his brother's gone."
"So be patient and give him time..."
"So do whatever feels right." Alaric said. "You've got instincts. Use them."
He nodded "So... it looks like I'll need to stay in Delcrest a while longer. I'm thinking of taking them up on their offer and transferring to Whitmore. I'll be a little behind but I think I can catch up."
"If you do, I could use a TA... and what offer are we talking about here?"
"The medical college." He said "Because they're using my situation as a case study and picking my bones as it were, a scholarship was always offered. I just don't want to leave Atlanta."
"Then why are you considering it now?"
"Look, don't tell Elena. I'm not ready to deal with that just yet," He knew she linked him inextricably with Damon and that the bad news about his condition would circle back to that loss and it would be a mess neither of them was ready to deal with. "Its not looking good. Congestive Heart Failure, and I'm going in for more tests soon. If it gets any worse they'll put me on the list again. I'll be fine eventually." He hoped "But I'm gonna be here all the time for tests and treatments and what ever so I may as well go to school here too."
Ric nodded. "Makes sense ." He said "Here she comes." He said lowly "So yeah if you end up transferring I'll put in a request for you in specific for TA. Everyone could use a little added income here and there. And since I like the sound of my own voice you can spend a lot of that time catching up on whatever you need instead of giving my lectures for me."
Elena sat down at the table with a sigh. "Well I finally got Jeremy badgered into coming. I told him everyone would be there and that it was a party so that he would stop telling me to but out of his life. So that means he'll be bringing Matt and Tyler and I have to talk to Stefan and Caroline."
"Sounds like someone is getting ambushed." Jace said with a smirk. "And yeah... I'll let you know when I put in the paperwork. The TA job would be great."
TVD
"This is nice." Caroline said as Stefan opened her door and offered his hand.
"I said I'd take you to dinner." He smiled "We're not in high school anymore." Stefan had made reservations at a four star restaurant across town from the college. He'd wanted the night to be special. It needed to be special. He needed to appear normal.
She smiled and took his hand letting him lead her inside. Her heart fluttered a little at his touch and she flushed. Was this an actual date? Did she dare ask?
They were taken to a quiet table, and Stefan pulled her chair out for her. She thanked him as she settled into the chair and let him push it in for her as well.
"You look happier today." Caroline said as he took his seat.
"I feel happier. " He told her. "Don't worry its not a sudden permanent shift in my personality. "
"Would it be so bad to be happy?" She asked.
"No. But its a process. I'll get there don't worry."
"Is this because of Elena's new friend Jace Hamilton?" Caroline asked, fidgeting with the menu.
"Partly, yes." He said "I don't know how to deal with his face yet, but he is family. "I'm not the last one anymore."
"I wanted to tell you." Caroline said. "I really did."
"I know. I assume that's what you were so desperate to talk to me about yesterday."
She nodded. "There are things that I don't think Elena knows about him. I'm not even sure that he knows them about himself-"
"Care- lets talk about him later. I don't want to talk about Jace, or Elena or Damon or anyone else tonight. Not tonight." He said resting his hand over hers and looking into her eyes.
She smiled once more "Are you saying this is a Date date?" She asked.
He smiled a little in amusement. "Yes, I'm saying this is a Date date." he said in a slightly teasing tone. He thought her smile could brighten the entire room in that moment.
TVD
Liv settled onto the floor of her dorm room and took out the silver bowl once more. She had to get better at this spell. Connecting to Damon in the hereafter was imperative if she was going to be able to bring him back. which she was sure she wouldn't be able to accomplish. And if she did where would she put him? His body was a flash fried blackened crispy critter moldering in the ground. There wasn't enough blood in the world to fix that body.
Still it was what Stefan wanted which meant she had to do try, which meant she had to practice so that when ultimately the spell failed and Damon was not brought back into the land of the living, it was not because she didn't know what she was doing.
She sat cross legged on the floor as she set things up. Ritually purified water, ink made from the right plants with the right minerals and blood added, and the daylight ring. She canted the spell softly at first, growing with fervor with each repetition until the water swirled wildly in the bowl, The ink spread across the surface creating a reflective sheen over the churning current.
Her eyes rolled back in her head and the vision appeared in the water. two people sitting quietly, quite literally at peace with themselves, each other, with their surroundings. Bringing him back was wrong, so horribly wrong. But she couldn't convince Stefan of that. He had seen the tableau earlier through different eyes. He'd seen fear and darkness. It was how he saw his brother in life and it reflected onto the water.
She reached out through the void between the two planes of existence knowing what it would do to her target. Their world was peace, her world was anything but. Her touch would be pain and regret and sorrow crashing down on Damon Salvatore. Things from which he'd been released. This part she didn't mind as much as she should.
TVD
There wasn't anything particularly special about James Cavanaugh. He wasn't the brightest bulb in the box, wasn't the most talented player on the soccer field. He just... was. He was average. Average intellect, average talents, average appearance. But he was trying to be more. James had dreams and he knew that to achieve those dreams of greatness, an average guy had to put in more than the average effort. You could say he had heart, and that was precisely what they were after.
He had taken up running to increase his endurance during the games. He had a set route and he timed himself at various stopping points. The traffic light at 24th and Alder, the movie theater where the girl of his dreams was doling out tickets in a glass cage. He hoped she'd notice him running every night and maybe say something the next day in the classes they had together. She never had. Finally at the soccer field where he always began and ended his run, to remind himself of his dreams, to remind himself why he was pushing himself so hard.
He didn't think anything strange about the men crossing the field. People cut through the various stadiums all the time. He looked up at them as they drew closer and frowned a little. They seemed to be making a beeline for him. He stood a little taller and watched them, not sure what to expect but he certainly didn't expect it to be anything he couldn't handle. This was Whitmore not UCLA after all.
"Can I help you?" Maybe they were lost.
One of the men raised a gun, and James back pedaled, nearly stumbling backward into the soccer nets.
"Whoa! Hang on fellas!" He exclaimed. No amount of running could outrun a bullet and he knew it. His mind was instantly looking for a way out, as well as trying to figure out who he'd pissed off enough to want to hurt him. His musings were cut short by the tranquilizer dart that struck his chest.
TVD
It had been a long time since Meredith had been at the University Hospital. It was entirely possible that they'd changed the passwords. Then again it was a hospital not a monument to national security. She logged onto the website and navigated her way through the screens to the doctor's log on screen.
She took a deep breath and logged in using her former id and password. Her eyes widened as she was let in, and she smiled. She skimmed through the pages at mostly innocuous things, then she went to patient records and her screen locked up at the same moment her phone rang causing her to jump in her seat, heart pounding in her chest.
"Hello?" She said answering it.
"Dr. Fell." Said an aristocratic voice. "what exactly is it you're looking for?"
Meredith's mouth went dry and it took a moment for her to pull herself together. "I want back in."
"I'm not sure you were ever actually ... in... as you put it. Close, I will admit, but never quite one of us."
"Alright... then I want in. All the way in." She said, straining to hear the response over the swooshing of her heart beat in her ears.
"My office, tomorrow morning 8am sharp. Do not be late, Dr. Fell. "
Meredith was certain she heard a silent threat in that admonition. "I'll be there." She said and drew in a deep shaky breath as the connection was broken. She listened to the dial tone for several seconds before hanging up and putting it down on the table herself. "ooh wow." She said, her voice trembling slightly.
She looked back at her computer and the Whitmore University Hospital web page had closed, and she had control of her computer again.
TVD
Claire frowned. She was distracted tonight. Someone was doing something they shouldn't and it was going to be a problem. The trouble was she didn't know any of the answers to the basic questions of who, what, when, where, or how.
She cancelled her last set for the night and apologized to the night manager claiming a headache that she didn't have. She went to the shop that rested in between the bar and the apartment and let herself in. "Lisa?" She called out, and received no answer.
She took off her jacket and tossed it to the sales counter as she walked past it and through the beaded curtain into the ritual chamber beyond. "Lis?" She called again, but there was nothing. Where was she? That was odd.
The candles lit around the room as she moved to the center and spread her arms wide. There was more than one kind of magic in the world. Spirit magic, Expression, Wicca, the more hermetic practices of groups such as the Golden Dawn. Through her life Claire had dabbled in more than one before settling on spirit magic with her own particular philosophy, pulling in fragments from the other things she'd learned. She was by nature a magical creature. Her people always had been.
She stepped into the middle of the circle drawn on the floor. She set her feet at shoulder width and spread her arms wide, head tilted back as she drew the energy to herself. She pulled it from the ground, from the air, from the creek that flowed through the town surrounding her, the candles flickered and dimmed briefly before their flames shot upward almost blindingly bright.
She felt a tug at the center of her brow, ajna, the third eye. Her physical eyes rolled back in her head as she let her consciousness wander seeking the darkness that called to her earlier.
The city sprawled out around her small specks of astral light flaring brightly, or dimly, but not what she sought. The specs of darkness were little more than angry little girls casting their rage into the wind and calling it will. This was not what had hit her between the eyes on stage. She drew more power and expanded her vision through the surrounding area, following the barest tendril of wispy darkness toward its destination. Delcrest. She might have known.
A college town was always filled with many more 'aware' people than the average town. She'd expected to see the spectrum of colors cast about in the ether by trained and untrained witches of all sorts. She expected and found pinpoints of the brightest white, and some so dark as to be the equivalent of magical black holes sucking the power and life force from those around them. What she did not expect was the beacon of iridescent black light shooting skyward.
She ventured closer, slowly, cautiously, stalking her prey. The closer her consciousness drew to the source, the more she could feel it pulling her, draining her. Her physical body collapsed into a heap on the floor, even though the candles still blazed brightly filling her with their energy, everything she could draw was in turn drawn from her.
"Claire!" Lisa rushed into the room and quickly doused the candles, and dispelled the energy as she pulled her friend and mentor from the circle. "Claire!"
The witch tried to push herself upright and collapsed onto the floor again.
"What happened?" Lisa asked, eyes wide.
Claire patted her hand. "I'm alright." She said weakly. "I need my phone... "
Lisa rushed out to the main storefront to get the phone from the leather jacket on the counter. She paused on the way back to grab a juice from the mini fridge and a pendant from an ornate box on a shelf at the back wall of the ritual room.
She handed her the phone first, knowing she'd do nothing else until she had it in her hand. While Claire dialed Alaric's number, Lisa slid the pendant around her neck and then opened the juice and put it in her free hand.
"I need your help." She said into the phone.
"On my way." Ric answered, not wasting time with questions.