Part 27 (1/2)

”Stefan...will come back,” Matt got out, looking up at Damon from where he was unintentionally groveling on the ground. ”Stefan will kill you.”

”Guess what?” Damon said conversationally. ”Your face is all messed up on one side-scratches, you know. You've got sort of a Phantom of the Opera thing going on.”

”If he doesn't, I will. I don't know how, but I will. I swear it.”

”Careful what you promise.”

Just as Matt got his arm working enough to prop him up-exactly then, to the millisecond-Damon reached out and grabbed him painfully by a handful of hair, yanking his head up.

”Stefan,” Damon said, looking straight down into Matt's face and forcing Matt to look up at him, no matter how Matt tried to turn his face away, ”was only powerful for a few days because he was drinking the blood of a very powerful spirit who hadn't yet adapted to Earth yet. But look at her now.” He twisted his grip on Matt's hair again, more painfully. ”Some spirit. Lying there in the dirt. Now the Power is back where it should be. Do you understand?Do you-boy?”

Matt just stared at Elena. ”How could you do that?” he whispered finally.

”An object lesson in what it means to defy me. And surely you wouldn't want me to be s.e.xist and leave her out?” Damontched .

”You have to keep up with the times.”

Matt said nothing. He had to get Elena out of this.

”Worrying about the girl? She's just playing possum now. Hoping I'll ignore her and concentrate on you.”

”You're a liar.”

”So I'll concentrate on you. Speaking of keeping up with the times, you know-except for the scratches and things, you're a fine- looking young man.”

At first the words meant nothing to Matt. When he understood them, Matt could feel his blood freeze in his body.

”As a vampire, I can give you an informed and honest opinion. And as a vampire, I'm getting very thirsty. There's you. And then there's the girl who's still pretending to be asleep. I'm sure you can see what I'm getting at.”

I believe in you, Elena, Matt thought. He's a liar, and he'll always be a liar. ”Take my blood,” he said wearily.

”Are you sure?” Now Damon sounded solicitous. ”If you resist, the pain is horrible.”

”Just get it over with.”

”Whatever you like.” Damon knelt fluidly on one knee, at the same time twisting his grip on Matt's hair, making Matt wince. The new grip dragged Matt's upper body across Damon's knee, so that his head was thrown back, his neck arched and exposed. In fact Matt had never felt so exposed, so helpless, so vulnerable in his life.

”You can always change your mind,” Damon taunted him.

Matt shut his eyes, stubbornly saying nothing.

At the last moment, though, as Damon bent with fangs exposed, Matt's fingers almost involuntarily, almost as if it were something his body was doingapart from his mind, clenched themselves into a fist and he suddenly, unpredictably, brought the fist swinging up to deal a violent blow to Damon's temple. But-serpent-quick-Damon reached up and caught the blow almost nonchalantly in an open hand, and held Matt's fingers in a crus.h.i.+ng grip-just as razor-sharp fangs opened a vein in Matt's throat and an open mouth fastened on his exposed throat, sucking and drinking the blood that sprayed upward.

Elena-awake but unable to move from where she had fallen, unable to make a sound or turn her head-was forced to listen to the entire exchange, forced to hear Matt's groan as his blood was taken against his will, as he resisted to the last.

And then she thought of something that, as dizzy and frightened as she was, almost made her pa.s.s out in fear.

26.

Ley lines. Stefan had spoken of them, and with the influence of the spirit world still on her, she had seen them without trying. Now, still lying on her side, channeling what remained of that Power to her eyes, she looked at the earth.

And that was what made her mind go gray in terror.

As far as she could see there were lines converging here from all directions. Thick lines that glowed with a cold phosph.o.r.escence, medium-sized lines that had the dull s.h.i.+ne of bad mushrooms in a cellar, and tiny lines that looked like perfectly straight cracks of the outer surface layer of the world. They were like veins and arteries and nerves just under the skin of the clearing-beast.

No wonder it seemed alive. She was lying on a ma.s.sive convergence of ley lines. And if the cemetery was worse than this-she couldn't imagine what it might look like.

If Damon had somehow found a way to tap into that Power...no wonder he seemed different, arrogant, undefeatable. Ever since he had released her to drink Matt's blood, she had kept shaking her head, trying to shake off the humiliation with it. But now finally she stopped as she tried to calculate a way to make use of this Power. There had to be a way to do it.

The grayness wouldn't clear from her vision. Finally Elena realized that it was not because she was faint, but because it was getting dark-twilight outside the clearing, true darkness coming into it.

She tried again to lift herself up, and this time she succeeded. Almost immediately a hand was extended to her and, automatically, she took it, letting it draw her to her feet.

She faced-whoever it was, Damon or whatever was using his features or his body. Despite the almost-darkness, he still wore those wraparound sungla.s.ses. She could make nothing out of the rest of his face.

”Now,” the thing in the sungla.s.ses said. ”You're going to come with me.”

It was nearing full dark, and they were in the clearing that was a beast.

This place-it was unwholesome. She was afraid of the clearing as she had never been afraid of a person or creature. It resounded with malevolence, and she couldn't shut her ears to it.

She had to keep thinking, and keep thinking straight, she thought.She was terribly frightened for Matt; frightened that Damon had taken too much blood or had played too hard with his toy; breaking it.

And she was afraid of this Damon thing. She was also worried about the influence this place might have had on the real Damon. The woods around them shouldn't have any effect on vampires, except to hurt them. Was the possible-Damon inside the possessor hurt? If he could understand anything of what was happening, could he distinguish that hurt from his hurt and anger at Stefan?

She didn't know. She did know that there had been a terrible look in his eyes when Stefan had told him to get out of the boardinghouse. And she did know that there were creatures in the forest, malach, that could influence a person's mind. She was afraid, deeply afraid, that the malach were using Damon now, blackening his darkest desires and twisting him into something horrible, something he had never been even at his worst.

But how could she be sure? How could she know whether or not there was something else behind the malach, something that controlledthem ? Her soul was telling her that this might be the case, that Damon might be completely unconscious of what his body was doing, but that might just be wishful thinking.

Certainly all she could sense around her were small, evil creatures. She could feel them encircling the clearing, strange insect-like beings like the one that had attacked Matt. They were in a furor of excitement, whipping their tentacles around to make a noise almost like a buzzing helicopter.

Were they influencing Damon now? Certainly, he had never before hurt any of the other humans she knew the way he had today.

She had to get all three of them out of this place. It was diseased, contaminated. Once again she felt a wave of longing for Stefan, who might know what to do in this situation.

She turned, slowly, to look at Damon.

”May I call someone to come and help Matt? I'm afraid to leave him here; I'm afraidthey'll get him.” Just as well to let him know that she knewthey were hiding in the liverwort and the rhododendron and mountain holly bushes all around.

Damon hesitated; he seemed to consider it. Then he shook his head.

”We wouldn't want to give them too many clues to where you are,” he said cheerily. ”It'll be an interesting experiment to see if the malach do get him-and how they do it.”

”It wouldn't be an interesting experiment forme .” Elena's voice was flat. ”Matt is my friend.”

”Nevertheless, we'll leave him here for now. I don't trust you-even to giveme a message to Meredith or Bonnie-to send on my phone.”