THE VAMPIRE DIARIES: We’ll Always Have Bourbon Street

Well, well, well. This week’s episode started off just as last week’s episode ended, with Damon and Elena in the bed getting a little frisky. I can’t say that I mind seeing Mr. Blue eyes with Elena but if she is sired to him like Caroline and Stefan suspect, it takes some of the fun out of it. So let’s find out the truth shall we?

Tyler and Haley are helping Adrian work on breaking his sire bond from Klaus but it becomes too much for him and he leaves with Kim (another Hybrid who already broke the sire bond).

Elena wants to tell Stefan about her relationship with Damon, but Damon wants to enjoy one day with their secret and of course she goes along. Stefan shows up as she is leaving. Awkward! He tells Damon that he thinks Elena is sired to him and Damon thinks it is ridiculous. To test his theory, Stefan told Damon to tell Elena to drink from a blood bag and make sure to mention how happy it would make him if she does it. If Stefan is wrong, he will gladly apologize. This should be good.

At school Elena convinces Bonnie and Caroline to have a girl’s night at the Salvatore mansion.  Bonnie was cool with it but Caroline was a little hesitant, but finally agreed. Damon showed up at school with Elena’s blood bag lunch. He told her he thinks it will work this time and said please do it for me. So she did and she was perfectly fine. Looks like Stefan was right.

Haley talks to Professor Shane and their deal is he will give her all the information she ever wanted about her biological parents if she gives him 12 hybrids that are not sired to Klaus. Right now they have 12 including Tyler. Haley does not want “Ty” to be part of the deal so that brings her to 11. She better get cracking on that Adrian kid. Professor Shane is not to be trusted.

Damon breaks the news to Stefan that Elena is sired to him. Damon is looking for information to help when he comes across a picture from New Orleans in 1942. Flashback scene to New Orleans and there was a girl named Charlotte who was sired to Damon. He found a witch, Valerie La Marche, to break that bond after Charlotte went a little “fatal Attraction” on him. So it looks like the Salvatore boys are taking a trip to Bourbon Street.

Elena, Bonnie and Caroline are having their girl’s night and Elena reveals that she can now drink out of a blood bag, thanks to Damon of course. Caroline starts to bash Damon and Bonnie puts an end to it by breaking out her “spirit tea” she got from Professor Shane (which looks like illegal drugs). She said it is supposed to open up your chi (do vampires have chi?).

Stefan and Damon are in New Orleans and get into a little tiff about Elena. Stefan blames the sire bond for Elena’s feelings for Damon because he is so wrong for her. Then Stefan apologizes and it triggers a flashback scene where Stefan and Lexi are practicing an apology to Damon for his bloodlust and becoming a ripper (looks like Stefan has always blamed everything on Damon). He wants to be friends again and Lexi encourages him to make nice with his brother.  Stefan and Damon bury the hatchet and catch up until Charlotte shows up with a woman for their dinner. Lexi gets Stefan out of there fast before the ripper shows up.

Back in the present, Damon tells Stefan that to get rid of Charlotte he told her to count bricks on a building and he would meet her on the corner Bourbon and Duman but he skipped town instead. Stefan wondered if she was still there so they went there and she was there! She told Damon she counted every brick in New Orleans and knew he would come back. Whoa! That sire bond is stronger than they thought.

The girls are having way too much at the Salvatore mansion drinking Dom P and spirit tea until Caroline starts to rip on Damon again. Caroline said he was only nice to her because he was hoping she would sleep with him. Elena told them that she already did and wanted to share her happiness with her best friends. She walked out of the room disappointed and told them the party was over. She doesn’t like that they hate the man she is falling in love with. Caroline couldn’t take another word and blurted out “you are not falling in love with him, you are sired to him!” Elena was confused and Caroline told her the whole theory. Elena got pissed and told them to leave. She opens the door just as Adrian and Kim (hybrids) arrive to attack them. Bonnie started to do some natural magic but Kim threatened to kill Caroline if she didn’t stop. They fight and the hybrids take Caroline. They are tired of alpha Tyler telling them what to do. He is not going to be happy about this.

The Salvatore brothers find the witch shop but had no luck. The woman working there was the Val’s great grand-daughter but does not practice magic (so she says). She told them all of her spells, and journals were lost in hurricane Katrina so if that spell did exist, it doesn’t now. They left the shop but Damon doesn’t believe the witch and wants to pressure her. One small thing Damon forgot to mention, the spell calls for the sacrifice of 12 human lives (what is up with the number 12? First it was 12 unsired hybrids, now 12 humans…interesting).

Elena finds Tyler and he explains to her that the sire bond only effects how you act, not how you feel. He hated Klaus but still did everything he told him to do. They hear a scream and know it is Caroline. They find her chained in the stables and Kim was torturing her. Tyler told Kim she was on their team, and she said not her team, and about 10 hybrids came in the stables. Uh oh.

Damon goes back to the shop and calls out the witch. He tells her he knows she is Val’s daughter not her great-granddaughter. She told him to leave and he didn’t, so she did some witchy moves on him. Stefan told her they didn’t want trouble, just her help. She explained to them that there was no spell to break a vampire sire bond. Her mother told them there was because she wanted the power that she got from the sacrifice of the 12 humans. What she did isn’t called magic, it’s called expression. The vampire sire bond happens when a human has feelings for the vampire before they are turned, and once they become a vampire, those feelings are heightened. The only way to free her is to tell her to stop caring about him and leave her alone.

Kim starts to stake Caroline but Elena tells her if she really wants to get revenge on Klaus, she should stake her. She walks towards Elena, Tyler gets free and stakes Kim. Go Tyler! He threatens to rip her heart out if any of the hybrids come near them. He said they have to work together to get back at Klaus. He told Kim to submit or die and she submitted. So did the rest of the hybrids. Tyler is one badass!

Flashback to a scene with Damon and Lexi. She told him he can’t be around Stefan because it would be bad for him. He listened to her and put Stefan’s needs above his own. Damon is capable of doing the right thing. Damon knows that he has to tell Elena the truth about the sire bond and free her from it. It should be her choice to be with him.

After being rescued, Caroline apologized to Elena and promised not to judge anymore. Elena told Bonnie that professor Shane must really know his stuff. She replied “he’s helping with a new kind of magic. He called it expression.” Bonnie better watch out!

Haley met with Professor Shane to tell him Adrian broke the sire bond and he has his 12 hybrids. He told her that her parents are dead and gave her all the information he had about them. Feeling lied to, she told him he just picked a fight with a Werewolf. He told her, just because they are dead doesn’t mean she can’t see them again. It is just the beginning for them (seriously this guy is up to no good).

Stefan tells Caroline how Damon has to break the sire bond and Caroline admitted she told Elena she was sired to Damon. He told her he trusted Damon to do the right thing because he believes Damon loves her as much as he does. Aw!

Damon comes home to find Elena cleaning up after the party. She told him she knows about the sire bond. Damon tells her he doesn’t want to do this and she knows what is coming. She begs him not to, but he has to do the right thing when it comes to her. She touches his face and asks if that felt wrong? The end.

Wow! What an episode! The Vampire Diaries pushes the envelope every week and I love it! What do you think Professor Shane is up to? Will Damon and Elena’s bond be broken? Let me know your thoughts in the comment section below. Check in next week for the mid-season finale!

The Vampire Diaries airs Thursday nights at 8/7c on the CW.