Unmasked (The Vampire Diaries 13)

A voice sounded through the warehouse. “Okay, they’re about to let in the line. Cut the lights, Ed!” Gloom fell, and, with an audible click, somebody started the recorded sounds of groans and maniacal laughter, so that they resounded through the Haunted House. Letting go of Bonnie, Elena headed for her own chosen spot as the doors opened to let in the crowd.

It took a long time for Damon to appear. From her hiding place behind a particularly gruesome-looking plastic apparatus and agonized dummy in the Torture Room, Elena listened to the shrieks of kids going through the Haunted House and itched with impatience and anxiety.

Stefan paced from one side of the room to the other and hesitated in the doorway, listening carefully. The red light that illuminated the room turned his skin a ghastly shade. Things were coming to a crisis, Elena could see that. Stefan’s jaw was set, and he was kneading the bridge of his nose between his finger and thumb. He was worried that Damon might be feeding on humans while he and Elena waited in the wrong place. Finally, he straightened, making up his mind, and stepped toward the entrance once more.

Just then, a hooded figure came through the door, black robes sweeping around him. The Grim Reaper regarded Stefan silently for a moment, scythe clutched in front of him, and then he swept back his hood.

“Hello, little brother,” Damon said, showing his teeth in what looked more like a snarl than a smile.

Stefan looked at him gravely. “I’ve been waiting for you, Damon,” he said.

Damon cocked a cynical eyebrow. “Saint Stefan,” he said mockingly. “Does the lovely Elena want you to make peace? Stop me from making a new family?” He moved closer, resting a hand lightly on Stefan’s shoulder, and Elena saw Stefan flinch. Stefan was, she realized, afraid.

When he spoke, though, his voice was steady. “It’s been a long time since I thought talking to you would do any good, Damon. If you want family, I’m here. All I can do is try to stop you from doing your worst, from doing something you’ll regret.”

Damon’s smile widened. “You stop me, baby brother? All you do is ruin everything, without even trying to.” He pulled Stefan closer, his hand clamping down on Stefan’s shoulder like a vise.

Moving so fast that Elena had no time to react, not even to gasp, he spun Stefan around and slammed him into the wall, sinking his teeth deep into Stefan’s throat. Stefan gave a small choked moan of pain, and Elena flinched. Damon hadn’t taken care, hadn’t bothered to soothe Stefan the way he would have a human. He wanted to this to hurt.

A terrible ripping noise came from the grappling brothers—Damon’s teeth tearing something in Stefan’s throat—and Elena clenched her fists. This was a stupid plan, she realized. Damon’s angry enough to kill Stefan.

Just as she began to step forward out of her hiding place, a new voice, cool and arrogant, rang out.

“Stop it.” Katherine, her head held high and her mouth thin and angry, was suddenly beside them. Damon lifted his head, his mouth dripping with blood from his brother’s throat, and they both stared at her.

She was wearing the Renaissance dress Aunt Judith had made for Elena’s Halloween costume, and she looked lovely, as delicate and ornate as an expensive doll, just the way she must have looked five hundred years before. The red lighting changed the ice blue of the dress to a pale violet and threw pink shadows on Katherine’s pale face and golden hair.

Elena had thought that Stefan and Damon might mistake Katherine for Elena, just for a second, but it was clear that neither of them had the least doubt about who she was.

“Katherine,” Stefan said. His face was full of mixed emotions. Shock, disbelief, dawning joy, and relief. Fear. “But that’s impossible. It can’t be. You’re dead. …”

Katherine laughed, a brittle, desperately unhappy laugh. “I wanted you to believe that. Your little human toy, the one who looks so much like me, she figured it out, but you never did.”

“Elena?” Damon asked, his eyes narrowing suspiciously.

Katherine circled them, head held high. Her long skirts swept the floor with a quiet susurration, and Damon turned slowly, so that he was always facing her, tense and wary. “Your Elena convinced me to tell you the truth.”

“Tell us then,” Stefan said steadily.

“I wanted us all to be happy,” Katherine said, looking back and forth between Stefan and Damon. Under the red lights, tears glistened on her cheeks. “I loved you. But it wasn’t good enough for you. I wanted you to love each other, but you wouldn’t. I thought if I died, you would love each other.”

Elena had heard Katherine’s story before. She let the words wash over her and concentrated on Stefan and Damon’s faces as Katherine unfolded her tale: how she had another talisman against the sun made and given her maid her ring. How the maid had burned fat in the fireplace and filled Katherine’s best dress with it, left it in the sun along with Katherine’s note telling Stefan and Damon she couldn’t bear to be the cause of strife between them. That she hoped that, once she was gone, they would come together.

Katherine’s face was paler than ever, her eyes huge, tears running down her cheeks. The story had taken her back, and it was in the hurt, puzzled voice of the young girl she had been that she exclaimed, “You didn’t listen, and you ran and got swords. You killed each other. Why? You made your deaths my fault.”

Stefan’s face was wet with tears, too, and he was as caught up in the memory as she was. “It was my fault, Katherine, not yours. I attacked first,” he said in a choked voice. “You don’t know how sorry I’ve been, how many times I’ve prayed to take it all back. I murdered my own brother. …”

Damon was watching him intently, his eyes dark and opaque. Elena couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Surely this was what he needed? To know their centuries of enmity had been pointless, that his brother regretted striking that blow and dooming them both?

Stefan turned to him. “Please, Damon,” Stefan said, his voice cracking. “I’m sorry. What we’ve fought about for so long, hated each other over”—he gestured to Katherine—“none of it was real.”

Trembling, Stefan reached a hand toward his brother, and something snapped shut in Damon’s expression. He stepped away as quickly as a cat.

“Well, it’s lovely to know that you’ve survived,” he said, turning to Katherine. His voice sharpened. “But don’t flatter yourself that I’ve spent the last five hundred years pining over you. It’s not about you anymore, Katherine. It hasn’t been, not for a long time.”

As he spoke, his eyes fixed on the spot where Elena was hiding. He’s known I’m here all along, she realized. She stepped out from behind the dummy. “Please, Damon,” she began.

But Damon’s face was a mask of fury. “You think this changes anything, Elena? I’m not going to forgive you so you can live happily ever after with my whining weakling of a baby brother. The world is nothing but suffering, and the fact that one girl lived when we thought she was dead doesn’t make any difference. This doesn’t change my plans.”