AN: TRIGGER WARNINGS: Violence, miscarriage, depression (hinted at)
If you do not wish to read this chapter but wish to know what happens for future reference, PM me and I will summarise it for you.
Six months passed in peace. There was not even a bad word against the King and Queen, only joy from the people that there would be an heir. Klaus hadn't slept since Bonnie gave them the news. He did not need sleep, anyway. He needed to watch over them. His mate and son.
Also since that night, she had not endured a single corset. The damned things were bad enough but Anna was a vampire and when she pulled the strings with her might, Caroline constantly feared her back would break and she'd be crushed.
Klaus overlooked the construction of the nursery himself but it was Rebekah who designed it all herself. The walls were white with blue and red accents – their kingdoms' colours. Blue for Caroline and red for Klaus. It was stunning, Rebekah had told her. That was all she knew as she was banned from the room until her son was born.
The birthing always made Caroline anxious. Not for the birthing itself but for Davina's paleness whenever it came to conversation around her. Something terrible was to happen and only she knew it. She feared telling the others in case Davina was killed and she'd never know the fate of her child.
Her stomach was round with child by now and Rebekah was constantly bouncing with excitement, even offering names. The only help Kol was in that department was hinting that Kol was the greatest name for the heir of the king to which Klaus would snap a bone in his body. Usually the neck unless she was extraordinarily hormonal and moody, to which he'd pick another such as the arm.
In less than three months, it was planned that she would have her child. She wished that she could be excited but she could not. It was hurting her to be pregnant. Her back, her insides, her head. The child was unusual and so fed from moreso than any other. She had to keep a constant supply of her mate's blood with her should the baby need the connection to Klaus when he was not there.
Caroline was walking with Anna through the castle when the warning bell began to ring. Two vampire guards were beside her in an instant, ushering her as fast as she could go towards one of the secret passages. The bell was all she could hear but the vampires around her froze. Anna's hand was tight on her wrist, stopping her just in time as a spear stuck in to the wall a few inches in front of her stomach. One of the guards flashed in to a room and decapitated the man that threw it but his head flew off the same moment. The remaining guard stumbled a second but Anna had them moving on.
"If you kill one, the same fate befalls you," Anna warned the guard. "No killing. Just knock them out. That will keep them down but you will also fall. It will be for just a moment, but we would be defenceless." He took the warning with a nod and moved in front of them.
As he pulled back the tapestry, a clawed spear was thrust in to him. Caroline let out a choked scream as the guard's heart was pushed out of his back. Anna lifted her then, flashing them away. They breezed through what Anna knew to be witched until they came to Anna's room near Caroline and Klaus'. With the baby, Anna was moved to their floor to tend to Caroline and also to offer her protection.
Anna easily moved a wardrobe four times her own size and revealed a passage to Caroline. "Come quickly," Anna ordered, taking the lead but staying behind a moment to lose the 'door' behind them. Once she had, she shifted to the front and took Caroline's hand. "Make no sound," Anna whispered before leading the Queen through the darkness.
The bell ringing alerted Klaus and his siblings to a danger. He flashed to the door but could not rush to Caroline as he had wished. There was a full scale invasion already in his castle. Witches were in his home and he wanted to kill them all for bringing a threat to his child. He moved in for the kill but Elijah's hand gripped his arm. He turned to face the betrayal but found none in his older brother's eyes. "Look, Niklaus," Elijah hissed. They turned to see that when a witch was killed, so was their killer by the same fate.
"KNOCK THEM OUT! THEY'RE SPELLED!" Klaus ordered with a roar, his vampires doing as told. "They're a distraction," Rebekah whispered with her eyes widening. Of course they were. How could he not see it. No attack comes through the front door! They had been standing there but no witch paid any attention to them. They were not the targets. "Caroline," he let out.
Rebekah followed him, both blurring through the castle in search of his mate. It was only when a sword was thrust out towards Klaus' middle that they knew they were on the right path. He barely moved in time to dodge it but Rebekah wasn't so lucky. She slammed in to the blade, stopping just for it to reach through half of her middle. She jutted out her hand, nails slicing the warlock's throat. Her own throat was slit but healed as the man fell dead to the floor. Klaus ripped the sword from her and she fell to her knees. "Vervain," she choked out, looking down at her stomach that wasn't healing as her throat had. Vervain in the wound meant it wouldn't heal quickly. "Go. Find her."
Klaus hesitated before going.
If only he hadn't paused.
Elijah and Kol fought through most of the witches, cracking heads together so they fell unconscious and only stumbling with a long blink whilst their men were lost to darkness for seconds and minutes, depending on age. They were the Originals. They did not feel the affects so much as their guards but it weakened them with each hit. Gashes covered them at time where they cut the living with their swords but they healed whilst the witches did not.
They fought for mere minutes before the witches all stopped and fell to the ground dead without attack. Kol and Elijah turned to each other. Someone had sucked the power from the witches, killing them. "Esther," Kol whispered, then the two of them were flashing around looking for their siblings.
Rebekah groaned as darkness took over her. There was but a speck of light and she could see a familiar pair of cold green eyes surrounded by red hair. "I am so sorry, my sweet daughter, but you cannot live any longer."
"I have yet to live at all, mother. You took my chance at happiness when you turned us. Allow me to find it now. You owe me that chance."
"You are not of this world. You have had long enough to live as abominations, Rebekah. I must right my wrong."
"By killing us."
"By destroying you. Then you shall kill yourselves."
Rebekah fought the darkness off to see her mother clearer. No, she wasn't her mother anymore. There was something in her eyes that actually frightened Rebekah. By destroying you. "Caroline," she breathed in horror, a hurt expression coming to her face as her mother stared at her. "You would take her life to destroy us? She is innocent!"
"She is anything but innocent," Esther hissed with a wild look in her eyes. "She is Niklaus' mate. She must have darkness in her to be that. She is-"
"NO! Nik never had darkness in him before. You and Mikael put that in to him. You neglected him and Mikael beat him. Nik was nothing but wonderful to us but you could not look at him because he brought you shame. He was punished because you were a harlot!"
A crack echoed in the hall as Esther slapped her. "You are not my daughter anymore. You are a monster."
"Because I defend my brother?"
"Because you slaughter the innocent."
"So do you, Esther. You're going to kill a child, an unborn child, all because you made a mistake centuries ago. If our kind were not a balance to the world, we would have been taken away the minute we were created. We would never have been made if we weren't meant to be here. There is a reason for this but you're too mad to see it."
"Call me mad all you wish, Rebekah. I have been pained and haunted since my death for making you. Torture on the Other Side is worse than anything you and your brothers could ever do to me on this side. I take my chances here over that hell."
Rebekah moved to lunge at Esther, but the witch flicked her hand and Rebekah's head snapped to the side with a sickening crack. She was left slumped against the wall, neck broken and stomach pouring with blood, the vervain festering in the gash.
Elijah and Kol blurred in to the hall but paused upon finding their sister. "You stay with her. Find someone for her to feed on. Preferably one of our fallen. They may be dead, but I suspect our humans and the witches have been fed vervain to prevent us gaining strength," Elijah sighed. Kol nodded before flashing away. Elijah lingered, waiting for him to return. He did so a moment later empty handed but a haunted expression. "What is it, Kol?"
"Our men have been turned to ash. All of them."
Anna led her through the tunnels, turn after turn, she questioned where they were going but never spoke a word. Anna suddenly stopped and a strike of stone against stone filled the silent cavern. A spark lit a torch, finally filling the darkness with some light. Caroline blinked against the light but Anna flinched away. With her enhanced sight, the sudden light was overwhelming. It was enough for the vampire ahead of them to whoosh past Anna and grab Caroline.
She was being carried away through the darkness until she was tossed to the ground. There was a space like a small room, lit by flaming torches all around her. Caroline looked up to the vampire, a hand protectively over her stomach. "Elena?" She whispered stunned, only earning a manic cackle from the brunette.
"I am not that wench!" She snapped suddenly, a frightening wildness in her eyes. There was no one to help her here. She was stuck with an insane version of her friend that had kidnapped her... probably to kill her. "My name is Tatia. I am the Original doppelgänger. You stole from me."
"What did I steal? I do not know you. I have never met you. I have never taken anything."
Tatia leaned in close, inches between their faces. Caroline pushed back but found she only cornered herself against a wall.
"Niklaus and Elijah. I was meant to have them both. They were taken from me by Esther. When I awoke a vampire, Esther told me I would never see them again unless I helped kill them. On the Other Side, I will be with them. Only, I do not trust the witch. She killed me once and I will not allow her to do the same again. I shall kill you and when they are vulnerable and mourning you, they shall be mine to take once more. It is a perfect plan."
"Not quite," Anna said coldly, walking towards them. Before either Caroline or Anna could react, Tatia span around. Caroline didn't know what happened until Tatia was pulling a dagger from her stomach. Then she let out the heart wrenching scream.
It was the scream that made the Original brothers pause, all dotted at weak points of the castle. They all flashed through to where it came from. When they arrived, they found Anna healing Caroline as the blonde lay unconscious in her arms. There was blood pooling from her stomach and between her legs, the small of death breaking Klaus.
He fell beside Caroline, snatching her from Ann but holding her carefully and closely. Her heart was faint but the heartbeat from her stomach was gone. Their son was gone. Someone had taken their son. "Tatia," Anna choked out with tear filled eyes. "That way. Dead end." She could not form sentences, also grieving for the heir and baby lost to the monster that was Tatia.
Kol and Elijah fled after her whilst Klaus was frozen. He lost his son. He almost lost his mate. He failed them. He failed himself. He failed her.
Elijah and Kol came to the dead end and looked around. There was no one around. There was also no escape. That was until Kol turned and the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. "There was magic here. I can feel it." They never questioned Kol's unnatural ability to sense magic just as they never questioned Rebekah's ability to spot even the best of lies that convinced everyone else.
"Where?" Elijah demanded, looking to see Kol's hand moving to a wall. Instead of touching it, his hand went straight through. "Here," he muttered before jumping through. "KOL!" Elijah screamed out before jumping after him.
They landed outside the grounds, coming out through a tree. There was no one there but there had been. A fire, still warm, had been abandoned. It could have been left before the attack but Elijah guessed they fled when Kol's hand fell through the portal.
"Come, I sense it is this way," Kol ordered, taking on an uncharacteristic seriousness that had Elijah following without question.
She awoke with a gasp, hand coming to find her stomach flat. Her heart shattered inside her chest. He was gone. Her son, her child, her baby, was gone. Tears pricked her eyes but it was only when Klaus suddenly came to her side that she broke. She had imagined their son so many times but he always looked like his father. Seeing Klaus look at her with such worry made her feel broken.
She lost her son and could see him in her husband.
She could no longer look at him but he took her in to his arms and held her.
She found no comfort in his arms. She could only imagine her son's arms waving around as a newborn. Where Klaus' hands rested on her hip and arm to hold her, she imagined her son's hands gripping her finger for the first time. The tears that fell from Klaus' eyes on to her shoulder had her imagining her son's wail in the night when he missed her.
She shoved him off with all her might. She was weak but the shock was what had Klaus releasing her. "Leave me," she hissed at him. He looked broken, even moreso than when he attacked her that night for making him feel for her. He looked lost and confused but she still only saw what she had lost.
Caroline had failed as a wife, as a mate, and as a mother. She could not even feel his presence without feeling the sickening guilt consume her. She was drowning and it was his fault. If he was gone like her son, then she would feel nothing.
Klaus nodded once and silently left in the moment it took for her to blink away the tears. Anna came in then, sitting beside her and holding her as a mother would with her saddened child. That only served to make her angry and she pushed Anna away, too. She would push everyone away. Then she would find a way to join her son in death. Only after she ripped apart the woman that took him from her.
He tried to join her later that night when Elijah and Kol returned empty handed and alone but she pushed him away again. "Why are you doing this? We need each other now more than ever, Caroline. We lost our son-"
"YOU LOST NOTHING! I should have protected him but she took him. He did not grow in your womb. You did not feel his kicks, his movements. You did not feel his life tied to yours. I did! I lost my son! You only lost an heir. I cannot even look at you without seeing what I lost. Just leave! LEAVE ME ALONE! Die for all I care. Just leave me! You bring me nothing but pain. You always have. Stay away from me and let my grieve for my son!"
He stepped back, looking at her as if she'd slapped him and then ripped out his heart. She did not care though. She was in pain – in agony – and nothing could break through that wall of mourning. "Very well. I shall leave. I will return when you wish it," he replied diplomatically.
"I would not expect a request for your return," she hissed before turning her back on him.
"Goodbye, Caroline."
He told no one that he meant to leave the country, not just their wing of the castle. He left a note for Elijah and then took a carriage to the docks where he boarded a ship, compelling himself the captain's quarters.
Dear Elijah,
Caroline is in too much pain for me to stay. As her mate, I cannot refuse her. I care not for the kingdom whilst she is in so much pain. The distance may hurt me but her loss will prevent her from feeling anything for me, if she ever felt anything before.
Take care of her, brother. I entrust you with her life. I also entrust you with our kingdom. Whilst I am gone, you may rule until Caroline is fit to be queen again. I expect no letter to come to me any time soon and that is why I will wait for six more months to tell you my location.
I believe the point the attack was to break us so the kingdom would be weak. Make sure that does not happen.
When Caroline is well again, when she has mourned her loss of our son, tell her that there is a letter for her in the first drawer of my dresser. It will explain much and tell her much. Take care of our family, Elijah.
Your brother,
Niklaus.
AN: As I know that the littlest of things can be a trigger, I did try to hold the same emphasis on the trauma without the details. Please, leave a review and let me know what you think.
By the way, I'll be on holiday for the next two weeks and I don't think there is any wi-fi. I hate to say this, but do not expect an update for a few weeks. I would say I'll have the next chapter written soon after I come back but there is a lot going on in my life so if it is longer than a month, PM me and tell me to write the next chapter for you.
I am working on Giving In for those of you that also read that. Its just that I had a burst of inspiration for this then got distracted. I'll get that up in a couple of days, I think.