Tangled Fate

The Last Day

April 28, 2010

Sunlight dappled through the pristine windows in rough-hewn beams into the oldest Salvatore's room as Damon laid motionless on his bed. His icy blue eyes were fixated on the ceiling as his train of thought abruptly stopped to invade an incoming conversation in the living room. He narrowed his eyes acutely as he heard below, Elijah, Stefan, Louise and Elena talking among one another, probably about a plan.

"Tonight is the full moon. We should assume that Klaus is prepared to break the curse."

Damon heard Elijah say in his ever so polite voice. He stubbornly decided he had heard enough and wanted to make himself officially apart of the conversation that Stefan had so kindly left him out of so he hastily got up from his bed to make that thought a reality.

Downstairs in the expansive living room of the Salvatore boarding house, Stefan sat in the heavy brown leather armchair. He was slumped forward, elbows propped upon his knees, listening with a brooding intensity to Elijah. On the sofa beside him, Elena and Louise were huddled together, engulfed in the conversation.

Louise looked small against the deep cushions, her dark brown cable-knit babydoll cardigan pulled tight around her. The white lace trim of her camisole peeked out from the V-neckline, looking fragile against the dark wool. She sat with her dark-wash bootcut jeans tucked under her, the white toes of her black Converse just visible beneath the hem.

"Elena said that the Sun and the Moon curse is fake?" Stefan said, his gaze shifting from Elena to Elijah. "That it's actually just a curse placed on Klaus." He was trying to map out the danger, his protective instincts warring with the sheer scale of the revelation.

"Klaus is a vampire born of a werewolf bloodline." Elijah explained, standing before the trio with a practiced, lethal elegance. He rolled his wrist as he spoke, as if dismissing the laws of nature. "The curse has kept his werewolf aspect from manifesting. But if he breaks it...he'll be a true hybrid."

Stefan turned to Elena, watching her nod absently to the news. His eyes flickered toward Louise; she was fiddling with one of the wooden toggle-style buttons on her cardigan, her expression etched with a quiet, mounting dread.

"Then why are we letting him break the curse?"

The voice cut through the room like a jagged blade. Damon stepped through the archway, his irascibility radiating off him in waves. He had clearly been eavesdropping, and he wasn't interested in the history lesson.

"We can kill him today." Damon went on, his icy gaze flickering to his younger brother. He ignored the thick tension his arrival sparked, his focus entirely on the end game. "With Bonnie."

Louise's hand stilled on her button as a look of instant, startled fear crossed her face. The "win-win" she had hoped for was already starting to crumble.

"Damon..." Stefan warned him in attempted to shush him when a concerned Elena interrupted, bolding retorting Damon's idea.

"No. Bonnie can't use that much power without dying." She proclaimed in her friends defence, shaking her head vigorously.

"I'll write her a great eulogy." Damon factiously responded.

"No, Damon. It's not an option." Louise riposted, tight lipped as she received Damon's angry grimace as he shook his head full of disappointment, ready to argue with her further if need be.

"All right, how do we break this curse?" Stefan asked enthusiastically, trying to change the subject.

"Well, the ritual itself is relatively straightforward. The ingredients, so to speak, you already know." Elijah answered while passing Damon.