Below the earth in the Lockwood's cellar, Yeona steps into a new world.
She knows what Caroline is, she's given the girl pig's blood to help soothe the animal in her. But seeing her wade out from the dark, her snarling mouth covered in the red of her mother's deputies, paints a whole new picture. Her fangs are bared and black veins crawl from beneath the fragile skin of her under eyes. Irises that were once sky-blue are replaced by two black holes, the whites of her eyes a hellish red.
Caroline looks like a monster.
She isn't frightened by the girl in front of her. But she's frightened for the life she's now going to lead. Yeona watches, her expression grim, as Caroline's features fade from monstrous to young once more.
"Hi, mom."
"Caroline, no," Liz whispered. She collapses in on herself, falling to her knees as her daughter comes fully out of the dark. Her gaze swings Yeona's way to take in her clawed hands and her bared fangs, and she simply wilts. "You're a vampire too?"
"Not a vampire," Yeona says stiffly, flickering over to Damon and Stefan's side.
The brothers are littered with bullet holes, bits and pieces of splintering wood pellets being slowly ejected from their flesh by their regenerative powers. They fall to the floor with dull ' clinks '. Elena is already helping Stefan off the cold rocky floor, brown eyes absorbed by his face.
"Hey there," Yeona says softly, kneeling next to Damon. She runs a hand over him, quick and clinical, before taking a hold of his upper arm. "I'm going to lift you up, alright?"
Damon groans and gives her a nod. Unable to give him her full attention with Caroline huddling close to the cell doors next to her trigger-happy mother, Yeona accidentally presses against one of his wounds. He gives a wince.
"Sorry." She mutters.
"Not your fault. You're not the one who shot me. Hold on a second." Damon pulls his arm out of her grip, moving towards one of the felled officers.
Yeona grimaces and looks away, refocusing back on Caroline as Damon takes his time feeding. She plays with her fingers, carefully avoiding her mother's eyes. Liz looks like she's going into shock, gaze unseeing as she stares straight ahead. Crawling over to his brother, Damon gives him a careful once over.
"You need some deputy blood."
"You might as well drink up, kiddo. They are going to die anyway." Yeona says gently.
"No, I'll be fine. It'll just take longer to heal." Stefan says. He trembles in place, from leftover adrenaline or from pain, Yeona can't tell. Elena rubs soothing circles on his back.
"Damon's right. If there was ever a time to break your diet-"
"He says he didn't want it, okay?" Elena interrupts, shooting a hard glance at her friend.
Caroline goes quiet once more, watching Damon stand up. Yeona keeps her hands at his sides, ready to catch him if he falls.
"This is a most unfortunate situation. Two deputies are dead. And you. What am I going to do with you?" Damon turns to Liz.
"You won't tell anyone, will you?" Caroline asks anxiously.
Liz can't help but look at her daughter when she speaks. For a second, Yeona thinks she's softening, but Liz's expression only grows more horrified as she stares at her daughter's blood-covered mouth. Liz turns away with a sharp breath, heartbreak clear on her face.
"Mom? Please! Look, I know that we don't get along and that you hate me but I'm your daughter. And you'll do this for me, right?"
Liz stifles a sob but remains steadfast. Her mind has already been made up but still, Caroline begs.
"Mom, please. He will kill you."
Feeling her claws and fangs recede, Yeona steps forward to Liz, ignoring how the woman flinches. A very different Yeona wouldn't have hesitated in putting Liz down. After all, Liz was now a threat. But this is now and Yeona won't be the one to take Caroline's mother away from her.
"Liz, he really will kill you. For your daughter's sake, promise you'll keep this a secret."
Liz looks past her, right at Damon. "Then kill me."
"No!" Caroline shouts.
"I can't take this." Liz continues. She takes in a deep breath, her voice coming out rough with unshed tears. "Just kill me. Please."
Damon blurs. He's no longer standing by his brother and Elena, now he's gripping Liz in his hands and staring at her like he could peel her skin back with his gaze alone. The sheriff only hangs limply in his hold, her tears finally spilling. Many different voices call out to him at once, everyone in the cellar tensing.
"I'm not going to kill you. You're my friend." He spits the word like it's a curse and Yeona knows by the sound alone that he'd kill Liz momentarily if she were anything but human.
Despite the affectionate term, there is no affection in his voice as he continues to stare Liz down. Her fate is a game in his hands that he enjoys all too much and as each second ticks by, Yeona readies herself to intervene. There's a collective sigh of relief when he sets her back down on her feet.
"You're coming with us."
Trading one founding family cellar for another, the group leaves to the Salvatore's boarding house. Stefan takes Elena home but not before Yeona gets Elena to swear she's going to catch her up to everything . There are too many unknowns about this town and the questions only keep on stacking up in Yeona's mind. Her training tells her it'll be her downfall. Her body says that's a future Yeona's problem.
Lush red carpet and dark woods take up most of Yeona's attention the second she crosses the threshold. Liz is taken down the stairs and into another cell, where she lies through her teeth about a stomach bug. The sheriff's station thankfully buys it and she's left down there with a desperate Caroline.
Damon comes up behind her, watching as she absorbs his home. Everything about it was dramatic, from the bookshelves that touched the ceiling, to the plush couches right out of a vintage movie. Yeona falls face-first into one of them, the mental exhaustion of the day catching up to her. Her stomach grumbles.
"It's a bit kitschy for my taste." He says offhandedly, strolling past her towards a heavily stocked bar cart gilded with gold. Copper and whiskey are poured into two crystal glasses and he hands one out to her.
Yeona rolls onto her back, barely sitting up before gulping down her drink. AB negative explodes on her taste buds and she hurriedly sticks her glass back out for more. Damon rolls his eyes and instead of getting her another glass, he tosses her a bag of blood from a mini-fridge.
It's been a while since she's consumed human blood. It's not technically breaking her little 'diet', because blood will never have the same effect as consuming human flesh does, but it's tipping her in the wrong direction. She already craves more and she's only halfway through her bag. Yeona knows without a shadow of a doubt that the next time she drinks pig's blood, it's going to taste like misery and bad choices.
But Yeona can so clearly see the end result in her mind.
If she just holds out a little longer, if she just keeps filling herself with blood and ignoring her cramping stomach, she can see if that old legend really does work.
"What are you planning on doing with Liz?" Yeona finally peels her lips away from the bag, licking the corners to make sure there isn't a single drop wasted. If she's cheating she may as well not waste anything.
"Once the vervains out of her system, I'll compulse her into forgetting this whole thing."
"Even about Caroline?"
"Especially about Blondie. That girl is going to get killed someday. I'm not about to let us all die with her."
Yeona frowns. "You're underestimating her. Look at her, she's already compelled her way out of the hospital hours after she was born again. Could you do that?"
Damon plops gracelessly into an old leather chair, his legs straight out before him. His eyes go far away as he takes slow sips from the glass in his hand. "Not exactly. And don't act like she's some kind of vampire prodigy."
"You're a dick."
It gets him to snap out of his thoughts. Damon sends her a dry smile. "You're just now noticing?"
"I noticed right away. It's kind of hard to miss."
"Part of my charm."
"You don't have any charm," Caroline shouts from the basement.
Yeona looks down at the floor with raised brows. "You didn't soundproof the cellar? Isn't that your torture chamber?"
"It used to be for wine. You should probably go and make sure her mother doesn't try and stake her." Damon says flatly.
Yeona drags herself from the couch, cracking her neck. "I doubt she could. Deep down, Liz loves her daughter. She's just going to take a while to remember that. Or she would if you weren't going to Jedi mind swipe her."
"It's compulse her or kill her."
"Not complaining. Just observing."
"Do a little less observing and a little more walking."
She gives him an eye roll and tosses the emptied blood bag at him, smiling to herself as it hits him square in the face. The Salvatore house blurs by her, one giant smear of decadence and old money that normally she would have loved to explore more. But Yeona keeps on until she hits the basement, taking to reducing her speed to a slow walk so as to not disturb Liz any further.
Yeona hangs by in the closed-door feeling suddenly unsure. The door is thrown open by a frowning Caroline.
"Quit hovering, it's weird."
Caroline stands aside for Yeona to pass, shutting the heavy cellar door behind her without much effort. Sheriff Forbes sits on a lone cot, her soft pink shirt so at odds with the cold grey walls. In her eyes, Yeona finds fear. Finds disgust.
She gives the Sheriff her best smile anyhow, if only for Caroline's sake. Yeona had never gotten to know the woman that well, given that Liz was always working. And despite the strained relationship between Caroline and her mother, Yeona didn't have the heart to be antagonistic on purpose.
But Liz didn't seem to get the memo. Once she catches sight of Yeona, she shuffles backward until her shoulders hit the wall, hand instinctively hovering where her gun would be.
"How could this have happened?" Liz asks, her voice hoarse. "Did you do this to my daughter?"
"Again, not a vampire. My kind can't make others like us, we are born like this. Neither you're daughter nor I had much of a choice, Liz."
"That's not my daughter. My daughter was human. My daughter is dead."
A sharp intake of breath is the only sign of distress Caroline shows and Yeona reaches behind her back to take hold of the girl's hand. Caroline's heartbeat thumps loud in her ears, her thick vanilla scent and underlayer of grave dirt steadying Yeona's rising temper. How a parent could look at their child and disown them so easily for something out of their control will never make sense to her.
Acid burns in the pit of her stomach. The steady thrum of hunger that sits in the back of Yeona's mind jumps under her anger's hand. Like a cat leaning into the touch of a human, hunger tended to show its face when her anger did. It was a nasty habit of hers that she's never quite let go of- the whirling, raging desire to render flesh from the bone when upset. The urge to take Liz's cruel tongue from her skull is a hard one to shove back, but Yeona keeps her body locked enough to only allow the slightest tremble.
"Listen to me very carefully, Sheriff. Vampires do not eject who they are the second they turn. That person is still in there, and they always will be. The only thing that could ever make Caroline the monster you think she is is Caroline. And, if you use your eyes and really take a look, you'd see that your daughter is standing right in front of you."
Liz clenches her eyes tight, tears slipping down her tired cheeks. "I want to believe that. But everything I know-"
"Everything you know is wrong. You think we are the monsters, and maybe we are. We aren't like you and never will be. We'll never age, never die from diseases. But Caroline is good , Liz. She's good and she has no intentions of hurting anybody. What happened today was because her friends were in danger."
"Mom, please. I'm right here." Caroline says through tears of her own.
"You sound so much like how I remember you," Liz whispers. She opens her eyes and looks at the girls before her. "You both do. You look like you love her just as much as you always have."
Casting a look over her shoulder, Yeona meets Caroline's eyes and gives her hand a squeeze. "That's because I do. Nothing's changed, Liz. You just see us now, it's not our fault that you don't like what you see."
"This wasn't how things were supposed to go. Caroline was supposed to grow up, and get married. Have kids, if I got lucky. And you, Yeona..."
"...Me?" Yeona's brows furrowed.
"When Sheila and I approached your family when you were in high school, it wasn't for your mom."
"What does that even mean?" Caroline whispers.
"We thought if we got your mom to join, you'd eventually follow in her footsteps and join the Council. You had so many good ideas and you loved our kids as much as we did- when you said you were coming back to town, I thought, f inally. But you're…you're not any better than the monsters we are trying to exterminate."
"Oh, Liz," Yeona lets go of Caroline's hand, crouching before Liz. She waited until Liz made eye contact to speak again, her smile full of fangs. "I would never, ever join your sick little hunting club."
"Yeona!"
"Sorry Car," Yeona sighs, her fangs disappearing once more. "Liz, just think things over. If after all of this, you don't want a relationship with your daughter, just know you're the one shutting that avenue down. And with all due respect, you can't afford to do that."
"Is that a threat, Ms. Noe?" Sheriff's Forbes voice wobbles but the trademarked fierce look that all Forbes women carried gleamed in her eyes.
"No, Liz. I'm not here to threaten you. I'm just pointing out how you've been kind of absent from your daughter's life. She's been begging for a relationship and you've been putting your time into hunting monsters out of your weight class. Maybe this time, you can open your eyes and see what's right in front of you."
Getting to her feet, Yeona gives Caroline what she hopes to be an encouraging smile as she makes her way to the door. The cellar door shuts behind her with a heavy click and she leans against it, the back of her head hitting the metal enough for a ringing to bounce about in her mind. It gives her enough of a distraction to get the rolling hurricane of emotions inside of her under control.
Yeona shoves off of the door and treks up the stairs. Just like she'd expected, Damon was sitting just as she'd left him, his glacier blue eyes catching hers the second she turns fully into the room.
"That sounded rather personal at the end," He drawled, swirling the contents of his drink.
"There's a lot you don't know about Kumihos, Damon. But the most important thing is that Kumihos stick together, and they never, ever leave. If you do…there goes everything you've ever built."
"I'm taking you you left."
"I did, and now I'm suffering the consequences. I should be broke but my mom took pity on me. I don't even have a bed in my place, I'll be sleeping on the couch until I can figure that out."
"There are plenty of beds here," Damon says with his trademarked devilish smirk. "Mine included."
Yeona sits back down on the couch she'd vacated earlier, staring at him hard. Sincerity is a difficult thing to suss out, but his heart does not jump nor does his gaze waver. Mason's words swirl around in her head like toxic sludge, touching and coating every interaction she's had with Damon up until now with dirty hands.
Her voice strains as she speaks, doubt tainting her words. "Hah. Funny."
"Who said I'm joking, Vixi?"
"I don't even know you. I'm not interested in sleeping with somebody I don't know. It's not for me." Skirting the truth is second nature but the intensity of his gaze rattles her.
Damon, for all that he looks like some edgy playboy, stares at her like he wants to crawl inside her skin and live there. Like a bug, burrowing past her flesh and sinew to nip at her vulnerable organs until she's only a shell. Yeona breaks their eye contact, a shiver running down her body.
Is that how Mate bonds worked? Is this how Elena felt around Stefan? Like she was put on this earth to be consumed by him? Or was this a Damon special? Maybe it's even Yeona's paranoia, taking and twisting something that should be beautiful until it resembles nothing but a horrifying burden.
If what Mason said was true, Yeona doesn't know what she could do. Killing him could be an option, but what happens when one-half of the weird vampiric mating equation is wiped off the earth? Is she going to go mad with grief? Would she risk trying to join him in the afterlife?
Those are questions she never, ever wants the answer to. Logic screams he's more than a normal predator. He's not just another vampire, he's a monster by nature. Damon will sink inside of her and hungrily consume every piece of her she can give him until there is nothing left of either of them. A franticness peers out at the world from behind his cocky expressions, one that speaks of doom for everyone involved.
She knows all of this, has seen this movie play out a thousand times, but when he speaks her soul still jumps at the sound of his voice.
"Get to know me. Maybe you'll find out you like me more than you think."
That's what she's afraid of.
He switches the topic with a nonchalance that startles her. "What did you run from?"
"Excuse me?"
Damon leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "I asked what did you run from? You said earlier you left. Seems like you're a runner."
The words settle between them, both an observation and a frustrated accusation. Yeona pretends she doesn't understand the second meaning of them and throws out an easy answer, getting to her feet. He stands as well, gaze challenging.
"Love can be beautiful. Can be a source of strength, a sense of community. But they can also be the worst kind of poison. Goodnight, Damon."
A muscle twitched in Damon's jaw and he pours himself another drink. "Goodnight, Vixi."
She drives around aimlessly through the small town, the top of her car down and her hair flowing in the breeze. Just like most nights when she was sixteen and allowed out of the house, she finds herself at Jenna's doorstep. The strawberry blonde lets her in with little response, years of conditioning making it an automatic response.
They pull out the blackberry wine and get tipsy off of memories of better days. Jenna, for all her brilliance, has never mastered cooking. Bypassing it entirely, she goes and tries the next best thing. Making a charcuterie board.
"This is basically adult Lunchables," Yeona giggles, taking a hefty sip of wine. It scorches deliciously across her tongue and down her throat before settling like a spark in her stomach.
Her tolerance is on par with a vampire's, but Yeona's cousin made a special kind of wine. A supernatural kind. Something about the blackberries made it linger, making the alcohol cling to Kumihos in a way that takes longer to burn off. Hedonism is a classic trait in her kind and it'd only make sense that her cousin would find a way to profit off of it.
"Shh, don't give my groove," Jenna said, the entirety of her focus on cutting a block of cheese.
The knife slices through the thin pad of her thumb. Jenna lets out a hiss and drops the knife. A pinprick of red beads, then another. Soon the cut becomes a solid drop, one that Yeona watches with rapt attention. Drool pools in her mouth and Yeona scrambles to attention. The rags are where they always are, stuffed in a drawer next to the stove. Yeona pulls one out and tosses it to Jenna.
"Thanks," Jenna grins at her, pressing the raggedy green cloth to her thumb.
"No problem. Be right back. Put a bandage on that or something," Yeona mumbles, gulping past the wave of salvia that descends every time she glances at Jenna's thumb and speed walking to the downstairs bathroom.
Yeona shuts the door as softly as her shaking hands will let her, careful not to leave a dent in the vintage-looking knobs. In the mirror, her eyes are bloodshot and her face sweaty. The hunger inside her snarled, clawing at her stomach. All she can think about is the blood bubbling past Jenna's skin and sitting on the tip of her thumb. Visions of Yeona that didn't exist, of things that hadn't happened, slammed through her.
She's there, backing Jenna into the cabinets and putting her bloody thumb in her mouth. Tasting that copper nectar, sucking at Jenna's skin. This version of Yeona, who had let her hunger take her over, bites down. Jenna screams and Yeona covers her mouth, the sound of muffled cries and cartilage crunching between her fangs blending into a single ravenous song.
This version of Yeona eats Jenna whole.
The sink groans beneath Yeona's hands. Lines of drool slip past her panting lips and her eyes flare electric blue at the sight. Her stomach twists painfully and Yeona has to stifle a low whine. Unbidden, sparks crackle around her leather bracelet, the raging current in her begging to be let out.
She listens carefully for Jenna, her ears straining. Jenna shuffles from the kitchen to the living room, flicking on the TV. Yeona takes in a deep breath and speeds out of the bathroom and up the stairs, not stopping until she's in front of Elena's closed door. Soft music plays from the inside and Yeona doesn't bother knocking, her limbs straining with the desire to run back down the stairs and clamp her jaws down on her best friend.
Only once she is inside and facing a startled Elena does Yeona let herself breathe.
"Yeona? What's wrong? I thought you were busy with Jenna. Did something else happen?" Elena closes her the diary in front of her, crawling out of the nook by her window to grip Yeona's hands.
"No," Yeona gasps out. "Something almost did. I almost ate Jenna."
"What? Is Jenna okay? Is she hurt? Oh my God-"
"Elena, she's fine. She didn't even notice, I ran to the bathroom before I could do anything. SHe cut her thumb and I just…I just kept seeing myself kill her, over and over again."
"How? I don't understand, you've never reacted like this before right?"
Yeona sighs, gripping at her hair. "There's something I need to tell you. I didn't want to, but I think you need to know if you're going to be around me."
Yeona takes to pacing, heart beating furiously. Elena's lavender scent does little to calm her down- all it does it make her feel more guilty. She hasn't thought of hurting Jenna since she was a teenager dealing with bouts of anger. To be so out of control, to be basically back where she started…
It's so shameful.
"There are a lot of reasons why I left Korea, Se-Hun being one of them. I couldn't really share much with you, but now that I'm here, I might as well." Yeona took in a deep breath."There are only Kumihos who are women but not because of nature's design. It just so happens that tradition dictates it to be the shape of a female."
Elena sits back down in her nook, grabbing one of the smaller pillows and hugging it to her chest. "So you can shift to a male if you wanted to?"
"Yeah, though we don't do so permanently."
"What about Se-Hun? I don't understand," Elena's brows furrow.
"Se-Hun was the expectation and he was shunned for it. None of the Kumiho's resources or help were offered to him and he was left to navigate the world alone. Until I came defected from the compound that is. We became friends, which already put me on thin ice with the Charm. Then I refused to go through with the Trials to activate my full powers until he died and the second I got them I ran here."
Yeona stops pacing, standing in front of Elena and wringing her hands.
"The thing about leaving the Kumihos is that means I left their resources behind too. This bracelet doesn't just cover my mark, Elena. It contains my powers. My full powers."
Elena's eyes light up with understanding, her mouth dropping open. "The night you attacked Damon, there were sparks."
Yeona nods. "Those sparks came from my magic. I don't have magic the way witches do- Kumiho magic is different. There's a limit to it. But most Kumiho, before they hit one thousand, we have access to something called a Yeowoo Guseul ."
"A Yeowoo Guseul ?" Despite herself, Yeona smiles at Elena's butchered attempt.
"People have claimed it to be a literal bead of power that hangs in the back of our throats. But that's not really true. It's just another name for the kind of power we generate that happens to stem there- which is why the hunters tend to decapitate us. Every Kumiho can generate two things from there. Our breath of temptation, the equivalent of a vampire's compulsion, and, well…fire."
"Fire? Like fire from a bonfire fire? Like a dragon? That kind of fire? Yeona-"
"Kind of? It can be a healing fire or a burning fire. And we don't spit it from our mouths, it only generates in our throats, not come from it. But the real kicker comes when my mom met my dad," Yeona gives a dry chuckle.
Elena's eyebrows shoot up. Yeona never talked about her dad. It was always a sensitive subject and never ever brought up where Yeona could hear. Mystic Falls is a small town full of some small minds and Yeona's mom used to get a lot of flack for being a single immigrant mother. To hear her bring it up, to see the pain in her eyes as she chokes out the word 'dad', is all the reminder Elena needs to leave that man in the past.
"My mom met my dad in Hawaii, you know. They had a fling," She rolls her eyes. "It was very Mamma Mia of them. Something in his bloodline, some far-off relative, reacted strangely with my mom's bloodline."
As calmly as she's able, Yeona comes to sit next to Elena. She looks at the teen girl next to her, a wistfulness to her face that verges on bitterness.
"You see, Elena, I don't have that kind of power. I can't make fire. I make storms . I'm the first of my kind with that kind of power."
"Did they not accept you for it, like with Se-Hun?" Elena frowns, her doe eyes sad at the mere idea.
"Some don't, no. Some like my power. They think it means our species can evolve further. But I didn't leave because of that. I left because my bracelet won't work forever and there's nobody around to train me. If I lose control in the wrong place, at the wrong time-"
"You'll hurt a lot of people."
"Exactly, I'll hurt a lot of people. I might even evaporate myself in the process, I don't know, nobody does. I don't want to hurt innocent people, Elena. I don't want to just explode someday and possibly level a city with me."
"So how do we fix this?"
Yeona puts a hand on Elena's shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. "There's a myth about my kind I'm trying to test out. If I can just abstain from human flesh for a thousand days straight, I can put a stop to this. All of it. Maybe not the mark, but I won't put anyone in danger."
"That doesn't sound like a good idea Yeona. Look at you, you almost wanted to eat Jenna. How long have you been abstaining? I don't think a fast is going to work with something like this."
"A little starvation won't kill me." She tries for a wry smile but it falters. "I'll be starving and moody and weak but it won't kill me."
"What's the point if you're suffering, Yeona? How could you be so okay with this?"
Yeona leans in, the light in her eyes feverish.
"Because if the legend is true, I'll become human ."
AN: In regards to Kumihos taking shape- they always choose a cis-women due to tradition and some other stuff that will come into play. As you can see, not everyone agrees with it and are punished for it. Lowkey a trans/nb allegory because I can't help myself lol. Think of Kumihos as genderless beings who then stuff themselves in human suits and they are kind of forced into being cis-women. They can still shift along the gender spectrum but it has consequences, which is WACK.
Charm- another term for a group of foxes.
ps: should I start adding the lyrics from the song titles I use in each chapter, at the top? or just keep them as titles. some of them just match vibes and not full moments.
