Happy Easter!
In honour of today being an awesome day and how happy and intrigued I was by the feedback on the last chapter, I'm putting this one up early! Well, uh, obviously. Lol. So thank you for the reviews :)
It's quite possible the same fate will not befall you but I must admit that I cried several times while writing this.
Previously On: Liz invited Klaus and Caroline to a Benefit when they were over at her house for dinner. Caroline tried unsuccessfully to put a dent in Klaus' bank account by ordering a dress for the event. Caroline confronted Klaus and found out that he hadn't told her about Silas in order to selfishly prolong their period of happiness. She broke up with him and returned to Katherine and Elijah's house. The latter couple discussed the danger of Klaus turning into a werewolf in order to deal with the breakup.
Chapter 8: Broken
~~ A week later ~~
Caroline frowned when she walked into the kitchen.
Not only had Katherine and Elijah all but jumped away from each other and stopped whispering when she walked in, but breakfast was usually done by now – instead all she saw was a bowl containing some half-scrambled eggs.
"Hey guys, what's going on?"
They both hesitated and Caroline's frown deepened. She'd never before seen Katherine hesitate to spill anything.
It was Elijah who finally spoke.
"A wildlife photographer – the latest but only human in a string of such occurrences – has been admitted to the ER after being savagely attacked by what appears to have been a wolf."
"Werewolf," Katherine corrected.
Caroline gasped. This was the last thing they needed.
"So there's another werewolf in town?"
Katherine and Elijah shared a look and Caroline swallowed anxiously.
"Do you guys know who it is?" A pit started in her stomach. "It's not Tyler, is it?"
Elijah met her eyes again. "We believe it's Niklaus."
Her first response was to shake her head in surprised confusion.
"Klaus?"
Katherine, still in her sleepwear, stepped forward. "He doesn't have a humanity switch anymore, Caroline. We think he's turning every night to cope. And last night some woman got mauled because of it."
"Oh."
Caroline couldn't think of any more to say.
A million emotions were fighting for vantage in her mind and as a result nothing coherent was being produced. Nor did it help that Katherine and Elijah stood staring intently at her.
"Um, how bad is she?"
Elijah cleared his throat. "She's in critical condition. She was lucky to have been discovered but unfortunately it was in a just barely living state."
Caroline nodded quickly, swallowing as her breaths sped.
"Ok, well we have to help her; heal her."
Elijah nodded in understanding. "I'll go right away."
"No, I'll do it," Caroline countered.
Katherine shook her head. "He's right, he should."
Caroline frowned and the brunette explained: "In case this is all supposed to lure you out."
He'd tried things, in the past week. Mostly practically knocking down the door and harassing Elijah with phone calls but with nothing yielding any results – Katherine and the eldest Original were shielding her just as they'd promised to.
"Klaus wouldn't do that," the blonde replied, her voice filled to the brim with certainty as she shook her head.
Katherine looked at her strangely, a brow arching, and Caroline met her gaze then looked away. Feeling weird, she shrugged.
"Ok, Elijah. Thanks."
"I'll return in a moment," he assured, before disappearing in a whoosh.
Caroline entered the kitchen further, acquainting herself with whatever stage of cooking Elijah had gotten to.
Consciously she avoided eye contact with Katherine, turning on the stove before turning back to the counter to continue whisking the eggs.
"What was that?" the doppelganger finally spoke.
"What was what?" she asked, cracking another egg into the bowl.
"You defending Klaus."
Caroline sighed. "I wasn't defending him."
"You sure about that?"
"Does it matter if I was?" she shot, annoyed.
"No," Katherine admitted then shrugged. "I just haven't heard you say anything good about him in a while."
Caroline shrugged too, keeping her gaze on what she was doing.
"I just know he wouldn't do this on purpose."
Watching the blonde interestedly, Katherine stood back with folded arms.
"Good to know he draws the line somewhere, I guess I'm just wondering how you can be so sure."
Caroline shot the brunette a frustrated look.
"Tyler almost tried to kill me more than once when he was in wolf form. They don't have a lot of control over their actions and besides, that lady was a photographer, maybe a flash confused him or something."
"That's it?"
Caroline hesitated in her actions before turning to the stove to check the pan's heat.
"What do you mean? That totally made sense."
"Yeah, a bit too much so."
Finally the blonde faced Katherine head-on.
"What are you trying to say?"
"That maybe you're feeling bad or guilty or something."
Caroline laughed bitterly, shaking her head as she grabbed the bowl.
"I don't know what I'm feeling." Dumping the egg mixture into the pan, she sighed with an exasperated shake of her head. "Actually, yeah, I do. You're right, I feel bad – because he's breaking all the bones in his body every single night and letting an animal's mind take over just so he won't have to think about us."
Not to mention all the terrible things she'd said to him last week, some of which hadn't even been true but had rather been meant to be scathing and she'd been able to tell that it had had the intended effect.
Katherine looked about to say something when there was a loud whoosh and Elijah stood in the middle of the kitchen again.
Caroline immediately turned to him, her eyes wide.
"Is she ok?"
He nodded. "Her vitals were returning to normal when I left."
"Thank god," Caroline breathed.
"I'm going to get dressed," Katherine murmured before promptly leaving.
Elijah frowned as he watched the brunette's exit.
"What was that about?"
"I think she's mad at me."
Elijah stepped closer to the stove to attend to the eggs.
"Why so?"
She sighed. "I don't know. I feel like maybe she's annoyed at me for taking on any guilt in all this." Elijah said nothing and she continued. "But a woman almost dying because me and Klaus are going through relationship problems kinda feels like I should take some responsibility."
He glanced at her, his expression indecipherable. "Perhaps she isn't entirely in the wrong, no?"
As usual his gaze weighed on her, forcing an honest answer.
"It's not just the woman getting hurt – it's the whole wolf thing, what he's doing to… deal with what's happening. At the end of the day Klaus didn't get into all this because he wanted to, you know? I mean I'm pretty sure he didn't go looking for Silas and ask him to find a way to kill seven billion people. He doesn't deserve this."
In Elijah's eyes she saw something and for a second she swore it resembled pride.
"On the other hand, he has an escape available to him and is utilising it instead of appropriately dealing with his feelings. One can't ignore how unhealthy that is."
She was a bit surprised by this response from him before smiling a little when she recognised his tactic.
"Devil's advocate?"
Elijah grinned with a nod and turned back to the stove.
"Well, to be fair, I'm not exactly helping him with the 'dealing with his emotions' part."
He shook his head. "He would only take them out on you if he could see you, not work through them."
Caroline rubbed her arms. "I know." She sighed. "Can I help with anything?"
"There was a salsa I planned on making. I believe the recipe is in that cookbook over there."
Following his gesture, Caroline crossed to the other end of the counter to open the cookbook.
She was flipping through to find the salsa Elijah had mentioned when she saw how many amazing recipes it contained.
"Oh my god, I want to eat everything in this."
The Original chuckled. "If you bookmark your favourites I can attempt them."
Caroline was about to smile and thank him when an idea occurred to her as she continued turning pages.
"Or I could make them."
Elijah turned with an interested glance. "I didn't realise you cooked."
She pulled a face. "I don't really, but I can follow a recipe."
He smiled gently. "Then you should; feel free to make use of the kitchen any time you like."
Excitedly she grinned. "Thanks." Glancing at the amount of pages in the book, she quickly expanded on her idea: "I'm going to make every single recipe in here."
Elijah's eyebrow shot up. "That's quite ambitious."
She shrugged. "It's not like I have anything else to do."
"Good point," he chuckled.
"So I guess that means you're off cooking duty."
"I suppose it does," he smiled and she returned it.
"So tonight we're having… lemon-infused Moroccan chicken with olives on couscous," she chose at random.
"That sounds wonderful, I look forward to it."
Caroline slowly allowed her smile to disappear as she browsed through the book trying to find the salsa Elijah had originally mentioned.
She was highly conscious of why she'd be doing this: she needed a distraction. She needed to be doing something that wasn't sulking in her room staring at the TV thinking about how much she hurt. After a week of doing so she'd come to realise that wallowing in her pain and sense of betrayal wasn't helping.
"Elijah, do you…" keeping her head down, she sighed as she struggled. "Do you think he's ok?"
There was a bit of scuffling, during which she imagined Elijah to be dishing the cooked eggs out of the pan, before everything went silent.
"No, I don't."
Her heart stopped. She'd been expecting some method of sparing of her feelings or an assurance that whatever Klaus was going through was of his own making – like Katherine usually did – so the answer came as a jolt.
As much as she hurt, she really didn't want Klaus to be going through the same.
Her first reaction, that day a week ago when they'd had their confrontation, had been to hurt him as much as she'd been hurt or more, if she could manage it. Now she felt differently.
Because all she saw in her mind's eye was him sitting in the darkest corner of a room and drinking until he couldn't think straight; till his eyes glazed over and he either passed out or went in search of someone to take his drunken temper out on.
And it made her heart ache.
"You know I think might not make the salsa after all," Elijah suddenly said thoughtfully, breaking through her thoughts. "Katerina seemed against the idea."
Caroline smiled, shaking off the troubling mental image along with the accompanying worries.
"You guys are such a cute couple," she mused. "I wish I could've watched your love story or something. I bet it was epic."
Elijah looked amused. "Some would use the word tragic."
She laughed. "But you guys love each other. You found your way back."
"Not easily," he admitted, looking thoughtful. "It certainly was a hobbled road."
"But worth it, right? Because you love her," Caroline smiled before laughingly adding: "Somehow."
Elijah chuckled too before sobering. "Yes, I get that often."
"Well you can't really blame us – Katherine isn't exactly the easiest person to get along with."
"She always was to me," he admitted solemnly, nostalgia entering his tone. "You know, after Niklaus found out how I felt about her and gave me the advice I once told you about, he wanted to know I could possibly feel anything for such an insipid girl. I was astonished. I thought he had concertedly been distancing his attention so as not to fall for the woman he would have to use in his sacrifice."
Elijah looked her right in the eye and she became almost uncomfortable beneath his sure gaze.
"He asked me why her; how I could love her – and I could simply not comprehend how anyone could not. Katerina has a zest for life; she is a hurricane in many ways." He smiled. "And though I have lived a long time, I have yet to discover anything that matches the feeling of being loved by a woman like her."
Caroline let out a heavy breath. The intensity in the way Elijah loved Katherine reminded her of –
"I've made you melancholy," Elijah noted with disappointment.
She hastily shook her head. "No, it's just…"
I miss him.
She didn't finish her sentence and she hated that the eldest Original still seemed to know exactly what she'd been thinking.
"It's just you Originals really know how to make moving speeches," she saved herself with a small laugh.
Elijah smiled but she could still see pity in his eyes and her gaze darted around the room for something to distract him with. Her eyes landed on a box before him.
"Seriously, melba toast?"
Elijah threw up his hands. "Not you too."
She laughed. "What do you mean?"
"Everyone in my family has a certain… distaste for melba toast and all give it the widest possible berth they can manage, while I quite frankly adore the stuff."
She smiled gently. "I don't like or dislike it, it's just that I haven't actually seen melba toast in forever."
She left out the part about how she associated it with old ladies and boring tea parties.
"And we're sorry for bringing out the past now," Katherine said airily, re-entering the kitchen.
Elijah looked amused. "Breakfast is just about ready, my love."
Katherine slipped her way between the counter and the Original, anchoring her hands at his sides before leaning up to kiss him. It was quick but Caroline winced at the intimacy.
Katherine met her eyes and it was awkward for a second before the brunette smiled.
"Come on," she gestured, her thick curls bopping. "Table's set, let's eat."
Caroline was making a list.
It sat on the bed to the right of her as she cradled the cookbook in her lap.
On the list were all the days for the next two weeks, beside which were written different foods.
Lunch, something to bake and dinner.
Her current task was pairing all the dishes perfectly.
Chicken for lunch meant fish for dinner which meant no chocolate in the baking. A creamy dish meant nothing too rich for dessert.
Carefully she thought out the menu for each day, putting more thought into it than even Caroline Forbes usually would.
This was the way she completed tasks nowadays, making the most out of it. The longer she took and the more thought she put into it the less time there was for her mind to wander to where it did more often than not.
This was the smartest thing she'd done yet – two hours of contemplating and planning followed by at least double that in the following days when she would execute all the planning.
She'd have to work out something to do while things were in the oven but otherwise she felt pretty proud of her self-distraction tactics.
There was a light tap on her door and the blonde looked up to see Katherine in the doorway.
"You know, I thought that you cooking dinner meant you'd actually join us for it."
She tried a smile. "I guess I'm just used to eating in here."
"Is it working?" Katherine asked, stepping inside.
Confused, Caroline glanced around the room for the source of the doppelganger's question.
"The cooking," she elaborated. "Does it take your mind off it?"
Caroline shifted uncomfortably, clearing her throat.
Then she nodded. "Y-yeah."
Katherine nodded slowly, approaching the bed. "Look, I'm sorry about this morning. I shouldn't judge."
Caroline shook her head. "No, I'm sorry. I've been sulking around your house all week. That can't be fun to watch or deal with."
"Well I wasn't planning on saying anything about the massive burden you are, but…" Katherine teased.
They both laughed and Caroline felt better until the brunette hesitated, then spoke again.
"Do you know something about a Benefit dress?"
She stared at Katherine for so long that the doppelganger waved a hand in front of her face.
"Hello?"
"Um, y-yeah." Noting Katherine's pointed stare, she sighed. "I ordered a Zuhair Murad for the Policeman's Benefit."
Katherine nodded in understanding and Caroline frowned.
"How do you know about it?"
The brunette eyed her for a few seconds, sizing her up, before sighing. "Klaus texted me."
"What?" Caroline breathed.
"He said your dress came."
Again Caroline's emotions went haywire.
There were the amused thoughts at how Klaus must have felt voluntarily communicating with Katherine, mixed with the realisation that she'd ordered that dress in happier times, when she'd excitedly planned them going to the Benefit together. She'd even ordered him a new Tom Ford suit.
"And there was something else, although – "
"Can I see it?" Caroline said a little more hastily than she'd intended to.
Katherine looked a strange mix of disapproving and amused as she handed over her phone.
Caroline would want to know that her dress for the Benefit has arrived. I would consider it a favour if you would please tell her so, as well as that I love her.
Klaus
"He said please," she breathed.
"He did," Katherine agreed.
He said he loves me. To you.
"Someone's learned how to ease up on his pride," the brunette noted.
Caroline passed the phone back, clearing her throat.
"Thanks for letting me know. God, I completely spaced about the Benefit."
Katherine frowned. "Are you going to go?"
"I don't know," Caroline admitted with a sad shrug. "My mom really wanted us there."
"When is it?"
"Next Saturday."
"Over a week away."
Caroline nodded slowly and Katherine turned to leave then hesitated, something clearly bothering her, before spinning back around.
"Elijah said something interesting at dinner tonight."
With a frown at the random turn of conversation, Caroline looked back up.
"What did he say?"
"That Klaus by himself has nothing to lose."
Her frown deepened. "What do you mean?"
Katherine sat. "The last time Klaus worked with Silas it was because he'd threatened his life and the stakes the other way weren't all that high – Silas being the one to take the cure instead of Elena."
Caroline nodded. Her memories of digging around in Klaus' back for the white oak stake he'd thought to be in there because of Silas' mind control were still crisp in her mind.
"But this is different. This time the whole world is at stake. Except now Klaus has even more to lose – more to protect."
"You mean me?"
"I mean his reunited family, I mean you and I mean your family and friends. If Silas needed to force Klaus into being compliant he had a long list of people he could've killed his way through to get there."
Caroline gasped for words before she folded her arms, scoffing.
"Are you saying this is all my fault?"
She had been the one to reunite his family – he'd said so himself.
She'd made him suddenly have a trail of people all the way to Wazoo he needed to protect because she cared for them – her mother, Elena, Stefan, Damon and Jeremy.
But she still felt affronted by the implication. If he'd been honest with her from the beginning she never would've agreed to them working with Silas, no matter what it had cost. They could've once again all found a way to take him down, permanently.
"That was my response."
"Oh." Caroline felt ashamed for her accusation, averting her gaze for a second.
"What did Elijah say?" she asked timidly.
Katherine shrugged. "That Klaus is the only one who owns his actions. What he did is on him and him alone. But we also probably would've been to a whole bunch of funerals by now if he hadn't done what he did."
Caroline opened her mouth but the doppelganger spoke first.
"That's why I wanted to apologise about this morning. You were right – Klaus does have a line," Katherine said sincerely. "If he really is protecting all of us then maybe he didn't deliberately hurt that woman."
The blonde was struck speechless by this and Katherine, seemingly understanding, stood.
"See you in the morning."
Caroline sat stock-still, her hands nervously folded into her lap.
She'd been here for just under half an hour and was still basically trembling in anxiety.
Suddenly she heard a rustle in the trees and a knot began in the bottom of her stomach.
Its paws were so quiet that a human wouldn't have caught it but Caroline heard the footsteps as they made their way closer to her.
Still, her breath caught when it stepped out into the clearing.
"Klaus?" she breathed.
She'd only ever seen one werewolf – Tyler – and this one looked completely different. Tyler had been all black but the one before her was different shades of tawny and russet with some grey on its face.
The wolf stopped in its tracks and Caroline's heart beat wildly as she stood very slowly, so as not to provoke it.
They'd had no confirmation that this was in fact Klaus – it could be any werewolf, in which case she could've just placed herself in an incredibly dangerous situation. Then again it could actually be Klaus and this could still be just as dangerous, if not more so. A week ago she'd feared the man himself after remembering who he was. Now he was in werewolf form, meaning he quite possibly had little to no control over his faculties, and had the strength of the Original hybrid.
For a second – as the wolf stood motionless, staring – she considered running, but then she looked into his eyes and her body automatically relaxed.
She'd seen Klaus' eyes change many times; had countlessly been turned on by the amber crescents glowing in the black pools. Now it was the opposite but something about them was still so familiar.
When she looked into the wolf's eyes her fear somehow melted away.
She approached and he stepped away then angled his body as if to run off and she held out a hand.
"Wait! Don't go," she shook her head. "Don't change, I just… wanted to talk to you."
He turned to look at her again and in her mind she created a dialogue, which was silly because there was something comforting in knowing he couldn't say anything back to her, but she supposed she felt a little more sane this way.
It's not like you usually let me get much talking in anyhow.
She would've playfully hit him if he'd really said that but now she just stepped closer until she was standing right in front of him.
It was literally the strangest thing she'd ever experienced and god knew that was something, coming from her.
Klaus had always been physically imposing – not bulky, but lean in a way that exuded confident power, so much so that you always felt he was ten feet taller than you.
Now he barely came up past her knee.
"This is so weird," she thought aloud. "I mean not only are you, you know, a wolf, but I was so scared that you'd kill me or something and now I'm ordering you around."
He lifted his face and she swore she saw confusion cross his eyes.
Why would you think I'd hurt you?
"I mean, you know, vampires are werewolves' natural enemies and duh, Tyler almost killed me quite a few times that way."
Klaus' mouth pulled back over his teeth and he growled dangerously at the mention of the other hybrid.
She laughed nervously. "Right, ok. So I guess that's positive conformation that Tyler is a sore topic no matter what form you're in."
Klaus looked back down at the ground and something that sounded like an amused sniff came from the wolf.
"Are you…" she frowned, trying to verbalise her thoughts in the least offensive way possible. "Are you ok?" she asked awkwardly before shaking her head quickly, realising that that hadn't conveyed what she meant. "Like, are you ok with me being here? No 'Vampire – kill kill kill' urges?"
Klaus had no reaction for a second, seemingly warring with himself, before he stepped forward.
The blonde flinched, but he'd only moved closer to nuzzle into her open hand.
She giggled at the feeling of his soft damp nose pressing into her palm before he bowed and rubbed so she was unwittingly caressing his head.
Unable to stop a smile from blooming on her face, Caroline consciously began petting him, rubbing her hand over his snout then up between his eyes and onto the short fur on his forehead before beginning to play with his ears, pushing them down so they'd pop back up or lightly flicking them to watch them quiver. Klaus let her for a while before he shook his head like he was shaking off a fly. That made her giggle and she quickly bit at her lip.
"God this is weird."
Automatically her hand moved into his neck and she made a tickling motion which made the wolf's head roll, and she took pleasure in being the tickler for once even if it didn't seem to be bothering him as much as it usually did her.
"I can't believe you've never let me see you like this before," she noted. "God, I was so scared of coming here in case you bit me or something, I mean I couldn't even work on my speech I was so…"
Her speech.
In the excitement of finally seeing Klaus as a wolf and him not turning her into a meal she'd completely forgotten that she'd come here for a reason.
Withdrawing her hand, she sighed.
"Klaus, I came here because – "
She cut off when Klaus began moving. She thought he was going to pass her but instead he circled where she was standing, rubbing the length of his body against her legs as he went.
"If you pee on me I will kill you."
Again the amused sniff.
She rolled her eyes and was about to continue her half-prepared speech when Klaus suddenly stopped in front of her then began nosing determinedly at her legs.
She frowned. "Do you seriously need to know what my shins smell like?"
Wolves probably didn't sigh but in that moment she swore Klaus did.
Then he began more concertedly pushing against her and by the time she realised what he was trying to convey he was all but headbutting her.
"Ok ok, I get it! It's rude to push, you know."
Sighing, she made her way back to the big flat rock she'd been sitting on when she'd been waiting for him.
She sat and Klaus jumped a little, putting his front paws beside her.
"Ok… I'm sitting and you're doing a weird standing-crouching thing, what now?"
Klaus lowered his body, the wolf's lithe form stretching elegantly in the process, with his head bent, and she caught his hint.
"You know, good wolf manners would be to run off and fetch me some berries or something," she pointed out, to which the wolf grumbled.
She rolled her eyes but smiled interestedly. She couldn't deny that she was curious to touch him.
Biting her lip, she tentatively placed her hands on either of his sides.
Carefully she worked her way backward, feeling the sturdy muscles in his body, then running her hands forward and onto his spine, amazed by all the bones she could feel and how strong his body was.
It was almost unbelievable that this creature – an animal, really – was the same person as Klaus. Sure, a long time ago she'd become used to the concept, but she'd never touched Tyler like this; experienced feeling the same person with an entirely different structure.
She knew Klaus' body as well as she knew her own, if not better. She knew where to kiss him when she wanted to rile him up or where to sink her fangs when she needed a quick satisfying fix. She knew which muscles tensed when her mouth lowered on him or the ones that flexed when he pulled her in to him and kept her anchored to his body.
Caroline had kissed every square inch of Klaus Mikaelson's body but this body beneath her hands right now was entirely unfamiliar to her.
And yet she didn't hate it. She liked the way the colour of his fur was almost like his hair, skirting the cherry blond line. She liked that there was some grey on his head, reminding her of his substantial age.
She liked that, somehow, this wild side of him still knew who she was.
She was exploratively massaging his neck, where his fur was palest, when loud whimpers – clearly repressed until that point – began to escape the wolf's mouth and she felt light vibrations against her hands working at his throat.
All at once she realised how inappropriate this was.
She was feeling up Klaus.
Immediately she jumped up, folding her arms to keep her hands away from him.
Klaus looked a little hurt – god, was she seriously interpreting wolf expressions now – but she didn't allow herself to feel guilty. As novel as this experience was it didn't change that they were broken up, nor did it change that she'd come here for a sole reason that she had yet to follow through on.
"I need to talk to you."
Klaus jumped off the rock and stood before her with his snout raised to meet her eyes.
Pushing down how she felt about the weirdness of the situation, she swallowed.
"I know about the woman you attacked yesterday."
Could wolves feel shame? It seemed to flood his features.
She shook her head. "I know you didn't mean to hurt her, Klaus."
His gold eyes shone up at her and she had the feeling that if he could speak right now he would be offering up some crazy compliment that she wouldn't accept.
"But you still did," she continued.
The wolf's pride seemed to diminish, his head dropping a little, but he kept her gaze.
"And I know that this is probably your way of dealing with everything but I hurt too, you know." She swallowed. "Except I don't get to turn into an animal to help me forget that you broke my heart and destroyed the happiest I've ever been, because yes, you were right – I was happy."
She was crying now and her voice shook as she spoke.
"But I don't get to not think about how the happiest I've ever been was with the same person who took it all away; who'd been lying to me through it all. I'm dealing with it."
She wiped away her tears with the back of her hand, thinking about polishing heirlooms and cooking tonight's supper – anything that had kept her mind busy.
So, maybe she wasn't exactly dealing with it head on but she was doing it the only way she knew how; the only way that numbed the pain even a little.
So she couldn't be mad at him for doing the same, but the difference was that she wasn't hurting anyone.
"Please, you have to stop doing this. I can't… c-can't s-stand the thought of more innocent people getting hurt because… because of us. Jesse and those people from the massacre and the entire fucking human race, I just – "
She broke down.
Her knees caved and she fell onto them, sobbing as she thought about Silas' plan.
It was the thing she let herself think of least often. Yes, Klaus had lied to her about something involving Silas and yes it was unforgivable and yes there was a plan she'd been forced into, but she kept the technicalities locked away in a vault in a corner of her mind. She still couldn't bring herself to believe that they were going to wipe out the planet.
And when she did it had the power to literally bring her to her knees.
Klaus approached uncertainly as her body wracked with sobs, her shoulders shaking violently.
Slowly he walked up to her and placed his muzzle on her shoulder, then angled his head so he was laying in her neck and she let him support the weight of her body.
"Please just don't hurt anyone else," she begged through heavy tears.
A tiny section of his tongue swept along the inside of her neck and it was the second part of this Klaus she recognised even in unfamiliarity.
The tongue and lick was less substantial than his human one but it had the same solid heat to it, though instead of sexual in nature it now felt comforting.
It felt like words that tumbled into her mind far easier than any of the other things she'd made up for him tonight.
I won't; stop crying, sweetheart.
I love you, Caroline.
Caroline had crept back into the house with the grace of someone who had done so all but professionally for a good chunk of her teenage years.
Then she'd taken a long hot shower, washing the wolf off her – because yes it had been Klaus but that didn't mean it smelled like him, ok – then brushed her teeth and was climbing into bed feeling exhausted when her ears picked up something that made her freeze in place.
Klaus' voice.
It had just been a snippet, caught after the end of one of her train of thoughts, but she was sure it had been his voice. The accent alone gave him away but she'd know that husky tortured quality, usually accompanied by a healthy dose of smugness, to his voice anywhere.
Pushing her hair back behind her ears, Caroline desperately searched the house for a sign of him.
She could pick his heartbeat out of a room; his steady breaths.
But neither sound was anywhere to be found, not even when her hearing stopped at the front door.
Frowning, Caroline continued to search until she found Elijah talking to someone.
"You always have had trouble accepting that your actions have consequences," he was saying.
Caroline perked up. Elijah always used a certain tone when talking to Klaus. It was superior in that way older siblings had, whilst simultaneously containing a sort of pleading edge as if fully aware that anything accomplished during the conversation would be tantamount to drawing water from a rock.
"You have no right to keep her from me," Klaus growled.
His voice was indistinct and Caroline realised this was a phone conversation.
"You're intoxicated," Elijah replied, seemingly straining at keeping his cool. "Perhaps you should call again once you're in full control of your faculties."
"I will kill your doppelganger and feed her to you in bits."
Caroline's heart hammered in her chest but Elijah remained calm.
"Yes, murdering her confidante is a sure way of earning Caroline's forgiveness."
There was quiet for so long that Caroline wondered if Elijah had taken the call outside.
"I have to talk to her."
He sounded broken.
Her nails, digging into her palms, were close to drawing blood.
"As I said, your actions are what led to this, Niklaus. She does not want to see you."
"She came to see me tonight."
Elijah was quiet and Caroline could only assume it was out of surprise.
"I'm certain she had her reasons."
"She was a mess," Klaus accused, and she could tell it was tearing him up inside. "I thought you were taking care of her."
Elijah sounded hurt. "I am."
"You could've FUCKING FOOLED ME!" Klaus roared, and there was a loud crash from his side of the call that sounded like an overturned item of furniture.
Elijah bristled. "You should get some rest."
"I don't need sleep I need her," he growled.
"You're losing control, brother," Elijah noted, sounding acutely worried.
There was a dull thump and Caroline imagined Klaus having slumped to the floor.
"I love her, Elijah, I love her. I love her; I need her."
A litany; a plea.
She couldn't breathe. Her lungs constricted and wouldn't relax again, the sound of his rabid pleas sticking harshly in her mind and weighing on her chest.
"I know, Niklaus," Elijah sighed heavily. "I know you do."
"It hurts I don't want to feel this." He was crying now and she heard scraping that sounded an awful lot like him pulling his nails across the floor.
In her mind she saw him sprawled dejectedly against a wall, his fingers sticky with blood and splinters down what was left of his fingernails.
The image made her want to jump in her car right now and go to him but she was scared.
Of him and of falling back into him.
Not to mention that she wasn't even sure she knew how to handle Klaus like this; she'd never witnessed a breakdown quite like this one before.
Guiltily she swallowed away the fact that it was about her.
"Tell me how to make it stop," he demanded roughly. "Tell me!"
There was a slight pause before the elder Original spoke.
"Get rid of the alcohol," Elijah instructed.
There was a crash followed by a short hiss as if Klaus had smashed the bottle right into the ground, setting glass into his hand.
"You have to take back your control; get a hold of yourself. Visualise the next hour; plan what you will do and how you will clean yourself up."
Suddenly Caroline felt like she was intruding on a personal moment. Klaus was a loose cannon, someone whose mood could change completely in a split second. And they'd lived a thousand years as brothers – it occurred to her that this might not be the first time Elijah had talked his younger brother down.
"Caroline will never take you back like this."
Her heart pattered when she heard her name.
"She needs someone as strong as her. Remember that."
There was another long silence, so long that she would've thought Elijah had ended the call if she'd heard the closing of the study door.
"Thank you," Klaus eventually managed, sounding strangled.
"Goodnight, Niklaus," Elijah greeted tersely.
"Brother," Klaus called out desperately, then quickly continued when he found he still had Elijah's attention: "Ask her if she'll see me."
Again Elijah paused before sighing. "I will."
With that he pressed the button that ended the call and Caroline all but broke out into a cold sweat.
She didn't know what she would say if Elijah asked her, which he would because he was nothing if not a man of his word.
She didn't know if she wanted to see Klaus or not; what all the sides of him she'd experienced tonight meant in the long run.
She started panicking when she heard the Original's light footsteps near her bedroom and ridiculously she pulled the blanket up to her chin to protect herself.
"Caroline, may I come in?" Elijah asked after knocking softly.
She knew she could ignore him, pretending to be asleep, and he wouldn't say anything about it the next day despite hearing her breathing in favour of the contrary, but she decided against it. It would be way too embarrassing to act like a wimp after Elijah had just touted her strength.
"Yeah!" she called.
Elijah stepped in and shut the door behind him with a gentle smile.
"I apologise for disturbing you."
"Not at all," she assured, sitting up in bed a little.
Elijah nodded slowly and she could tell he was trying to verbalise everything he had running through his mind as he sat on the chaise at the end of the bed. She suddenly felt really guilty for having listened in on the phone conversation, something he obviously now felt he was keeping from her.
"I didn't realise you'd gone anywhere this evening," he began, tentatively.
Again she realised he was giving her an out. She could easily claim not to know what he was talking about and that would be that.
She nodded. "I found out where they'd found that attacked woman and went there hoping to meet Klaus."
"What did you hope to accomplish?"
"I asked him to stop turning," she admitted. "I don't want anyone else getting hurt."
"Did he agree?"
"Well… he couldn't really speak, but I think so."
Elijah looked a little amused at that before he sobered again, evidently having remembered what he'd come to say.
"I'm glad. You're correct, no one else should have to suffer…"
He said the last word lingeringly, like there was more, and she couldn't help filling in what she knew he'd intended to: yet.
She swallowed. "I'm sorry I snuck out."
He smiled gently. "That's quite alright. Your intentions were pure and besides, you're free to come and go as you wish."
She nodded again and the Original shifted uncomfortably.
"Speaking of which… Niklaus has requested that I issue you an invitation. He would like an opportunity to see you – while having the ability to speak, I would think," he offered, smiling a little at the end.
Her own expression had dropped into one of guilt and she looked away as she admitted to it.
"I heard your phone conversation."
She snuck a glance at him and Elijah looked so stunned that it made her feel even worse.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, I just… heard his voice and…"
"That's understandable, Caroline. I just shudder to think of the things that must have gone through your mind." He sighed. "It was not Niklaus' finest hour."
She bit her lip for a second before looking at him again.
"Have you helped him through something like that before?"
"Similar situations, yes, a few times. But certainly never to this degree." He looked away, avoiding her eyes. "And usually it involved prevention of mass murder. Now he is… self-imploding."
"I'm sorry," she whispered.
He met her eyes again. "Don't be. Especially not when you are the only thing that can put him back together again."
Now she was the one to look away, a tear rolling down her cheek.
Elijah sighed and her heart ached at the disappointment she heard there.
"But I surmise that you aren't keen to meet with him."
"I'm scared, Elijah," she admitted, her voice breaking. "Honestly, yes, that man you were just talking to scared me. But what scared me more is how much I wanted to make him stop feeling that way and I…" The tears were coming freely now as she spoke. "I can't. I haven't even put myself back together yet and he's the one who broke me."
Her tears had completely blinded her, making her lose sight of Elijah and suddenly she felt the blanket lift from her body.
Wiping her eyes, she looked up to see the Original standing beside her with the blanket in hand, slightly lifted to allow her more space.
Taking the hint, she lay down again and curled into a foetal position with her back to him before he put the blanket down again, making sure she was well enveloped in it.
"You don't have to forgive him until you're ready, Caroline, if ever."
He continued tucking her in firmly until he stood back, evidently satisfied with the job he'd done.
"You are still welcome to stay here as long as you'd like and are under absolutely no obligation to see my brother." He took another step back. "You have to do what is best for you."
She nodded a little, gratefully, from within her shroud of blanket and the Original retreated.
His hand was on the doorknob when she called him back.
"Elijah?"
"Yes?" he asked, turning.
"He said he loved me," she whispered into the blankets.
Gently the Original smiled.
"He did."
A/N: Awww. I have a real soft spot for Carolijah, y'all.
So, the thing I was excited to share with you guys was wolf!Klaus and Caroline. I felt up my bestie's husky for that scene lol, so I hope it paid off and you guys liked it. I also hope that it came across how desperate he's been for her touch.
Btw, I will not just ignore it – they're not mates, but why Klaus was able to remain in control around Caroline will be explained. Also, in the past I posted a picture of exactly what I imagine wolf!Klaus to look like so I'll go ahead and reblog that on my tumblr for you guys.
Both Caroline and Klaus had breakdowns this chapter and I hope that it was affecting even if it didn't make you cry or anything like that. Personally I'm more of a Klaus stan but while writing this I found myself crying at all the Caroline breakdown parts for some reason.
Pretty please leave me a review telling if you cried, what at/who for, what you thought of wolf!Klaus and Caroline, if you're feeling a little Broken right now, etc. Or whatever you want and if you liked it in general lol, I just really love hearing from you guys. Also, I see I'm beginning to near a thousand reviews on this story and I'm really excited about that!
Ok that's it from me, love y'all and enjoy the rest of your Easter :)
xx
P.S. The melba toast is important.