The Bourbon Diaries ✢ The Vampire Diaries FanFiction ✢ TVD FanFic ✢ TVDU FanFic

Chapter Fifty-Nine - Cristian Balescu

Present day

Mystic Falls, VA

Letting the empty pendant slip from his fingers, Cristian finally remembered the truth: he had been the witch in the ritual.

Nothing could save him now. He was well and truly beaten.

The moment his magic left him, all defenses stripped away, the knife was snatched out of Cristian's hand. It didn't matter who had taken it. It didn't matter if they used it against him. He was dying anyway.

There was a strange moment of respite after the spell's invisible hatchet had hacked away all his magic. It was as though it was deliberately giving him a taste of being human... of being vulnerable... of being scared. He would rather have gone instantly, like Adam. But of course, Adam had been human: there was nothing supernatural within him for the spell to remove, and he would never know the torment of what it felt like to die twice. He had been lucky in that respect. But that was only the second reason Cristian felt jealousy towards Adam's death. The first was that he had others to grieve for him---family who would miss him, a woman who loved him, friends who wanted revenge for his death---none of which would happen for Cristian. He would be forgotten quickly.

Cristian lowered his head, awaiting his fate. For him, it was over.

But for someone else, it wasn't.

Without a witch to defend her, Lorraine had backed herself into a corner. Stef was a fully transitioned vampire without her humanity, surrounded by three further vampires, a former witch---since there was no way Raid's powers, which had been absorbed into Stef through the cuffs, would be returning now that her magic was gone---as well as one hell of an unpredictable human. Lorraine hadn't a chance of killing Damon Salvatore anymore. She had only one plan left that might get her out of this predicament alive. She placed the recently-snatched blade against Gabe's talisman, her eyes darting cautiously around everyone in the room. The movement put them all on high alert. Good. That was exactly what she needed. If she took out the stone, it would kill two of the vampires. The remaining two were significantly younger than her and far easier to defeat.

"Lorraine, don't---" Gabe started, his hand raised in a stopping motion.

Lorraine shot an accusing look at Stef. "You helped them! Your humanity is supposed to be off!"

Stef glared back at her with crossed arms and an insulted scowl. "Excuse me?! I helped myself get revenge and my memories back---which I'm still processing, by the way, thank you for the concern." She turned towards her father. "FYI, Dad, microdosing me with vampire blood after my memories were wiped? Not cool." She held up a finger, silencing him as he opened his mouth to speak. "And before you even begin to tell me that it was something I wanted, I was fourteen years old! Fourteen! I also wanted a daith piercing at that age too, but did I get that? Nooooo! I can't even get one now because of my damn vampire healing ability."

Damon looked heartbroken. "Sweetheart, I was trying to protect you. I didn't know what would happen to you---"

"No, because nothing bad ever happens in Mystic Falls, does it, Dad?" she interrupted. "And I didn't even get the pleasure of telling you what had happened to me, did I?" She swept her eyes angrily towards Gabe. "All because you were too busy taking the fall for my father, pretending that it was you who had been microdosing me with your vampire blood, you didn't even consider what the wording of your compulsion actually did to me." It annoyed Stef further that Gabe looked like he hadn't a clue what she was talking about. She huffed and elaborated: "I want to do whatever I can to make sure my parents see me as nothing but a regular human daughter..? Remember that? Well, it backfired! Because I avoided telling them I was a vampire for years because of that wording! It's not like you didn't have five hundred years of experience in compulsion that you couldn't have figured that out and warned me."