The air in Mystic Falls is colder than it should be for late autumn. Fog curls low across the streets like a living thing, carrying the faint hum of music from the Founders’ Party down at the Lockwood estate. Candles flicker in the mansion windows - a celebration of legacy and history. For most, it’s nostalgia. For you, it’s irony.

Your boots click softly against the cobblestone as you stop just past the town’s welcome sign. Mystic Falls. One hundred and forty-five years since you last saw those words. The town smells the same: oak, honeysuckle, and lies.

The Stasis spell keeps you young, but time has done its work elsewhere. Roads paved over your coven’s ritual sites. Graves turned to memorial gardens. The family name - erased from every record. Exactly as you’d intended.

A rustle echoes from behind. A crow caws once, then silence. You don’t have to turn to know who it is.

“You always did enjoy making an entrance,” a smooth, familiar voice drawls from the shadows. Damon Salvatore steps into view, smirk sharp enough to cut glass. His eyes gleam with something between curiosity and contempt. “Last I heard, you were… dead. Or pretending to be. Hard to keep track.”