SPOILER! The Vampire Diaries Speculation: Where is Katherine?SPOILER! The Vampire Diaries Speculation: Where is Katherine?

After her fatal cure-snatch and run out on lonely island, The Vampire Diaries villain Katherine (Nina Dobrev) has hit the road and hasn’t been heard from since. She’s on the lam, she’s got the cure, and everyone wants a piece of her. Damon (Ian Somerhalder) and Rebekah (Claire Holt) are trying to track her down, Klaus (Joseph Morgan) is on the prowl, and no one has found her yet: Where is Katherine?

 There’s a chance she’s coming after Hayley (Phoebe Tonkin). As Klaus told the wolf, “You were stupid enough to make a deal with Katerina Petrova to help her find the cure, now you’re a loose end.” Hayley and Katherine had been working together in New Orleans, so she could be headed that way, via a truck stop in the boonies, to try and wrap up that particular loose end. Since Klaus is one of the few people who is Katherine’s equal in the evil department, he’s probably got a decent idea how she works.

(And obviously by “working” we mean “manipulating and taking advantage of,” and by “wrap up” we mean “murder, probably in a horrible fashion.”)

Then again, Katherine likely wants to cram that cure down Klaus’s throat stat, so she can kill him and put that an end to her 500 years of being hunted. In that case, she’s probably a little closer to Mystic Falls, which is in line with her nasty habit of being right under our noses.

Of course, there’s always the chance that she’s a million miles away, compelling some hot young things to fan her on a tropical island, just relishing her win and waiting for her moment to use the cure. But given everything we know about this malicious doppelganger, we’re putting our money for Katherine’s location on “closer than you’d think.”

In that same vein (so to speak), Katherine could just as easily show up in Pennsylvania. According to the synopsis for Season 4, Episode 18, “American Gothic,” Rebekah and Elena (Nina Dobrev) take a road trip to and small town in that state, and judging by the promo, it looks like they find her.

So what’s Katherine doing hiding out there? Lay your theories on us!