Title: Footsteps of a Traveler
Author: Traxits
Chapter Rating: Teen for mild sexual tension.
Chapter Content Notes: Mild sexual tension, kissing.
Chapter Word Count: 4078 words.
Author's Notes: After over two years hiatus, I think I might be planning on finally finishing this story! We'll see. I also feel the need to point out that for this story, I set the beginning of Wings of a Butterfly about midway through Season Two, somewhere around episode fourteen. This means that Jeremy's information could be inaccurate according to current canon! He is limited by what he knows and understands up to that point.

Please reread chapter two before reading this chapter! I added a new scene to the end of it on 12/19/12 that contains a major plot point, and this chapter will not make sense unless you read that scene first!

[[ … Chapter 3: Flickering … ]]

Eventually, Jeremy had to go back home, but it didn't mean that Damon had to let him out of his sight, especially not with the memory of Jeremy vanishing like that right there, so fresh in his mind. So when Jeremy headed home and went upstairs, Damon smiled as he spotted the window open. He didn't need more invitation than that, and he crawled inside, perching on the edge of Jeremy's bed. Jeremy smiled shakily at him, and Damon let him wander around the room for a few minutes, poking things and dropping his bag and setting out books for the illusion that maybe he was actually going to think about homework tonight. Then Damon held out a hand and Jeremy looked at him, swallowed, and came to him. Damon pulled him down onto the bed, and he leaned in close, his lips brushing against Jeremy's throat.

He could feel Jeremy's pulse picking up, and he licked lightly, his eyes closing for it. So good, so vulnerable, so trusting.

"Damon," Jeremy breathed, and Damon hummed softly, not pulling back. If anything, he found himself pulling Jeremy closer, his fingers sliding up Jeremy's back, touching him because he was there, because this was real and after one hundred and forty five years, he could touch Jeremy again. Jeremy made this low little noise, and Damon scraped his teeth over his neck lightly.

He wouldn't bite him there. Not where it would be seen. Not where Jeremy might have to explain anything. He could give Jeremy his blood to heal it, but... he wanted Jeremy to wear his bite. He wanted to be able to brush his fingers over it and see the little flush that he bet would come up in Jeremy's face for the reminder. But it didn't stop him from teasing, and Jeremy made another sound, this one edging onto a breathy moan. Damon wanted to know what other noises he could get out of Jeremy like this.

"Damon, wait, we... what're we doing? Just pretending it didn't happen?"

That was a wash of cold down Damon's back, and he pulled back with a sigh, narrowing his eyes and raising an eyebrow at Jeremy. "Can you? Pretend it didn't happen?"

"Well, no—"

"There's your answer then." Damon's teeth gritted at the thought. He'd much rather just have Jeremy, not think about the idea that he might just vanish like that all over again and there was nothing he could do. Again. He hated feeling helpless. His hands dug in against Jeremy's back.

"Damon..." Jeremy blinked at him, and then he shook his head, and he leaned in close, reaching up, his fingers tangling in Damon's shirt on his side. "I don't want it to happen again. This is weird enough. I don't need that too."

"It's not going to happen again," Damon said immediately, his hold tightening. Jeremy's mouth tensed, and Damon was holding on too tight, he could tell, but hell if he could make himself let go. Not when he hadn't gotten to touch Jeremy in so long. "It isn't."

"You can't know that, Damon," Jeremy said quietly, and Damon swallowed, leaning in to press his face against Jeremy's throat. He grazed his teeth over Jeremy's pulse again. He could taste the lake on his skin. Taste that last night he'd been human on Jeremy's skin, and it was addictive, knowing that for Jeremy it had only been the other night.

He didn't have the memories Stefan did of what Damon had done, what he'd become, didn't even have the memories that this Jeremy had possessed, when Damon had been struggling to figure out exactly what was going on. Compelling Jeremy had been easy, even easier when he realized that this Jeremy didn't know about vampires yet. But it... it hadn't been his Jeremy. The one in his arms now was. This Jeremy had fought beside him in the trenches, had sparred with Katherine and Giuseppe and had helped vampires escape their deaths on that fateful night.

He'd been the one to feed Damon, make certain that he survived.

"I can't," he said lowly, and his throat tightened, threatening to cut the words off, "lose you."

"Again. I know. I can't... You won't, Damon," Jeremy whispered, and his voice was steadier than it really should have been. "I don't wanna go anywhere but here."

"Good," Damon murmured, and he pulled Jeremy's shirt down some, stretching out the collar so that he could get his mouth on Jeremy's shoulder. "I don't plan on letting you."

Jeremy whined very slightly, and Damon's gaze lifted just in time to watch his eyes close. He scraped his teeth over the skin on Jeremy's shoulder, and just as he started to consider biting him, he heard the front door open. His own eyes closed for a second before he pulled back. Jeremy blinked, lips parted slightly as he dragged in a breath, and he looked up at him, brow furrowing in confusion.

"Someone's home," Damon responded with a wry smile, and he drew back a little from Jeremy, sinking down to sit on the edge of the bed. He'd hear them if they started toward his bedroom door, so he wasn't worried about getting out in time. He just didn't want them walking in and Jeremy looking like that, flushed and breathing just a little hard. That was for him, and it was something he didn't plan on sharing with anyone.

He'd get Jeremy alone somewhere soon, he promised himself, somewhere that he could lay him out and really drink him in.

"Oh," Jeremy said after a moment, and he licked his bottom lip, glancing toward the door before he nodded. "Probably Elena."

"Or your father," Damon offered, raising an eyebrow.

"He... Maybe. I don't know his schedule now. Used to, he was at the hospital until late. Sometimes, Mom would go and get him just to keep him from being there all night." Jeremy dropped onto the bed beside him, sighing as he started to fold his legs under him. He stopped just long enough to kick his shoes off, and then he was sitting cross-legged, shrugging. For another minute, they were both quiet, and then Jeremy asked, his voice low, "Why didn't you kill her?"

Damon reached out to brush his hair back from his face, and he hummed a short, tuneless note. "Who?"

"Anna."

Damon tensed at her name, but Jeremy was looking at him, focused on him, one hand slowly coming up to brush his fingers against Damon's, so maybe there was nothing to be jealous about, maybe it was all in his head.

"She... she said she stole the journal. I'm surprised that... well."

"That I didn't tear her ass to pieces?" Damon finished, and he laughed. It wasn't a particularly pleasant laugh, but Jeremy didn't flinch at the sound of it, didn't pull away from him. Instead, he just nodded as he shifted how he was sitting so that he could inch a little closer. Damon snorted. "Started to. Injected her with vervain and locked her up." He'd been planning on starving her first, really driving home the fact that she shouldn't have messed with him, and touching that journal... well. Touching it was a death sentence anyway.

Jeremy nodded, and he leaned closer, his eyes narrowing. "What changed your mind?"

Damon's eyes drifted back over to him, and he smiled slightly at the curiosity on Jeremy's face. It wasn't laced with the horror that he expected, and part of him wanted to test that, wanted to tell him everything, one terrible thing at a time, just to see what it would take to twist that expression into the same look that Stefan had given him over the years. That Zach still gave him when he thought Damon wasn't paying him any attention.

"She said you saved her," he explained, and he wasn't sure that anyone else would understand, but Jeremy's expression smoothed out and he smiled, like he really did get it. "And I remembered how you looked at her. Your first, right?"

"Not like that," Jeremy said quickly, smile widening into a grin. "She was the first vampire that I really... that I knew she was a vampire. She was the one who taught me about them. You. About you." His fingers curled instinctively, and Damon reached for his hand, pulled it up to his mouth and licked across the scar there. Jeremy's eyes slid half closed, and he made another very slight whining noise for the drag of Damon's tongue over the skin. "Back before I messed everything up, I mean. This Anna... she doesn't really know me or anything. And hell, she's probably a completely different person now. Her mother survived. She didn't get locked under the church for forever."

Damon drew back from Jeremy's hand, raising an eyebrow sharply. "Under the church?"

Jeremy blinked, nodded, and he met Damon's eyes evenly. "Yeah. Originally, Emily cast a spell to protect the vampires under the church. It was supposed to save Katherine. But she didn't have time this go around. I got her away from the church too early."

"So Katherine..."

"She isn't dead, Damon. Not... I mean, okay, obviously, she's a vampire, but she wasn't killed in the church." Jeremy sighed, pulling away from Damon to turn and prop his feet up on the edge of the bed frame, his arms folding over his knees. "She was never in the church to begin with. She bribed one of the guards to get her out before they put her under there."

Damon looked at Jeremy for a long moment, trying to decide exactly how he felt about that, about Katherine and this whole mess that had become his unlife. It was funny, when he'd first started picturing this, he'd had a very different view of his future. He reached up and rubbed his forehead for just a second before he wrapped his arm over Jeremy's shoulders and pulled him in close. Jeremy stiffened and only relaxed after Damon made it obvious that he wasn't about to let him go anytime soon.

"Too bad," he finally said, and Jeremy twisted to look up at him. "I mean it."

"I... really? I thought you... you and she... you were so flirty back in 1863..."

Damon waved one of his hands, and Jeremy smiled faintly, gaze sliding down to stare at the carpet before he nodded, recognizing Damon's 'drop it' attitude.

"In any case, I don't know what all has changed here, Damon. I mean, I assume that under the church wasn't saved, but I guess Emily could have had time to cast the spell before I found her? I know she used the comet last time for that too. You needed a crystal—"

"What sort of crystal?"

"Some ugly brown crystal. You used Caroline to get it in my timeline. It was hidden somewhere, and Caroline managed to get it for you but she ended up giving it to Bonnie. Why are you asking?"

Damon hesitated, and then he shrugged, shifting on the bed until he was leaning back against the headboard and he could pull Jeremy in to lean against his chest. "Emily gave me a crystal back then. Told me to hold onto it. Said I'd need it."

Jeremy pushed off Damon's chest, looking back up at him sharply. "What for?"

"She never said. Just said I'd need it."

"What if... what if she tied me to it? Like she did the original spell for under the church? What if it would keep me from—"

Before Jeremy could say it, he flickered again, fading out of sight for just a second before he came back, and when he came back, Damon growled and held him too tight. He could practically feel Jeremy's wrist bruising under his hand, and Jeremy hissed between his teeth but he didn't fight Damon exactly. He didn't even try to get away from him, just looked at him, and Damon's hand opened suddenly, letting him go. The bruises were dark against his pale skin, and Damon blew out a breath before he bit his wrist and held it up to Jeremy's mouth.

He hesitated for a second, looking up at Damon, but before Damon could prompt him, he dipped his head down and licked the blood off his skin. There was a sharp coil of heat through him at the sight, and when Jeremy drew back, Damon wrapped a hand tight in his hair and pulled him up to kiss him. He was kissing his own blood out of Jeremy's mouth, and he growled very slightly for it. Jeremy was all pretty compliance, going wherever Damon pulled him.

He had no sense of self-preservation.

Damon pulled back after a heartbeat, and then he murmured lowly, "I hid it. The crystal. It's in the Fell house."

Jeremy was breathing hard as he nodded. "Founder's party," he said finally. "They're going to put all the old family treasures in one place. We can get it then. It's in a few days, I think. If I'm remembering right."

"You are," Damon said. "I didn't know they were going to put all the things in the same place though."

"It's what you needed Caroline for. She was going. Salvatores don't get an invite anymore, do you?"

That smile would have been much sharply had Jeremy been breathing normally. As it stood, it was just charming, and Damon laughed at it, leaning in to brush another quick kiss to Jeremy's mouth. "No. We don't."

Jeremy's smile softened, and he leaned back down, putting his ear against Damon's chest and laying on him, relaxing and letting Damon hold his weight. "I can get it. Gilberts always get invites."

"Just think," Damon murmured, his fingers stroking idly through Jeremy's hair, "you'll get to go and see your signature."

Jeremy laughed, and he reached up, one of his hands brushing against Damon's waist. "What do you think, my dad named me for the mysterious cousin who came in and vanished the night of the vampire round-up?"

"Johnathan thought you died that night," Damon murmured, a smile quirking his lips. "You were counted among the civilian casualties. He assumed that whatever tore Giuseppe apart got you as well. Broke his heart."

"I wonder if he wrote about me then. If I'm in the journals. I wonder if he wrote the Louisiana Gilberts to inform them of the sad loss of their youngest." Another little laugh, but this one was a touch more hysterical than the last, and Damon's hand gained a little weight as he stroked it down Jeremy's back. "I'm sure it confused them if he did."

"He was eccentric, to say the least. Most of his neighbors considered him mad by the time he passed. I am sure that any tales he might have told his family were colored by that," Damon offered, and Jeremy relaxed fractionally under his hand.

He glanced up when he heard footsteps— too light to be Dr. Gilbert, so it was probably Elena again— and he gently moved Jeremy, getting his weight off Damon's chest just in case she knocked, in case he needed to bolt. Her footsteps stopped by the door, he was so focused on it he thought he could hear her breathing, and then she moved on, heading to her own door instead. Jeremy blew out a little sigh of relief when Damon relaxed.

"I don't know how to talk to her," he admitted quietly, glancing up at Damon, and Damon reached over to brush his hair back from his face. "I mean, she's been the one who always knows what's going on, but she doesn't even know Stefan is a vampire yet."

"Why does it matter that she know Stefan is a vampire?"

"They're... a couple. Dating. You know. She really loves him." Jeremy sighed as he shoved his hand through his hair, and then he leaned back on the bed, eyeing the door that led to the bathroom they shared. "It'd be weird if they're not here."

"Look at you, the little matchmaker," Damon replied, and he laughed softly, keeping his attention on Jeremy's face. He couldn't get enough of it. Not after having waited for so long to see it again, see the way Jeremy wrinkled his nose and threw a playful punch, laughing at him.

"Shut up," he muttered, but he was grinning, undercutting his own serious tone, and Damon's smile widened for it. He'd missed that too.

He leaned in, brushed his mouth against Jeremy's, and when Jeremy's lips parted on a slight, startled noise, he breathed, "Make me." Then he was kissing Jeremy again, licking his way into Jeremy's mouth and stroking his fingers against the side of Jeremy's face before he dropped his hand to tangle in Jeremy's shirt, holding him close. When he finally pulled back, it took Jeremy a second or two in order to focus enough to look up at him. Then he smiled slowly, the motion easy and pleased. Damon wanted to keep it on him forever.

"Don't gotta," he retorted. "You do it all on your own."

Damon grinned, and he bit Jeremy's bottom lip sharply. He didn't make him bleed, but only because Damon wasn't sure he'd be able to make himself stop if he did. The last time he'd drank Jeremy's blood after all, he'd drained him dry. Killed him.

Then again, with that ring on, he could do it as many times as he wanted.

The thought had merit, if only so that Damon could keep being the first thing Jeremy saw every time he came back.

"Only when it's in my favor," he replied, and he drew back, shrugging slightly as he got a little space between them. He had to be careful how much he let himself touch Jeremy. That sort of thought... he didn't want to destroy him. Just have him.

"Bet you only do anything when it's in your favor."

"It's the only time you should do anything," Damon replied, and he moved across the room, heading to the window. Jeremy stayed on the bed, sensing his mood maybe, sensing that he needed to keep a little distance until Damon got himself back under control. "It should always be in your favor."

"You do things when they're in my favor," Jeremy said, and Damon glanced back at him when he heard him move. Jeremy was folding one leg under him, pulling the other up to wrap his arms around. He looked incredibly small on the bed like that, and Damon's fingers flexed. He wanted to touch him. When had he ever wanted to do anything different?

"Don't be stupid," he retorted automatically, and he stayed right where he was by the window. He could hear Elena rustling around in her room, moving things and doing things, probably getting ready to curl up and write in her journal. He'd spent enough time learning the rhythms of this house to know their routine. Jeremy moved then, pushing off the bed and coming to him, reaching out to touch him with all that ridiculous bravery that Damon had decided years ago he had to be exaggerating when he remembered him.

Perhaps he'd underestimated it after all.

"It's true. You tried to protect me. There was nothing in that for you."

"More in it for me than you realize," Damon corrected, and he drew back from Jeremy— he'd never, in all the years of imagining his first few days back with him, pictured that he'd be retreating from him nearly so much— to keep himself from pulling him in close all over again. He wanted to feel him, wanted to feel his heartbeat, feel him breathing and taste his skin. He wanted to relearn what Jeremy's skin felt like, wanted to see how much he'd imagined and how much was memory, and he just wanted Jeremy, wanted all of him. Jeremy stood there, between Damon and the window now, and he was staring at him, brow furrowing and a little hurt in his eyes.

He hadn't been expecting Damon to draw back from him.

Damon wanted to hurt him more. He deserved it after what he did, after he just took every option away from Damon, after—

He stopped himself there, and he waved a hand, bringing his attention back to the present, back to this. Back to Jeremy. (Had his attention ever, at any point, really left him?)

"You still have to get caught up here," he said then, and Jeremy's eyes widened before he nodded.

"Things are different," he agreed, and he sighed, reaching up to rub the back of his neck with one hand. "I fucked up. I wasn't going to mess with anything, wasn't going to change anything, and then... I just..."

"It was different, wasn't it? Watching them die instead of just reading about it or knowing they would." Damon had to close the distance between them again then, and his hands curved over Jeremy's shoulders, pulled his back against Damon's chest while Jeremy glanced over his shoulder at him.

"Yeah. I wasn't prepared for it really. I mean, they weren't just going to die, Damon. They were going to starve. A living, mummified corpse that can't... do anything."

Damon pressed his lips against the back of Jeremy's neck, and then he nodded, his eyes closing. He couldn't really imagine what it must have been like, wasn't sure he even wanted to. He was fairly certain that he wouldn't have tried to help nearly as many as Jeremy had.

Then his arms slid around Jeremy's waist for a moment, and he pulled back just enough to murmur against Jeremy's skin, "It's all over now."

"I thought you said it was just beginning," Jeremy said easily, and Damon snorted, scraping his teeth against Jeremy's skin. Jeremy's heart skipped a beat, and Damon had to brace himself, had to get his mouth away from Jeremy's neck to keep from biting him right there. Jeremy groaned a little, and he turned when Damon's hold loosened, looking over at him. "C'mon, Damon, you can, you know. You can bite me—"

"Stop it," Damon said sharply, and he felt the push behind the words, the instinctive need to throw all his weight behind them, make sure they'd be obeyed, but he wasn't expecting Jeremy to stop, wasn't expecting the way Jeremy's mouth closed and he nodded slightly.

Damon felt his stomach sink, and his eyes darted down toward Jeremy's bracelet, still on his wrist, before he looked back up. It took him two of Jeremy's heartbeats, and then he said, voice even, eyes narrowing to pinpricks when he spoke, "Jeremy, sit on the bed."

Jeremy did so, perching on the edge of the bed and smiling vacantly up at him, everything that made him Jeremy gone and this was just like before, just as though his Jeremy had never come back. Damon growled and he jerked back from him, getting space in between them and letting Jeremy surface from the compulsion. It didn't take him as long as Damon had suspected it might, but then again, Jeremy always was surprising him.

"Damon?" His voice was shaky, probably uncertain how the hell he'd ended up sitting on the edge of the bed, and Damon shook his head slightly.

"It's nothing, Jeremy," he said, careful not to look at him. He might end up compelling him all over again, making him trust him instead of getting it because Jeremy was Jeremy and gave it to him so freely. "You're fine."

"You're not," Jeremy said, and Damon cursed him silently, wondering why, exactly, Jeremy had to be perceptive, had to be so damned brave.

"Am too," he countered, and then he moved, pressing a very quick kiss to Jeremy's forehead. "I'll see you later. You need to get some sleep. And do homework, yeah? Yeah. I'll catch up with you."

And he was out the window without giving Jeremy a chance to argue.

He hadn't thought about that, about the fact that the bracelet was over a hundred years old. There was no vervain left in it by now probably. It was a worthless, pretty piece of jewelry that matched Damon's but did nothing to keep Jeremy safe. He swallowed.

There wasn't vervain anywhere near Mystic Falls anymore either. He'd made certain of that.

He'd never expected to actually need any.