vampire diaries Shadow Souls | Page 9

malach, vampire s who were
thugs to begin with. She couldn’t even imagine what such
creatures would do to her, and she didn’t want to. She could only be glad that Damon had
been clever enough and, yes, ruthless enough to take care of them before they got to her.
And she would have to be blind and just plain stupid not to appreciate the fact that
Damon was gorgeous. After having died twice, this fact did not
affect her as it would most other girls, but it was still a fact, whether Da mon was pensive
or giving one of those rare genuine smiles that he seemed to
have only for Elena.
The problem with this was that Damon was a vampire and could therefore read he r mind,
especially with Elena being so close, their auras
intermingling. And Damon appreciated Elena’s appreciation, and it became a l ittle cycle
of feedback, all on its own. Before Elena could quite focus she
was melting, her weightless body feeling heavier as it molded itself to Damon’s arms.
And the other problem was that Damon wasn’t Influencing her; he was as caught up in
the feedback as Elena was—more so, because he didn’t
have any barriers against it. Elena did, but they were blurring, dissolvi ng. She couldn’t
think properly. Damon was gazing at her with wonder and a look
she was all too used to seeing—but she couldn’t remember where.

Elena had lost the power to analyze. She was simply basking in the warm glow of being
cherished, being held and loved and cared for with an
intensity that shook her to the bone.
And when Elena gave of herself, she gave completely. Almost without conscious e ffort,
she arched her head back to expose her throat and closed
her eyes.Damon gently positioned her head differently, supported it with one hand, a nd
kissed her.
3
T ime stopped. Elena found that she was instinctively groping for the mind of t he one who
was kissing her so sweetly. She had never really appreciated a
kiss until she had died, become a spirit, and then been returned to earth with an aura t hat
revealed the hidden meaning of other people’s thoughts, words,
and even their minds and souls. It was as if she had gained a beautiful new sense. W hen
two auras mingled as deeply as this, two souls were laid bare to
each other.
Semi-consciously, Elena let her aura expand, and met a mind almost at once. To her
surprise, it recoiled from her. That wasn’t right. She managed
to snag it before it could retreat behind a great hard stone, like a boulder. T he only things
left outside the boulder—which reminded her of a picture of a
meteorite she had seen, with a pocked, charred surface—were rudimentary bra in
functions, and a little boy, chained to the rock by both wrists and both
ankles.
Elena was shocked. Whatever she was seeing, she knew it was a metaphor only, and t hat
she should not judge too quickly what the metaphor
meant. The images before her were really the symbols of Damon’s naked soul, b ut in a
form that her own mind could understand and interpret, if only she
looked at it from the right perspective.
Instinctively, though, she knew that she was seeing something important. She had come
through the breathless delight and dizzying sweetness of
joining her soul to another’s. And now, her inherent love and concern drove her to try to communicate.
“Are you cold?” she asked the child, whose chains were long enough to allow him to
wrap his arms tightly about his drawn-up legs. He was clothed
in ragged black.
He nodded silently. His huge dark eyes seemed to swallow up his face.
“Where do you belong?” Elena said doubtfully, thinking of ways to get the child warm .
“Not inside that?” She made a gesture toward the giant
stone boulder.
The child nodded again. “It’s warmer in there, but he won’t let me inside anymore.”
“He?” Elena was always on the lookout for signs of Shinichi, that malicious fox spi rit.
“Which ‘he,’ darling?” She had already knelt and taken the
child in her arms, and he was cold, ice cold, and the iron was freezing.
“Damon,” the little ragamuffin boy whispered. For the first time the boy ’s eyes left her
face, to glance fearfully around him.

“Damon did this?” Elena’s voice started loud and ended up as soft as the boy’s whisper ,
as he turned pleading eyes on her and desperately
patted at her lips, like a velvet-clawed kitten. This is all just symbols, Elena