change things, to reverse the deaths, to fix the broken, to make everything the way it would have been if nothing dangerous had touched the little town of Fel 's Church, she had thought that it would make her life simple and easy. She would have her family, her friends, her Stefan. But it wasn't going to work, was it? It wasn't ever going to be that way, not for Elena.
As soon as she'd come back to town, the very first day she'd stepped outside into the sunshine of a Fel 's Church summer, something dark and evil and supernatural had started stalking her and her friends.
And as for Stefan... God... Stefan. What was happening to him?
When she closed her eyes, she saw Caleb flying through the air and heard that horrible, final-sounding crack that Caleb's head had made as it connected with the marble of the mausoleum. What if Caleb never ful y recovered? What if this cute, innocent guy, this guy whose parents had died and left him like hers had died and left her, was broken forever because of Stefan?
Stefan. How had he become the kind of person who could do something like that? Stefan, who felt guilty about the animals he took blood from, the doves and rabbits and deer of the forest. The Stefan who she knew at the deepest level of her soul, who she thought kept nothing from her -
that Stefan would never have harmed a human being like that.
Elena lay in the bathtub until the water got cold and her tears had stopped. Then she got out, drained the tub, dried her hair, brushed her teeth, put on a nightgown, cal ed good night to Aunt Judith and Robert, and climbed into bed. She did not want to write in her diary. Not tonight. She switched off the light and lay flat on her back, staring into the darkness - the same blackness, she thought, as Damon's eyes.
Damon had been a monster, she knew - he had kil ed, although not as blithely as he pretended; he had manipulated people and enjoyed it; he had haunted and hated Stefan for hundreds of years - but she had also seen the lost little boy he kept locked inside him. He had loved her, she had loved him, and he had died.
And she loved Stefan. Desperately, devotedly, undeniably. She loved the sincerity in his eyes, his pride, his courtly manners, his honor, and his intel igence. She loved that he had rejected the monster that lurked inside him, the one that had driven so many vampires to terrible acts. She loved the sorrow he held - for his past, for his hatred and jealousy of Damon, for the terrible things he had seen. And she loved the hope that always sprang up in him, the strength of wil Stefan possessed that al owed him to keep fighting back the darkness.
Beyond al that, she loved Stefan. But she was afraid. She had thought she knew him inside and out, that she could see clear through to the innermost reaches of his soul. That wasn't true, not anymore. Not since the Guardians had stripped her powers, severing their psychic connection and reverting her back to a normal, human girl. Elena rol ed over and buried her face in the pil ow. She knew the truth now. No matter what the Guardians had done for her, she would never be a normal girl. Her life would never be simple. Tragedy and horror would fol ow her forever.
In the end, there was nothing Elena could do to change her destiny.
Chapter 20
"Cookies," Alaric said gravely. "Bonnie thinks she could manage to choke down a few cookies. Just to keep her strength up."
"Cookies, got it," said Meredith, rummaging in Mrs. Flowers's kitchen cabinet to find a mixing bowl. She clunked a big china bowl that was probably older than she was onto the counter and checked the refrigerator. Eggs, milk, butter. Flour in the freezer. Vanil a and sugar in the cupboard.
"Look at you," Alaric said admiringly as Meredith unwrapped a stick of butter. "You don't even need a recipe. Is there anything you can't do?"
"Lots of things," Meredith replied, basking in the warmth of Alaric's gaze.
"What can I do to help?" he asked cheerful y.
"You can get another mixing bowl and measure two cups of flour and a teaspoon of baking powder into it," Meredith told him. "I'l beat the butter with the other ingredients in this