Damon idly rubbed a thumb across the moonstone Tyler had given them the previous night. Maya had taken one look at it and confirmed that there was a curse attached to it, but whether it was the actual moonstone or not none of them really knew. Himiko or Aradia would be needed to confirm that, but it seemed likely. It not being the right moonstone, would be way too big of a coincidence, for him to accept. Sort of like Mason and Katherine both turning up in Mystic Falls around the same time.

He set it down on the desk and straightened up as Dobby showed Director Picquery and the others into the living room. Director Calhoun's eyes seemed drawn to it as he entered, lighting up with a mix of curiosity and glee.

"Is that what I think it is?"

To Damon's ear he sounded like a breathless teenage girl talking about sparkly jewels. He rolled his eyes, Selene seemed to share his feelings.

"Really, Galen? We are here to discuss the current security arrangement; not whatever esoteric item has caught your fancy."

Galen waved his hand airily.

"Yes, yes, let's talk about what we came to talk about, but once we're done I would very much like to talk about that." He pointed at the moonstone eyes alight with the eagerness of a child on Christmas morning.

Selene met Damon's eyes and sighed, shaking her head despairingly.

"It's very difficult to get him to come down out of his ivory tower sometimes." She spoke reproachfully, though Damon could see amusement in her eyes. "Let's sit down and talk about what we actually came here to talk about."

"Now." She said, once they were all seated. "When we decided upon the current security arrangements for you and your family, we were working on the basis of there being an active threat against Miss Potter."

Damon nodded.

"Since that's no longer the case a review is necessary. I think it would be lax of me not to point out, that just because there is no active threat that we are aware of against Miss Potter, doesn't mean she is completely safe. Commander, you've been making regular threat assessments."

Commander Graves cleared his throat and nodded.

"Yes, Director I have." He looked at Damon, "Whilst there is no longer an active threat, a person in Miss Potter's position is at more risk of kidnappings and attempts on her life than most young people her age. Her position in British society and her particular… notoriety, shall we say, in our world, makes her a target."

Dammon nodded again, Narcissa had said as much in her very first letter to him, it was part of the reason Maya went to school under an assumed name even now, when custody was sorted. If you added to her position in the wixen world, her biological relatives on her father's side being who they were made the risk even higher. Not that Commander Graves had any knowledge of that. It was a very closely held secret, known only to those they trusted most.

"Taking into consideration that there are currently no active threats against Miss Potter. I have lowered the threat level of my latest assessment. As such my proposal is to withdraw the auror teams here in Mystic Falls and those that have been working towards your protection in New York City.

"I further recommend, that Miss Potter continues to attend school under an assumed name. That you remain living in this home with its wards, that provide a level of protection that cannot be matched in your New York Home. And that Miss Potter continues to carry or wear a portkey at all times, though you may wish to make some adjustments to it.

"With regards to the Auror department, I propose that bi-weekly threat assessments for Miss Potter should continue to be carried out, covering both her home and the Academy. How often the threat assessments should be carried out should be reviewed every four months, with an eye to decreasing or increasing them as required. Any active threats will require changes to these recommendations as they occur."

Commander Graves was a consummate professional, delivering his recommendations without any inflection to his tone or mannerisms. Damon had expected the withdrawal of the auror teams, with what they'd learned Saturday night, he appreciated the recommendations Commander Graves had provided and the continued promise of some level of watching out for Maya in case of any future incidences.

Director Picquery nodded when it became clear that Commander Graves was finished.

"Thank you, Commander. Special Agent Blye, Special Agent LaSalle, do you have anything to add to the recommendations Commander Graves has made."

"I would suggest that at the very least a low-level passive monitoring of Mystic Falls be implemented, even if Mr Salvatore and his family choose to move elsewhere. It seems to have an inordinate amount of supernatural visitors and occurrences for a town of it's size and such monitoring would allow Magical Law Enforcement to act with increased speed should something occur that requires out presence." Agent Blye said.

"I agree with Agent Blye. Dis town, be almost worse than New Orleans, when it comes to da supernatural."

"Given everything that's occurred over the past few months, I'm inclined to agree with their assessment." Commander Graves said, once they'd both spoken.

Director Picquery nodded.

"Galen, could your department set that up?"

"Yes. It shouldn't be a problem and I'm also inclined to agree with their assessment."

"Good. Any questions or objections to Commander Graves recommendations, Damon?"

"None. I would like to thank you for everything you've done to help protect Maya since August, though."

She nodded, smiling gently.

"Just doing our jobs, Damon." She turned to Commander Graves, "Commander?"

"We'll have our base of operations closed down, and everyone back to their normal assignments, by tomorrow."

"Good, Thank you Commander, Agents." All three nodded and left to get everything shut down, though both Agent Blye and Agent LaSalle promised to swing by and say goodbye to everyone before they left town.

Galen rubbed his hands together, looking gleefully at Damon.

"Now that the boring stuff is out of the way, can we please discuss that moonstone on your desk."

Selene sighed and shook her head again as Damon stood up and retrieved the moonstone, handing it over to Galen who examined it carefully.

"Well, it's certainly what I believed it was. Fascinating, I never thought I'd actually get to see it."

"What is it?" Selene asked curiously, despite herself.

"It's a very special moonstone." Galen replied handing it back to Damon, "One that binds a curse placed upon Niklaus Mikaelson, the Original, a thousand years ago. There are a lot of legends surrounding that moonstone, Damon. I advise you to keep it well-hidden, and let as few people as possible know you have it."

"That was the plan."

"Hey Stefan, another box for you"

Mason's voice broke through Stefan's concentration as he sorted through the glasses and plates for the fundraiser. He looked up and saw Mason carrying a heavy cardboard box and setting it down on the table across from him. He smiled and nodded his appreciation.

"Hey Mason, thanks."

"No problem. Damon around here somewhere as well?"

"Yeah, I think Carol shanghaied him moving tables somewhere. You know how she is," He replied, rolling his eyes.

Mason chuckled,

"Yeah, I do, I guess I'll try and catch him later then."

"Anything I can help with?" Stefan asked.

"Naw man, I just wanted to thank him. What he said at Jenna's BBQ, really helped me clear the air with Tyler. Anyway, I'd better crack on before Carol decides I'm not doing enough to be helpful." Mason replied, flashing a grin.

Stefan chuckled as Mason turned and walked away, accidentally bumping into Bonnie as he did so. He didn't notice the bump, but he did notice the way Bonnie froze, and the strange expression that came over her face as she stared after him. Her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open, as if she had seen a ghost. He put down the glasses he was sorting and crossed to her side, gently touching her elbow.

"Bonnie, what's the matter? Are you okay?" He asked concerned.

She blinked and shook her head, as if trying to clear her mind. Frowning, eyes filled with confusion.

"When I touched him, I saw something."

"What do you mean? Like a vision?"

"I saw Elena."

He frowned, confused.

"You saw Elena?"

"He was kissing her."

He was confused for a moment longer and then realisation swept over him. Damon had suggested as much, but Stefan has assumed he was being his normal uber-paranoid self. Welp, he was definitely gonna have to apologise to his brother.

"You didn't see Elena, Bonnie. You saw Katherine."

"Katherine?" Bonnie repeated, her eyes widening even more. "Mason's with Katherine?"

Stefan nodded, and rubbed a hand over his face.

"Damon said as much. They both got to town around the same time and Mason's looking for the moonstone and Katherine wants the moonstone, so we, well Damon, figured there was a good chance they were connected somehow." He explained, briefly.

"Moonstone?" Bonnie asked, her voice rising. "What moonstone?"

Stefan looked down at Bonnie's bewildered face and groaned, realising he'd just opened a whole new can of worms.

"Okay. I guess there's a lot you haven't been filled in on yet, but to be fair we've kind of been leaving it to Sheila to decide what to tell you." He said, apologetically.

"Right. Well, I'm guessing I've got a long conversation with grams in my future."

"Yeah, probably." He sighed, "I should go find Damon, tell him he was right."

"Uh. Not alone you're not. I'm coming with you, and later you can tell me more about this whole moonstone deal."

It didn't take them long to find Damon, he was standing in an out of the way location, talking to Tyler.

"You were right." Stefan said by way of greeting.

"About, so many things." Damon replied jokingly.

Tyler laughed and even Bonnie hid a smile. Stefan just groaned again.

"Can we not joke around right now please."

"Fine. I can be boring. I'll just pretend to be you."

"You were right about Mason. He's with Katherine."

Tyler grimaced and Damon's face turned calculating.

"How sure are you?"

"I had a vision." Bonnie answered, "When I touched Mason, I saw him kissing who I thought was Elena, but Stefan –"

"Pretty sure it was Katherine and not Elena." Stefan finished.

Damon looked at Tyler.

"He's your uncle, so it's your call. What do you wanna do?"

"Find out what he knows and why he's working with Katherine." Tyler said without hesitation, "Maybe he knows the truth, or maybe she filled his head with all that crap about the "curse of the sun and the moon". I know he hates what he is, so I'm pretty sure if she convinced him there was a way, he'd never have to turn into a wolf again, he'd leap at it without a second thought."

"'Curse of the sun and the moon?', that thing Elena found in Isobel's research, about vampires and…" Bonnie turned a startled glance on Tyler, "Werewolves?" she finished.

"Told you I had my own deal going on, Bon." Tyler replied, in lieu of an actual answer.

Damon clapped his hands together.

"No time for that now, sorry Bon-Bon, getting you up to speed will have to wait a bit. We need to make a plan."

"What are you thinking?" Stefan asked.

"We need to kidnap Mason, take him to the house, interrogate him, and –"

"We're not killing my uncle, man!"

"No, we're not." Damon said, with steely-eyed resolve, "But we are going to find out what he knows and either turn him away from Katherine, because that bitch will get him killed. Or if that doesn't work, obliviate him and pack him back off to Florida so we can keep him out of this mess."

Bonnie was having a lot of trouble following what was going on, but Stefan and Tyler both nodded when Damon finished his little speech.

"So, how are we gonna kidnap him?"

Damon looked at Bonnie speculatively.

"You know that little aneurysm spell you can do?"

"Yeah why?"

"Is it vampire-specific?"

Bonnie shook her head,

"It'd work on anyone with a supernatural healing ability."

"Good. Good, good. I think we have our plan."

"Damon, I don't want to hurt him."

"Think of it this way, Bon-Bon, you're causing him a little bit of pain now, so he doesn't wind up dead later."

Bonnie bit her lip, looking reluctant, but when neither Stefan nor Tyler raised an abjection to Damon's plan, she nodded.

"Okay, so how are we gonna do this without anyone spotting us?"

When Maya portkeyed home after her Equestrian club finished, she was expecting to go through her normal after-school routine. Have her lemonade and snack provided by Dobby, while she told Damon everything that had happened that day. Which today would need to include the fact that Ronan had asked her to go to the dance with him and she'd said maybe, pending her talking to Damon about it.

What she hadn't been expecting was to be greeted by a startled scream, coming from a pale-faced Bonnie, and the sight of Tyler's uncle, sitting chained up in their living room.

"Ooooh yeah." Damon said as absolute silence filled the room, "I may not have timed this at all well."

"Then it's a good thing we're here, Mr Salvatore, isn't it."

The last time Maya had seen that level of disapproving on her headmistresses face she and Ronan had accidentally set loose all the puppies at the animal adoption day in Central Park. So, she was incredibly grateful that the look was aimed at Damon this time and not her. Himiko was openly laughing at Damon, whilst everyone else in the room looked varying degrees of guilty.

"Himiko, why don't you and Miss Nicholls take miss Bennett and provide her with an explanation. Whilst I assist Mr Salvatore with this situation."

Himiko swallowed back her cackles and nodded.

"Well Maya, why don't we take Miss Bennett to the kitchen. Might as well get all the shocks over at once, and she can have some good hot chocolate while we explain everything."

Maya nodded. Himiko grabbed Bonnie's wrist and tugged her along, not giving her a chance to object, whilst Maya trailed along behind. The last thing she heard clearly was Professor Aradia berating Damon for acting with the sort of idiocy and lack of foresight that she would expect from a hormonal teenager. Being a hormonal teenager herself, Maya wasn't sure whether to be offended by that or agree. It was about fifty-fifty she decided as she entered the kitchen, where Bonnie had stopped dead and was staring at something on the counter. Maya followed her gaze to where Dobby was stood, staring back at Bonnie, his ears twitching mildly. Maya decided she would have to be the one to break the ice, and reassure Dobby that he hadn't done anything wrong.

"Dobby this is Bonnie, Sheila's granddaughter." Maya introduced, "Bonnie, this is Dobby. He's a house-elf, and my friend." Maya sent a beaming smile filled with love at the little elf who was looking quite abashed by Maya's introduction.

"Dobby is being very pleased to meet Miss Bonnie, finally." He said in his usual high-pitched voice.

"Hi." Bonnie squeaked back, in a voice far from normal, but Maya could forgive that because she'd definitely had a couple of shocks.

"Dobby, could you make us all a mug of Hot chocolate, and be sure to put lots of sugar in Miss Bennett's." Himiko said.

"Dobby can be doing that." He bustled over to the stove and climbed up onto the little stool Stefan had made him, so that he could do as Himiko had asked.

Himiko pretty much forced a shell-shocked Bonnie to sit down at the kitchen table, before taking the seat opposite her and nodding to Maya to take the empty one at the end.

"I'm Himiko. I'm Maya's current magic teacher. I'm both a wixen and a channeler, as is Maya, which is why I'm the one teaching her."

Himiko pulled out her wand and turned the vase of flowers on the table into a dozen songbirds and back again. Bonnie hesitantly reached out and touched the vase, jumping back slightly when her finger touched cold glass. She turned to Maya her eyes wide with wonder.

"Can you do that?"

"No, not yet. I can do butterflies, but birds are more complicated."

"But in time, she will be able to do exactly that." Himiko said, "Now, I shall explain everything, you will drink your hot chocolate, listen, and ask your questions at the end. Understand."

Bonnie nodded.

"Your teacher's a hard-ass." She muttered softly to Maya as Dobby handed out the mugs, just not softly enough.

"Yes. Yes, I am." Himiko told her proudly.

Damon was glad when Mason startled awake from being knocked out, because it meant Aradia stopped berating him about forgetting that Maya would be coming home and portkeying in front of an unknowing Bonnie.

Mason rocked the chair, struggling to loosen the ropes that were tying him to it. Unfortunately for Mason, Aradia had conjured the ropes that tied him to the chair, and they would only come undone if she willed them to.

"Ooooh. Someone's feisty." Damon said cheerfully.

"What the hell? I thought we had a truce! What the hell is wrong with you?"

"So many things." Stefan muttered, drawing Mason's attention to him, and thus to the person standing next to him.

"Tyler!" Mason gaped at his nephew. "What the – You're a part of this?!"

"This." Tyler waved a hand encompassing all of them and Mason, "Is not what you think it is. We just needed to make sure you'd listen."

"So, you kidnapped me and tied me up?! You could have just asked!"

Stefan and Damon both tilted their heads to the side and nodded.

"And under any other circumstances we probably would have," Damon said, "But not when those circumstances are that you're dating Katherine Pierce."

"What?" Mason let out a startled laugh, "please don't tell me all this is 'cause you're jealous."

"Good guess. You're wrong, but you still get points for having a go." Damon smiled winningly at Mason as he spoke, causing Tyler to groan and Stefan to shake his head.

Aradia decided she'd had enough of the banter and stepped forward, drawing Mason's attention to her. He frowned in confusion, not understanding who she was or why she was involved.

"Hello, Mr Lockwood. My name is Aradia. Mr Salvatore has asked me to speak to you about a certain moonstone."

Mason froze again, before throwing a betrayed look at his nephew, who threw his hands up in surrender.

"It's really not what you think Uncle Mason. Whatever Katherine told you; she's been playing you."

"You don't know anything about me and Katherine!"

"No. But we can take a good guess." Stefan said. "Katherine spun you some tale about an Aztec curse, that makes werewolves slaves to the full moon, and binds vampires from walking under the sun."

Given the look on Mason's face, Stefan was absolutely spot on, with what he'd said.

"Then I'll bet she told you at little story about the moonstone that sealed the werewolf part of the curse," Damon took up where Stefan had left off, "A moonstone, that just so conveniently happens to be in your family's possession, and if you find it and give it to her, she'll get a witch she knows to break the curse."

"So, you came home Uncle Mason, because you're desperate to break the curse, and you've been looking for the moonstone. The only problem is… Katherine lied. The moonstone won't break the werewolf curse."

"You don't know that!"

"Yes, we do, Uncle Mason. The curse of the sun and the moon is fake."

Aradia waved a hand for silence, and drew Mason's attention back to her.

"I have walked this earth for millennia, Mr Lockwood. I walked through the hanging gardens of Babylon, I was in Egypt when the first Pharoah ruled, and Rome when Caesar was betrayed."

When Aradia spoke, you couldn't help but believe her, however fanciful it sounded. Even Mason was drawn in, Damon could tell by the look in his eyes, that he was hanging on her every word.

"And I was here in these lands when the werewolf curse was cast. Five hundred years before vampires existed. Werewolves have always been bound to the full moon Mr Lockwood, and if you would like me to, I can tell you the entire story of the origins of your people, but it is not bound in any rock, it is bound in your blood. In the blood of all of your ancestors, going back to the very first, and it will be bound in the blood of all your descendants still to come until your bloodline dies out.

"And I am sorry, but the werewolf curse cannot be broken, it was powered by the death of one of the most powerful witches to ever walk this earth. Her blood, flesh, and bone went into the casting of this curse, and it was sealed by her spirit and soul. There is no mortal power capable of unbinding such magic.

"I am afraid that Miss Pierce has lied to you, sprinkling just enough truth in to make it believable. And she did so knowingly, Katherine Pierce, know the truth of the curse that is bound in the moonstone you seek, and she was using you to get it, not so she could save you, but so she could save herself."

"Your lying." Mason said softly, sheer desperation in his eyes.

"I am not, and I think you already know that. Even if you don't want to believe it."

Mason shook his head, tears leaked out of his eyes.

"I love her. I thought she loved me too."

Damon couldn't help but feel a stirring sympathy for Mason, he'd been there. Believing he'd loved her, believing Katherine loved him in return.

"I'm afraid not." Aradia said, "Are you willing to listen?"

Mason nodded, and with a wave of her hands, the ropes that had bound him to the chair disappeared.