Text from; Stefan Salvatore

What did you and Elena do?

Text to; Stefan Salvatore

It was our only option.

Text from; Stefan Salvatore

You know it wasn't

Text to; Stefan Salvatore

You know neither of us would have ever let you die.

The doorbell rings. Not louder than it usually does but it scares me nonetheless, hurts my ears. Damon opens it and I know who is in front of it, this man who I remember a little bit now. Who I remember falling in love with at English court, this man who hunted my sister, but tried his very best to protect me until the end.

I hear his low voice, "Good evening." So very formal.

"Thank you for coming. Please, come in." after that I only hear low whispers coming from the front door, things that the others and I are not supposed to hear.

A foot enters the house, I hear his expensive shoes on the hard wood floors, tapping.

They whisper some more, and what I wouldn't do for some good ol' vampire hearing right now.

He sees Jenna first and walks over to her with a big smile on his face.

"Jenna. Wonderful to see you again. How are you?" she smiles back, obviously charmed, and if I am honest with myself, who wouldn't be.

"Nice to see you." His eyes scan her body.

"You look incredible."

A shy smile as she looks down at her clothes, "Thank you."

I don't think he was expecting me to be here, because when he looks at me he looks almost shocked and I feel almost shy. He smiles at me slowly, not an obvious smile but one I recognize anyway and I smile back at him, my heeled feet shuffling over the floor.

"Lola," I hear Damon shut the front door loudly, trying to make some kind of point that I cannot connect to.

"Elijah," Jenna looks at the two of us and points between us.

"Have you two met before?" he is so close to me now and I smell his cologne, manly.

"Lets discuss that over dinner."

Jenna pours me a glass of wine, the red liquid glugs into the pristine crystal glass slowly and its gotten strange how much a red wine has started to remind me of blood. Damon is next in line of Jenna's wine pouring adventure, and when the liquid is next to Damon the strange feeling gets more intense.

"I hate to break it to you, Damon, but according to Elijah, your family is so not a founder of this town." He takes a gentle sip of the wine.

"Hmm, do tell." I avert my gaze from Elijah when he starts to talk.

"Well, as I mentioned to Jenna earlier, a faction of settlers migrated from Salem after the witch trials in the 1690s. Over the next hundred years they developed this community where they could feel safe from persecution." Jenna sits back down and laughs at it all. The supernatural has not yet become a touchstone of her life, as I am sure it soon will be.

"Hmm. Because they were witches."

Andie puts up a long, well-manicured finger and finishes her sip.

"Yeah, but there's no tangible proof that there were witches in Salem." Damon scrapes his fork over his plate.

"Andie's a journalist. Big on facts."

Elijah continues, "Well, the lore says that there was this wave of anti-witch hysteria. It broke out in the neighboring settlement, so these witches were rounded up. They were tied to stakes in a field together and, uh, burned. Some say you could hear the screams from miles around us. They were consumed by the fire. Could you pass the..." I pass him the salt before he can finish his question and he stares at me intently. Jenna laughs.

"I wouldn't repeat this to the Historical Society." I know she is staring at me so I giggle with her.

"It's starting to sound a little like a ghost story at me." John chimes in, like the useless twat he is. He and I both know that these are not ghost stories.

"So why do you want to know the location of these alleged massacres?" Damon retorts, his knife still tightly clutches in his hand. Under the table I put a hand on his knee.

"You know.. a healthy historian's curiosity, of course." He lets go of the knife a little bit, his grip not so tight anymore when he responds.

"Of course."

Jenna darts her eyes around the table uncomfortably before she starts the next topic of conversation.

"So Elijah, how do you and Lola know each other?" He is just taking a sip of his wine when Jenna asks this which gives me the chance to swoop in and steal the question.

"He used to work at my high school, you know as an intern? You and Alaric could totally bond over that, 'Lijah." He smirks at me over his glass and it looks to be genuine, like a loving smirk instead of an annoyed one.

"That's right. Why did you move to Mystic Falls, Paloma?I never expected to see you of all people here, in this quiet town, away from all the excitement of the Big Apple." Now it's time for Damon to put a comforting hand on my knee, gently stroking over the bone. I don't know if Elijah is taunting me, or if he just really doesn't know. We can only assume that he does, since it is his younger brother who has been hunting me for centuries.

I take a uncomfortable bite of my food and swallow it quickly.

"You know, my parents were brutally murdered and I was only almost brutally murdered. Then there was this whole trial-business and then the whole of New York hated me." I shrug at the last word and I can feel the uncomfortable vibe I have created in the dining room. Elijah doesn't do anything else than look at me with sympathy filling his eyes.

"Oh, you're that Paloma Arends. I know I recognized your name from somewhere!" Andie says loudly, somehow making the feeling in the room even more awkward then it was.

"Yeah, that's me. Good old parricidal Lola." Damon's and slips off my knee.

We start to get up from the long table, pushing back our chairs, they scrape over the floors with an annoying sound. My eyes scan the room and spot Damon, signing something to Andie.

"The gentlemen should take their drinks in the study." Elijah walks towards her and I notice that my feet are hurting in these shoes, even when I was only stood in them for about two seconds. My back hurts, I need some more of Bonnie's magical herbs.

He kisses her hand and smiles, "I have to say the food was almost as wonderful as the company."

She passes him a coy smile back, " I like you."

Instead of helping out with the dishes, like Jenna and Andie are doing I sneak past them and into the study with Damon and Elijah, they are standing around an old globe, feigning casualty.

"Hello boys," they don't even turn around. They both know me so well that they knew I would follow them in here. I put my arm on Damon's shoulder and lean on him.

"So, let me guess. In addition to the moonstone, the doppelgänger, the lion, the witch and the wardrobe, you need to find this witch burial ground." Elijah smirks.

"Because I feel as though we've grown so close, Damon, I'll tell you yes. Do you know where it is?"

He stirs his glass with the movement of his hands, ice clinks against the glass.

"Maybe. Tell me why it's so important."

Damon hands me a glass of scotch but I hand it to Elijah instead, my body won't be doing well on alcohol with how weak it is.

He nods at me when I hand him it and looks back at Damon, "we're not that close."

My phone beeps in my bra and when I take it out I see a confusing message.

Text from; Stefan Salvatore

Dagger will kill Damon on use. Stop him.

That must be Damon's evil plan, the one he didn't share with me for whatever reason. Killing Elijah.

I see him grab the dagger from the tray of glasses but I know I can't make any sound, so I put my hand on his behind his back, holding the dagger in both our hands.

Elijah sighs and I have never been more afraid for my life, "It's a funny thing about books. Before they existed, people actually had memories." Thank god, it might be a sly dig at my supposed memory loss but he doesn't know anything is up yet. Before Damon can begin to struggle against my hand on his back, Andie and Alaric burst into the room. Alaric looks at me with giant eyes when he talks.

"Gentlemen, we forgot about dessert." Andie holds her hand out to Elijah.

"Elijah," he grabs it fondly after handing his glass to Damon. "Miss Star."

Damon drowns the glass immediately, Andie twirls around in Elijah's arms it's almost cute. Damon smacks me on the shoulder angrily first before doing the same to Alaric. Alaric points at the dagger, but since we can't speak without Elijah hearing us Damon doesn't understand.

Alaric walks over to the study's desk and quickly scribbles something on a piece of paper. It must not read well to Damon because he crumples it up angrily, throws it at Alaric and we follow him when he leaves the room.

When we get back to the dining room we sit down in our respective places again, Damon glares at John from across the table. He knew what would happen when Damon used the dagger.

"Ric, would you do me a favor and grab the notebook out of my bag." Alaric listens and gets up to retrieve the notebook from Andie's purse.

"Elijah, did John tell you he's Elena's uncle-slash-father?"

"Damon, did Lola here tell you that she too is a sacrifice in the ritual? I don't recall hearing her tell you this." John replies sarcastically. Damon doesn't reply but he does pinch the skin of my thigh way too harshly. He ignores his comment.

"Yes, I'm well aware of both of these things."

"Of course, she hates him, so there's absolutely no need to keep him on the endangered species list."

Damon glares at him from the corner of his eye. Andie turns around on her chair to look at Ric digging through her bag.

'No Ric, it's in the front pocket. On... you know what? Excuse me, guys. Sorry." She gets up from her chair to help Alaric look, I hear her heels click over the floor behind me.

"What I'd like to know, Elijah, is how do you intend on killing Klaus?" John asks after taking a sip of the steaming hot coffee in front of him.

"Gentlemen, there's a few things we should probably get clear right now. I allow you to live solely to keep an eye on Elena. I allow Elena to remain in her house living her life with her friends as she does as a courtesy. If you become a liability, I'll take her away from you and you'll never see her again."

"But not me?" I ask, genuinely curious about why all these precautions have been taken to keep Elena from leaving, from killing herself before Klaus can get to her.

"No, not you Paloma. I know you won't run from this, you never have before."

I take a deep breath and let myself sink deeply into the wooden chair I am on, I do remember it, bit by bit, how I had always known it would come to this. Andie comes back excitedly, with her notebook in her hand and sits down.

"Okay. My first question is when you got here to Mystic Falls..." Elijah suddenly screams, his face turn into the familiar grey veins that I have seen on him before. But this time he won't be coming back. Standing behind him is Alaric now with the dagger in his hand, he places it on the table and looks at Damon.

"Now, get rid of him before Jenna comes back with dessert."

"All right."