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Chapter 18

those who wait

Whatever you do in life will be insignificant,
but it is important that you do it,
because nobody else will.
―Mahatma Gandhi

Bonnie Bennett met Damon Salvatore when she was five years old. He saved her from a dog and compelled it to love her. In another life, this would be a memory that loomed large in the little girl's mind. She would go home and tell her parents about the friendly and dark-dressed man, and they would exchange concerned looks over her head. But that was never this life.

Bonnie barely remembered the rescue, because when she went back inside, her dad was pacing in the kitchen, his features drawn in worry. The wringing of his hands only stopped with the ringing of the phone. He answered, and his face went completely ashen. Bonnie watched the minute changes, and this would be her most vivid memory of the day. The moment when, without her realizing, her dad became her father, a more distant figure, not often seen or thought of.

Her father stroked one hand over her hair, before walking upstairs and packing a bag. He hugged her when he came back into the kitchen. He poured her a bowl of cereal at her request, and then he left. Bonnie wouldn't see him for two weeks. That evening she came to understand something it took other kids years to come to terms with. Her family was gone, and they were not coming back. She was alone.

Of course, none of that had happened yet, or maybe it happened over a decade ago. It depended on who you asked. The world, or the witch who was watching her younger self happily chase butterflies around the front yard.

Bonnie stood across the street from her childhood home. When her vision had started to blur in Chicago she'd thought it'd be the last time. The time between trips had been getting longer, and she thought she'd skip right past her own lifetime, and slot back into place in 2010.

She'd opened her eyes on a park bench in the Mystic Falls town square. Bonnie had almost jumped for joy, so happy to be back. But then she'd seen them, Grayson and Miranda Gilbert, outside Dr. Gilbert's medical practice. For a split second she'd allowed herself to believe that she'd managed to get home and saved her best friend's parents in the process. But she could see the small children they were buckling into their car seats, and she recognized them. Elena couldn't be older than six.

Bonnie had looked at the building, untouched by fire, and stared after the minivan that held her best friend and her still-living parents. She was closer than ever to her own present, and any ripples would, hypothetically, be more controllable. But how could she tell the Gilberts not to pick Elena up from a party in thirteen years? And what would happen to Elena if no one was there to get her? Who knew who, or what, she'd meet looking for a ride home from that party?

She'd acquired a long coat at some point. Which was good, because her dress had both smoke and water damage, and the slinky dress would have stood out in Mystic Falls even brand new. Bonnie guessed that someone, maybe even Damon, had put the trench coat on her unconscious body while she was getting drunk with Katherine, but there was nothing in the pockets to help her solve that mystery.

Bonnie felt more like an outsider here than she had in any other city or time. Everything was so close to how she remembered it, but just slightly wrong. Too new or too old or an awning a shade off from the color it would be in 2010. So Bonnie had walked the mile to her old house, hoping to find some familiarity. Instead she'd found herself.

"I brought coffee." Bonnie's head jerked up, surprised by the approaching figure.

Damon held out a cup with a familiar green logo.

"Iced. All the rage on the west coast. Might as well be a trendy stalker."

"Hope you're talking about yourself, because I'm not a stalker."

"You're standing outside of the Bennett house wearing a trench coat. I assumed you were waiting for me."

"Well, you were wrong." She replied shortly.

"So you're not here to finally keep our breakfast date. That's too bad, it's impolite to keep a lady waiting so long, Bon Bon."

"I'm sure your delicate sensibilities survived."

"Not so! You standing me up haunted me for decades. You should have seen the bender I went on; it was Stefan level stuff."

Bonnie rolled her eyes and took a sip of her coffee. It was good, and he'd somehow known her preference for a pump of hazelnut.

"Okay, maybe not Stefan level. I think you managed to miss all the times he's fallen off the wagon, lucky you. Not a pretty sight."

"And you doing your best to follow his lead is my fault, why?"

"Ouch, Bonnie, ouch. Don't you know you're supposed to be my support? Look at Lexi! She's always running after Stefan when he's in his funks, and she's even tried it with me. Oh wait, you don't even know the blonde bestie, do you? Not around enough."

Bonnie ignored him. Despite the coffee gesture, Damon was off. His words too performative, and lacking substance. She didn't want to look in his eyes and confirm what Katherine had told her even though she knew it was true. He'd turned his emotions off.

"You don't happen to know where this munchkin's mama is, do you? Sheila gave me a call and said that something was up, that her kid had bitten off more than she could chew."

"Gr—what? Sheila Bennett called you? About Abby?" He snapped his fingers.

"That's the name! I haven't been as on top of it this generation. Though really, with seatbelts and modern medicine, there's not much I have to do anymore. Unless a stray Bennett gets a bit too big for her britches that is. So, Abby? Any ideas on where she is?"

"Sheila Bennett called you for help?"

"Yes, Bonnie. Don't you remember the deal good old Emily extracted out of me? Believe me, the Bennetts haven't forgotten. They've been cashing in well enough. At least with cell phones they just call. The summonings were brutal, bad for digestion."

"Oh."

"So, Abby? I'm prompting you again because I remember you being smarter than this, despite current evidence."

Bonnie shook away her shock at Grams and Damon's apparent past friendly, or at least working, relationship.

"She's not here. She left."

"Any idea when she's coming back?"

"She doesn't. Ever. She'll send birthday cards for the next couple of years, but that's it."

"Oh-kay. That was weird and specific. But it is my job to protect the chick, so I better get some more detail from her mom. Maybe Sheila will tell me what's up, without the mystic mojo crap for once. See ya!"

"Damon, wait!"

"Bonnie, I've got stuff to do. Whatever is going on with you is not my problem anymore. I don't care. About anything. So unless you've got something to sweeten this little reunion a bit more, I've got to go."

Bonnie winced and finally met his eyes. They were cold, but not dead as she'd feared they would be.

"You need to stay. That dog will attack her. You need to be here to save her."

"Or I can just kill the dog now and leave you to deal with the crying toddler."

"Don't kill the dog, Damon. Just compel it."

"Just compel it? Do you know how annoying it is to compel animals? You have to train them to understand you first, or else the orders mean nothing. Do you know how hard it is to train something when its every instinct tells it to run away from the big bad predator giving it orders? God, I'm so glad horses are no longer a thing. I was the first in line to buy a car, believe me."

"It will work. It's a dog, not a wild animal. It will know enough for you to compel it."

Damon's further grumbling was cut off by the sharp bark of Neela. The butterfly had landed next to the dog, and the child had followed after it.

"Hold my drink." Damon dropped the cup in Bonnie's vicinity, and she just managed to catch it. He rushed off, swooping to catch little Bonnie up into his arms. The girl laughed, loving the feel of the wind in her hair. Damon rested Bonnie on one hip, and he held Neela by the neck with his other hand. He glanced back at the older Bonnie, once, and loosened his grip. He crouched, not letting go of his Bennett charge, and spoke directly into the dog's eyes.

Then he placed the girl down, observed for a few moments to make sure that the compulsion had taken, and walked away. The girl toddled after him for a moment before being distracted by the friendly dog and the butterflies again. Bonnie, the older one standing at the sidelines, crushed a piece of coffee-coated ice between her teeth.

Damon strutted back over to her.

"Nice coat, by the way. But it looked better on me."

Bonnie glanced down at the trench coat that she was swimming in. She didn't doubt it.

"Thanks for the loan. You want it back?"

He shook his head.

"Nah, a few seasons out of date for me now."

Bonnie nodded, and handed his coffee back to him. Across the way, her younger self ran back inside, hungry and looking for her father. Bonnie watched the door slam shut behind her. She waited for the phone to start ringing.

"You just going to stand there? Because I'm leaving. People to do, places to see and all that."

"Her grandmother will be here soon; you don't have to go looking for her."

"You alright, Bonnie? You don't look so good. And how do you know so much anyway? Did I give you a play by play of today at some point in the future?"

The phone rang, and Bonnie's dad picked it up. Bonnie wished she could hear the conversation. She couldn't remember what her mother's voice sounded like. Damon cocked his head, listening.

Whatever he heard made him turn away from Bonnie and take a step closer to the house.

"What's she saying?" Damon glanced back at her.

"It's Abby. She said there's something she has to do. To protect the town and her daughter." He paused. "And that she might not be coming back."

Bonnie looked at the closed door of her house. She knew that Abby wouldn't be coming back. For years she had wondered why her mother had left, what she could have done differently, what sort of daughter she should have been to make her stay.

Her father burst out the front door, bag in hand. He threw it in the backseat and drove off, not even sparing a glance at the vampire and his grown daughter that stood witness. Grams would be here soon.

"What did she say she was protecting the town from?" Bonnie asked.

Damon shrugged and slurped at his coffee obnoxiously.

"Didn't say. Sounds witchy to me, uncontrollable evil, blah blah; don't know what Sheila wants me to do about it."

Bonnie frowned. Could her mother really have left the town to protect it? Bonnie remembered her vow to Stefan, that she would protect the town from him and Damon. She'd been eager to leave the promise behind when she tried to change the past. But now she considered the weight of it. Maybe her mother had made a similar promise and found herself losing her family because of it. Was that possible? That Abby Bennett had left her out of love and not selfishness?

"Where is she? She should be here by now." Bonnie was speaking to herself, but Damon answered anyway.

"Sheila? You're the one who was insistent that she was showing up, why're you asking me? But it does seem wrong that he left the little tyke alone without at least calling a sitter."

"He called Grams."

"The grandmother? Sheila? No, he didn't. I was listening the whole time."

Bonnie stared at the house for a moment. She'd grown up in this house, still slept beneath its roof every night when she couldn't escape its emptiness for the warmth of Caroline's and Elena's. This house was just as off as the rest of the town. The front garden was overflowing with well kept tulips, the shutters were all recently painted, the grass freshly mowed. A house is not a home, but this one was, until just this moment. It just didn't realize it wasn't anymore. Soon the outside would reflect the inside. The garden would empty, the shutters fade, and the grass would grow mostly untended, like the daughter inside.

Bonnie started to laugh with an edge of hysteria. She ignored Damon's looks, didn't check if they were concerned or judgmental. She laughed and laughed until her face ached like her heart. Because of course. Her entire life she'd believed that her father had called Grams. That even in his grief over his wife he had remembered his daughter and made sure that she would be cared for. That, in a way, he was a part of their family unit because he had set it up, in this moment. He had made sure that she and Grams would have each other, even if Abby never came back and he never stayed in town for more than two weeks at a time. But he hadn't.

Damon finally lay a hand on her back. Bonnie didn't know if it was actually meant to be soothing, but it did the trick. It grounded her, brought her back to herself. Her laughter slowed, and she only choked on a few snorts-turned-sobs before she completely sobered. If Rudy wasn't going to call, she'd have to do it herself.

Bonnie ducked from under Damon's hand and marched across the street and over the lawn. She stooped to grab the spare key from beneath the loose stone in the walkway, but found out it was an unnecessary step. When she got to the door it was already unlocked. She restrained herself and didn't punch the door frame like she wanted to.

"Bonnie, wait! I can't come in!"

Bonnie ignored Damon's calls after her and entered the house. She shut the door behind her, quietly, and bypassed the living room where she could hear the television. The kitchen was quiet, Ms. Cuddles lay, fallen over on her side, on one of the kitchen chairs. Bonnie set the bear upright again, rubbing one of her ears between her fingers. She placed her empty cereal bowl in the sink, took a deep breath, and picked the phone off the wall.

The number had been the same her whole life, and her memory didn't fail her now. Grams' voice sounded tinny through the old phone, but Bonnie still had to suppress tears.

"Hello? Rudy?" Grams said. Bonnie gathered herself.

"Hi. Sheila Bennett? Your granddaughter needs you right now. Her father just left in a hurry. He asked me to call you."

"Who is this? Where's Rudy? Is Bonnie okay? Put her on the phone!" Bonnie heard Damon calling for her from the front door, but she ignored him.

"I'm nobody important, and Bonnie is watching television. She's fine. But I really think you should come over." Bonnie couldn't exactly give her name, and she struggled to find something to say, something that would allay some of Grams' concerns, something that would make her grandmother speak to her. Maybe a familiar name? "Damon Salvatore is here too." Bonnie immediately knew this was the wrong thing to say.

"I'm on my way." The line went dead.

Bonnie held the phone to her ear for a moment, prolonging it as long as possible, ignoring the sound of the television in the next room. It had been so good to hear Grams's voice again. When Bonnie placed the phone back on the hook she realized that the voices she's been tuning out weren't coming from the television in the living room. They were coming from the hall.

"Well if you tell me your name, we won't be strangers. Then you can invite me in no problem."

"Mr. Damon what'dya mean? You know my name! You called me!" said Bonnie Bennett in her squeaky voice.

"Well I'm glad you came to the door, but I was calling for my friend."

"No! For me! You say Bonnie! Bonnie! Come to the door! And I did!" The little girl insisted. Bonnie rounded the corner just as Damon looked up from where he crouched in front of the child. He met Bonnie's horrified eyes over the excited girl's head.

"Bonnie Bennett?" He asked, tone measured.

"That's me! That's me!" The girl cried. Bonnie's throat was tight. Damon's smile took on a sinister air.

"Well Baby Bonnie, now that we're friends you can invite me in right?"

"Sure Mister! Co—" Bonnie sprinted down the hall and slapped her hand over her younger self's mouth. Damon could not have an invitation into her home, especially not now, when he had his humanity turned off.

"Aw Bonnie? Don't want me inside the house?" He ran his hands over the door frame. "I don't need the kid though, do I? I think if you invited me in, this barrier would fall. Because this is your house too, isn't it, Bonnie Bennett?"

Bonnie shivered but didn't look away. His eyes were like ice. She gently released her fingers from over the young Bonnie's mouth.

"Go back to the living room, Grams will be here soon." The girl scampered off. Bonnie didn't know if her younger self was stupidly trustful of strangers, or if the touch had let her know that Bonnie was family, was her. Probably a bit of both.

"Well, well, well. Look who's been keeping secrets. All these years, Bonnie, and I never realized how similar you and Emily were. Bennett cunning at its finest. What was this? Were you supposed to check up on me to make sure I kept my end of the bargain?"

"No! That wasn't why, it wasn't about you at all."

"Well that's good to hear, makes me feel all better. Why don't you invite me in, and we can talk about this without this pesky barrier between us?" Damon had his hands braced against both sides of the door frame, and he was leaning in to loom over her despite the distance between them.

Bonnie stepped over the threshold and into him, lifting her chin. She would not let this lesser version of her friend intimidate her. Not when she'd come this far.

"Oh stop lifting your chin. It doesn't make you look taller; it just makes you look like an overconfident chihuahua."

"You wanted to talk face to face. Here I am. Talk."

Damon loomed even closer.

"I met you a hundred years ago Bonnie, and all my life I've thought of you as my friend. But I've never really known you at all, have I?" His voice sounded almost sad, even though that shouldn't be possible in his current state.

"Damon, I…" Her hard stance was crumbling. Damon reached forward and ran his ring finger down the side of her face, racing the curve of her cheekbone. His finger only held his daylight ring. Bonnie had never claimed him in return.. Not, she thought, that he would be wearing it now if she had. She could see something in his eyes, a hint emotion. Betrayal, but also a softening. She had to talk to him, to explain herself, and get him to flip his humanity switch back on.

A car squealed into the driveway and Damon snatched his hand back. His face closed, and his eyes went cold and dead. Grams leapt from her car, not bothering to close her door behind her.

"Damon! Did you find Abby? Is she alright? Why are you here? Is Bonnie alright? Who are you?' Her questions were sharp and frantic, but Damon answered completely nonplussed.

"Calm down Sheila, we're having a moment here."

Gram has reached the porch and looked at the two figures standing inches apart.

"Damon, you're supposed to be protecting my daughter. If you didn't bring this witch here to help you, why are you wasting time with her?"

"A question I'm asking myself at this very moment Sheila."

Bonnie met her Grams' eyes, and couldn't suppress her tears. She angrily wiped them away, she didn't want anything blurring her vision. Grams's eyes widened, taking in the familiar face before her. It lacked the baby fat she was accustomed to, but the features were undeniable.

"Bonnie?" The word was breathed out, rife with disbelief. Bonnie nodded sniffling.

"It's me Grams. It's me." She let the tears welling in her eyes escape and rushed into her grandmother's arms. The arms around her were hesitant, but just as comforting as she remembered.

"But Bonnie, baby, how?" Bonnie pulled away from her embrace. She took a step back but still struggled to answer. How could she explain?

"She's just popping in for a visit. Don't worry, she'll be gone soon enough." Damon said.

Bonnie had backed away from Grams, but she hadn't realized how close she now stood to Damon until he spoke, his voice just over her shoulder. She'd retreated to the familiar, and now with everything that she'd been through, Damon was more familiar than Grams.

"Not helpful, Damon." Bonnie turned to glare, but Damon remained glib.

"You weren't offering up any answers, Bonnie."

"Never mind that. Is Abby okay?" Grams interrupted.

"Don't know. Got here and saved Baby Bonnie, so I think my job is done."

"Done? My daughter is in danger because of one of your kind is trying to kill a child! You have to go and help!"

"I'm not about to tangle with a vampire over something that has nothing to do with me. Besides, I have it on good authority that your dear Abby survives, and it looks like Bonnie will make it out fine without me for the next few years."

"Damon, I know you've helped our family in the past, but if you don't help my daughter today I will never forget it, and I will never forgive you. No Bennett will welcome your presence again"

"I think you'll find them more than welcoming, Sheila. Accommodating to the extreme" He said before he grabbed Bonnie and pressed a hard kiss to her mouth. Bonnie was so startled she completely froze.

This was different from all of their previous kisses. It was ugly, aimed to hurt, and it made Bonnie burn with shame. Not only that Grams was seeing Damon kiss her, but was seeing him kiss her like this, in anger, just using her for a point. She pushed him away, pushing heat and force through her hands.

"Get off me!" She said. The cruel twist of his mouth remained undiminished and he was breathing harshly.

"Not so willing now that you have to own up to your family, huh? Slumming it with the likes of me?"

"Not so willing now that you're being a jackass!"

"This is who I always was Bonnie, no use pretending otherwise since your mask is off too."

Bonnie looked down. A last name was hardly a mask, but her name was not the only thing she'd lied about. She wiped her lips. The kiss had lasted seconds, but she wanted to cry. This isn't who Damon always was. Without his emotions he was someone different, something different.

"Damon. My daughter." Grams said. Damon didn't look away from Bonnie, but he scoffed.

"You know what? I promised to protect her descendants, not chase after them when I'm not wanted. Your family can deal with their own problems." He blurred away.

Bonnie heard a loud engine turn over a few blocks away. Damon was consistent with his love of muscle cars.

Bonnie felt bereft. Her dead grandmother stood in front of her, her past self was inside watching cartoons, and the one constant she'd had throughout this entire century and a half long disaster had just abandoned her. She'd tried to prepare herself, create a distance, but it hadn't worked out as she planned. Her heart ached.

"Come on, baby. Let's get you inside." Bonnie let Grams lead her through the doorway again, and into the kitchen. She put the kettle on before leaving Bonnie for a moment, presumably to check on the younger Bonnie.

Bonnie remembered this from her own childhood. Grams's steady presence bustling around the house talking to herself while Bonnie sat in the living room. She'd been so grateful that her grandmother had left her alone to process in private. Her grief had felt too big for her small body, but she didn't want to share it until she understood it. Later, she would fall asleep crying in her grandmother's warm embrace, but the first few hours of quiet contemplation had always been a blessing.

Grams was back in the kitchen soon enough, pouring each of them a cup. After the tea had steeped for a minute, she took a bottle from the top cabinet and poured more than a dash of rum into her own cup. She glanced back at Bonnie.

"You old enough to drink yet?" Bonnie mutely shook her head. Grams gave her a hard look. "You look like you need it." And she poured a very small amount into Bonnie's tea. She set both mugs on the table and sat across from Bonnie.

"Now, why don't you tell me what's going on. First, what you know about where your mom is. Then we can tackle whatever situation you've gotten yourself into."

"I don't really know anything about where Abby is. I haven't seen her in years. She never came home after this."

"Never came home? Damon said she was safe!"

"Well, she is, I think. I haven't really heard anything in a few years. She's not hurt from today though, not that I know of. I saw her a few times since she left, we did Christmas a couple of times when she was living in Savannah." Bonnie said glumly. She didn't have many memories of her mother that she could offer up to her grandmother. She didn't really know Abby.

Grams took a deep sip from her mug.

"I just don't understand. She left Mystic Falls to draw him away, but she would have died if she failed, and if she succeeded there's no reason not to come back."

"Draw who away? Neither of you ever said anything about any danger."

"A few weeks ago a vampire came to town. He was asking questions about a little girl in your kindergarten class. Her mother is a good friend of Abby's, Miranda Gilbert."

"Elena? A vampire was asking about Elena? She's five years old." Grams nodded. Bonnie felt a chill. Was it Klaus? Already? She thought she would have time to warn the others, to warn her friend, before Klaus or Katherine came, or anyone else in Mystic Falls ever heard the word doppelganger. How had he found Elena so soon? She didn't look like Katherine at all yet!

"She is. But this vampire was something different. He's older than any other I've met, and he could do things I've never seen. Grayson shot him with a stake, straight through the heart, but it didn't kill him. He had vampires compelled to do his bidding, against their will, and he drank from them." Grams shivered. Vampires were unnatural, an imbalance in nature, but this vampire was a greater aberration than most. To drink from others, just for food? And to compel another vampire? Bonnie had never heard of anything like that.

"How is that possible? Did a witch somehow protect him from a stake? Give him extra powers?"

"No, Bonnie. This isn't an extra charm or spell. He is the original vampire."

"What?"

"He called himself Mikael and claimed that he was trying to rid the world of a greater threat than even him. A vampire that has the potential to be a werewolf as well, a hybrid."

"Is that possible?" Bonnie asked. It seemed to be the question of the day. Bonnie cursed herself, for the thousandth time, for not reading the books in Grams's occult library more thoroughly.

"I'd never heard of such a thing, and werewolves are almost extinct besides, but he claimed the creature was his son."

"But what does Elena have to do with any of this?"

"Your friend Elena is part of the supernatural world. She isn't a witch, but something of a magical vessel. She is a doppelganger. According to Mikael, another doppelganger of her line was used to lock his son's werewolf side within. But he's hunting for her, and as long as Elena is alive, and her line continues, there is a chance for his son to find her and use her to unlock his curse."

"He has to sacrifice Elena?" It must be Klaus. Katherine had told her that he was trying to break a curse with the sacrifice of a doppelganger, and Bonnie remembered the rune he'd stood over in that vile cellar. The rune for union. She'd thought he was trying to unlock further powers, to combine his own with the witches he'd killed, but he must have been trying to unlock his own werewolf capabilities.

"He needs her blood to complete the transition. The doppelganger locks his curse away, but also that of every potential hybrid. If he gets his hands on her, he could create an entire new race of monster with her blood."

"Why did Mikael tell you all of this? Do you believe him? I only just learned werewolves are real, to find out that hybrids are possible is a little shocking."

"He was trying to convince the Gilberts to hand Elena over. He knew that they hunted vampires, and he tried to appeal to their sense of the greater good. But they refused."

"Why didn't he just take her?"

"He hasn't been invited in. And the Gilberts are very good at protecting their daughter, and better at knowing when to ask for help. Lucrezia Salvatore provided enough vervain to down an army of vampires, and Abby and I spelled the house so that Mikael couldn't burn it down around them."

"But where is Abby now?"

"Mikael wouldn't give up. He's been waiting for a millennium to kill his son, and a few hunters and witches with a bag of tricks wouldn't deter him. So, we came up with a plan. Abby is far more powerful than me, and she's been the only one who could take him on, even if only for a short time."

"My mother is a witch? A powerful one?"

"Yes. She's the most powerful Bennett for generations."

"She never mentioned magic to me."

"I'm sure there's a reason baby." Grams said, but she looked worried.

"Maybe. So, Abby is going to take on Mikael?"

"Yes, we found a spell that should subdue him. Immediate desiccation. It draws all of the blood from his veins and will immobilize him. There's an old Sommers tomb a little ways to the south, in North Carolina, that we've sealed using an old spell of Emily's. Should keep him under for at least a hundred years, long past when Elena has to worry about him. Abby left last night, with a charmed dummy Elena. Mikael followed"

"Will Abby be able to do it?"

"Abby would do anything for her friends, especially Miranda. But Mikael threatened you too Bonnie. I have no doubt that Abby will do whatever it takes to rid us of Mikael, even if it means she goes down with him."

"But she called Dad and said she wasn't coming home."

"That's another thing that's odd. The Gilberts were supposed to be her first contact unless something went very wrong. They stayed the night in Grayson's office so that no one watching the house would see that Elena was still here in town. Abby should have called them to tell them if it was safe to leave."

"They left. I saw them going home earlier today. She must have called them first."

"That means she's safe!" Grams exuberance contrasted sharply with Bonnie's own depressed tone. Even if her mother had apparently left for a good reason, Bonnie couldn't erase the years of hurt that her mother's absence had dealt.

"Don't look so glum, Bonnie. We'll figure this out. Though it's a relief you've never heard of Mikael, your mother locked him up tight enough that you don't even know he exists."

"I think I would have preferred honesty."

"Hmm. It seems that we could have given you a few more lessons in magic at least. You didn't mean to come here at all, is that right? Why don't you tell me what happened."

"I was stupid. I didn't know what I was doing, and I messed up a spell."

"You shouldn't dabble in magic you don't understand Bonnie, I hope I teach you better than that."

"I don't understand any of it! Not really. Better than I did before at least. But I don't have any teacher. Not anymore. You're gone, Mom left, and Emily taught me what she could, but I barely got any time with her. Dad doesn't get it at all. How am I supposed to understand anything?" Bonnie took a big sip, trying to soothe herself with the warmth of the tea and the rum, and the familiar sight and scent of her grandmother in front of her.

Grams reached out and grasped Bonnie's hand in hers.

"Oh baby, I'm so sorry. I never wanted to leave you when you're so young."

"It's my fault! I made you do the spell and now you're gone!" Bonnie's sobs made her words hard to understand, but Grams seemed to grasp the gist of it, because she left her own seat to wrap her arms around Bonnie.

"Shh, shh, baby girl, no. Nothing is your fault. Shh."

"You don't know! You didn't want to do it, but Damon and Stefan and Elena! I needed to save them, and I made you! I'd barely lit a candle before that; I couldn't take on my fair share. I basically killed you myself."

"Bonnie! You listen to me. I am a grown woman, and I make my own choices. You couldn't make me do anything if you wanted to. Give me the respect of trusting that I can make decisions for myself. I don't know what you asked me to do, but I promise that I knew the consequences when I did it."

Bonnie's sobs quieted but didn't lessen. Her body shook from the force of them and Grams kept a vice like grip around her.

"But Grams! You're gone! Dead!"

"Bonnie, do you know where our magic comes from?"

Bonnie remembered Emily's earliest lessons.

"Nature?"

"Yes, and our connection to it through those we love. A witch is a conduit to Nature, energy made manifest. When we die, we do not simply disappear. Our spirits continue to strengthen Nature, and the witches we leave behind. Know that even after I am gone, I am still with you. Every time you light a candle I am smiling next to you, and every time you cast a spell in defense of yourself I am there, standing behind you."

"How can you say that Grams? When you saw how Damon was? And that I saved his life over yours?"

"Bonnie, my sweet granddaughter. I've known you since the moment I first held you in my arms. I'll admit, it's shocking to see you as you are now, a young woman so grown up before me, but that doesn't mean you are suddenly a stranger. You didn't trade my life for Damon's, we saved your friends. And that's something I don't want you to ever regret."

"Even if they're vampires?" Bonnie asked quietly, twisting the ring around her finger. Grams glanced down at Bonnie's hands, but didn't comment.

"Even if they're vampires." She gave a sharp look, "Now I hope you keep some human friends around, and you could do with another witch to help out with heavy spell casting. But if these vampires make you happy, then I am happy."

"What if they don't? Make me happy I mean."

"Then you should leave Bonnie. But make sure that whatever your choice, whether it be to stay or leave, you are making it for the you of the present. You, not the judgement you think I or your parents would have on your choices, and the present, not some past or some ideal morality you wish you could fully believe."

"Any other pearls of wisdom you want to leave me with?"

"Just one. Remember that I love you, and I always will."

Tears flooded Bonnie's eyes and she threw herself into her grandmother's arms again. She got one last hug, a minute-long tight squeeze full of love and devotion, before she felt the bloodstone burn against her skin.

It was the shortest trip yet, and Bonnie knew, the last.