The night was already old when Damon finally neared Mystic Falls.
The kind of night that felt like it had always been there, as if the sky had stopped trying to pretend it could be anything other than darkness. The Camaro tore down the narrow road, devouring miles with a deep, steady growl. Damon drove fast, but it wasn't recklessness. It was efficiency. And a kind of nerves he refused to call by name.
An odd premonition had pumped his blood faster the moment he left Atlanta, pushing him to hurry to Mystic Falls.
He almost regretted leaving Bree like that, so… raw. No full explanation. No believable everything's going to be fine promise. He wasn't that kind of man. And he'd learned the hard way that promises made to soothe always came back to bite you in the neck.
One of the only promises he'd ever made was the one he made to Emily Bennett: to protect her descendants. It had been the first promise he'd ever made seriously, and kept, for his entire life.
Emily had sealed the tomb with several vampires inside. The magic required was powerful, designed to last for centuries, maybe millennia. A spell like that had to be recorded somewhere for her descendants.
Notes. Diagrams. Structure. A witch of that caliber didn't work blind. She mapped. She wrote. She passed things down.
All the way to Mystic Falls, he'd turned it over in his head: if the spell to free Katherine existed… it was definitely in that damn grimoire.
Bree had backed him up, and now he had another path to follow if the first one failed. That grimoire was another key to the tomb's lock. Damon let the idea settle into his mind because, for once, things seemed to be aligning with what he wanted.
The feeling that the world was helping him was simple, beautiful, even…
Almost delicious.
He had to find the grimoire. Katherine depended on it.
"Katherine," Damon breathed, the word laced with hunger.
Her name sat on his tongue like the familiar taste of blood. He tightened his grip on the wheel, not because he was afraid of failing, but because he refused to let anything slow him down in his search for her. He'd waited one hundred and forty-five years. He'd survived humiliation, obsession, absence.
Plan A: get Emily's pendant. Wait for the comet. Approach the Bennetts. Finally, free Katherine.
Plan B: find the grimoire, approach the Bennetts, understand the mechanics of the seal, and go around it.
Plan C, D, E…? Damon smiled without any humor.
He would've loved an entire alphabet of solutions.
Inside the car, he reached into the glove compartment, grabbed a blood bag, and took a sip, just enough to calm the sharp edge vibrating under his skin. It was more control than need at this point.
Then something shifted.
Not in the road. Not in the engine.
In the air.
A dissonance.
Damon slowed almost imperceptibly, his senses unfurling without effort. It wasn't a smell. It wasn't a sound. It was the feeling that the night had thickened at one precise point, like a portion of the darkness had decided to become… heavier than the rest.
His deduction was right.
He saw her about a hundred meters ahead.
A silhouette. Human from a distance. But "human" the way a reflection resembles a face close enough to fool a hurried mind.
Damon's left hand vanished, and in its place, mist appeared then slipped out through the cracked window of his car and disappeared.
Several dozen feet above the ground, a bat with black eyes materialized in the sky, watching carefully what was happening on the road.
Several cars ahead of Damon, a family station wagon, headlights trembling, slammed on its brakes.
The driver, a woman in her thirties, felt her heart climb into her throat before she even understood why. She had seen the shape cross through the beam of her headlights. She'd thought thing. Then person. Then no. Her brain sent one simple command to her hands: brake.
The front tire screamed. The headlights flung light like a panicked spotlight.
The guy behind her, a man in a pickup truck, had just enough time to curse. He hadn't seen the silhouette, only the brake lights, the absurd stop, the brutal unfairness of the road demanding an immediate reaction. He hit his brakes, felt his vehicle fishtail, felt the weight pull, and the world became an equation he didn't have time to solve.
A crash.
A second one.
The chain reaction spread like a disease.
Damon didn't panic. Neither did the bat overhead. It shot after the humanoid shape.
From his car, Damon watched the silhouette escape in the distance. Through the vision he shared with the bat, it was clear as day, and in a fraction of a second he understood that if he stayed in line, he'd plow straight into this human wreck.
Not because he couldn't survive.
Because an accident here always drew people, and he didn't need that right now.
He jerked the steering wheel, sharp and precise, almost elegant. The tires bit into the shoulder. The Camaro slid through dirt, tore up leaves, slammed into a small embankment, and finally crashed in a shriek of metal against a tree.
The engine choked then died.
Silence.
Believable.
Then came the human sounds: panic, pain, fear. Doors flying open. Frantic calls. Voices breaking.
Damon didn't look at the accident.
His mind locked onto the silhouette.
She stood at the edge of the woods now, perfectly still, as if she were watching his bat, watching him.
He didn't open the door.
He didn't need to.
The driver's-side window was already cracked just enough, just enough for his body to obey his will.
His flesh lost coherence, his outline fell apart, and Damon became invisible mist that slipped out through the opening like a breath of night. The Camaro remained behind, empty and abandoned, a simple shell without its owner.
The mist skimmed along the ground, crossed the roadside, and slipped into the tree line.
He re-formed between the trees.
Already moving at full speed.
The silhouette fled, gliding, dissolving between trunks. He chased her, his feet leaving almost no trace in the soil.
His world narrowed to one objective. He only heard what mattered: the friction of a leaf caught by wind, the crack of a branch, the useless breathing of an animal too close.
Then…
Nothing.
The shadow vanished.
Damon stopped dead. So did the piece of him in the air between the branches.
A frustrated curl twisted his mouth.
"Of course."
He scanned the forest. Smells. Sounds. Vibrations. But nothing. No heartbeat. No warmth. Not even that lingering sense you leave behind when you truly exist.
"Fine. If you want to play hide-and-seek…"
His body burst into a swarm of bats.
Dozens of winged shadows exploded in every direction, separating instantly like they were following a military strategy. Damon saw through each one. Heard through each one. A part of him took a cold, vicious pleasure in how efficient this new power was. A power that should've made him feel other, but strangely didn't.
It just made him feel…
More.
This hunt is going to get a lot more fun, he thought, as the cries of dozens of bats echoed through the trees.
They swept the underbrush, climbed into branches, followed paths, searched ditches. Damon felt every wingbeat like fingers brushing the air.
Nothing.
Not a trace.
Not an echo.
It was like hunting a lie.
Far off, he caught sirens.
Blue and red lights were already cutting through the night, even through the trees.
Damon felt his frustration sharpen into something colder, more calculating. If he stayed, he'd have to explain. If he explained, he'd have to lie. And lies in this town always stacked up until they became a mountain.
All the bats turned back toward the Camaro, their bodies becoming invisible.
Each bat converged a few dozen meters from the car, and in the motion they melted into an invisible mist that shot to the Camaro, slipped through the cracked window, and in an instant Damon was back in the driver's seat.
He gave the damage a quick glance. Crumpled hood. Destroyed bumper. Scraped bodywork.
"I really kinda overdid it this time."
His dead heart tightened. His precious car had taken a beating tonight.
Damon checked his reflection in the rearview mirror.
Impeccable.
Too impeccable.
He couldn't be "too" anything. Not here. Not now. Humans accepted an accident. They accepted blood. They accepted pain. They did not accept the absence of consequences.
So he made a clean cut on his forehead.
Blood beaded instantly. He forced the wound to stay open, holding back his healing with almost clinical control. Then he tilted his head and hit his forehead against the steering wheel, just hard enough to sell the impact, leave a believable mark, and coat his fingers in red.
Footsteps approached.
A police officer arrived first, flashlight in hand, face tight with adrenaline. Young. New, maybe. He hadn't learned how to pretend nothing got to him yet.
He saw Damon, the blood, the vintage car, and for a second his brain made the usual connection: handsome and rich + unconscious = problem.
"Sir? Can you hear me?" the officer asked, worried.
Damon lifted his blue eyes unnervingly calm under the officer's assessment.
"I've had worse wake-up calls…"he muttered, his exhaustion perfectly measured.
The officer helped him out. Damon leaned into him just enough to play the dazed man. Once they were back on the road, a small crowd had formed, people who'd seen the smoke and gotten out of their cars while they waited to continue. Onlookers who fed on drama like it was a show.
The officer felt the pressure rising. He didn't want a crowd. He wanted one simple order.
"Back up!" he yelled. "Give him space! The ambulance will be here any second!"
They backed up reluctantly, murmuring among themselves.
The station wagon driver, trembling, clutched her phone like a lifeline. She kept repeating, "I swear I saw someone…" No one flat-out contradicted her, but no one truly believed her either. They all figured she was overtired… or just crazy.
Either way, she was the reason for the crash they'd just lived through.
No surprise: she was getting nothing but cold shoulders from almost everyone.
In her head, the silhouette looped on repeat, and fear took on an absurd shape: What if she'd almost hit someone? What if she made it up? What if she was losing her mind?
The man in the pickup had already flipped into anger, at her, at the road, at the night, at the feeling of having brushed death because of one stupid stop. He swore, he gestured wildly, and yet his hands still trembled.
Damon heard them all.
The heartbeats. The anger. The fear. The denial.
He set a hand discreetly on the officer's shoulder, voice soft, almost confidential.
"Let me sit alone for a few minutes. I need… air."
The compulsion slid in.
The officer didn't hesitate. His shoulders loosened.
"Yeah. Of course. I… I'll be right back."
He dispersed the crowd with more authority than he actually had, then walked away.
Damon stayed seated on the shoulder, alone.
The sirens were getting closer.
And his mind drifted back to the shadow.
That silhouette hadn't been a road accident. It had chosen that spot. It had caused a slowdown. Chaos. Noise. A scene.
Why?
Damon thought immediately of the Entity from barely two days ago. He thought of its voice. The way it had looked at him like you look at an interesting insect.
This wasn't over.
It was a reminder.
Of what? Damon had no idea, but he didn't like it at all.
Earlier, he'd had the feeling everything was aligning in his favor. It took one moment for him to crush that thought.
It was like the wind was whispering to him:
I know where you are…
The situation he was in was dangerous for his plan. Something unknown had entered the game, and Damon couldn't let it interfere with what he was doing.
But what could he do?
Go back to Atlanta and, through Bree, figure out what he was facing?
"Yeah… maybe that's the smartest path." he told himself.
The problem was, he didn't want to talk about the Entity with anyone.
He didn't know or understand why.
He just… didn't.
Fifteen minutes later, the ambulance arrived. Damon had ultimately decided to investigate on his own in Mystic Falls. Besides, the date to free the woman he loved was approaching, and he wasn't going to let fear make him miss it.
The paramedics moved fast.
Professional.
One of them, an ordinary-looking woman, took care of him. She cleaned the wound, placed a compress, and looked vaguely surprised that Damon was so lucid.
"You're sure this won't leave a scar?" Damon's voice came out; he sounded slightly disturbed.
Sophie, the paramedic, reassured him.
"Yes, don't worry, Mr. Salvatore." Then, right after: "Tell me… did you lose consciousness after the crash?"
"One second," Damon replied with a shrug. "Then my forehead reminded me it existed."
A nervous smile.
A human laugh.
The paramedics liked his answer.
Damon, on the inside, was cold. Humans always admired people who joked so they wouldn't cry. He knew that.
Damon didn't really realize it, but with his current appearance, he didn't need to try to charm anyone.
Even if he kept his mouth shut and acted nonchalant, most people would be delighted just to be near him.
A police car pulled up, cutting off the conversation Damon was having with the paramedic.
Sheriff Elizabeth Forbes stepped out.
Damon sensed her before he saw her. His sharpened nose tightened, catching the scent on her breath…
Vervain.
The one thing that could block a vampire's compulsion.
The subtle smell carried by the night breeze told him she'd consumed it recently.
So no compulsion.
Perfect. This night just keeps getting better, Damon thought bitterly as he watched her.
Elizabeth approached. Piercing gaze, straight posture, natural authority. She scanned the scene in one look, then fixed on Damon. For a moment she looked surprised by his appearance, but she hid it quickly.
Damon saw it anyway.
The sheriff already knew him by name. The officer who'd helped Damon had told her.
Mystic Falls was a small town. The sheriff knew the Salvatore name perfectly. Zacharia or Zach Salvatore was a name everyone knew, especially the founding families.
An unknown Salvatore on a crashed road didn't go unnoticed.
"Damon Salvatore," she said without preamble. "Zach never mentioned you. But Danny told me you're his nephew."
Damon gave her a tired smile.
His eyes flicked to her uniform and the smile turned into a smirk.
"Evening, Sheriff Forbes. Damon Salvatore at your service. In flesh, in bone… and apparently, in crumpled metal."
Elizabeth, Liz to the people close enough to use it, studied him for a long moment. Damon gave her exactly what she gave him: calm.
Insolent calm.
"The ambulance will take you to the hospital shortly. Have you already notified your uncle?" she asked.
"I've spent enough time in hospitals for one lifetime," Damon replied, perfectly polite. "And I'm fine. Do me a favor and just let me go home so I can rest. It was a long trip and I'd like to find a bed. And no, I haven't…I haven't seen my uncle in a long time, my arrival was supposed to be a surprise."
Elizabeth leaned in slightly, brows drawing together.
To Damon, it felt like she could read his lie.
She was sharp.
"You seem… too calm for someone who just ended up in a ditch."
"I get why Zach never talked about me, he's not the bragging type,"
Damon said, the laugh in his voice clear.
"But for future reference, Sheriff, I'm a pretty free-spirited person. It's part of my charm." He flashed a light smile. "Some people have breakdowns. I make it look good. Besides… I'm a Salvatore."
He put emphasis on the last part on purpose.
The sheriff finally smiled as she pulled out her phone, amused and intrigued by the strange young man.
"Alright, alright. Wait a minute. I'm calling your uncle to come pick you up. That's my compromise."
Before Damon could protest, Zach's phone picked up. Damon heard it. Every word. The calm voice. The word nephew. The accident. The status: okay, I'll be there as soon as possible.
A sharp irritation climbed up Damon's throat.
Zach knows I'm back now… and it won't take long before Stefan does too.
There was no way to cut that thread without pulling the whole web.
And that was definitely not part of his plan.
The powers he needed to get out of this cleanly were useless because of vervain.
And Damon absolutely couldn't afford a bloodbath just for this. He could've done it, sure, but it would derail his plans, which were already drifting more and more off-course.
With Katherine on the line, all he could do was grit his teeth and swallow his anger.
He locked it away in that inner box where he kept the things that could explode at the wrong time.
Damon went back to retrieve his bags and everything he had in the car. It would be hard to explain if someone searched his vehicle and found blood bags.
People seemed to sense his mood, and no one bothered him anymore.
Thirty minutes passed, and a Chevrolet Silverado rolled up.
Damon sensed it before he saw it. His thoughts froze for a moment, then everything came rushing back.
"Good evening… Damon."
A handsome young man with brown hair said it. His green eyes were wide.
Confused by what stood in front of him.
Was that really Damon? The question blinked furiously through his mind.
Damon stared at him, expressionless, then his lips pulled into a smile.
"Hey. Brother."
The mocking smile.
The arrogant voice.
The satisfied tone.
Yeah.
It was his brother.