Deathly Love
DG32173

Sarah: I do so hope you enjoy. This was supposed to come out in October 2014 for Halloween but a variety of personal reasons have delayed the posting of this first chapter.

CREDIT
Credit goes to my former beta for his help coming up with the plotline. Thanks, Cameron. Credit goes to my current beta for helping me make my writing the best it can be. Thanks, crzykittyfangirl.

DISCLAIMER
Unless I put a credit section like the above giving credit to whoever gave me the idea or claiming ownership of a concept, you can be assured that it is most likely copyrighted to someone with a bigger bank account than mine.

WARNINGS
ALTERNATE UNIVERSE! Rated M for more than just my sanity. Alternating viewpoints between Damon and Elena. Starts with Damon.

SUMMARY
When Elena, a medium who has trouble telling the living from the dead, moves to Mystic Falls, she is less than pleased to find her new house is haunted by the previous owner, a ghostly vampire whose ego matches his looks. What will happen when she finds herself falling for this mysterious ghost? And how far will she go to finally be with him? Damon/Elena

Chapter 1
Medium Meets Ghost

You know, I always thought I'd go out with a bang, or at least with a bit of flair. I never thought I'd meet Death on a complete fluke. Because that is sure as hell how it happened and I am still pissed about it.

I was drunk and fighting with my brother. Nothing unusual there. I don't know what happened to cause me to lose my balance on the stairs but the next thing I knew I was falling backwards. I remember the sound of wood breaking and feeling something pierce through my leather jacket into my back. No harm done, though. I would have gotten it out when I landed. Fate had other plans. I landed on the first floor, landing on that something in my back. It shoved deeper into me, piercing my heart. And it proved to be made of wood. And wood of course, is fatal to vampires which I had been since the 1800s.

Now I'm a ghost, stuck haunting the home I built for my brother and myself. It's been about forty years since I died and today the ownership of the Salvatore Boarding House is changing hands. Apparently my brother can no longer tolerate keeping the deed of a property that was home to us far longer than the home we were born in.

I watch him as he paces back and forth, glancing at his watch every so often. Apparently the new owner of both the boarding house and my car – thanks ever so much, brother – is late. That or Stefan's impatient. Could be both.

It took twenty-three years, five months, three weeks, two days, twelve hours, thirty-seven minutes, and forty-five seconds for me to give up trying to communicate with my brother. Strange how now that I'm truly dead I have a better grasp of time than when I was merely undead.

I frown when I hear bicycle wheels turn on the long drive from the road to the boarding house. None of my senses have lessened in the transition from vampire to ghost. And unfortunately, I am completely unable to step a ghostly toe outside of the boarding house. Oh, I can probably go for a ride in my car with the new owner, but that's probably the furthest I can get.

A firm knock comes at the door soon after. Stefan surges to the door to open it. I stand beside him, crossing my arms as I examine the girl. "Sorry I'm late," the young beauty says. "I got all turned around and had to ask for directions from the mailman of all people."

"It's quite alright," Stefan assures her. "Please, come in," he continues, stepping back and holding the door for her.

I'm crowding the opening, examining her minutely. She frowns thoughtfully at me. "I thought you said that you live alone," she tells my brother.

"I do," Stefan says, frowning.

"Oh-ho! So you can actually see me?" I gloat. Things are actually looking up.

Chagrin covers her features. She whirls on Stefan. "I thought I made it perfectly clear I wasn't interested in haunted houses," she says.

"What are you talking about?" he asks.

"Look, I don't know if you're a believer in spirits or not, nor do I care. I'm a medium," the girl says. "There happens to be a blue-eyed guy standing right there," she says, pointing at me. "And since you obviously can't see him, that means he's a ghost. I'd really rather not move from one haunted house to another."

Stefan looks bewildered. "What did you say he looks like?" he asks uneasily.

The girl groans before turning on me. I wink at her as she examines me. "He stands about five foot nine, has short black hair and ice blue eyes. And he's very flirtatious."

"Tell my brother I said 'hi'," I tell her.

"He refers to you as his brother and says to tell you hi," she says, turning back to Stefan.

Stefan's staring in my general direction, general seeing as he can't see me. "Damon?" he breathes. He shakes his head. "No, that's not possible," he says. "There's no such thing as ghosts."

"I envy you for your ability to disbelieve," she says sincerely. She sighs. "Well, I'm not going to argue my case. And, seeing as I just finished signing over my old place and I've already paid for this place and that Camaro you told me about, I might as well sign the deeds. But first I want to lay eyes on that car. If there's not really a 1969 Chevy Camaro convertible in the deal, I'm demanding an immediate refund."

"Oh, it's there, sweetheart," I assure her. "It was mine."

She pretends to ignore me but the way she clenches her jaw tells me she's not happy about it. "Well?" she asks my brother.

"The Camaro is in the garage," he assures her. "Right this way."

I fall into step next to her as she follows my brother. "Do tell me I'm not imagining this," I beg of her. "You really do see me, right?"

She gives a very slight nod but doesn't answer. Stefan opens the door leading into the garage and flicks on the light. He motions to the tarp covering my car. The young woman purses her lips but walks forward and carefully peels back the tarp to reveal my pride and joy. Her eyes light up in wonder and a broad smile lights up her face. "She's beautiful," she breathes, delicately stroking the hood. "Okay, I'm sold on the car. Might as well get the house, even if it does come with a ghost."

"Gee, thanks, so nice to feel wanted," I say sarcastically.

"Here are the deeds," Stefan says, stepping forward with the papers. "You just need to sign them and the house and the car will belong to you."

The girl pulls a pen out of her purse and signs her name on the deeds for both the house and my car. "Okay," she says. "Anything else?"

"That should be everything. Everything in the house is now yours, including the Camaro," Stefan says. "Are you going to be needing help transferring your belongings here?"

"Nah, just got a knapsack and my bike," she says, waving her hand. "Both are out front."

"That's all?" Stefan asks, frowning.

"I tend not to put much emphasis on material belongings, except my laptop," she says. "I'm going to get my knapsack and bring my bike in here. C'mon, I'll walk you out."

I follow behind as the girl walks Stefan out. I try to walk out of the house but yet again run into the barrier that has me stuck in here. So I can only watch from the door as my new housemate grabs her twelve-speed mountain bike from the yard and raises the kickstand. Stefan doesn't bother making small talk. He just climbs into his Porsche and leaves.

"Hey, hey, hey! What do you think you're doing?" I demand of the girl as she starts bringing her bike inside.

"I'm bringing my bike into my new house," she replies.

"Do you realize how much this hardwood cost me?"

"Why do you care? You're dead," she snaps.

I'm beyond surprised when she manages to actually shove me aside so she can bring her bike in. "Okay, you just touched me," I say. "Everyone else just walks through me. What is going on here?"

She shuts the front door and locks it. She then unhitches her knapsack from behind the seat on her bike. "It's my special brand of being a medium," she mutters. "I can interact with ghosts as if they were still in the life-state they were in at the time of death. As such, I often find it very difficult to tell the difference between the living and the dead. At least until I start getting odd looks from the living and the dead start acting overjoyed at finally being seen again." She turns to me. "I saw how you couldn't pass over the threshold to leave this place. That can be because of numerous reasons. My guess, though, is that not only was this the only place you've ever felt at home, but you also met your death here."

"And how do you know that?" I ask. "And since we're going to be roomies now, mind telling me your name?"

"My name is Elena Gilbert," she says, shouldering her knapsack and making her way towards the stairs. "I've been seeing and interacting with ghosts from infancy. According to my mom, I had ghosts for nannies and babysitters. I even had a ghost dog. Mom made me help him move on after a couple of months, though. I guess she wasn't very happy to find her slippers chewed up by what was obviously a dog when we technically didn't own a dog."

"Move on?" I ask, following her up the stairs.

"After you die, you're given various options. Most of the time, it requires a medium to help a ghost know what options are available to them and achieve the best option. Skylark wasn't very happy about leaving me. From what I could understand, his master hadn't moved on yet. Even now, he keeps coming back from time to time and I keep having to sending him to the light again." She stops at the landing and turns to me. "Where's the best bedroom?" she asks.

"That would be my old room," I reply. I dodge around her and lead her down my wing. "And did you say the ghost dog that keeps coming back to you is named Skylark?"

"Lemme guess, you had a dog named Skylark," she asks from behind me.

I stop outside the doors to my room. "Actually, I did. I was very young when I had him. He was killed by wolves shortly after Stefan was born," I reply. "And right through that door is the master bedroom suite."

She opens the door and steps in. She wrinkles her nose. "Does your brother never dust?" she demands.

"Not much," I admit, following her in. "And he hasn't been in here since just after my death."

"Can you remember much about your death?" she asks curiously, setting her knapsack down just inside the door. She proceeds to start stripping the furnishings of their protective blankets.

"Why do you ask?" I ask.

She shrugs. "Not many ghosts can remember their deaths, particularly if it was sudden or traumatic," she says, carefully pulling the blanket off the mirror.

"Well, my death was sudden and I remember most of it," I reply.

"Most?" she asks, turning to me.

"I was fighting with my brother, like we always did. I know that I fell and broke through the banister on the stairwell. A bit of wood from the railing pierced through my jacket into my heart. What I don't remember is how I started that fall," I tell her.

"Could your brother have pushed you?" she asks.

I glare at her. "What are you suggesting?" I demand icily.

"In my experience, when guys fight, they tend to push and shove. I'm not saying he would have intentionally caused your death. My guess is that you two were fighting, shoving each other around, and you lost your balance after he pushed you."

"Not possible," I refute.

She sighs. "Anyone can lose their balance. I'm a medium. Humans and animals aren't the only ghosts I've worked with. Vampires, witches, werewolves, even other kinds of supernatural entities that have died. There's always a chance for that complete fluke that ends everything," she says, pulling the sheet off the bed. "You have a nice room, Damon."

"I wouldn't visit Stefan's room if I were you. I wasn't really paying attention enough to see if he had taken all his stuff before signing the place over," I tell her.

She shrugs. "He said something about having to pick up some stuff at a future date," she replies. She goes over to her knapsack and opens it. After rifling through her clothes, she pulls out a small laptop and a charging cord. "Now, if you don't mind, I have some research I have to do for my next book," she says. She plugs in the charging cord behind the nightstand, attaches it to her laptop, and sits on my bed.

"Your next book?" I ask dubiously.

"I'm a writer," she says, flipping open her laptop and powering it up. "I've got a few books published, which is how I was able to afford this place."

"And what do you write?" I ask.

"Primarily paranormal romance," she says. "But I'm doing a bit of research for this next one."

"Paranormal romance?" I ask sceptically. "You're a medium and you write about ghosts?"

"So long as my publishers and readers think it's all make-believe, all's good. I've got copies of my three previous books in my knapsack, if you want to read them."

I walk over and dig out the three books she was talking about. "So what are they about?"

"They're part of an ongoing series about a young medium that has the same god-awful luck as me and usually can't tell the dead from the living. In the first three books, she had three different boyfriends because each time her ability to mingle with the dead was found out, she was quite cruelly dumped for a more 'normal' girl. Interestingly enough, Ella Jane, my heroine, has a life quite similar to mine. I'm trying to start work on the fourth book but I'm having a good deal of trouble with inspiration."

"You have three ex's?" I ask.

"One," she corrects. "To be fair, he tried to deal with the whole ghost thing. But Skylark does not like him. After the third attack by a ghost dog, Matt gave up. To be fair to Skylark, the poor ghost dog doesn't like any guy trying to flirt with me. And if it's not Skylark running the guys off, it's my very odd tendency to talk to people no one else sees that makes them back off. If it weren't for my looks, I'd have been cast in among the loser crowd in school."

"Being a medium must be harsh," I comment, leafing through the first book.

"It does have its perks, though," she admits with a wry grin. "Such as the time some serial rapist targeted me. By the time Skylark got through with him, he was clutching the arm of some poor policewoman babbling about every sin he'd committed since birth and begging her to save him from me. The poor cop arrested him but told me that he's probably going to some insane asylum rather than jail. I kept my mouth shut."

"When was the last time you saw Skylark?" I ask curiously.

"After the last time Skylark made his way back to this plane of existence, which was three years ago, I chose to let him stay where he was happiest. I mean, it's not like I have to pick up after him or feed him or anything. He comes and goes when he chooses. Last I saw him was two days ago when he ran off some guy that wouldn't get the hint that I wasn't interested," she says, shrugging. "He always returns, usually in time to save me from some threat or other. I'm not really worried. He's a ghost, after all. If it's bad enough to take out a ghost, I don't want to face it. He never really leaves me alone for more than a few days at a time anyways. I think he's trying to locate his master when he's out and about."

As she talks, she's typing away at the keyboard on her laptop. I peer over her shoulder to see what she's doing. "Is that a forum for real mediums?" I ask, frowning.

"Most of the members are just fans or con artists but there are a few who, like me, are the real deal. We try to keep the fact that we really do see ghosts under wraps. You will not believe how many times I've been asked to perform a séance once it became known that I can see ghosts," she replies.

"Have you?" I ask.

"Have I what?" she asks.

"Don't play stupid. Have you ever performed a séance?" I ask.

"I prefer to let the ghosts come to me on their own rather than summoning them. Sometimes a séance will call more than the participants had bargained for and it's never easy to convince the less-than-friendly arrivals to vacate. Not to mention that sometimes when I touch a ghost, the living people around me can see a translucent form of that ghost. That particular ability is as random as it is annoying. A witch once told me that I might be able to pull a ghost from death to life if I mastered my powers and the conditions were right."

"What do you mean by 'if the conditions were right'?" I ask.

"Well, for one, the ghost would have to have met their final death prematurely. For another, I'd have to have something that once belonged to the ghost and there would have to still be a strong bond between the ghost and that possession. And there are a bunch of other details I don't feel like getting into because I have never had a strong enough reason to tap into the full force of my powers. And I've never met a ghost who I felt was worth risking the side-effects of such a feat."

"How do you meet death prematurely?" I ask. "And what are these side-effects?"

"Basically, everyone has a day they are set to die. But sometimes a complete fluke makes them die before their time," she replies. "Once I've discovered I'm conversing with a ghost, I have always been able to tell if their death was premature or not. There aren't very many ghosts out there who've suffered a premature death. Fewer still have even considered trying to come back to life. As for the side-effects of bringing a ghost to life … well, they're not pretty. On a different note, however, I might be able to extend the range of where you can go so you can at least get out of this dreary old house. It must suck having been trapped in here for years on years."

"You can bet on it," I agree. "How far do you think you can extend my range?"

"I might be able to get you full access of the entire property. But I'm not sure. And you can leave the property entirely via the Camaro but you can't get very far from the Camaro once you're off this property."

"And why are you helping me?" I ask. Surely she must have some agenda behind all this.

"You're a ghost, I'm a medium. Helping ghosts is what I was born to do," she replies. "Besides, I figure that if I can extend your range so you can go outside, you might actually spend time out there after all these years cooped up in here. And I can work on my book without a ghost hovering over me day and night."

"Aww, and here I was hoping you liked me," I tease.

"I don't even know you," she points out.

"And you'll have plenty of time to get to know me," I point out. "Ever had sex with a ghost?"

"Nope, and I'm not about to start," she says firmly.

"Aw, c'mon, surely you've wondered what it was like," I wheedle. "Is it because I'm a ghost?"

"Look, even if you were still among the ranks of the living, you'd still get 'no' for an answer. I'm not looking to change my status as a virgin any time soon. Particularly not with some flirtatious ghost who's just looking to get laid for the first time since he died."

I roll my eyes but I'm not about to push the subject and risk having her refuse to try to extend the range of where I can go. "So, about extending my range?" I ask.

She puts her laptop to the side and goes to her knapsack. After digging to the very bottom of it, she pulls out a collection of five white candles that look like they've been used many times before and are almost spent, a red candle that looks like it's barely been used, a box of chalk, and a matchbook. I take that to mean she will try to extend my range so I can go outside.

She goes to the relatively clear area in front of the fireplace and sets candles and matchbook to the side before marking down what looks like a witch's pentagram with white chalk. Once that's done, she places a white candle at each point where the star meets the circle and lights them. Then she carefully makes her way to the center of the pentagram with the red candle, which she had also lit before shaking out the match. she stands in the very center of the pentagram, the red candle in her hand. "Okay, Damon, come stand before me and place your right hand over mine holding the candle," she says.

I raise an eyebrow but obey. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were about to cast a witch's spell," I remark.

"Mediums are just another, much rarer form of witch, to be honest," she replies, surprising me. "We just deal with ghosts on an almost daily basis while regular witches will be lucky if they deal with ghosts or even the spirits even once in their lifetime. Most witches go their entire lives without dealing with those who have gone before us. Mediums are trained very differently from normal witches, given knowledge and access to magic normally forbidden of mortals. And we are always trained by a spirit rather than a mortal witch. Like the spell I'm about to do. It's normally forbidden of mortals. But as a medium, I am required to help any ghost I come across to the best of my abilities. And this spell will help you, which is why I was taught it. Now close your eyes and concentrate on being able to leave this big house and go outside, which should be your greatest desire right now."

I close my eyes and try to concentrate on what she asked of me while she casts the spell. But, strangely, the only thing I can concentrate on is her, on the desire that has been within me since I first saw her to be with her forever, no matter where she is. No matter how hard I try to drag my concentration to the task she had given me, I can't drag my mind off this other, even greater desire that burns within me.

Suddenly, as I sense the spell nearing completion, I feel an almost imperceptible shift within me and I realize by her stumbling over her words she feels the same shift. I feel a deep-rooted sense of dread over what I fear my inability to get my mind off this strange new desire had done to us. But we both know once a witch starts casting a spell, she must finish it, no matter what. So despite the deep-seated dread I suddenly sense within her, she finishes her spell.

Once she breathes out the last word and before I open my eyes, I feel a sharp stinging sensation in my cheek for the first time since my final death, telling me she had slapped me with all her strength. "Bastard!" she hisses. "You have no idea what you just did, do you?"

"Not really, no," I admit, opening my eyes and rubbing my cheek. As much as it hurts, it is good to finally feel something physical again, even if it is pain.

"Whatever you concentrated on, it wasn't what I asked of you," she snaps. "Whatever you concentrated on caused the spell not to release you to travel the grounds of the estate, but to be bound to follow me, no matter where I go or what I do, for the rest of eternity, even after my death. Because whatever you concentrated on bound our spirits together in a way that can never be broken. Now you're not trapped in this house. No. You and I are trapped in the same ten foot diameter of each other forever. Wherever I go, wherever my spirit goes when I die, you will be forced to be no more than ten feet away from me at all times for eternity. Even if you somehow manage to regain your status as an undead vampire rather than a ghost, you will still be trapped to going where I go. Because our spirits are bound together. And if I die after such a thing happens, you will be forced into death again because of this, unless I was transitioning into vampirism."

I feel my eyes widen with horror as her words pour over me like a ton of bricks. What have I done?

Sarah: that last part was a twist I had not been planning but my muse had insisted on. Well, I like this twist so much because it adds so much that can be done with the storyline that I'm not going to argue with my muse. I rarely argue with my muse anyways. Please review and tell me what you think.