Two years had passed since her parents' death. But Hope hadn't been able to move on even though people had tried to help her. Especially her aunt Freya who had tried to be her mother, her father, her everything. She just couldn't forget Klaus or Hayley, her parents. She blamed their deaths on herself and felt guilty and responsible for them dying. Her father had sacrificed herself so that she could be safe from the Hollow.

"You're awake!" a familiar brusque voice observed as the door opened with a loud click.

"Yes, I am," Hope said, looking out the window eastward to see the sun rising. "Looks like it is going to be a good morning."

She turned to see Alaric standing in the middle of the room, looking concerned. The frown lines on his face told him that something had happened.

"So, are you going to stand quietly there or tell me what is going on?" Hope asked, impatiently.

Alaric seemed to be in a mood for hesitating (she could relate, considering even she had the habit of keeping things close to hand), but he opened his mouth. "You remember Cassie?"

Hope nodded. She remembered Cassie all right. The girl had been a bitch to her. She had never understood why.

"What about her?" she asked, wondering why the Headmaster of the Salvatore School for the Young and Gifted was bringing her up.

And how did he even know about her and Cassie?

Maybe the rumors are right. Nothing gets by in Mystic Falls without Alaric Saltzman knowing about it.

"She's dead!" he remarked, showing no other emotion but sadness. "Car accident!"

"Hmmm… are we investigating car accidents now?" she questioned, still trying to find the importance in her death. Oh, she felt sad that the girl had to die! She might even grieve for it, but what had it to do with her? And why couldn't the Headmaster wait until the sun was up?

"No!" the Headmaster answered with a sigh following it. He sat down on one of the chairs beside the easel. A large canvas lay beside it, showing the beginning of a painting. She had not yet finished it - it was awful, she thought, at its present stage, and she wished he wouldn't turn around and notice it. "But the accident itself was uncanny to say the least."

"How so?" Hope frowned.

"There was one survivor in the crash," Alaric continued. "Went by Rafael."

"Cassie's boyfriend!" Hope had seen him once with Cassie at some townie event. She had sneaked out of the boarding school, flouting its rules. She had always felt like she was being pitied for the loss of her parents at the Salvatore School. So, ever and anon, she would go into town and observe people. Along the way, she had made one friend who went by Landon Kirby. He had been the one to introduce her to Cassie, telling her that she was his best friend's girlfriend.

It had been surprising to her that Landon even had a best friend, considering they both were the loner type and preferred not to mingle with the crowd. For Landon, the crowd at his school, Mystic Falls High, had always bullied him. He had ranted out to her about how they stuffed him in those weird compartments the school had. Also, something about his face having a date with toilets and wash basins.

"Yes, he healed fast and was able to give a statement to the police," Alaric said, breathing deep. "Thanks to my friendship with the Sheriff…"

"The one with the adorable blue eyes?" Hope winked. "The one my Auntie Rebecca liked once upon a time?"

"Yes, the same one," Alaric said, not liking her interruptions evidently. "Thanks to him, I got hold of the statement."

"Why would you do that?" she asked, squinting at him. Why would the Headmaster want to get involved with a car accident? It didn't make sense to her. The Salvatore School was a school for the supernatural. And, even though Alaric was a human, he barely had contact with his kind except for maybe the Sheriff Matt Donovan, his best friend who came by the school every once in a while and who used to be a vampire Damon Salvatore, and of course, the one whom her father had sacrificed in a ritual, Elena Salvatore, who now had her own doctor's practice in Mystic Falls. She had, however, avoided meeting with Elena whenever she came. She wouldn't know how to react if Elena ever saw her. Would she blame her for her father's misdeeds?

"I've been researching into some werewolf bloodlines," Alaric explained. "Many of the packs here, especially the North Eastern Atlantic Pack, went down south to New Orleans. Rumor has it that they went south to see the miracle baby."

Hope knew he was referring to her. She was the miracle baby, Nature's big loophole.

"But some remained here. The ones who went south were obliterated by this guy named Lucien. We all know how those events played out in the south."

She bobbed her head. The vampire named Lucien set a string of events in motion that caused her father to be imprisoned under his own house and almost eradicated her family. Lucien had died at the hands of her father, but the damage had been done.

"Among the pack was a returned Army woman named Madeleine. She married one of the pack… I think his name is Henry…. well, he's a friend of mine. Granted he shifted to Atlanta in search of his wife, who went missing some two decades ago. He had found out that Madeleine was a werewolf, you see. And she ran away to protect him from herself. Henry wouldn't take it and went after her, but it seemed that Madeleine had a baby and she named him Rafael, and she left him with his father. Henry couldn't raise his child without her and so gave him to the foster system."

Hope nodded, wondering where this story was getting to.

"Now, I believe that this Rafael has the wolf gene."

"Okay…"

"Now, Rafael claims that he saw some dark figure standing in the middle of the road and he swerved to avoid her. He was driving fast and didn't notice a sharp turn or the sign preceding it. The car slammed into a tree and Cassie died instantly from her injuries."

"Aah…" Hope began to see what's coming.

"Rafael triggered his werewolf curse a full moon ago. His foster parents are freaked out, and they reached out to someone they know, awakened to the supernatural."

"Who?"

"Bonnie Bennett!" Alaric answered. "Well, Bonnie asked me to involve myself into it before she went abroad on one of her world tours, and I have been following up on Rafael."

"Okay…"

"Well, as I investigated, I also found his claims to be true… Now, I think… that the black figure is something real. No idea what he or she or it is, but real. I saw it too at the same bend where Rafael crashed. Crimson eyes, and all that."

Hope furrowed her brows. "What?" she asked. "I don't get it… what kind of a supernatural is it?"

The Headmaster just shrugged. "We have no idea…who or what it is… Why does it appear only at that place? And why did it appear in front of Rafael's car? And only that car? There has also been no sightings of it before Raf's incident… and now there are reports that it has been sighted at least five times since then and always at the same place."

Hope slumped to the bed as she went into deep thought. This was why Dr. Saltzman had come to her? Did he need her help uncovering the mystery of this supernatural entity?

"Well, I'm in, whatever it is!" she said, standing up and drawing a breath.

Alaric stood up too, a smile on his face. "I… thank you, Hope."

"Like I said, a good morning and I need the distraction."

"Distraction from what?" the Headmaster asked, frowning.

"Story for another time, Dr. Saltzman," she replied. Well, he kept Rafael's secret from her for a number of days. She would keep hers close to her heart for a few more days. "Now, take me to the accident site, will you, Dr. Saltzman?"

Alaric hummed in response. "Fine!" he said, giving up. "Will take you there in an hour. Have your breakfast and meet me at the gate."

She nodded.

Alaric looked into her eyes and then turned and left.

Hope breathed deep and strode to the table beside the easel. She took out an envelope from below a stack of papers, each paper sporting a strange sigil drawn upon it in a weird language. The envelope had her name on it.

Hope Mikaelson, Salvatore School for the Gifted and Young - it read.

Taking out the letter, she unfurled it and read its contents once again. The message was but a single line - Beware, we're coming for you, Tribrid.

She put the envelope back on the table. Let them come, she mumbled. Over the years, many enemies had come for her head, and they had all been defeated. All those times, her family did the honors. Now, it was her turn.