Days flew by quickly, one after another. School, training, hanging out with friends. Those were peaceful days, nothing major happened really. We would wake up early for a run and a little training. Not without complaining and tears mind you, but nothing could falter me, because I was on a mission. The training wasn't even that hard: first of all there was running, then the warming exercises and self defense lessons after that, nothing major. I wasn't trying to turn them into ninjas or something, I just wanted to teach them how to use a stake and where to aim it, that's it. But little punks being lazy, kept whining every freaking day. Elena lost almost all of her agility after she stopped training with cheerleaders, so she had it harder than Jeremy.
School was boring. They were yet to find a new history teacher, so we were left with substitutes for now. Poor lads. Jeremy started dating Emily and they looked really cute together. So much so, that I, being the cringe older sister, kept taking their photos, just to embarrass Jeremy whenever I felt like it. I'm evil. I know.
Elena's love life, on the other hand, didn't look promising. Stefan stopped coming to school, spending all of his time trying to make a proper vampire out of Vicki. Something told me that he wasn't doing a good job. Anyways, Elena was a little depressed, thinking that after he made sure that Vicki was stable enough he would disappear from her life. I knew better of course, but she got herself worked up so much so that she would've never believed me. She was gathering her willpower to go and meet with him, under the pretense of wanting an update about the Vicki situation, but she wasn't there yet. Until today. I could feel her radiating with confidence today on the training, so I believed that we would be visiting Casa de Salvatore soon. Oh joy. No, really! They got some good bourbon over there, so I was in.
We threw a few slumber parties with girls. They were fun. Caroline got over Damon and I think was into someone else now, but she wasn't even aware of those feelings herself so I couldn't grasp on who the lucky guy was.
Bonnie, on the other hand, was starting to concern me. She didn't tell me anything, but from all the symptoms I assumed that she wasn't sleeping well. What was even worse, she tried to avoid every conversation about magic whatsoever. I tried to talk to her a few times, but she kept cutting me off. So I assumed that it wasn't the right time yet. I was yet to see her at school today, after she was away for a week, spending some time with her Grams.
Matt was concerning me as well, but there wasn't much that I could do there. He reported to the police about his missing sister and they kept organizing search parties for her, but that was it. Poor guy.
It was Halloween. And I was feeling extra energized with all the spiritual magic coursing through the air. It would get better at midnight, and I couldn't wait to perform a few interesting rituals from the Nefeli's Grimoire.
We finished our morning training and were getting ready for school. It was getting quite cold, so I was wearing a long sleeved emerald turtleneck, some black high-waisted skinny jeans and my favorite combat boots. I grabbed my jacket, checked myself in a mirror for the last time and went downstairs to wait for Elena. She always took ages to get ready.
I went to the kitchen, texted Nik, wishing him a good day and poured myself some orange juice. After two more glasses Elena finally showed up.
"Hey, can we go to the Boarding House? I want to check up on Vicki." She looked a little nervous from the anticipation of finally seeing Stefan. But hearing her words I just raised an eyebrow as if asking "who the hell are you trying to fool here". "Fine, I just want to see Stefan. Happy?" She rolled her eyes and headed to the front door, but I still saw her flushed cheeks. She's such a child sometimes.
We drove in silence, Elena was fiddling with her hair nervously the whole time and I had to slap her hands away constantly until she finally stopped. She got out of the car as soon as I stopped it in front of the house and almost ran to the front door, where she suddenly froze, her courage flying out of the window once again. I shook my head and decided to save her some nerve cells and knocked on the door.
"Stay close, okay? We don't know if she's stable yet. I will get mad if she tries to bite your head off," I said half seriously half jokingly. The girl was unstable long before she turned into a vampire, I didn't think that she suddenly miraculously changed for the better.
Elena just rolled her eyes at me, but didn't say anything as the door suddenly swung open, revealing a very smug looking Damon.
"I'm sorry. We are not buying anything. Have a good day," he said mockingly and tried to close the door in our faces, forcing me to use magic to burst it open.
"Very funny, Salvatore," I rolled my eyes at him, thinking that I was doing too much eye rolling recently, but couldn't help myself. My eyes almost did that on their own, I swear.
"Gilbert, Gilbert," he greeted us, eyeing us up and down, making me try so hard to not roll my eyes yet again. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"Is Stefan here?" Elena asked, before I could say something back.
"Yep!" he simply said, annoying us even further.
"Where is he?"
He looked like he was about to say something annoying again, but looked at me and apparently changed his mind, as he simply said, "He's upstairs singing "The rain in Spain". Knock yourselves out." He closed the door behind us and disappeared, so we had to find our own way. We found Stefan in the parlor. He immediately stood up when he spotted us, his eyes only on Elena.
"Hello, Stefan," I greeted him before taking a stroll to the bar, my eyes only on the bottles of bourbon. I'm not an alcoholic, I swear, I can't even get drunk, I just love the taste. He nodded, returning the greeting, his eyes filled with amusement, then looked back at Elena, who was standing there awkwardly.
"Where's Vicki?" she asked curiously, not seeing her around.
"She's upstairs," he simply said gesturing her to take a sit and sitting down himself.
"What happens now? Her brother is looking for her with the rest of the town."
"I'm working with her. But it's gonna take time. She has a very volatile and impulsive personality," he said, making me snort at the absolute understatement, but carried on, completely ignoring me. "She's a drug user. It complicates the situation."
"So what are you gonna do next?" I asked, pouring myself some good stuff that was well hidden between some cheap shit for unwanted guests. Damon's scheming, I'm sure. "You can't keep her here forever."
"I'm gonna keep her here until I know that she's safe," he answered sternly, not noticing the said girl coming into the room, looking pissed by being talked about behind her back.
"And how long is that?" she asked, getting Stefan and Elena's attention.
"We can talk about that later," he said calmly as if talking to a rabid dog.
"Hey, Vicki. How are you?" Elena, being a sweetheart, asked. Don't get me wrong, she despised her too after I told her what she did to our brother (whore!), but still behaved decently around her, as a tribute to the time when she dated her brother.
"How am I? You are kidding right? What kind of a stupid question is that?" Vicki's face changed when she talked to Elena, her inner ugly self showing its face.
"Tone that attitude down," I said nonchalantly, sipping on my drink. "I've been itching to lay my hands on that neck of yours for a while now. Do not tempt me."
"Or what, Gilbert?" she asked smugly. "I'm a vampire now, I can kill you in the blink of an eye."
I looked at her cocky face and did the one thing that I was dying to do for a veeery long time. The magic in the air was so thick that I didn't even have to concentrate as I took a hold on her heart, giving it a light squeeze, just so she knew that I was doing it.
"I said. Tone. It. Down. Or I will rip your heart out right through your ass." Her eyes got bigger as she opened and closed her mouth repeatedly, trying to squeeze out some words but failing, her fingers scratching her chest, as if trying to reach the heart and free it from the prison of my hold. "You know why I always only threatened you, never really following through on my threat? Because you were just a weak human, annoying, sure, but weak. It would've been as if trying to kill a fly using a nuclear bomb. But now... now when you are a vampire and have an enhanced healing I can do this and a little more every time you piss me off."
"Thalia!" Stefan said warningly and I stopped, letting the whore go and taking another sip of my drink.
She fell on the ground, breathing shallowly.
"What... was that?" she gasped, but I ignored her, letting Stefan answer if he wanted to.
"I'm going to the bathroom," I said finishing my drink and giving Stefan a stern glare. "I don't need to tell you to keep an eye on her, do I?"
He shook his head in no and went to help Vick to stand up and sat her on the couch. I didn't hear the rest of their conversation, as three glasses of orange juice and one glass of bourbon were begging me to let them go.
When I came back the first thing I heard was my sister's stern voice.
"... you're gonna leave Jeremy alone!"
"Or what?"
That wasn't good. That wasn't good at all. I came into the room right when Vicki was about to lash out.
She whooshed to Elena baring her fangs, but hit the invisible wall of my protecting spell that I managed to cast right in time and flew to the opposite wall, hitting it with enough force to break a few bones. Next instant I was in front of my sister, ready to break her neck if she tried anything else. She groaned and stood up groggily, throwing hateful looks in our direction.
"You have some serious issues Donovan, you know that?" I asked quietly. "Even when people are trying to help you, you still tend to ruin everything. But that's just your fucked up life, I don't really care. What I do care about, is the fact that you wouldn't leave my brother alone. So I'm warning you one last time. Games are over. If you ever try to harm my loved ones again, I will kill you. That simple."
I could feel Elena's fingers gripping the back of my jacket nervously, her hands shaking. The bitch scared the hell out of her. And I felt myself getting angrier.
"I hate you," Vicki gasped, still slightly out of breath, aiming her burning gaze at Elena. "You perky little bitch, had my brother whipped for fifteen years. Fifteen years and then you dumped him. That's all I see when I look at you. And I'm gonna see Jeremy, whenever I wanna see Jeremy, because I have some new fun toys to play with."
I wrapped my magic around her heart and pulled, not too strong so I would rip it out, just enough for her to feel pain. She fell on her knees, coughing blood, as I came closer and leaned down so she could hear me.
"Stop talking about Matt as if you care about him," I whispered, jerking her head up by pulling on her hair. "We both know that you don't give a shit about your brother, because if you did, you would've never ended up in this situation. And about Jeremy..." I leaned to her ear, strengthening the pull on her heart a little more, making her let out a small cry. "Touch him and I will rip out your heart and feed it to the dogs."
I let her go and went back to my sister, ignoring her writhing body. Seconds later Stefan whooshed into the room, but I didn't even spare him a glance. I took Ellie's hand and gave it a gentle squeeze.
"Are you okay?"
"She threatened Jeremy," she whispered quietly, but we all could hear the anger in her voice.
"She's on edge," Stefan said quietly, looking a little guilty, and he should, because even when I told him to keep an eye on her, he just left them alone. "Imagine every sense in your body operating at super speed. I mean, she's uncomfortable in her own skin. And then when you throw in her other issues..."
"How long before it settles? Hours? Days? Weeks? Stefan, she threatened my little brother!"
"There's no rule book."
I tuned them out when I received a text from Nik, saying that he missed me and he would be out of reach for a couple of days due to the bad signal. I sighed sadly but replied that I would be missing him too and wished him a good luck. He was still trying to find the werewolves who would willingly accept his gift. And according to him, quite a few agreed already, even considering the war between species. Not all of them were ready to go through unimaginable pain throughout their lives.
Elena took my hand, shaking me out of my thoughts, and told me that she was ready to go to school. She looked sad and I felt sorry for not listening to their conversation, as I had no idea what happened between the two of them.
The school was a mess. Literally. Everyone was preparing for the Halloween party, fixing the decorations and stuff. We met with Caroline and Bonnie, who told us that they were going as witches and interrogated us brutally about our costumes. Least to say, Caroline was pissed when she found out that Elena didn't have a costume and was gonna wear the one from last year.
"What do you mean you are wearing last year's costume?!" she half asked half yelled. "Last year you were dating Matt and both of you wore matching costumes. He told me that he's gonna wear that one this year as well, so you can't wear it. You just can't. And what about you, young lady?" She suddenly asked, throwing a suspicious look at me.
"Oh my costume is brilliant. I'm going to dress as the baddest bitch herself." I gave her a smug smirk, trying to hold my laughter under her suspicious gaze.
"And who is that?" Bonnie and Elena looked curious too, so I couldn't disappoint them.
I slowly raised my hands and turned around until I was facing them again, made a dramatic stance and said, "Thalia Gilbert."
Least to say it was the first time I've ever witnessed a collective eye roll. That was epic. Until Caroline decided that she had enough of course, and nearly bit my head off.
After finishing scolding us Caroline, like an experienced magician, took out from God knows where, two bags with apparently two more witch costumes and presented them to us with a blinding smile on her face, obviously proud of herself. Bonnie couldn't hold her laughter after seeing our gobsmacked faces, and told us just to accept our fate. And accept it we did. What other choice did we have?
When we got home, we found Jeremy trying on a pirate costume. He wasn't quick enough to hide, so now I possessed an adorable photo of him looking like Jack the Sparrow, with a look of pure horror on his face. That made my day, I'm telling you. I made a mental note to take a photo of him and Emily in their pair costumes, because it was pretty obvious that she was the one who made him wear it in the first place. The guy was whipped.
Me and Elena went to change into our outfits, and let me tell you what outfits those were. I thought that they would be like classic witch costumes with pointy hats and all that, but they weren't. In fact, when I first saw my costume I almost squealed like a little girl, because it was a Hogwarts school uniform, not just any witch costume. I was a huge Harry Potter fan which all my friends were aware of, I even participated in a few online tests like in which House would I be sorted in and etc. and 80% of the time I was in Ravenclaw. So my best friend in the whole world, got me a Ravenclaw uniform, which consisted of an ivory shirt, a blue school tie, knee length black pleaded skirt, black stockings and a black robe. I was ecstatic. Elena got a Gryffindor costume, and I was almost a 100% sure that Caroline would be wearing a Slytherin one and Bonnie a Hufflepuff one. Those were the best Halloween costumes anyone could ever wish for.
I asked Elena to take a picture of me and sent it to Nik, so he could see it whenever he reached the civilization again. We all got into my car and went to pick up Emily before heading to the school (I got the opportunity to take a picture of two lovebirds).
At the school Jeremy and Emily went to their friends and me and Elena went to find Caroline and Bonnie. The school was so crowded that we had to literally fight our way through people, plus it was very dark and everyone was in costumes looking almost unrecognizable. We bumped into Matt on our way and I could see the relief on Elena's face when we saw him wearing the costume from last year. It would've been really awkward if she wore hers as well (thanx Care). I greeted him and left when I spotted Bonnie in the distance.
"Hey!" I hugged her, then eyed her up and down approvingly. "Caroline did a pretty good job."
"Hey! Yes, she did. I was skeptical at first thinking that she was mocking me or something, but it's brilliant!" she exclaimed excitedly, fixing her Hufflepuff bow tie.
"Where's she, by the way? I need to thank her properly." As soon as I said that, I was attacked by an excited little puppy, as it felt. I turned around and saw a slightly drunk Caroline, beaming at me happily. I didn't waste any time and hugged her tightly, thanking her over and over again for a magnificent costume.
For the first time in a while, I could say that I enjoyed the party. I don't know whether it was the costume or my friends that made me comfortable, but I was having a really good time. Caroline brought some cocktails (Lockwood special apparently) which I was reluctant to drink at first, but they turned out pretty good. We took millions of photos in every interesting corner and even played beer pong a few times. At first, I was worried when Elena didn't join us, but then I spotted her in the crowd with Stefan, so I decided to leave them alone as they had a lot to talk about.
So, I could say that everything was fine. Was. Until Elena took me aside with panic clear on her face and said that Vicki was here. She and Stefan went to look for her when I, on the other hand, went to find my brother. I had a bad feeling about it.
With every second that I couldn't find Jeremy, I was getting more and more anxious. I would've performed a tracking spell to find him, but we weren't related by blood, so it was pretty much useless. But I had another thing that I could use. Because I used my own magic to enchant and power the artifacts, I could always feel them wherever they were. The vervain jewelry that I gave my family and friends to protect them from compulsion, had a little spell on them, that prevented said jewelry from being noticed. It wasn't much, but it was enough to use to find a person who was wearing something with my magic on it in the immediate surroundings. The problem was, at the moment at the party were four people who were wearing my jewelry and I had to concentrate really hard to find the one that Jeremy was wearing.
Caroline and Bonnie were not too far away from me, so I excluded them pretty quickly, and concentrated on the last two signatures. One of them was constantly moving, while the other was standing still, so I assumed that the moving one was Elena's, as she obviously was frantically searching for Vicki throughout the whole school. I concentrated on the last one and headed in that direction.
I was running through the crowd, mercilessly shoving anyone that got in my way aside, and a second later ran out of the school and appeared in the parking lot, filled with yellow school buses.
I saw Jeremy almost right away, he was pressed against the side of a bus by Vicki who second after buried her fangs into his neck, making him scream. The time froze for me as soon as I heard my baby brother's voice filled with pain. I'm pretty sure that my reaction was as quick as a lightning and she wasn't even able to take even one gulp of his blood, though it hadn't felt like it. I concentrated my magic in her head giving her a major aneurysm and throwing her aside at the same time and she fell to the ground screaming her lungs out.
I stood still, not weakening the concentration, and heard Elena and Stefan running in our direction, Elena frantically screaming our brother's name. Everything around me was still moving in a slow-mo, while my mind was working super fast, analyzing the whole situation. I could've killed her in many different ways, but I needed to make the most out of the situation.
My eyes were observing our surroundings, and when I heard Elena saying that it was just a scratch, I finally knew what I needed to do. There was a bunch of demolition waste right behind Vicki, just what I needed. I weakened the pain that I was causing her just a little bit, but it was enough for her to jump on her feet, screaming in rage, ready to lash out once again, but she wasn't able to do anything. With a slightest touch of my magic I pushed her back, making her trip on her high heels at the same time. Her eyes got bigger from the confusion and a second after she fell right on the sharp piece of wood that was sticking out of rubble.
It happened so fast that others didn't even notice. I fell out of my weird trance-like state and watched calmly as Vicki's body slowly turned grey. She still had the enraged expression on her face, her mouth opened wide, baring her sharp fangs still covered in my brother's blood.
I heard Elena gasp in shock and turned to look at them. Their eyes were glued to Vicki's body, while I went to Jeremy and examined his wound. It really is a simple scratch, I thought, breathing out a sigh of relief.
"Are you okay?" I asked him quietly, but his eyes were only on Vicki, so I had to stand right in front of him so he wouldn't be able to see her anymore and repeated the question.
"Yeah, yeah, I-I'm fine," he slowly said, as if struggling with every word. "Is she-is she dead?"
He was obviously in a state of shock, his pupils dilated, his reaction poor. I just simply engulfed him into a hug, which he returned shakily, burying his face in the crook of my neck.
"Shhh, it's okay. Everything's gonna be okay," I kept saying over and over again, until he relaxed in my arms and stopped shaking. I broke the hug and looked straight into his teary eyes. "What happened, Jer? Where's Emily?"
"I-I, she left, she-she said that her mom called and drove home with her. I was... I don't know what happened. She appeared in front of me out of nowhere, and told me to go with her. I said no, and-and she got really angry, the next thing I know we are standing here and her face changed and she-she bit me. It wasn't painful, she just scared me. And then you came, and..." He was almost fine now, his eyes clear, and his breathing almost normal. "What are we gonna do?"
I looked around and saw Elena standing right beside us, crying silently. The whole situation shook her pretty bad too.
"Stefan's going to take you home," I looked at Stefan, who gave me a nod and continued, "I'm gonna stay here and take care of it."
"But..." Elena tried to protest weakly, but I looked at her sternly and shook my head.
"I will take care of it. You both just go home. And, Stefan," I added when they turned to leave. "Don't try to heal Jeremy's wound, okay?"
He looked at me confused, but nodded, then guided both of them out of the parking lot. I waited until they were gone and turned to look at the body once again. It was a complete disaster. Not that I killed her, I was ready to do that for a while now. Just the fact that it all went too far, that I let it go too far. But I just couldn't kill her. I mean I threatened to do that more times than I can even count, and I'm not feeling remorseful or anything, bitch deserved it. It was just... I knew her most of my life. She was annoying, sure, but I never thought that she could turn into a psychopath. Just another reminder that some people were not meant to become vampires.
Deep in my thoughts I missed the moment when someone else appeared on the crime scene.
"You should go too. I got this," Damon said from behind me, startling me a little, though I kinda expected him to show up.
"No, I'll do it myself. Besides, I know exactly what to do," I replied without even looking at him.
"Why? It's not even your problem."
"Yes, it is. My town, my responsibility. I know it sounds cheesy, but still. It's true." I thought about the situation once again, flinching from my own stupidity. I should've let her bite me or something, but it all happened so fast. Then I got an idea and turned to Damon, looking at him thoughtfully, making him raise his eyebrow. "There's something you can do though. I need you to bite me."
His eyebrows then flew up in surprise almost meeting his hairline, not expecting that kind of request at all.
"You are asking me to do what?"
"I'm asking you to bite me. I need it so everything would look more realistic and believable."
"Why, what are you...?" Then his eyes got bigger in shock. "You are not going to do what I think you are going to do, are you?"
"Are you gonna bite me, or not?" Seriously, this man just drives me crazy sometimes. My eyes hurt from the amount of eye rolling that I did because of him.
"Fine!"
I removed my hair, baring one side of my neck and tilted my head, waiting until he came closer. He was watching me intently, trying to figure out what was going on inside my head, trying to find any signs of fear, but I wasn't scared. Actually, the only thought that went through my head was that Nik would not gonna like it. I waited patiently until he finished with staring and finally did what I asked him to. Anyone could stumble upon us any minute, so I wanted to get everything done and go home, as quick as possible.
It happened fast, one second he still was staring into my eyes, the other his fangs were piercing my skin. I didn't let him take even one gulp, immediately pushing him away after getting what I wanted. While he was licking the blood from his lips, I concentrated and gathered a small amount of my blood in the air with my magic and headed to Vicki's body.
"What are you doing," I heard his confused voice but didn't bother to answer, too busy smearing my blood on Vicki's lips and fangs.
Maybe I was being overly paranoid, but I felt that I was doing the right thing. If they would, for some strange reason, try to perform an examination, they would see exactly what I had told them.
I concentrated on my wound again and made my blood run faster with a use of a little spell, so it would cover me up, to make everything look more realistic. What? I'm a perfectionist.
"You need to go," I told him taking out my phone and dialing Sheriff's personal number. "Sheriff's gonna be here soon."
"You are crazy, you know that?" He sounded really confused, which didn't suit him at all, he looked much better with that smug little smirk of his and behaving like his usual cocky self.
"Just, go!"
I waved him away, and tried to concentrate on something sad. I needed to sound hysterical and panicked, which meant that I needed some tears to add to my little acting. I didn't have to do much, just to remember the faces of my parents, their caring, warm smiles and that was it.
I didn't even look if Damon was still there, just pressed the call button, feeling that I overdid a little, as tears started streaming down my face uncontrollably. I noticed that I started to hyperventilate.
"Thalia? Is that you? Did something happen to Caroline?" I heard Sheriff's worried voice and sighed internally. She had all rights to be a little worried by my call, because even though I had her personal number, I called her only a few times in the past and only on emergencies. Last time I called, I had to tell her that her daughter broke her ankle while trying to do a back flip for the first time. She knew that I wouldn't call if it wasn't for something serious.
"Sheriff F-Forbes," I stuttered, calling her Sheriff, to show her that the situation was completely serious. Then I started talking frantically, choking on my tears. "Caroline is fine. I-I just... I-I didn't know what to do. It all happened so fast. Please you need to come here. She just... she went crazy and... I never believed in all those stories and... This is so messed up..."
"Thalia, listen to me. Take a deep breath and tell me where you are," she ordered sternly, already in her Sheriff mode.
"I-I'm in a school parking lot, where the school buses are parked. Please, you need to come alone, I just... I don't think that you would want anyone else to see this."
"Stay right where you are. I'll be there in 5 minutes, okay?"
"Yes yes. Please hurry up."
I hung up and rubbed my face tiredly, wincing when the pain pierced through my neck from the sudden movement, I totally forgot about the wound. I also forgot to undo the spell that I used to rush my blood circulation and noticed that I was getting lightheaded from the blood loss. I looked down at myself and winced again. I looked like I came straight out of the horror movie, my white shirt was completely wet with blood. I broke the spell and pressed on the wound with my hand in attempt to stop the blood, I've already lost too much of it.
Feeling the blood slipping through my fingers down my forearm, I turned to look at the body again. I've killed vampires before, but this... It was just... Maybe it was a good sign that I was feeling something, not remorse, but pity maybe? I mean it shows that I'm not a psychopath, right? The girl just ruined her own life. I mean, of course it wasn't her fault that she became a vampire. But, as far as I know, she wasn't even trying to learn to control her hunger. All those talks about avenging her brother's hurt feelings, but instead she could've just been there for him. She could've learned to live a life as a vampire and still try to be a good sister, but she didn't. For the whole month, she'd been just whining that animal blood tasted like shit. She never accepted anyone's help and wasn't helping herself either. It was truly pathetic.
The back door burst open and I turned around only to sigh with relief seeing that it was the Sheriff. I totally forgot to cast a spell on the door from unwanted attention.
Liz walked out of the door with a gun in her hands, looking around for any dangers and lowered it only when she heard my voice.
"Sheriff! Thank God!" I cried, taking my hand away from my wound on purpose, so she could see it. It was dark, but not so dark that she wouldn't notice a huge bleeding wound on my neck.
"Thalia! Oh my God!" She put her gun into a holster and ran to me. "What happened?"
"I-I was looking for Jeremy and heard him screaming and when I came here I saw her trying to bite him and..." I started crying again, talking too fast and was proud of myself for being such a good actress.
"Her?" From her expression I could say that she was preparing herself for the worst scenario. "Someone bit Jeremy?"
"Her," I nodded, taking a step aside so she could see Vicki's grey body, impaled on a huge piece of wood.
"Oh my God!" She exclaimed, covering her mouth in shock.
"I heard Jeremy screaming and saw her biting his neck. I screamed and she let him go. She then... she then appeared in front of me and bit me. I told Jeremy to run away and when she got distracted I kicked her with a wooden plank. She-she stumbled on her heels and fell and... she just turned like this... I didn't want to do it, I swear. I was just trying to protect Jeremy." I was rumbling, choking on my tears when she finally turned to look at me.
"Did Jeremy see anything?" Her tone was professional once again, she recovered from her shock rather quickly.
"N-no, no, I don't think so. He thought that she was on drugs. She acted like that before."
"When was that?"
"She came to our house a month or so ago, behaving like a psycho, throwing things around and screaming about voices and stuff. She really freaked us out. But this... I never believed in my dad's stories, I mean who would have?" I let out a hysterical laughter, and then burst in tears once again.
She looked at me and I could see that her two personalities were fighting each other inside of her. The Sheriff side of her probably wanted to question the hell out of me, wanting to see the whole picture, while Aunt Liz wanted to comfort her daughter's best friend.
"Is she-is she a... vampire?" I whispered that last word, as if afraid that if I said it out loud she would've laughed at me. "I mean dad told me stories and... and made me read the journals, but... I mean, how is this even possible? Oh my God... I killed her. I killed Vicki Donovan. I'm a murderer."
I started to cry again, feeling tired already of the amount of acting. She probably saw me sinking into hysterics again, as she came closer and put her hands on my shoulders, giving me a small shake.
"Thalia, listen to me! You are not a murderer," she sternly said squeezing my shoulders. "Vampires are real. We were aware of a new vampire in town and were doing our best to catch it. You did a great job. You protected not only your brother, but every other innocent life that she could've taken away. Do you understand?"
"But Sheriff... that's Vicki. I knew her most of my life... how could that even happen? Oh, poor Matt..."
"I understand, but she wasn't the girl that we both knew anymore. She was a monster. Someone must've turned her," she mumbled the last part under her breath thoughtfully, then shook her head and spoke again. "Do you know if she mentioned someone, someone new? Stranger probably?"
"I, we weren't that close. Even opposite actually. She tried to get Jeremy on drugs a few times, so I kinda threatened her to leave him alone. But that's it. I can... I can ask Jeremy, but he, he doesn't know about this. He can't know, he's-he's too young."
"Of course. You said he thinks she was on drugs?" She asked again, thinking about how to clean all this mess.
"Yeah, totally. She didn't even bite him properly. Just a scratch. I don't even want to think what would've happened if I was a bit late," I said tiredly and touched my wound again, feeling that the blood stopped finally. But I had the feeling that there was just nothing left to bleed. "What will happen now? Will I go to jail?"
"Of course not. I'll call my deputy to drive you to the hospital. You don't need to worry, I'll take care of everything, okay?"
"Can I go home? Jeremy must be scared out of his mind."
"You need to take care of the wound, you'll probably need some stitches too."
She sounded concerned and I had to do my best to convince her to let me go home. She probably needed to get rid of the body and come up with a story or something, so after a few more arguments she finally let me go.
"Wait," she called, when I already reached the back door. "You should probably cover yourself up, you are covered in blood."
"It's Halloween," I said, giving her a weak smile. "Everyone would think that it's a part of the costume."
The way back through the crowd was painfully slow. Wasted teenagers didn't understand the need to step aside when someone was passing through. Without adult supervision, people just let loose, the school looked more like a night club. Some drunk dude tried to slap my behind when I was passing by, but unfortunately for him even though I was tired from the blood loss, I was yet in a good enough condition to kick some ass. I left him behind, cursing and crying that I broke his wrist. I didn't.
I reached my car and looked at my bloody hands with disgust. I loved my car and tried to keep it clean, so the dilemma I was facing was pissing me off. I huffed in annoyance and tried to wipe my hands on my robe, cringing from my own actions as I was ruining my favorite costume even more. I didn't even think of the cleaning spell for some reason.
I gave up trying to clean my hands and sighed taking my car keys out of my pocket. I guess I don't have other choice. I'll clean it tomorrow. With that thought I was about to open my car, when someone snatched the keys right out of my hands. I turned around only to see Damon, looking at me without his usual smirk.
"I'll drive," he simply said but I shook my head.
"You are not touching my baby, Damon."
"Baby?" He raised his eyebrow mockingly.
"Yes, baby. Give me back my keys."
"Just get in the car, witchy," he said rolling his eyes in annoyance. "You don't want to get the blood on your baby, do you? I'll drive."
"Fine." I sighed in defeat seeing his point. "Then if you are playing a gentleman here, you wouldn't mind opening the passenger door for me, would you?"
The next thing I knew he was standing near the opened passenger door waiting for me impatiently. I smiled sweetly at him before getting carefully into the passenger seat, trying not to smear the blood everywhere. A second later he was in a driver's seat starting my car and we drove away.
I looked out of the window, waiting patiently until he said what he wanted to say. I didn't believe in generous Damon Salvatore. He wanted something.
"I could've handled it myself. I had a plan." He quietly said, his eyes on the road.
"You would've just gotten rid of the body. I solved the problem. I gave them the body of a dead vampire."
"I had a plan for that."
"I know what you wanted to do. You can come up with something else to earn their trust. You don't have to kill your brother's best friend for that." I saw him flinch, his pale blue eyes darting to me and returning to the road within seconds.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Damon. I'm a Seer. I know a lot of things, I see a lot of things. Sometimes I do something about it, sometimes I don't. I just feel when I need to interfere and when I had a vision of you killing, what was her name? Lexi? When I had a vision of you killing Lexi, I knew that I needed to do something about it. So I did." Well that was one of the reasons, but whatever.
"People started to die long before Vicki Donovan turned into a vampire. They are not stupid, they know that there's another one," he said stubbornly and I finally turned to look at him.
"You are strangely adamant about killing that girl," I stated the obvious, watching his reaction closely. "I know that you promised your brother an eternity of misery, but it's a little bit too much, don't you think? Killing the only person that knows how to fix your brother when he falls off the wagon?"
"How did you..." he turned to look at me, but I slapped his arm.
"Eyes on the road, Lestat!" He clenched his teeth angrily, but obeyed.
"You know about the Ripper Stefan and yet you are not trying to keep your sister away from him. Why?"
"I had a premonition about both of you, you know? Long before you officially appeared in Mystic Falls." I turned my eyes to the road once again, feeling him turn into a one big ear. "I painted you actually. I wasn't in a good condition back then, so when I tried to see why you two were even important in the first place, I couldn't. The only thing I knew was that the two of you weren't really a threat."
"Your third eye wasn't seeing clearly, then." He couldn't help adding a witty comment, but it sounded half assed even for me. So I just continued, ignoring him completely.
"I tried and tried to feel something from both of you, but the only thing I got was that one of you was a little bit more dangerous than another, but still not a threat to my family. When I met both of you in person, I thought that the one who was giving me creepy vibes was you, but it turned out that I was mistaken. So you can guess that I got a little worried, considering the fact that he was interested in my sister. He felt a little... unstable," I saw him flinch again but carried on. "So I did a little research and stumbled upon the bloody story of "The Ripper of Monterey". But something wasn't adding up, he wasn't giving me creepy vibes anymore, even when I touched him directly. So I got this theory..."
The car stopped in front of my house and I turned to Damon who didn't look like he was going anywhere.
"Care to share?"
"You vampires have this metaphorical little switch inside your head, so I assumed that he went off the wagon every time he flipped it. In my vision, heartbroken Stefan said something about Lexi helping him in times of need, while driving a stake through your chest, so I just put two and two together. There was no need for you to kill Lexi, you could've just turned any homeless guy into a vampire and give him as a present to the Sheriff to earn her trust, but you didn't. You killed the only person who could fix your brother every time he breaks. That's a little messed up. Even for you."
I got out of the car and when I reached the drivers seat he was already standing there, holding my keys.
"You know nothing about me," he said darkly, looking straight into my eyes.
"True. But you are trying so hard not to let anyone know the real you, so that's not my fault." I was about to leave but for some strange reason spoke to him again. "I have visions for a reason, Damon. Sometimes they warn me about the danger, sometimes they show me what will happen if I don't interfere and sometimes they show me what needs to be fixed. Mother Nature always knows what's better, and even if she doesn't let me know her reasons, I always end up figuring it all out. So far, she was never wrong." I took my keys from him and went to the front door, turning around only when I was about to open it. He was still standing on the same spot, looking deep in his thoughts, but turned around as if sensing my gaze. "Goodnight, Damon. Thanks for the ride."
He didn't say anything, but I didn't really expect him to, so I just went inside. And realized immediately that I made a huge mistake, when I heard Jenna's gasp.
"Oh my God! What happened?" I wasn't even able to see where she came from, that's how fast she was. She grabbed my shoulder rather gently and turned me around, pushing the hair from my neck. She couldn't hold another gasp and I suddenly realized that she wasn't the only one. I slowly turned to the left and saw Elena and Jeremy looking at me in horror.
Shit!
Jeremy had a bandage on his neck, so I assumed that Jenna and Elena were in the middle of treating his wound or something. Elena rushed to me too, tears streaming down her face, and I thought that maybe I looked a little bit worse than I thought.
"What happened? Did Vicki do this? I thought you killed her?" She asked frantically, examining my neck.
"What?!" Jenna looked at her in terror and confusion, making Elena widen her eyes in realization. Yeah, you screwed up Ellie!
I tried to say something, tell Jenna that it was all just a part of the costume or that someone spilled some fake blood on me, but I knew that it was too late. She was standing right in front of me, she saw the wound. It was too late. Suddenly I felt the room spinning around me or was it just in my head? I tried to move, but stumbled and almost fell. Almost, because my sister and aunt caught me in time and helped me to walk to the couch.
They started going through our first aid kit in panic, getting into each other's way, but I just sighed tiredly and cast a little calming spell. They both froze in mid movement, as if hit with a warm breeze and took a deep breath. Well the three of them actually, as I felt Jeremy, who was silently sitting beside me and holding my hand, relaxing a bit as well. I looked at them and sternly ordered. "Sit down."
They obliged slowly, still looking a bit out of it.
"What was that?" Elena asked silently. "What did you do? I feel so calm all of a sudden."
"Nothing much. Just a little calming spell." I said nonchalantly and grabbed the clean gauze and antiseptic and started wiping the blood from my neck. You are probably curious, why is she talking about the spells around Aunt Jenna that easily? Well the answer is, I didn't see the point anymore. She would've found out sooner or later, and instead of lying to her, I decided to use the opportunity and tell her everything. She would freak out of course, but she would understand eventually, as she was a smart woman.
I think Jeremy felt that change in me as well, as he silently picked another gauze and began helping me.
"What the hell is happening here? First Jeremy comes home with a wound on his neck that suspiciously looks like a... like a vampire bite, and now you... God Thalia, you are completely covered in blood! And Elena said something about you killing Vicki... I need to know what's going on!" Her voice broke a few times and there were tears in her eyes, but she still managed to look calm. My spell wasn't that strong, so it was all her. She is a strong woman, I thought proudly.
"Vicki Donovan is... was a vampire. She attacked Jeremy and I killed her." She looked like she was about to burst from anger, thinking that I was kidding around, but saw my deadly serious expression and paled.
"It's... it's impossible. Vampires are not real."
"Aren't they?" I asked softly, feeling that she could break if I raised my voice even a little bit. "You've read the journals, haven't you? Don't answer, I know you have. And you overheard enough suspicious conversations that mom and dad were not so subtle to hide. You saw Jeremy's neck and your first thought was about vampires. I know it's hard to believe, but you are too smart to deny all the facts."
She became paler and paler with every word I uttered, but I knew that she believed me. It was interesting actually. Back in the days I overheard my parents' talks about vampires a couple of times, and if I did, I know that others did as well. And it's not even considering the fact that they kept telling us bedtime stories about vampires and insisted that all of us read the journals. It was like they wanted us to figure it out on our own or at least to be prepared when they finally decided to perform "the big reveal". That's why Elena figured out Stefan's secret so fast. It was already there, in her head. The knowledge.
I finally managed to clean my neck, and must've exposed the wound as Aunt Jenna turned a little green, but didn't look away, as if mesmerized by the sight.
"So, what happened?" Jeremy quietly asked, squeezing my hand. "You were completely fine when we left. And what did you do with... with Vicki?"
I looked at them all, one after another, thinking sadly that I was totally gonna miss the magic of the Halloween night.