face was blue-white. There wasn’t a plant in the room that could be
strangling him.
Poisoned, was the next thing Elena thought and immediately her
eyes darted around the room to see a spilled drink, a dropped plate, any
sign that poison had done this. There was nothing.
Sage was clapping Damon on the back. Oh, God, could he have
choked? But that was idiocy. Vampires didn’t breathe, except for talking
and building Power.
But then what was happening?
“You have to breathe,” Sage was shouting in Damon’s ear. “Take a
breath, as if you were going to speak, but then hold on to it, as if for
raising your Power. Think about your insides. Get those lungs working!”
The words only confused Elena.
“There!” cried Sage. “You see?”
“But it only lasts an instant. Then I need to do it again.”
“But, yes, that is the point!”
“I tell you I’m dying and you laugh at me?” a disheveled Damon
shouted. “I’m blind, deaf, my senses are haywire—and you laugh!”
Disheveled, thought Elena, bothered by something.
“Well.” Sage seemed to be at least trying not to laugh. “Perhaps,
mon petit chou, you should not have opened something that was not
addressed to you?”
“I put wards all around me before I did it. The house was safe.”
“But you were not—breathe! Breathe, Damon!”
“It looked completely harmless—and admit it—we were all