There was something comforting about the smell of beeswax. It reminded Damon of his father - his obsessive habit of polishing the antiques he collected. He felt a lot like his father as he sat at the dining table with a tin of beeswax, an old t-shirt, and a rosewood chess set.

He dipped a corner of the t-shirt in the wax and then started to polish the chess pieces. He had spent the morning rummaging through the hoard of clutter in the study, looking for photo albums, when he found the vintage chess set. It was still in good condition but in need of a polish.

His quest for photo albums ended in disappointment. Even his father who lived in the past, collecting everything from spyglasses to chess sets as a way to reconnect with a forgotten way of life, didn't have any photo albums.

Everything about the picture in Kai's pocket baffled him. There was a place name and a number scrawled on the back but the handwriting was unfamiliar - not Kai's and not Bonnie's.

At first glance the number had seemed like a date but 1994 was so long ago, and yet it made sense. Damon knew when he was looking at something from a former time. It was almost an instinctive feeling - one that he felt strongly when he looked at the picture. The image printed in colourful ink and preserved in glossy photo paper was antiquated. Just holding the picture made him feel like he had travelled back in time.

Then he remembered the image of Bonnie and Kai, and he knew the number couldn't be a date. Although they looked slightly younger in the picture, 1994 was over four generations ago. It had to be something else. A password or coordinates.

The number was a puzzle but the name 'Crescent Cove' was familiar. Damon remembered something he had learned in high school history. Not trusting his own memory, he gathered some of the outdated maps his father used to collect. Crescent Cove was the old name for Mist Haven. From what he could remember, the name had been changed after a widespread tragic event struck the area. It was meant as a kind of rebranding and somehow the small fishing town expanded into a dynamic metropolis. Although Mist Haven managed to shake its bad reputation, there were still reports of strange things happening there.

By the time Damon was finished polishing all the pieces, almost every part of the white t-shirt was dusted with a pale yellow colour from the beeswax.

Damon closed his eyes. It helped him pay attention to all the intricate sounds around him. He tried to untangle them all. To separate the wind, the hum of the refrigerator, and the static of the television from what he really wanted to hear. Kai's boots scuffing along the floor in the hallway. An abrupt quietness when the footsteps stopped. The rustle of material. A flitter in Kai's heartbeat. An exhalation of breath like a relieved sigh.

He had put Kai's coat back on the rack in the hallway, making sure to return the picture to the same inner pocket he had found it in.

Confronting Kai about the picture wasn't going to be effective. Kai would lie without hesitation. He didn't have the usual tells, so even someone with vampire senses wouldn't know when he was lying. It would take careful pokes and prods to get Kai to reveal anything.

Kai looked smaller in his human form as he drifted into the living room. The dark circles under his eyes were almost pitiable. Damon couldn't remember the last time he felt the effects of a lack of sleep. It was such a puny, human problem. There was only one thing he depended on for survival. As long as he had a fresh supply of blood, he had nothing to worry about.

Kai on the other hand looked as if he had an endless store of things to worry about. He slid into the chair opposite Damon, heaving a little like it required more effort than it should.

Damon went back to arranging the polished pieces on the chess board. "You look terrible."

Kai folded his arms on the table and slumped over it, saying something in a muffled groan.

Damon guessed it was probably some snarky comeback so he didn't bother asking Kai to repeat it. "Where were you last night?" The chiding older brother tone came to him naturally even after their time apart.

Kai lifted his head. "At a friend's." His annoyed expression made him look a lot like his teenage self. "Is that my chess set?"

"My chess set." Damon corrected. He remembered having that exact argument before. Dad bought it for me. No, he bought it for both of us.

"I'll play you for it."

Damon shook his head. It wasn't that he doubted he could win but that despite having the chess set since they were children, they had never played before. It was a precious antique, to be collected and displayed not actually played with.

"Come on. I'll go easy on you." Kai reached for one of the pieces.

Damon batted his hand away. "No."

Kai didn't goad him further, the way he might have done when they were teenagers. Maybe he had grown up in the last ten years. Damon finished arranging the pieces on the board, the rosewood figures glinting in the afternoon light. His fingers felt slick with a beeswax coating as he rubbed them together.

"Do you feed on Bonnie?" Kai asked it without much feeling, pausing to yawn before adding, "I've seen the fang marks."

Damon's eyes snapped from the chess set to his brother. He wiped his hands on the one clean patch of the t-shirt, nails digging into the material so hard he could hear the threads coming apart. If Kai had seen the fang marks, then he already knew the answer to his question. It was an explanation that he was really asking for.

Damon knew his thirst for blood was overpowering. It was so easy for him to lose control, but he was working to manage it. He couldn't always help the mood swings and angry outbursts that came with deprivation. When he told Bonnie it was his alcohol addiction that made him that way, he hadn't really been lying. He had just swapped one substance for another.

"I only take as much as I need. I would never hurt Bonnie." It was the truth but he knew Kai wouldn't understand. He had never needed blood in the same way. He didn't know the agonising ache that came from craving blood or the sweet satisfaction of finally getting it.

Kai turned the chess board so that the side lined with dark brown pieces was closer to him. "What were you doing in Doveport?" He tapped his finger against the table, waiting for Damon to make the first move.

Damon's fingers were still greasy with wax as he moved a cream-coloured piece. It was a simple move, no flash or risk. "What were you doing in Mist Haven?"

Kai was too focused on playing the game to answer.

Damon considered the move he made, then frowned. "Cheating already?" He put Kai's piece back to its original position. "Do you think I don't know about the fires?" He watched the board carefully, ready to correct any improper move that Kai made. "You sent me a postcard from Mist Haven and a week later there were people on TV talking about a crazed arsonist and witch hunts happening throughout the city."

Kai tapped his fingers against his chin. "An unfortunate coincidence."

"What were you doing in Mist Haven?" Damon asked again, taking a moment to look up from the board and see Kai's expression falter.

"What were you doing in Doveport?"

"I asked you first."

Kai's hand hovered over one of the dark brown pieces. "There was this ritual." He rubbed the polished round top of the piece. "My magic was starting to weaken and I needed another witch to perform the spell. The main idea was to draw on the natural energy of fire but it got out of hand." Kai's fingers lifted off the rounded piece in favour of moving another pointy-topped piece. "I kept trying to get it right but something always went wrong."

"You can't do that." Damon directed his gaze to the piece Kai was originally going to move. "If you touch it you have to move it."

"You made that up."

Damon was having trouble concentrating on the game and the conversation at the same time. "Whatever." He tried to match what Kai said to the reports of the witch hunts in Mist Haven. All those fires. All those witches. Somehow Kai had survived it all. "I'm not an expert when it comes to magic, but there's no way you could get your magic back from the energy in fire. That doesn't make sense." He replaced one of Kai's dark brown pieces with his own cream-coloured one. "Unless you were trying to take those other witches' magic."

The move left his own piece unguarded and Kai swiped it off the board. "What were you doing in Doveport? What was so important that you had to lie and leave your family?"

Damon wasn't going to answer, but the words poured out of him without much thought. "My mother lives in Doveport. She moved there about a year after you left. I visit her sometimes." He realised that Kai hadn't asked about Lilly at all. Maybe he really didn't care but he was also the only other person who knew her, who Damon could talk to about her. "She's older now, not as strong as she used to be. There were rumours of vampire hunters moving through Doveport and I wanted to make sure she was okay."

"Which group of vampire hunters? There are so many different ones." It was still Damon's move, but Kai was watching the board with a thoughtful expression as if he were forming a complicated strategy. "I heard rumours about this one group that employs werewolves and they take out entire families of vampires. I don't know if that thing about werewolf bites is true but I bet there are a few werewolves who wouldn't mind ripping me apart with their teeth."

Damon listened as Kai went on about the different methods of killing vampires, but then he was distracted by the drop of black liquid that trickled from Kai's nose.

Damon pointed to his nose. Kai stopped talking and mirrored the action. He didn't seem surprised by the dark liquid on his fingertip. When he was younger he used to have nosebleeds after performing a lot of magic. Damon wouldn't have found it that unusual, except Kai's blood was black like a drop of melted coal.

The fierce tang of blood in the air was hard to ignore. Damon stood up, groaning as his fangs poked his bottom lip. It didn't make a difference how hard he tried to control the urge. His body was driven by something stronger, something primal and consuming. Even though Kai's blood was unusually dark, the smell was still as inviting as ever.

"Seriously?" Kai gestured to his face and the dark blood slowly dripping from his nose onto his lips. "Is this appetising to you?"

Damon snapped out of his wild reverie. He turned the t-shirt inside out, remembering that Kai hated the smell of beeswax, before sliding it across the table. Without his vampire senses, Kai would probably be unbothered by the subtle scent anyway.

Kai cleaned the blood on his finger and then dabbed at his nose.

Damon licked his lips, relieved to feel that his fangs weren't there anymore. "What's going on with you?"

Kai seemed completely relaxed. "Nothing. It's just a little blood."

Even just hearing the word sent a chill through Damon, that excited shiver he got just before he fed. "I have to be at Micah's school to help set up for the play." There were still a few hours before he had to be at the school, but he couldn't stay there when all he could think about was pressing the t-shirt to his mouth and sucking out the few drops of dark blood.

"But we haven't finished the game." Kai threw a pointed look at the chess set. "I was about to win."

"We'll finish later." Before he left, Damon glanced at the board. He hadn't realised it while they were playing, but a lot of Kai's dark brown pieces had made their way across the board and were dangerously close to his side.

x

Kai weaved through the teeming auditorium, swivelling and twisting to avoid bumping into people. He was determined to find Jo but the multitude of parents and other relatives that had gathered to watch Stone Soup made his task that much harder. The lights dimmed, casting a blanket of darkness over everyone. The chatter that had filled the room dulled to hushed whispering as people started taking their seats. It was harder to recognise Jo with only the flickering stage lights for illumination. His only other option would be to approach any woman with dark hair and pale skin and hope that one of them would happen to be Jo. Deciding he wasn't that desperate yet, Kai found his way back to Damon and Bonnie. The aisle seat was open and he settled into it, almost touched that Damon remembered which seat he preferred.

A buzz of anticipation rippled through the crowd as the stage curtains drew back. Children dressed in vegetable costumes flooded the stage. At the first note of upbeat piano music, Kai buried his head in his hands to stifle a groan. He kicked his legs up, resting his feet on the back of the seat in front of him. He felt Damon shifting next to him, leaning forward in his seat, probably trying to decipher which carrot was Micah.

Kai turned his head to the side. Without Damon in between them, he had a clear view of Bonnie. The combined laughter of the audience filled the air. Something funny must have happened onstage but Kai wasn't paying attention to the play. Bonnie threw her head back when she laughed, unselfconscious and effortless, her shoulders trembling as the sound moved through her. Kai couldn't help smiling at the display of contagious joy. Feeling his eyes on her, Bonnie stilled and turned her head towards Kai. He felt a prickle of shame as if he had glimpsed an intimate scene while looking through a stranger's window.

Kai tried to look away, but he wasn't quick enough. Their eyes met and everything - the play unfolding onstage, the enraptured crowd of people around them, Damon in between them - melted away.

He twisted uncomfortably in his seat and his leg jerked, kicking the seat in front of him.

The man sitting in front of him tilted his head back. "Hey, buddy. Do you mind?"

Kai could only see half of his face but he had greying brown hair and the voice of a stern professor.

Kai flashed the biggest smile he could manage. He lifted his foot, preparing to kick the seat again.

"Knock it off." Damon swatted Kai's thigh with his programme booklet.

The man turned back around. Kai planted his feet on the floor, his boots landing with a thud loud enough to be heard over the synchronised singing onstage.

The woman sitting next to the brown-haired man turned to look at Kai over her shoulder. Her black hair fell around her ghostly pale face in sheets. Her blue eyes looked almost white with the stage lights reflecting on them.

Kai rose up on the edge of his seat when he recognised her.

Jo turned her attention back to the stage. She faced forward for the rest of the play, but her posture was tense like she was trying too hard not to look anywhere else.

Kai tried focusing on the play but his mind was elsewhere. As he watched the children linking hands and dancing around in a circle, he thought about what he wanted to say to Jo and his fingers closed around the matching pendants in his coat pocket.

After Damon left in the middle of their chess game, Kai had the opportunity to take the pink-stoned necklace from Bonnie's jewellery box. It was identical to the one he got from Jo's shop except for the colour of the chain - Bonnie's was gold and Jo's was silver. They had to be connected in some way.

Kai's mind snapped back to the play in time to catch a few lines of dialogue before all the vegetable characters drifted off the stage. The audience applauded but Kai was familiar enough with the story to know that it wasn't the end, just an intermission.

Light flooded the auditorium. Kai blinked, adjusting to the brightness.

"We're going to get snacks. Do you want anything?" Damon squeezed past him to get to the aisle.

"No." Although having something to eat would make watching the play more enjoyable, Kai couldn't think about food. He tucked his legs closer to himself to let Bonnie through. She shuffled past, her back turned to him, thighs brushing his knees.

In front of him, the brown-haired man stood up and followed the crowd that was moving towards the back of the auditorium.

Clenching the pendants in his fist, Kai stood up and slid into the seat next to Jo.

"What do you want, Kai?" Her expression didn't give away any particular emotion.

"Can we talk?"

"Isn't that what we're doing now?"

Kai opened his fist to reveal the necklaces in his hand. He separated the gold and silver chains, holding one in each palm. "We need to talk about this."

Jo's eyes narrowed disbelievingly. She reached for the gold necklace. "Okay. When the second part starts, I'll tell Alaric I need to get some fresh air and I'll meet you outside." Her fingers skimmed the coiled chain and then the round pendant.

Kai nodded in agreement as he put the necklaces back in his coat pocket. Jo made a small noise, almost like a gasp, when he put the necklaces away. Her hand still lingered where his open palm with the necklace had been. Collecting herself, she let her hand drop to her side and mirrored his nod.

Kai was back in his seat before Bonnie and Damon returned. He tucked his knees in so they could get to their seats. They shuffled past carefully, balancing buckets of popcorn and cups of steaming liquid. From the smell Kai could tell it was the grainy flavour-less kind of coffee that was always served at school events.

The lights dimmed again and empty seats were filled with people. Kai leaned closer to Damon and muttered an excuse about needing to get some fresh air. Then he stood up, moving towards the doors at the back, until he was outside. As he closed the door behind him, the warmth from the auditorium was extinguished like a candle being snuffed out.

Kai pulled the collar of his coat up. The ground was wet with puddles and the muddy smell seemed to hover in the air. It must have rained earlier. He couldn't help pacing back and forth, hands stuffed into his pockets. His breath curled in the cold night air with every exhale and he grew fascinated with watching the wisps form and fade.

The childish affectation entertained him for a short while but his patience started to wear thin. Maybe Jo had changed her mind.

Kai was about to reach for the door when it swung open, carrying the sound of piano music and children's singing with it.

The sound dulled as Jo closed the door behind her.

She managed the manoeuvre quite gracefully despite the strain of having to balance two coffee cups in one hand.

When she held one of the cups out to him, Kai stared at it blankly. He hadn't been expecting the kind gesture but as his hand closed around the warm cup after a delayed moment, he was grateful.

Jo blew on her coffee before taking a sip. "Can I see the necklace?"

Kai reached into his pocket for the necklaces. They were tangled together in a bunch as he pulled them out. He stepped closer to Jo, trying to separate the chains. The cup in his other hand wobbled and some of the hot liquid splashed onto his boots.

Jo moved forward to help him. She untangled the chains, taking the gold necklace from him and peering at it closely.

"So you recognise it?"

A sad smile formed on Jo's face. "It was Michelle's." She looked up from the necklace resting in her palm. "My sister's."

Kai remembered their conversation at the Mystic Grill. Even the suggestion of them being related somehow had seemed to repulse Jo. He wasn't sure what to say next, hesitant to broach the topic.

"You really are her kid." The prickly attitude she always seemed to have with him softened. "I couldn't believe it at first, but you opened her dictionary and you have her necklace." Her words were strung together excitedly. "Just looking at you now it seems so obvious."

Kai glanced at his reflection in a muddy puddle, wondering if he looked like his mother. He didn't ask about it. He had to focus on getting information that would actually be useful. "Do you think she could have put her magic in her necklace?"

"Maybe." Jo's eyebrows lifted, as if she hadn't really considered that possibility before. "I can't imagine why she would want to give her magic up."

"Why did you?"

"Magic always felt like a curse to me, but Michelle thought it was a gift. She was going to take over as coven leader, since she was the firstborn. She had been raised for it since birth but our coven is traditional and Michelle was always a little more…free-spirited." Jo fidgeted with the necklace while she talked, twirling the gold chain around her fingers. "One day she decided she didn't want to be a part of the coven anymore. She said she was moving back to Mystic Falls. We lived here originally but our coven is based in Mist Haven." At least that explained why Jo didn't have Cassandra's accent. "I always hoped that someday we would reconnect again." There was a question in what she said.

Kai felt something crack inside him. The way he had sought Jo out with such eager interest and then showing her the necklace must have given her the wrong idea. She thought she would finally have a chance to reunite with her sister.

He didn't have any particular feelings towards his mother since he hadn't known her, and he couldn't help the offhand tone. "She died when I was a baby."

Jo stumbled backwards. Her hand with the necklace was outstretched behind her like she was feeling for a chair or a wall or something to brace herself against. There was nothing to support her and it seemed like she might fall over, but her coffee cup clattered to the ground instead. She squeezed her eyes closed, clutching the necklace to her chest.

Kai moved closer to her, stepping through puddles of rainwater and the pool of coffee. If he weren't holding the silver necklace and coffee cup in his hands, he might have reached out to offer some kind of comfort. He couldn't mourn for someone he hadn't known but he felt a pang of grief when he looked at Jo. She was all he had. She was the only connection to his mother, to his witch side.

With a shaky exhale, she opened her eyes again and pushed the necklace into Kai's hand like its touch burned her.

Then she regained her composure. "What about your father?" Her eyes were glassy despite her furious blinking to try and clear them.

Kai took a step back, turning away from her. The coffee cup was cold in his hand. He took a few big gulps of the grainy coffee, needing something to wet his dry mouth. He wouldn't talk about his father. He wouldn't think about him. He let his thoughts drift in another direction, away from his past and towards his newly-discovered family.

The bitter taste still lingered in his mouth when he spoke. "Why didn't you take over as coven leader?"

Jo made a mumbled sound. Kai didn't look over his shoulder, but he could tell that his question unsettled her. "I tried, but I wasn't raised for it the way Michelle was. I didn't know what I was doing and our collective power grew weaker. Without a leader, there was a lot of fighting amongst us and the coven kind of broke apart. Over the years other members tried to lead the coven but even the strongest failed." Her voice lowered to a whisper. "I think I know why." She paused for a long moment and Kai whipped around to face her when she spoke again. "We already had a rightful leader. You're Michelle's heir."

The realisation was immediate. Kai knew exactly what she was suggesting. Belonging to a coven was something he had dreamt of since he was a child. The idea should have made him happy but a mixture of emotions swelled inside him, caught between a dream and a nightmare.

"I can't lead a coven." Kai ran his thumb along his lip, remembering the taste of his own poisoned blood. "I don't even have magic and I'm half vampire."

Jo's hopeful expression drooped, confusion clouding her features. Her mouth formed a circle as if preparing to ask a question but the words wouldn't form.

Kai, being familiar with his affliction, sometimes forgot how unusual it was. He found himself telling her everything: the prophecy, his magical sickness, Bonnie and her siphoning abilities, their doppelgängers, the plan to get his magic back.

He talked quickly, the words tumbling out of his mouth. The second part of the play wasn't long enough for him to get through all the details and he knew he was leaving things out. Jo didn't interrupt or seem fazed by anything he said.

He finished by running through his conversation with Morgan and her idea of where Gina and Rhys were.

Jo folded her arms across her chest, taut with resolution. Her cheeks were flushed a rosy pink. "Mist Haven is a big place. You're going to need someone who knows the ins and outs."

Kai had almost forgotten about the necklaces in his hand. He squeezed his fist around them before putting them in his coat pocket. "You're going to help me?"

There was that sad smile again. "Yes." Jo was looking at him but he knew she was seeing something else - someone else.