Next, Julian shows up, and drags Valerie away. He forces her to tell Lily that Stefan is fine without her. The Heretic family then start planning a move to Europe. However, Valerie writes to Stefan a little later telling him that she wants to see him again. The day Valerie is supposed to leave, Julian catches her and hears the heart beat of her unborn child. He then beats her, so that Lily never learns of her betrayal. She loses the baby. The next day Lily nurses Valerie back to health.
Both Valerie and Julian lie about what happened to her. Julian says that Valerie was attacked and robbed. He found her and took her to them. Valerie agrees to this lie because she believes Lily would never forgive her for sleeping with Stefan.
The next day, instead of staying with Julian any longer, Valerie tries to commit suicide by submerging herself into a bathtub and drowning. She has Lily’s blood in her system when she tries to die, so she becomes Lily’s first Heretic. Stefan and Lily bond and talk about these events as he helps her practice her driving. Lily only tells the side she knows, which is that she sent Lily to check on Stefan. She didn’t know about their affair. Stefan fills her in on some other details, like Valerie writing a note wanting to see him and not showing up. Stefan says he moved past it, but it seems like there still may be some lingering pain. Meanwhile, Valerie tells Caroline all these details, minus how it ended. She confesses the terrible ending to Stefan, but while invisible so he never hears any of it. For Stefan’s honesty, Lily releases Caroline. Stefan and her reunite and he assures her that the past is the past. He is over Valerie and only thinking about the future. Insecure Caroline makes a bit of an appearance as she once again wonders if Stefan will ever love her as much as he did Valerie and Elena.
Bonnie, Alaric, and Damon take a road trip to find the missing Heretic, Oscar. He was sent on a secret mission by Lily. Having freedom, makes him realize that he likes it and no longer wants to be one of Lily’s children. However, Damon is not going to grant him that wish. He first asks Oscar to help Bonnie. Bonnie continues to have her Phoenix Stone visions. She questions Alaric about whether he really destroyed the stone. He lies about it. However, when Oscar tries to siphon the visions out of Bonnie’s head, he tells them that the Phoenix Stone was not destroyed. He then tries to run. Damon catches him and knocks him out. He then calls Lily to make a trade for Elena. After the trio work together to take down Oscar, Bonnie forgives Alaric. He tells her that Jo was the love of his life, and he cannot live without her.
Bonnie agrees to help him figure out how to use the spell and resurrect Jo.
Valerie appears as Oscar gains consciousness. She asks him how his mission to find Julian is going. He reveals that he found Julian, and plans to negotiate his freedom by trading it for Julian’s whereabouts. Valerie tells Oscar she loved him like a brother, and then rips out his heart. She cannot have that devil, Julian, returning to her life.
In the flash forward, Tyler makes a brief appearance. Stefan calls him to ask about Caroline. Tyler responds about not wanting to get in the middle of their drama, and has not spoken to her. Stefan also sets his car on fire. Whatever he’s running from must be scary. Anyway, Tyler’s appearance made it clear that in the future he is still a part of the core group. Our Forwood hearts are conflicted, because on the one hand: yay Forwood. In reality, we know if Tyler and Caroline are engage, it won’t end well for him. The writers seem set on a Steroline end game, which means Tyler will inevitably get his heartbroken (again), when Caroline chooses Stefan over him. However, we aren’t falling for it. Tyler showing up and talking about Caroline seems like a red herring to make us believe she’s engaged to him. In reality, her fiancé will probably be some new guy, or someone random like Beau. Tyler’s appearance probably means one major thing: he is someone else’s love interest in the future.
We are actually starting to warm up to Steroline (yes, hell must have frozen over), but when you compare their relationship to Stefan’s past loves (Katherine, Elena and now Valerie), it just seems like he is just not that into her. It feels like he’s settling for her, not choosing her. And that’s pretty rough. But as we said, we see a Steroline endgame here. So the writers need to stop telling us that Stefan only wants and loves Caroline, but actually SHOW us too. Caroline became so confident when she was with Tyler. We don’t like seeing her revert back to insecure Care from season one, and that’s what she’s becoming again. Fix it, Stefan!