Damon told her never to try to reach the heart through the chest, because that solid plate of bone would block access.
He was wrong. The knife slid so easily between Alaric's ribs. There was the slightest resistance, the grinding sound of metal against bone, and then the blade was in his heart, popping it like a water balloon. And he was dead. Her teacher, her trainer, her older brother and surrogate father was dead at her hand.
Now all she could do was wait, to hope that his ring wasn't irreparably broken, to hope that being a doppelganger actually qualified her as a supernatural being, to hope that she hadn't been too late and Alaric wasn't gone forever, to hope that yet another family member hadn't crossed into the other world.
The coffin had turned out to be a bust. Damon drove them to the old Viking tunnels ("My love for you only extends so far where the Camaro's concerned. Poor baby," he'd cooed to the ill-treated car as they traded seats), but there was little to see. Bonnie and her mom were both out cold, the coffin was empty, and Stefan was grouchy.
"They found something in Katherine's book. It's called a blood knot, and they needed two generations from a shared line to break it," Stefan explained, rubbing his head. A gash was just closing above his eyebrow. "They were chanting and it seemed to be working, and then I woke up and the coffin was empty."
"You let it get away?" Damon growled. "All this work, and you just let that thing waltz out of here?"
Elena rolled her eyes and stepped into the No Vampire Zone. Damon had assured her that both Bonnie and Abby were alive, but she felt better when she checked their pulses for herself. The bickering continued in the corridor.
"Yeah, that's exactly what happened, Damon. I purposefully hit myself in the head with a rock so I missed what was in the coffin, just to piss you off. Once again, you've discovered my sinister master plan," Stefan said.
"Grow up," Elena panted as she dragged a still-unconscious Bonnie towards them, careful to keep her head clear of the floor. Her friend seemed fine, just...sleeping. Elena was so proud of Bonnie. To think that less than a year ago she'd joked that she was psychic and her greatest magical accomplishment was floating a few feathers. Now she was a powerful witch in her own right, and had stared down the biggest, baddest monsters on the planet. Sure, she could get a little power mad sometimes, but Bonnie had worked so hard and sacrificed so much to keep them all safe.
"So if you were an unspeakably old and powerful something who'd been locked in a coffin for a thousand years or more, where would you go?" Damon asked as he scooped Bonnie up, throwing her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
Elena turned towards them just in time to see the brother share a look. "No. Absolutely not. You are not going back to the mansion," she insisted. She left Abby for the moment, storming back into the corridor.
"Elena, we have to find out what was in there," Damon started, but Elena cut him off, jabbing him in the chest with her finger. She was furious.
"Did you miss the part where your intestines were on the outside, Damon? Or how about the part where the whole Original family was bonding by cutting pieces off of Klaus? They're busy destroying each other right now—we should let them," she said. Were the Salvatores really this stupid, to charge into a nest full of pissed off, unkillable vampires? Of course they were.
"You might be right, but stop poking me," Damon said irritably, grabbing her extended index finger. "If what's in there is the key to killing him, then maybe it's already gone to do it. Nothing we can do either way."
"We probably should still go take a look, though," Stefan said, a strange gleam in his eyes. The boys were up to something, and Elena didn't like it. One idiotic Salvatore was bad enough, but when they were together, she swore they shared a brain. She started to open her mouth to argue, but Damon cut her off.
"How about we make you a deal? You go get Witchy Mama there, and we'll take the two of them home and then cruise through Mystic Falls, just to see if anything's up. We won't go anywhere near Klaus'," he said before she could argue. "Just a general check to see if anything's strange. And you'll go home—that is, your house—and hold down the fort. Get Ric up to speed. And we'll be back before you know it."
Elena started to argue, to ask why she had to go back to the Gilbert house, but then she realized the answer. Of course. Rebekah, Klaus, and Elijah could all enter the Salvatore Boarding house at any time—they'd been invited in. But only Elijah, the least threatening of the whole terrifying family, could get to her at home.
"The last time I let you out of my sight, Klaus made you his chew toy," she said. "Why can't I come with you? I have leverage."
"We aren't doing anything dangerous, Elena. We aren't even going to get out of the car," Damon coaxed. "Besides, like you said, they're too busy playing 'pin the dagger on Klaus' to even think about us. It'll take thirty minutes, tops."
Elena tugged her finger free and went back into the cavern to retrieve Abby. She needed a moment to think. She knew he was trying to protect her, but the image of him laying in a shattered heap of blood and entrails was going to haunt her every time she closed her eyes. She slid her arms under Abby's shoulders, dragging the woman out over the uneven floor. Once she'd cleared the threshold, Stefan picked Abby up as if she were weightless.
It was time to decide. Her eyes shot from one Salvatore to the other. "You have half an hour. If you aren't back at my house in exactly thirty minutes, I'm coming after you. And if you're lying to me, if I find out you tried to storm the Originals' mansion or something..." she let the warning trail off. She wasn't sure what she'd do, but rest assured it would be bad.
Damon shifted Bonnie to his other shoulder, leaning down to kiss Elena. "I promised you last time no heroics; there weren't any. This time, I promise you I won't get caught. And that's a promise I intend to keep. Trust me, okay?"
She melted. Just a little. More of a thaw, really. But he'd won and he knew it. "Thirty minutes. That's it."
"You two done yet? Can we go find the world-destroying whatever?" Stefan asked bitterly. Elena looked at him, saw the hurt and envy lurking in his eyes behind a carefully constructed mask of coolness. And she was glad. It was wrong, but after a summer of searching for a man who didn't want to be found, a fall spent trying to see the good in his erratic, broken soul, and a winter of quiet acceptance that her lover was gone, a small, petty part of her couldn't help but exult in the pain she saw there.
She shook the emotion away, and the group silently surfaced. She'd taken the Camaro ("Stay on the road this time," Damon ordered) home, only to find a nightmare world of bloody hand prints and Alaric gasping for his last breath, begging her to kill him. And now she sat. And waited.
Elena drew her knees up to her chest, staring at Alaric's still body. Her phone buzzed like a hornet's nest, but she couldn't bear to speak to anyone right now. What new tragedy lurked? What new horror awaited? But the thing wouldn't shut up, so she answered it, silently waiting for the hammer to fall.
"I have bad news," Damon said.
"I killed Alaric," Elena said flatly before he could elaborate.
There was utter silence. She knew Damon would never admit it, but he loved Alaric. This wasn't some trivial "bromance,"this was true friendship. Alaric was maybe the first real friend he'd ever had. Damon wasn't exactly easy to be friends with—not with his tendency to kill people first and ask questions later—but Alaric's steady nature, loyalty, and love of good bourbon had won Damon over. Elena didn't really know what Damon would do without the teacher in his life.
"I heard that wrong. Say it again," Damon commanded.
"He was dying, there was a knife, there was blood...There wasn't time, Damon. I stabbed him through the heart...The ring, Damon..." she trailed off.
"Right. Supernatural being and all. Just hang on, Elena, I'm on my way," he said tersely.
"Wait. What were you going to tell me?" Elena asked. What else could it possibly go wrong on this incredibly awful day? Had they found whoever was in the coffin? For a horrible moment, she was certain Stefan was dead, killed at the hand of some unknown menace, and her last words to him were so unkind, her last thoughts so cruel...
There was a moment of hesitation on the other end. "It's Caroline's dad, Elena. Someone got to him, too. Bill's dead."
Slowly, Elena set the phone down. On the other end of the line, she heard Damon's voice, but it was too far away, the words without meaning. She lay her head on Alaric's cold, motionless chest and the tears began to fall.