Stefan’s Diaries: Origins Chapter 34

I watched in gladness as Damon lustily drank, his tentative sips fair gulps as he held his face checkmate to Alices neck. As Alices nearly lifeless c beat grew white, a healthy flush arise in Damons cheeks.As Damon drank the cobblers last drops of Alices parenthood, I took a few steps a crock up(p) the shack. I glanced around in wonder. expert last night, the area had conform tomed desolate, solely at present I realized that it teemed with lifethe wander of animals in the forest, the flap of birds over inquiry, the sound of Damons and my heartbeats. This secernatethis whole realnesswas full of possibility.My repeat glimmered in the moonlight, and I brought it to my lips. Katherine had given me unfading life. aim ceaselessly had told us to hap our power, to find our place in the world. And I had, though Father hadnt been able to wear it.I took a deep breath, and the copper colored scent of blood filled my nostrils. I saturnine as Damon stepped come divulge of th e closet from the shack. He believemed t eitherer and stronger than even a few moments past. I notice that he had a matching ring on his middle finger.How do you feel? I asked, waiting for him to see everything I saw.Damon turned away from me and walked toward the water. He knelt follow up and cupped the liquid to his mouth, washing away the remnants of blood on his lips.I crouched succeeding(prenominal) to him at the edge of the pond.Isnt it amazing? I asked. Its a whole new world, and its ours. continuously I said, giddy. Damon and I would never keep up to grow older. Never pose to die.Y oure right, Damon said slowly, as if he were speak in an unfamiliar language.Well explore it to happenher. ripe think. We can go to Europe, explore the world, disturb away from Virginia and memories. I touched his get up.Damon turned to face me, his look wide. I stepped back, absolutely fearful. There was something different about him, a foreignness in his dark eye. are you happy no w, brother? Damon snorted derisively.I took a step toward him. Y oud rather be stillborn than have this whole world for the victorious? Y ou should be thanking me force flareed in his eyes. Thanking you? I never asked you to launch my life a hell from which I cant escape, he said, spitting each(prenominal) excogitate into the pond. Suddenly he pulled me into a mash with such strength that I gasped. simply hear this, brother, he hissed in my ear. though we will be unneurotic for an eternity, I will pass water an eternity of misfortune for you. With that, he released me from his grip and sprinted into the dark forest.As his form disappeared into the gruesome shadows of the trees, a unity crow rose from the woodlands. It let out a plaintive shriek, and then it was gone.Suddenly, in a world that mere moments ago had teemed with possibility, I was utterly alone. EPILOGUEOctober 1864When I try to reconstruct that moment when I succumbed to my Power and destroyed my relationsh ip with Damon, I imagine a split cooperate of silence. In that second, Damon turned around, our eyes connected, and we make peace. But thither was no silence, nor would there ever be again. Now I constantly hear the rustling of animals in the forest, the quickening of breath that occurs when any world knows danger is near, the pitter-patter-pause of a heart stop. I also hear my thoughts, tumbling and colliding against each other manage ocean waves.If simply I hadnt been weak when Katherine stared into my eyes. If scarcely I hadnt gone back to see Father. If nevertheless I hadnt made Damon drink. But I did. The fallout of those choices is a mantle that precisely grows darker and more nuanced with age. And I must populate with the consequences of my misdeeds for eternity. LUSTING AFTER MORE OFSTEFANS DIARIES?TURN THE raps bring forwardion FOR A SNEAK PEEK OF BLOODLUST, orgasmJANUARY 2011. 1It was October. The leaves on the trees in the necropolis had turned a decayed brow n, and a cold breeze had whistled in, replacing the acerbic heat of Virginia summer. Not that I such(prenominal) felt it. As a lamia, the only temperature my body registered was that of the hot blood from my in vogue(p) victim coiling through my veins. I stood beneath the limbs of a large oak, a light mist swirling around my ankles, my clothe and communicates sticky with the fresh blood of the girl I carried in my arms. My brother, Damon, lay prone at the base of the tree, his black eyes staring blankly up at me.It had been days since Id last oblige him to feed. His body had taken on a chalky texture, blood vessels twisting in darkness under his skin like cracks. level(p) now, as I dropped the nearly dead girl at his feet, I had to mantel his right arm across her stomach to keep him from rolling over onto his back. Were it not for the blood that had purpled her dress, they would have looked like devil chicaners holding each other.I dislike you with everything I am, he whispered into her ear, though I knew his words were meant for me. She stirred notwithstanding didnt open her eyes.Y need your strength, I said. Drink.He breathed in and his shoulders went limp. The aluminiferous scent of her blood hung heavy in the air around us.That isnt strength, he said, his eyes fluttering shut. Its weakness.Stefan This from the girl, clementine tree Haverford, who reached a tremor afford out to me, her own bouquet blood glistening like a silk glove around her fingers. Last summer, Clementine and I kissed in the shadows of the Wickery Bridge later on one of the games Damon had dreamed up for us. Shed allowed my hand to graze the bodice of her blue muslin dress. I kneeled down and tucked a few clear strands of hair behind her ear. A phonate somewhere in my mind told me that I should feel regret over taking her life, but I felt nothing.Youre a monster, Damon said, keeping his lips as far as possible from the blood that seeped from Clementines neck.Foreve r is a long time to deny what you are, I told him.From where we crouched in the hemlock grove, I could see my old neighbors milling around gemstone grave markers in the very totality of the cemetery. My heightened vampire senses allowed me to pick through the clump of townspeople. Honoria Fells sniffed into a lace handkerchief. Sheriff Forbes kept his hand on his holster. Jonathan gibibyte cleared his throat and flicked open a pocket watch. My head throbbed with every whisper, like the world was existing secrets immediately into my eardrums.Mayor Lockwood stood separate from the others, eulogizing our father, Giuseppe Salvatore the man who had killed me and Damon, his only family, in cold blood. Father believed vampires to be utterly, unredeemably evil, and so he condemned us to death for trying to save Katherine Pierce, the vampire with whom wed both go in lovethe vampire whod changed us to be like her.Lockwoods voice sliced through the raindrops that had honorable begun to fall. We come together today to regularize farewell to one of Mystic Falls great sons, Giuseppe Salvatore, a man for whom town and family always came before self.They stood before a gape hole in the earth. Father would be wearing the suit he wore to church on Sundays, the black one. With the wide lapels that came together save at the point where Id by chance cut him open when he came at me with a stake. I could just make out the winged figure preceding(prenominal) him, the angel statue that marked my mothers final resting place. twain empty plots lay just beyond, where Damon and I should have been buried.It shant be possible to celluloid this heros life, Lockwood continued, but in a depicting in which Giuseppe is flanked by his two fallen sons, heroes of the Battle of Willow Creek. Damon let out a low, rattling scoff. The portrait he paints, he muttered, should contain the muzzle flash of Fathers rifle. He rubbed the place where Fathers bullet had ripped through his chest only a week earlier.Mayor Lockwood looked out over his congregation. A menace has descended on Mystic Falls, and only a brave few have risen to the challenge of protecting all that we hold dear. Jonathan, Giuseppe, and I stood shoulder to shoulder against the threat. Now we must heed Giuseppes last words as a call to arms.Lockwoods voice dragged with it the scent of smoky, blackened wood from the destroyed church on the contrary side of the cemetery. He was talking, ostensibly, about the groups of sum of money and Confederate soldiers who had been nipping about our part of Virginia for months, but there was no identify that he really meant vampires. Vampires like the ones Damon and I had been shot trying to free, like the ones Damon and I had become.I could do it, I told Damon. I could run out there and burgeon forth out all of their throats before they knew it.Whats stopping you, brother? he hissed. I knew his hike came only from the possibility of me dying in the act.I held my breath and listened to Damons panting, to the droning lies locomote from Fathers plot, and to some kind of clicking, like a watch or a fingernail tapping against a mausoleum wall. I wasnt used to the rawness of my senses the world gave me so much more as a vampire than it had as a human.Come, I said, putting an arm around him. Lets get one last look at Mystic Falls finest citizens.He didnt say anything but leaned into me, allowing me to hold him up as we go from Clementines bleeding body toward the grave site. We were just at a mausoleum a cytosine yards from Fathers grave when Lockwood introduced Gilbert to recite a prayer.Gilbert licked his lips. As he read some prayer or another out loud, I noticed the clicking once more. It picked up in travel as we neared the crowd.The clicking was now a steady, flagrant rattle and it seemed to be coming directly from Jonathans hand. Then, with my mothers wings stretched wide behind him, Jonathan Gilbert consulted the clicking object i n his palm.My blood ran cold. The compass. Jonathan had created a compass that, rather than pointing north, identified vampires.Suddenly, Jonathan looked up. His eyes locked on Damon and me instantly.Demon He let out an unholy shriek and pointed in our direction.I think he way of life us, brother, Damon said with a short laugh.