Elena looked at the doctor desperately. "How much did he get?"
"Only about half. It's all right - I filled it with twice the dose and pushed as hard as I could to get the" - some medical word Elena didn't recognize - "into him. I knew it would hurt him more, injecting that fast, but I accomplished what I wanted."
"Good," Elena said rapturously. "Now I want you to fill this syringe with my blood."
"Blood?" Dr. Meggar looked dismayed.
"Yes! The syringe is long enough to go through the bars. The blood will drip out the other side. He can drink it as it comes out. It might save him!" Elena said every word carefully, as if speaking to a child. She desperately wanted to convey her meaning.
"Oh, Elena." The doctor sat down, with a clink, and took a hidden bottle of Black Magic out of his tunic. "I'm so sorry. But it's hard enough for me to get blood out of a vial. My eyes, child - they're ruined."
"But glasses - spectacles - ?"
"They're no good to me anymore. It's a complicated condition. But you have to be very good to actually tap a vein in any case. Most doctors are pretty hopeless; I'm impossible. I'm sorry, child. But it's been twenty years since I was successful."
"Then I'll find Damon and have him open my aorta. I don't care if it kills me."
"But I do."
This new voice coming from the brilliantly lighted cell in front of them made both the doctor and Elena jerk their heads up.
"Stefan! Stefan! Stefan!" Uncaring of what the razor fence would do to her flesh, Elena leaned over to try to hold his hands.
"No," Stefan whispered, as if sharing a precious secret. "Put your fingers here and here - on top of mine. This fence is only specially treated steel - it numbs my Power but it can't break my skin."
Elena put her fingers there and there. And then she was touching Stefan. Really touching him. After so long.
Neither of them spoke. Elena heard Dr. Meggar get up and quietly creep away - to Sage, she supposed. But her mind was full of Stefan. She and he simply looked at each other, trembling, with tears quivering on their lashes, feeling very young.
And very close to death.
"You say I always make you say it first, so I'll confound you. I love you, Elena."
Teardrops fell from Elena's eyes.
"Just this morning I was thinking how many people there are to love. But really it's only because there's one in the first place," she whispered back to him. "One forever. I love you, Stefan! I love you!"
Elena drew back for a moment and wiped her eyes the way all clever girls know how to do without ruining their makeup: by putting her thumbs beneath her lower lashes and leaning backward, scooping tears and kohl into infinitesimal droplets in the air.
For the first time she could think.
"Stefan," she whispered, "I'm so sorry. I wasted time this morning getting dressed up - well, dressed down - to show you what's waiting for you when we get you out. But now...I feel...like..."
Now there were no tears in Stefan's eyes, either. "Show me," he whispered back eagerly.
Elena stood, and without theatrics, shrugged the cloak off. Shut her eyes, her hair in hundreds of kiss curls, little wispy spirals that were plastered around her face. Her gilded eyelids, waterproof, still gilded. Her only clothing the wisps of golden tulle with jewels attached to make it decent. Her entire body iridescent, perfection in the first bloom of youth that could never be matched or re-created.
There was a sound like a long sigh...and then silence, and Elena opened her eyes, terrified that Stefan might have died. But he was standing up, clutching at the iron gate as if he might wrench it off to get to her.
"I get all this?" he whispered. "All this for you. Everything for you," Elena said. At that moment there was a soft sound behind her and she whirled to see two eyes shining in the dimness of the cell opposite Stefan's.
Chapter 33
To her surprise, Elena felt no anger, only a determination to protect Stefan if she could.
And then she saw that in the cell she'd assumed was empty, there was a kitsune.
The kitsune looked nothing like Shinichi or Misao. He had long, long hair as white as snow - but his face was young. He was wearing all white, too, tunic and breeches out of some flowing, silky material and his tail practically filled the small cell, it was so fluffy. He also had fox ears which twitched this way and that. His eyes were the gold of fireworks.
He was gorgeous.
The kitsune coughed again. Then he produced - from his long hair, Elena thought, a very, very small and thin-skinned leather bag.
Like, Elena thought, the perfect bag for one perfect jewel.
Now the kitsune took a pretend bottle of Black Magic (it was heavy and a pretend drink was delicious), and filled the little bag with it. Then he took a pretend syringe (he held it as Dr. Meggar had and tapped it to get the bubbles out) and filled it from the little bag. Finally, he stuck the pretend syringe through his own bars and depressed his thumb, emptying it.
"I can feed you Black Magic wine," Elena translated. "With his little pouch I can hold it and fill the syringe. Dr. Meggar could fill the syringe, too. But there's no time, so I'm going to do it."
"I - " began Stefan.
"You are going to drink as fast as you can." Elena loved Stefan, wanted to hear his voice, wanted to fill her eyes with him, but there was a life to be saved, and the life was his. She took the little pouch with a bow of thanks to the kitsune and left her cloak on the floor. She was too intent on Stefan to even remember how she was dressed.
Her hands wanted to shake but she wouldn't let them. She had three bottles of Black Magic here: her own, in her cloak, Dr. Meggar's, and somewhere, in his cloak, Damon's.