Damon, too smart to use up Power-enhancing air by speaking, sent telepathically: I can take it back if you like, but it isn’t going to change the facts. You’ve fed on a human today.
I have not! Stefan replied passionately. I took down a twelve-point buck! Ever since I left Dalcrest I’ve had only animal blood—animal! That and Black Magic!
Damon tried to think while being throttled. He supposed it was just possible that Stefan was telling the truth. Sometimes a particularly large and experienced animal could boost Power in a marvelous way. A handsome stag at the height of its autumn strength, ready to fight and full of mating hormones, might have the kind of blood that mimicked a human’s. Certainly Stefan believed what he was saying.
All right, Damon said strategically. I’ll take it back. You’re still an animal-lover and I’m just a humanitarian.
The moment Stefan’s grip on him slackened, Damon moved fast, getting Stefan into a half-Nelson and holding him still.
“But I’m afraid,” he said out loud, “that I could be pretty easily convinced to kill you right now. I don’t normally forgive being attacked for no reason. Is that understood, little brother?”
Kill me if you want to. I’d consider it a favor at this point. You have Elena; you might as well have my life, too.
“Tch, tch. Always so dramatic,” Damon murmured. “I have Elena because you wrote me into her brain—without my permission. And I already have your life, because you wrote me into your place in everyone’s brains—as a human—again without my permission. I’m not feeling overly tolerant this evening for some reason.”
Stefan made no attempt to free himself. I said it before. Kill me if you like.
Damon hesitated a long moment and then let his brother go. Stefan sat up and rubbed the back of his neck.
“What’s she doing right now?” he asked, getting out each word separately, reluctantly. “Is she really healthy?”
“I don’t know what she’s doing right now,” Damon said flatly, “but what she was watching on TV a little while ago was the local news.”
Stefan froze over again and refused to speak. That alone told Damon volumes.
“Look,” he said, working hard to keep animosity out of his voice, “so there’s another girl who lost most of her bloodstream today. What else is going on in your fuzzy little head?”
Stefan’s voice was dull. “I had to make sure that it wasn’t Elena they were talking about on the radio. There weren’t many details, but they said she was in serious condition. And I wanted to talk to you.”
Damon touched his throat. “Pithy way of talking.”
Stefan’s eyes blazed suddenly. “You have no idea how exhausting it was, taking away memory after memory. Yes, I was tempted to drink from lots of the humans I Influenced. But I decided I would rather die.”
“Each to his own,” Damon murmured. Out loud he said, “Have you found the other vampire?”
“What other vampire?”
“The one who did the copycat thing, putting that new girl in the hospital with Elena’s symptoms,” Damon said impatiently.
“Copycat?” Stefan said blankly. Despite the amount of Power in his aura, he didn’t look either sharp or stable to Damon.
“Think,” Damon suggested. “First, you almost drain Elena while you’re . . . well, merging souls or whatever. Her condition must have made the news. So, now, some copycat vampire has done something similar to a second girl—although I doubt the two of them did a lot of soul-merging. It probably was a straight-out draining job.”
Stefan blinked. “Then you don’t think it was me?”
Damon blinked in turn. “What the hell are you talking a
bout?”
“I thought—when I heard about the girl on the radio I thought at first that they must mean Elena. But then, the more I wondered about it—well, you’re right, drinking animal blood doesn’t usually give so much Power. I thought that maybe, while I was out Influencing people, I might have gone overboard and bit someone. There were times when I was almost blacking out, especially when I had to walk back to the Old Wood to get my car.”
Damon leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. “Sometimes I really think you’re insane,” he said confidentially.
“Sometimes I almost believe you might not be,” was the bitter reply.
“Stefan, if you had drained a girl while you were Influencing her, you’d remember. Besides, you wouldn’t have been blacking out at the end. You’d have had more than enough Power to get to your car. Therefore, it was someone else.”
“Who?”