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Her eyes were mildly curious.
“I’d like to see that. Little things like that, if you can remember them. Just any little thing—”
He was repeating himself—and he was starting to break down. Meredith put a hand on his elbow, guiding him to the threadbare brokenspringed couch in this room that had been his home for the happiest days of his life.
Meredith
Meredith was worried about Stefan. Those haunted green eyes . . . they’d used to be a brighter leaf green. Now they were dark as emerald. The tightly molded planes of his face, the beauty of his features, the soft promise of his mouth were all there . . . but still, somehow, these days Stefan managed to look like a condemned man. It wasn’t just since the monster had started attacking Fell’s Church. It was since losing Elena. Stefan had become the most beautiful walking shadow of his former self.
Fear assailed her suddenly, and she had to know about their champion. “Stefan?
With human blood in your veins, and White Ash in your hands, how do you rate your chances?” she asked him.
“How can I know? All I do know is that I’ll fight him with everything I have; with everything you’re giving me.”
With what they were giving him. A wry, mocking voice started in Meredith’s head.
Making a bargain with the devil? You’re going to let this lesser fiend have his way with you, breech your veins, just so he can go into a hopeless battle with a greater devil?
Yes. Oh, yes, indeed. She’d do much more than give her blood to a halfbroken lost soul like Stefan if it would allow her a chance to save Fell’s Church. Revenge . . . even revenge for her grandfather and Sue Carson . . . was pointless. If everyone insisted on revenge then the world would be full of maimed things: widows and orphans and gibbering phantoms. But if Stefan wasn’t able to stop that monster tonight, the monster would blaze through Fell’s Church, and leave it ruined in his wake. Hundreds of gibbering phantoms . . .
Grandfather . . .
Grandfather, there’s a real devil loose and nobody fit to stand up to him. And Damon may have—how would Stefan put it?—already played us false. He’s not a very good choice of ally. But what I know is that Stefan won’t. Stefan will hang in there until he stops that thing, even if it means he has to die.
I have to help him in any way I can.
She wondered why she was telling herself this, why she was so vehement. But the answer was too obvious. She was facing an old fear now with Stefan. Since her grandfather’s—breakdown—she had a terror and a disgust for vampires. She’d been young enough to believe him and develop that. Now, was she woman enough to hold herself still and face those translucent needlelike fangs when they were hovering over her throat?
It was time to see.
Stefan
Stefan thought, God help me, don’t let me let her down—or Bonnie, either. If it hadn’t been that Elena was in every atom of his body, every breath of air he did not take; that she was in the marrow of his bones, and in his vision, somehow always there in his sidesight no matter what desperate situation was in front, he would have mistrusted himself. The gallantry of these two girls in facing a horror all humans shared made him admire them almost too much. He had no fears of forgetting Elena for a millisecond, but both Bonnie and Meredith, in their own ways, were so dear to him, so fine in their characters and in their graceful bodies, that tonight he was close to loving them.
And what that could lead to, while he was drinking their blood . . . . . .
“We’re your friends,” Meredith said, still helping him, as they sat. “Friends pooling their strength—out of lovingkindness—for the sake of all the ignorant people who don’t even know they’re in danger.”
Lovingkindness, now there was an apt word. Had it been used since the days of long skirts and governesses? But it was exactly right. Meredith and Bonnie both knew the value of lovingkindness.
Then Meredith did something that would seem to offset what she had just said.
Deliberately, she snapped the lamp beside her on. This brightened the room so much that Stefan found it almost painful; Mrs. Flower’s had changed his lowwattage bulb for a slightly higher one. But it also seemed to bring the matter into the sane, level ground of the daylight world. It acted as a shock and a restorative for both of them.
“I want this in the light,” she said. “No vampire mind control—I won’t need it. I’ve made up my own mind, and I’ll stick to my decision; if you can believe that.”
“Yes,” Stefan said simply. He added, “I’ll do my best without controlling your mind. I know how—uneasy—you are about anything interfering with your thoughts.” Meredith smiled, a little sadly. “That’s not the only issue, my friend, and I think you know it. But if you don’t mind . . .”
“I don’t mind.”
And then for a moment they both just sat, looking at each other in the toobright light, searching each other’s eyes, and neither of them able to think of a thing to say.
Finally Stefan said, somewhat huskily, “We should really . . .”
“ . . . get started.” Meredith nodded. She unbuttoned her blouse again. “Just . . .
tell me what to do . . .”
