⇢ ˗ˏˋI found you࿐ྂ

Melanie has been following her dad through the woods. She offered for him to drink for her mainly because he looked so pale she almost thought he was dead. They arrived at a bar and Stefan stumbled into it.

"Hey, man. Last call was 4 hours ago. If you want some coffee, I could put some on, or..." A women says behind the cashier. Stefan keeps walking towards her and then he bares his fangs at her neck.

"Ahhh!"The women screams and Stefan realizes what he's doing and stops and yells "Run. RUN!" The women runs outside. Unfortunately the hunger took over him and ran after her not realizing the sun was coming up and when he stepped into it he burned. Melanie had to bite her lip from screaming out dad in fear. She quickly pulled him back to the gas station. She saw how badly her father looked even after draining a bit out of that women's neck so she found a knife and a cup.

She took a few deep breaths before she bite her lip and sliced the palm of her hand. She only managed to get a little blood into the cup before she had to cut her hand again due to her heightened healing. When the cup was halfway full she brought it to Stefan who was behind one of the stands trying to control his bloodlust.

"Here, come on, you need it"She said and handed him the cup. He looked at her hand that had traces of blood on it but there was no cut visible. Stefan drank the entire cup in almost one sip. "You want more?"She asked and even if everything in him was telling him to say yes he shaked his head no. Even in his darkest times like these he couldn't let another girl cut herself for him to feed on.

"Who are you?" He asked with shaky breathes as he was trying hard not to hurt the her. Melanie was deciding for a moment if she should tell him the truth she told to Caroline or go with the lie.

"My name is Melanie Sebrof and I'm a complicated species"She said with a chuckle at the end. Stefan just looked at the girl baffled.

"Why are helping me? or better question how did you know where I was?" Stefan questioned now fully himself and not driven by bloodlust. At least not completely.

"Because we're family"She decided there was no point in sugar coating it. Based on Stefan's co fused looks she continued. "I'm Zach Salvatores daughter. Along with my sister Sarah" She said and Stefan knew it was lie because, he time to time checked up on Sarah and she was an only child not to mention her last name was Nelson and not Sebrof. In the end he decided he's going to play her game because she obviously had her reasons to lie. He would find out why this girl was posing as his distant niece. Was she an enemy trying to hurt them? Or is she a friend that doesn't know how to tell them?

"Ohh okay I'm Stefan nice to meet you" He said and held out his hand and she shaked it. Then out of nowhere they both fell unconscious and a women entered the bar.

After waking up Stefan saw a women infront of him. Automatically he answered.

"I don't want to hurt you, so get away from me before I rip your throat out"

"Hello to you, too. I brought dinner"Tessa answered and she holds out a blood bag. Stefan hesitates for a moment, then grabs the blood bag and starts sucking on it.

"Where is the girl? There was girl with me" Stefan says panicking that he can't see Melanie anywhere near him.

"Relax, I didn't leave her there. I couldn't"Tessa sighs and her face is showing different emotions that one would not be able to figure out. Anger, relief or even a slightest amount of happiness. "She's sleeping in the next room"Stefan immediately got up from the couch and looked into the room next to the kitchen. He looked and saw that she was still peacefully sleeping on the bed.

"A vampire doppelgänger who's burdened by a conscience. Now I've seen everything"Tessa says jokingly but Stefan's face remains unamused.

"I pulled you from the quarry. That is, I figured out where you were and told the former owner of this cabin to pull your lock box from the water. You thanked him...by biting off his head" Tessa told him and Stefan looked even more confused then before.

"How do you know I'm a doppelgänger?"Stefan asked growing suspicious about the women by the second.

"Because I've seen your face before on someone who wasn't you" Tessa revealed.

"Who are you?"

"How much do you know about Silas?"She asked him completely ignoring his question.

"Huh...I know that he's a bloodthirsty immortal who's killed more people than I can count, and who forced me to drown over and over for the past few months. He's a monster, and I'm going after him"Stefan said and he was about to leave the room when something stopped him. A thought, an impulse, something that could only be discribed as instinct. Je turned around realizing he also didn't have his daylight ring so he'll burn to death. Tessa continued the story about Silas and his one true love. How he betrayed her and ran off with Amara. How he said and that even if he has a child by another women he only loves her.

"Amalthea" Tessa said. "That was the girls name, she was around 13 years old. He loved her more then me. Of course I could accept that she was his heir but that was until I found out that her mother was Amara. Silas loved Amara then she gave him a child and he pretended to love me so that I could create the immortality elixir" Tessa told him and Stefan glanced at the room where Melanie was still sleeping. He was wondering why she wasn't waking up? Was it because Tessa had her under a spell or was she just so sleepy? The only thing je knew for sure is that he can't and wouldn't let amy harm come her.

"Okay so you're saying Silas was in love with a women that had a kid then he was with you but only to manipulate you. The guy sounds like a dick to me"Stefan said and sipped on the Alcohol she offered him in between.

Back at Withmore Caroline was furious about the note she saw in her room. Not only did Melanie leave without telling her she went looking for her family even though Caroline told her not to since it could stir up a lot of confusion. She called Damon and ne said they're going to look for Stefan because apparently both Elena and Kathrine are having the same dreams about Stefan. Only this time there was a girl appearing with him.

Melanie woke up and found herself on a strangers bed. She looked around the room. She could tell it was a cabin by the wooden walls and a little double window on her right side. Although it looked old the bed was comfortable. When she looked infront of she saw a painting. It was simple yet really beautiful. A meadow surrounded by trees and mountains. There were some flowers here and there and little stream that went through on the ride side of the forest. A perfect place to have a picnic or read fantasy books. On her right she saw a nightstand with a lamp. The room wasn't big it was barely enough to fit in a wardrobe that was standing next to the window and the bed she was sleeping on the previous night. She stepped out of the room and saw her father and another women.

"Melanie" Stefan said and jumped from the couch to go and hug her. He didn't know why at the time but he had to make sure she was okay.

"Hey, Stefan"She said and took in all of his features. From the brown hero hair that had a loose strands of hair here there to those mesmerizing forest green eyes. She could see herself in him.

"Okay now that the reunion is over and she is awake we can get started" Tessa said and both of them looked questioning towards her. What did the old women want?

"What do you want to start?" Stefan asked standing beside Melanie. Her anxiety was building up again and this time she didn't have Hope to calm her down. Stefan picking up on her emotions, discreetly slipped his hand into hers squeezing it. Melanie relaxed for a bit. She kept reminding herself that she's here with her dad. The one person she always wanted to see.

"Well there is only one way to make Silas vulnerable and that's his daughter meaning her"Tessa pointed to Melanie and continued with the explanation. "Doppelganger, well when I turned Silas into stone his daughter ran away with her best friend. Now I'm going to use, Melanie to bring Amalthea back to life for a short period of time. She will make him vulnerable and I can finally kill him"Tessa explained and just like that the nervousness was back. Stefan squeezed her hand and whispered in a low voice that the witch couldn't hear. "When I say run. You're going to run like hell out of here" Melanie looked up at him and he looked down at her. She nodded before Tessa turned around.

"So why don't you relax a little bit and I prepare everything I need" Tessa said and Stefan looked at Melanie and nodded for her to run. She did as she was told only to bounce into a barrier at the door.

"Yeah also I figured you wouldn't trust me so I put up a barrier spell to keep us in" Tessa said and Stefan stood protectively infront of Melanie. He didn't know what spell she wanted to perform but he knew one thing it wouldn't be pretty if we're talking about bringing someone back from the dead. "If I were you I would relax you will be pretty tired once we're done" Tessa smirked and it made Mel's stomach turn into knots.

They sat on the couch. Stefan had a protective arm around her as she snuggled closer to him. She knew she shouldn't because from his part it had be really weird since he knew for about a day but Stefan didn't mind.

"I'm scared" Melanie whispered to him and he looked down at her. He tried to smile to ease the situation a little. "Don't worry it's going to be alright you will be alright" he told her. He wanted to lunch himself at the witch and kill her so that the barrier would be down but going after a 2000 year old witch. Even he knew that would be stupid.

"Now don't try anything. I allowed you to remain with her instead of snapping your neck" Tessa reminded them and Melanie breathed in and out heavily. At this moment she wanted her mom,Uncle Damon or Aunt Elena to tell her it's okay and that she has nothing to worry about like they did when she was first getting stitches on her leg after slipping on some ice during skating. "Alright we're ready, lay down on the couch" Tessa said and Stefan pushed the girl behind him.

"I don't know what you want to do but No, I'm not allowing it" He said as his unknown paternal instincts kicked in. With a wave of her hand Tessa showed him away and threw him into the wall. He got up his face vamped out and he looked pissed. He was about to lunch when she looked at him and gave him aneurysm. Stefan dropped to his knees groaning as his blood vessels popped.

"NO STOP stop hurting my"She stopped her herself from almost saying the word."STOP, I'll do it" Melanie screamed as she saw him on the floor barely able to get up. "Melanie, no"He said and Melanie turned to Tessa. "I'll do it if you promise you won't hurt him, and he can be by my side" She said and Tessa rolled her eyes but nodded nonethelessly. Stefan got up and walked over to the brunette girl.

"If she's as crazy as Silas, there's no telling what she'll do"Stefan told her really concerned about the girl but she shaked her head. No matter how scared or anxious she was from what was about to come she couldn't let him suffer. That they had in common. They would always save the people that they love.

She layed down on the couch her head where Tessa's face was. She was laying on some herbs, she didn't know what they were because she couldn't get good look at them. Around the couch was a circle of salt and Tessa some weird bowls next to her. Stefan took Melanie's hand to give her at least a bit of comfort before it began.

Tessa dipped her fingers in the first bowl that was filled with a purple flower. "First I'm going to neutralize the link Amalthea had to the other side, so that she's not bound by anything" The moment she said that she placed her fingers on Mel's temples and the girls skin started burn. Stefan quickly realized it was vervain and had to fight everything inside of him not to tear the women's throat out. Melanie groaned loudly as she never came skin to skin contact with the flower.

Then the real torment came. Tessa started to chant something that caused her to have a migraine so big she screamed out and squeezed Stefan's hand in order to direct the pain somewhere else. He closed his eyes not being able to take this. To hear her like this.

After a good half an hour the screams died out and the only thing that could be heard were the Mel's heavy breathes as she tried to get some air into her system. "You're doing great, I won't let her continue this much longer I promise" He whispered again so that witch wouldn't hear it. He wiped away the sweat that was created on her forehead."How much longer are you going torture her with this?" He asked his voice filled with anger.

"Don't worry Stefan, now that she's not bound to the otherside. I can finally bring her back" Tessa said and this time she had her whole hands dipped into some weird silver liquid. She placed both of her hands on Mel's and started chanting. If the previous was bad this had to be hell on earth. Every cell in her body felt like it was going to explode. She screamed and tried to move away from the women's grasp but her strong hand were holding her down. It took them around 20 minutes to finish it and when she put away her hands there were only two red spots on Melanie's hands that any doctor would declare as a second degree burn. Stefan wondered about the power this girl had. She went through all of this and she was able to stay awake.

"We're done here" He told her sternly and unslipped his hand from hers and took her into his arms bridal style.

"Yes we are, just know that when Amalthea thouches Silas he will loose his psychic powers and we can kill him" Tessa said and waved her hand. Stefan didn't hesitate a second before rushing away from there. On the way he met Damon and Elena who looked horrified when they saw the girls arms.

"Stefan what happened?"Elena asked as she stepped closer to the girl.

"Tessa happened. She brought back Silas's daughter from the otherside using her as a vessel because they're doppelgangers" Stefan briefly explained. Luckily they had a first aid kit in the car and Elena wouldn't let them drive until the girl was al patched up.

Hello guys I think this is far by the longest chapter I written for this story around 2700 words which is insane. Also hope you like the little drama I added. Loved writing Stefan's protective side. Okay have a great summer.