The point of the stake went all the way through the kid’s neck, the sharp tip sticking out just below his chin in front. He gagged and choked, clawing at it, then fell to his knees, one arm still awkwardly pulled up by the handcuff connecting his wrist to the bars.

Damon stepped back and watched blood pool down the young vampire’s neck and chest, puddling on the floor beneath him. The kid knocked the stake free at last, but slid limply farther down the bars, supported only by the one thin arm chained to them.

He let out a harsh, blood-choked breath, and his body stiffened, his eyes rolling back into his head.

Then he lay still. He wasn’t breathing. Damon listened, and heard nothing: no heartbeat, no struggle to breathe.

“We did it,” Meredith said softly. Her eyes were wide and shining with excitement.

“Wow,” Matt said. “That was, um… surprisingly easy.”

With a sudden jerk, the vampire spasmed on the floor, his eyes flying open. Then he leaped to his feet, his handcuff rattling. The gash in his neck was healing, new pink skin stretching across it. He growled and swiped at Damon through the bars. Damon, caught off balance, stumbled and almost fell. The vampire’s sharp nails cut into his leg, and Damon shook him off, swearing.

It didn’t work. Damon could feel Elena’s leaden misery filling him, mixing with his own red-hot rage.

“I’m sorry,” he said, desperately, and reached for her hand.

Then the back of his neck began to prickle uncomfortably. Something wrong, getting closer.

Jack’s voice, as cold as ice, came suddenly from behind them. “Meredith, I expected so much more from you.”

Damon whipped around.

Jack was at the end of the row of dusty cages, flanked by a crowd of his vampires. A long hunting knife gleamed in his hand.

“It was a trap,” Meredith said flatly.

“Of course it was a trap,” Jack said, his lips curling into a sneer. “It was a test, too, and you failed.”

With that, Jack and his vampires charged.

Two of them, a stocky guy and a blond-haired girl, slammed into Damon, one on each side, the girl driving her arm against his throat while the guy swept a leg against Damon’s, trying to knock him off balance.

The move felt like one of Meredith’s to him. She’d been teaching them. Wonderful, Damon thought, grabbing the guy’s leg and flinging him backward onto the hard concrete floor. The last thing they needed was a crowd of vampire hunter–trained vampires. He managed to snap the girl’s neck, giving himself some breathing room, but he knew she wouldn’t stay down for long.

Snarling, Damon looked around for Elena and saw that she was safe for the moment. She was in a corner at one end of the long row of storage cages, her hands extended. The air shimmered slightly around her. She must be making some sort of Guardian force field around herself, because no vampire was coming near her. As he watched, the shimmer around her expanded, encompassing the rest of their group for a moment, but then it shrank back. She was trying to protect them all, but it didn’t look like she could work up the Power.

Matt had Jasmine and Bonnie backed into a corner behind him and was swinging a stave at the lanky vampire coming toward them, driving it into him again and again. The vampire flinched under the blows, but kept coming toward them, his wounds healing faster than Matt could inflict them.

Bonnie was fumbling in her purse, no doubt looking for a weapon. Matt was no coward, but the vampire was just toying with him—one quick move, and the human would fall. Before Damon could spring forward to save the girls, Meredith was there, slamming the other vampire against the wall and efficiently breaking his neck.

There was the rattle of metal behind him, and suddenly someone landed on Damon’s back, thin strong arms twining around his throat. He automatically slammed his back against the wall, forcing a grunt of pain from his assailant. A sharp edge of metal—handcuffs, Damon realized—on his opponent’s wrist pressed against Damon’s throat. Someone had let the kid loose from his cage.

The young vampire was furious and half-mad with hunger. He clung on tight and bit down, working his sharp fangs savagely into Damon’s neck.

Damon slammed backward into the wall again, trying to get rid of him. The kid’s desperation gave him strength, though, and he held on tighter.

Distracted by the young vampire, Damon almost missed Bonnie’s fierce gesture, her hands shooting up into the air. There was a burst of blinding white light and suddenly Damon was flying backward.

His elbow scraped painfully along the floor as the force of Bonnie’s explosion shoved him along, but at least it had knocked the kid off his back. They landed side by side, and glared at each other, both flat on the ground and gasping with effort. The kid’s mouth was sloppy with blood.

All the vampires were on the ground, Damon realized. Jack was the fastest back on his feet, and he dragged Meredith up with him, his long knife pressed tightly against her throat. A thin line of blood dripped down Meredith’s neck, soaking the edge of her dark blue T-shirt.

Everyone froze. Damon could hear the young vampire panting beside him, but he couldn’t tear his eyes off Meredith, not even to snap the kid’s neck.

“Go ahead,” Meredith said bitterly. “Cut my head off. See if that’ll kill me.”

Jack smiled. “Oh, I know how to kill you,” he said softly. “But that would be giving you what you want.” His eyes flicked to Damon. “Immortality’s quite the curse, isn’t it, Salvatore?”

Faster than even Damon’s eyes could follow, Jack stabbed the knife viciously down, cutting through Meredith’s stomach. Then, he let go and let her fall. Meredith dropped to her knees, her hands desperately trying to hold the gaping wound together. Bonnie screamed, and Matt shouted, “Meredith!” sounding horrified. Damon only winced—that looked painful.

As they watched, the wound began to heal. In just a few seconds, Meredith’s flesh was whole again beneath the rip in her shirt. Elena gasped, and Jasmine whimpered.

Jack’s smile spread wider. “I thought you must have been lying to them. What do you think they’ll say, now that they know you’re one of mine?”

Bonnie began to chant in Latin, her voice hard and furious. A moment later, Elena joined her. She raised her hands above her head, seeming to draw on their energy, and a shimmer appeared above her.

Jack eyed them, and then grinned at Damon. “I’ll see you soon, Salvatore.” He snapped his fingers, and in a moment, his vampires were with him.

Damon pulled himself to his feet, ready to continue the fight, but Jack and his team were already gone. Damon could hear their footfalls, faint and far away.

Meredith, her face ghost-pale, climbed slowly to her feet. Her wound was already closing. She looked at her friends, who were staring back at her. Eyes wet, she looked from one human to another, taking in their horror. Damon could hear her heart pounding and her shaky, panicked breaths.

“I—I…” Meredith grasped the edges of her cut shirt and pulled them together, as if to hide the evidence of what she was. But she’d been revealed. There was no way to hide it now.

Chapter 18

“You knew about Meredith, didn’t you?” Elena asked Damon. After the first shock of discovery wore off, she had tried to get Meredith to come home with them. Her friend had seemed so lost. But Meredith had slid away, saying she had to go home and talk to Alaric. She hadn’t held eye contact with Elena, either, her eyes flitting down, her face averted. Meredith was ashamed, Elena realized.

Now, Elena and Damon were alone in Elena’s apartment, side by side on the couch. She felt exhausted; she just wanted to lay her head on Damon’s shoulder and close her eyes.

Damon looked at Elena, assessing, and then nodded warily. “She didn’t want me to tell anyone.”

Elena paused. “Thank you,” she said sincerely.

Damon arched an eyebrow curiously. Clearly, thanks hadn’t been what he was expecting.

“Remember when I became a vampire?” Elena asked.

“Believe me, princess, that’s not something I would forget.”

“Me neither.” Elena shivered. It had been a bad time for her. Fell’s Church was falling apart around them and everyone had thought—had needed to think—that Elena was dead. She had been lonely and frightened and almost out of her mind at the changes she was experiencing. “You took care of me,” she told Damon. “Without you, I wouldn’t have survived. I’m glad Meredith had you to turn to.”

Damon tilted his head, staring at her, his midnight-black eyes unreadable. “I know you want to think I’m a good person, Elena,” he said slowly. “But I didn’t help Meredith through the change, and I didn’t protect her. She wouldn’t have thanked me if I had.”

Without really meaning to, Elena leaned closer to Damon. “You would have helped her if she’d wanted you to,” she said, sure that this was true.

The corner of Damon’s mouth turned up in a half-smile. “For your sake, Elena,” he said softly. “Anything I do for any of them, for anyone, it’s for you. Always. You know that.”

She did know that. Deep inside, Elena was certain that she was the only one who connected Damon to anyone else, now that Stefan was gone.

The bond between them throbbed, sweet, sharp emotion spilling through it, and Damon leaned even closer to her. His lips were only millimeters away from hers. She could feel his cool breath. He moved closer still, his perfect lips parting.

Elena almost leaned in and took what Damon was offering. She wanted him, she did, and she could feel the love he would give her. But there was something cold and hard inside her, like a ball of ice in the center of her chest. If she did this, it would be moving on. It would be letting go of Stefan.

Elena pulled back. “I can’t,” she said. “I’m sorry. Stefan…”

With one swift, smooth movement, Damon was standing, turned away from her so that she couldn’t see his face. “Of course,” he said quietly. “He’ll always be between us, won’t he? Even if we live forever.”

Through their bond, Elena felt a sharp stinging pain. It brought tears to her eyes, but it only lasted for a few seconds before Damon muffled it, blocking the link between them to no more than a buzz. He still wouldn’t look at her.

Suddenly chilled, Elena folded her arms around herself. It was possible that they would live forever, wasn’t it? Un-aging, unchanging, forever young. Without Stefan.

“I’m sorry,” she said again. Damon nodded once, stiffly, and walked away, across the living room and through the door to the kitchen. A moment later, she heard the apartment door close quietly behind him.

What did I do? She pressed her hands against her chest, feeling a hollow, desperate ache inside. She couldn’t tell if the emotion belonged to her or to Damon.

Evening had come while Meredith sat on her and Alaric’s bed, waiting for Alaric to come home from teaching his class at Dalcrest. Dread pooled inside her. Half of her—more than half of her—just wanted to run, to get away before she saw him. She closed her eyes and clenched her fists so tight that her nails bit into her palms.

She had been waiting for hours. By the time she heard the front door open and close, the bedroom was almost totally dark, lit only by the streetlights shining in from outside.

Of course, Meredith could see perfectly well.

“Alaric,” she said in a small voice, unsure if he could hear her from the hall. He called back and then came to the bedroom.

“Hey,” he said softly. “When did you get home?” Even if she hadn’t been able to see the smile on his face, she would have heard it in his voice. “How come it’s so dark in here?” He reached toward the light switch, and Meredith stiffened.

“Leave it off, okay?”

“What’s wrong?” Alaric came closer and brushed a concerned hand featherlight across her cheek. Meredith pulled him down beside her on the bed and buried her head in his shoulder. She could hear his heart beating, as steady as the sea.

“What is it?” Alaric asked, pulling her against him. His body was warm and solid, and he petted her hair with one hand, trying to calm her down. Meredith realized she was shaking against Alaric, pushing her face against his shoulder. “Sweetheart, what’s wrong?” he asked again, sounding almost frantic now.

Meredith told him everything she could think of: how Jack had changed her, how long she’d been hiding it from him. That she’d lied, that she hadn’t been down in Atlanta with the hunters at all, but with Jack, being a vampire.

“I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t trust myself.” Around you, she didn’t add.

Alaric was silent for a moment, and tears began to fall from Meredith’s eyes. She pressed her face against his shoulder again, shaking. His shirt was warm with his body heat, and she pushed closer, treasuring the last moments of contact. He’d leave her. He’d have to. How could Alaric love her, if she was a monster?