Just Stefan.
Elena screamed and had no idea if she screamed words or just a formless sound of anguish. She threw herself into the cell — or tried to. Her hands grabbed onto curls of steel as sharp as razor that caused blood to well up instantly wherever they touched, and then Damon, who had the fastest reactions, was pulling her back.
And then he just pushed past her and stared. He stared open-mouthed at his younger brother — a gray- faced, skeletal, barely breathing young man, who looked like a child lost in his rumpled, stained, threadbare prison uniform. Damon raised a hand, as if he’d forgotten the barrier already — and Stefan flinched. Stefan seemed not to know or recognize any of them. He peered more closely at the drops of blood left on the razor-sharp fencing where Elena had grasped it, sniffed, and then, as if something had penetrated the fog of his bafflement, looked around dully. Stefan looked up at Damon, whose cloak had fallen, and then, like a baby’s, Stefan’s gaze wandered on.
Damon made a choking sound and turned and, knocking anyone in his way aside, ran the other way down the corner. If he was hoping that enough guards would follow him that his allies could get Stefan out, he was wrong. A few followed, like monkeys, calling out insults. The rest stayed put, behind Sage.
Meanwhile, Elena’s mind was churning and churning out plans. Finally she turned to Sage. “Use all the money we have plus this,” she said, and she reached under her cloak for her canary diamond necklace — over two dozen thumb-sized gems—“and call to me if we need more. Get me half an hour with him. Twenty minutes, then!”—as Sage began to shake his head. “Stall them, somehow; get me
After a moment Sage looked her in the eyes and nodded. “I will.”
Then Elena looked at Dr. Meggar pleadingly. Did he have something — did something exist — that would help?
Dr. Meggar’s eyebrows went down, then their inner sides went up. It was a look of grief, of despair. But then he frowned and whispered, “There’s something new — an injection that’s said to help in dire cases. I could try it.”
Elena did her best not to fall at his feet. “Please! Please try it!
“It won’t help beyond a couple of days—”
“It won’t need to! We’ll get him out by then!”
“All right.” Sage had by now herded all the guards away, saying, “I’m a dealer in gems and there’s something you all should see.”
Dr. Meggar opened his bag and took out of it a syringe. “Wooden needle,” he said with a wan smile as he filled it with a clear red liquid from a vial. Elena had taken another syringe and she examined it eagerly as Dr. Meggar coaxed Stefan by imitation to put his arm up to the bars. At last Stefan did as Dr. Meggar wished — only to jump away with a cry of pain as a syringe was plunged into his arm and stinging liquid injected.
Elena looked at the doctor desperately. “How much did he get?”
“Only about half. It’s all right — I filled it with twice the dose and pushed as hard as I could to get the”— some medical word Elena didn’t recognize—“into him. I knew it would hurt him more, injecting that fast, but I accomplished what I wanted.”
“Good,” Elena said rapturously. “Now I want you to fill this syringe with my blood.”
“Blood?” Dr. Meggar looked dismayed.
“Yes! The syringe is long enough to go through the bars. The blood will drip out the other side. He can drink it as it comes out. It might save him!” Elena said every word carefully, as if speaking to a child. She desperately wanted to convey her meaning.
“Oh, Elena.” The doctor sat down, with a clink, and took a hidden bottle of Black Magic out of his tunic. “I’m so sorry. But it’s hard enough for me to get blood out of a vial. My eyes, child — they’re ruined.”
“But glasses — spectacles—?”
“They’re no good to me anymore. It’s a complicated condition. But you have to be very good to actually tap a vein in any case. Most doctors are pretty hopeless; I’m impossible. I’m sorry, child. But it’s been twenty years since I was successful.”
“Then I’ll find Damon and have him open my aorta. I don’t care if it kills me.”
This new voice coming from the brilliantly lighted cell in front of them made both the doctor and Elena jerk their heads up.
“Stefan! Stefan! Stefan!” Uncaring of what the razor fence would do to her flesh, Elena leaned over to try to hold his hands.
“No,” Stefan whispered, as if sharing a precious secret. “Put your fingers
Elena put her fingers
Neither of them spoke. Elena heard Dr. Meggar get up and quietly creep away — to Sage, she supposed. But her mind was full of Stefan. She and he simply looked at each other, trembling, with tears quivering on their lashes, feeling very young.
And very close to death.
“You say I always make you say it first, so I’ll confound you. I love you, Elena.”
Teardrops fell from Elena’s eyes.
“Just this morning I was thinking how many people there are to love. But really it’s only because there’s one in the first place,” she whispered back to him. “One forever. I love you, Stefan! I love you!”
Elena drew back for a moment and wiped her eyes the way all clever girls know how to do without ruining their makeup: by putting her thumbs beneath her lower lashes and leaning backward, scooping tears and kohl into infinitesimal droplets in the air.
For the first time she could
“Stefan,” she whispered, “I’m so sorry. I wasted time this morning getting dressed up — well, dressed down — to show you what’s waiting for you when we get you out. But now…I feel…like…”
Now there were no tears in Stefan’s eyes, either. “Show me,” he whispered back eagerly.
Elena stood, and without theatrics, shrugged the cloak off. Shut her eyes, her hair in hundreds of kiss curls, little wispy spirals that were plastered around her face. Her gilded eyelids, waterproof, still gilded. Her only clothing the wisps of golden tulle with jewels attached to make it decent. Her entire body iridescent, perfection in the first bloom of youth that could never be matched or re-created.
There was a sound like a long sigh…and then silence, and Elena opened her eyes, terrified that Stefan might have died. But he was standing up, clutching at the iron gate as if he might wrench it off to get to her.
“I get all this?” he whispered. “All this for you. Everything for you,” Elena said. At that moment there was a soft sound behind her and she whirled to see two eyes shining in the dimness of the cell opposite Stefan’s.
To her surprise, Elena felt no anger, only a determination to protect Stefan if she could.
And then she saw that in the cell she’d assumed was empty, there was a kitsune.
The kitsune looked nothing like Shinichi or Misao. He had long, long hair as white as snow — but his face was young. He was wearing all white, too, tunic and breeches out of some flowing, silky material and his tail practically filled the small cell, it was so fluffy. He also had fox ears which twitched this way and that. His eyes were the gold of fireworks.
He was gorgeous.
The kitsune coughed again. Then he produced — from his long hair, Elena thought, a very, very small and thin-skinned leather bag.
Like, Elena thought, the perfect bag for one perfect jewel.
Now the kitsune took a pretend bottle of Black Magic (it was heavy and a pretend drink was delicious), and filled the little bag with it. Then he took a pretend syringe (he held it as Dr. Meggar had and tapped it to get the bubbles out) and filled it from the little bag. Finally, he stuck the pretend syringe through his own bars and depressed his thumb, emptying it.
