Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Pretty eyes, pretty bones, sharp face. A beauty queen born in the wrong century. Cold and fragile, lifeblood for him, like blood bags as he drains them till they’re empty, in the mornings. Apples of her cheeks, icy and full, thin boned and high. Her every feature a contrast to the next, like a starlight bursting with joy and malice, interwoven with magnetism ( all of it in the universe ).

"She is a little explosion of hope"

Beautiful sharp doe eyes, with arched brows looming over them like a death sentence. Not big and watery like Elena's, but cold and calculating. Sparkling in a way that shouts fire. A burning stop sign if he’s ever seen one.

Stefan stops himself. Regains a breath that he doesn't need and never will, but yearns for. He’s sure she gives herself credit for that.

Bird like bones, soft to the touch. Easy to snap and easier to mold. Holding within them 500 years of vampiric strength, muscle memory and knowledge. Gone and yet forever present. He doesn't believe she'll ever really be gone. Not when she's right here in front of him. Standing tall, confident, and predatory. Though, neither of them are relaxed. His shoulders are stiff, and hers are strategically placed.

"Never turns the lights down low"

Katherine's always held herself with quiet intelligence and yet louder charisma. It's in her eyes. Her mind is a diamond. Sharper than the blade she used to use to slice off fingers. A survivor’s mind.

Her molten dark brown eyes, a zenith. They always send a message, unintentional or not. Gaze upon him with reverence. Sparks that light like fireworks, during both day and night. Shining brighter than a fire beam, but holding within them an eclipse of the heart and mind. Dark and luminescent.

A pitch black surrounded by a halo of light.

He told her she was an angel once, before he learned to lie - she taught him well - only now he proclaims to hate her. Tries to dampen her glow, in hopes that it will stop pulling him in. Magnetic and old world as ever. He gives an internal chuckle at his own poor, misguided train of thought. Damon might still be as obsessed as ever with her face, but he's stuck on her soul, that's even worse. A bleeding heart will always kill a man quicker than a bloody nose.

"She can go there if you want to though

There are no markings on her country roads

No signs that show the way back home"

He is bitter that it holds no safety net, only a promise. A promise that he will be held within it for eternity, while she is free to go.

She's a chameleon soul, if he's ever met one. Never tethered to one thing.

Her expression doesn't flicker.

Untouchable perfection. As a human, Katherine is still larger than life.

Her dark curls fall around her shoulders, shiny and elegant. Never shrouding her visage, only framing her in opulence. Her aura is one of a kind, whether or not her face is.

He has tried to fight it and failed. The tomb has taught him an important lesson. One he will not forget, no matter how much effort he puts into erasing it.

Her smirks are captivating, but not nearly as bad as her smiles and she knows it. Warmth confined by an icy exterior. Ice burn to the touch for those like his brother, bluebell flames for him. She's softer around him, sweeter. Smiles more than she should. And yet she treats others with such distaste. He's not okay with it, never will be. Not again.

"To be honest with you, I never know exactly what you're doing, Katherine."

Stefan intentionally drags it out, only for a millisecond. His tone warm and joking, but he's hesitant.

"I forgot, you're a liar now."

She looks at him knowingly. Her head tilts down and to the left. A small enough movement that her hair doesn't move, but his eyes trail her every movement. Lips pursed just so, enough to make him internally honest. She's got those warm cheshire eyes, the ones that slip his soul through his ribcage. He won't share with the class though. He's skeptical. This isn't soft pliable Elena, who holds onto him like a saviour. It’s the forever cunning Katherine, who grips him like the devil entices prisoners into the underworld. He's not Damon, he's not ready to have her drag his heart out his ribcage and dig into it with her nails. Won't open up, if she refuses to first. He still remembers her reminding him, that there was so much he didn't know. Being so in love, he ignored the warning. Having fallen anyways. He won't fall if she's not there to catch him, not this time. He's always been calculated and calm, until she came along. The brother who knows who he is without her and refuses to lose himself to her mind games. This has been his new identity ever since she came back, and he can’t disappoint.

"Learned that from me, a shame really. I liked it better when you were truthful."

Her eyes are powerful. In this moment, they are a force to be reckoned with. Her cheeks are slightly lifted upwards along with the corners of her mouth, brows arched just so. Just a Katherine like subjugation with her ghost of a smile.

Something within him tightens, just a fraction. Her expectations coil around his throat. Gentle, yet there all the same. Climbing like vines and tugging at his heartstrings.

She lets the expression go. Let's the corners of her mouth go downwards and back to their resting place. Allows her brows to go placid and her eyes to loosen the hold she has on him. Acknowledges her part in it all.

Her face is calm.

He appreciates it. She's being honest for once, and he knows that's hard for her. Blunt she can do, honest she cannot. She can be all hard lines and rough edges but when it comes to vulnerability she fails. This time she tries and does well.

Red flames lick at his spirit. Enveloping him, so completely, he struggles to care whether or not it's right. His mind clear, as thoughts strike him with energy like lightning bolts. Her intuition has always been electric and when she places her palm on his chest, it restarts a cardiac rhythm long gone. It produces an electrical impulse used to restart the hearts' rhythm after death. He's stuck in a permanent tachycardic state. Adrenaline pumping through his veins bringing him back to life. He's human again, if only for a moment. Human with her. They're both mortal in this moment.

The quickening pitter patter of her heart brings him back to reality. Her beat matches his. Hearts marching to the same rhythm. A vampire and a human, always. The story continues flipped, but it continues. He doesn't think it'll ever come to a halt. He's unsure of wether or not this is a good decision to make, only that it feels good and he's tired of holding back.

Now that he can hear her beating heart, it's worse. He is reminded of her joint heart and mind, deceptive and cruel. It skips a beat or two whenever he enters a room. Keeping him aware, of her desire, as well as his own.

"I've frozen over my desires

Covered up in virgin snow"

A cardiac rhythm no different from any other humans, only special because it is hers. It belongs to Katherine Pierce, the same as his own does.

And he knows he can hear hers, but she cannot hear his own. He is linked to her forever. He said he'd love her forever and he meant it. The tables have turned, fates have twisted and paths have been replaced. He thinks it over. She chose not to come back and only did when he began to move on. To sacrifice the one he finally moved on with after a century and a half in cold blood.

"But when I stand beside her

She burns, yeah, she burns

Like petrol soaked paper and fireworks

And I'm burning, I'm burning"

And yet, he knows her feelings are true. How could he deny the proof? They shift like the tides and catch innocents under their waves. He shouldn't care, he knows her priorities change every time. This is cruel and unusual punishment, the best kind for someone like him. He can match her darkness and he knows it. Unlike Damon, they have both always lead with a twisting mind and a caged heart. Always seeing the possibilities for what they are, always numbing themselves. Their stars shine brightest under darkness.

"Keeps me warm right to my very soul

We get so tangled up, it's hard to know

What is hers and what my own"

Chapter Text

They were going to do a ritual to get her vampirism back.

Shockingly enough, to Katherine at least, Elijah had agreed to give them the spell his mother had used to turn them all into vampires in the first place. Bonnie had been reluctant to turn the she-devil, but even she’d given in once she realized how much this meant to Stefan.

The spell chosen had a somewhat difficult mix of Latin and Norse, Ester had named it Nasfet. Stefan couldn't help but to suspect that things would go wrong. They always had when they concerned Katherine. He didn't understand the situation well enough to feel reassured. Bonnie didn't really quite get it either, but she assumed it would be taken care of. They'd be bringing in a translator from New Orleans soon enough.

Plus, the guilty Original with a complex would be there to help her enunciate. He'd been gathering ingredients and would bring them to the Salvatore boarding house the approaching Friday.

"Ooh, and I bet she has it all”

It seemed, Elijah still had feelings for Katherine. Not that Stefan was jealous. He would NOT play that game again. He certainly didn't feel like punching a brick anytime Elijah called her "Katerina".

“Bet she's beautiful like you, like you"

It was solely a reminder of how much of her life he has missed out on and was clueless about. That was it. She knew everything about him and he was still in the dark, about 500 years of past relationships.

"And I bet she's got that touch”

“Makes you fall in love, like you, like you"

He felt like Damon at times and it was not a good feeling. Impulsivity had never been good to him. Or even for him.

"I wanna know how she could make a man lose his mind"

Repression was his go to, though Stefan wasn't sure how much more hearing about "Katerina" he could take.

The tone Elijah used did not sit well with him.

Still, he kept his calm knowing this was his one chance at getting her back and keeping her for good. The Original's expression had never flickered, and he knew he was a man who would keep his word.

Katherine had been very happy with him when he'd told her the news. That was a fun night.

The next day they'd overheard a screaming match through the walls. It had ended with a subtle brow raise from Katherine at the sound of feminine crying. He himself had given his own a lift at the loud footsteps coming from their direction. Damon's storming off was nothing new or at least it would've been nothing new, if his anger hadn't been directed towards Elena. He'd never seen Damon brush Elena off like that. It was strange to say the least.

Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind, Katherine knew this well.

It turned out, both Elena and Damon were coming to the realizations of who they were really in relationships with. Stefan shouldn't have been surprised as he was. Katherine surely wasn’t.

Damon and Elena were having problems. The doppelgänger was too slow for him and her black and white thinking seemed to be wrecking their relationship.

Comparing their relationship to his own, to be honest left him at a loss.

They were having the opposite problem. Stefan was used to feeling calm, being in control. He was unassuming and agreeable. Naturally this gave him the upper hand in most situations. He could point out to others that they were being irrational and acting on emotion, this would lead to him looking better. Others, being Damon of course. Slow reactions, but a quick mind. Katherine's was a bullet train and he couldn't keep up.

No matter how hard he tried. And he had. He really truly had. Stefan was slow, at least compared to her. Though, he assumed most guys were. She didn't seem to care though, her claims of loving him for him were proving true and none were more shocked than the people in the Salvatore Boarding house.

Oh well, it was the happiest he'd been in a relationship and he probably wouldn't be this happy again. Not without her. Oh, it was torture, but fun torture nonetheless. The kind that would allow him a happy death at her hands.

"Thinking about me?"

It was like she could sense his thoughts and it would be creepy.. If he didn't love it so much. Seeing her face made him happy, god knows how lame he'd gotten over the past few days. Sappier than his brother, he'd even gotten called out for it- it was a sad day when a Salvatore brother called you out- whether or not you were one. Not like Damon was in any place to be giving relationship advice though. Plus, Katherine liked him better in 1864 anyways.

Now, that was just petty. He really needed to stop it. "And if I was?" His irises darkened.

She strutted up to him, eyes alight with quiet mirth. Watched his expression flicker with pure joy. She so enjoyed bringing out his dark side. Stefan's pupils dilated and Katherine watched them with internal glee. God, she'd missed him this past century. Allowing Rebekah to have him hadn't been bad at all, but the fairytale life him and her shadow had been living did bother her to no end. Watching and not touching was not her thing.

"I'd say we should get you out of your head"
The brunette tilted his head up delicately with her soft fingers, digging in with her glossy black nails.
"-and into bed. "

"I can see her body rushing into you

Crashing on your skin

Burning within, burning so deep, deep"

Her dark curls fell around her shoulders as she put her arms around his neck, lifting herself up on her tippy toes. Pressing her lips to his in a quick, not very chaste kiss. He leaned in deepening it, she pulled back a few seconds later. Rule number four, was to look pure. Always leave him wanting more. She liked to mix and match the rules she obeyed on her whims. Modern day girls were much more free and she was going to enjoy her life as long as possible. Her kisses were magic and he'd swear it to god himself. He watched her walk away puffed up like a peacock at that, knowing he'd follow. She strutted like she was on a catwalk at all times. He could feel her smirking to herself and shook his head in a quiet laugh. She really hadn't changed, but it turned out he hadn't either.

"How does she touch you? Can I try it, too?"

They got to his room and she pulled him against her by the top of his shirt.

"I know you're twisted, but baby, I'm twisted, too"

The brunette pressed a quick kiss to his lips, firm and hard. He quickly dived in and she rolled them onto the bed. Leaning back with his weight pressed on top of her, she switched their positions and took control of the kiss. He moaned into it and she quickly began to take his top off. The Salvatore helped her roll it off then quickly got back to work helping her get hers off as well. It was only fair. She smiled into the kiss, giddy off her Stefan high.

Her red lips stained his own and she loved how it looked on him. So what, if she had a possessive streak?

"Maybe I should be more like her

I can taste her lipstick, it's like I'm kissing her, too

And she's perfect"

Chapter Text

Later that night, they were laying on his new bed, with Katherine’s curls spread out across muscled arms, bare skin pressed to 1000 thread count sheets. Egyptian cotton, of course ( she’d ordered new everything ) and Katherine was sprawled out like a cat across his chest. An astonishingly opulent one, who lived a like a goddess at that.

“I’ve never relearned, never wanted to. Am I doing it right? This honesty thing?” She inquired in a questioning tone. Her voice vibrated against his chest, as Katherine’s glossy black nails swirled icy circles around his skin, leaving goosebumps in their trail.

He released a soft exhale as he stilled with his brows knit and a reflective look in his eyes. Stefan, then quickly gathered her hands and interlocked their fingers, placing hers’ where his heart was. He watched the night sky while considering. Time flew by. She’d taken up painting again ( Katherine wanted to beat Klaus at this as well ) and chosen the wilderness as inspiration. His soulmate had even found the energy to go buy herself glow up stars with his credit card, not that he minded.

“You’re perfect. You’re you and trying.”

“If I stop trying, tell me. I’d want to know.” Katherine answered him, as bluntly as the blade of a dull knife. Stefan hushed her. After a short pause, he moved, so the brunette would be looking into his eyes. “You never fail to accomplish what you try to. Just never leave me again.” The Salvatore requested caringly.

His intense gaze on her was unwavering. She looked up at him and stared straight back. Stefan continued to speak after a pause.

“Don’t give me a reason to. I don’t think I can.”

The not again was silent.

Her upturned eyes were awfully glum with regret as she responded quietly “ I’m sorry.”

He moved over to kiss her, to cheer her up ( and maybe himself too ) if I ever lost you, I’d fall apart. He let go of her waist and got up.

“I got you some food, I can tell you’re hungry”.

She smiled up at him mischievously. Delicately wrapped her curls around the finger she’d done the same to him with. He analyzed Katherine’s lit up eyes and internally face palmed.

“I never should’ve let Damon tell me a hiding spot.”

She drawled.“No, you shouldn’t have. I was bored… And hungry.”

“I’m assuming you stole back my CD and he didn’t just hand it over.”

“Correct.” Katherine spoke with unshakable confident glee.

He raised his eyebrows as if to question if that was the extent of her mischief.

“I’ve also, been sneaking Bonnie ideas as to what spells she should use on a relentless vampire. Klaus needs to learn to take a hint. Damon has torn some great spells out of grimoires over the years.”