Chapter thirty six

Bullets

"What the hell just happened?"

Ava was pacing the length of the ghost ward when I came out of the half destroyed building, dragging Halia with me. I walked past Ava and towards my car, and she walked with me.

"We need to leave," I said, and Halia tugged uselessly at my grip.

"Hailey, you're hurting me!" Halia finally exclaimed, and I loosened my grip enough for her to slip away. She rubbed her wrist while glaring at me.

"Halia. Car. Now," I said, staring at her hard. She looked defiantly back at me.

"No," she said bluntly.

I took a deep breath to keep from snapping her neck. "Halia, we need to leave, okay? If those people come back-"

"A person just died," she said, cutting me off. "A living, breathing person, with a family and friends. A person with a life just died, and you don't even care. As long as we have the prophecy, why does it matter, right?" she added bitterly, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Yeah, basically," I said, and her glare deepened.

"You were human too, you know," Halia said in a low voice. "Not that long ago, either. How could you stop caring about humans so fast?"

"I hate to break it to you, Hallie," I said dryly, losing my patience with her. "But I cared about other humans when I was one about as much as I do now."

She stared at me, jaw hanging open, and I turned back to my car. I pulled the passenger door open so hard I was a little surprised I didn't tear it off. "Get in the car," I all but screamed at her. "Because, I swear to God, Halia, you don't want me to tell you to do it a third time."

Halia stared at me, long and hard. Then, after a few beats of silence, she slid silently into the passenger seat. I closed the door and let out a sigh. Halia could be such a pain in the ass when she was being self-righteous.

"What happened, Hailey?" Ava asked softly, bringing my attention back to her. "All I saw was a car and men came out and shot at the back window. Who died?"

"The prophet," I replied, feeling tired. "It seems someone found out about the prophecy too."

"Does that mean you didn't get it?" Ava asked, frowning.

"I never said that, Aves." I smirked at her and tapped my temple. "I got it; in my mind."

"Do share, Hails," she said, crossing her arms over her chest. "What is it?"

I frowned then. "It's the weirdest prophecy I've ever seen. More like a question, really. Like-" I cut myself off.

"Like what?" Ava prompted.

"Like… it hasn't been decided yet, what happens," I said slowly.

Ava frowned at me. "Well, shouldn't that be a good thing?"

"Depends on your definition of a 'good thing'."

~EL~

The next hours were completely silent and awkward, because Halia was too angry with me to talk. I kept thinking about the prophecy, trying to translate it. I couldn't focus, though, mostly because of something uncomfortable in my back. It wasn't painful, necessarily, but it was pretty annoying.

I pulled to the front of Klaus's mansion, but didn't make to get out of the car. Ava had long since ghosted out, to go find more information on what attacked us. "See you later, Kid," I said as Halia got out of the passenger seat.

She frowned at me. "You're not coming inside?" She asked.

"Nah," I said. "I gotta get home, go see Damon. Translate the prophecy. Take a shower."

"Speaking of the prophecy," Halia said. "You never told me what it was."

"I will," I answered vaguely. "In time."

She smiled slightly, and I frowned at her. "What's so funny?"

"Bella always said that," she explained. "Whenever she was keeping something from us, she'd said she'd tell us in time, but really she'd only tell us when she had no other options. You two aren't that different, really, when you think about it."

I snorted. "Please, I'm the anti-Bella."

"No, my sister Adora is the anti-Bella," Halia corrected dryly. "And you're a cross between the two of them. You have Adora's attitude but, deep down, you have Bella's beliefs. Her morals."

"I don't do morals," I told her.

"Really?" she raised an eyebrow. "You don't believe in loyalty? In protecting the people you care about no matter the cost? You don't believe in self-sacrifice?"

"A ha!" I exclaimed, smirking. "That's where you're wrong, Hallie. I'm an extremely selfish person."

She just sighed and shook her head. "I believe that, one day, Hailey," she said, slowly stepping away from the car. "You'll realize you're a lot more like my sister than you both think you are."

Halia walked towards the house then, but I called her back. "Halia, wait one second!"

"What is it?"

"Can you hold off on telling Bella what went down earlier?" I asked. "The prophecy, the attack, all that jazz?"

Her eyebrows furrowed. "You want to tell her yourself?"

"Yeah, something like that," I muttered, before putting the car in drive. "I'll see you soon, Halia."

Then I drove off, leaving Halia standing there alone.

~EL~

Halia didn't agree with Hailey's choice of keeping Bella out of the dark, but she didn't much feel like dealing with the consequences of going against her, so she decided to go along with it anyway.

What she didn't know was why Hailey had to drop her off here. She would've been much happier at the house her siblings had been living in, where she had a higher chance of not running into Klaus.

What would she say to him if she saw him? Would he be angry with her for undaggering his siblings? Would he be hurt that she left him? Or would he just be indifferent? She wasn't sure which one was the worst.

Halia made her way to the only bathroom she knew the location of, if anything to hide from Klaus. But when she saw her reflection in the bathroom mirror, she realized how badly she needed to clean herself up.

There was blood staining her dress, but she knew it wasn't hers. It had to be Adelina's. Her hair had dirt and dust and broken glass in it, and her entire body ached from when Hailey had pinned her against the ground. She went to work, making herself look decent to be seen by other people. If anything, it gave her busy work to do.

She had managed to clean off her face and hair, but the dried blood stain was proving to be a bitch to get out. She was sure there was nothing to she could do to keep it from being visible, until she remembered that she did have more clothes here. In Klaus's bedroom.

There was no way she was going in there. You didn't walk into the bear's cave if you wanted to avoid the bear. Plus, her last memories of the room weren't pleasant. She would just have to deal with the stain.

The only problem would be Bella's reaction to it. She'd know something was up the moment she saw her sister in blood stained clothes. And then she'd be forced to tell her about what happened and Hailey would hunt her down and murder her brutally.

Halia sighed and weighed the pros and cons of each option. Maybe Klaus wasn't home. His siblings were furious with him, she knew. Maybe he was distancing himself from their anger. She'd be able to slip into the room and out without him ever knowing she was there.

It seemed like the better option, compared to getting her head ripped off by her vengeful descendant.

The fact that she didn't run into anyone on her way to his bedroom seemed like a good omen. But when she quietly slipped into Klaus's room, she was hit sharply with the memory of the look on his face when she told him he wasn't the man she loved. Halia took a deep breath and moved towards the closet. The faster she was out of there, the better.

Halia pulled a flower printed dress off of a hanger and then turned back towards the door. She was so close to being home free. He would never know that she had been there.

She reached for the door knob at the same time it turned and the door swung open. Klaus frowned at her, something flickering in his eyes that she didn't recognize.

"Halia?"

She should've known she would've run into him. She had never been that lucky.

~EL~

"Honey, I'm home."

Damon was in the living room, a glass of bourbon in his hand, when I walked in. I shrugged off my jacket and tossed it on the back of a couch before making my way to him. He smiled when he saw me, and I kissed him quickly before taking his drink from him.

Damon sighed as I pulled away and took a sip of his bourbon. "How was visiting the prophetess?" he asked.

"Eventful," I answered vaguely. "She's dead."

He raised his eyebrows. "What'd she do to piss you off."

"Not by me." I rolled my eyes. "I probably would've, though, if I hadn't had Holier-than-thou Halia dragging me down."

"What happened then?" he asked, sitting down the couch. Then he frowned at me. "Hailey, what's on your back?"

I frowned and ran a hand down the back of my shirt. "I'm not sure, why?"

"Come here." He pulled me to him, and lifted up my shirt. Damon cursed and let my shit fall down.

"What? What's wrong? Do I have a skin disease or something?" I asked, frowning.

"You were shot, Hailey. Three times, actually," he told me.

"Oh." I relaxed. "So that was the pain in my back."

"How did you not know you were shot?" he asked me disbelievingly.

I shrugged. "Too focused on getting Halia back home without a scratch on her, I suppose."

"Let's go, then," he said, standing up and pulling me along with him.

"Where are we going?" I asked, frowning.

"To get the bullets out of your back," he answered, grabbing a bottle of whiskey as we walked towards our bedroom. "You're gonna need this."

I made a face. "I'm good, thanks."

"Don't be stupid, Hailey. You can't have bullets in your back forever," Damon argued.

"I beg to differ," I said. "It'd make a cool battle scar."

He rolled his eyes, and I let out a sigh. If I didn't cooperate, Damon would hold me down and pull them out, and that would just hurt more. It wasn't the first time he's removed bullets from my body, and it always hurt like hell.

We walked into our room, and Damon walked into the bathroom to get a tweezers. "Take your shirt off," he ordered.

"I can't remember the last time I've done that myself," I muttered, pulling it off and tossing it in a corner.

Damon returned and, without a word, pushed me down so that my chest was against the bed. His arm came around my stomach to hold me in place.

"You know," I said, my words muffled by the blankets. "I'd make a joke about you having me against the bed like this, but I can feel the bullets digging into my skin in this position, so I'm just gonna stay still so you can get them out faster."

"Good decision," Damon said, before digging the tweezers into the first bullet hole and I swore. He wasn't very gentle when it came to pulling the bullets out.

"So," Damon said, pulling the first one out. "How exactly did you get shot three times."

I was gritting my teeth to keep from shouting out in pain. "Surprise attack," I answered. "A group did a drive by and shot up the place. Halia wasn't hurt, and I came out okay enough, but the prophetess took about a dozen bullets or so."

Damon yanked the second one out, and I cursed into the mattress. "I take it someone didn't want you finding out the prophecy?"

"That'd be a good assumpt- God damn it!" I swore, as Damon removed the last bullet. I took a deep breath as my body finally healed. I sat up and Damon smirked at me as he got rid of the bullets.

"Now was that so bad?" he asked.

"Yeah, it was," I muttered.

"Back to the prophecy," Damon said. "Did the people who shot you get what they want?"

I smirked and stood up. "You'd think you know me by now, Damon," I mused.

He smirked back. "You got it?"

"'Two families, both the first of their kind, are joined by love and hate, life and death. Both will return to this world and bring light and darkness to it. But a force, the most powerful kind existing, threatens to destroy them and their entire race. One, a mix, descending from both families, will either be their salvation or their destruction, their becoming or their undoing.'"

I smirked up at Damon. "Did you really expect anything less from me?"

~EL~

A/N: thank you to: purpleXorchid, ravenclawfairy, w.i.t.c.h fan in ut, colleenrawr, SomebodyWhoCares, and AudreyDarke96 for reviewing!

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