Destiny Rising

A drop of blood rolled down Tyler’s forehead from a scrape Zander must have inflicted, and he wiped it away with the hand that wasn’t holding on to Caroline. "One day I woke up, and I remembered normal life, but I also remembered this crazy story where I was a werewolf and did, uh . . ." His cheeks flushed. "Bad things."

"The bad things happened, but then everything changed," Meredith told him. "Most people don’t remember, but everything you think you know is true." It would be too complicated to explain to them how Elena had saved Fell’s Church by blackmailing the Guardians into changing the events of the last year. For almost everyone, their senior year had been completely normal: no vampires, no werewolves, no kitsune. But a handful of people, all with supernatural Powers or Influences of one kind or another, could remember both timelines.

"Do you remember Klaus?" Alaric asked. "Did you see him at all after you left Fell’s Church? Maybe in your dreams?"

Meredith glanced at him approvingly. Klaus could dream-travel; they knew that. Maybe Tyler or Caroline would have some residual memory that could help them, even if they couldn’t remember being Influenced.

But Tyler shook his head. "I haven’t seen him since Fell’s Church," he said.

"Not since you kidnapped Caroline to help bring Stefan to him, you mean?" Bonnie said tartly. "How did you two end up together again, anyway?"

Tyler was blushing miserably and Caroline took his hand, folding his meaty fingers in her long, elegant ones. "I was still expecting Tyler’s babies. Both sets of memories were sure about that. So when we found each other we decided that the best thing we could do was try to raise our family." She shrugged. "All that stuff – Klaus and everything – it just seems like a dream now. We’ve been staying with my grandmother, and she’s been helping to take care of the twins." And that – picking the version of events that was most convenient for her and sticking to it – was just like Caroline, Meredith realized. She’d never had any imagination.

"You know, Tyler," Bonnie said, "you should get in touch with your cousin Caleb. He was looking for you in Fell’s Church, and he seemed really worried."

That was one way of putting it, Meredith supposed. Caleb had stalked them, put glamours on them, and cast spells to sow discord between Elena and the others, all because he suspected them of being behind Tyler’s disappearance and his own dual memories.

Caroline put her hand on Tyler’s shoulder, and Meredith noticed something. "You cut your nails off," she said. Caroline had always had long, perfectly polished nails, ever since they had stopped making mud pies and started talking about boys.

"Oh," Caroline said, glancing at her hands. "Yeah, I had to cut them short so they wouldn’t scratch the twins. They like to suck on my fingers." She added hesitantly, "Do you want to see pictures?"

Bonnie nodded curiously, and Meredith joined her to look at Caroline’s cell-phone pictures of two tiny babies. "Brianna and Luke," she told them. "See how blue their eyes are?"

That was when Meredith decided she might as well forgive Caroline and Tyler. If Caroline had changed enough that she cared more for her babies than her looks, and Tyler wasn’t trying to throw his weight around, they were probably no threat. True, they had ruined everything by destroying the white ash, but they hadn’t done it maliciously.

They exchanged a few more words, and then parted ways. Caroline and Tyler headed back down the trail, Caroline’s long hair swinging against her tanned shoulders. It was strange, Meredith thought as she watched them. Caroline had been such a close friend, and then such a despised enemy, and now she felt nothing for her.

"That was the only lead I’d found in any of the references about defeating Klaus," Alaric said mournfully, looking at the heap of ash and scorched pieces of the blessed ash tree.

"Could we gather up the ashes and use them for something?" Bonnie asked hopefully. "Maybe make a salve and put it on a regular stake?"

Alaric shook his head. "It wouldn’t work," he told her. "Everything I’ve read makes it clear that it’s got to be undamaged wood."

"We’ll find something else," Meredith said, gritting her teeth. "There has to be something he’s susceptible to. But at least one good thing that came out of this."

"What?" Bonnie asked. "I hope you’re not talking about Caroline, because a few pictures aren’t going to erase everything that she’s done. And those babies are clearly going to look more like Tyler than like her."

"Well," Meredith pointed out, "remember how we told you that when you were having your vision in our room, you said Klaus was calling an old friend to help him?" She waved a hand toward the retreating figures down the path. "If it was Tyler, he’s not a threat after all. We’re not facing a second enemy."

"Yeah," Bonnie said thoughtfully, and wrapped her arms around herself. "If the vision was talking about Tyler."

Chapter 17

Meredith moodily picked at the mud in the grooves of her hiking boots, flicking the little pieces of dirt onto the floor of the car.

Beside her, Alaric was driving them back to campus. There was a thoughtful crease between his eyebrows, and Meredith knew he was turning over possibilities, trying to approach the Klaus problem from every angle he could think of. She felt a wave of affection for him wash over her, and she reached over to squeeze his knee. Alaric glanced at her and smiled.

Turning to look into the backseat, she saw Bonnie fast asleep, her head on Zander’s shoulder. Zander had cuddled her close, his cheek resting against her hair.