Children Of The Damned

Eliana

I limped back to Matt, sighing in relief when I saw that he was still conscious and that Richard wasn’t back yet. I took the box cutter out of my back pocket, and carefully cut away the zip ties with trembling fingers.

I was unable to get my coat off the fence on my way back over; the razor wire had embedded itself into the jacket too deeply. Now I only had my tank top, tattered jeans, and my stake-filled boots. I was freezing.

“What happened to you. You’re leg…”

“I think I broke my ankle climbing over a fence. But now I have stakes and a box cutter to show for it. I lost my coat, but that doesn’t matter. We need to get out of here, though, before Richard comes back.”

Matt pulled me into a hug before I could say anything else, and his body gave some heat to my frozen one.

“Come on. There was a door a little this way,” I said, pulling him in the general direction where I was pointing. “If you help me we might be able to get it open.”

“That won’t be necessary,” a voice said, cutting through the darkness. “Because you aren’t going anywhere.”

I froze, a shiver rushing down my spine as I saw Richard emerge from the shadows.

“Eliana Forbes. You have been a very, very naughty little girl. What have you done?”

_________________________________________

Damon

I gunned the engine and we spun out of the driveway. Stefan’s expression was stoic, lips pursed and eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

If my heart could beat, it would be hammering in my chest. My mind kept repeating words I didn’t want to think about.

Please let her be alive. Please let me get to her in time. Don’t let me lose her. Not now that I have finally found her.

Stefan reached into the back seat of the car and pulled out a box that I stashed under the passenger seat for occasions like this.

Inside were rows of stakes, springs of vervain, vervain water, and a gun loaded with wooden bullets.

I took a stake and slid it between my belt and my jeans. Then I took the gun and a bottle of vervain water and stashed them in my pockets.

“Our main objective is to get Ana out of there first, Damon. Remember that,” Stefan said, obviously thinking he was being reasonable.

“I’m going to kill him, Stefan. I won’t leave that warehouse until Richard is destroyed. He will never threaten her again. He messed with the wrong people, and now he is going to pay. I can’t let him go. Not after this.”

____________________________________________

Eliana

I watched as her circled us, and I positioned myself in front of Matt at every turn, even though deep down I knew that wouldn’t save him if Richard wanted to hurt him.

However, I happened to know that the person he really wanted to hurt was me. I was just afraid he would use Matt as a weapon against me, that he would hurt me by hurting Matt.

And he did just that.

In a blindingly fast movement, he grabbed Matt around the throat, holding him up until his feet no longer touched the ground, slowly choking the life out of him.

“Stop!” I screeched, surprised by the volume of my own voice.

“I’m not sure if I should,” Richard mused, his hand tightening around Matt’s neck, making his face slowly turn purple.

“Please! Stop!”

“Get over here,” he said, beckoning me with his other hand.

I obeyed, not daring to think of what might happen if I didn’t.

“Let him go, please,” I pleaded with him as I put my hand in his outstretched one.

He dropped Matt unceremoniously as he put his hand on my throat instead. I didn’t give him the satisfaction of protesting, and instead shut my eyes.

Go ahead…squeeze the life out of me. At least then I’ll be rid of you.

“Such a pretty neck,” he said, his grip loosening, letting me breathe…for the time being. He stroked the skin along my color bone to the place where the curve of my throat began, making me shiver at the touch of his freezing hands.

I opened my eyes to see him with his fangs drawn, his eyes black and surrounded by purplish red veins. It wasn’t the same as seeing Damon. At least there was humanity in Damon’s eyes, and the knowledge deep down that he would never purposefully harm me. With Richard, all I could see were the black tunnels of his eyes that chilled me to the bone. His were the eyes of an animal, a demon, someone not in control of his nature when he was alive, or now, when he was Other, and wielding a power he couldn’t begin to understand. A power that made him cruel and more evil than he could have possibly been as a human; a power that made him more dangerous than anything I had ever known.

“Matt, run!” I said as I pulled the box cutter from my hand and slashed his cheek with it. Richard roared in fury, but before he had a chance to stop me or hurt Matt, I slashed my own hand, cutting deep until I felt bone.

Matt stared in horror for a moment, but the look I gave him made him obey. The look said: I have a plan.

It was a lie. There was no plan. I acted on a whim, hoping that it would be enough to allow Matt to get away.

I was right. I assumed Richard was still being controlled by his own bloodlust, especially after he had attacked me at the Lockwood party.

Richard’s eyes widened for a split second, transfixed by the viscous crimson liquid that spilled from my palm. Then there was a sudden, sharp pain as he lifted the hand with blinding speed to his mouth and drank deeply from the wound.

He roared like a madman, like a wild animal, frustrated by the low flow of blood.

Then his hand was in my hair, yanking my head back as he sank his fangs into my throat.