One second Damon was getting impaled by Brenna on the shore and the next he was somewhere entirely different – he was somewhen entirely different. Based off the clothes he was wearing now he'd guess Old Scotland but the year he wasn't even going to try and guess. All that mattered was finding Blair's life in this time so that's what he set out to do.
Damon walked through the dense forest not knowing where he was going but feeling like he was going the right way. He stepped out of the tree line and as soon as he did a herd of deer took off like a shot. A second later an arrow shot past his head and hit one of deer. Damon turned around to see where the arrow had come from and there stood a woman wearing a deep blue dress and a dark cloak holding a bow in her hand. What drew him first was the flowing fire atop her head but his eyes then met hers and he knew who this was.
"Kin ye nae hear me?" Ailia asked as she approached him with fire in her bones. "Wur ye trying tae friten th' entire herd wi' yer stomping aboot?"
It took Damon a second to understand what she was trying to say. It was the same as before when the people were talking around him in Brenna's lifetime – like the spell was trying to translate it for it. "What was that?" This time when she spoke, he could understand her without a problem.
"Were you trying to frighten off the entire herd with your stomping about?" Ailia asked again, clearly annoyed with this man. "If I didn't get one, I would have skinned you instead."
Damon's eyes went wide as he watched her pass him. He could definitely see Blair in her or maybe it was that he had seen a lot of whoever this life was in Blair and just didn't know it. "Seriously?"
Ailia knelt next to the deer and removed the arrow before saying a praying and killing the animal to end the suffering. "I am not a cannibal if that is what you're asking." She stood up and finally got a real look at the one who had annoyed her so much. There was something familiar about him but she couldn't place it just yet. "You're not from around here, are you?"
"No," Damon replied and moved closer to her. "What's your name?"
"Ailia," she answered and turned the question back on him. "What's your name?"
A wide smile spread across his face as he told her. "Damon."
Ailia's eyes shot open as a flash of Brenna's life entered her mind and the only plausible explanation came to pass. "Vampire!" she hissed and quickly notched another arrow.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Damon held out his hands to show he meant her no harm. "I'm not a Vampire…at the moment." When Ailia took firmer aim he realized he was digging his hole deeper.
Ailia shot one of her arrows right into his shoulder and when he dropped to the ground in pain she went over to him, yanked on the back of his hear, and pressed a wooden stake over his heart. "Are you one of his minions?" she demanded to know. "Did they send you to kill me?!"
"I'm human," Damon groaned. "I swear. Come on, Miss Ailia, you don't want to kill me…again."
Ailia looked at his hands, wrists, and neck for any sign of the jewelry that could allow the Vampire kind to walk in the light but found none there. It didn't make any sense – she saw this man, killed this man as Brenna all those years ago and yet here he was. She wanted answers – needed them.
Ailia returned the stake to her belt and twisted the arrow, making him groan in pain a bit. "What are you?"
Damon chuckled a bit. "Now, you see, that's where things get a bit complicated." He remembered the warning Blair gave him right before the spell was cast – Her lives would feel manipulated if he told them about the spell in the future. Damon wasn't about to risk losing any headway he may be making so he answered with, "I guess you could say I'm kind of like you. Same soul moving from one person to the next upon death and doing it all over again."
Ailia never told anyone about he 'affliction' and yet this man somehow knew. This did not sit well. "How do you know what I am?"
Damon raised his free hand to point at her face. "I can see it in your eyes."
Ailia couldn't explain it but she trusted his words and thus regretted her hasty actions. She couldn't be too careful though, not with the Vampire family being so close by. "I trust your words but this does not mean I trust you." She pulled the arrow out of Damon's shoulder without warning and looked at him oddly when he laughed while coughing and groaning from pain. "What do you find so amusing?"
"You are a lot like her," Damon replied as Ailia proceeded to tend to his wound.
"Brenna was not of the right mind." Ailia thought that was who he was talking about. "She was afflicted, tortured by inner demons. I am nothing like her."
"I wasn't talking about Brenna," Damon admitted but was cut off when Ailia pressed something into the wound that made it burn. "I've forgotten how slow humans heal."
"For your own safety, I would refrain from speaking of Vampires," Ailia warned him.
"Is everyone around here aware of them?" Damon asked, admiring the fiery head of hair she had in this life.
"No," Ailia informed him, "but I am aware and…" she tied the wrap with extra force as she said her last piece, "I hunt them."
"Where are we going?" Damon asked as he followed Ailia and the deer she was dragging behind her through the woods.
"My camp," Ailia answered. "The Vampire family is not too pleased with my…hunting activities. I stay in the woods to keep others from being harmed."
"Don't you think all this blood of mine will attract them?" Damon asked, checking on his shoulder wound. When Ailia didn't answer he stopped and looked right at her as she turned around and faced him. "Don't tell me – You're using me as bait."
"Alright." Ailia turned around and returned walking. "I won't tell you."
"What if I told you that you that once upon a life or two you fall in love with me?" Damon asked as he resumed following. "Would that keep you from trying to get me killed?"
Ailia sighed and stopped to face him again. "I am not trying to get you killed. I am trying to kill their minions."
They reached the campsite at that moment and she started tending to the deer.
Damon sat down on the rock near the unlite fire and found something curious. "You keep saying 'they'. Who are 'they'?"
Ailia stopped what she was doing, wiped her hands off on a stained rag, and sat down on the rock across from him. "They are my problem. If their minions follow your blood trail, then they will become your problem too. If that time comes, we can revisit this conversation then."
Damon didn't think he was taking a shot in the dark when he asked, "Is it Klaus?"
Ailia's face hardened at the mention of the name but did not answer. Instead, she turned a question to him. "How much did you learn about Brenna?"
Damon grunted in discomfort as he shifted before answering. "Elijah called her his brother's pet. What did he mean by that?"
"Brenna was Klaus'…guard dog, you could say." Ailia started working on the fire as she spoke now. "Brenna's life did not acclimate to the past memories well and could not process the fact he and his siblings were now monsters. She remembered them as the humans Tatia once knew and was determined to protect them. When Elijah revealed his Vampire half to her, she was reminded and tried to kill him. He killed her for that."
Ailia held her hands over the freshly lit campfire. "I better tend to the stag before the light fades."
Damon didn't try to stop her and remained quiet, going over the current situation. Not only that, he was going over what could happen if Ailia's plan did work and he was successfully used as bait.
It was the middle of the night when Damon was woken by Ailia jabbing him in the ribs with her foot. "What's wrong?" he asked, pushing himself into a sitting position on the ground.
"What did you mean?" Ailia asked, standing above him. "When you said once upon a life or two I fall in love with you – What did you mean?"
"Do you believe in soulmates?" Damon asked, and she must have become intrigued because she sat cross legged across from him. "I believe that is what we are."
"Tatia believed that is what she and Klaus were," Ailia countered. "I do not believe this, but she did. And if my soul has already been claimed then what makes you believe you and I are?" She was curious to hear his theory on this.
Damon knew Blair told him not to tell her past lives about the spell and how he was from the future and stuff but there was something about Ailia that made him think that she would understand. In fact, he was just about to tell her everything when a nearby snap of a branch was heard by them.
Ailia brought her finger to her lips to shush him and stood with bow raised. As soon as she felt in her gut she had a shot, she took it and hit something. She was about to fire another when she turned around at the sound of a struggle. A Vampire was going after Damon so she quickly acted and drove a wooden stake right into its back and straight into the Vampire's heart.
"Thanks," Damon replied and picked up another wooden weapon just as several more Vampires came into the light and surrounded them. "Was this part of your plan?"
"They didn't have this many before," Ailia replied, really not liking the odds.
"You overestimated your skill, Ailia," Kol's voice said as he walked through the crowd of Vampires. "My brother is intrigued with you, however. So, I am here with a deal. You and your friend can live if you come back with me."
"She's not going anywhere with you," Damon said fimly as he moved protectively in front of Ailia.
"Perhaps not." Kol grinned wickedly as an idea came to his mind. "Not while you are alive."
"No!" Ailia screamed out, just knowing what Kol was up to, and tried to fight off the Vampires but there were too many. Ailia was grabbed by two of the Vampires and held firm as she was made to watch Kol rip out Damon's heart. "No!" she said with such fire, feeling an unexpected sense of loss.
Before Kol did this, Damon could have put up a fight but he didn't. There was something in Ailia's eyes that revealed she felt something or was at least starting to. If Kol did kill him on Klaus' behalf then that could work in Damon's favor in turning Blair's soul against Klaus. Hoping he was right, he let it happen. Besides, if he was wrong then at least he had more of her lives to make up for it…
End Journey 2 - Ailia