Elena couldn't take her eyes off the bodies on the floor. Damon Salvatore, neck contorted in a way so familiar to her. But the issue was that she cared, now. She cared more than she'd like to admit, enough that the sight of him unconscious and weak made her eyes sting with tears. The man, Klaus, continued to pace before her with his hands together in front of his chest, rubbing them like he worked through some particularly difficult problem. He'd bound her wrists to the arms of the chair, her ankles tight to the legs, and the same cloth that had been in Damon's mouth gagged her, keeping her from speaking. She watched him pace, following his every movement. She did not fight against the restraints, did not waste her strength on an impossible task, no matter how much she wished to be free.

Damon would wake up. Marcus would wake up, and everything would be fine. They would get out of this place, this place that she'd been fighting to get into only weeks prior, and they would be okay. Or, she would wake up, and it would be like nothing ever happened. Yes, that would be the best outcome. She squeezed her eyes tight shut, hoping to provoke a sequence that would end with her shooting up in bed covered in sweat. She would find Damon in the living room waiting to argue with her about something nonsensical. She would find Caroline with an invitation to a party she would inevitably turn down. She would find her brother. There would be no monster pacing before her, looking as if he calculated the best way in which to kill her.

Unfortunately, none of that happened. When her eyes opened, she was not greeted by the comfort of her but, by the same room behind the bar at the strange building on the outskirts of town. The heavy circular table in the center of the room where the man had offered his blood only a few nights previous. Her, tied to the chair off to the side, the bodies, the blood, the taste of Damon's blood in her mouth, the man pacing back and forth, back and forth, and her head throbbing more than it ever had before, worse than any hangover.

How could this possibly be happening when there were so many things she wanted to say, so many questions she wanted to ask, so many things she still didn't understand? But she was alone, the person who'd bent over backward to protect her unconscious on the ground. Klaus said that Damon would be fine, but what did that mean? Would he wake up? When? How long would she have to endure this man's pacing, and what did he plan to do with her? A question she couldn't even voice. He'd made the right decision, placing the cloth into her mouth—otherwise, she'd have annoyed him with question after question. After all, Elena Gilbert was not the kind of person to go quiet, even in the presence of a monster. If she went down, it would be with a fight and a sharp word or two.

Klaus stopped pacing then, kneeling down before her and ever so gently taking the cloth out of her mouth. His gentle touch made her want to gag.

He captured her gaze and held it tight. She could feel something,like he'd tried to seize control of her mind with just his gaze. Pupils dilated, but nothing took eyes flicked away, desperate to find anything else to look at besides him.

The permanent smirk on his face disappeared at this, and then he was checking her fingers, her wrists. He stopped at the bracelet she wore. "Can't have that," he said and broke it off like it was nothing. The gift from Caroline clattered to the ground along with the rest of her hope. Then, he found her eyes again. That same feeling came over her, except this time, it did something. "I'm going to remove these binds, and you're going to walk calmly out of this building with me. Do you understand?"

She nodded. There was no fighting his command. She only understood. He slowly undid the bindings that kept her tied down, then motioned with two fingers for her to stand. She did so, despite everything screaming in her head to fight back, to run. Not only was this not an option, but she knew that if it were, he'd catch her and hurt her in any way necessary. She could still feel the bruises on either side of her face from where he'd gripped it, her arms ached from where he'd roughly shoved her down into the chair the first time, and her wrists and ankles were raw from the bindings that hadn't even been on for that long. While he'd been delicate in removing the bindings, he had certainly not been in applying them.

"Good," he said, proud of his own work. "Let's go. We have much work to do," he said, followed by a sound of agony. His hand clutched at his chest and he grunted again.

A pointed piece of wound broke through layers of skin and clothing, protruding out from his chest as he grasped at it. He bared his teeth, blinking slowly in a show of annoyance, but not pain. He moved with lightning speed across the room to the now open door where Stefan Salvatore stood with a weapon that looked like a crossbow but had wooden stakes instead of arrows. Klaus took Stefan by the neck, but still Stefan managed to get out the words, "Caroline, now."

The blonde appeared behind Klaus in a fraction of a second, snapping his neck just as he had snapped Damon's, wordlessly with an expression on her face that Elena did not recognize. Klaus fell to the floor in a heap.

"That won't hold him long, we have to go," Stefan said, stepping over Klaus to pick up Damon and throw him over his shoulder.

Caroline turned and met Elena's eyes, more shock in them than ever before. If Damon was a vampire, it would have been a safe assumption to say that his friends were as well, but she hadn't even had an opportunity to think about it. Caroline grabbed her hand, shaking her out of the state of shock that had overtaken her. "Elena, we have to go."

She could only nod as Caroline moved away, picking up Marcus' slack body, carrying him like he weighed nothing, with much more care than Stefan carried Damon.

The carriage ride was silent, and no one looked at her. Stefan and Caroline sat opposite each other, engaged in a conversation that she couldn't follow. She caught bits and pieces in the rare moments when her mind quieted. But for the most part, her thoughts were too loud. She sat in a carriage with Caroline and Stefan, two vampires. Two people who saw through her disguise. Her hat had been lost in the scuffle and her braids fell heavy on her shoulders. But none of that seemed to matter now. The disguise, the society, her education. None of it mattered now that her life was in danger. And still, she did not know why. But she couldn't bring herself to ask, either, especially when Damon and Marcus sat leaned against one another on the bench next to each other, still unconscious.

"We can't go back to your apartment," Stefan said.

Caroline nodded. "I know."

Stefan pulled back a curtain that separated them from the driver and whispered a few words that Elena didn't catch.

"Elena," Caroline said, reaching out to touch her on the shoulder. She jumped out of her skin at the touch. "Are you okay?"

She nodded numbly.

"You're not injured?" Caroline asked.

She shook her head.

"We're going to explain everything. I promise," she said, attempting to be gentle with Elena, seeing how fragile she was. "Just try to get some sleep, and we'll be at the country house soon."

Elena listened, and let her eyelids fall closed. As soon as darkness surrounded her, everything came flooding back. Damon holding her face in his hands, saying her name, feeding her his blood. The look on his face. The sound of his neck snapping. The feeling of the dagger gliding across her palm. Klaus' eyes, the way he handled her. The stake going through his chest. All of it played over and over again in stark clarity as if she were experiencing it again and again.

Somehow, she fell asleep with these thoughts raging on behind her eyes. There was an exhaustion in knowing. In knowing that she sat in a carriage full of people who knew her secret, in a carriage full of vampires. Caroline, a vampire. Her best friend. Had she known all along, that Damon knew her secret? Had everything been lying to her this entire time? All of these thoughts felt like a tight hand around her neck, suffocating her even in sleep.

She woke up to a gentle movement, startling. Her eyes flew open to meet familiar blue ones. He held her close to his chest as he walked, his grip tight like he worried about dropping her. Being in his arms should have sent sparks down her spine, but feeling anything other than fear and betrayal was an impossible challenge.

"It's okay," Damon said, voice softer than he'd ever heard it. "It's just me."

He didn't ask her if she wanted to be put down, which she was glad for. She wanted to fight, to complain about her capability, and demand he put her down. But her lids were heavy and her mind was weary. Instead, she just let her eyes close again, resting her head against his chest. A sigh of relief escaped her lips, more glad than she'd admit out loud to see him conscious once more.

Once inside, Damon set her down on the couch but stayed close, leaning slightly over her. He reached out and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear, and she shuttered at the touch.

"Damon," she said, voice soft, tired. "What's going on?"

"Be honest with her," Caroline said, from somewhere across the room, and Damon loosed a sigh.

Elena sat up, Damon moving away to give her space. She wrapped her arms tight around her waist. She was desperate to pull her legs to her chest, to make herself small enough that maybe they'd forget she was there entirely. But that desire was at war with something else in her chest, one that wished to be loud and angry. In the end, that desire won out.

"You knew," she said, her voice gaining some strength, finding her fight again. "You knew this whole time. Didn't you? About me?"

He nodded, and Elena squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to look at him.

"God, I'm such an idiot." She stood up from the couch, pacing. He reached out a hand like he needed to steady her, but she just glared at him until it dropped again. "Well," she spat. "Go on, then. What else have you been keeping from me? Aside from the fact that you're all vampires."

Damon looked away for a second, losing a bit of his own confidence. "Klaus used to be a friend of ours."

Caroline stepped forward, looking at Elena. "He wants to use you for a ritual he's planning. He wants to sacrifice you. That's why we've been trying to keep you safe all this time."

"I got that," she said, eyes bouncing between Damon and Caroline. "But why? Why me?"

Caroline and Damon shared a glance.

"Stop," Elena commented, terse. "Stop communicating in code, in eye contact, and just tell me everything. Tell me what's going on." She threw her hands out at her sides in exasperation, head throbbing with pain and betrayal and an aching sadness in her chest. "I'm so sick of this. You two have both been keeping secrets from me since I got here. It ends now."

"Elena," Caroline reached out to her and Elena flinched back.

"Don't."

If Caroline was upset by this, she made an effort not to show it on her face. "Klaus created vampires. He sacrificed one of our friends to do so. An ancestor of yours. We think that he wants to use you in order to break the curse and become truly immortal."

The story sounded familiar. Too familiar. "Is Klaus Arthur Harmon?"

Damon nodded. "I wasn't certain at first. But yes. He is."

"I met his brother," Elena said, like it didn't matter.

Damon tensed at this. "Elijah."

"I guess. He didn't say his name. Just told me that he wanted to kill Arthur Harmon, and offered to turn me. He said that I could help them."

Caroline was still pacing off to the side, and Damon pinched his nose between thumb and forefinger.

"My ancestor," Elena said, trying to piece everything together. "You knew her? Hold old are you?" She looked between Caroline and Damon.

It was Damon who spoke. "Two hundred."

Elena nodded, absorbing all of the information they gave her. What did this all mean? How had she gotten caught up in something like this? And it killed her because that meant that Damon had been right this entire time. Her life was at stake, the society was dangerous, and she had been completely in over her head. That annoyed her the most. That he'd been right, and that she'd almost kissed him.

"You were really just trying to protect me," she said. "This whole time. Why didn't you just say something? Why—why let me just pretend, when you—you knew everything, you knew I was a fraud?" she spoke, the anger rising in her tone. "God, I must have looked like such an idiot. And everyone… everyone knew." She shook her head, struggling to get over that one point. All of the time spent trying to protect her identity, to keep them from learning the truth about her? It had been pointless. Unnecessary. It hurt more than learning that her best friend and the man she'd started to develop feelings for were two hundred-year-old blood-sucking monsters.

"I don't know, Elena," Damon said.

But she interrupted him. "Don't call me that."

He looked at her with eyes too soft she had to look away. "I underestimated you. I didn't think you would figure out as much as you did on your own. I was going to tell you. I was about to tell you, and then this."

She laughed and pulled the bands from her braids, unwinding them with her fingers. She dug her fingers through the brown waves, reaching her scalp and shaking them out, attempting to relieve her headache. "You know, I was about to tell you. Caroline had nearly convinced me that it was a good idea. God, how embarrassing that would have been. What would you have said, would have pretended you hadn't known?" She shook her head again, pressing her hands to her face, feeling like she wanted to scream. "Would you have pretended to be shocked?"

"I don't know," Damon said.

She laughed again, wanting to pull her hair out. "Well, at least you don't know everything."

"Cut him some slack, Elena. He was trying to protect you. We all were," Caroline said.

Elena turned her glare on the blonde, and immediately pain bloomed in her chest. Damon was one thing, but Caroline entirely another. That hurt. "And you," she said, shaking her head, bottom lip so close to wobbling. "You have been lying to me for months. I thought…" she couldn't find the words to accurately describe how she felt. "I trusted you, with everything. And now," she looked back at Damon. "I don't know what I'm supposed to say right now. I—I think I want to be alone."

Caroline turned away, but Elena caught the look on her face before she could fully hide it. The hurt in her friend's eyes only hurt her more, and she didn't know what to do with that. She didn't know what to do with any of this. Because despite all the betrayal, she did care about these people.

Damon leaned forward, hands clasped together and elbows on his knees. "I know it's a lot. I know you're overwhelmed."

"Don't," Elena said, taking a step away from him like she could flee up the stairs and into one of the guest rooms at any moment. "You don't know anything about me." Then she did turn, hurrying up the stairs and away as fast as she could. When she ducked into the guest room she'd stayed in before, she quickly buried her face in the mountain of pillows. How had she gotten here? How had everything turned so terribly awful so fast? Only days ago she'd been questioning her feelings for Damon. At least she knew what she felt now—hurt.

A/N: Happy IPOP weekend an even happier Act III start. This act is truly a wild ride, so I hope you're all wearing your seat belts. Thank you so so so so much for all your love on the last chapter, it truly brings me so much joy and inspires me to keep going when I see all of your lovely comments and reviews. I appreciate it more than anything!