Chapter 12.

Damon

As Damon walked out the room he shut his eyes tight wishing to block out Elena's screams. He hated knowing that she would blame him, that she still believed he would...that he even could hurt her. So maybe at first he had influenced her to dream about him, but he had only created the moonbeam, to show her that he would be there for her, to catch her in the dark because she wouldn't believe him if he told her with words. A dream was the only way. But he had meant it to last five minutes alone; for her to see him in the light and whisper his name and then he'd planned to let her go.

Someone had pulled the power out of his hands, and Damon had watched as a mirror of himself taunted Stefan, as someone else created the ballroom scene. He had never wished to hurt her. So who had?

"I have a very good idea who" Damon thought to himself, anger flowing through his body at the thought of them threatening Elena.

In that moment Damon swore to hurt Misao and Shinichi. When he found them he would make them feel the pain that Elena felt, make them understand what it felt like to be despised like Damon now would be by Elena.

Damon waltzed down the hall and into his bedroom where Daphne, the girl he had compelled this morning for Breakfast sat by the window, stone-still and waiting for him to speak.

He walked over and sat next to her, taking in how many of Elena's features she had. The same red heart lips, the same button nose. But, as he looked in her eyes, he saw how Daphne lacked that spark, the spark that only Elena's soul could alight in those lapis-blue rings.

He felt the tears well in his eyes as his desire for Elena swelled. The unbearable thought of more hatred from her being thrown at him, every day was only added to by knowing that Stefan's anger and disappointment would cut through him like ice; searing him with pain stronger than any stake that could be plunged in his heart.

"Why Daphne? Tell me why I do these things. Why do I take the blame for everything, even when I didn't do it?" he pleaded as the tears fell, and he was thankful for the privacy of his room. He stared into those eyes and wished that the light would be there; wished that he could at least try to love someone else.

"I don't know Damon. Tell me why." Daphne spoke in a robot voice, as her human thought processes slowly decoded the message.

He didn't have to think of the answer. He had rehearsed it so many times, for if Elena herself ever asked.

"Because I love her. Because, at least if she thinks it's only me who hurt her; she won't be so afraid of the other things; the things that are actually preying on her." He sighed through the pain; wanting nothing more than to turn it off.

Daphne's expression remained blank as his words went through one ear and out of the other.

"But if she thinks it's you she'll just hate you anyway" Daphne responded.

"I would take a thousand days of her hating me, just to know that she feels safe." Damon whispered "I would walk to the end of this earth and beyond to make her feel protected."

"It seems a little emotional, don't you think" Daphne said coldly and Damon felt his anger flare.

"Oh do shut up" he snarled as his fangs extended and he sank them into the warm veins in her neck; relishing the ability to turn off the pain...just for a while.

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