(The Stars Were Brightly Shining)
by adlyb
Disclaimer: I own nothing except these words.
Summary: After a one night stand with Klaus, Elena discovers she's not going to be alone for Christmas after all.
Spoilers: Seasons 3 & 4
Rating: R
Warnings: canon typical violence/ teen pregnancy / angst angst angst and Christmas
Elena stares at her, her mouth agape, as she struggles to formulate an intelligent response. It's very difficult. She feels as though she's been hit over the head with something big and heavy.
"What are you doing here?" she finally manages. Terrible. Totally weak. She swallows hard and tries again. "What have you done to Bonnie?"
Esther smiles, that sweet, wise smile that makes the hairs on the back of Elena's neck stand on end. "Your friend will be alright. I've merely exerted my influence on her, with the help of the spirits, so that she would do as I bade her." She pats Bonnie on the back of the hand, heedless of the fresh tears that trickle down Bonnie's cheeks and drip onto the table.
Mind control. Just like compulsion.
Esther has more in common with her children than she would ever admit.
Despite her obvious distress, Bonnie doesn't say a word. All she does is stare and stare and stare at Elena. As though trying to communicate through look alone what she cannot say aloud.
It occurs to Elena that maybe Bonnie can't speak, now that Esther is seated right beside her. That maybe the older with had stolen her speech along with her free will.
Somehow, she needs to warn Klaus about his mother's return, and she needs to get Bonnie out of here. She wrestles with different ideas for how they could escape.
If only she had a knife of some kind. She's awfully good at stabbing.
"I wouldn't hurt a witch so promising," Esther continues, turning back to study Elena. "As for why I'm here… I should have hoped that would be obvious. I'm here for you."
"Me," she repeats, somewhat stupidly. Of course. Just, of course. Under the table, Elena reaches for her phone. Maybe she can shoot a text off, to Caroline or to Klaus or someone. God, Caroline had been right. She should never have come alone. That's her heart though. Always dragging her into peril. No, no, this is okay. They're in public. Esther won't make a move here. She wouldn't dare. Elena tells herself this, over and over, fighting for any scrap of confidence as she tells Esther, "I have it on good authority that my blood's not useful for very much right now. I'm afraid I can't help you with any murders at the moment."
"Foolish child. I'm not here for your blood."
Ice fills her veins. She clambers unsteadily to her feet. Shoves her way out from the booth without a word and rushes for the door, her phone in her hand, already dialing Klaus. She'll have to come back for Bonnie once she has reinforcements. Once she's safe, and her baby's safe.
She hears the phone click as Klaus answers. Relief pulses through her.
A cool hand brushes her temple.
Rips her from consciousness.
Darkness overtakes her.
Her head is on fire and the rest of her body feels absolutely numb when she eventually swims up through the black haze bearing down on her and regains consciousness. For a dizzying minute, she's not certain that she has—it's so dark that at first she can't see a thing. Only the sharp lance of agony at the base of her skull convinces her that she must have awakened.
In those first few hazy moments, everything is such a confused blur in her head that she can't remember how she'd gotten here. The last thing she remembers is going to find Bonnie at the Grill, and then—Snatches of emotions—surprise, fear, panic—flash through her, but she can't place them.
Disoriented and blind, there's nothing for Elena to do other than wait for her head to stop spinning and splitting, and to try to clamp down on the fear that threatens to engulf her.
Slowly, slowly, her eyes adjust, and she realizes that, wherever she is, hours have passed since the Grill. The sun is already completely set, and the night stars stud the winter sky.
The stars. She's outside then.
The realization brings with it a creeping awareness of the cold. Shivers wrack her body.
Ordinarily, Elena never worries too much about the winters in Virginia… but she's never found herself out in the woods on a December night without more than a jacket to keep her warm. Already, her hands are so numb that she can barely bend her fingers. Worse, the cold has seeped into her limbs. Into her chest. The temperature is bound to dip below freezing tonight. If she doesn't find shelter soon, she's in serious trouble.
She fumbles through her pockets, her hands clumsy with the cold, hunting for her phone. If she's lucky, she'll have reception and can call someone to come find her. Worst comes to worst, she can use the compass on it to navigate to a road and she can walk until she gets in range of a cell tower.
This would be a great plan, except that her pockets are empty.
Stubbornly, desperately, Elena keeps searching. She definitely brought her phone with her—she'd had it out when—
The memory of that last instant before she'd passed out sweeps over her.
Esther must have done something to her. No doubt the phone is lying somewhere on the floor of the Grill, dropped and forgotten about when Esther had bespelled her.
Esther. Esther had been at the Grill—had told her she wanted her for something other than her blood.
There's only one possible answer as to what that other thing could be.
Elena will never let that happen.
Esther's not here now, and she'll be damned if she doesn't use this time to escape whatever nefarious plan Klaus's mother had schemed up.
Gritting her teeth, she tucks her hands into her armpits for warmth, praying that they're not already damaged, and tries to catch her bearings by studying the stars.
It's hopeless. She never paid attention to her dad when he tried to teach her how to navigate on any of their family camping trips. Frustrated tears prick her eyes. She's not even sure which star the North Star is. There are too many trees blocking her view. Maybe she can't even see it.
No. No. She's not going to give up. Better to get away in the wrong direction than just sit here. Anything is better than letting Esther have her baby.
That tempest of her protective fury warms her the way no fire could. Lends her the strength and determination she so desperately needs.
Slowly, fighting down a crashing wave of nausea, Elena sits up. The change in equilibrium proves to be a terrible mistake. Her gorge rises, and she vomits into the loam and dead pine needles by her hands.
It helps. The pain in her head recedes to a mild drum. Her thoughts clear with each passing pulse.
The cool, silvery light of the stars seems to shine all the brighter.
Elena pulls herself to her feet and looks around her. She has no idea which direction to go in. It doesn't matter.
She walks and she walks.
It's slow, treacherous going at first. Shadows pool like inky ponds in the trenches and hollows of the forest floor, and she trips more than once, barely avoiding a sprained ankle or worse.
After a while, though, the gibbous moon peaks out from behind the clouds, casting the forest floor in a pale glow. Her eyes still strain to pick out potential obstacles and pitfalls in her path, but the going gets much easier.
Her ears strain for the sound of the highway. Twice, she adjusts her course when the wind carries the sound of traffic through the woods.
The walking at least warms her, enough that she can clearly feel the knotted muscles in her shoulders from lying on a bed of rocks and roots for hours. Enough that her back and her belly cramp from the exertion.
Her thoughts wander as she picks her way through the underbrush.
Why had Esther kidnapped her just to leave her alone and unguarded in the woods?
The uglier question of what Esther might want with her mystical, unnatural child preys on her. Probably as fodder for some sort of dark sacrifice, she broods. Maybe as fuel to help her murder all of her children.
Why her plan had seemed so reasonable just a couple of months ago, Elena can't even begin to understand. Her own child is hardly more than a dream and a bodily discomfort, and yet she loves it so fiercely. So entirely. Just the idea of giving her baby up for harm feels like a spike to the chest.
But then, Elena also can't imagine laying a blood curse on her child and then calling it a protection spell, either.
Anxiety for Bonnie clings to her like a spiderweb, settling claustrophobically over every other thought. While she fumes about Esther's assassination schemes, she worries about what had happened to Bonnie. Is she with Esther now? Or had Esther let her go? Had Esther been telling the truth when she told her she wouldn't hurt a such a talented witch? And how long had Esther been controlling Bonnie, whispering into her thoughts and twisting them inside out? She'd been in Alaric's head for months before anyone had detected her.
Elena finds no answers in the tangle of her ruminations, only further questions.
The sound of rushing water drags her from her circling thoughts.
Elena freezes as she realizes where she's wandered.
It's so dark that she cannot make out the sheer drop-off she knows is there just past the line of trees.
For a moment, she cannot help but imagine herself, oblivious and exhausted, stepping through that very line of trees and plunging into the icy black river below.
Carefully, she makes her way forward. Once she nears the edge of the woods, lights from the newly constructed Wickery Bridge prick through the treeline.
Relief saws through her. She's on the wrong side of the valley, but so long as she keeps the bridge in sight and is careful not to walk too close to the bank, she can follow the river back to a road.
(If there's a part of her that wonders at what instinct led her here, she squashes it down down down.)
"There you are. I'd wondered where you'd wandered off to."
At the sound of Esther's melodious voice, Elena shuts her eyes and internally screams. She'd come so close.
She has only two choices. Face Esther while attempting to stall for time and praying like hell that someone comes to rescue her, or throw herself into the river.
If it were only her own life at stake, she just might make a dash for the water.
But that's not an option anymore.
Turning to face Esther, Elena raises her chin, doing her best not to appear the least bit cowed. "Did you think I was just going to stay still like a good pawn?"
"I set a barrier spell on the circle I left you in. Did you truly pierce it without even noticing it was there?" Esther cocks her head, assessing her. "How fascinating. I can feel your child's spirit—she whispers to me across the void—the interaction of your blood with her gifts have made her stronger by far than she should have any right to be at this stage. She's lending you a good deal of unconscious power right now."
Her words pelt against her like hail—Elena's sure they portend something awful, but at the same time, she can't focus on this particular line of ominous gibberish right now. She keys in on the one detail she can absorb.
"Why isn't Bonnie with you? Where is she?"
"I've let her go for now. She'll come again when I call."
"Why go through the trouble of involving Bonnie at all, though? Why not just grab me like you did that time outside the school?"
Esther takes a step toward her. Moon shadows shift over her face like claws as she approaches. "When you already have a tool in hand, you may as well use it," she explains. "Even if it's not for the purpose for which you originally intended it."
Déjà vu whispers over her as she watches Esther in the dark, more wraith than witch in the eerie darkness. A memory sparks. Esther in the moonlit graveyard, fleeing with the impervious white oak stake wrought with the magic from Alaric's ring.
Insight crashes through her as all of the pieces snap together.
"You're Shane's contact," she realizes. "The one who was controlling him."
Esther snatches at her arm and drags her into the woods.
"How clever of you. Just like your predecessors."
Elena struggles against her, but a wave of Esther's hand has her slumping into Esther's grasp, suddenly nearly too weak to stand.
"Why manipulate us though?" Elena asks through gritted teeth. "Why go through the trouble?"
"Why does any woman do what she must? For her children."
Instead of forcing her back to the clearing she had awakened in, Esther brings her to a deeper place within the woods.
A familiar place.
The site of the sacrifice last spring.
Esther loosens her hold on her. "Do not try to run," she warns her. "I've erected a barrier spell around this whole meadow. This one is more than strong enough to hold you."
Elena barely hears her. Her eyes skitter over the clearing.
The earth still bears the scorch marks from the fire that had engulfed and imprisoned them all that fateful night.
To her left, the place where Jules had had her heart ripped from her chest. And to her right… the circle where Klaus had murdered Jenna.
Her gorge rises.
She's fantasized about this place in the dark still of the night, all alone in her bed. Reenacted it again and again in Klaus's embrace.
She's never let herself think about what had come before the bite. Never faced it.
"Why'd you bring me here?" Elena asks. The question tears at her throat. Her soul.
There's a flicker of movement in the distance. The wind rustling through the trees.
Esther guides her to the circle where she had stood last spring, awaiting her death. "The magic is still strong here," she whispers into her ear. "Where the barrier between what is and is not possible is at its thinnest. The place where you and my son unmade reality." A flutter of her hand is all it takes to reignite the fires that have burned at the back of her every thought ever since.
The entire clearing leaps into overpowering brightness as heat explodes from the flames.
Elena crosses her arms over her belly. "I won't let you hurt my baby."
She has no weapons, no friends, no plans.
And yet, she refuses to give in to hopelessness. Refuses to back down from this fight.
Esther pauses. "Hurt your baby? Why would I want to do that?"
"I don't know. I assume you have some sick plan."
Esther grips her by the chin and tips her face up so that she is forced to look her in the eyes. "Do you truly not realize the significance of the child you carry?"
Another flicker out of the corner of her eye. This time she realizes what she sees. Elena fights the urge to turn, to look, lest she tip Esther off.
Nervous, heart hammering, Elena licks her lips. Hazards, "I know my baby's special."
"The first of its kind, it's true."
There's something about Esther's expression. About the light in her eyes. She knows something about her baby. What had she said earlier?
I can feel your child's spirit.
Despite the danger, Elena cannot help but ask her. Cannot help the desire in her heart to know, fervent and violent as a bolt of lightning.
"Bonnie says my baby is unnatural. Is that true?"
"Yes. Of course it is."
"Because I'm the doppelganger."
Esther's gaze sharpens on her face. She lays a hand over her belly.
It should be impossible at this stage, but she swears she feels her child stir within her.
Responding to Esther's magic.
"Not at all," Esther murmurs, ducking her head to focus on Elena's abdomen.
Elena stares out into the night, searching out the familiar silhouette she had glimpsed out of the corner of her eye.
Nearly immediately, she locks eyes Klaus, prowling at the edge of Esther's barrier as he carefully tests it for a weak point. An entryway through which to rescue her.
She has no idea how he's found her. Doesn't care.
She has to fight to keep the relief from showing on her face, even as that relief is quickly followed with a very real jolt of fear, heightened all the more by their surroundings.
She swallows around the lump in her throat. The ache of her racing heart. She has to keep Esther distracted.
"Then why?" she asks. "Why is my baby special?"
In the distance, Klaus seems to find the weak spot he needs to push inside the barrier. She witnesses him tear through its walls as though he were tearing through an actual wall of stone with his bare hands.
Abstractly, Elena thinks this should not be possible—she has seen witches keep him out on more occasions than she can count—except—this is the place where the barrier between what is and isn't possible is thinnest. Where Klaus and she had remade reality. Where he had drunk down her life and her power and absorbed it into himself. The power to disobey Nature and remake the world in their own image.
It's the work of mere moments before he is within, creeping through the night like a phantom so as to avoid summoning his mother's attention.
"Because of who the father is," Esther replies to her question, oblivious, her attention still diverted to the baby.
"There is no father." The words by now sound as robotic as they feel.
This actually elicits a laugh from her. "Of course there is. It takes two lives to create a new one. Even your blood cannot override that law."
Elena stares uncomprehendingly at her. "What are you saying?"
"I'm saying that my interest in your child is solely because of its paternity."
"What?" Elena asks, barely able to hear herself over those alarms from the other day, blaring now at full strength inside her head.
Esther straightens, and strokes a hand down the side of her face. "Dear child, do you truly not realize? The father of your child is Niklaus."
The wind howls, and the fire all around them leaps.
Reality tumbles out from under her feet and lands on its side.
All at once, she finds herself staring directly into Klaus's wild, incredulous eyes, huge and gleaming in his otherwise ashen face. He stands just behind Esther, arm raised, poised to strike his mother down. Frozen by the meteor strike of his mother's words.
Mere seconds stretch into an eternity.
Elena stares and stares and stares, and she knows.
This is the moment when her life changes forever. The moment where there really is no turning back.
A/N: The time of revelations is upon us! At last! Please leave a comment and let me know your thoughts! Next chapter is going to be WILD as we delve into Klaus and Elena's reactions to the NEWS!
Thanks for reading!
