Blood Witch

4

He supposed that he could have simply carried her in his arms and ran, or have her run beside him, but instead he had stolen a car. A slick black Lexus LS600h, a beautiful machine he had wanted ever since he glanced it out of the corner of his eye. Bonnie suited leather seats, he thought as he settled her in the front passenger seat, reaching across her to pull the seatbelt across her chest. He looked over his shoulder and saw no one following them, although the hairs on the back of his neck were raised. There was a strange feeling building within him that he couldn't remember feeling before – fear that something he loved would be destroyed.

Her door closed with a soft sound and Bonnie tried to feel good about being in strapped safely in the seat. She'd been out of Mystic Falls before, of course, but this time felt like the first. She had butterflies in her stomach and a tightness in her chest, but also an excitement that almost eclipsed these feelings. She was going to be alone with Damon, truly and utterly alone, for perhaps the first time, and she wondered if he was thinking the same thing as he got into the driver's seat beside her. She opened her mouth to ask him, but before she could the car roared to life without any keys in the ignition.

Damon chuckled at her suprised expression. The little mental power he had exerted was nothing compared to what he was capable of, but she seemed amazed. If he had known she was so easy to please he still wouldn't have done this sooner; he always loved a challenge, and he enjoyed having to work to make her happy, and he found it hard to believe that he had ever thought Elena, Katherine, was worth the time he spent on them. He tapped his head and smiled when she did, for the moment his vampiric state seeming not to be a hinderance but instead something to be valued and used to make her happy.

"How on earth did you do that?" she almost whispered, breathing the words so softly that her voice was barely louder than the sound of mice as they scurried in shadows.

"Magic, of course." he replied with a wicked glint in his eyes when he glanced sideways to her. Her face brightened and the smile she suddenly wore sent another bit of the darkness inside him came away. He could become used to this, he thought with a twinge—because there was a real possibilty that neither of them would survive long after Klaus found them and attacked. If he had needed any evidence of the lengths the original would go to in order to use Bonnie for his own purpourses, he needed no more. If he had needed the passion to hunt down Klaus, to try and destroy him, it had just been ignited. His need to protect her was a burning sensation in his chest, although he thought that words alone could never fully describe it. He had never felt anything so powerful before in his long, long existance.

"Magic..." she seemed to retreat inside herself after this one word, and it was as if sucked in to a memory. In reality, she was trapped in a future she could never have, watching herself and Elena and Meredith as if watching a film. She was seperate from them now and this realisation tore at her from with her skull. She clutched her head so tightly that it seemed it would crack like an egg any minute. For a moment she hoped that it would, thaty this all would end, but then she would remember Damon sitting beside her in the driver's seat and she would pull herself back with an almost physical tug. She had to stop thinking like this; Things could be a lot worse, she scolded herself, you could be dead, or worse, Damon could be. No, she thought sitting straight in the seat, I will not be Baby Bonnie anymore. She would be strong for Damon because he loved her, and believed that she was strong. She would not prove him wrong by being weak, she would be strong because he believed she was. Her mind made up, she relaxed in the chair and closed her eyes.

Bonnie opened her eyes and swept a look around her in surprise. She was no longer in the passenger seat of an expensive car, she was standing at the centre of a ring of people chanting some strange poem or song. The words were said to a beat and felt oddly familiar to her. They all had their eyes closed and Bonnie felt unsure if they were aware of her intusion or not. They all seemed to be undisturbed by her sudden appearance at the centre of the circle, almost as if they were expecting her to be there. She watched as they each opened their eyes and was shaken by the opaque colour of their eyes. Their irises seemed to be black rather than a really dark brown, so much so that their pupils shone lighter in contrast. It was more than a little disturbing but she could not seem to look away. Even as one of the people stood forwards from the circle she could turn her face away.

"Where am I?" she asked at last, the words coming out in a jumble so that she was almost speaking jibberish. She couldn't have understood herself, but the woman who stood apart from the rest seemed to understand her anyway. She came forwards even closer to her until she stood a bare metre before her. She did not speak and remained eerily silent, just staring. "Who are you?" Bonnie asked once it was clear that she wasn't going to get an answer to her first question. She'd never had so many people staring at her before, but she imagined this was how it felt to be stared at by everyone in the cafeteria back at school. Somehow, she doubted that this place was anywhere near Mystic Falls.

"You have been bitten," the woman said in a gentle, almost heavanly voice, putting a hand on her shoulder as if to give comfort. "You have been tainted by those of the darkness." She was saying all of this as if Bonnie was meant to know what it meant, though she did not. She opened her mouth to say as much but the woman placed a cool finger across her lips. "It would be best if you remained quiet during the proceedings."

"Lansia," one of the other women warned in a cracked voice. Bonnie realised that not all of the women here were as young and full of vitality as the woman Lansia. An old woman emerged from the circle too and came to Bonnie. "You're a Blood-Witch," she accused, gesturing vaguely towards Bonnie's mouth and the fangs that were hidden behind her lips, "This cannot be."

Damon pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned in his seat to face his lovely Bonnie. She had been napping for over an hour, but it was only when he could not wake her that he bagan to worry. She was pale, he knew she was always pale and it did not necessarily mean anything sinister, but her eyes were moving wildly beneath the lids in a way that made him instantly weary. Could she just be having a dream, or could she be having a vision of the future? With the way her eye-balls moved he wanted to wake her, but his instinct told him that he would not be able to. If she was having a vision, he knew it was potentially deadly to try and force her from it.

There was a knock on the drivers-side window and Damon caught the reflected light from a badge. He adjusted his face, "Good afternoon officer," his smile was dazzling, "What can I do for you?" He hoped that the man wouldn't be unfortunate enough to have notice how Bonnie was slumped in her seat. The officer motioned towards his passenger with his shinning black laquered bat, "Oh, her?" Damon laughed, sounding almost natural, "We partied a bit too hard last night—she's just sleeping the drinks off."

"Step out of the car, sir," the cop said, a grim smile on his lips. Once Damon was out of the car he asked in a knowing voice, "I'm just going to do a blood test, you might be driving under the..." But he dud not get to finish his sentence before a punch to the side of his head knocked him out cold. There was no way Damon was going to allow this policeman to take even a little bit of his or Bonnie's blood, since he would find it very unusual indeed. He would not find alchol, Damon was pretty sure.

TBC