Chapter thirty five

Avril couldn't sleep. She could hear Jeremy upstairs pacing his room. She felt for the boy. He didn't know whether to be angry or feel guilty about what had happened. He was young and thought he was in love with the girl. She turned on her computer and loaded up Skype. She needed to talk to Jessica, she needed to feel connected to something normal and real in her life. Nothing seemed real since her sister's death.

215 years she had spent with her sister. Even when they weren't together there was still a connection. It wasn't always a comfortable connection. The natural animosity between Necromancers and Witches made things difficult sometimes; especially when there was too much back lash from one or the other. They didn't have the sort of link they talk about in fantasy novels or science fiction movies. They couldn't read each other's minds, or sense each other's pain, but there had always been a sure and certain knowledge that the other one was there. Now that was gone.

Jessica was in the Pacific Time zone and was more than willing to talk to her lover long into the night, she could sleep later. They talked about Jessica's shop, and the neighbor's cat that kept digging in their flower beds and hunting the squirrels. She kept up the distraction for hours. Until finally… "I can come out there. You don't need to be out there alone after something like this," She said

"No. I don't want you anywhere near this, sweetheart. Alexandra and I can handle this, besides the woman that did it is locked up. I'll be safe." She said.

"It's not just your safety I worry about. " Jessica said quietly. "I want to be there for you."

"With any luck it will be done this weekend and I'll be home." She said. "Can you do me a favor? Alex sent me these pictures of a crypt and the symbology looks familiar. I have a few books there on funerary practices. Can I send you the pictures and have you check it out for me?"

"Sure. I can do that for you." Jessica said.

"Thank you." She said. "I really appreciate it." Avril forwarded the photos to Jessica. "I'll talk to you tomorrow. I'm going to go try and sleep." They exchanged 'I love you''s and Avril closed down her lap top before heading up stairs to the bed room she was borrowing.

Jeremy looked out the door as she walked down the hall. "I'm sorry." He said quietly, as she entered his aunts old room, not really intending her to hear.

Damon hadn't taken the car when he'd left. He'd gone on foot to Veritas, heedless of the rain that fell in near sheets. He knew the paths well. He'd traveled them his mortal life, short though it had been. The better part of 20 years spent running between the millhouse and his family's home; playing with Stefan, playing tag and much more adult games with the young ladies of the other founding families. Now he walked them without seeing, without feeling. The rich clay soil was slick under foot and he slipped, sliding down the hill before getting back to his feet and continuing on like a sailor drawn forward by sirens song.

He braced himself against trees, as he left the paths for the more direct route. He climbed over dead fall and brambles until he reached his destination. He entered the marble structure and then down the stairs to the crypt.

Damon pushed aside the lid to the sarcophagus and put the book inside next to the disk. "It's ready now, Mother," he said breathlessly, closing it once more. He blinked in exhaustion. "So tired." He muttered.

"Come on, stay awake." Alaric said aloud. "You can't sleep here, Damon. Come on. Wake up."

"Ric… ?"

"Yeah it's me. Come on. Let's go. Alexandra's waiting. She needs you. Let's get you home."

"Just need to rest a minute. " He said dropping to his knees.

"Let him go." Alaric yelled angrily. "He's your son. Let him go." He watched helplessly as Damon collapsed the rest of the way to the floor as his energy left his body. Alaric knelt down beside him. "Just hang on. I'll get help." He moved through space instantly, honing in on the white oak stake.

Alexandra was still sleeping on the floor in front of the fireplace, when Alaric appeared in her home. "Alex, wake up." He said and growled in frustration "Alex, wake up." He said loudly and the woman startled awake.

"What the hell?" She asked as she sat up, pulling the blanket up for modesty.

"We have to go. Damon's in trouble."

She got up and hurried to the bedroom to throw something on. "What kind of trouble?" Alex called out as she wriggled quickly into a pair of jeans.

"He's in the tomb and I think his mother is draining him dry."

The tee-shirt and slip on shoes were next and she was heading toward the door." How is that possible?" She grabbed keys and headed out into the storm running for the car. As soon as she had started it up Ric appeared at her side in the passenger's seat.

"I don't know." He said. "He took the book out and put it in the sarcophagus. Then he just collapsed."

"I've never heard of a ghost of a necromancer being able to do that." She said."They're powerful spirits but …. I don't know. None of this situation is making any sense."

"His mother was a necromancer?" Alaric asked.

"Sorry, found out today and I've been a little out of it." She said as she parked as far onto what used to be known as Veritas as possible. She hurried down the paths she had taken just a few days before. She could feel the presence as she entered the mausoleum. "Damon?" She called out, and got no response as she hurried down the stairs.

He laid on the floor, bent backwards, knees folded under him. His skin was pale, dark veins visible around the eyes spreading through his features. His eyes opened but she didn't think he was seeing anything around him.

"Damon… come on baby. Let's go home." She said easing her arm under his shoulders to bring him to a sitting position. "I can't carry you. You have to help me."

"Just need to rest." He said. His voice was almost too soft to hear.

"Damon, get up." She attempted to command him, and found that was blocked. "The ring. Damn it. Talk about bad timing, "She muttered. "Damon, take off the ring." This was one time she was less than pleased with the added protection her mother had put into it.

He shook his head.

"You take it off and give it to me or I swear to god I will break into that sarcophagus and do what I have to do." She said firmly.

He looked at her, anger in his eyes, but there was no strength behind it. He was fading quickly. He slowly removed the ring she had placed on his finger earlier that night and it slipped from his fingers.

Alex pocketed it, "Damon get up." She ordered and watched as he reluctantly, and with difficulty pulled himself up off of the floor to stand on rubbery legs. "We're going home now." She said pulling his arm over her shoulder and putting one around his waist. She struggled to get him up the stairs as he was one step away from becoming dead weight. The walk to the car was only marginally easier.

"We'll be home soon. You can rest then. I promise." She said buckling him in and closing the door. The windshield wipers weren't keeping up with the sheer volume of water that was falling from the skies. She was driving slowly on the dirt roads as the wheels of the car sunk several inches.

Damon drifted off into a troubled sleep his head pressed against the passenger's side window.

1854

Madelena Salvatore smiled at her son. "She's very pretty isn't she" she said and laughed softly as the 10 year old boy blushed. "It's alright. You can come closer. "

"Father says she's contagious and we should stay away." Damon said but stepped closer anyway to look at the girl on the bed. She was older than he was, just coming out of the fresh and glowing teen years and beginning to truly become a woman.

"No. You can't catch what she has." Madelena said holding her hand out to her son.

Damon came closer, not noticing as Stefan shadowed him through the door. "What's wrong with her?" He asked standing at his mother's side. "Who is she?"

"Sleeping beauty," Madelena said and laughed at the look her son gave her. "She's the daughter of an old friend of mine from before we came to America." She told him. "And she has been through a great deal. What she needs now is just to be at peace until she is ready to return to us."

Damon didn't think she looked as though she was sleeping.

"Did someone hurt her?" Stefan asked more curious about what had his brother's attention than the girl really. He didn't understand girls or why Damon liked them so much. At six, Stefan was much more interested in bugs.

"No." Madelena said, moving the younger boy away from the bed.

"Then why doesn't she wake up, cause Daddy said she was asleep when she got here and that's been days and days." Stefan said, willing to talk about anything if it got him his mother's attention.

Damon rolled his eyes. There were times he hated his brother. He didn't have anything that was his own anymore. Not even his mother.

"And Miss Victoria said that it's a sleeping sickness and people die of sleeping sickness. Is she going to die, Mama?"

Madelena sighed barely keeping the impatience from her voice. "No she isn't going to die, Stefan and it isn't sleeping sickness."

"I told you Victoria was stupid." Damon told his brother.

"Damon that's enough." Giuseppe said sharply, as he appeared at the door. "Take your brother outside."

"Yes father." He said tightly and grabbed Stefan by the arm. He pulled the younger boy out of the room. "Go down stairs. I'll meet you on the front porch."

"But Damon!"Stefan protested.

"Shhh! You're gonna get me in trouble. Go down stairs. I'll be there in a minute." He said glaring at his little brother.

Stefan sniffled but went down the stairs dutifully.

Damon crept back to the door, peering cautiously around the door frame.

"I don't like you bringing the boys in here with the body." Giuseppe said. "When are you sending these people on their way?"

Madelena adjusted the blanket over the girl. "When I have concluded my business." She said toying with a red stone.

"I thought we agreed you were through with that when we left Italy."

"There was no agreement, Giuseppe, there was merely you giving orders." She said quietly. "This is an arrangement from before I met you. "

He appeared to be placated even if unhappy. " Well… be quick about it and keep the boys out of it."

"I think you should leave the hospitality of our home to me, as well as my son."

"You would do well to remember you have two of them." He told her pointedly.

Madelena's features went from calm and dispassionate to cold and hard. "I remember very well that you have three. So I suggest you leave me be and tend to your own affairs, before I do."

Damon turned and darted for the stairs. He raced down and grabbed Stefan by the arm and dragged him out the door before his father caught sight of him.

Alexandra pulled out onto paved road after what seemed an eternity and gasped as the car hydroplaned on the thick layer of rain water. She stole a glance over at Damon and then turned her attention back to the road, still not able to drive as quickly as she would have liked. She needed to get him home quickly. He needed to feed to regain his strength and she was still taking vervain.

1856

The brothers stood at her bedside, no longer scuffling with each other, no longer competing for her attention. Instead they stood solemn and quiet. Damon stood with his arm around his younger brother, protectively. The dark looks the twelve year old was giving his father went unnoticed by anyone but the woman lying in the bed.

Madelena sighed and attempted to shoo her husband away. "The doctor says I am improving. I believe him. There have been enough long faces and silence. There will be time enough for that later." She told them. "Where are my smiling sons?" She asked.

Stefan broke free of his brother and pushed past their father to hug his mother with the exuberance that came of being eight. Exuberance and gullibility, Damon thought. His mother was better because Damon had been switching out her water dutifully. She was being poisoned and he had only two suspects in his mind; his father and the man's mistress Victoria. In either case the blame lay at his father's feet.

Damon went to the other side of the bed and sat down beside her, ignoring his father completely now. "I promised you, remember." He said smiling for her even if he didn't mean it.

"So you did." Madelena said with a weak smile. She lay her hand over his. "I can always depend on you."

Alexandra pulled onto Fell's Church Road and picked up a little speed. The canopy of ancient oaks that lined the road thinned the rain fall enough to make it possible. "We're almost there, Damon. We're almost home, " She said even though she knew he was asleep.

1857

"The boy knows." Victoria said in hushed tones. "There is something about him that scares me, Giuseppe."

"It's because he has his mother's eyes and you feel guilty." He told her firmly. "Once Madelena is done he will change. You will see."

"Why must it take so long?" She asked. "The woman is a monster. "

"You seem to be under the mistaken impression that I am doing this for you." Giuseppe Salvatore said. " I love my wife. I will always love my wife. I'm doing this because it's the only way to protect the boys from what she is. To stop her from turning them into what she is."

Damon was pressed against the wall just outside the door. Liar, he thought. You don't love her. You don't torture people you love. What his father was doing to her was torture. He was sickened as their conversation turned to Victoria's bastard son. His supposed brother. He left before he said something he'd have to pay for later and went to his mother's rooms. He didn't knock. He rarely did anymore because the days she was too weak to answer outnumbered the ones where she could in spite of his best intentions and hard work to keep her safe.

He found her seated by the window, staring out at the gardens below. "We have to leave here. We'll pack up Stefan and go." Damon said insistently. "I won't let him kill you."

"I will be fine no matter what he does," She said, calmly. "Preparations have been made and nothing he does will harm me for long. I need you to believe that."

"I heard him plotting with Victoria. She's already trying to pick your bones. I won't have it." Damon yelled. "We have to get you out of here before they actually succeed."

"Shhh," She said and took his hand pulling him around to sit on the ottoman. "Look at me." Madelena said. "You have to trust me, Damon. I cannot leave Mystic Falls. "

"Why not? It's just a town. There's nothing here we can't find somewhere else. I don't care about any of it. Not the town, not the plantation, not his money or anything else."

"I know. That's not why I'm staying. I can't explain it to you. Not yet. But one day you will understand and one day you will be able to make things right, I have faith in you."

Alexandra parked the car and was able to unclench for a moment. "Okay. " She said more to herself than to him "Let's get inside and sort this out." She said getting out and going to the passenger's side. "Damon, wake up." She said gently. "Let's get in the house and get cleaned up."

He opened his eyes. "Let me sleep." He said as she pulled him from the car. He groaned. "Sacha." But he didn't resist as she walked him toward the house. "Did you leave the door open?" He asked, as they went through it.

"I was in a hurry." She said, closing it behind them. They were all over mud, and she moved them into the bathroom, "Glad you're able to see the world around you again." Alexandra started the water running in the tub.

"I'm just tired. That's all." He said.

"What made you go out there in the middle of the night in this weather?" She asked, watching as his eyes seemed to clear a little.

"I was just… out. Let it go." He said running a hand through his hair and making a disgusted sound as it came back covered in mud and forest debris.

"No, I'm not going to let it go. What were you doing in your mother's crypt?" She knew why he was there. Alaric had told her everything.

"I went for a walk. I wasn't out there. I just… went … out." He said "I slipped in the mud and you're worrying over nothing." He looked at his hand again. "Where's my ring?" Damon asked, meaning the one he thought of almost as a wedding band.

"I have it." She told him.

He was confused and it showed. "I had to make you give it to me so that I could get you out of the crypt. You were being leeched dry." She told him.

"By what?" He frowned.

"Your mother's ghost." She told him and had to push him back to the seated position. The fact that he was weak enough for her to do so worried her.

"You're crazy. I wasn't anywhere near my mother." He said firmly.

"Is that honestly what you believe Damon?" She asked "Really? Because that's where I found you, collapsed on the floor. "

He shook his head. "No. I would … remember." He said frowning.

"You will not go back there." She said forcing her will on him. "Not until I say." She then gave him his ring back, and was relieved to see he put it back on his left hand.

"You're over reacting." He said. "Can ghosts really feed off of vampires?" He asked "It doesn't make sense."

"Maybe if she was as powerful as I suspect." She said "I've never thought to need protection against ghosts before. I've never heard anything about it happening to anyone else."

He nodded. "We're gonna talk about this when I'm more awake. You don't get to just command me like that." He said. "Not about something like that."

"Do you want me to let you go?" She asked.

"No." He said firmly.

"Then yeah, I do." She told him gently, ignoring the frustrated growl she got in return.

"We're covered in mud." He said changing the subject "I think we're a little over dressed for this to be because we were having fun."

"You're right. Why don't you get in the tub, I'll get you something to eat."