Vampires · Era IV, Mystic Falls, 1864
Rayna Cruz & the Phoenix Stone
A huntress with eight lives, bound to a sword that brands vampires and a stone that traps their souls in bespoke personal hells. Her mark makes every other vampire on Earth compulsively hunt whoever carries it — an elegant way to make one person the problem of an entire species.
Details
- The Phoenix Stone hells are the franchise's first real hint that the afterlife has more than one floor.
- Her mark on Stefan is what drives him to New Orleans, and produces the best crossover the two shows ever did.
- Rayna was the daughter of Vicente Cruz of the Brotherhood of the Five, given eight lives by the shamans who sacrificed themselves to forge her sword; each time she dies she comes back younger and angrier.
- The Phoenix Stone puts a trapped vampire through a hallucinated century of their own worst memories. Stefan and Elijah both come out of it wrong.
- Her mark passes to Bonnie, which turns Bonnie into the target of every vampire on Earth for half a season.