An Elemental Difference - FIRE - Book 2 (Stefan Salvatore)

Chapter 27 - A Mother's Fury

FORBES HOUSEHOLD

Caroline let herself and Tyler into the house, ushering Tyler to one room they both needed. As he sat down on the couch, Caroline poured them both a couple glasses of her mom's hidden stash of whiskey Damon had given her for Christmas. She set the drinks down in front of them and perched next to Tyler.

"Thanks for coming."

Tyler only shrugged, "It was better than everyone staring at me at school." Caroline smiled tightly at him and offered him a glass, which she watched him shoot back in one go, "I'm sorry about earlier. It's just, I'm alone with this. It's gonna happen to me. On the next full moon, I'm gonna turn, and I won't be able to stop it." He looked at her, his eyes full of tears, "I'm scared."

"Tyler," Caroline sighed in sympathy, and when she watched the first tear fall, she pulled him into her arms and held onto him tight as he cried for the first time.

MIDDLE OF NOWHERE, VIRGINIA

"Rose told me herself, Elijah was an original," Elena explained to her three rescuers as they traveled home, squeezing Aella's hand in hers. "They were running from him for over 500 years."

Stefan's brow furrowed, "Original?" He glanced at Damon, "Have you ever heard of that phrase?" Damon calmly shook his head, but his lips were pursed together firmly, showing his anger was still fresh. Although he expected Damon to answer no, Stefan felt something in the furthest part of his mind nudging him that while Damon didn't know, for some strange reason, he did.

"Somehow, he knew about Katherine being alive," Elena continued cautiously, not missing Damon's eye roll at the mention of Katherine. "She's the reason I was taken. Because I'm a Petrova Doppelgänger."

Stefan turned to look at her, "And what does that mean, that makes it sound like you weren't the first?"

"Because I wasn't," Elena shook her head, brow tense. "They made it out that Katherine was one as well, not just the original. But she betrayed them and Elijah 500 years ago, that's why they took me..."

The brothers reflected on her story and missed the way Elena's eyes glanced to the floor then to her hands, but Aella hadn't, and she knew that look, "And?" She questioned immediately, making the brothers focus back on them. "You're keeping something back."

Elena raised a hesitant brow, "How do you know that?"

Aella raised her own brow to match Elena's, "Because it's the same look you gave your mom when we snuck out freshman year, and she caught us returning. That's the look you gave her that gave us away that we had our first taste of alcohol that night. That look..." Aella poked Elena's nose, "got me banned from coffee for a whole week!"

For the first time since they had left the abandoned home, Damon's lips pulled into a smirk as he looked at Aella through the rear-view mirror, "Your punishment was no coffee... Oooh, how bad."

Stefan shook his head, "You think she's annoying in the morning sans coffee; you wouldn't last a day with a coffee-less Aella, let alone a week."

Elena smiled guiltily at her friend, "Yeah, that was a punishment for all of us."

"Exactly," Aella smiled menacingly at her friend. "I know your tell, so spill, Elena."

Elena's eyes darted between all three of them nervously before she finally blurted it out, "The sun and the moon curse, it's real. The moonstone is what binds it; the sacrifice is what breaks it."

Aella felt an unnerving feeling settle in her stomach as she saw the light cover of tears settle in Elena's eyes. Taking a calming breath, Aella asked the question she and the Salvatore brothers were thinking, "What sacrifice?" A tear fell from Elena's eyes, and when she didn't answer, Aella felt her stomach drop, and she pushed, "What sacrifice, Elena!?"