Chapter 3
Unbeknownst to the man and the woman inside the French Quarter estate, the soldiers of the Armory positioned themselves around the home, waiting for the signal to extract the couple.
Inside Nik took a seat next to Bella and grabbed her hands forcing her to turn and look at him. "I know that this seems out of left field to you, but you have been my priority for the last ten years." For some reason, Nik's confession was not a surprise to Bella; she could feel his need to protect her. As Bella opened her mouth to address this, she began to cough roughly. Nik stood, planning to get a glass of water when he noticed smoke slowly rising from the ground.
"Bella," urged Nik as he went to pick her up as she continued coughing, "we need to go!"
"My magic," coughing she adds "isn't working."
"Sorry, my sister has a spell on the house. Only Mikaelsons can use magic inside the estate." he answered as he stretched his ears to listen for anyone trying to breach the residence.
Bella's coughing continued as she whispered a spell to Nik. "Repeat the words!" she was able to say before passing out. Nik took a deep breath and said the words she had whispered to him, and suddenly the smoke that was filling the room receded.
"Bella...Love, please wake up." he said as his lips touched her cheek.
"NIKLAUS MIKAELSON, COME OUT OR WE ARE COMING IN!" came a voice on a megaphone.
"Don't worry Love they can't get in" he says as he walked her up the stairs to his bedroom and placed her on his bed. "I will be back soon."
Nik covered Bella with his black duvet as he placed another kiss on her right cheek. He turned one last time to look at her. Nik knew that his promise may not come to fruition, that he may not be able to make it back to her. But what he knew for certain was that the Armory did not know who the witch was that saved his life. He knew that they did not know she was his mate. He knew that he needed to allow them to catch him. If he allowed them to believe that they had won, then she would be safe.
They did not want to kill him; the humans wanted to study him and discover a way to harness his power. Nik decided in that moment, gazing at her face, that he would rather be held in captivity for the rest of time if it meant they would not get their hands on her. That his Bella, his Love, his mate would continue to be safe. With that he went into battle.
Nik turned quickly heading down the stairs. No one was home except him, and Bella, so he headed back downstairs to the courtyard and shifted into his sandy colored wolf. Growling and howling could be heard as he fought the army of men and women that had surrounded his family's home. Neighbors knew what the Mikaelsons were, but everyone kept their distance. No one came to assist Nik in his losing battle.
He made sure that it looked like he put up a fight, but he was surrendering. He led them away from the compound that they could not enter. He realized once they had found him at Bella's rental that the men, he had fought with must have put a tracking device on him. He had found a puncture wound behind his forearm when they made it back to his place. He knew that it would only be a matter of time before they located him, but he hoped that his sister Freya's spell would somehow block any transmission.
Nik was banking on the Armory taking the bait and following him to the Bayou. He whimpered in pain as electroshock flooded his system through a super powered taser.
Nik was surrounded, a smile graced his face as the army moved in closer to access their prisoner. She was safe and that was all that mattered in that moment.
Bella woke with a start as her mind began to clear, as she assessed her surroundings. She realized that she was alone in a very masculine bedroom. The last thing she could recall was smoke and telling Nik the spell to remove it. She deduced that the imprint would allow him to access her magic since only a Mikaelson could use magic within the home.
Was that the Armory? Where was Nik? She did not feel any different, so she knew she had not been harmed. Bella felt panicked as she composed herself to the possibility of her having to fight her way out of this situation.
"Damn it, I wish I had brought my gun" she said into the empty space.
"That won't be necessary, Ms. Swan" came a deep voice from the doorway.
She screamed as she grabbed the lamp on the nightstand next to her.
"I am sorry I didn't mean to scare you" said a man in a three-piece suit. Bella, now in a sitting position on the bed, observed that the gentlemen looked to be about twenty-seven years old. He had similar facial features of Nik.
"So which sibling are you?" she asked as she placed the lamp in front of her body, just to be on the safe side.
"My name is Elijah" he stood, "we need to join the others downstairs. Freya needs you to track Niklaus." Elijah watched her as she realized that Nik was no longer in the residence. She was right that the Armory was trying to gain access to the compound, and they had successfully taken Nik.
She left the lamp on the bed as she ran out of the room to the balcony that overlooked the courtyard. There she observed two blonde women and two men. They seemed worried but not shocked to see her. Like Elijah, they all seem to know who she was even if this was her first time meeting them.
"BELLA!" came the high-pitched scream of joy from the younger of the two women. Her joy was infectious which caused Bella to smile automatically. She turned to follow Elijah down the set of stairs that led to the courtyard. There she saw evidence of very dark and dangerous magic.
"Hi" said the older blonde woman, "I am going to need your blood to do this connective magic spell."
"Goodness, Freya" came the younger male in the group, "at least introduce yourself before you try and bleed this beauty dry. I am Kol by the way." He reached out his hand to a shocked Bella.
"Bleed me dry" she answered back as she started walking backwards bumping into the other male, who from his complexion was clearly not one of the Mikaelsons, at least not by blood. He placed his hands on her shoulders, "I am Marcel, by the way and don't worry we will not bleed you dry because Klaus would kill us."
"Look we need to move fast before they move him to a secure location" Freya grabbed Bella's arm and produced a knife in her other hand. In that moment, Bella growled and pushed backwards against Marcel. This strength came over her as she vamp speeded to the top of the balcony.
"Did you know she could do that?" said Kol as everyone looked at Bella in shock. She did have access to Nik's abilities for the last ten years even though she never realized it until today. She was not letting anyone sacrifice her for anyone, not even Nik.
But she was willing to try something that she never thought she would try again.
After Grams' death and once she was of legal age, Bella and her cousin Bonnie had traveled together for a few years studying and learning all different forms of witchcraft all around the world including traditional magic, spirit magic, necromancy and even the ancestral magic practiced in New Orleans. Bella continued her travels which led her to New Orleans after Bonnie had fallen prey to Dark Magic and Expression. With the help of Bonnie's friends from Mystic Falls, they were able to save Bonnie and now she is happily engaged to a vampire named Enzo.
Bella opened her hand and summoned the knife that Freya had tried to use on her. It was a ceremonial knife, and she knew that with her connection to Nik it would be strong enough to allow her to find him. She sat down on the marble stone floor folding her legs. Reaching her hand out she cuts into her hand and created a figure eight with the blood on the floor in front of her. Channeling Expression was hard, but she opened herself up to calling on her ancestors as well. By using three forms of magic at the same time, she hoped it would help her to tap into the mark of the mate to find Nik.
As the magics took hold of Bella, she began chanting. Her eyes turned white as she took hold of the nearest witch's mind which would be Nik's sister, Freya. She could have taken any of his siblings for the spell to work, but Freya was going to use a dangerous spell on her without her consent, so she chose her to be the anchor for the spell.
Freya screamed as her body began to shake as the bulbs in the lanterns around the courtyard began to break causing glass to fly everywhere. Bella struggled to keep her mental hold on Freya as she stretched her mind and magic further than she ever had in the past.
She saw it, a golden spark and then a sign. "We found him" said Freya, and with that information Bella mentally let go of her connection to Freya.
It took her a minute to get her bearings as her heart rate started to regulate. "I cannot believe you did that to me" said Freya angrily.
"Well, at least what I did didn't almost cost you your life," she sneered as she stood up looking at the family from the balcony. They all had a shocked look on their faces as they looked up at her.
"What are we waiting for people?" said Bella, "go get my mate" and then she fainted.
