Stefan’s Diaries: Origins Chapter 34

I watched in satisfaction as Damon lustily drank, his conditional sips be approaching gulps as he held his face down to Alices neck. As Alices close to lifeless body grew white, a healthy flush rose in Damons cheeks.As Damon drank the last drops of Alices tune, I took a hardly a(prenominal) steps international the shack. I glanced just aboutwhat in wonder. Just last night, the area had seemed desolate, nevertheless now I realized that it teemed with lifethe scent of animals in the forest, the quake of birds overhead, the sound of Damons and my heartbeats. This spotthis whole worldwas full of casualty.My ring glimmered in the moonlight, and I brought it to my lips. Katherine had given me eternal life. Father always had told us to go our power, to find our place in the world. And I had, though Father hadnt been capable to accept it.I took a deep breath, and the coppery scent of channel filled my nostrils. I turned as Damon stepped out from the shack. He seemed taller and st ronger than counterbalance a few moments ago. I noticed that he had a interconnected ring on his middle finger.How do you feel? I asked, hold for him to see allthing I saw.Damon turned forth from me and walked toward the water. He knelt down and cupped the gas to his mouth, washing away the remnants of lineage on his lips.I crouched next to him at the edge of the pond.Isnt it amazing? I asked. Its a whole new world, and its ours. perpetually I said, giddy. Damon and I would never bring to grow older. Never energize to die.Y oure right, Damon said slowly, as if he were speaking in an unacquainted with(predicate) language.Well explore it together. Just think. We can go to Europe, explore the world, get away from Virginia and memories. I touched his shoulder.Damon turned to face me, his eyes wide. I stepped back, unawares fearful. There was something different nearly him, a foreignness in his sinfulness eyes.Are you happy now, brother? Damon snorted derisively.I took a s tep toward him. Y oud rather be absolutely than get down this whole world for the victorious? Y ou should be thanking meFury flashed in his eyes. Thanking you? I never asked you to strive my life a hell from which I cant escape, he said, spitting each(prenominal) word into the pond. Suddenly he pulled me into a hug with such military strength that I gasped. But hear this, brother, he hissed in my ear. Though we impart be together for an eternity, I will make an eternity of bereavement for you. With that, he released me from his grip and sprinted into the dark forest.As his form disappeared into the black shadows of the trees, a single 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 relationship with Damon, I imagine a set out second of silence. In that second, Damon turned around, our eyes connected, and we made peace. But in that location 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 macrocosm knows danger is near, the pitter-patter-pause of a heart stopping. I also hear my thoughts, tumble and colliding against each other like ocean waves.If altogether I hadnt been listless when Katherine stared into my eyes. If only I hadnt gone back to see Father. If only I hadnt made Damon drink. But I did. The fallout of those choices is a compositiontle that only grows darker and more nuanced with age. And I must live with the consequences of my misdeeds for eternity. LUSTING AFTER MORE OFSTEFANS DIARIES? p resideing period THE PAGE FOR A SNEAK PEEK OF BLOODLUST, COMINGJANUARY 2011. 1It was October. The leaves on the trees in the cemetery had turned a decayed brown, and a gelid breeze had whistled in, replacing the sti fling heat of Virginia summer. Not that I some(prenominal) mat it. As a vampire, the only temperature my body registered was that of the hot blood from my latest victim coiling with my veins. I stood beneath the limbs of a large oak, a light mist swirling around my ankles, my shirt and reach 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 forced him to feed. His body had taken on a chalky texture, blood vessels twisting darkly nether his skin like cracks. Even now, as I dropped the nearly dead girl at his feet, I had to drape his right arm crosswise 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 two lovers holding each other.I hate you with everything I am, he whispered into her ear, though I knew his manner of speaking were meant for me. She stirre d but didnt open her eyes.Y need your strength, I said. Drink.He breathed in and his shoulders went limp. The metallic 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 Haverford, who reached a trembling go out to me, her own sweet blood glistening like a silk glove around her fingers. Last summer, Clementine and I kissed in the shadows of the Wickery bridge over after one of the games Damon had dreamed up for us. Shed allowed my hand to graze the bodice of her bluing muslin dress. I kneeled down and tucked a few loose strands of blur behind her ear. A role 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.Forever is a long time to deny what you are, I told him.From where we crouched in the hemlock grove, I could s ee my old neighbors milling around rock music grave markers in the very center of the cemetery. My heightened vampire senses allowed me to pick through the crowd of townspeople. Honoria Fells sniffed into a lace handkerchief. Sheriff Forbes kept his hand on his holster. Jonathan gigabit cleared his throat and f shell open a pocket watch. My head throbbed with every whisper, like the world was breathing secrets directly 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 travel in lovethe vampire whod changed us to be like her.Lockwoods voice sliced through the raindrops that had effective begun to fall. We come together today to joint farewell to one of inscrutable Falls greatest sons, Giuseppe Salva tore, a man for whom town and family always came in the first place self.They stood before a gaping 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 just at the point where Id unexpectedly cut him open when he came at me with a stake. I could just make out the winged figure above him, the angel statue that label my mothers final resting place. Two empty plots lay just beyond, where Damon and I should have been buried.It shant be possible to picture this heros life, Lockwood continued, but in a portraiture 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 view as the muzzle flash of Fathers rifle. He rubbed the place where Fathers bullet had ripped through his thorax 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 opposite side of the cemetery. He was talking, ostensibly, about the groups of Union and Confederate soldiers who had been nipping about our part of Virginia for months, but there was no mistaking that he really meant vampires. Vampires like the ones Damon and I had been tang trying to free, like the ones Damon and I had become.I could do it, I told Damon. I could run out there and tear out all of their throats before they knew it.Whats stopping you, brother? he hissed. I knew his encouragement came only from the possibility of me dying in the act.I held my breath and listened to Damons panting, to the droning lies rising 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 hundred yards from Fathers grave when Lockwood introduced Gilbert to recite a prayer.Gilbert licked his lips. As he read some prayer or another(prenominal) out loud, I noticed the clicking once more. It picked up in urge on as we neared the crowd.The clicking was now a steady, insistent 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 in his palm.My blood ran cold. The compass. Jonathan had created a compass that, rather than pointing north, ide ntified 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 means us, brother, Damon said with a slight laugh.