Pairing: Alek/OC

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Summary: The last thing Oliviya King needs is yet another reason to resent her little sister, but the Mai and all the prophecies they bring with them seem determined to make it so.

AN: I wrote this fic mostly because the main female protagonist of the show left a lot to be desired and I was greatly inspired by Egyptian Kiss' wonderful Alek/OC story Touched by the Goddess. You all should definitely check it out.

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1 Ties that Bind

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Just on the edges of one of the better-known districts in the Ukraine, lay a community that not many tourists dared venture into, though "community" was hardly what its inhabitants would call it. Most would probably liken it to a black stain on the progress of humanity. A self contained Mecca for all transactions of a less than legal nature, one could find themselves never lacking an opportunity to sell their soul (or another's) for the right price in Chernyĭ Raĭona, one of the few crime districts to survive the country's move to independence.

To the untrained eye, the barren wasteland of rundown warehouses, abandoned factories, and empty streets would seem unremarkable, but if you were in the know and you had the cash, Chernyĭ Raĭona was open for business. It took little imagination to figure out what kind of business brought in the most profit in the derelict town.

Girls; ages 4-15, near enough worth their weight in gold for the members of the Eight-Circle Triad, were the hottest commodity aside from drugs and less troublesome to come by. One could never underestimate the market for such things, and there were all kinds of deplorable individuals ready and willing to spend, steal, or borrow hard earned money to acquire them.

Before the King's, life in the factory had been simple for her. Do as your told, and you'll survive. Keep yourself useful or die. These were the rules Oliviya, and the others like her, had lived by for as long as she could remember.

Not many of the other girls had much fight left in them anyway, and that was just the way Papa Viktor preferred it. Like animals stolen from the wild and kept from the sun, the untamed light of freedom slowly but surely waned from their eyes (almost as quickly as their innocence), with every passing day until the word "freedom" became just that, a word.

The will to resist was all but a distant memory for most of them. No one dared speak of home; they'd been captive much too long for that, snatched away from border cities and districts all over the Eastern Ukraine, and the haze of confusion and fear that followed "the Capture" kept them complacent, at least until they were old enough to gain favor with the higher ups.

Often times, she counted herself fortunate that she'd been taken so young, younger even than some of the girls twice her age, especially when she heard their cries late at night huddled beneath the warm blankets of the bunks they were made to share, one of the few luxuries afforded them when they weren't entertaining clients.

She had no memories of windows without bars, no recollection of the warm feel of a mother's touch, and so had grasped at her new role with both hands, looking for approval wherever she could. She'd grown accustomed to the strangers' hands that brushed back her dark hair reverently as if she were the finest of dolls; taken to heart their silver-tongued whispers in the shell of her ear that she was by far the prettiest "anhel" they'd ever seen. It had been an easy existence for a child so unfamiliar with love.

She had welcomed the attention her doe eyes attracted from the visiting business partners before one of the more willful girl's freshly plucked from a busy street during one of the annual 'fishing' trips (no doubt for the vibrancy of her blue eyes) had revealed that grown men weren't supposed to touch little girls that way, weren't supposed to lovingly run their hands along the back of her neck in quiet reverence, or gaze upon her with a hunger meant only for women. She hadn't understood at the time, hadn't thought anything wrong with her life…and so she'd gone to Viktor.

Because in her naïve six-year-old minds eye, he knew everything and the golden wrapped chocolates he gifted her with every time she pleased him meant he cared for her. It was the first time she'd ever questioned her place and when he'd sent her off in tears with a stinging cheek and a promise to see about that nasty girl's big mouth, Oliviya thought she couldn't have been more heartbroken. Until she'd realized the girl with the mesmerizing blue eyes hadn't been in her bunk after lights out, nor had she been the next day, or the next.

And that's when she'd run; as fast as her clumsy feet could carry her one day while her "caretaker" had been preoccupied relieving himself in an alley and left her unattended. Never mind that she had nowhere to run, or everything that she knew about herself could very well be a lie. Who knew if her name had ever been Oliviya? None of it had mattered in that moment, but the taste of fresh air on her tongue. It had taken her most of the day to reach the heart of the neighboring town, heart hammering so loudly in her chest she was sure it would give her away as she made her escape.

How lucky she'd been to chance upon the neighboring towns orphanage children out buying groceries with their den mother. There had only been five or so kids accompanying her, but apparently it had been enough to lose track of as she'd mistaken the little brunette as part of her group and herded her onto the bus with the rest of the children.

It was a blessed mistake and though it had only taken Mistress Yelena two hours after they'd passed over the threshold of the rundown orphanage for her to figure out the girl wasn't actually one of her wards, Oliviya knew somehow that this place was the start of a whole new beginning for her. All she had to do was prove her worth and that was nothing new for her.

Yelena, overworked and understaffed as she was, had been all set to phone the authorities, for what could she possibly do with yet another child to look after. The government had all but deserted them out here, too busy with politics and fighting over funding to bother with another orphanage looking for a bigger hand-out, and she wasn't so confident in her ability to keep track of yet another child when she was already teetering on exhaustion with seventeen wards under her care.

But all thoughts of foisting the little brunette onto the police left her the minute she spotted the telltale figure-eight tattooed on the inside of the child's tiny wrist, a brand of ownership to anyone who believed the whispers, whispers of a town so full of corruption and sin only devils would venture in. And while Yelena was much too rational to find merit in ghost stories, she took stock of the girl before her more clearly, her keen eyes running over the child's beautiful face and dark spun hair. Yes, Yelena mused sadly, the little one would have been quite a treasure for the soulless men who dealt in flesh.

Even as Oliviya tried tugging her sleeve over the offending mark, shame heavy on her heart, she was sure the woman had recognized the symbol for what it was. And it was then, as the world-weary woman knelt before her, the tattered folds of her thick woven skirt spread around her, that the six-year-old experienced her first act of true kindness. Warm hands, roughened and textured from years of labor, caressed her cheeks in a fashion quite unlike any before and leveled their eyes for a proper meeting.

"Vse, chto vy znaete..." she whispered softly, rubbing the pads of her thumbs gently against the little girl's skin, "vse, chto vy uchili, zabytʹ dorogogo odin. Segodnya ... Vy rodilisʹ."

Oliviya smiled then, hoping her eyes would convey how grateful she was to be kept. The woman's echoing smile was answer enough.

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"Everything you know...everything you have been taught, forget, dear-one. Today…you are born."

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Even with the Yelena's kind soul, Oliviya took great pains to prove herself invaluable, lending a hand wherever was needed and always before she was asked. Prove your usefulness. It was the one lesson she had not been able to shake despite Yelena's advice.

And though she hadn't made any friends, she was content to watch the others play and laugh amongst each other. Yelena, who'd moonlighted for a time as a school teacher, had been using every spare minute she had to teach Oliviya how to read, a talent her captors hadn't deemed useful or necessary. It was a whole new world; each page a new experience, and she found comfort in them, though it had proven itself to be both a blessing and a curse. For as her knowledge base grew with every book, she began shying away from interacting with the other children altogether, preferring instead to curl up in a corner forgotten with whatever she could get her hands on.

She had only been at the orphanage a few months when the little blonde terror had reared her curly head to save her from a descent into isolation, dropped on the orphanages doorstep one summer night with only a small box of papers and trinkets to identify her. And though she was uncharacteristically small for a toddler, what little Chloe lacked in size she made up for in lung capacity.

For the first few days, the girl had done nothing but holler all through the night, leaving the Mistress both frazzled and frustrated as it kept the other children in the nursery awake, so much so that Yelena had been forced to sequester the girl's crib in her office away from the others. The child refused to eat and willfully avoided sleep as if it were the greatest evil imaginable. By the fourth day the other kids had taken to walking around with their fingers plugged in their ears to avoid the banshee-like shrieks. Yelena had been at her wits end as to how to deal with the child, and at that point all Oliviya had wanted was to stop the screaming.

After helping with kitchen duty, she prepped a bottle and hid it in the folds of her apron, hoping to keep her venture a secret lest she fail. Quietly, she approached the screaming bundle of blonde in the crib as if she were the wildest of strays, ready to pounce on prey that ventured too close. The trepidation lasted as long as it took to reach the slates of the wooden crib. Because she hadn't been tall enough to reach over the crib, she'd thrust the warm bottle through the cribs slates holding it out for the toddler expectantly, shaking it enticingly for good measure.

And as if by some rare form of magic she'd found an off switch for the squirming babe, Chloe's cries came to a standstill, and the older girl heaved a near backbreaking sigh of relief. The silence that followed had been a thing of true beauty. Little hands wrapped unexpectedly around her own, tugging her forward along with the bottle and she grimaced in disgust as the girl's drool traveled down her hand, but pushed her discomfort away less she anger the little devil enough to take up her hollering again.

Once the bottle was finished, Oliviya went to reclaim her hand so she could find Yelena and tell her of the amazing feat she'd accomplished. But Chloe's grip was unrelenting and even as her brow twitched in irritation every time her tugging proved futile, the tinkling laughter that fell from the three-year-olds mouth at this newly discovered game was enough to warrant Oliviya's smile.

From that day on, neither girl was ever seen without the other. It was not for lack of trying on Oliviya's part. But for whatever reason, Chloe seemed permanently attached to her, and if she were honest, most days she felt the same pull towards the girl and gravity had little to do with it. It was a fondness she'd hardly understood at the time, being that she hadn't really bonded with anyone besides Yelena. Understandably, she was leery of people in general.

So when a man had shown up seemingly out of thin air to take Chloe away, Oliviya had been fearful of his intentions. She'd noticed him out of the corner of her eye for weeks prior to actually meeting the illusive Malcolm King as she and Chloe played on the front steps of the orphanage. When she'd told the Mistress of her worries, the woman had gently padded her cheek while explaining that not everyone had such vile intentions for sweet little girls like her and Chloe and that this man, or another family just like him, could very well be the one to provide a good home for her little blonde friend and one day soon Oliviya would have to let them, for everyone left the orphanage at some point. And though she was saddened at the prospect of her first real friend leaving her behind, Yelena's words gave her hope. Hope that one day she too would find a family all her own.

But alas, fate had different plans.

The day Malcolm had come to take little Chloe home with him, the girl had pitched the mother of all fits, attaching herself to Oliviya's waist with a stubborn tilt of her chin. She'd screamed and she'd kicked and she'd begged and she'd cried, and despite Oliviya's best efforts, in this, she could not calm her friend. Tears of frustration came unbidden, and she pulled Chloe tightly to her then, offering the girl what little comfort she could.

Yelena had stepped in, the scene far too much for her heart to take as she pulled the man aside and made a last minute decision that would unwittingly seal both girls' fates, together and apart.

"Mr. King," Yelena spoke, the English words tasting alien on her tongue as she ushered the man a few steps away from the pair, "Why not take them both? Chloe is very fond of Oliviya and they have been inseparable since they came to me."

"I don't know…" Malcolm hedged, glancing over his shoulder, his eyes taking note of the way the older girl swept Chloe's hair back fondly and whispered softly to her in their native tongue and how the action seemed to calm both girls immensely. He really hadn't planned on adopting one child let alone two, but the radiance of the little blonde had near enough grasped at his heartstrings when he'd spied her playing on his way into work. Although, now that he had an opportunity to study her more closely, he admitted the older girl was truly just as spellbinding as the girl in her arms had been, only there was an air about her that he'd been cautious of, a haunted quality he wasn't quite sure he or his wife would be equipped to handle.

"Are they sisters?" he questioned as he spotted the similar coloring of their grey eyes, turning back to face the caretaker then, already knowing in his heart what the answer would be.

"As good as, Mr. King," Yelena promised with a smile, "as good as."

And so it was that both girls were bound for a new family in America, and though no one was aware that Oliviya knew enough of the English language to piece together their conversation, the words spoken would admittedly haunt her for years to come. Because in the dark recesses of her heart, she would always wonder whether the King's would've chosen her had it not been for Chloe, or whether she'd merely been a toss-in to placate the child they'd actually wanted.

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AN: I needed a break from my writers' block concerning my Twilight fic and this is sort of the result. Some stories come more easily than others I guess. This one is kind of writing itself. Please let me know what you think. Constructive criticism is always welcomed.

Side Note: All apologies if the Russian was dreadful, I got it off a translation site. I debated a bit whether to have the native tongue for the girl's be Ukrainian or Russian seeing as most people in the Ukraine speak both. It was a toss up really but I read somewhere that it was a matter of great debate as some Ukrainians feel now that they are independent that they shouldn't have to learn Russian, which is still mandatory in their schooling. I tried to keep the girls in context, as around the time they were born the Ukraine was a fairly new country and Russians were a strong minority at the time, so much so that most everyone in the Ukraine speaks the language as well as Ukrainian even if they aren't Russian.

FYI, the Ukrainian city mentioned above is entirely fictional, and translates to 'Black District' in Russian.

Feed the beast peeps, and review…please.