“They’l be here,” Elena said. Something generous in her made her add, “But if you’re that worried, you can sleep here if you want.” She’d missed him, she had, and he was being a perfect gentleman. And she had to admit, she would feel safer with him there.
“I can?” Damon quirked a wicked eyebrow.
“On the floor,” Elena said firmly. “I’m sure Bonnie and Meredith wil be glad for your protection, too.” It was a lie.
While Bonnie would be thril ed to see him, there was a decent chance Meredith would kick him on purpose as she crossed the room. She might even put on special pointy-toed boots to do it.
Elena got up and pul ed down a spare blanket from her closet for him, then headed off to brush her teeth and change. When she came back, al ready for bed, he was lying on the floor, wrapped in the blanket. His eyes lingered for a minute on the curve of her neck leading down to her lacy white nightgown, but he didn’t say anything.
Elena climbed into bed and turned out the light. “Good night, Damon,” she said.
There was a soft rush of air. Then suddenly he whispered softly in her ear, “Good night, princess.” Cool lips brushed her cheek and then were gone.
18
The next morning, Elena woke to find Damon gone, his blanket folded neatly at the foot of her bed. Meredith was dressing for a morning workout, sleepy-eyed and silent, and she only nodded as Elena passed her; Elena had learned long ago that Meredith was useless for conversation before she’d had her first cup of coffee.
Bonnie, who didn’t have class until that afternoon, was only a lump under her covers.
Surely Meredith would have said something if she had noticed Damon on the floor, Elena thought as she dropped in at the cafeteria to grab a muffin before class. Maybe Damon hadn’t stayed. Elena bit her lip, thinking about that, kicking little stones on her way to class. She had thought he would stay, that he would want to try and keep her safe.
Was it right that she liked that and that she felt more than a twinge of hurt at the idea that he had left?
She didn’t want Damon to be in love with her, did she?
Wasn’t part of the reason she put her romance with Stefan on hold so that she and Damon could get each other out of their systems? But…
I am a lousy person, she realized.
Musing on her own lousiness took Elena al the way into her History of the South class, where she was doodling sadly in her notebook when Professor Campbel —James
—came in. Clearing his throat loudly, he walked to the front of the class, and Elena reluctantly pul ed her attention away from her own problems to pay attention to him.
James looked different. Unsure of himself, Elena realized. His eyes didn’t seem quite as bright as usual, and he appeared to be somehow smal er.
“There’s been another disappearance,” he said quietly.
An anxious babble rose up from the rest of the class, and he held up his hand. “The victim this time—and I think we can say at this point that we’re talking about victims, not students simply leaving campus—is, unfortunately, a student in this class. Courtney Brooks is missing; she was last seen walking back to her dorm from a party last night.” Scanning the class, Elena tried to remember who Courtney Brooks was. A tal , quiet girl with caramel-colored hair, she thought, and spotted the girl’s empty seat.
James raised his hand again to quel the rising clamor of frightened and excited voices. “Because of this,” he said slowly, “I think that today we must postpone continuing our discussion of the colonial period so that I can tel you a little bit about the history of Dalcrest Col ege.” He looked around at the confused faces of the class. “This is not, you see, the first time unusual things have happened on this campus.” Elena frowned and, looking at her classmates, saw her confusion mirrored on their faces.
“Dalcrest, as many of you doubtlessly know, was founded in 1889 by Simon Dalcrest with the aim of educating the wealthy sons of the postwar Southern aristocracy. He said that he wanted Dalcrest to be considered the ‘Harvard of the South’ and that he and his family would be at the forefront of intel ectualism and academia in the soon-to-begin new century. This much is frequently featured in the official campus histories.
“It’s less wel known that Simon’s hopes were dashed in 1895 when his wild twenty-year-old son, Wil iam Dalcrest, was found dead with three others in the tunnels underneath the school. It was what appeared to be a suicide pact.
Certain materials and symbols found in the tunnels with the bodies suggested some ties to black magic. Two years later Simon’s wife, Julia Dalcrest, was brutal y murdered in what is now the administration building; the mystery surrounding her death was never solved.” Elena glanced around at her classmates. Had they known about this? The col ege brochures mentioned when the school was founded and by who, but nothing about suicides and murders. Tunnels underneath the school?
“Julia Dalcrest is one of at least three distinct ghosts who are rumored to haunt the campus. The other ghosts are those of a seventeen-year-old girl who drowned, again under mysterious circumstances, when visiting for a weekend dance in 1929. She is said to wander wailing through the hal s of McClel an House, leaving dripping pools of water behind her. The third is a twenty-one-year-old boy who vanished in 1953 and whose body was found three years later in the library basement. His ghost has reportedly been seen coming in and out of offices in the library, running and looking backward in terror, as if he is being pursued.
“There are also rumors of several other mysterious occurrences: a student in 1963 disappeared for four days and reappeared, saying he had been kidnapped by elves.” A nervous giggle ran through the class, and James waved a reproving finger at his audience. He seemed to be perking up, swel ing back to his usual self under the influence of the class’s attention.
“The point is,” he said, “that Dalcrest is an unusual place. Beyond elves and ghosts, there has been a plethora of documented unusual occurrences, and rumors and legends of far more spring up around campus every year.
Mysterious deaths. Secret societies. Tales of monsters.” He paused dramatical y and looked around at them. “I beg you, do not become part of the legend. Be smart, be safe, and stick together. Class dismissed.”
The students glanced at one another uneasily, startled by this abrupt dismissal with stil more than half an hour left in the class. Regardless, they started to gather their possessions together and trickle out of the room in twos and threes.
Elena grabbed her bag and hurried to the front of the room.
“Professor,” she said. “James.”
“Ah, Elena,” James said. “I hope you were paying attention today. It is important that you young girls be on your guard. The young men, too, real y. Whatever affects this campus does not seem to discriminate.” Up close, he looked pale and worried, older than he had at the beginning of the semester.
“I was very interested in what you said about the history of Dalcrest,” Elena said. “But you didn’t talk about what’s happening now. What do you think is going on here?” Professor Campbel ’s face creased into even grimmer lines, and his bright eyes gazed past her. “Wel , my dear,” he said, “it’s hard to say. Yes, very hard.” He licked his lips nervously. “I’ve spent a lot of time at this school, you know, years and years. There’s not a lot I wouldn’t believe at this point. But I just don’t know,” he said softly, as if he was talking to himself.
“There was something else I wanted to ask you,” Elena said, and he looked at her attentively. “I went to see the picture you told me about. The one of you and my parents when you were students here. You were al wearing the same pin in the picture. It was blue and in the shape of a V.” She was close enough to James that she felt his whole body jolt with surprise. His face lost its grim thoughtfulness and went blank. “Oh, yes?” he said. “I can’t imagine what it was, I’m afraid. Probably something Elizabeth made. She was always very creative. Now, my dear, I real y must run.” He slipped past Elena and made his escape, hurrying out of the classroom despite a few other students’ trying to stop him with questions.