Midnight

"You did that? Of course you did."Elena’s voice was soft and low and flattering. "You can do anything. But – our first encounter? I don’t remember – "

"You were too young, and you saw just a flash of our air car as it passed your parents’vehicle. It was meant to be a minor accident with one apparent casualty – you. But instead…"

Bonnie’s hands flew to her mouth. She was clearly getting something Elena wasn’t. Her parents’"vehicle"…? The last time she’d driven with her father and mother – and little Margaret – had been the day of the crash. The day she’d distracted her father, who’d been driving…

"Look, Daddy! Look at the pretty – "

And then had come the impact.

Elena forgot about being meek and keeping her head low. In fact, she raised her head, and met gold-splattered blue eyes very much like hers. Her own gaze, she knew, was piercing and hard.

"You… killed my parents?"she whispered.

"No, no!"the dark one cried. "It was an operation gone sour.

We only had to intersect with the Earth dimension for a few minutes. But, quite unexpectedly, your talent flared. You saw our air car. Instead of a crash with only one apparent casualty: you, your father turned to look and…"Slowly her voice trailed off as Elena’s turned unbelieving eyes on her.

Bonnie was staring sightlessly into the distance, almost as if she were in trance. "Shinichi,"she breathed. "That weird riddle of his – or whatever it was. That one of us had murdered, and that it was nothing to do with being a vampire or a mercy kil ing…"

"I’d always assumed it was me,"Stefan said quietly. "My mother never real y recovered after my birth. She died."

"But that doesn’t make you a murderer!"Elena cried. "Not like me. Not like me! "

"Well, that was why I was asking you now,"the businesslike blond woman said. "It was a flawed mission, but you understand that we were only trying to recruit you, yes? It’s the traditional method. Our genes have honed us to be the best at managing powerful, irrational demons, who don’t respond to traditional strength but require on-the-spot recalculation – "

Elena choked back a scream. A scream of wrath – agony – disbelief – guilt –  she didn’t know what. Her Plans. Her schemes. The way she had handled boisterous boys in the bad old days – it was al genetic. And…her parents…what had they died for?

Stefan stood up. His jaw was hard, his green eyes were burning bril iantly. There was no gentleness in his face. He clasped Elena’s hand and she heard, If you want to fight, I’m in.

Mais, non. Elena turned around and saw Sage. His telepathic voice was unmistakable. She was compel ed to listen. We cannot fight them on their own territory and win.

Even I cannot. What you can do is make them pay! Elena, my brave one, your parents’spirits have undoubtedly found new homes. It would be cruel to drag them back. But let us demand of the Guardians anything you desire. For a year and a day in the past, demand whatever you wish! I think that we all will back you.

Elena paused. She looked at the Guardians and she looked at the treasures. She looked at Bonnie and Stefan, who were waiting. There was permission in their eyes.

Then she said slowly to the Guardians, "This is really going to cost you. And I don’t want to hear that any of it is impossible. For al your treasures back and the Master Key too…I want my old life. No, I want a new life, with my real old life behind me. I want to be Elena Gilbert, exactly as if I’d graduated with my high school class, and I want to go to Dalcrest Col ege. I want to wake up in my aunt Judith’s house in the morning and find that no one realizes I’ve been gone for almost ten months. And I want a 4.5 grade point average for my last year in high school – just in case of emergencies.

And I want Stefan to have lived in the boardinghouse peaceful y al that time, and to have everyone accept him as my boyfriend. And I want every single thing that Shinichi and Misao and whoever they were working for did undone and forgotten. I want the person they were working for dead. And I want everything that Klaus did in Fel ‘s Church undone as well. I want Sue Carson back! I want Vickie Bennett back! I want everyone back! "

Bonnie said faintly, "Even Mr. Tanner?"

Elena understood. If Mr. Tanner had not died – mysteriously drained of blood – then Alaric Saltzman would never have been cal ed to Fel ‘s Church. Elena remembered Alaric from the out-of-body experience: sandy hair, laughing hazel eyes.

She thought of Meredith and his almost-engagement to her.

But who was she to play God? To say, yes, this person can die because he was unlovely and unloved, but this one has to live because she was my friend.

Chapter 42

"It’s not a problem,"the fair ruler, Ryannen, said unexpectedly. "We can make it so that your Mr. Tanner repel ed an apparent vampire attack and the school cal ed in Alaric Saltzman to take his place and investigate. All right, Idola?" – to the redhead, and to the dark one – "All right, Susurre?"

Elena wasn’t All right. Despite the example she’d just had of turn-on-a-dime plotting and scheming, she was scarcely listening. Al she knew was that her voice had gone husky and that tears blurred her eyes. "And…for the Master Key – I want – "

Stefan squeezed her hand. Elena suddenly realized that they were al standing, al three of them, beside her. And the look on every face was the same. Dead resolve.

"I want Damon back."Elena hadn’t heard quite this note in her voice since the day she’d been told both her parents had died. If there had been a table, she would have put her clenched fists on it and did her best to loom over the women.

As it was, she simply leaned toward them, speaking in a low and grating voice. "If you do that – bring him back, exactly as he was before he walked into the Gatehouse – then you get the Master Key and the treasures. You say no – and you lose everything. Everything. This is non-negotiable, get it?"