Amelia blinks up at the ceiling, watching shadows shifting in the dawn light before turning her head on the pillow to look at her sister. Lia sleeps quietly, curled up on her side. They each have a separate room, connected by a door, but neither considered the alternative. Both have been only children for years, used to their own space, but they feel small and lost without each other now.
"…I used to dream of me and mom," Lia says quietly, eyes still closed. "Only I think that was you. I think I had visions of you both in Mystic Falls but didn't know it."
"How did you know what she looked like?" Ames asks as Lia opens her eyes and turns to her.
"Dad had this old, really weird picture of them together. They were dressed up as Victorians," Lia explains and they laugh. "I think he still has it. It might be with the luggage."
"Which is still in the rental car outside."
"In the real world," Ames adds and they giggle again. Lia grasps her arm excitedly.
"It's 1964! It's like we've time travelled!"
"Wouldn't be the first time," Ames says dryly and their smiles fall. The peculiar dilemma of Gemima, the rainbow haired waitress, hangs heavy over both. Ames has tried to push the strange fact away but it will not leave her. In the future she wins the merge, travels back in time only to be killed by her own father. Nine years ago someone must have had to remove her body from her grandmother's kitchen, if the curse did not just erase all trace of her. Her grandmother never mentioned finding a dead girl in her kitchen so maybe there was nothing to bury. But she always felt uncomfortable in that room hadn't she? Something that made it hard to breathe.
…It's messed up…Lia's voice whispers softly into her thoughts and Ames snorts.
To a super duper degree. I know it won't be the same for us, the future isn't fixed like the past but she still died. She's actually dead. Maybe she has a grave…future me should never have gone back to 2017…that's what got her killed, she – me – tried to mess with the past but you can't.
They nod at each other in silence and then sit up to rest against the wall. Lia sighs, rubbing sleep from her eyes. "One thing is for sure future you is a bad bitch. Time travel! Tattoos!"
Ames tells her to shut up, laughing and then grows pensive. "That's what we could be Lee. We can learn to control this power, we can do so much with it."
"I don't even know what the hell this is. I mean it feels so right, like breathing, but it's breathing moon air or something. Which is why grandpa separated us," Lia says darkly and Ames feels her breath catch. The Gemini leader…only their father is the true leader.
"You have a lot to catch me up on. What job does dad do if he's not officially in charge?"
"He's a house wife," Lia says at once and they laugh again. "I'm not even joking. It might be the curse but I think if he could just stay at home, update his cooking blog, annoy aunt Jo and play baseball he'd be happy. Apart from that he finds siphoners in the coven. We have monthly meetings, it's nice but lots are still too scared to come forward. They call us leeches and stuff."
"Meetings sounds nice. There was no siphoners in Mystic Falls, it was just me," Ames touches her pendant as Lia nod, getting out of bed. She stretches and holds out her hand, wagging her fingers at a cardigan she folded over a chair. It shrugs and then falls to the ground. She sighs and drops her arm.
"The magic from the curse we siphoned is gone. I'm running empty."
Ames makes an awing noise and with a wave of her fingers she sends the zip up hoodie flying to her twin. Lia frowns at her as Ames smiles smugly, getting out of bed. She taps at the pendant around her neck. From a distance it appears to be a small faceted ruby but as Lia inspects closer she sees her mistake.
"Blood?"
"Vampire to be exact. They're only walking around and stuff because magic created them. Their blood is a renewable source of magic for me. Once we get our hands on more I'll make you one."
Lia gives her twin an impressed look, who shrugs off her ingenuity. They look for something else to wear, talking about the investment possibilities of a magical jewellery business, which then brings them to the dreadful realisation that they have no internet access. They peer at their cell phones, matching looks of horror on their faces.
"How are we gonna survive with no wifi?" Lia whines as Ames pulls out gingham dresses in a wardrobe that is clearly much, much bigger on the inside. She pushes coats aside and finds another rail of shirts. The sting of despair fades.
"This is so cool. I think I've found Narnia," she laughs, about to explore the depths of the wardrobe when Lia grabs her wrist and they pause. From below they hear music and the clack and clang of pots. Lia inhales and smells pancakes and then the sound of her mother singing. Combined with the scent and the singing voice she has not heard since she was four years old Lia blinks back tears, overwhelmed with memory. Ames smiles at her in understanding and taking her hand they walk from the bedroom and into the spacious apartment they share but do not stop to explore it. They will have time for that later and the wardrobe and the mystery of where it leads to…
Bonnie swings her hips to the beat to Hallelujah, I Love Her So, twirling the end of her dressing gown belt. Kai smiles as he makes a batch of scrambled eggs, watching her dance as she puts plates down on the table and when the girls appear she spins on the spot, singing loud before beckoning them to her. She takes their hands, twirling them around her and then to their seats at the breakfast table. The bay windows have a stunning view of the sea.
"What date is it?" Ames asks as Bonnie sits at the head of the table as Kai serves the eggs. He frowns, looking up.
"May 25th? I think. It'll last until June 21st and then reboot."
"Your birthday!" Lia proclaims and he smiles, nodding but Ames looks confused.
"Reboot?"
"Pris – these worlds are stuck in time loops," Bonnie explains as Kai sits at the other end of the table. "Usually it's daily but this one lasts for a month."
Kai nods, digging into his breakfast. "We'll grow for a month but then time resets the entire dimension, along with our bodies. We won't really age."
"Cool…" Ames smiles in wonder, forgetting her food until Bonnie prompts her to eat. She chews on bacon as Lia folds over a pancake and stuffs it into her mouth, looking thoughtful. Ames taps her fork. "They're usually on a daily loop? How do you know that?"
Bonnie stills and looks at Kai over the table. He wears a matching look of surprise before he covers it with an easy smile. "I told her. These places are a Gemini speciality."
Ames nods and carries on eating, not seeing the secretive look that her parents share. Bonnie sips on coffee as House of the Rising Sun croons from the stereo. Lia gulps down orange juice, looking between Bonnie and Kai for a few moments.
"So…are you dating now?"
Kai chokes on a bark of shocked laughter and coffee. He opens his mouth and looks at Bonnie with wide eyes. She gazes at him, the corner of her lips quirking and the beginnings of doubt cloud his eyes as she remains silent. She looks at Lia, lowering her head and voice.
"Yes," she answers simply. Kai sighs audibly, sitting back and Ames laughs.
"This is so awkward. Imagine if either of you were dating or married!"
Lia gasps, shaking her head at her twin. "No way. Dad never dated."
"Neither did mom. I had more boyfriends than she did," she proclaims and they break into loud laughter. Bonnie rolls her eyes and then smiles at Kai over her coffee cup but it slops over the side at Lia's next question.
"Sooo…wedding?"
"Lia!" Ames cries, looking scandalised but she turns hopeful eyes to Bonnie and Kai. "That was our birthday wish; you know when we were together last? We wanted to be bridesmaids." Again the adults share looks of bewilderment, blinking in the morning light before they start laughing.
"She just agreed to be my girlfriend. Do you know how long it's taken me to get this far? Your mom is hard work," Kai answers, chuckling as Bonnie sits back, saying nothing but she casts him heated gazes, which he returns with a smirk. They finish their breakfast until the girls stand, itching to move and see what the house has to offer. They demand that Kai give them a tour and he agrees.
"This place is a lot bigger then it appears. There's a map somewhere…" he narrows his eyes in thought as Bonnie comes to his side and he places his arm around her waist. Still dressed for bed they move to the glass conservatory, which is accessed through French doors at the end of the kitchen.
"We've seen this," Lia says and Kai smirks.
"You sure? See that door behind those big ferns? Open it."
Frowning but following his instructions the twins walk along the tables that are littered with pots and earth, to the side of the conservatory. A small white door is almost hidden behind plants, its paint old and peeling. Kai stands back with his hands in the pockets of his sweatpants, smiling as Ames opens the door. More leaves block the path and the girls push them aside and step through.
"…Holy sh…sugar," Lia breathes, staring upwards and Bonnie follows. They are not in a store cupboard as she first suspected, or even another part of the same small conservatory. The greenhouse is immense, the vaulted glass ceiling tall enough to house palm trees and others that she has to crane her neck to look up at. She can hear a fountain in the distance and inhales the scent of petrichor and jasmine. The foliage is dense but sunshine beams down at them through foggy windows.
"How big is it?" she asks with wonder. They appear to be in a section that houses orchids, growing in the root systems of mossy trees. Bonnie experiences an vivid memory of another Victorian glasshouse, where orchids had grown in the steaming heat while an endless snow had fallen outside. Spring sunshine bathes them and they soon become warm.
"I'm not sure exactly," Kai answers as she takes off her robe, revealing Kai's shirt she had put on. He comes to her side. "It's huge, with all sorts of rare plants and cuttings. There's even an original white oak on the grounds."
Bonnie widens her eyes and looks back at the plants as the girls try to sniff the orchids. "The only thing that can kill an Original? If Klaus knew he'd burn this island to the ground."
Kai laughs and then sighs wistfully. "I'm bummed I never got to meet an Original vampire, especially since they went missing. That your doing?" he asks but Bonnie shakes her head with a shrug. They begin walking, the twins already lost in the foliage.
"Elena has been missing too, for years now. I think the two are connected but I could never find any of them."
"Hmm know what that means right?"
"They're dead?"
"Even without the Other Side you can speak to the dead Bon, if you try hard enough. What if they're in a place like this?" Kai asks and Bonnie stops as they come to a huge rectangular lily pond the size of a swimming pool. The girls wave from the other side as the adults sit on a bench. Bonnie taps her knee thoughtfully.
"It would explain why no locating spells worked. But how?"
He shrugs. "I'm just hypothesising. The Gemini wouldn't lock them up unless provoked and I heard nothing. So something else…"
The sit and ponder in silence, watching the pond as a warm breeze blows over their faces. Bonnie gazes at him, playing with the hair at the nape of his neck as he sits back. She had taken the contraceptive potion that morning but Kai says they can make capsules, with ingredients from the greenhouse. Bonnie looks at the pond again, a thought plaguing her.
"Lia said that you're sick…"
Kai stiffens, looking at her before he shrugs and looks aside. "I'm managing it."
"But what is it? Are you okay?" she leans closer to him and he glances at her.
"It's not catching or anything…well, I don't think so," he adds with a frown and then stares at her fixedly. "After I merged with Luke I could generate his magic but I should have gotten Jo's. Every time I used it, like when I helped get you out of 1994, I got sick. Sweating, shakes like a fever or a bad trip. Just all around crappy."
"But you got better when you took her magic?"
"She gave it to me. If she hadn't I think I would have died if I kept using the magic I had. As soon as she did I was fine…and the world didn't disintegrate around you. I was worried you'd get sucked into oblivion if I died," he confesses and she smiles briefly before growing serious. He had died in a prison world before and thin spots had appeared, spots that did not mend. That was how they had run into Silas, who escaped oblivion only to be trapped by them in 1994...
Bonnie blinks and focuses on Kai. "But you started to get sick again? When they were ten?"
He nods after a pause. "Yeah. I couldn't figure it out and I still don't know why. It doesn't happen when I use magic. It's just random. Jo is stumped but we found something that helps the symptoms, just through trial and error. I got really lucky. The herbs grow here."
"Good. I'll help you. You haven't heard of anyone else with it?"
Again he hesitates, licking his lips before he speaks. "…My mom died when I was twenty. It was sudden, she got sick and a month later she was dead. My dad said it was a very rapid, virulent form of cancer but he lied. When I got sick he confessed that she had a magical disease, didn't know what it was but he was sure it was magical in origin. He didn't want people to know in case it caused a panic."
"Was it magical?"
"The illness fed on her magic, made the disease stronger. It drained it, along with her life…and that's what happens to me if I don't take the medication."
"A siphoning disease?" Bonnie asks and he smirks.
"Ironic right?"
"But she wasn't a siphoner?"
"No. It's strictly a Parker speciality. Our genes are cursed," he adds cheerfully and then winces. "Sorry. I don't think the girls are at risk or you, no one else has gotten sick after all this time but…"
"You don't know for sure."
They sit in silence, mulling it over until the sound of running feet and heavy breathing reaches them. The girls, sweaty and grinning, stop at the bench.
"There's a locked door," Ames gasps.
"Called The Poison Room," Lia finishes excitedly.
Kai looks at them with a cocked brow. "…And you want me to open it?"
Ames scoffs. "We can open it we just thought it would be polite to ask first."
"Oh my god," Bonnie groans as Kai laughs, getting to his feet and pulling her up with him. She looks at the girls. "This is purely educational. No touching, taking or inhaling anything."
Kai nods and then hums. "That's a point: school."
The twins groan but Bonnie nods. "He's right. While we're here you're not just gonna sit on your butts doing nothing. You should both be studying right now…but seeing as this is a witch house…"
They gasp in happiness, Ames clasping her hands. "It'll be like our night classes. No math, no science, no history," she sighs with bliss as they walk through the glasshouse, passing into a section with an array of herbs that hang from drying racks. Kai shakes his head.
"Yes math, yes science, yes history. Bonnie's right, you're not gonna spend your days floating feathers. You'll learn all there is to know about magic. Lia you were about to start defensive magic anyway."
"Will you be floating feathers while we're studying?" Ames answers back, though the knowledge that they will be taught defensive magic makes her want to fly.
Bonnie tilts her head. "We'll be working out how to break the curse when we're not teaching you."
"And when we're not floating feathers," Kai answers as he presses his palm over the lock of the door. The girls roll their eyes.
"Will Granny P teach us? We could go see her between sunrise and sunset?" Lia asks and Kai stills as they look through the door. Frosted, foggy glass offers an obscured view of the room beyond. Bonnie shakes her head.
"No, you leave her alone. We'll teach you. Now let's see what the Gemini keep behind locked doors…"
"Oleander. Seers burn it and inhale the fumes to get visions. Too much and you end up hallucinating. Me and Jo did it once, most fun we ever had together," Kai reminisces with a grin and Bonnie looks at the small white flowers growing on the small tree.
"Your family are a little too into narcotics, you know that?" Bonnie deadpans as he laughs. She sighs, peering closer at the delicate flowers. "I used to have so many visions when I was a teenager. I don't get them as much now."
"Well if you're tempted," he waves his hand at the flowers but she shakes her head, straightening.
"No thanks. I also know that doing too much and you could end up poisoning yourself and go mad," she moves away as Kai follows at her back. The twins are back in the house, looking for clothes to wear. The fascination had worn off quickly when they could only look and not start brewing deadly nightshade for their enemies. The Poison Room is about the same size as the conservatory, with many glass cabinets lining a side wall. Belladonna, wolfsbane, vervain and many other plants grow in neat rows and powders are stored in glass bottles in the cabinets. Tables line the other side of the room, where dried herbs are crushed and bottled.
"Every supernatural creature has a weakness. Werewolves have aconite and silver, vampires have vervain, sunlight and the white oak. Their strength is balanced by weakness," Kai muses as Bonnie stops to look at the labelled bottles. Sunlight slants through the glass around them and waves crash against a nearby beach. She smiles.
"Wondering what balances a witch? When we step out of line Nature doesn't create a plant or metal, she strikes us with the very thing we're meant to serve."
"Or takes it away," Kai adds and again Bonnie thinks on his illness. His magic weakens when the illness is not treated. Could it be something that only targets witches? A rare disease as she has not heard of it affecting anyone else.
"Have you tried healers?"
He nods, fiddling with a mortar and pestle. "Yup and nothing. They agreed it was magical in origin, the way it feeds on it," he says and after another long, tense silence he looks up and smiles. "This is boring. I wanna show you more…and then fuck you again until I can't move."
Bonnie smirks as he takes her hand and pulls her from the room, locking it with a wave of his hand. "And when you can't move?"
"You take over, duh."
"Duh…" cheeks warm Bonnie follows him back into the kitchen and up the stairs. Her mind whirling with the possibilities of how they will tire each other out Kai leads her up and up, higher than the house has any right to be. He wants to work from top to the bottom.
"It's got like a thousand rooms."
"That's impossible."
"It might be more. This is meant to house my coven, if they need protection, so lots of space…Eloise loves illusions and regularly fucks with dimensional proportion of things, as you witnessed with her house. She pushes the boundaries. The Lighthouse spreads through the island…and under it," Kai adds, out of breath as they reach the top of the staircase. There is just a short corridor with a door at the end.
"The attic?" Bonnie sits on a couch, chest heaving. The spiral staircase made her feel dizzy.
"Take a look," he urges and Bonnie eyes him for a moment but once her breathing is under control she moves to the door.
She expects to find a room bigger than it should be and her guess is right but it does not prepare her. Attics store keepsakes and memories, broken things that have too much sentimental value to discard. trunks full of baby clothes and old records, albums of photographs, letters and bus tickets. Faded wedding dresses and broken beds. Old funeral wreathes. A place of quiet and still, an ephemeral collection of cherished and forgotten pasts. For a two thousand year old coven there is a lot to forget…
"Oh my god!" Bonnie gasps, staring wide eyed in the gloom of the room, which is speared by beams of light. "This isn't an attic, it's a warehouse."
"Pretty much. Wanna explore?"
"Where are the girls?" she asks, looking back at the door. They are many floors up, Bonnie counted seven in all but she may be wrong.
"They're in the wardrobe trying on stuff," he says and then rolls his eyes at her uncertainty. "I can feel every presence on this island. If a mouse sneezed I'd hear it. We're safe here. They'll probably be in there for hours. I'll show it to you next, we can get a change of clothes there."
Bonnie nods and follows Kai into the attic, which is separated into sections by wardrobes, large picture frames and bookshelves. Kai takes her hand and leads her past a flank of beds, mattresses piled on top of each other in topsy-turvy columns until they disappear in the darkness of the roof. He eyes her suggestively over his shoulder. Bonnie gives him a heavy lidded look and he laughs.
"They're only good for jumping on anyway…"
"Where did all this stuff come from?"
"The family. If no one else wants their stuff when they die we store it here. A lot of it is magical so we can't give it to thrift stores."
"These musty mattresses are magical?"
Kai turns, grinning. "Fertility spells are woven into them. Why do you think there's so many of us?"
"Gross." Bonnie pulls a face as she eyes the beds, careful not to touch and he laughs again.
"They also have enchantments so you sleep well and ward off nightmares and stuff."
"What about our bed?" she asks and feels a pang. Is it their bed already? By rights they should be working to break the curse keeping them on the island not familiarising themselves with it. She knows that is the sensible thing to do, to get back to their lives but she has no desire. Was that life even real? The people she has met, the job she has and the friends she has made, was it all fake? Bonnie stares at the dark interior of a busted television set and Kai rubs her arm, looking at her thoughtfully.
"What's wrong?"
"Should we be doing this?"
Kai stiffens, jaw clenching. "Doing what?"
"We're not doing anything. Shouldn't we be trying to stop the curse?"
"We will, you said it yourself. Do you want to right now?"
"Do you?"
"It's not going anywhere and we're safe here. We could stay for as long as we need. Not forever," he adds hastily at the anxious look on her face, moving closer. He smirks. "As nice as this is I have no desire to spend forever in another prison world. We'll leave, nothing is stopping us this time."
"We have Eloise's blood and the ascendant. The curse can only get us at sunrise or set. You asked your grandmother to get siphoners. Do you really think there's enough to drain the curse?"
Kai shrugs. "It's worth a try."
"What about your coven? Your father?" Bonnie whispers, rage igniting in her belly at the thought of the man. He thought he was acting for a greater good, seeing her children as an imbalance but he ripped their lives apart. This is why they must stay for as long as they need, not to mend the pieces together, that's impossible, but to grow new ones. She does not know what will happen when they leave, if those Gemini will try to separate them again but this time they will be ready.
Kai gazes at her deeply before speaking and she is caught in the darkness of it. "…If I kill him would you stop me?"
"…No."
"If I trap him in another world would you stop me?"
"I'd push him in as you chant," she says and Kai nods with relief, breathing out through his nose. She touches his cheek gently. "What are you planning?"
"I don't know yet but he's going to fucking suffer, they all are."
Bonnie thinks of her cousin Lucy, of the few Bennett's who had a part in the curse, and her stomach turns. They had sided with the Gemini rather than help her, not out of anger but fear. Her own scattered family were so scared of her children they attacked, rather than reach out. Her rage is intense and sharp but she remembers the trembling, regretful voice of her cousin and cannot get it out of her mind.
"We need to know about the Bennett prophecy that started this mess. We have to figure it out and what it has to do with the girls, if at all."
Kai nods, pulling her into his arms with a sigh. "Seers from all covens have been reporting about something bad coming. There's a library here, the Gemini Archive, we can start there."
Bonnie nods, pulling back and he leans down to kiss her softly. The touch is light but when she steps away he pulls her back quickly. His tongue parts her lips, his hands sliding down her back to rest on her ass. The kiss is slow and leisurely and when she pulls back for air every part of her tingling and pulsing. Kai draws his thumb over her lip.
"I know you're grossed out by the beds but it could be fun. I'm thinking the stacked mattresses. You'd be at the top, like the princess and the pea. I'd be the hard thing keeping you up…" he bites his bottom lip as his eyes start to shine mischievously. Bonnie arches an eyebrow.
"No chance. You'll have to catch me first," she sing songs, backing away and before Kai can respond she disappears. He grins, cocking his head.
"You know I can sense your every movement?"
"…Doesn't mean I can't outrace you old man."
Kai gasps. "That's low. I'm super sprightly for a fifty something year old."
"…Forget I said anything," her dry voice drifts simultaneously from above and behind him and he spins. He can sense her presence near the boxes full of old photographs but he ignores it, pretending that he has no clue.
"Does it gross you out? I mean I don't even look my physical age…" by appearances they were both in their mid-thirties now, though look younger.
"When I'm eighty you'll be a hundred."
"But look fifty and still get it up," he assures her and hears a chuckle from behind a manikin. "When I get you I want you on your hands and knees. A bed is optional."
"…And if I catch you?" she asks, her voice echoing around him. He does nothing to disguise his voice, he wants her to know exactly where he is.
"Hmm, I just realised I don't really know what your fantasies are. What do you dream about Bon?"
There is silence and he stills, listening. He can imagine the heat bathing her cheeks, the constriction of her chest as she tries to speak. Her voice is soft when she finally talks, not hiding where she is. She is two feet from him, crouching behind a trunk.
"…It depends. On the way here, I thought if we weren't going to make it I wanted you to take me wherever we stopped. In a bathroom stall by the side of the road, against a tree…Anywhere. Quick, desperate and unseen. Then I had nine years before that…" her voice drifts off and he exhales a pent up breath. He had imagined a similar scenario on the way to Portland. However he cannot imagine her fantasies are as messed up and pathetic as his in the nine years they had been separated. He thought she was dead but she had a sliver of hope he was alive.
"What did you imagine?"
"…When – when I had sex with men I pictured you," she whispers in a breathless voice. "I sometimes got so…dissatisfied that I imagined that it was an illusion, a trick. I'd come and open my eyes and see you on top of me, inside me. I'd cry afterwards because I knew it was impossible. None were witches, none were you."
Kai licks his lips, chest rising and falling. He was painfully hard now but clenches his hands around a large picture frame. "Did you ever…?"
"Create an illusion of you?" she finishes for him and Kai nods, Bonnie still hidden from him. "Yes…mostly you spooning me."
He laughs. "Really?"
"Yeah, I had lots of dreams about that actually but you'd siphon my magic too. Those were weird. Those started after I saw you at the rave."
"After my painfully awkward apology? I didn't know I could stammer until that day," he confesses and she laughs.
"What did you hope would happen?"
"You'd set me on fire and shout at me until I stopped burning. Then we'd have a drink, get wasted and then I'd screw away all your anger against a cold wall of that warehouse."
"…We would have been fucking for days."
"Ooh Bon. We have so much time to make up for."
"I know. Did you create illusions of me?" she asks and he hears her shift on her knees, the catch of her breath. She is turned on. His hand reaches for his fly, toying with the zip.
"At first but it wasn't enough. It's superficial, there was no magic…Bonster, when I catch you, I'm going to make your magic go fucking nuts."
"If you catch me," she says as Kai suddenly leans over the trunk but she is gone. Out of the corner of his eye he sees the edge of her bathing robe and spins as she disappears behind a huge ancient family portrait.
He throws out his hands and the walls ripple, the lights dimming before the attic suddenly plunges into darkness. He hears her ragged breathing and grins as a drumbeat starts in the dark, a note that resonates around them before more join it. It grows louder, becoming clearer as a kaleidoscope of flashing lights suddenly burst through the attic.
The rave.
He wonders briefly if this is the right thing to do but his head is thumping with memory, his body pounding with want. When she flashes past him she is no longer dressed in a robe but a dark dress, black tights and coat. Her hair is different, a short bob like she used to wear. She had changed her appearance and Kai follows suit. When he finally catches her she freezes as he prowls forward in a high necked black frock coat and jeans.
"Oh god," she says in a choked voice, her face bathed in light and colour before he pounces on her and pushes her into the shadows. Her back hits a cold brick wall and she looks up to see a ribbon of starry night sky between buildings. She exhales and her breath mists in the cold February air. Music beats faintly from the warehouse, lights flickering on the wall opposite. The base thuds in her chest, matching her heart. His illusion is total, a testament to his power.
"This is turning me on so much," he moans and kisses her hard. She tastes alcohol when his tongue thrusts into her mouth and then she stops thinking about gin and stars when his hands squeeze her tits. She grips his head, feels the tickle of heat along her skin and knows if this happened during that night she would have set him on fire, not push him to his knees. He rips her leggings and panties down, so they rope around her ankles. Bonnie grips his hair, tugging and he looks up at her on his knees. Her skin stings in the cold but she ignores it and she just has time to inhale before he leans forward, spreads her and slowly swipes at her clit with his tongue.
Bonnie groans, her head falling back against the wall as he buries his face between her legs. At the real rave, now so many years ago, she had threatened to maim him and stormed out, inflicting her violence on another. Does she harbour any of that anger still? She forgave him but she feels a prickle of sadness for the girl who left and decided to carry all that bottled rage and pour it into a hunting knife instead. Would it have been different if they fought? If they fucked? She doubts it would have solved anything but it might have prevented 1903 and everything that came after.
"…You'd be gentle back then, if this happened. You were shaking," she says softly and he pulls back to stare at her. He licks his lips and a pulse of lust shoots through her. Kai inhales sharply.
"What do you want?"
"I don't want soft."
"…Good."
He presses his lips to the back of her hand then bites her palm hard enough to leave a mark before he resumes eating her out. Bonnie leans her head back, moaning low in her throat, and imagines where it would have led. Would she have taken him back to her dorm room? No, that's what he would hope for, that man who could barely string a sentence together he was so nervous. He would get drunk, try to numb the feelings that were making him crazy but it would not work. His fantasy was a chance of reconnection but she would not have given him that mercy.
"If – if this happened I'd get what I wanted and walk away, leave you on your knees, unsatisfied," she whispers, looking up at the sky as his tongue circles her clit. Her legs shake and she rests her knees against his shoulders, otherwise she would fall. She looks down and he gazes at her with a predatory excitement, still working her and she gets the feeling he wants to respond and she smiles sharply. "Don't stop, use that tongue for something else for once."
He chuckles and looks back down, his fingers digging into her ass, pulling her closer. She grabs his hair in fists, the pleasure building until she begins to buck slowly against his mouth. He lathes his tongue over her flesh in long, slow swipes before concentrating on the small bud of nerves and never stops. She gasps, her hands alternatively gripping his head and waving helplessly in the air, the pleasure becoming so intense she wants to escape it. He looks up as she keens, almost sobbing and licks and sucks on her faster, left hand on her hip. Bonnie closes her eyes but she still sees the lights flashing around them, rocks with the thud of a fast, deep base bouncing through her body. Her eyes fly open and she shouts as he pushes two fingers inside her without warning, easing them in and out slowly before ramming them back in. Bonnie swears and shouts his name loudly.
"…I think they're here," a faint, distant voice says and Kai and Bonnie freeze. She stares wide eyed into the dark as far away someone stumbles. Bonnie tugs on his hair, almost tearing it out and he pulls back, blinking before he grins wickedly and pushes his face back between her thighs.
"Kai," she hisses, legs shaking but all words get sucked back into her chest with a ragged gasp as her knees give way as the first wave of her orgasm spikes through her. Kai supports her down to the ground, not stopping but as she mews loudly he reaches up and covers her mouth. She bucks and arches, riding out her orgasm, biting into the palm of his hand as he licks and finger fucks her, her legs shaking and stiffening around his body. Riding out the orgasm, one of the best she has ever had, Bonnie pants around his fingers that he forces into her mouth. She sucks on them, tasting herself. Smaller shudders pass through her as the pleasure fades, her limbs sapped of strength and now filled with something like honey. Kai pulls back after one last twirl of his tongue, making her hips buck. He rubs his face against her inner thigh, almost purring. She breathes heavily, hands now cradling his head gently but he keeps her down when she tries to get up, coming back to reality.
"They're going around in circles, they won't find us."
"…Kinda mean."
"And seeing this would be better? They'd need eye bleach and therapy," Kai comments and she smirks, stretching out her arms with a sated satisfaction. He leans over her, propped up on his hands. "So if this really happened you'd be walking away about now?"
She nods. "I wouldn't have given you anything."
"You think this wouldn't have meant something to me? Even using me for sex would have been more than I dreamed. Though I don't think I could have touched you without shaking like an idiot. Trust me, just looking at you satisfies me."
Bonnie hums happily, running one of her legs between his until she brushes against his softening erection. She wants to wrap her hand around him, make him lose the ability to speak but when she hears a noise closer to them she sits up, pushing him back sharply.
"Stay here, I'll go first."
"Go first?" he laughs, helping her stand. His clothes shimmer and change back into a t-shirt and sweat pants. "I feel we're in a school closet or something. Not that I ever did that, another drawback of being home schooled," he sighs, cocking his head. "Speaking of, I saw a picture of you in a cheerleader uniform when I was in your high school, you looked so cute."
Not wanting to know why he was at her old school Bonnie cocks her head. "If you were at my school with me I don't think the locker room would have been safe," she comments, standing on her tiptoes, back in her dressing gown as she brushes her lips close to his. Kai narrows his eyes.
"I would have probably tried out for a place just to fuck with you and your friends."
Bonnie laughs at the thought and then remembers how much he likes baseball. If they had a team she would have cheered him on. She lets herself daydream as she moves back, hearing the girls clearly now. They're giggling and Bonnie feels a swoop of embarrassment. She hopes they did not hear.
"Okay I'm gonna get dressed and then we're going to sit down and plan what we're gonna do while we're here." Bonnie taps her finger against her wrist and thinks somewhere Caroline would be proud of her. She then feels a deep pang of guilt. She has not seen her friend for some time or even thought about her much…
Kai nods, saluting and watches her move back through the dim aisle that is created by stacked paintings. More line the walls behind them. They cover the entire attic, thousands upon thousands, nestled between broken clocks and amulets. Bonnie stops, staring up and he turns. Directly over him is a large photograph of his family, taken before he and Jo were born. It is illuminated by a beam of light.
"Is that your mother?" Bonnie asks, pointing at a small, heavily pregnant woman with wild curly blonde hair. The young woman is sitting next to a twenty something Joshua Parker. Behind him Eloise and another man stand. They appear to be in a garden.
Kai looks at the picture of his parents and grandparents. "My dad had recently become coven leader, recently married…"
Bonnie nods, inspecting the wall and shelves. She catches glimpses of Kai, from baby to adolescent and smiles, moving closer. Kai's mother smiles down at a sleeping baby. He must have been a month old. Bonnie picks up a stack of photos and sees more and more of Kai. She settles them down, her stomach jumping strangely as he says nothing, just watches her with a mask like face. Amongst the picture frames she spots a child's baseball glove, a crude drawing of the sun and a hand print turkey. More and more items and she can guess she'll find clothes in the trunk at her feet.
"What's all your stuff doing up here in the dark?"
Kai shrugs, avoiding looking at her. "Are you surprised? My dad didn't want any recollection of me in the house. There's a lot missing. Guess Eloise got her hands on some, otherwise there'd be nothing left," he smiles briefly, hands in his pockets and she wishes she had not mentioned anything but the wound is visible and she cannot ignore it.
"Is that why you wanted to come up here? Find your old things?" Find them but not alone. Had he wanted her there for support? She could not imagine how she would feel if her family tried to remove every trace of her existence, warranted or not. She waits for an answer but Kai just shrugs again. The mood lies heavy and thick, only broken by the sudden appearance of the twins.
"There you are! We found something cool!" Ames and Lia appear at the end of the aisle, wrapped in large towels. Underneath they wear old fashioned bathing suits and swimming caps cover their hair. Bonnie goes to them with a soft smirk, after giving Kai a searching look.
"There's a pool here?"
"Three! It's indoor. It's nice and warm and huge. There are slides!" Ames brandishes a pair of goggles. Her towel is daisy yellow, while Lia's is pale lavender. Their favourite colours.
"We went through the wardrobe and found this amazing room full of clothes! For all ages and sizes. There are dresses and swords and capes! We're gonna dress up every day. There's another door that leads to the swimming pool's changing room. Let's go," Lia says excitedly and grabs Bonnie's hand. Kai watches them as they pull her away, hanging back. Lia beckons to him but he shakes his head with a small smile.
"I'll come later. Promise," he adds as their smiles falter. Bonnie stares at him, sees the hesitance and dark forgotten childhood around him and moves forward. She takes his hand and pulls him to her. He gazes at her as her lips curl up and she pulls him down to whisper in his ear.
"Think there's a cheerleading uniform in there?" she pulls back, looking at him innocently and a slow smile spreads over his face.
"Wouldn't a lifeguard be more appropriate? Never got to see that picture."
The twins look at each other, pulling disgusted faces. "We heard that."
Kai laughs and when they leave the attic he does not look back.
After spending the day swimming and exploring more of the house Bonnie lays curled along Kai's body, her back to him. She is exhausted and happy but a question keeps her up.
"What do you think is happening out there?" she asks and Kai groans behind her sleepily. They had made love earlier, after showering.
"…What do you mean?"
"What the curse has done. Have they forgotten about us completely? Do they still think we're at the theme park?"
Bonnie turns to look at him as he leans on an elbow and stares down at her. "I don't know. We'll need to pay my grandmother a visit soon, after sunrise," he sighs and slumps back down. "Jo better remember something otherwise I think that demon cat will have killed Damon, before he dies of starvation."
"What?" Bonnie laughs, confused. Kai grins and lifts his hand towards his cell phone. It flies off the nightstand and after catching it he opens up his picture gallery. They have no reception or internet but there is electricity, so their phones won't drain of power.
"I have a husky with bright blue eyes and a thing for brunettes."
"Damon," she laughs in understanding, looking at a picture of the dog, the light bathing their faces. Her smile fades and Kai tilts his head, staring at her.
"How did he die?"
Bonnie shrugs. "Elena went missing and Damon wanted to find her. I had just given birth, on the run from your coven, but he found me. I did a locating spell but I couldn't find any trace of her, no matter how many times I tried. He didn't like that…so he took one of the girls, said I needed more motivation."
"What?!" Kai sits up, dropping the cell and Bonnie sits up with him, nodding.
"Damon was a dick but he did become my friend, in a weird way…something wasn't right, it was like he had switched off his humanity."
"Had he?" Kai's voice is low, a growl.
She shakes her head. "There was nothing to switch back to. He was like the person I first met but worse. He began a killing spree along the west coast, while your coven were hunting the Heretics and searching for me. I know Damon was an asshole but this was something else. Something bad happened to him but even now I don't know what it was. He wanted Elena, that's all he would tell me but I thought if he found her she wouldn't survive. So I stopped looking and told him to leave. I started to think he was working with the Gemini and he used that against me. He took Ames and contacted your father," Bonnie inhales at the memory, the panic that had griped her and how all notion of friendship had vanished.
"You killed him?"
"…I left him to die, which I guess amounts to the same thing. I captured him, tied him up but he wouldn't tell me where she was. I – I didn't have anyone to turn to then but the Heretics. I had killed Malcolm but Beau and Nora, they helped me. They found her and we used our magic to stop him. Damon killed a lot of them too."
"Which I'm sure my coven was grateful for," Kai adds and Bonnie nods.
"Very. I started to suspect that they had something to with Damon's behaviour, he killed a lot of Heretics in his rampage...Anyway, we captured him and melted his daylight ring. They left him tied to a stake as the sun came up as revenge."
"That's how we like to kill them, if they mess with us," Kai whispers and Bonnie remembers when he once recounted how he and his father watched two vampires burning alive in their back yard. He had called it a bonding experience.
"I – I'm sorry that he died like that, for whatever it's worth but he threatened me, he was dangerous and I had to make a choice."
"The right one. Where does Stefan fit into this?"
Bonnie lifts her brows. "He was in New Orleans. He tried to reach out to Damon but couldn't. The Originals disappeared at the same time as Elena so Stefan was investigating that coincidence. The last time I saw Elena was in Oregon, she visited me and the twins. She seemed okay when she left but she never made it home. I never saw her again," Bonnie says and Kai nods, looking thoughtful.
"That's why Damon targeted you…" he hums and then looks at her with a smirk. "I know she was your friend and she totally dug my sense of humour but her life was a web of drama and doppelgangers. Think how crazier your life would be right now if she was still here and in need of help? So for that I'm thankful you only see her on milk cartons, our life is dramatic enough without you sacrificing yourself again."
Bonnie stares at the dimming screen of his phone, at the dog but not seeing it. Kai kisses the side of her head, telling her that she had done the right thing leaving the mystery of Elena Gilbert alone and Bonnie nods. Her children are her priority and she would sacrifice others a thousand times over for them and for her place beside them. It is a strange hollow feeling, where once she would have felt a deep responsibility and guilt but now it is empty. She had risked her life and soul repeatedly for others and it had filled her up in a way, the odd power of martyrdom. It fed that starved, lonely place in her but in reality it left her with nothing. Martyrs are only meant to die once, anymore and it becomes nothing more than a parlour trick, taken for granted and in time loses power over people. They had lost the wonder in her magic, in her and in time so had she. She lost faith in those friendships a long time ago and you can't be a martyr without a cause, otherwise it's just suicide.
Kai brushes his lips against cheek. "What are you thinking?"
"That I probably should have gone to see a therapist when I was a teenager," she admits and he laughs.
"Oh I loved fucking with them. I think I gave one of them a nervous breakdown? Or at least a helpful push. I didn't wanna be there, I felt there was nothing wrong with me…though, to be fair, I actually learned a lot," he admits and Bonnie frowns, stomach squeezing at his light tone.
"Learned what?"
"How to be human."
Bonnie looks away, breath hitching. They are damaged in their own ways but she can say with assurance they are not who they were…but underneath her heart is a tiny hollow place that needs a sacrifice to feel whole and he still grins in accomplished at the minds he has toyed with. They are different but not wiped clean.
Bonnie tries to shake these peculiar thoughts and swipes the screen of his phone. Her eyes widen and she sits up. "Miss Cuddles! That's my cat!"
"Mr Cuddles," Kai corrects and laughs at the photograph of the black cat lying in Lia's lap. "That big bastard has already eaten my dog, I know it."
Bonnie inhales in wonder and feels a pang of sadness. "Did you call me before Halloween?"
"Yes but I never heard back. Guess you couldn't."
They smile at each other softly until the cat and dog are forgotten and the phone slips from her hand as she leans over to press her lips to his. All thought of lost friends and sacrifices fade away as they kiss and sink back down onto the bed.
In another bed the blue light of two phones illuminates a dark room as the twins hold a late night running commentary on the snapshots of their lives over the last nine years.
"Our cousins, Ellie and Lucy. They don't have any magic. They're my best friends," Lia explains as Ames looks at the picture of the identical twins with blonde hair and bright blue eyes. She smiles, remembering them from the theme park and looks at another picture.
"That's their mom and dad?"
"Yeah, Uncle Ric and Aunt Jo. She's dad's twin."
"What? She's like fifty," Ames frowns, looking at the picture of their beautiful aunt. She has a resemblance to their father, clearly his older sister not his twin.
"I know it's weird. Dad was born in 1972 but he looks mom's age."
"Uh how? And if he's the leader that means he won the merge and his twin died. Jo is alive."
Lia hesitates, licking her lips and Ames stares at her. When she speaks she keeps her voice low, as if scared of being overheard. "I don't know much and people won't tell me if I ask. Twins are meant to merge in the ritual to become leader, you're right but dad didn't merge with aunt Jo. He merged with him," Lia says and shows Ames a picture of a smiling blonde man Ames has never seen.
"Who's that?"
"Luke. He was aunt Liv's twin. He's dead now."
"…Because he died merging with our dad? That doesn't make sense. I asked mom about the Gemini and she said that they have to merge with their twins. That's pretty much all she would tell me actually," Ames adds disparagingly.
Lia nods. "They won't tell me much either. I asked about dad, the merge and everything but nothing. Sometimes I get the feeling they wanna say more but they won't. Or can't."
Ames frowns, looking at the picture of Luke and Liv, running her finger over Luke's face. "He looks nice."
Lia nods. "Aunt Liv says he was a good person. She misses him a lot."
"Dad killed him," Ames says quietly but Lia shakes her head.
"It doesn't work like that. They do a spell and then it's up to the powers that be after that. Dad says it's like your soul is weighed or something and the stronger one with magic wakes up."
"But they weren't twins," Ames says with exasperation and though she is frustrated a glimmer of hope begins to shine. "You can win the merge without killing your twin...Dad did it with Luke. Siblings but not the right twin…"
Lia stills, mouth open as she looks at Ames before she breaks into a laugh. "You thinking we need a backup pair of twins? Bloodthirsty. Shall we ask mom if she's feeling broody?"
"No!" Ames hits her sister's thigh over the cover with the phone. "I'm just saying there was a way around it."
They nod and fall into a thoughtful silence as they settle on a picture of Kai and Lia at a baseball game. Ames narrows her eyes. "Did he explain why he looks younger?"
Lia shrugs. "Not really, only that witches have ways around it but I guessed, especially when we got here."
Ames looks at her in question and Lia rolls her eyes. She waves her phone around the room. "He stayed in one of these places. He told us you don't age here."
"Oh why didn't I think of that?! That's smart Lia."
"I know," she brags and they giggle before growing serious. "He looks almost twenty years younger than aunt Jo. Twenty years."
"You think he was in another dimension for two decades? No way. He'd tell you."
Lia gives a sad, weak smile before it falls. "You'd think. Sometimes he looks like he wants to tell me something, like he's bursting with it but then he stops himself. He's…weird at those times, distant."
"What do you think is wrong?" Ames asks gently, taking Lia's hand.
"I don't know but we're gonna find out. We're together now and there shouldn't be any secrets."
They nod in determination and continue looking at Ames' phone. She asks if their father has any other siblings but Lia shakes her head. It had ever only been the two sets of twins, as far as she knows. Their solemn faces break into a grin as they come across another picture. It shows a man with green eyes smiling into the camera, his arm around Ames. Lia's eyes fill with recognition.
"Uncle Jaime! Oh man I haven't seen him in so long. Or granny," she adds sadly.
"He's getting married. I was gonna be a bridesmaid."
"When is he getting married?"
"Next year. June, I think. It's November in the real world right?"
Lia nods. "Well, now we know when the curse has to be broken by," Lia quips and sighs. "Seven months."
They smile, thinking of the possibilities that can occur during seven months on a magical island and when they fall asleep they share dreams of weddings, witches and newborn babies…