Elena explained. She hadn't seen Solomon-or the guy they had thought was Solomon-die, but she remembered everything Stefan and Meredith had told her, how he'd examined all of them, his intense concentration on Trinity as she'd jittered and bled. How they'd thought that Solomon was dead, but then Trinity had escaped them and turned into a powerful vampire with Solomon's yellow gaze. How the "Solomon" they'd fought wasn't originally Solomon at all, but a man named Gabriel Dalton.
Bonnie listened intently, picking at an apple turnover and asking an occasional question. When Elena finished, she shook her head, puzzled. "It doesn't sound like body-swapping to me," she said stubbornly.
"I forgot you were the expert on this," Elena said, with just a touch of sarcasm, and Bonnie made a face at her.
"Listen," Bonnie said. "All I've been doing this last month is working with people's energies. Everybody's got a very distinct flavor that's all their own."
"Like their auras," Elena said, nodding in understanding. Everyone's aura was different. "But I still haven't been able to see Solomon's aura."
"Auras, energies. Potato, potahto," Bonnie said. "Just because you couldn't see it doesn't mean it wasn't there. Somehow, Solomon can shield it from you." She put down her fork and leaned forward, fixing Elena earnestly with her wide brown eyes. "My point is, if Solomon swapped bodies with Trinity, everyone would have known right away, before Solomon-or Gabriel, or whoever-died. They'd be able to tell that it wasn't the same person." Elena started to object, and Bonnie held up her hand. "Think about it," she said. "Nobody ever thought Katherine was you for more than a few minutes, even though you looked so much alike. Different energy. Similar shells, but different inside. If the people who knew her thought it was still Trinity in there-and they hunted with her, they must know her really well-then it was Trinity."
"But when Meredith saw her, she was a vampire," Elena said helplessly. "And she had Solomon's eyes. Do you think she's possessed? That was Alaric's other theory."
"I'm pretty sure you have to be a demon to possess somebody," Bonnie said dismissively. "Old Ones aren't demons; they're just really powerful, ancient vampires." She went back to picking at her turnover, frowning thoughtfully. "I think I know what it is, though," she said.
Elena stared at her. "Go on."
Bonnie rested her elbows on the table and cupped her chin in her hands. "I can do a lot of things now that I couldn't do before, some of them by drawing on other people's energy, like I did last night." Elena nodded. She'd felt Bonnie tugging at her, knew she had somehow used Elena's own Power to levitate Enrique. "And if I were a bad person, a really Powerful one"-Bonnie looked at Elena-"like an Old One, I think I could go the other way."
"What do you mean?" Elena asked.
"If I were strong enough, I could take my own energy and force it into someone else instead of using their energy. I could fill them up with myself and make them do whatever I wanted. It would just be flipping the switch the other way, really."
"That sounds like possession," Elena said, confused, but Bonnie shook her head impatiently.
"No," she explained. "In possession, the demon is actually going inside the person and taking their body for their own. This would be more like a really powerful kind of compulsion.
Solomon isn't inside Trinity; he's just using her. Since he's so strong, he could transfer his own attributes-like the yellow eyes, and being a vampire-but she's just compelled. She's still there, underneath all this Power he's forcing into her."
Hope bloomed in Elena's chest. This was scary stuff, but it was also the first real suggestion that saving Trinity was a viable plan. "So you're saying Solomon does have a body, still out there somewhere," she said breathlessly. "We've been hunting the wrong targets all along-first Gabriel, and then Trinity-while the right one, the real Solomon, has stayed hidden."
Bonnie grinned and jumped up from the table, rattling the plates. She held her hand out to Elena. "Come on," she said impatiently. "If you've been looking for the wrong people all this time, maybe it's time to start trying to find the right one."
In the bedroom, Bonnie spread out a map out over the king-size bed. "This is the whole state," she told Elena. "This kind of compulsion must take a lot of Power. I don't think he could do it from somewhere farther away." She placed a purple candle on each post of the bed, carefully, then lit them all. "Purple's good for divination and psychic stuff," she explained.
She stepped across from Elena, the bed and the map between them, and stretched out her hands. "I need you to use your Guardian Power," she told her.
Elena shook her head. "It doesn't work on Solomon," she said. "I've been searching and searching for him. I couldn't find Gabriel or Trinity, either. There's no trace of them."
"Like I said, he must be able to shield himself from you somehow," Bonnie said. "He knows that you can find evil and is doing something to protect himself from you." She grinned mischievously, her teeth white in the candlelight. "But he doesn't know what I can do. Trust me."
And Elena did. She reached for Bonnie's hands, then, shutting her eyes for a moment, felt for her Power. She thought of the evil Solomon had done: taking over Trinity and the unknown Gabriel Dalton; killing gentle Andres, his blood flowing red across the bed; poor little broken Sammy.
When she opened her eyes, Elena could see Bonnie's aura, gentle and rosy pink all around her, and her own golden one next to it, but there was no trace of evil, nothing for her to follow. "You see the problem," she said.