Katherine was after the moonstone. If the Lockwoods do have the moonstone, that explains why Katherine has returned to Mystic Falls. I smile internally to myself. The bitch was playing a risky game here if she thought she could bargain for her life.
After all the drama that had occurred, I decide to call it quits for the night. I climbed into my soft, comfy bed and fell asleep almost instantly. When I woke the next day, it was already well into the afternoon.
“Hi sleepyhead,” Damon greets me when I walk into the kitchen in my pyjamas.
I glare at him. “I think I’ve earned my sleep. Do you have a blood bag?”
Damon reached into the fridge and tossed me one. “I thought you hated blood bags?”
“I do but I’m not in the mood to drive out of town. Blood bags are so bad though, I don’t know how you can handle it.”
Damon laughs. “Blood is blood, there is no such thing as bad blood. Although I have to agree that blood from the vain is much, much better.”
“So what time is it?”
“Three in the afternoon.”
“What?! I thought it was only eleven,” I mumble. “Well that’s another day wasted but I have an eternity to live so who cares.”
“You missed our meeting this morning.”
“Meeting?”
“We’re looking into the theory of lycanthropy and Alaric has agreed to help out.”
“Great, do you need me to do anything?”
“Yeah, just stick around town and keep an eye on things. Stefan is going over to Caroline’s and Elena, Alaric and I are going up to Duke to view the research that Isobel did. We all know she was a fanatic for the supernatural.”
“She was obsessed with vampires but hey, who knows, she could have stumbled upon other things as well,” I shrug. “Text me if you find anything.”
“Sure. But do me a favour, if you have time, go watch Mason Lockwood.”
“Damon I’m not stalking Mason Lockwood. Just because you have a man cru-”
I close my mouth and just grin at him when I see the look he is giving me.
“I’m heading off now to Elena’s,” Damon informs me.
“Oh wait! I want to come too,” I say. “Let me change really quickly.”
In a flash, I’m back in the kitchen where Damon looks like he hasn’t moved a muscle. However, instead of wearing pyjamas, I was now sporting a pair of tight black yoga pants along with a white tank top.
“You look like you’re going for a nice jog around the neighbourhood,” Damon comments, checking out my butt.
“Hey eternal stud, eyes up here,” I say. “Come on, let’s go.”
Damon and I decide to walk over to Elena’s house. The walk is nice, quiet and peaceful. I didn’t think it was possible to have a peaceful moment with Damon Salvatore. When we get to Elena’s house, I see Alaric and Jenna talking in the door way while I know Stefan and Elena are having a make out session upstairs. I tried to listen further but Jeremy didn’t seem to be home. He was probably out somewhere with Anna.
Damon and I stand outside and wait while everyone else is taking their precious time in saying their goodbyes. You would have thought they were never going to see each other again. Finally, Alaric, Elena and Stefan come out. Alaric climbs into the driver’s seat while Damon leans on the side of the car and smirks at Stefan.
“Sorry you can’t come too, Stef,” Damon taunts.
Elena gives Damon a cold look while throwing her bag into the car before she turns back to Stefan.
“Call me if you need anything,” he tells her.
“Oh I’ll take really good care of her,” comments Damon.
Elena gives Damon a pointed look before she leans into Stefan and kisses him. I pretend not to gag while Damon looks mildly disturbed. They both pause for a second to smile at Damon.
“Okay, time to go,” Damon says. He opens the passenger side and climbs in before looking at me. “Remember; keep your eyes peeled for any signs of danger.”
As soon as they are gone, Stefan and I are left standing there awkwardly.
“Now what?” I ask.
“Nothing,” says Stefan. “You can go do whatever it is that you do while I go over to Caroline’s.”
“Aw, and I thought we were going to be working together!”
“We aren’t on the same side, Alayne,” Stefan glares at me. “You can’t prove that you can be trusted so I can’t trust you anymore.”
I pout. “Fine, go do whatever you need to do. I’m going over to Caroline’s.”
“Wait, wh-”
I’m gone before Stefan can continue whatever it was he wanted to say. Soon, I’m standing in front of Caroline’s house, knocking on her front door. No one comes to answer.
“Caroline?” I call out. “Are you home?”
“Aly?” I hear a whisper come from within the house. “I can’t open the door. The sunlight hurts.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. “Why don’t you just quickly open it and then run back into the shadows. It’ll only hurt for a second and then you’ll heal.”
I hear Caroline take a deep breath from inside. Suddenly, the door is whipped open but no one is there. I can hear Caroline panting from inside the house though. I take my step to enter the house but find that I am blocked from entering.
“Shit!” I swear.
Caroline’s head peeps out from behind a doorway. “What’s wrong?”
“I haven’t been invited in and I need a living person that resides at your house to invite me in,” I say. “But here.” I toss her a silver ring with a blue stone in the center. “Put that on and you can walk in the sun.”
I watch as Caroline gingerly slips her finger into the ring.
“Are you sure it works?” she asks cautiously.
“It should,” I shrug.
She takes a deep breath and takes a step out into the sunlight. The look on her face is miraculous.
“Oh my gosh!” Caroline squeals. “Yes, yes, yes! I don’t have to be trapped in the dark anymore. Hurray!”
I laugh. “Calm down. Have you fed yet today?”
She stops squealing and looks serious again. “Not yet. Stefan was going to come by and take me hunting.”
“Stefan?” I make a face. “Then where is he?”
“Right here,” a voice says from behind me.
I turn around and annoyingly enough, Stefan is standing there smirking.
“I’m taking Caroline out to teach her how to hunt now,” Stefan says.
I roll my eyes. “Okay, I’ll come with you guys to see how this turns out.”
“Can we go to Tyler’s party afterwards?” Caroline asks in a small voice.
We both turn to look at her and there is a pleading look in her eyes. Stefan and I glanced at each other.
“Yes,” I say.
“No,” Stefan says at the exact same time.
“Why not?” I argue. “It’ll be good for her to be around her friends again since she hasn’t seen them in such a long time. Plus, she’s feeding right before she goes and we’ll be there to keep an eye on her.”
Caroline nods quickly and gives Stefan a pleading look.
Stefan sighs. “Fine.”
We take Stefan’s car out into the woods where Stefan teaches Caroline how to catch bunnies and where I just roll my eyes in disgust. Bunny blood was honestly not that great compared to fresh blood from the human vein. After Caroline has fed, we head over to the Lockwood property to join Tyler’s party.
“Why is that bitch with Matt?” Caroline immediately points to a petite girl with dark hair who appears to be flirting with Matt.
“Who is she?” I ask.
“Amy Bradley.” Caroline spits out her name. “All the guys like her ass but really, she’s just some bimbo.”
I stifle my laughter and Caroline turns her glare on me. I hold out my hands in defense.
“Caroline, why don’t you go talk to Matt,” suggests Stefan.
Caroline stalks over to them and smiles at Matt. Stefan turns to me.
“You think she’ll be alright?”
“Yeah,” I say. “She has brilliant control. She’s good.”
***
It is dark now and the party is pretty much over. Tyler wanted everyone to leave before dark since he claimed his family would be liable if someone got wasted and ended up at the bottom of the pond. I had hung out with Caroline and Stefan for the whole day since Matt was apparently mad at Caroline. Hanging out with Stefan had been tolerable since we kept the conversation between us to a minimum. The day had been all about Caroline.
Suddenly, Stefan’s phone rings and he goes to take the phone call. I watch as Caroline keeps staring wistfully at Matt and finally shove her forward.
“Go talk to him,” I instruct.
“He’s mad me at!” she protests.
“Go talk to him.”
Caroline glances over at Matt before she smiles. “Okay.”
I watch as she walks over to Matt. Suddenly, Tyler slides in beside me, replacing Caroline.
“What?” I scowl at him.
“Whoa, what did I do?” He holds out his hands defensively.
I sigh. “Nothing, just get lost Tyler. I’m not in the mood to be dealing with your usual bullshit.”
“Someone seems to have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed.”
I punch him. Hard. He yelps in response.
“Okay, okay! I’m leaving, bye!” He scrambles off to help with the rest of the clean-up.
Stefan comes back up to me with a worried look on his face that makes me tense up instantly.
“What’s wrong?” I ask him.
“Elena said that the bite of a werewolf is rumoured to be fatal to a vampire.”
“Yeah, I could have told you that too,” I say. “Which is why you need to be careful.”
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“Stefan! I’m an extremely old vampire, I can’t keep track of everything and if I remember correctly, you never asked me about the lycanthropes.”
“Yeah, we need to be careful. Where’s Caroline?”
“She’s right over there with Ma-”
My voice falters since Caroline is nowhere to be seen.
“Shit,” I mutter.
“We need to find Caroline.”
“No Stefan, I’ll find Caroline. You need to get out of here right now or else you’re going to die,” I say seriously.
“And you’re not in danger of dying?” challenges Stefan.
I smile and show my fangs. “Nope.”
“I’m not leaving you, Aly,” says Stefan. “We’ll do this together.”
“Keep your cellphone on you,” I say before running off.
The woods are dark but with my perfect vampire vision, I can see just fine. It is eerily quiet where I am, the only sound is the sound of the wind rustling against the leaves in the trees. I wander further and further into the woods, not really sure where I am anymore since I am in unexplored territory.
Suddenly, I hear a growl behind me and I whip around but there is nothing there. Cautiously, I head in the direction of the growl, only to hear it come from behind me once again. I turn around and there is nothing there. All my senses are fully alert right now and I close my eyes and make sure my timing is absolutely flawless. I turn around right when the growl comes and I come face to face with a wolf, its amber eyes staring menacingly at me.
We stare silently at each other for a couple of long seconds before making a move. We charge at the same time and I manage to knock the wolf to the side. It whimpers slightly as it bounds back up onto its legs. It lunges at me again but I fling it aside using my telekinesis. I smirk at the wolf.
“Aw what’s wrong? Can’t get me, can you?” I taunt.
It tries one more time to lunge at me and this time, using my telepathic powers, I launch a full assault on the wolf’s mind. The wolf collapses to the ground immediately and starts thrashing in pain.
I grin evilly at it before releasing the wolf from my mental torture.
“So I need to know, which Lockwood are you?” I say, stepping closer to the werewolf once again.
It is quickly up on its feet and it growls at me once before running off into the night. I stand alone and mentally count in my head.
“Alright, you’ve had your head start,” I shout. “I’m coming after you now!”
I hear screaming coming from a distance and I swear internally. I knew I shouldn’t have let that wolf get away. I make a run for it but just as I enter the clearing, I see the wolf run away again and Caroline sobbing on the ground.
“Caroline!” I shout, running towards her. “Oh god, did it bite you?” I frantically ask. It will not be fun to explain to Elena how one of her best friends died by the bite of a werewolf while she was gone for a day.
“No,” she cries.
I let out of a breath of relief.
“Stefan,” I turn to him. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” he nods but glances over at Tyler, who I didn’t notice was standing there and staring at all of us.
“You take care of him,” I say. “I’ll get Caroline home.”
I help Caroline up and start to drag her out of the woods.
“Wait, I need to go get Matt,” she whimpers quietly. “I bit him.”
“What?!”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened. We were making out and then all of a sudden, he was bleeding and I couldn’t resist myself and I accidentally gave over to the urges and ugh. What is wrong with me?” Caroline rambles with wide eyes.
“You’re a vampire, it’s your natural instinct,” I say. “Come on, let’s find Matt and fix this.”
We follow the scent of blood and find Matt lying at the base of a tree.
“Are you going to give him your blood?” Caroline asks me.
I smile slightly. “No, we don’t want to risk another turnout similar to yours.”
“Oh, right.”
“Here, you do the compelling, just make him forget any of this happened. I’ll do the spell to clean him up.”
After we take care of Matt, I decide to go home for the day. Although Damon, Elena and Alaric were out of town, it had still been an eventful day.
***
I wake up the next morning to the sun shining brightly on my face and voices coming from downstairs. Quickly, I’m up and I head to the bathroom to take care of my daily morning business such as brushing my teeth and washing before I head to my closet. I pick out a royal blue, long sleeve shirt and pair it with a pair of black skinny jeans and my black ballet flats before heading back into the bathroom.
I stare at my reflection in the mirror. My face was pale and my green eyes were surprisingly dark today. My hair was much more tousled today than usual so I plug in my curling iron and put my hair into messier curls before running my fingers through them and making my hair more wavy than curly.
After getting dressed for the day, I head downstairs and surprisingly enough find that Stefan is standing above Katherine with a vervain dart in his hand.
“Whoa,” I say when I enter.
“Morning,” greets Stefan.
“What happened here?”
“She was stupid enough to come here so I had to take action,” Stefan says. “Are you going out today?”
“Yeah, I’ll probably just go bother some people around town,” I shrug. “I need to speak with Damon about his trip yesterday.”
“Okay, I’ll take care of Katherine, you go have fun,” he says.
I glance at him awkwardly. “Are we just going to pretend that we’re cool again?”
Stefan shrugs. “For now.”
My phone rings just as I’m about to leave the boarding house.
“Hello?”
“Aly?” It’s Damon and he’s whispering.
“Damon?”
“Yeah, hey do you want to come over to Elena’s house?”
“Elena’s? What are you doing at Elena’s?”
“Barbeque, we’re all here but no one really seems to like me right now,” Damon says.
“So you’re inviting me over because you think I like you?”
“I would hope so.”
I sigh. “Damon, I was going to go out of town today.”
“Please? Mason Lockwood is here. You could help us investigate?”
I sigh again. “Fine, I’ll be right over.”
I decide to take my car, which I have driven in a long time and I speed over to Elena’s house. I ring the doorbell and Elena opens it, surprise on her face when she sees me.
“Aly? Hey, I didn’t know you were coming over.”
“Oh yeah, Rick invited me over,” I lie.
“Really, he didn’t tell us that,” Elena says. “Whatever, come on in.”
I step into the house and am immediately greeted by everyone. Jenna smiles warmly and gives me a hug while Damon and Alaric nod at me.
“Hey Aly,” Alaric says. “I didn’t know you were coming over.”
“Really, because you invited me this morning,” I say pointedly. I see Damon nudge Alaric and realization dawns on his face.
“Oh right, I forgot I texted you, whoops my bad,” Alaric covers. “Here, I’ll get you some food, it’s pretty much ready.”
“Thanks Alaric,” I smile gratefully.
A young man with brown hair steps forward to introduce himself.
“Hi, I’m Mason Lockwood.” He holds out his hand which I take.
“Alayne Mikaelson,” I say, smiling.
Mason grins cheekily before letting go of my hand.
“Are you single?” he blurts out.
“No,” I say without thinking.
“No?” Damon looks surprised.
“I don’t know,” I blush slightly.
“Ah, teenage love,” coos Jenna.
I grin sheepishly before taking my seat at the table.
“Have you seen Stefan?” Elena asks me out of nowhere.
I pause in between my bite of food and deliberate for a second. I knew where Stefan was, he was back at the boarding house interrogating his ex-lover Katherine. But was that something I should be telling Elena? It would only make her worry more about him and she really didn’t need to know about Katherine right now.
“Yeah, I think he’s running some errands and taking care of some business around the house,” I say. It was true and it wasn’t a complete lie. Elena can deal with that.
After we all finish eating, we move to the living room and start playing a game of Pictionary, which Mason turns out to be really good at. The rest of us are just confused and can’t seem to guess anything right.
Currently, Damon was drawing a picture of a sort of animal in tutu while Caroline and Jenna are screaming out answers but of course, Mason guesses it right.
“Mason wins… again,” declares Damon.
“How the hell did he get that?” protests Jenna.
I leave the living to help out Elena in the kitchen while Jenna is still protesting.
“Your aunt is getting tipsy,” I tell Elena.
“Yeah, it would help if Damon stopped giving her the alcohol,” she grumbles. “How is operation Lockwood going?”
I shrug. “I don’t know, you’ll have to check with Damon on that. I have absolutely no idea what is going on.” I glance around the kitchen and notice a silver set sitting nicely on the counter. “Is that real silver?” I ask Elena.
She glances at it. “Yeah, that belonged to my grandmother.”
“Fancy,” I observe. I pull out a silver knife. “We should get Mason to slice the pie.”
As soon as everyone is in the kitchen for dessert, I shove the pie at Mason, smiling sweetly at him.
“Since you’re new to town, you should do the honours and take the first slice.”
I watch as Mason glances warily at the silver knife before turning the pie around. He takes out a chunk of it with his hand instead but I am already able to confirm my suspicions. His hesitation was enough for me, Damon and Alaric. Mason notices our looks and he laughs awkwardly.
“Sorry,” he apologizes. “I’m an animal.”
Oh the irony in those words.
Elena and Caroline leave shortly after while Jenna and Alaric move back into the family room where the TV is. Mason joins Damon and I in the kitchen and watches as I take a swig of Damon’s beer.
“Aren’t you under age?” he questions.
I glare at him. “You’re barking up the wrong tree. Piss off.”
“Okay, what is your problem?” Mason inquires.
“My problem?” I glare at him. “You tried to kill me last night.”
“I’m not your enemy,” says Mason. “What happened last night was a mistake. I didn’t have enough time to chain myself up since Tyler got into the mix of things. I have no control over myself once I shift.”
“Oh, you didn’t go to obedience school?” Damon cuts in, smirking.
“I’m serious,” Mason says. “Let’s not spark some feud that has nothing to do with us.”
I laugh out loud. “Oh it has everything to do with us.”
“Come on guys,” Mason tries to laugh it off. “I’m seriously not your enemy.”
I glare at him distastefully. “I’ll believe that when you prove yourself. Until then, I better not see you again.”
I leave the Gilbert house shortly after and decide to go to the Grill for a couple of drinks myself. After compelling the bartender, I just sit alone until someone slides into the seat next to me.
I smile at the petite girl with dark hair framing her face.
“Anna,” I say. “I haven’t seen you in a while. Do you even live at the boarding house anymore?”
Anna smiles at me. “Yes, we just never run into each other.”
“How is Jeremy?”
“He’s good, I’ve been keeping an eye out on him.”
“Where were you when Damon killed him?”
“I left for a short hunting trip. I didn’t know he would be killed the minute I left him,” she scowls. “Thankfully, he was wearing that ring of his.”
“Well, you’re doing a good job,” I tell her. “We need to keep Jeremy out of all this.” I rub my temples. “God, fucking Katherine is causing so many issues. I’m wondering if I should just turn her over,” I blab.
“Turn her over?” Anna gives me a curious look.
“Katherine is running from someone who has been hunting her for a very long time. That’s all I’m going to say about it.”
“Who?”
“That’s not important but that person can not be directed to Mystic Falls because if they come here, all hell will break lose and a lot of people are going to die,” I say.
Anna shrugs. “Well, whatever. Just know that I’m here if you ever need any help with anything.”
“I just need you to continue whatever you’re doing but be careful because we have a werewolf on the loose right now and a werewolf bite can kill a vampire.”
Anna’s eyes widen. “I haven’t seen or heard about werewolves since 1864 when I discovered George Lockwood was one.”
“You knew a werewolf?” I raise my eyebrows in surprise.
“Yeah, I was out feeding one night when I saw a wolf. It ripped a man apart. I followed it from a distance and when it changed back into a human, I realized it was the son of one of the founding family members.”
I nod my head. “Interesting. Lycanthropy must run in the Lockwood genes because Mason Lockwood is one.”
“That would make sense,” anna points out. “You look so stressed though, are you okay?”
“No I am not okay,” I admit. “I am at the point where I want to almost kill everyone and I have been deprived of fresh human blood. In fact, now that i actually have time to notice that, I might decide to take a short field trip.”
“Wait, you’re leaving?”
“Maybe, I think I need to get away just for a little bit.”
“But the Salvatores are bound to need you here. They can’t take on Katherine and the werewolves by themselves.”
“You can help them?” I suggest.
“They don’t even like me!”
“But Jeremy does,” I say. “Just go talk to them. You haven’t even tried.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed but I don’t really make friends all that well.”
“Actually I have. You’ve been around for a long time now, maybe it is time to start trying?” I stand up and pay for my drink. “Yeah, leaving for a while. That does sound like a brilliant idea.”
“Alayne!”
“Bye Anna!”
I run out of the Grill quickly and hop into my car before I start driving out of time. The music is blaring from my awesome car stereo and at that moment, I felt so carefree. I was a thousand year old vampire for god’s sake. I shouldn’t have been so overwhelmed.
After about an hour of driving to nowhere, I decide to call Sebastian.
“Hey,” I greet him over the phone.
“Aly? What’s wrong?” Sebastian sounds a little worried.
“Wrong?” I’m confused. “Nothing’s wrong. I just left Mystic Falls because I decided I need room to breathe. Where are you?”
“You left? Why?” Sebastian sounds curious. “We’re in New York. Someone informed us that Nathaniel was last seen here about a month ago.”
“Nate is in the big apple? Perfect! I’ve always loved your younger brother.”
“Are you coming?”
“Yeah I’m about a couple hours away.”
“Great, I’ll see then.”
My usual perky and not-caring-self seemed to be coming back the further away I drove from Mystic Falls. It was literally as if a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I hadn’t been to New York in a month and I was ready to get back to my old life and partying it up in the big city. Who knows? If I find Sebastian and the rest of his siblings there, we could all enjoy a good time together.
A/N: If you're reading this and liking the story, please vote! You have no idea how nice it makes me feel when people comment and say they like the story. Love you all!
Ps. This chapter was literally finished right before I uploaded it so please don't hate if there are tons of mistakes.
I can't upload every Thursday any more, seeing as there isn't enough time so I'll post a chapter every time I'm finished writing one. Thanks for putting up with me :)