Chapter 38:

Jasmine was glaring down at her mud-covered shoes as she trekked through the woods, her eyebrows knitted together, she was in deep thought. The house was around here somewhere, both she and Elijah had been here before, and they were both fairly certain it was up ahead.

"I can smell smoke," Kol said, after he came to, Elijah explained what had happened. How they were all linked. As Kol said it, a small glow could be made out through the trees, each brother hurried along. They had stopped using Vampire speed a few paces back, so they could scope the place for spells or attacks, rather than just storming in.

Jasmine was angry, she had her suspicions about Esther, maybe if she voiced them earlier this dreadful shoe-ruining hike could have been avoided. Though she was more agitated than usual, since her headache was creeping back to the front of her mind and clouding her ability to think.

The trees grew further apart and Esther became more visible, Jasmine almost growled as she spotted Finn in the circle with her. He was willing to help her kill his siblings for his own selfish gain.

"My sons, come forward," Esther called and smiled at her three sons as they exited the trees into the clearing. She smiled at Jasmine in acknowledgement and receive nothing but a cold glare back.

"Really, Esther? A Pentagram of salt and five medieval torches. Are you summoning, Satan?" Jasmine commented, her glare never leaving the centuries-old witch.

"Stay beside me, mother," Finn said his mother all but rolled her eyes.

"It's okay. They can't enter."

Kol tested the theory by walking straight towards the salt line, only to have the fire flare up and push him back. He went to step forward again, but Jasmine grabbed his arm.

"If your goal is to have no eyebrows then, by all means, keep walking at the circle of fire!" when she saw that Kol recognised he could get through the circle, she let go of his arm. She didn't feel like dealing with another crispy original, she still couldn't get the smell of baked Mikael off of her favourite dress.

"That's lovely. We're stuck out here, while the favorite son plays sacrificial lamb. How pathetic you are, Finn." Kol growled.

"Be quiet, Kol. Your brother knows virtue you cannot even imagine." Esther reprimanded Kol as if she still had the right to as his mother.

"Whatever you think of us, killing your own children will be an atrocity." Elijah tried to reason, but Esther was set in her ways.

"My only regret is that I did not let you die a thousand years ago."

"Enough. All this talk is boring me. End this now, Mother, or I'll send you back to Hell." Klaus joined in, having enough of his siblings asking politely.

"For a thousand years, I've been forced to watch you. Felt the pain of every victim, suffered while you shed blood. Even you, Elijah, with your claim to nobility, you're no better. All of you. You're a curse on this Earth. Stretched out over generations. If you've come to plead for your life, I'm sorry, you've wasted your time." She said a sad frown on her.

"You're no Mother, Esther Mikaelson. You do not deserve half the respect your children had for you!" Jasmine told her, the same cold stare gracing her face.

"I must do what is right, you of all people should know that sometimes mothers need to make sacrifices!" She said and Jasmine laughed coldly.

"How dare you compare yourself to my Mother. She made sacrifices FOR her child. The only favours you are doing is for yourself, by killing them you are fixing your mistakes. To save your soul. Any mother who claimed to love her children half as much as you claim to love yours would see that it is your mistake that has made them killers, not their own! So don't you even dare, for even a second, try and place yourself on the same level as Lily Potter, when you're not even worth the gravel under her shoes. You insufferable b-" Jasmine was about to add a long list of insults to her speech when the small throb in her head suddenly became unbearable. Like someone was sticking needles and spikes in her brain. She gave small cry in pain and clasped her head, her feet giving way as she fell to her knees. Klaus was quick enough to hold her up before she fell further.

"What are you doing?!" Klaus demanded from his mother, who looked around frantically. Someone had severed her connection to the Bennett line.

"No! Sisters! Do not abandon me!" She cried out to the rapidly fleeing witches. "Finn, It has to be done now!"

Jasmine was confused, the severing of the Bennett line should have rendered her powerless. It only took a moment for her to begin connecting the dots, Hermione would have been proud.

"Nik," Jasmine looked up to the man she had come to call a friend, with wide eyes, she had forced them open, pushing the pain to the back of her mind and climbed to her feet. Nik was still holding her up, for fear that if he moved away she would collapse like a flat-pack shelf. "What did you smell when you came to my house earlier?" It was the only way Jasmine could think to test her theory. She really hoped she was wrong but she tended not to be when it came to spells anymore, growing up with Hermione had its benefits. She'd picked up a few things, but she didn't even want to think about what it actually meant if she was right.

Nik gave her a confused looked, out of everything she had ever asked him this took the medal for weirdest, but the pleading look in her emerald eyes gave him no choice. He had to answer.

"I smelt something coppery, like blood. Then something flowery, like a bunch of flowers and then-" Nik looked slightly uncomfortable admitting all this in front his family, especially his mother who was minutes away from killing them, but he continued. "Raspberries."

Jasmine paled slightly, recalling the class she had done with Professor Slughorn in Sixth year. To a vampire, a witches blood has no scent. In the vein or out, but if a vampire was to taste the blood of a witch it would be as overwhelming as the smell of love potion. A witches blood tastes like they should smell. The same smell the people who love them smell in Amortentia. Klaus loved her, but she couldn't dwell on that. It also meant her blood was in the champagne.

"You crazy bitch!" Jasmine turned to Esther who was behind the ring of flames still trying to gather enough power from Jasmine to do the spell. Jasmine was fighting her. "Do you know what might have happened if you'd have used even slightly over too much? You would have had a Vampire massacre! All those people could have been harmed, if even one of those vampires figured out what they were drinking was blood, they would have torn that place apart looking for the source."

"I knew what the consequences could have been, yes!" Esther answered her in a sort of snap. "I am older and wiser than you girl! You should respect me! What I am doing is for the greater good of our kind and the human race!"

"You may be older you snivelling, self-righteous, old hag, but I'm stronger!" Jasmine hissed her best Slytherin impression. Esther's fire shrank, till it was almost half as small, slowly down the process of her spell. Jasmine was channeling all her remaining power into slowing Esther down. Jazz turned to Nik, before reaching down into her boot and pulling out her knife. She turned the handle towards him and held it a few centimetres away from her heart "Nik, you need to kill me!"

Both of them ignored the shouts of protest from the three of four vampires around them, but neither of them really cared.

"What?! Are you insane?"

"If you don't, you and your family die!" Jasmine tried her hardest to plead with him. "Your mother is channeling me! Finn must have compelled that boy to crash into me, your mother used the blood the waiter cleared up to help her with the spell! The spell hasn't stopped because she isn't just channeling the Bennett line anymore. She is channeling me!"

"Jasmine, what if it doesn't work?" He said and she sighed but smirked at him even though her eyes were sad. She didn't know how this worked. She didn't like to assume she was immortal.

"It will."

"Well, then what if you don't come back? How am supposed to live my life knowing I killed the one person I-." He stopped himself, but he knew he had to tell her. If she didn't come back. He had to know she knew how he felt. Nik took her hands in his, lowering the knife for a moment. "Jasmine, do you remember what you said yesterday, about not knowing what your future was? Well, Love, I'm not sure exactly what your future is, but I'm pretty sure mine is you! If you don't come back,-!"

"I will come back!" Jasmine cut him off. "I will fight my way through hell and personally kick deaths arse just so I can get back here! Even if it's just to haunt you!" Jasmine cracked a smile. "There is a fifty percent chance that I will be back and insulting you in time for supper. If you don't do this there is a hundred percent chance that you and your family will die at the hands of this monster. Please, if I lose you, I lose my future too."

Klaus searched her eyes for any sort of fear or dishonesty and only found the truthful green of the girl he loves. Nik nodded and raised the knife back up to Jasmine's heart.

She smiled and closed her eyes. Nik leant down and placed a small gentle kiss on her lips.

When he kissed her, it was like the reality around them fell away. They weren't supernatural beings, there was no Witch hell bent on killing her children. It was just the two of them. Then pain in Jasmine's head was no longer there if it was she couldn't feel it. Her brain was numb to all except Klaus, the Original Hybrid she had reluctantly fallen for. Klaus was in a similar state of euphoria, but the reality around them was still very real. He cleared his head, then drove the blade forward into Jasmine's heart, never breaking the kiss.

Jasmine gasped, the air knocked out of her and she immediately went limp in his arms, the ghost of a smile still on her face. Esther's spell immediately stopped. With Jasmine dead again and Abby in transition, she had no leg to stand on. Klaus ignored what was going on around him and scooped jasmine up into his arms.

"Take her home brother, Kol and I will deal with Esther!" Elijah said as he and his brother ran off in the direction Finn had run with their mother.

-x-

Klaus was pacing. He had not stopped for the past few hours. The others in the room were beginning to doubt that Jasmine would wake.

Damon stood in the archway of the door leant on the wood frame, his brother a few paces behind him with his arms crossed. In any other circumstance, Klaus wouldn't have allowed the brothers to be there. Especially since the matter was so person to him, but Damon was the only one there last time she woke from the dead.

"How long did it take last time?" Klaus asked Damon. He was becoming Impatient, but he couldn't give up.

"I don't know, Katherine brought her to the Boarding House and then she woke." Damon looked down at his friend on the couch, expecting her to jump up any moment and laugh at all their sad expressions. Damon frowned at the floor. "I'm going to go and call Andy. Maybe she knows what to do." He left the room with his phone in hand.

Rebekah was sat on the couch facing Jasmine, Elijah was sat on the other side of her staring off into the walls. He had a million things going through his mind. His mother, Jasmine's sacrifice and how he was going to help his brother back from the spiral downwards that would come with Jasmine's death.

Kol was stood behind the couch Jasmine lay on. He'd always had a soft spot for Witches and Jasmine was no exception. He was just as hopeful as everyone else.

"Something's wrong!" Rebekah voiced everyone's thoughts.

"She can't die!" Klaus snapped.

"Niklaus, she is already dead." Elijah tried to reason with his brother. It had been almost five hours and Jasmine's body hadn't moved an inch.

Stefan stepped forward from his place in the shadows, he'd also noticed that Jasmine hadn't moved. Nor had she changed colour. "She doesn't look dead." He said and all the eyes in the room turned to Jasmine. It was true. There was still the flush of colour in her cheeks and rigamortis hadn't set in.

"That could be make up for all we know!" Rebekah countered.

Nik walked over and grasped her hand and frowned in confusion, "She's still warm."

"How is that-"

"Sh, do you hear that?" Klaus cut off his sister and the whole room was silent too. The noise was like a small thump spaced two or so seconds apart.

"Is that-" Stefan looked down I surprise.

"It's her heart." that small unmistakable sounds of Jasmine's heart starting to beat again shocked the vampires in the room. It slowly got faster and Jasmine's hand twitched from next to her.

If Andromeda hadn't headed straight for Jasmine as she Jenna and Teddy entered the room, with Damon trailing behind them, the Mikaelsons wouldn't have known they were there. Andromeda had had a few years Medi-witch training before she became pregnant with Nymphadora, so she knew what to do in a situation such as this. She knelt down beside Jazz and placed her hand on her neck. She too could feel her heart beat. "Jenna come here." Jenna walked quickly over too Andromeda and gave the baby to Kol as she passed him. They would have left Teddy with Jeremy but since it was Damon who called they couldn't. He couldn't find out that he was still in Mystic Falls and leaving a baby alone in a house was somewhat frowned upon by most people.

Kol looked uncomfortable with the baby, he hadn't really held one in centuries. Teddy was sleepy since it was way past his bedtime and he'd been woken to at early hours in the morning, so he didn't care it was Kol who's shoulder his head was and was out like a light within seconds. Kol eventually relaxed, he almost forgot the little tyke was there.

"What's wrong with her?" Jenna asked, a slight panic in her voice.

"She's fighting to get back to this side of life, but it's happening slowly. Hold down her legs." Jenna nodded and place a slight amount of pressure on Jasmine's legs. Andy turned to Klaus. "How long has her heart been beating? Damon told me she was dead."

"She was dead, it only started beating again just before you got here. Is she going to be okay?" Klaus asked, his facial expression was pained.

"Jasmine is a mystery to even me, she has been through so much. Enough to divide across ten more life times. Yet she continues to pull through." Andromeda removed the pillow from underneath Jasmine's head. "That doesn't mean we can't give her a little help every now and again. Come, Niklaus. Hold down her shoulder." Nik moved around to the front of Jasmine and placed his hands on her shoulders. Andy stood and paced back a few steps. "Now remember to keep her steady, she may jolt and become confused, which could lead to her hurting herself. If she does Panic, Nik, I'm going to need you to try and calm her."

Andy waved her wand and Jasmine vitals appeared in smoke like words above her. Her heart beat was there but it was still very slow.

Andy pointed her wand directly at Jasmine's heart. The was only one spell she could think of that would get Jasmine's heart beating faster and bring her back to the land of the living. "Rennervate." Jasmine barely twitched and Andromeda sighed. There was something else she could try, It was an idea she had been working on for a while now and there was no time like the present to try it. Even though it didn't sit well with her, but she'd do anything for Jasmine. What did she have to lose if it didn't work? Azkaban seemed worth it for Jasmine to be alive.

"Hold her still, if she screams it's only normal. Don't let her go." Andy closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. She began to think about all the cruel and unjust things that had happened in her life. Being disowned for loving a muggle born. Ted being murdered. Dora being murdered by her sisters. The unjust treatment of Jasmine Potter by the Wizarding world she once called home. Those things were enough to have her blood boiling. "Crucio!" She shouted and a red bolt of light shot from her wand and straight at Jasmine on the couch. Andy immediately lost control of the spell and it died out. Her hatred wasn't strong even for the spell to last.

The brief spell was enough, though. Jasmine went rigid and her eyes shot open. Her heart beat had almost doubled and she let out a cry of pain. Klaus and Jenna were holding her down well. She had panicked a little but as soon as her eyes made contact with Nik and Jenna she relaxed. Her breathing calmed down and all her vitals went back to their normal states.

"What the hell was that?" Jenna asked, a little shocked. Andy's gaze was guilty but relieved.

"That was the Cruciatus Curse," Andromeda admitted.

Jasmine's head snapped towards the woman, she noticed the look of guilt and pain on her face, "You used the Cruciatus Curse on me?" She asked calmly and quietly. Jasmine knew she had recognised the familiar ache in her bones. Jasmine went to sit up but the too vampires were still holding her in place. Once they realised that she wasn't freaking out anytime soon they let go and Jasmine stood. She felt awful and like she could sleep for a month but she had to know Andromeda's reasoning.

"Your heart wasn't beating properly. It was slow and unsteady. You were fighting to come back but it was happening at such a slow place, I had to do something to help you. I won't lose another Daughter." Jasmine smiled as Andy finished and embraced her in a hug.

"I don't be guilty of a second, it takes a lot of courage to do something like that. Thank you!"

Andy visibly relaxed. After a few minutes of Andy checking her over and determining that Jasmine was well enough for her to be left alone for some rest, Jenna, Andy, and a sleeping Teddy left. Jasmine decided she'd be too weak to walk or apparate so she'd spend the night in her spare room at the manor.

Everyone else in the room hadn't uttered a word. They were still in shock, but Damon was the first to recover. He walked over to where Jasmine was sat on the couch and sat down next to her.

"Well, you know how to make an entrance. I'm glad your back." Damon smirked and she smiled. "Though you look like crap, I don't remember you still being this 'dead' last time."

"Oh, it's just a side effect of the spell Andy used. My bones will be aching for days, even though the spell was weak and lasted barely a second."

Damon visibly paled, "What was the thing? The scream you made, I think that's the reason everybody else looks like they've just witnessed a puppy massacre."

"I screamed?" She asked shocked, she was so startled when she woke that she hadn't noticed.

"It was like you were being burned alive," Rebekah said across from her. One glance around the room and she could see that all looked slightly scared. She knew she'd have to explain.

"Essentially, that's what was happening. The Cruciatus Curse it is forbidden in the wizarding world. Along with the killing curse and the mind control curse. The Cruciatus is used to torture people. To make them feel as though all the bones in their body are on fire, it leaves you with a dull ache for days or weeks depending on how long it was held, but it eventually goes." She explained. "Andy knew what she was doing, I don't mind being in slight pain if it means I'm alive."

-x-

The Salvatore brothers had left. Even Stefan had been relieved to see Jasmine alive, though he was sure that her scream wouldn't ever be forgotten. Not by anyone who heard it.

Jasmine was still on the couch relaxing with a warm drink that Kol had brought her with a small vial of potion that Andy had sent over with Kreature. It was a pain reliever with a slight sedative. She downed it and drank her tea. One by one the Mikaelsons went to get some rest. They all told her how grateful they were for what she had done and how they were glad she was back.

"Anyone willing do so much for my family, is considered family too." Elijah had said before he left.

Now it was only Jasmine and Klaus in the room. He hadn't spoken a word since she awoke, she was beginning to think she had done something wrong.

"You need some sleep!" Nik finally broke the silence, as she walked over to her and picked her up bridal style.

"Thank you," she muttered. He walked with her to her room at a human pace so he didn't hurt her. Though he avoided eye contact the whole way. He felt responsible for everything. Once she was there she changed into one of Nik's spare shirts in the bathroom and climbed into bed. Nik was about to leave.

"N-"

"I thought you were gone." he stopped at the door. Still not looking at her.

"Well, I'm not."

"That doesn't change the fact that you were lying dead on my couch because of me." He turned, looking at her for the first time since. He was angry, but at himself, not her.

"Because of Esther. How were you to know, Niklaus? I don't blame you, not for a second." Jasmine said truthfully her eyes filled with honesty. "Please, I don't want to argue with you. I just want to go to sleep and pretend I didn't spend my night fighting my way back to life."

Nik nodded and then turned to leave.

"I also haven't forgotten about what was said before." She told him, a small smile on her face. "You love me!" She taunted and Nik rolled his eyes.

"Regretfully so, I seem to be in love with a child." He smirked back Jasmine just laughed.

"And I'm in love with an overgrown mutt, seems we're both screwed."

"And there are the insults." He smirked. "Though you missed supper."

"It's a good thing they are just in time for breakfast then, isn't it? Now, shut up and come and get in the bed, I am not sleeping alone tonight and I know for a fact you'll probably just sit up planning world domination. You may as well keep me warm at the same time," Klaus rolled his eyes but obliged and it wasn't long before Jasmine's potions kicked in and she was asleep in Nik's arms. Nik lay there for while, just listening to her heart beat. His plans for world domination could wait till tomorrow.

-x-

A/N: First off, I apologise for being so MIA for the last month or so. Trying to find the inspiration to write was hard. It was the most intense writer's block I've ever had to overcome. This chapter is average sized. I have wrote and re-wrote every single word in this chapter at least twice. I just couldn't seem to get it right. I still don't know if it is, but this is the end product and I'm pretty happy with it. I hope youse are too. I hope to have chapter 39 up real soon. Though i do absolutely suck at writing anything lovey and sweet.

Thanks for reading, if you have any questions or ideas about this fic, PM me or let me know in the review section.

Kat xox