Hey, so. *waves awkwardly* Yeah, I'm alive. I'll only bore you with the excuse that life sucks, and fanfiction rocks, so I'm back on the roll, for like, at least three chapters. I hate myself, I'm sorry for doing this to you guys but I really really do literally live on reviews. I keep reading and rereading them to motivate myself and write more. They are so much appreciated, I swear. Without futher ado, I hope you enjoy this one - typed it out on my phone. Yep, that's how motivated I am!

Chapter 9

Damon wasn't sure how much time had passed since the short, curly-haired British witch had left, but some feeling had finally sarted creeping into his arm and legs. The night had been an eye-opener, especially the part after he had attacked her – he had had no idea she had been tracking their every move. It was impossible, but there was no other way that she knew what they had been up to while she was at the hospital with Elena, Bonnie and Jenna. And then she had frozen him like a piece of iced fruitcake, which shouldn't have been possible as well, but here he was, still lying on the woman's goddamn couch.

He still hadn't figured out what she was, because some things she did, like freezing him, the barriers, and apparently clairvoyance, didn't match any supernatural creature he had ever heard about. On the other hand, she looked barely of age – she didn't even reach up to his neck for God's sake. And then there was the hair – which was always a disaster. No teenage girl, or adult girl, or any girl he had ever met paid so less attention to her hair. It was very confusing, but his closest guess would have to be a witch, seeing as how the other self-righteous stubborn one he knew was also a midget.

Then his mind had moved to the barriers around the house – she had said she could hear through them, but he had been trying to do the same ever since, and hadn't heard anything outside the house. Her cat was somewhere in the back garden, probably enjoying his torture, but nothing else. For a while, he had concentrated on her movements – her getting ready for bed, lying awake for a while, and then finally falling into a disturbed sleep. It had only been a few minutes, but he could tell she wasn't going to sleep well.

It had been funny to watch her ramble on while she was sitting beside him, talking to him, or mostly to herself, seeing as he could only convey himself through his eyes, something she had actually translated pretty well. He was itching to move again, mostly so that he could check out her bar, though he was pretty sure the sneaky little thing kept the good stuff hidden in her kitchen cabinets.

Suddenly, he felt his spine relaxing with a slightly plainful tingle, and feeling came back to him; every inch of his body felt like it was sore. He decided to lay on the sofa for a minute and rest, before getting up and proceeding to examine the bar. He moved reluctantly, sighing as his joints cracked satisfactorily as he got up. Just as he was walking towards the bar, he noticed a sound – it was coming from her bedroom.

It was the Brit, she was breathing unsteadily, like someone was choking her or something. But he couldn't hear anyone else in the house. Should he check –? Wait, there it was again. She seemed to be having trouble breathing, as if someone was blocking her air pipe. He decided to have a look once, uncertainty in his steps as he climbed the stairs. It was easy to figure out her bedroom, and he entered, hearing her more clearly as her breathing quickened even more. Her heart was beating rather quickly, like she was running a marathon.

When he finally entered, it took him a second to get over the size of the room. She was laying on the bed in the farthest corner and he blurred over to her quickly. Her little form was lying tangled up in the sheets and sbe was probably having a bad dream; her breathing was quick and her heart was banging wildly in the silence.

He watched her twitch and move on the bed for a minute, before she let out a horrible, drawn out scream. He watched, horrified and confused, as her body convulsed and she screamed her head off, like she was being tortured. Very cruelly. The sound was hurting his ears, but more than that – it went through him like needles, it hurt to watch. He moved towards her, grabbing her arms on the bed, "Hey! Hermione, wake up!"

Her muscles were stiff as a board and she no gave no indication of having heard him, instead curling up into herself and still screaming. He tried to shake her, but she kept screaming – not stopping for a breath as her muscles convulsed horribly, like she was in unbearable pain. His dead heart beat loudly in his ears – what the hell was going on?

"HERMIONE! You need to wake up!" He tried shaking her again, but it had no effect. Suddenly, she stopped and went limp in his arms for a second, and he breathed, confused, but then she was screaming again.

"STOP IT!" She screamed, shaking beside him, her voice hoarse and he tried to shake her again, saying her name repeatedly, desperately, anything to wake her from whatever horrible dream she was having.

"IT'S A FAKE! IT'S A FAKE!" She shouted and then she was screaming again, arms curled in on her stomach and spine straight as a stick as she tried to fight off whatever was causing her so much pain, unbearable pain.

There was a push on his shoulder, and he felt himself thrown off the bed into the wall. He was up in another quick motion – Stefan was standing beside her bed, looking over at the scene in confusion.

"I don't know what's happening, she was fine one second and then she just started screaming." He said quickly, fumbling over his words as his brother looked from him to Hermione, who was still screaming at the top of her voice.

"Do something!" he said desperately, moving to her bed again, "HERMIONE! WAKE UP!" He shouted again and tried shaking her again, and this time, she gave a sudden jolt. He felt Stefan grab his shoulder, as Hermione grabbed her own arm in her sleep, sobbing uncontrollably.

"I didn't steal anything! I SWEAR! STOP!" She shouted again, and her voice was horribly worse than before, but her eyes were still closed, and she was crying –

"Damon." He only turned back to look at his brother because of the warning in his voice – he was looking at the bed and he followed his gaze. Hermione's arm was bleeding. It was covered with bandages that were completely soaked with blood – she was still screaming.

He didn't care though – he was beyond reason, he was hardly noticing the smell of the blood, but she needed to stop. He wasn't sure he could manage hearing her scream any longer – so he moved back to the bed and started shaking her again, repeating her name and muttering 'wake up' repeatedly.

It was stupid of him, and it was probably no use, but he knew he couldn't watch more or he would go insane. After a few seconds, she grew silent and went limp again, and he grabbed onto her arms, as she sobbed silently.

What in fucking hell was going on? He looked up at his brother, who was frowning and watching silently. Hermione's body gave another twitch, but she didn't open her eyes, tears were still seeping from them.

"Should we take her to the hospital?" He heard Stefan say, but he couldn't take his eyes off the brunette, scared that she would start screaming again. She twitched occasionally every few seconds, and as he watched, her eyes opened.

There were several seconds of silence as she watched them both, dull brown eyes staring at them without noticing, the pain he could see reflected in them made him swallow. She was still crying but it seemed like she wasn't controlling it, it was unconscious. She blinked twice, and he didn't know what to do. What the hell was one supposed to say to that? What in fuck's name had even happened?

He looked to Stefan – he was supposed to know what to say, what to do.

He looked back at Hermione to see her eyes move around the room. It was the only part of her body she seemed to be controlling. There was a tremor in her body every few seconds, and he faintly registered it as aftereffects of the nightmare – if that was what it was. She blinked dazedly as her gaze moved from them to her arm. There was no change in her expression or position as she drew in a shuddering breath with difficulty.

"Second-" Hermione started, and then coughed violently. He snapped his eyes back to her, she was coughing uncontrollably; Stefan had quickly pushed a glass in his hands. He tried to make her drink without slopping it over, but she moved her head away. She still hadn't moved from the position she had woken up in and he didn't know what to do except watch while the coughing died down.

"Second cupboard, third shelf." She whispered slowly, looking at him through heavily lidded eyes, "Purple liquid."

He swallowed thickly as he realized she wanted him to go and get it, but he wasn't sure he wanted to leave her with his brother. He looked at Stefan, who nodded once.

Fine then. He quickly ran through to the kitchen, blurring over at a high speed, ears fixed on any sound from upstairs. But he heard nothing except her light breathing – dangerously light breathing – and the cat, which seemed to be heading towards the bedroom. It took him a minute to find the liquid she had said – the cabinets were filled with bottles and flasks of all sizes and colors, and they were unlocked. He took another five seconds to read a few labels, and then he was beside her with the flask.

She was looking curiously at Stefan, who was still standing respectfully away and making no move to help her. She supported herself up with her right arm as he exchanged a look with Stefan, who frowned back at him, still as a statue, eyes fixed on her arm, most probably not breathing.

She brought her hand forward to take the little bottle from him – it was shaking. She seemed to notice it too and she breathed deeply twice, looking at her hand, and it steadied after a few seconds. He handed her the bottled and she gulped the liquid desperately. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply – it looked like she was going to fall back to sleep in seconds.

"Thanks for your help. You can go now." She said after a minute, eyes closed.

What?

She didn't really expect him to leave, just like that, did she? He looked towards Stefan, who was already nodding his head, eyes widened in warning. He moved a hand on his shoulder, grabbing forcefully.

"We'll talk to you tomorrow." Stefan said, and she nodded minimally, eyes still closed.

"Yeah, we'll have a long talk tomorrow." He added, glaring at Stefan, who didn't move his hand. Hermione's lips twitched in what looked like a faint smile, and she nodded again, never opening her eyes.

Just then, the cat pounced on the bed, into her lap, and she started petting it sleepily. That looked like their cue to leave, and he felt Stefan walk beside him rather fast, still looking deep in thought. He was having a bit of a hard time processing things too – Hermione's screams were still ringing in his ears and he wasn't sure he could get the sound out of his head anytime soon.

"What happened exactly?" Stefan said, getting in the car and starting the engine, looking at him curiously. He shrugged non committaly.

"Sleeping one second, screaming the next." He said lowly, and saw Stefan nodding thoughtfully.

"D'you – d'you think it was a dream?" Stefan asked, eyes on the road.

He wasn't sure himself – he wasn't sure of anything right now. It took him a while, but he answered anyway, "I don't know, brother."

By the time they were home, his mind had cleared a bit, and he was able to think past the screams and the obvious pain the girl had been in. Stefan had seemed to have recovered too, and soon, they were theorizing, or gossiping like old ladies in the living room, drinks in hand.

"I noticed the blood too." Stefan said, "It smelled like an otter, or… or a weasel or something."

"I don't understand though – why did her arm bleed, and through the bandages? What kind of wound did she have?"

"And it was fine before, it started bleeding later. I remember." Baby bro said, and he nodded, he remembered too.

"I think she was right about Katherine." He said after a while, thinking her words over from earlier in the night, "The first day I talked to her in the Grill, Katherine followed me outside and warned me to stay away from her. Then yesterday, when we were finally reaching the conclusion that maybe we could try talking to her, there she was again."

Stefan nodded, conceding his point, "Katherine didn't want us to trust her because she could be a useful ally."

"What exactly do we know that she can do?" He said, thinking over all the time he had spent in her company, trying to remember.

"Well, there's the freezing people thing, then there are those barriers around her house, which are far too flexible to be electronic force fields." His brother counted, and he remembered her mentioning hearing everything.

"The outside is bugged too. She knew we were gonna use Bonnie and everything. Were you able to hear anything happening inside?" He said, and Stefan frowned, "No, I couldn't. Except when I suddenly heard her screaming – then it was like some spell broke, and I could hear everything."

"And you automatically assumed I'd done something." He concluded, as Stefan stared at him somewhat guiltily. He didn't care though – he was beyond caring what his brother, or Elena thought about him. He couldn't help their thought processes.

"She's controlling those barriers mentally." Stefan said suddenly, and he frowned. "That's why I able to enter as soon as she was having that nightmare or whatever. It must be too much to hold up when she was in pain."

Huh. That made complete sense actually. He nodded slowly.

"Anyway, she probably heard you saying that you were gonna stay and wait outside for me to come while everyone else left. She thought it was 'cute'." Damon concluded disgustedly, rolling his eyes as his brother scoffed.

"What did she want to talk to you about?" He said and Damon found himself recalling the conversation with a smirk, and the part before it, when she had blushed like a school girl while cleaning him.

"Oh, nothing. She wanted to see your reaction on leaving your brother, wanted to figure you out or some bullshit." He remarked, faintly recalling the fact that she hadn't seemed much interested in their relationship with Katherine or anything. "What do you think she wants with Katherine?" he continued.

"I have no idea." Stefan said, but then frowned, "But on the other hand, if we do give her the information she needs, maybe we can learn something we want from her – like why Katherine wants the moonstone. And why she wanted to keep us away from her so desperately."

There was slight buzzing from somewhere under him, and he fished around for his phone – it was Hermione.

Stefan raised his eyebrows at him, surprised, and Damon put her on speaker.

"Hello?" Her unsure voice said, still a bit hoarse.

"How's the arm?" He said, and Stefan rolled his eyes, putting a hand on his forehead exasperatedly. He couldn't help himself – he had always been better at getting straight to the point.

"All better. Thank you for asking." She replied sweetly, and he smirked, recognizing the taunt, and replied in his best honey-coated voice, "You're welcome, darling."

"Now that that's done, I need a favor." She said in a normal voice, though he could hear the reluctant smile in her voice.

"So soon after today?" He said, and Stefan made a face at him, mouthing 'Play nice'.

"I want you to not mention what happened tonight to anyone, even your friends. It's somewhat… sensitive information, and I'd prefer the less people know in this town, the better."

Stefan looked at the phone with narrowed eyes, then at him, nodding fiercely. "Yes sure, Hermione. If that's what you want." He said, while he found himself shrugging. Fine, who were they to leak that to anyone if the clairvoyant one didn't want them to.

"Alright then. Thank you, both of you, for tonight." There was a pause, and Damon and Stefan exchanged a look as Hermione sighed on the other end. "It means more to me than you think, guys but I want you to please keep this to yourself. Consider it my weakness. One thing you know about me that you aren't supposed to, yeah? And I'd rather you didn't go exposing my weaknesses to everyone you know."

"It's okay Hermione. We understand. You can chill now, and try to sleep, why don't you, huh?" Damon replied, more softly than he'd intended.

"Right. Good night, Damon, Stefan." She said, and Stefan muttered back the same, before cutting the call.

They sat in silence for a minute before Stefan sat up in his seat to look at him with a frown.

"Earlier in the evening – when you threatened her, you held her left arm, right?" He said, and it was Damon's turn to frown.

"Yeah… You think that might've-?"

"She checked it before getting up again. She knows something happens to it." Stefan said, and he nodded slowly as another part of the night came back to him.

"Earlier, she joked not to attack her in her sleep, because the consequences could be 'dangerous' and that she wasn't responsible for what she did in that case." He remembered and Stefan nodded faintly, continuing, "Sensitive information. She never asked what all we know, the whole episode is nothing new to her. It's a repeat."

He nodded quietly, and they elapsed into a comfortable silence - each busy in their own thoughts. He couldn't say about his brother, but those screams were not going to get out of his head anytime soon – his worse victims hadn't screamed with that much pain in his entire lifetime. And if Stefan was right, and it wasn't a dream… his stomach churned uncomfortably at the thought, and he had a split second urge to go back to the Brit's house and check if she wasn't screaming again.

Grimacing at that last thought, he finished his drink and headed to bed.

Damon woke up the next morning feeling like complete shit. He had dreamt about Hermione screaming because he had held her arm too tightly and it was bleeding, while he watched from the sidelines, useless as a rock. He had woken suddenly in a panic, and hoped that Stefan had to been too busy to notice it. The last thing he needed was his brother to realize that last night's episode affected him so much.

He didn't understand why that had happened exactly. Sure, the little midget was attractive, but it had been in a girly scholar way until last night. Last night… well, it had opened his eyes for sure. If something like that had really happened to Hermione, he would bet his left arm that whatever she was doing in Mystic Falls, wasn't simply for research. That said, he had also begun to doubt the decision to trust her. Or try to. Could she really be trusted at all, if she'd gone through all that – and still come out sane?

He knew he was being more paranoid than necessary with the British girl, but something about her set him off. Whenever he got a sight of that bushy mane, and her expressive brown eyes, his heart screamed that surely, there could be nothing wrong with trusting her. But then his head intervened and noticed her battle hardened stance and the disturbing number of scars littering her unusually pale skin.

Damon rubbed his eyes with a groan. He hated those damn thoughts. He had to let Stefan make the decisions for this one, since he was obviously off the rocker. He climbed down half an hour later, to find the house empty. Weren't they supposed to go and tell the Brit today? He fished out his phone and called his brother, who picked at the fifth ring.

"Where is everybody? I thought we were meeting with Hermione today?"

There was a beat of silence, in which Stefan seemed to be moving around some crowd. He had school. Right. "Damon, you're up."

He rolled his eyes, and waited for his brother to get to a place he could talk. "I called Hermione in the morning and told her that we've decided we're on the same side. But I gave her today to… gather herself, and she sounded relieved with it and said we can meet tomorrow."

Huh. Great. So his brother had put on his Saint Stefan hat and pushed them another day back in the learning process about the Brit.

"So who's keeping an eye on her?"

"What do you mean?"

Oh God. Why did his brother have to be so fucking trusting?

"Stefan, please tell me that you have somebody keeping an eye on her house so that she doesn't suddenly decide to backstab us or something."

"Not everybody here is free Damon. It's Thursday – we've all got school. Rick's got classes and if you still think she'll go running to Katherine behind our backs, then by all means – go and stalk her."

"It's not stalking if it's gonna save our necks when that bitch sticks her wooden heels in them. Never mind you brother, I'll do it myself."

He snapped the phone shut and quickly blurred his way through a shower, standing outside the barrier of Hermione's house fifteen minutes later. Since he couldn't really see anything properly, he made use of his ever-efficient birds to spy through her bedroom window. She sat writing something on her desk till afternoon, when she disappeared for half an hour and emerged from the bedroom fully dressed.

That put him on alert. Where was she going? She was new to town so she couldn't really know that many people, as Katherine had pointed out. He followed her black car silently through the forest, but as she neared town, he made a split second decision, and decided to surprise her.

She swerved well for someone who'd only had two seconds of warning that someone was in front of their car. The black SUV screeched to a halt, tilting dangerously for a fifth of a second, before stopping, and he quickly blurred over by her window with a cocky grin.

Her brown eyes were alight with panic and fury, and she moved to roll down the window, but in the next second, he was sitting beside her on the passenger seat. She gave a short squeak of surprise on turning, putting a hand over her heart, which he could hear beating erratically.

The first thing he noticed, obviously, were the hair. They were rather tame today, almost wavy. And then his eyes fell on her arm, which was bandaged, but stained with red. He frowned, but before his mind could form the question, the Brit was swearing at him at the top of her voice.

"Holy mother of Godric! Damon Salvatore you are the most incorrigible bloody arse on-"

He snorted at her insulted. "Incorrigible? Really?"

His comment made her glare at him silently, looking like she was contemplating freezing him again, or maybe something worse.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"Making sure you're not going to rat us out to the perky bitch." He replied cheerily, watching as she got even more physically wound up with his tone.

"I thought Stefan said you've decided we're on the same side?" She snapped, raising an eyebrow, not making a move to restart the car.

"Stefan decided. Not me."

"So you're not on your brother's side?"

Damon sighed long-sufferingly. "To avoid confusion, let's just say that I don't second my brother's decision for the white flag whole-heartedly. I don't trust easy, so I don't trust you. Everyone is busy but since I'm faced with immortality, I have nothing better to do than keep an eye on you today."

There was silence as Hermione seemed to be taking deep breaths to calm herself. Damon smirked to himself. He loved when he annoyed someone to that level.

"I have some things to discuss with Bonnie today, and I really cannot have you interfering. At all."

Damon rolled his eyes at her, making himself comfortable in the seat, "You don't have a choice, Hot Shot."

Dear Harry,

I think I'm going to be back soon. Things are not working out too well here, but I'm fine. Hope you all are too. George sounded fine in his letter, he said Charlie seems to be enjoying his time with Lavender. I hope Ron is okay with it and not flipping out. Luna mentioned that Teddy's been sick a bit – what's happened? I hope he isn't giving you and Andy much of a hard time.

I've been missing you people like mad here, though there's this girl here – Caroline – she reminds of Ginny a lot. We get along well, but hopefully, if all goes according to plan, I'll be out of their hair soon and if not, well then I'll probably sit and wait for things to pan out.

I'm having some trouble with magic and the American Ministry – don't panic, I'm going to visit and sort it out later this week, I'v already written to them today and Blaise will help me through it. Also, I'm sometimes free here and even bored – tell Lavender to send some work along if she wants to.

That also reminds me, Padma and Parvati are going to need a place to crash for the summer – I already told Blaise it's fine – you know he hates talking about that stuff with you. Apparently, those two have been studying with him all these months and he just happened to forget to tell us. Check with Neville about how many kids are going to be staying from Hogwarts, and let me know that it's going to work out so I can confirm it to Blaise.

I made a few more friends here – there's Caroline, who is really sweet on Matt, by the way, she stalks him at the restaurant sometimes (bet Ginny cooed), and Jeremy's aunt Jenna accidently stabbed herself with a knife – she's going to die of mortification if they keep her in the hospital for another day. She's just like Ginny in that department, though Theo could give her a run for her money for mishaps in the kitchen. Where is he, anyway? Blaise said he hadn't heard from him in a while. I hope he's alright and not doing something I have to charge him for, again.

Did you know Theo has that SUV in America? I'm using it right now – the tattoos look fantastic by the way, still fit in with everything. How are Neville, Ginny, Draco and Ron? I haven't heard a word from any of them. And you too – tell me that your new boss got rid of that cane of his. I fear Ron will have permanent brain damage if that guy keeps hitting him with it. Also, George mentioned McLaggen's been giving you a hard time about my whereabouts? I hope you punch him.

Tell me about Teddy soon and if he's alright – I'm worried. Don't miss work, last I heard, your boss wasn't very happy with you. Also, if you get the time, tell Mrs. Weasley to send some food with the next owl? Everything I brought is finished and I feel very homesick without it. And do convince George to stop using Errol – I don't care if he's funny – he broke my mirror this time. Plus it's getting increasingly difficult to find more owls or birds to send letters from this part of the world – even though there's a small forest nearby. Crookshanks seems to enjoy the woods.

Give the attached letter to Luna, and tell everyone I say Hi.

Burn this when you're done.

I love you all and hope to see everyone soon.

– H

It was a disaster. A complete disaster. This town was cursed to be the bane of anyone's existence who happened to set foot in it. Hermione was pretty sure she was going to go insane if she had to stay in this stupid town for any more time. All she wanted at this point was the stupid Salvatores to tell her what had happened in 1864, ask some follow up questions about what that little bitch Katherine was up to, and then leave this town behind to search for that madman Klaus, and bring this assignment to an end.

Everything was mucked up right now – especially because of that bloody nightmare last night – she had revisited Malfoy Manor and woke up with the effects of the Cruciatus Curse back in full force, and a vampire looking scared as shit staring her right in the face.

Disaster.

And now those two – Stefan and Damon – had probably witnessed her screaming torture, and mostly happened to agree not to mention it to anyone out of sheer shock of the incident. At least that had played in her favor – the less people that knew about this predicament, the better. With Stefan and Damon having witnessed it, she was sure there was going to be a long list of questions the next time they talked, so she was hoping that would be their last conversation. She would get her answers, avoid theirs or answer vaguely and then happily leave town.

She hadn't been able to sleep at all after the nightmare, and she also hadn't been able to move much, but Stefan's presence meant she had accidently fried the wards, so there was nothing guarding her. She had stayed up all night as a result, digging through all her stuff for the old prescription Madam Pomfrey had given her for the after-effects of the Cruciatus. She had also felt a bit at odds with her stomach – there was a weird pain in her abdomen, so she had also taken out the prescription of medicines for whatever Dolohov had cursed her with during the Battle at the Department of Mysteries.

She had spent the night thinking of what she would do if the scar kept opening up throughout this mission, bringing with it the nightmares and the possibility of every wound reopening eventually. By morning, she had decided panicking was useless, so she had written to Harry to gather her thoughts, and requested to send some more food by Mrs. Weasley - she was feeling more homesick that day than she had felt any other time. She hadn't mentioned the nightmares or anything much worrying at all; she knew Harry would worry his head off, and most probably tell everyone else too. She hoped he wouldn't read too much into her trouble at the Ministry – she had already sent a letter to the address Blaise texted her.

That had all been for the morning after Stefan had called, graciously giving her the opportunity to gather her wits, but unintentionally giving her a day to get completely bored. In that time she had wondered vaguely what Matt was up to and if she should meet him once – but he hadn't picked her call so she had let it go. Then she'd called Jeremy – she was pretty sure he was involved and sure enough, he had said that he would join the rest of them when they came to visit.

And then she had remembered that just because Stefan had agreed to play nice, it didn't renegade the fact that she had to talk to Bonnie and get the witch into confidence. That motivated her to finally shower and head to the school to meet Bonnie and hopefully catch her alone. And then, Damon Salvatore had happened in the middle of the road and, surprisingly, made things a little simpler.

Once he had established that he wasn't going anywhere, Hermione had to cough up her actual plan for the day, which had him frowning at her from across the seat.

"So why do you need to talk to Bonnie?" He had frowned, as she started the car and resumed her way to town. "Didn't you just meet her yesterday? What's so important that you have to talk today?"

She took a while to consider his answer - since Stefan had finally extended the olive branch, it would only be in her favor to tell the vague truth. Plus, she wasn't very comfortable with Damon alone in her car – he was a vampire, for crying out loud, and to top it off, she'd just overpowered and sort-of insulted his capabilities the night before. He should've been murderously angry with her at that point of time, but there he was, all annoyingly calm and sympathetic, stealing curious looks at her arm. She had no idea what would suddenly set him off and dispel the guy' s cheery mood away, so she answered carefully.

"Bonnie… is special. And important. Since we're hypothetically on the same side, you should know that Bonnie is going to be really important in the future. She's an amateur right now, she has no powers, she's not practicing properly, and from the talk yesterday, I'm assuming she doesn't have proper guidance?"

She turned to the silent vampire as she said this, who nodded slowly, with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"I have books that can help her. Whole collections and some… let's say experience."

"Experience." Damon deadpanned. She could feel his piercing stare, even though she was resolutely facing the road.

"Alright." He said after a few moments, and flipped out his phone, dialing a number in the next second. "I'll help you with Bonnie because I happen to believe in that particular part of your story. Bennet witches are hot stock."

"Bon-Bon. How's history class?" He said, rolling his eyes at whatever she replied.

"So stuck-up. What I want from you is what you would want today. Skip classes and indulge in a little witch-doo-doo!"

Hermione snorted loudly, and Damon glared, to which she rolled her eyes. Hard.

"AH wait wait wait. I'll get to the point. Don't know if Elena told you but we're in cahoots with the little Brit now, and she has expressed concern about your freelance magical practices."

"That doesn't matter. What matters is that we're reaching school in five and you'll meet us in the parking lot."

"It is important or I wouldn't have called you, Bonnie. Just get your witchy ass out of the school, Hermione will explain the rest when we meet."

He cut the call without waiting for a reply after that, with an exaggerated roll of his eyes, "Witches."

So, am I dead or does this story still live? Anyone alive? Interested to know more? Honestly I'm really doubting myself over the presence of interest in this story, but yeah whatever. Review and lemme know if I still got game people.