The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall Read Online Free PDF Page A

without being told!” Caroline fixed shining cat-green eyes on Meredith.
    Meredith looked back with her best no-expression expression.
    “All right!” Caroline said. “She killed him for me. Or had him called to Judgment, or whatever. That vampire, Klaus. And after being kidnapped and—and—and— used —like a toy—whenever Klaus wanted blood—or—” Her face twisted and her breathing hitched.
    Bonnie felt sympathy, but she also was wary. Her intuition was aching, warning her. And she noticed that although Caroline spoke about Klaus, the vampire, she was strangely silent about her other kidnapper, TylerSmallwood, the werewolf. Maybe because Tyler had been her boyfriend until he and Klaus had held her hostage.
    “I’m sorry,” Meredith said in a quiet voice that did sound sorry. “So you want to thank Elena.”
    “ Yes . I want to thank her.” Caroline was breathing hard. “And I want to make sure that she’s okay.”
    “Okay. But this oath covers quite a bit of time,” Meredith continued calmly. “You may change your mind tomorrow, next week, a month from now…we haven’t even thought about consequences.”
    “Look, we can’t threaten Caroline,” Matt said. “Not physically.”
    “Or get other people to threaten her,” Bonnie said wistfully.
    “No, we can’t,” Meredith said. “But for the short term—you’re a sorority pledge this coming fall, aren’t you, Caroline? I can always tell your prospective sorority sisters that you broke your solemn vow about somebody who is helpless to hurt you—who I’m sure doesn’t want to hurt you. Somehow I don’t think they’d care for you much after that.”
    Caroline’s face flushed deeply again. “You wouldn’t. You wouldn’t go interfering with my college—”
    Meredith cut her off with two words. “Try me.”
    Caroline seemed to wilt. “I never said I wouldn’t take the vow, and I never said I wouldn’t keep it. Just try me, why don’t you? I—I’ve learned a few things this summer.”
    I should hope so. The words, although nobody said them aloud, seemed to hover over all of them. Caroline’s hobby for the entire last year had been trying to find ways to hurt Stefan and Elena.
    Bonnie shifted position. There was something—shadowed—behind what Caroline was saying. She didn’t know how she knew; it was the sixth sense that she’d been born with. But maybe it just had to do with how much Caroline had changed, with what she had learned, Bonnie told herself.
    Look how many times she’d asked Bonnie in the last week about Elena. Was she really all right? Could Caroline send flowers? Could Elena have visitors yet? When would she be all right? Caroline really had been a nuisance, although Bonnie didn’t have the heart to tell her that. Everyone else was waiting just as anxiously to see how Elena was…after returning from the afterlife.
    Meredith, who always had a pen and paper, was scribbling some words. Now she said, “How about this?” and they all leaned forward to look at the pad.
    I swear not to tell anyone about any supernatural events relating to Stefan or Elena, unless given specific permission to do so by Stefan or Elena. Iwill also help in the punishment of anyone who breaks this vow, in a way to be determined by the rest of the group. This vow is made in perpetuity, with my blood as my witness.
    Matt was nodding his head. “‘In perpetuity’—perfect,” he said. “It sounds just like what an attorney would write.”
    What followed was not particularly attorney-like. Each of the individuals around the table took the piece of paper, read it aloud, and then solemnly signed it. Then they each pricked a finger with a safety pin that Meredith had in her purse and added a drop of blood beside their signatures, with Bonnie shutting her eyes as she pricked herself.
    “Now it’s really binding,” she said grimly, as one who knows. “I wouldn’t try to break this.”
    “I’ve had enough of blood for a long time,”