Not-Yet-Relatives

3. Revive To Meet

When Caroline left, Bonnie's face hardened with suspicion. "Who are you?" She asked coldly. "You came to Care demanding to see me, but how can I know that we can trust..." Her ranting continued and I knew that I didn't have time for this. It took me only seconds to consider my options and decide what to do, before I grabbed her hand.

She blinked as her predictions overhelmed her.

I remembered her telling me that she used to get these visions when she met someone for the first time so I thought that it's worth a try. Immediately I was assured I was right when her expession softened and she asked: "I... I... Do I know you?"

"Yeah, well, not exactly, probably not, but in some way you do, I mean I do know you but you don't yet," I bit my lip nervously. "Sorry, I talk too much, it's one of those traits my family keeps arguing after whom did I take it after."

Bonnie didn't seem that she was listening (and if she was, she definitely didn't understand. "I get this feeling only around people I trust the most or my family. Are we related?"

I shaked my head in silent disagreement, not wanting to start talking again. It was normal for me to be talkative but when I was nervous it was a whole new level. I hated when something didn't go according to the plan, when I had no control about what was happening. And when I was uncomfortable, I tended to express it very loudly and fast. Dad always laughed and said that I was so similar to mom and didn't even know it. When he said that for the first time to my four years old self frowned but with passing years I realized it was a compliment. And one of the best ones.

Bonnie was still trying to figure me out. "But if you aren't my family, how come that I feel like I can trust you? I've never met you. I don't know you. Who are you?"

I sighed. "Someone who needs your help." Then I put my hands on her shoulders and looked straight in her eyes searching for any sign of deceit or even a sign of thinking about betraying me. "Do you promise to not tell anyone?"

She opened her mouth to refuse but then her curiosity overpowered her and she nodded.

I inhaled shakily. "I... am from the future."

Bonnie's eyebrows furrowed but she didn't say anything.

"As in the time that is yet to come. I was born fifty three years from now and I messed up when I was doing a spell and I got sent here. And I don't know how to get back but I know that I need to! I need to help my parents. I have to help my parents! They..." I was silenced by Bonnie's palm on my lips. I expected her to say something but she just stood there, looking wide-eyed. I opened my mouth to continue, but she signaled for me to not to, so I just closed it again. It took about twenty seconds before she finally said that one word I expected to hear since I decided to come here. "What?"

"Future. F...U...T...U..."

Bonnie stared at me, certainly not amused by my answer and I decided it would be better (for my physical health, judging by wary look on her face) to stop with my sarcastic remarks at least until she agrees to help me. She acted differently than her daughter. She would probably snicker or hit me playfully in the chest. Bonnie was almost the same age as Kerra and they were almost lookalikes, yet there was that seriousness as if she carried the weight of the world on her shoulders. Her tired eyes resembled the Kerra from last year and half more than my best friend Kerra. I understood Kerra. I got why she was doing what she was doing. Was I a fool because I forgave already? Or because I never actually blamed her?

I shaked myself out of those thoughts. I should stop thinking about Kerra, no matter how hard it was when I was looking to her mom's face. I can deal with her when I come back. I tried to smile as reassuringly as I was able to and started talking again. "Look, I know that it's hard to believe, but it's the truth. I'm not asking you to do a spell and hurt yourself in the process due to lack of enough power, just... do the research. Go through your grimoires, ask other witches you know,... Please."

She eyed me suspiciously. "No offense, because you seem like a really nice girl and I'm almost 45% sure you're telling the truth, because not many people are insane enough to come up with this. And Caroline with Elena seem to trust you, but you see, there's like really murderous and ancient family of vampires in the town and one of them already killed Elena's aunt and Elena, although she was resurrected, and countless of others and I need to stop him. Something tells me that he can be stopped by whatever it is in this coffin," she pointed at the box in the center of the cave, I'd been wondering about, "but I can't open it. I even found my mother to help me, to no avail, she lost her powers a long time ago."

"What about a deal then?" I suggested cheerfully, happy, because I already knew what she was going to say. "We help each other and when I return, every witch in this country will praise you for keeping a nature's balance, because I'm sure that me being here broke it a big time. We're stronger together and we might be able to do it."

She contemplated only for a moment before she nodded slowly.

"Fine, then we have a coffin to open!"

There are a lot of situations when you think: This is a wise decision that I'm making. I'm so clever! and a day later your mind changes from satisfaction to: What was I thinking?

Well, that was exactly what was happening now.

It seemed like a perfect plan. I'll help to set free whatever is inside and she'll find a spell to send me back.

Bonnie started chanting.

It was one seriously old spell from her grimoire. When I read it, I almost felt magic radiating through the yellowed paper and the words penetrating into my mind. Bennett was one of the strongest witch lines in the world and its grimoires were... something. The coffin started to shake but nothing more. And then I joined Bonnie repeating the same words over and over again until something cracked and the lid slowly as if almost carefully lifted itself.

Until then I was in that I'm so clever phase. Then came up the What was I thinking? one.

Because inside the coffin was someone whom I recognized from one of dad's sketches. He drew it for me, when I asked him to show me how my grandparents looked like. And this... was my grandmother. Not the nice one with a name Liz Forbes, but the other one. The homicidal, heartless, lunatic one from daddy's side.

I froze completely when I saw her standing up. She was supposed to be dead, I could tell that even she was surprised to wake up but she hid it immediately. She approached Bonnie and extended her hand. It pleased me to see, that since Bonnie didn't know how to feel about her, she automatically found my eyes in silent question. Faint shake of my head made her step away from her.

It was crazy. She didn't know me. Noone here did. But they all seemed to trust me. Maybe It was because of magic? Or emotions didn't depend on time? Maybe.

Esther caressed Bonnie's cheek. "Bonnie Bennett, I always loved Bennetts. Do you know that your ancestor was my close friend?" She smiled and turned to me. Bonnie seemed pretty creeped out by the fact that Esther knew her ancestor. She didn't know who she was, unlike me.

I held my head high when my grandmother started walking towards me, though my confidence wavered more with every step she took. But I was stubborn and decided that I wasn't going to let her win. This was just a powerplay, her walking so high and mighty so I would get scared and do whatever she wanted. It might had worked on this young version of Bonnie, who started practicing magic about a year ago, but I was raised by Mikealsons and while I might had missed few parties or sleepovers, I was intimately familiar with powerplay. Rule number one: never reveal your secrets too soon.

Esther stopped in front of me. We were looking into each other's eyes and she raised her eyebrows. "But you, Eli, are a mystery, aren't you? A few days ago you appeared out of nowhere, telling everyone lies." I really hoped she didn't hear our earlier conversation, but I didn't think so. I figured she'd been dead and watched us from the other side, but even she couldn't be everywhere and she seemed genuinely curious about me. "So, tell me? Who are you?"

I smirked in an answer. "Not unless you tell me first."

She didn't even flinch. "Please, call me Esther." I saw Bonnie gape at her but I didn't have time to ask her what was it about.

"Well, then. You can call me Eli."

Esther frowned and I got a feeling that it was not wisest to anger her. "No surname?"

"I didn't catch yours."

I saw a dangerous gleam in her eye and with that she left, my knees too shaky to follow her. "We probably should have learned more about that coffin before we opened it so foolishly, don't you think?" I asked breathlessly from overflow of adrenaline I just went through.

Bonnie hurried to me. "It was Esther!"

I know! I wanted to scream but then something clicked in my mind. "You know her?" She quickly shaked her head.

"No, but look here!" She helped me stand up, picked a candle from the ground, lit it with her mind and pushed me near one wall. There were... pictures. And writing. "Our friend Alaric, who is history teacher and can read runes translated those words as names of members of the exact same murderous family that we are trying to stop," she slowly pointed at Rebekah, Elijah, Kol, Finn, Mikael, "...this is the guy who killed Elena" her finger pointed at another name and then finally settled at Esther. "And this is supposed to mean Esther. She's one of them! Damn right, we shouldn't have revive her!" Bonnie continued with her cursing, but I didn't pay any attention, because the name of a person, who killed Elena, sounded Niklaus. Good thing that uncle 'Lijah taught me almost every possible and impossible language including reading old Nordic runes.

How did it mom used to tell me? Be positive. Think everything through. And no matter how crazy it seems at the moment, stay rational.

Okay, I thought, let's state the facts. You learned four important things.

1. Dad is here, in Mystic Falls.

2. Mom's friends are trying to stop him, most likely by killing him.

3. This is probably the reason why your parents don't talk about Mystic Falls.

4. And you finally found out why Elena and Damon want to have nothing to do with me or my dad in the future.

Look at the bright side, I tried to reason with myself to calm down, you could have had... acne.

It was a very desperate attempt to be optimistic but A for effort, right? Bonnie was still rambling about how stupid we are that we let Esther leave. "Stop it!" I yelled and she immediately did. But after a second she responded.

"Do you realize we just brought back to life a thousand years old witch?"

My eyes snapped shut as I was trying to think. "I do. But I am the one who will get scolded about it when I get home. You are going to be fine."

She took a few seconds to examine my expression. "You know what is going to happen, don't you? You said you are from the future, so..."

I sighed. "If only it was that easy, but I didn't live this. I only heard about this from my family and they didn't... well, tell me everything. Plus, I'm pretty sure that me being here completely changed everything." I explained, as understandable as I was able.

I could almost hear her thoughts. She bit her lower lip, something Kerra takes after her, and her eyes widened. "We... We know each other in the future, don't we? That's why I thought I knew you. Because I did! Just not yet." All of a sudden her hands jerked up to her cheeks. "Oh my god, you were telling the truth." For a while all I could hear were her hard breaths and I waited patiently until she started thinking clearly once again.

"You cannot tell anyone else." My words resonated in the silence of the cave and it made Bonnie snap her head up and eye me curiosly.

"Why not?"

I simply shrugged my shoulders. "I can't change more than I already did, who knows how would the future look like. You're a witch. You out of all should know how important it is to keep an order of nature. Did nobody ever teach you basic rules?" I saw her look of sadness and finally understood. "They didn't, did they?"

She swallowed a sob. "My... grams died during one of my first spells."

It was so strange, being here and talking to my mentor who taught me a lot of those things herself. She was less experienced than I was. Was it selfish of me that I felt pleased with myself? "Okay, so, Witchy Basics 101: rule number one, always keep nature's balance, number two, don't hurt intentionally, the third one, don't meddle with vampire business,... there are hundreds of others and most of them are stupid or everyone broke them at least one, but number one and two are essential."

Bonnie furrowed her brows, confused. "But if it's against the balance, why did you do the spell that transported you here in the first place?"

My sigh must had been heard from miles away. "You think it was my intention?" I exclaimed irritated by her assumptions. "I already said I messed up! I tried everything! Every possible spell or curse I knew. I was desperate, okay? So, I tried one spell from my family grimoire that my aunt taught me and I must had - I don't know - pronounced it incorrectly! It was supposed to correct everything, not bring me... Unless..." I stopped, suddenly realizing how oblivious I was. I clenched fist and hit myself in the forehead. I regretted it instantly but as I hissed in pain my mind finally cleared. "Unless it worked perfectly as it was supposed to."

"What are you talking about?" Bonnie asked uncertainly but I paid no attention to her, because I finally knew what was happening. And it made perfect sense!

I was fighting Kerra in the future and the spell was supposed to correct the world. And because even magic isn't all powerful and cannot do everything within a blink of an eye it did the second best thing.

It sent me here to prevent the death that destroyed everything.

A corner of my mouth raised up in a small smile. I knew what I had to do. I could think of a plan. I wasn't kept in the dark anymore.

And that was all I needed to smile again. Because I actually stood a chance.

I rushed in front of Bonnie, hugged her tightly and didn't let her go until she started choking from the lack of oxygen. "You were right, Bonnie. It was my fault! Thank you, for opening my eyes." I heard Caroline's voice from the entry to the caves and stopped my gleeful murmur. I didn't want her to know. I knew her. She was observant. She would figure out the whole deal about me being her and Klaus's daughter in less than a day. And since there are little... unstable relationships between her friends and him, I guessed that few secrets will be fit. After all what they don't know cannot hurt them.

"Bonnie, so, please look for any way to send me home, I'll be doing what I came here for, but when I'm done I will need you help." She raised her eyebrow in a questioning manner and I touched my ear. She seemed to get the message right away and gave me a small nod. "Promise, you're not going to tell anyone?" I whispered in a tender tone of voice and when she answered with a simple yes I felt relief. Lies are full of words. When you're honest with all of your heart you don't need so many.

I turned away and started walking towards the entry and Caroline.

While will be Bonnie looking for a spell to return me home, I needed to make a lot of things better. Starting with stopping grandma Esther and ending with saving my uncle Kol.

And I might play a little matchmaker for my parents in the process, just for the fun of it.

OH MY GODS!

Guys, you are awesome! Thank you for your support, because seriously? Almost one thousand views? Pinch me, because I'm either dreaming or hallucinating.

So, I hope you liked this chapter and I'll try to post another one ASAP, but I'm going to Venice on Friday, so, I'm not sure, if I'll have a time, but I swear I'll try!