Chapter 24

Stefan ran out the motel room until he was in the secluded car park that only had one tenant – which was their vehicle. The car door was open but there was no sign of Caroline or Katherine.

"Caroline?!" Stefan shouted scanning the car park for life.

Caroline shot up from the ground and motioned Stefan over.

"Stefan, Katherine's hurt. I don't know what to do." Caroline glanced down at her blood soaked hands.

Stefan ran to her side and his stomach dropped at the all too familiar sight. Katherine's face and arms were covered in scratches and blood was pooling out from her mouth and ears. Katherine was barely conscious and Stefan could only ponder how she got to the motel in relatively one piece.

"We need to find a hospital right away. Help me put her in the backseat." Stefan grunted as he and Caroline lifted Katherine and placed her on the backseat of the car. Stefan hastily made his way to the driver's side and climbed in. Caroline followed suit and buckled herself up in the passenger seat. The engine roared into life.

"What's wrong with her?" Caroline asked as she glanced back towards Katherine.

"She's been tortured." Stefan answered simply as he pushed down on the accelerator as hard as he could. If he didn't act now – Katherine would die.

"Tortured? By what?" Caroline gasped.

"Witches. I've seen this happen before. She need's blood and fast." Stefan gritted his teeth in frustration as he swerved between cars.

"Blood bags. That's why we're going to the hospital?" She breathed out. The blood in the car was beginning to overwhelm her. Vampire blood wasn't as appealing as human blood but even now she could feel the hunger building in her and she soon realized that Stefan was most probably feeling more overwhelmed by the blood in the car.

"Stefan are you okay? With the blood?" She asked as she reached over and placed a hand on his knee.

"I'm trying not to breathe." He opened his mouth to speak and instantly the smell of warm blood attacked his senses.

Caroline nodded her head in understanding – they drove in silence until they came across a small town that had an equally small hospital.

"Wait here. I'm going to go get the blood bags. Try keep her head elevated and try stop as much of the blood flow as you can." Stefan climbed out the car after Caroline nodded her head in understanding.

Caroline climbed out the front and into the backseat and propped Katherine's head on to her knee. She wasn't fond of Katherine but Caroline could never be the kind to allow her to suffer even though she was sure Katherine had bought this upon herself.

Katherine opened her eyes warily still in a daze as she glanced up at the blonde. Her head felt heavy and she could feel her eyes opening and closing with discomfort.

"I'm sorry." Katherine breathed out before darkness over took her once more.

Caroline glanced down in shock at the brunette. Had Katherine apologized to her? However Caroline didn't have time to think about the apology because Stefan had returned with a heap of blood bags in his arm. He gave them all to Caroline before moving away from the car. He stood at a distance looking away from Caroline who was now busy ripping blood bags apart and feeding them to Katherine.

Caroline was relieved when Katherine's bleeding halted and the scratches around her face disappeared. Caroline sighed out wearily. The adrenalin that had been pulsing through her veins had disappeared and she was now left with the after shocks of the incident. Glancing around the car she noticed the strewn empty blood bags. She glanced out the window and noticed that Stefan was still standing in the same place and hadn't moved a muscle. He seemed just as shell shocked as she felt. Without wasting any more time Caroline began cleaning up the car and disposing the blood bags around the corner of the hospital.

Then as if she was on auto pilot she went into the hospital and retrieved some towels and a bucket of warm water to clean up Katherine and the blood in the car that she had messed when she had been transferring the blood from the bag into Katherine's mouth. It hadn't been an elegant task and luckily Caroline hadn't come across anyone because they surely would of fainted at the sight of her blood soaked shirt. Once she cleaned up Katherine, she took her bag out the car and proceeded to undress the doppelganger into a set of fresh clothes. Once she had done this she too changed and disposed of her clothes.

Caroline came to a stop beside Stefan and reached for his hand and grasped his hand tightly in his. Stefan shifted his head to the side to look at her form. She was looking up at him with concern swimming in her eyes. Of course she would be worried for him at a time like this.

"I'm sorry that I left you alone to deal with that." He nodded his head in the direction of the car before he continued;

"I just couldn't do it. The blood was overwhelming. But thank you for helping her."

Caroline smiled softly at him.

"Don't worry about it. I understand." She answered.

"How is she?" Stefan asked breathing deeply.

"The bleeding stopped and most of her wounds sealed up. Her breathing's also gone back to normal so I think she's okay. "Truthfully Caroline had no idea what state Katherine was in. She wasn't sure if the brunette was alright.

"I'm sure she will be fine. If her bleedings stopped then that's a good sign."

Caroline couldn't help it when an impulsive question escaped her mouth;

"You said you've seen this before?"

Stefan stiffened. Yes, he had seen these affects before but he wasn't sure if he should tell Caroline. After all the world wasn't shades of black and white , there were a lot of things that he didn't want to divulge her with but he sensed that if he didn't at least give the right answer she would suspect as much. Caroline wasn't stupid – she had good interrogation skills that she obviously picked up from Liz.

"Lexi warned me about witches when I was doing my stint as being the ripper. Witches can be good but they are capable of doing magic that has dire consequences. Bonnie knows this but sometimes witches can be pushed to the brink. Especially when their family is danger or if someone doesn't listen to them. Lexi brought me to a coven and showed me just how capable they were. They tortured vampires who had wronged them and many never survived the onslaught. It's all about balance and nature to them. They don't see anything wrong with using dark magic to get their way." Stefan sighed out deeply as he recalled that day when he witnessed the true power of witches. He learned his lesson that day and did well to avoid them as much as possible. Unlike Damon who enjoyed wooing witches to make them believe that he truly cared for them. Damon of course had no idea how stupid he was for doing that but then again Damon never learned.

"Wow. I always knew witches were powerful but I didn't know that they would use dark magic to get there way. Bonnie has always seemed scared of dark magic her grams always warned her not to channel to much magic or to delve into deeper studies of magic." Caroline spoke softly.

"Well the Bennet witches didn't believe in dark magic at all, quite a few covens have banned the practise completely but many have been tempted by the darkness. It's a human flaw to be drawn to darkness on occasion." Stefan answered.

Caroline shivered at the thought. What would happen if Bonnie turned evil all of a sudden just because it was for the so called greater good?

"I wonder who Katherine pissed off then." Caroline glanced back at the car where Katherine was.

Stefan shrugged his shoulders.

"Katherine never trusted witches. I know that for a fact. She must have had no choice in doing whatever she did or she was desperate enough to turn to them for help and not the good witches." Stefan pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration.

Caroline could see the questions in his green eyes. What had Katherine been up too?

"So what do we do now?" Caroline asked.

"I think its best that we carry on to Portland. Perhaps Katherine will wake up on the way there and she can fill us in on whose she's pissed off now." Stefan answered.

Caroline nodded her head but they both knew Katherine would not tell them a thing whether they liked it or not.