“Stake,” Damon demanded, and Matt slipped one into his hand.
Before the young vampire had a chance to react, Damon had unlocked the cage and had one arm tightly around his neck, yanking his head forward to show the base of his skull. “Scar,” Damon said, seeing the thin white line, and shoved the stake straight into it.
The point of the stake went all the way through the kid’s neck, the sharp tip sticking out just below his chin in front. He gagged and choked, clawing at it, then fell to his knees, one arm still awkwardly pulled up by the handcuff connecting his wrist to the bars.
Damon stepped back and watched blood pool down the young vampire’s neck and chest, puddling on the floor beneath him. The kid knocked the stake free at last, but slid limply farther down the bars, supported only by the one thin arm chained to them.
He let out a harsh, blood-choked breath, and his body stiffened, his eyes rolling back into his head.
Then he lay still. He wasn’t breathing. Damon listened, and heard nothing: no heartbeat, no struggle to breathe.
“We did it,” Meredith said softly. Her eyes were wide and shining with excitement.
“Wow,” Matt said. “That was, um… surprisingly easy. ”
With a sudden jerk, the vampire spasmed on the floor, his eyes flying open. Then he leaped to his feet, his handcuff rattling. The gash in his neck was healing, new pink skin stretching across it. He growled and swiped at Damon through the bars. Damon, caught off balance, stumbled and almost fell. The vampire’s sharp nails cut into his leg, and Damon shook him off, swearing.
It didn’t work. Damon could feel Elena’s leaden misery filling him, mixing with his own red-hot rage.
“I’m sorry,” he said, desperately, and reached for her hand.
Then the back of his neck began to prickle uncomfortably. Something wrong, getting closer.
Jack’s voice, as cold as ice, came suddenly from behind them. “Meredith, I expected so much more from you. ”
Damon whipped around.
Jack was at the end of the row of dusty cages, flanked by a crowd of his vampires. A long hunting knife gleamed in his hand.
“It was a trap,” Meredith said flatly.
“Of course it was a trap,” Jack said, his lips curling into a sneer. “It was a test, too, and you failed. ”
With that, Jack and his vampires charged.
Two of them, a stocky guy and a blond-haired girl, slammed into Damon, one on each side, the girl driving her arm against his throat while the guy swept a leg against Damon’s, trying to knock him off balance.
The move felt like one of Meredith’s to him. She’d been teaching them. Wonderful, Damon thought, grabbing the guy’s leg and flinging him backward onto the hard concrete floor. The last thing they needed was a crowd of vampire hunter–trained vampires. He managed to snap the girl’s neck, giving himself some breathing room, but he knew she wouldn’t stay down for long.
Snarling, Damon looked around for Elena and saw that she was safe for the moment. She was in a corner at one end of the long row of storage cages, her hands extended. The air shimmered slightly around her. She must be making some sort of Guardian force field around herself, because no vampire was coming near her. As he watched, the shimmer around her expanded, encompassing the rest of their group for a moment, but then it shrank back. She was trying to protect them all, but it didn’t look like she could work up the Power.
Matt had Jasmine and Bonnie backed into a corner behind him and was swinging a stave at the lanky vampire coming toward them, driving it into him again and again. The vampire flinched under the blows, but kept coming toward them, his wounds healing faster than Matt could inflict them.
Bonnie was fumbling in her purse, no doubt looking for a weapon. Matt was no coward, but the vampire was just toying with him—one quick move, and the human would fall. Before Damon could spring forward to save the girls, Meredith was there, slamming the other vampire against the wall and efficiently breaking his neck.
There was the rattle of metal behind him, and suddenly someone landed on Damon’s back, thin strong arms twining around his throat. He automatically slammed his back against the wall, forcing a grunt of pain from his assailant. A sharp edge of metal—handcuffs, Damon realized—on his opponent’s wrist pressed against Damon’s throat. Someone had let the kid loose from his cage.
The young vampire was furious and half-mad with hunger. He clung on tight and bit down, working his sharp fangs savagely into Damon’s neck.
Damon slammed backward into the wall again, trying to get rid of him. The kid’s desperation gave him strength, though, and he held on tighter.
Distracted by the young vampire, Damon almost missed Bonnie’s fierce gesture, her hands shooting up into the air. There was a burst of blinding white light and suddenly Damon was flying backward.
His elbow scraped painfully along the floor as the force of Bonnie’s explosion shoved him along, but at least it had knocked the kid off his back. They landed side by side, and glared at each other, both flat on the ground and gasping with effort. The kid’s mouth was sloppy with blood.
All the vampires were on the ground, Damon realized. Jack was the fastest back on his feet, and he dragged Meredith up with him, his long knife pressed tightly against her throat. A thin line of blood dripped down Meredith’s neck, soaking the edge of her dark blue T-shirt.
Everyone froze. Damon could hear the young vampire panting beside him, but he couldn’t tear his eyes off Meredith, not even to snap the kid’s neck.