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Chapter 23
a bird in hand
I speak into the silence.
I toss the stone of my story into a vast crevice;
measure the emptiness by its small sound.
—Carmen Maria Machado
The text Bonnie had managed to type out before pulling away from her house should have appeased Katherine, but it seemed to do the opposite. She could hardly use the GPS on her phone, as the display was continually being lit up by text after text from the vampire.
Following a particularly long string of emojis in the same message as an equally long string of insults, Bonnie gave up. She might not know what an otiose was, or how to pronounce it, but considering it was nestled between cowardly and late, she did not think it was complimentary. Also, she'd missed the exit. With a scowl, Bonnie turned off the GPS and tossed her phone in the backseat. Katherine could buzz at her from back there and suffer Bonnie's lateness as her own fault.
Eventually, with only a little more meandering than necessary, Bonnie made it to their meeting spot. The address was to a bed and breakfast on the edge of town, which hardly seemed Katherine's style, but the clerk had handed over a room key easily enough after Bonnie gave the vampire's name. Bonnie had knocked, but Katherine's lazy "come in" apparently hadn't meant she was actually ready for company. The vampire was sprawled across the unmade bed, stripped down to her bra and underwear, and didn't look like she planned on moving anytime soon.
"Oh, good, Bonnie, you're here. Would you mind handing me my drink?" Katherine gestured to the half-full champagne glass on the bedside table. Bonnie looked between the loosely pointed finger, and the drink that was less than a foot away. She pointedly did not look at any of her friend's other assets. Either Katherine was actually comfortable lounging around in lingerie, or she was trying to provoke Bonnie into reacting. Both were possible, but Bonnie didn't want to give Katherine the satisfaction either way, so she didn't draw any attention to it.
"I think you can manage on your own." Katherine pouted dramatically at Bonnie's deadpan refusal to wait on her.
"Oh Bonnie, why are you no fun? Present-day blues got you down?"
"I think it may have more to do with you murdering my best friend, Katherine."
"Hmm, that's funny. I don't remember committing suicide."
"Remember how you said I was your best friend because I was your only friend? Not an affliction I share. And, just an FYI, I don't stay friends with people who kill my friends!"
"I like how you've admitted you can deal with people who kill people, as long as you don't like their victims. I think this shows some real growth for you."
"Katherine! Be serious!" Bonnie tossed a shirt that lay across a nearby armchair at the vampire. She continued to ignore exactly what the rumpled sheets and scattered clothing suggested. And that the t-shirt she'd just thrown was about five sizes to big to be Katherine's own. Katherine would never be considerate enough to clean her room before she had company over, even if it was to erase the signs of a recent tryst. "What is wrong with you?"
"So, so many things. Is it time for our quarter-century therapy session? I'm glad you brought liquor because we've about cleared Mrs. Flowers out."
Bonnie didn't relinquish the bottle. "Seriously, what do you think you're doing? Showing up and threatening Stefan and Elena? I know you don't care about their relationship. We worked through that thirty years ago. And killing Caroline? That's a step too far, even for you."
"It's not like I really killed her, she perked right up. And I didn't even have to give her any beginner's lessons; she was feeding and compelling at barely an hour old. Honestly, a prodigy. We'll have to keep an eye on her as she gets older, no telling what kind of unsavory types she could attract."
"Stop acting like you're her mom; you murdered her!"
"Oh don't act like you're such a goody-goody yourself. I know you have blood on your hands, and not just from the undead either. Besides, a sire is like a parent in a way. Feed them, teach them, don't fuck them." She counted off on her fingers. "See? I'm practically a parenting guidebook. Besides, you should be proud of me for even thinking about taking responsibility for the baby vamp."
Bonnie could have screamed, but instead she fed her frustration into an aneurism in Katherine's brain. Katherine rolled over onto her back, pulled on the shirt, and propped herself up on her elbows, but didn't show even a single twitch of discomfort.
"I've been around a long time Bonnie. You're gonna have to do better than that."
"Don't worry, I will." Bonnie extended a hand, and Katherine fell out of her carefully cultivated pose. Bonnie pinned the vampire in place on the bed, letting her struggle in vain against Bonnie's magic. She could see Katherine's muscles straining, but she didn't allow her an inch.
"Did you really think that Emily would leave me helpless against you? Or that in a century and a half the Bennetts would never create any spell strong enough to take on the great Katherine Pierce? I'll let you in on a secret, since we're such great friends after all, you're hardly the biggest fish we've gone after, and if you cross me, you'll regret it."
Bonnie caught the hint of a smirk at the edges of Katherine's lips, as if the vampire wanted to laugh. A laugh in derision or in pride? Bonnie didn't want either. She latched on to the blood in Katherine's veins, slowly drawing it out, so that the vampire would feel the start of the gradual desecration process. She would know how it would have felt if she'd been stuck in that tomb. Bonnie meant to hold it for a minute, just to scare Katherine, but only got a second before a powerful wave of magic hit her, forcing Bonnie back and breaking her spell.
Another witch stood in the doorway, ready to leap forward and protect Katherine at a moment's notice. Bonnie glared.
"Who are you?" Bonnie demanded. The other witch didn't answer Bonnie, but Katherine sat up.
"Remember that surprise I mentioned?" Katherine croaked, "here she is." The two witches sized each other up, but neither spoke as Katherine snagged the champagne glass and downed the contents. "Bonnie this is Lucy, Lucy this is Bonnie."
Lucy spoke first.
"I thought you said Bonnie was your friend."
"She is."
"Funny way of showing it."
"Let it go, Lucy. It's alright. We're all friends here. Sometimes Bonnie just likes to bite a bit to show affection, which I can certainly relate to. Besides, I did kind of have it coming. Let me savor this moment though; as soon as I share the next bit you'll be picking her side over mine."
"Why?"
"Let's try this again. Bonnie this is Lucy Bennett, Lucy this is Bonnie Bennett."
Lucy immediately relaxed and stepped further into the room. Bonnie wasn't so hasty, but she sank carefully into the empty armchair after seeing that the room's other occupants weren't going to attack her anytime soon.
"I don't understand. Wasn't she supposed to offer a truce?" Lucy directed her words at Katherine, who shrugged.
"Truce, or pin me to the bed and threaten me? Not exactly shocked either way. I've gotten used to how you Bennetts are in the bedroom." She winked at Lucy, who laughed.
"Why would you think I was here to offer a truce?" Bonnie interrupted.
"Bonnie, just because I can't get into houses without an invitation, doesn't mean I can't listen from outside of them."
"You were listening outside my window? Creepy."
"Well since you oh-so-helpfully swooped in for Caroline in her time of vulnerability, I can't threaten her for information, so now I have to do the legwork myself."
"Wow, the caring tone there really sold it. But you having to do your own legwork? How dreadful."
"It is, Bonnie, it is. At least as dreadful as your inability to follow through on your peace plan."
Bonnie fiddled with her necklace. The golden setting securely held the last piece of the bloodstone, and dangling on the gold chain next to it was the dual-pearl ring. Now that she knew the necklace's true origins, she didn't feel guilty stringing Damon's first gift on the same thread.
"Negotiating has never been my strong suit." Bonnie said with a shrug. Katherine actually laughed.
"No, you and Damon are alike in that way. You let your emotions carry you away. Though when you actually should let your emotions lead you're weighed down by martyrdom."
"I'm hardly a martyr."
"Well certainly not for anything important."
"What are you talking about?"
"The walls have ears, Bonnie, remember? I know all about how you're going to lay your feelings aside so that Damon can relentlessly pursue my dull as dishwater doppelganger."
"Katherine, are we really going to talk about this now?"
Sensing the tension in the room, Lucy interrupted.
"How about lunch? I can order a pizza?" She asked leadingly, but neither Katherine nor Bonnie responded, choosing to continue their stare down. "Okay, then. I can see you have some things to talk over alone. I'll give you a few minutes." She bent and pressed a quick kiss to Katherine's lips. Bonnie could see that Katherine tried to deepen it, to hold Lucy there, but the witch pushed her away with a laugh. "Don't kill each other while I'm gone! And don't open that bottle until I'm back; it is way too strong to drink on an empty stomach."
Lucy waved as she left, seemingly amused by their confrontation. To leave them alone, she must have trusted Bonnie enough by her name, and Katherine enough by their…relationship to believe they wouldn't do any serious harm to each other without her there to prevent injuries. Bonnie eyed Katherine on the bed, who sported swollen lips and a challenging stare, and doubted the other Bennett's decision. Knowing Katherine had seduced her relative hadn't exactly improved her standing in Bonnie's good books.
Bonnie couldn't judge Lucy for sleeping with a vampire, considering her own feelings for Damon, but she would have hoped any cousin of hers would have better taste. Katherine was hardly someone to take home to your family.
"You can put your judgmental face away; we're just friends." Katherine said, like Bonnie hadn't just seen their lip lock.
"Really, friends?" she answered with a raised eyebrow.
"Okay, yes. The type of friends who sleep together when we're in the same city. There's nothing wrong with that. Not all of us could remain chaste for a century and a half."
"It was a week for me! A week!" Bonnie exclaimed. Katherine tutted in response.
"I'll give you that a week is better than a century, but Bonnie, come on. All the self-denial is not healthy. You know what you want. Reach out, take it!"
"I'm not here to get relationship advice from you."
"Well you brought rakia, despite you hating it. I assumed it was your turn to unburden your heart. Was that not the plan?"
"No, this is, you know, a peace offering."
"It goes well with the attack. Really lets me know you're committed."
"Can I remind you that you killed my friend? Not exactly a good opening on your end either."
"Oh please, you're going to forgive me if you're trying to convince me to be friends and work with you against Klaus."
"We don't have to be friends; allies would be enough. And requires no forgiveness."
"Allies? Don't kid yourself, Bonnie. You could never work with someone just as an ally. You're all or nothing, all the time."
"So you think I should just forgive you because I need you? Friends are supposed to be more than a transaction, Katherine."
"No, you should get over your issue because you need me and because you like me."
"Maybe. But I can't trust you, Katherine. Not after what you did to Caroline."
"Can you stop using Caroline as an excuse? She's already over it. We're texting right now."
"What? How did you even get her number?"
Katherine shrugged. "I didn't. She texted me." She tossed her unlocked phone towards Bonnie, who picked it up off the bed. Katherine had left her conversation with Caroline open. It began with Caroline's usual paragraph of an introduction, to which Katherine had responded with—
"This is just three addresses and a link to a metal plated bra." Bonnie said flatly.
"Yes, to block stakes! Doesn't this show I'm caring?"
"This barely covers the model's nipples. I'm pretty sure you could get a stake past it."
Katherine shrugged. "I didn't want to send her something ugly. It may need a bit of modification to actually protect her, but you can't tell your children everything. Some things have to be learned the hard way."
"A stake through the heart is not one of those things."
"Ugh fine. I'll text her a disclaimer. And I think there's still a traditional armorer in New York. I'll send Caroline her number."
"Why would she even need an armorer? Stakes barely came up in my supernatural overview. For some reason she was more worried about pillows and evil clones, imagine that."
"Some newborns are paranoid; I'm trying to be considerate here, Bonnie." Katherine said, ignoring the latter half of Bonnie's statement entirely. The witch huffed but decided to let it go. For now.
"And the addresses?"
"The three closest Red Cross blood distribution centers to Mystic Falls. I even included the password to their computer system, so she can figure out which blood is being discarded. Waste not, want not."
"That is actually…really nice of you, Katherine."
"Can't have her blowing our cover. Besides, if I didn't intervene she might end up following in Stefan's footsteps and that," Katherine gave a dramatic shudder, "is just unnatural."
The disturbed look on her face was so genuine, so sincerely unsettled by Stefan's dietary choices, that Bonnie couldn't help the snort of a laugh that escaped her.
The corner of Katherine's lips quirked in response, and it was at this moment that Lucy re-entered the room. Despite her earlier exit statement, she didn't have any pizza. Instead, she'd acquired a plate of sandwiches and a bottle of wine.
"Looks like you two worked it out." Lucy said.
Bonnie started to shake her head, started to say that absolutely nothing had been worked out because Katherine had killed her friend and shown no remorse or any plan for repentance. But was Bonnie angry about that, or was she angry because of how clearly she could still see Damon's face when he saw Katherine's name come across her phone? The hurt and stark betrayal in his eyes, before they were quickly buried under anger and he'd backed away from her?
Caroline was ready to forget and forgive, already embracing immortality and her new opportunities. She'd taken to the supernatural world like a duck to water and was ready to start anew with Katherine despite the other vampire's very active role in her own death. If she could do that, Bonnie could hardly carry on the grudge herself. But if Bonnie couldn't hold that against Katherine, what was left except Katherine's betrayal of the Salvatore brothers, of Damon? And that was hardly supportable, it was like getting angry at a scorpion for stinging. No, her anger was not at Katherine for acting as her nature dictated.
Because as Bonnie looked at Katherine, still lounging on the bed, and Lucy, her newfound family standing in the door, she could admit that it wasn't Katherine she was angry with at all. Bonnie was angry with herself. Angry that she'd never told Damon the truth. Angry that she'd backed away from every opportunity she had to do so, because she was protecting her heart from a future that was her past. Angry that, in her very fear of it, she'd created that future. And she was angry that now, with all the cards on the table, she was so scared of rejection that she'd run away from Damon, twice, instead of facing her own feelings for him. Reach out, take it Katherine said. As if it were easy.
"Yeah," Bonnie said. She crossed the room and plucked a sandwich off the top of the pile. Turkey. "We worked it out."
Bonnie sat down on the edge of the bed. Katherine leaned over to nudge her arm. Katherine was confused, that much was clear, but she wasn't asking any questions about Bonnie's change of heart. No, Katherine Pierce was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth. She'd take Bonnie's forgiveness and friendship without ever inquiring after them in earnest. The furthest she'd go was this nudge, this one look. Bonnie shook her head. She didn't want her internal confusion out there for anyone to see. She had to sort through it on her own first.
"All that's left to decide is whether we're opening the rakia or the wine first. Opinions?" Katherine said easily.
"It's not even noon." Bonnie protested.
Lucy laughed as Katherine rolled her eyes dramatically. "Fine, we'll wait the," Katherine checked the bedside table clock with an exaggerated motion, "thirteen minutes left until twelve so that you won't feel guilty about drinking. That means you're up Lucy. Budge up Bonnie, make room."
"Great, let me just grab my notes." Lucy put down the plate of sandwiches and started digging through one of the suitcases lying open around the room.
Bonnie gingerly moved further onto the bed, as Katherine sat up and fluffed a few pillows to lean on. Bonnie sat on top of the rumpled covers and did not move a thing. She didn't want to know if there was anything hidden in the sheets.
"What is she getting notes on?"
"My surprise, remember? That's how you start peace negotiations, Bonnie, with a gift. I know you tried, but mine is much better than a bottle of alcohol. Just look at her."
"You brought me a cousin as a peace offering?"
"No, I brought you the research of your cousin. Lucy studies magical phenomena, and she's something of a scholar on you."
"Me? But how?"
Lucy emerged from her luggage victorious, clutching a folder bulging with loose papers.
"Found them!" She said and spilled the folder's contents across the bed as she took a seat as well.
With the three of them cross-legged on the bed, it felt a bit like an odd sleepover. Except instead of Tiger Beat magazines and notebook pages full of MASH fortunes, the bed was covered in old photos, scans of diaries, footnoted essays, and a timeline scotch taped together.
"Everywhere you went," Lucy started, "you left behind a ripple. Think of it like a magical footprint, but, well, a lot bigger than a footprint. Witches could feel it, and early research was primarily tracking grimoire and journal mentions on the days of your appearances. It was later linked to Damon Salvatore, but through some," Lucy paused, lips pursed, "less than savory means in the fifties, it was determined that the vampire was not the source of the phenomenon."
Bonnie shivered. Damon had said his captors were vampire hunters, or something like them. Bonnie had pictured them as an old-timey founder's council, with a few evil white lab coats thrown in. But Lucy was suggesting that it wasn't just sadistically curious humans involved in the experiments Damon had suffered under. Had those years, that horror he'd endured as he hoped for her rescue, been her fault too?
Lucy took her silence as acceptance, and continued her explanation.
"I was the one who started looking into the Bennett connection, because I knew that Damon Salvatore had been charged with protecting our line. It made sense that he would be present for something like this, even when he wasn't the cause."
"Hurry up, she doesn't need the literature review Lucy, get to the magic explanation." Katherine interjected. Bonnie found herself agreeing.
"Yes, Katherine told me Emily said something about Expression?"
Lucy nodded. "Katherine told me that as well, and it helped me pin down what Emily did, but it's not Expression. I see why Emily would have used that branch of magic when trying to explain this though. Are you familiar with it?"
Bonnie shook her head.
"Thank Nature for that. It's hard to come back from. Expression requires a very specific sacrifice to be undertaken with purpose and without remorse. Once these three sacrifices are carried out, the triangle tears a hole in Nature itself, allowing the witch at the center near limitless power. But it also tears at the soul of that witch. It has to, or the wielder could never tap into the power, their own soul would hold them back. The power; that's the give. But there's a take too, and it's not just a little hole in the soul. Witches who use Expression nearly always lose themselves; they no longer have bonds to nature, their covens, or themselves to hold them back from completely cannibalizing their own magic and soul accidentally."
"And this is…not that? Right?" Bonnie certainly didn't feel like she'd lost her soul, not that she knew what that would feel like. But her bonds to her coven, the bonds she hadn't even been aware she'd forged before her trip, were stronger than ever. Even the one that ran between Bonnie and Katherine.
Lucy shook her head. "The spell that Emily started, and you continued on your way back here, is the opposite of Expression. You weren't the cause of any of the tragedies you visited, but none of them were accidents. Murders, massacres, even the club fire was caused by a human valuing a few bucks over the safety of others."
"So I was supposed to stop them? Sometimes I never even got the chance to try."
"No, Bonnie, you weren't there to stop them. You were there to mourn them. You were acting as a human anchor, not just for the tomb spell, but for Nature. You acted as a focus for the grief at each act. It fed the bloodstone, you can probably still feel that power in your talisman now, but it also helped mend Nature after each heinous event. You're now bound to Nature more closely than ever. Like I said, the very opposite of Expression. A circle, instead of a triangle if you will."
"How poetic."
"No need to snark at things you don't understand, Katherine."
"But I do it so well!"
"Yeah you do, and I love sarcasm, but maybe pipe down for now."
"So quick to cast me aside now that your thesis subject is here, huh?"
"Come on, Katherine." Lucy groaned exasperatedly and Katherine tossed her hair but let up.
Bonnie took her chance to interpose.
"When Emily and I performed the tomb spell, we tied it to her bloodstone, the one from 1864. Are you telling me that we also tied it to me?"
"Most likely. Emily didn't exactly take notes about that night, didn't have the time, but that's what makes the most sense."
"But what about Damon? Why was he always there, if it was the events that were bringing me to each point in time?" And why, when he needed her to come, had she overshot him by three decades?
"The Damon Salvatore factor is a bit more complicated. You were bound as coven members, as you were with Katherine and Stefan, so your magic deemed him a good constant, a safe harbor so to speak."
"Because of the witch's oath he swore to Emily?"
"That was my original theory, but since she broke her word before you travelled back in time, that actually wouldn't protect you. It wasn't any witch's oath; it was just you. You had three options to act as your constant, Stefan, Katherine, or Damon. You must have felt the safest with him, and your magic did the rest."
"And don't think I'm not offended Bonnie!" Katherine interjected, but Bonnie ignored her.
"So I wasn't there because of him? He was at each disaster because of me?"
And in the fifties there'd been no one to grieve him. Bonnie's own pain the day her mother left must have drawn her to Mystic Falls in the nineties, but Damon had been tortured without anyone but the torturers knowing. Whoever had done that to him had not felt any grief over the fact. There had been nothing for Bonnie, for the bloodstone, the tomb, or Nature, to focus. Just cold calculation and Damon's unending agony.
Lucy nodded. "Nature has a way of making things fit."
"It was me the whole time. That makes sense. He never really had a choice." Bonnie had mostly been talking to herself, but Katherine had never met a conversation she wouldn't barge into.
"I'm going to stop you right there. Now usually I would be pushing you for self-sacrifice, because it's a useful trait for my friends to have. But Bonnie, this is ridiculous, and more importantly, it doesn't benefit me at all."
"Wow."
"You, more than anyone, knew what you were signing up for when you became my friend. Now, Bonnie, listen to me. You are the main character of your own life. No one has to live with your choices but you, so you might as well go after what you want. Think about it; what do you want?"
"Well…I…"
"Bonnie, the relationship you and Damon have, it doesn't come around every day, or even every decade. It's rare, but it is not infallible. It takes work, from both people. Right now, Damon is the only one holding it together, and he won't be able to forever. You don't even know how fragile it is right now. Believe me, I've lost the same chance you're giving up. Bonnie, don't throw this away."
"Katherine…" Bonnie began, unsure how to ask for more. Behind Katherine's blasé façade was a real person, with feelings, despite what the vampire would have others believe most of the time. Her friend had five hundred years of life behind her, more than Bonnie could even wrap her head around. Who was it, in all of those lifetimes, that Katherine regretted letting go? Could she have been telling the truth? Was it Stefan? Was it Klaus's brother, the original she'd modeled Stefan after? Or some other person, someone Katherine had met in the intervening years, met, loved and lost, without Bonnie ever being the wiser?
"Whatever, think about it, okay? I can't handle any more feelings or lessons today, and I'm horny anyway; I'm going to go find Mason."
"Mason Lockwood?" Bonnie asked automatically. "But I thought…aren't you two," She stumbled as she realized it was none of her business, and that, actually, she really did not want to know. "sharing this room?" She finished lamely, desperate to brush this all under the rug and move on.
"A witch, a werewolf, and a vampire, and there was only one bed!" Katherine's faux shock was punctuated with a hand over her mouth as it opened in an exaggerated gasp. "Whatever would they do?" She laughed at Bonnie's surprise, and actually leaned over to ruffle Bonnie's hair. "You're too cute. I'm almost jealous of Damon for all the fun you two will have."
Before Bonnie could take offense, the vampire was off the bed and squeezing herself into a pair of dark skinny jeans. After a few hops, she buttoned them up and grabbed a jacket. She stooped to give Lucy a deep kiss before bouncing out of the room.
"Don't forget to explain the ritual for me too! Thanks, I'll owe you one, but also not really! Bye!" Katherine's voice grew distant as she descended the stairs. Lucy sighed in exasperation and Bonnie shifted awkwardly.
"So, the three of you…?"
"Yes, but that's not important."
"I know we just met, but you're my family, Lucy. I don't want you to get hurt. Katherine, she's—"
"You don't have to warn me about Katherine. This is just a bit of fun, I know not to get emotionally involved, and I'm not."
"You're sure?" Bonnie asked, remembering her own assurances to Stefan the night of the first founder's ball.
"Both Katherine and I are sleeping with Mason Lockwood, that's true. But we plan to sacrifice him as part of the ritual that breaks Klaus's curse. I'm very sure I'm not emotionally involved." Lucy shared in a remarkably even tone.
"What?" Bonnie exclaimed. She definitely needed to get to know her family more. And maybe stop trusting her witchy-spidey-senses so much.
Lucy held up a pacifying hand.
"I think I should start from the beginning."