"I don't want change!" Elena said through the huge swelling that had formed in her throat. "Take the ring. Hurry or I'll drop it."
He snatched it from her fingers as the litter bearers started forward again. "May the Guardians bless you, lady," he said, trying to keep up with the litter bearer's trot. "Hear me who may! May They bless you!"
"You really shouldn't," Damon said to Elena when the voice had died away behind them. "He's not going to get a meal with that, you know."
"He was hungry," Elena said softly. She couldn't explain that he reminded her of Stefan, not just now. "It was my ring," she added defensively. "I suppose you're going to say he'll spend it on alcohol or drugs."
"No, but he won't get a meal with it, either. He'll get a banquet."
"Well, so much the - "
"In his imagination. He'll get a dusty orb with some old vampire's memory of a Roman feast, or someone from the city's memory of a modern one. Then he'll play it over and over as he slowly starves to death."
Elena was appalled. "Damon! Quick! I have to go back and find him - "
"You can't, I'm afraid." Lazily, Damon held up a hand. He had a firm grip on her rope. "Besides, he's long gone."
"How can he do that? How could anyone do that?"
"How can a lung cancer patient refuse to quit smoking? But I agree that those orbs can be the most addictive substances of all. Blame the kitsune for bringing their star balls here and making them the most popular form of obsession."
"Star balls? Hoshi no tama?" Elena gasped.
Damon stared at her, looking equally surprised. "You know about them?"
"All I know is what Meredith researched. She said that kitsune were often portrayed with either keys" - she raised her eyebrows at him - "or with star balls. And that myths say they can put some or all of their power in the ball, so that if you find it, you can control the kitsune. She and Bonnie want to find Misao's or Shinichi's star balls and have control over them."
"Be still, my unbeating heart," Damon said dramatically, but the next second he was all business. "Remember what that old guy said? A summer's day for a meal? He was talking about this." Damon picked up the little marble that the old man had dropped on the litter and held it to Elena's temple.
The world disappeared.
Damon was gone. The sights and sounds - yes, and the smells - of the bazaar were gone. She was sitting on green grass which rippled in a slight breeze and she was looking at a weeping willow that bent down to a stream that was copper and deep, deep green at once. There was some sweet scent in the air - honeysuckle, freesia? Something delicious that stirred Elena as she leaned back to gaze at picture-perfect white clouds rolling in a cerulean sky.
She felt - she didn't know how to say it. She felt young, but somewhere in her mind she knew that she was actually younger than this alien personality that had taken hold of her. Still, she felt excited that it was springtime and every golden-green leaf, every springy little reed, every weightless white cloud seemed to be rejoicing with her.
Then suddenly her heart was pounding. She had just caught the sound of a footfall behind her. In one, springing joyous moment she was on her feet, arms held out in the extremity of her love, the wild devotion she felt for this...
...this young girl? Something inside the sphere user's brain seemed to fall back in bewilderment. Most of it, though, was taken up with cataloguing the perfections of the girl who had crept up so lightly in the waving grass: the clustering dark curls at her neck, the flashing green eyes below arching brows, the smooth glowing skin of her cheeks as she laughed with her lover, pretending to run away on feet as light as any elf's...!
Pursued and pursuer both fell down together on the soft carpet of long grass...and then things quickly got so steamy that Elena, the distant mind in the background, began wondering how on earth you made one of these things stop. Every time she put her hand to her temple, groping, she was caught and kissed breathless by...Allegra...that was the girl, Allegra. And Allegra was certainly beautiful, especially through this particular viewer's eyes. The creamy soft skin of her...
And then, with a shock just as great as she'd felt when the bazaar disappeared, it appeared again. She was Elena; she was riding on the litter with Damon; there was a cacophony of sounds around her - and a thousand different smells, too. But she was breathing hard and part of her was still resounding with John - that had been his name - with John's love for Allegra.
"But I still don't understand," she almost keened.
"It's simple," Damon said. "You put a blank star ball of the size you like to your temple and you think back to the time you want to record. The star ball does the rest." He waved off her attempted interruption and leaned forward with mischief in those fathomless black eyes of his. "Perhaps you got an especially warm summer day?" he said, adding suggestively, "These litters do have curtains you can draw closed."
"Don't be silly, Damon," Elena said, but John's feelings had sparked her own, like flint and tinder. She didn't want to kiss Damon, she told herself sternly. She wanted to kiss Stefan. But since a moment ago she had been kissing Allegra, it didn't seem as strong an argument as it could be.
"I don't think," she began, still breathless, as Damon reached for her, "that this is a very good..."
With a smooth flick of the rope, Damon untied her hands completely. He would have pulled it off both wrists, but Elena immediately half-turned, supporting herself with that hand. She needed the support.