The next few months were dedicated to taking control over the Armoury and the rather disgusting job of feeding the flesh of humans to the monster I kept locked up in a secure cell on site. In between that time I flew back and forth between the Armoury and my parents' house in order to be with Lucan, only able to stay a couple of days at a time before needing to go back to continue helping uncover the intricacies of the secret organisation that housed so many amazing historic artefacts that the small geeky part of me felt like practically exploding with joy to be able to go through, document and catalogue everything whilst also taking care of the beast in the basement.
Alaric and I had become something of a tag team, Alaric taking care of the artefacts and researching everything in the archives, whilst I focused on the siren who was gradually getting their strength back. Damon thought I was crazy feeding the siren like some kind of pet and giving her exactly what she needed to become more powerful, but I had everything under control. "I need her in order to draw out her sister so I can deal with them both together, and besides. Her psychic powers won't work so long as I'm around. The runes in her cell block psychic influences, and so long as you guys wear those stones I spelled for you, she can't get into your heads. Effectively, she's powerless. Just keep on bringing her bad people to eat. We're still short a few dozen from the eighty seven she needs."
"You know carrots, I've lived a long time but this is possibly one of the grossest things I have ever done." Damon said to me as we both watched as the siren, Sybil, ate her way through another carcass. "You better be right about all this."
"Would it kill you to have a little faith?" I responded dryly, shooting him a sidelong look. "Just keep up the good work. You, Stefan and Enzo need to branch out across as many states as possible to collect people without drawing too much attention. Just remember, they have to be terrible people who deserve to die, that way we can all carry on sleeping soundly at night." I reminded him as I frowned down at the person our pet siren was currently gnawing on. "Who was he?"
"A happy-go-lucky little psychopath who enjoyed trapping people in buildings and setting them on fire to burn them alive." Damon responded cheerfully, so I shrugged and accepted that this guy was a terrible human being. Gradually the siren gained back her own strength, becoming more human looking the more she consumed until finally after eating eighty seven people down to the marrow in their bones, she stood a beautiful and flawless example of female perfection. For a while she didn't speak, merely hummed to herself to test her psychic capability, pushing the boundaries however my spells held her in place and the runes I had burned into the walls trapped her inside. Even if the walls themselves fell to pieces and the Armoury became nothing more than a ruin, she was never leaving that room without my say so.
I spent hours at a time just looking at her directly in the eye as she looked back at me, the both of us trying to get a feel for the other. She was far older than I was, but I had the backing of all my ancestors at my disposal, which made me just as strong. However I knew that I wouldn't be able to take both her, her sister as well as the devil himself without some help, which was where Bonnie came in. I would need her, and she was more than willing to fight by my side to put this to an end before everyone could go back to their lives the way they should be. The happy future was a pale glimmer in the back of my mind, but with each passing day it was becoming brighter and brighter, more tangible as we worked towards the end goal. So far, everything was going in the right direction. "Any changes today?" Alaric questioned me as he joined me down in the detention level to see how I was doing.
"She won't speak yet. It'll be a while before she's pushed to her limit and we can use her as bait. I need more time." I answered him before turning to face him. "Did you find it?"
"The staff thing? Yeah it was exactly where you said it would be. It's right here." Holding up what I only knew to be called the Staff of Arcadius, I lifted it from my ex-teacher's hands in order to inspect it closely and try to ascertain exactly what it is.
"I only saw it briefly in a vision, I don't know anything about this except that it's vital for our plan. I'm guessing, however…that you know exactly what this is." Looking over to the siren, Sybil, as I lifted up the weapon which looked more like a giant tuning fork than anything else, I smirked when I saw the slightly terrified look in her eye as she fixated her focus on it intensely. "You wanna tell me what I want to know?" She remained silent, jaw hardening in defiance so with a shrug, I tapped the prongs against the wall and the moment the item rang out with a piercing sound, Sybil immediately cried out in pain and gripped her ears to try and block the sound as the disruptive pitch caused a fluctuation of her psychic powers. "Huh. Interesting." I allowed the sound to continue ringing for a few seconds more before I closed my fingers around the prongs to cut it off, allowing silence to fall once again. "I'm going to let you stew for a while longer, and when I come back, I expect you to be a little more forthcoming in telling me everything I want to know. Otherwise we're going to be doing a lot of fine tuning around here, which is likely to give you one hell of a headache."
We left together after that, handing the object back to Alaric who told me he was going to get his interns to focus on finding out as much information about it as possible so that we would get a better idea what we were dealing with. I glanced at him, recognising that his means of throwing himself into his work was his way of dealing with the fact that Stefan and Caroline were now back together. "Hey Ric?" Gathering his attention, I stopped for a moment so that I could focus on him entirely for a moment, dispelling all other concerns and worries that I had rocketing around in my head. "I'm sorry about Caroline, but you know, you shouldn't feel down about it."
"Oh really? And why is that? Because I'm pretty sure my fiancée is now getting married to her ex." I understood his attitude, but considering what I had in store for him was not only going to solve all his problems, but make him the happiest man alive, I let the sour tone pass this time around.
"Because once this is over and we destroy Hell and the devil, I'm going to bring your wife back from the dead." These words hit him like a brick to the face, so much so that Ric dropped the staff and let it clatter to the floor between our feet as he stared at me a little stupidly, like he hadn't exactly processed what I'd just said. "Just something for you to think about whilst you're researching." Grinning as I clapped him on the shoulder, I took off once again which prompted Ric to hurriedly grab the dropped staff and race after me, calling out.
"Hey wait! What do you mean bring my wife back? Are you being serious here? I tried everything to bring her back to life and found nothing. Can you really…? Don't give me false hope here, Lia. If you can really bring Josie back…just tell me the truth." His expression looked utterly tortured yet lined with a vague hope that he barely dared to cling onto as I softened towards him, having always seen Ric with a degree of affection for being my favourite teacher in the past.
"Sure I can. I'm a druid, I have special powers no one else in the world has. After we destroy Hell, there's going to be a massive surge of psychic and magical energy which will produce something called a Nexus Vorti, I can use that energy to accomplish the impossible. Since destroying Hell will release a load of souls and cause the veil between life and death to blur for a time, drawing Josie back from the dead won't be a problem." Reaching out my hand, I placed it on Ric's shoulder as I gripped on firmly to show just how resolute and confident I was in this. "You'll get her back, Ric, and this time, you'll be able to walk down the aisle with her for real."
"You'd…you'd do that? But…don't you have people you want to bring back from the dead too?" I had already thought about it a lot, so his question came as no surprise to me as I sadly drew back and almost started crying as I felt the hurt and pain from carrying the loss of Owen, my real parents and my younger siblings within me still.
"Even with the nexus vorti, I can't do that. My family weren't witches or vampires, and neither was Owen. They were all human and completely untouched by the supernatural, so their souls have already found complete peace. No amount of magical power can bring them back, but Josie was a Gemini witch, even if she didn't practice. Her unique soul will have an imprint of her power still on her, which will make it easy for me to bring her back from the dead." Drawing in a deep breath to settle my fractured feelings, I gave Ric a broad smile. "Your little girls will get to know their real mom, and both you and Caroline will be with the people you were meant to be with. Just do me a favour, don't push Caroline away. She loves those girls with everything she has, and it'll be difficult for a while after Josie comes back. Promise me you'll all work through it together." Stumbling for words, Ric managed to promise he'd do exactly that, so with that in mind, I carried on with the tasks that needed to be done.
With the weird tuning fork thing in hand, as well as Damon sent off searching for someone by the name of Peter Maxwell who I had seen repeatedly crop up in my visions along with some kind of bell which seemed to be vital for the endgame, I focused my attention on Sybil in order to get all the information out of her that we needed, Alaric and Stefan keeping me company as we returned to her cell the next day all freshly imbued with wonderful coffee to stave off the sleep deprivation. "The all-powerful siren. Imprisoned by a fork." Stefan began, tapping the fork against the wall in order to make it ring so that Sybil flinched in pain from the sound before she retorted rather wryly.
"Says the man who can be killed with a stick." Alaric brought us all into focus, diving straight in with the question of why the tuning fork hurt Sybil as well as his children, who had been affected by the sound the fork made when he'd accidentally dropped it at home. "And here I thought you had me all figured out. Guess not."
"We're not interested in you exactly, we're more curious about how you came to be." I interrupted, taking the lead so that the siren then focused on me with deep brown eyes that seemed to swim and pull a person's attention closer to her. Subtle hypnotism. Nice, but ineffective against me. "We know what you are, but that's about it. So unless you want to go back to starving and becoming nothing more than a rotting corpse, I suggest you start answering our questions and don't bother lying. My magic runes forbid deceit, so you have no choice but to tell the truth." Sybil smirked and chuckled richly at this, getting off the bed and sauntering rather seductively towards the window so that we stood face to face with one another, a mere pane of bulletproof glass separating us.
"Well, fortunately, the answer to your question is…a story. About me. You like stories, don't you, Professor?" Her eyes then shifted towards Ric, attempting to use her powers on him instead but I quickly snapped my fingers between them, keeping her from getting a hold of Alaric.
"Hey, hey, focus here. You try any of that psychic stuff and you get the fork." To emphasise my point, Stefan dutifully tapped the tuning fork once again to give Sybil a severe headache, causing her to cry out and grasp her head before the sound gradually died away, allowing her to stand upright and scowl at me, but concede defeat.
"A long time ago, in a little Mediterranean village, there was a girl. As she came of age, the village girl began to manifest psychic abilities, a trait that had been forbidden in her land for as long as anyone could remember." Sybil began to narrate the story of her life, starting from the very beginning as I stood and listened to absorb each and every single word so that I would not miss a single detail. "The fate of psychics was exile. Which is how our poor, innocent, forsaken village girl ended up on a raft…the current carrying her into the rocks of a cold and distant shore. But abandoned though she was meant to be, alone she was not. There she met the girl of the island. Exiled together, connected in psychic ability, two sisters in everything but blood, destined from that moment to one day become…the sirens."
"Sirens as in plural?" Stefan addressed and I nodded my head, frowning to myself.
"My visions showed me two sirens, but I don't know where the other one is or how to find her. Since they're not actually related, I can't use this one's blood to do a locator spell." I informed the guys as I clicked my tongue in thought. "We'll come back to that. I'm guessing you won't actually tell us who she is, right?" In answer, Sybil merely smirked and promised that we'd find out soon enough who her sister was. Just then Ric's phone started ringing and informed us that it was Seline calling, the nanny looking after his girls, so he stepped away in order to take it and left Stefan and I with the siren.
"Seline? Suspicious name. Very siren-y."
"How about we just focus on you and your sister?" Stefan suggested but Sybil decided she wanted to wait for Alaric to return, prompting Stefan to use the tuning fork again. "You're stalling. Who is she?"
"You think hurting me is gonna speed this up?" Still gripping her head against the pain the sound of the tuning fork brought her, Stefan eventually relented and made it stop so that she could catch her breath. Seeing as Stefan had made his point, I'm guessing Sybil decided to be a little more cooperative to avoid any further headaches. "Thank you. Now, despite enjoying each other's company, the girls had another constant companion…hunger. The one who had survived on the island this long had a plan." Sybil explained how she and her sister used their psychic powers to call out to passing ships in order to be rescued, waiting until a ship passed their island in order to reach out to them. "But the girl of the island knew better. She had done this before, called out to passing sailors with her mind. But no matter how keen her psychic reach, the shoals around the island were sharper."
"So you beached the ship." I could imagine it in my head, the wreckages of ships crashing against the shoals and completely shattering a ship's wooden hull to pieces. No wonder there were so many stories about sirens luring sailors to their deaths.
"Try annihilated. Dashed upon the rocks, dooming its sailors to death. But, silver lining, their sweet, sweet provisions would soon wash up on shore." Sybil explained as I rolled my eyes, uninterested with the details as she proceeded to explain that she had begged her sister to never go through with the plan again, wanting to live off the island rather than draw men to their deaths. "Stop me if this sounds familiar. One good sibling, determined to live like a monk, and one selfishly evil sibling, willing to murder to satiate their hunger." Her dark eyes loomed over Stefan as he remained stoically unmoved. "Oh, come on, you get it. The parallels are too good. Our story is your story, Stefan. So now here's the test. Which girl are you?"
"If you answer that, Stefan, you will seriously be undermining your masculinity." I warned him jokingly which earned an amused smirk from him as he glanced my way. "You can quit trying to get Stefan on your side. You can't mess with his head, not whilst he's wearing this." Reaching out to him I lifted his hand where on one finger he wore a daylight ring and on the other, another ring with a precious stone at the centre which protected his mind from any psychic attacks. "I'm guessing you don't have a lot of experience with druids, huh?"
"I may have crossed one or two in my travels, but yes, they were always rather difficult to contend with." Sybil admitted with a rather impetuous sigh and a slight pout of her lip as she eyeballed the ring that kept her from being able to get into Stefan's head as I let his hand go. "They were always so…incorruptible." I took this as a compliment and felt a rather strong sense of pride that my people were able to resist the influences of a siren even way back then. I liked the fact that I could boast about being a druid, we were pretty awesome. "Anyway, where were we? Oh yes, the shipwreck." Sybil reminded herself rather dramatically, as if this entire charade was just another night at the theatre for her. "The village girl insisted the island would nourish them, and when it didn't, her faith was shaken. God did not provide. That was up to her sister. The other side of the island was the wild boars' domain. It was dangerous, but she knew she must hunt. And behold. God was good."
"Or maybe there were no boars on the island. You kept luring ships into the rocks. Killing for provisions."
"And do you want to know the sickest part of all?" Sybil asked in response to Stefan's comment, and I dared not think about what could be worse than luring men to their deaths just so you could eat them. What was wrong with learning how to fish? "There were no provisions on the ships. Only sailors. And so, an innocent girl became a monster. All because her older sibling forced her to adopt her lifestyle, even if it meant killing and eating men to stay alive. So, I ask you again. Which girl are you?" Stefan started to grow agitated at Sybil's insistence on receiving an answer, going closer to the glass in order to drive his firm belief in his brother through to the captive siren.
"Here's all you need to know. Whatever Damon and I have done to one another in the past, it has been forgiven. He is my brother, and there's nothing you can do that will ever change that."
"I think you've overestimated your sibling. And clearly, I have underestimated mine." The hairs at the back of my neck began to shiver and prickle, the only warning I received before a needle was driven directly into the back of Stefan's neck by one of Alaric's interns, Georgie. Having not seen this one coming, I quickly turned and slammed my foot against her torso to wind her, sending her to the ground as I then cast a spell on her so that she fell into a deep sleep as Stefan slumped to the ground, unconscious. "Or perhaps not."
"So this was your sister's work?" I questioned as I pulled my hair back from my face with an irritated huff. "Well, at least we know she knows where you are. Not that you could go anywhere, you're still bound to that room no matter what. Even if I died the magic wouldn't lift. Guess this was all for nothing." Unable to deny that I took a rather sadistic pleasure out of mentally torturing the siren, I wondered if perhaps I had taken a page too many out of Nik's book, recognising that it would be the sort of psychological warfare he would employ against his enemy. Turning away from Sybil, I used magic to rouse Stefan from the vervain that he'd been injected with, then told him to watch the siren and the intern whilst I went looking for Alaric.
I sensed him nearby and a quick spell led me to the underground vault which I opened, dragging the heavy thing wide open before calling out. "Ric? You there?"
"Oh thank god. I thought I was going to have to resort to desperate measures to get out through the tunnel." Alaric breathed a heavy sigh of relief, quickly leaving the vault where I noticed that he held a knife in his hand, which I guess he'd planned to use to take out his hearing so that he'd be able to pass through the wall. Now that was just hard-core and plain disgusting. "Thanks for the save, is Georgie…?"
"I got her. Don't worry she's not the other siren, she's just being controlled by her. I knocked her out so after I've shaken off the siren's psychic control, we can ask her a few questions." By the time we got back to the cell, Sybil had already continued on with the story though she paused for a moment as we returned, eager to hear the ending so that we could understand exactly what we were up against.
"When I learned the truth about what my sister had done for me, I did the only thing a decent person could do. I threw myself off the cliffs. As I lay dying, I prayed. For mercy. For love. For forgiveness. But God never answered me. Instead, he did." Stefan, Alaric and I all looked at one another, recognising we were reaching the end of Sybil's tale. "My sister…she made a deal with Cade. Immortality, beauty and youth, for the two of us…if only we served our new Lord and master. We feast on the flesh to keep us beautiful, and he collects the souls of the wicked. In Hell."
"Hell? As in, literal Hell. Come on. Just tell me the truth. Who's Cade? What is he?" Stefan demanded, not believing a word that was coming out of Sybil's mouth until I reminded him that she couldn't lie in that room because of my magic runes.
"He's the answer to all your problems, Stefan. You want to save yourselves? All you have to do is kill the Devil."
"We already knew all that." I interrupted, waving a hand dismissively as I stood directly in front of Sybil, studying her closely as her expressions shifted very subtly, hiding most of what she felt behind a calm exterior. "Tell us about him. Cade. How did he become the Devil?"
"The people he loved damned him and only at the very end did he finally give up on them, only when the smell of his burning flesh was searing his nostrils, did he see them for what they really were. Monsters." She finally answered, glancing to Stefan with a small smile. "Just like you and me. So, Cade damned them in return. With his last breath, he let loose a psychic blast so powerful that it created its own world. Call it Hell if you want. It doesn't matter what name you give it or whether you believe in it or not. Either way, that is where Cade feeds on the souls of the damned. It's where he waits for you, Stefan."
"Stop making this about me. This isn't about me."
"Oh, but this is about you. Did you really think all your pathetic attempts at atonement would save you from the fate that, deep down, you know you deserve? A fate befitting the glorious Ripper of Monterey?" I listened to Sybil's words with a slow recognition dawning on me. She knew about Stefan's past, about his dark sins, and it appeared that the Devil wanted his soul for his own.
"No. That was almost a hundred years ago. I'm not that person anymore."
"It doesn't matter, Stefan. That stain will always be on your soul, no matter how hard you try to wash it away. So, stop fighting. It's easier that way." Having enough of this conversation, I flung out my magic from my hand in order to throw Sybil back onto the bed and knock her out for a while so that she would just shut up and let me think, both Stefan and Alaric quickly looking at me.
"She was straying off track, maybe a nap will help get her mind straight again. Anyway, at least now we have a better idea about what she and the Devil wants." I mused as I turned around and looked Stefan up and down. "Don't worry, I won't offer you up as a sacrifice, if only because I know Caroline would otherwise kill me."
"Thanks. That's comforting." Electing to leave the story telling there for the day, Stefan carried Georgie back upstairs where I used one of my obsidian stones to channel protective magic over Georgie, dispelling the psychic power that held her so that when she woke up, she was confused and distressed, but very much in control over herself.
"What…what happened? Why am I here? Why did I…professor I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to lock you in, I don't know why I…?" Gripping her face in order to make her look at me, I asked her who had made her attack us and try to free Sybil, the woman in the basement, however Georgie was unable to answer, the memory having already been removed by the other siren who must have recognised that something had gone wrong.
"We're too late. This stone only protects people from psychic attacks, I can't restore her memory." Stefan suggested using compulsion to try and dig the memory out, but I knew it would be futile and, even if it were successful, would most likely drive Georgie insane from the strain. Better to just keep an eye on her and try to explain a little about the crazy world we all lived in and were trying to navigate without ending up dead. With that now dealt with, I stood before the scattered books and pieces of paper I had scattered all over one of the desks, filled with all the information I knew about the sirens and Cade, the Devil, but I was still yet to figure out how to deal with the messengers and then the final boss himself. "Come on…a little hint would be helpful, you know." I muttered to myself whilst rubbing my head, struggling to think of where to look next.
"Maybe this'll help carrots." Hearing Damon's obnoxious voice did not lift my mood, however when he sauntered in carrying a round metal ball in his hand with the Maxwell family crest, I immediately straightened up.
"That's it, that's what I saw in my vision." I recognised, reaching out to take it but almost dropped the thing it was so unexpectedly heavy. "Damn it." With a smirk, Damon held his hand under mine to help support the iron sphere, letting me look at it thoroughly in order to try and read any magic off it, but so far I had nada. "You met Peter right?"
"Sure did, not that he was exactly helpful. Though I guess it kinda makes sense considering he's Matt's old man." Damon mused as he made himself comfortable in my chair and put his feet up on the desk, making me glower at him as he put his shoes up on one of the open books but refused to take the hint to move until I kicked at him. "Easy there carrots. Now, what is that thing?"
"Beats me. I just know it's important. Matt is with his dad now and they're going to go through their family history to try and figure it out." Feeling tired, I was on the verge of deciding to call it quits for the night when my phone started buzzing at me, and when I picked it up I immediately beamed and answered, opening the video feed. "Hey there my little man. What are you doing with nanny's phone? I'm pretty sure I called to say goodnight an hour ago." Lucan grinned at me with that angelic cheekiness that made it impossible to be mad at him as his green eyes shimmered brightly even from under the covers of his bed.
"I miss you mommy." Hearing Lucan's voice, Damon immediately became curious and started to crane his neck behind me, trying to get into the picture with me so I had to press my hand against his face to keep him away, battling with him whilst trying to talk to my son. "Mommy when are you coming home?"
"Aw sweetie, I'll be home soon I promise. Give me another week and I'll be home and I won't ever leave your side again, okay? Tell you what. When I get back, we'll go get ice cream together and you can have the super big chocolate fudge sundae you love. How does that sound?" Lucan eagerly accepted this promise of a special treat, however seeing that I was wrestling with someone, became curious about the other person and Damon quickly took advantage of this by butting himself into the frame so that he could talk to my son.
"Hey there munchkin. I'm Damon, your mom and I go way back. I'm her best friend in the whole wide world you know." He lied with a grin, however before I could protest Lucan was already shaking his head.
"No…mommy's bestest friend is Auntie Bekah." To this Damon wasn't sure how to respond, quirking an eyebrow at Lucan and then at me as I sat back and grinned.
"What can I say? My boy is sharp as a knife." Pushing Damon away once and for all, I turned my attention back to Lucan, wishing I was there next to him giving him cuddles and kisses before bed. "Lucan, it's time to go to sleep, okay? No more sneaking nana's phone away when she's not looking. Come on, let me see you snuggle in." Lucan followed my instructions, wriggling out from under his covers and burrowing himself into his pillow whilst holding the phone screen away from him, the bright light illuminating his perfect little features. "Sleep tight my angel, sweet dreams. I love you."
"I love you too mommy." Unable to hide my smile, I cast out my magic and allowed it to travel the hundreds of miles from my physical location all the way to my son's side, enshrouding him with my magic like a warm blanket so that he could sense me with him and his sleepy smile widened further as he yawned. I stayed with him until he was fast asleep, watching over him with a fulfilled heart before I had to pull back, as I knew that if I did not leave now then I never would.
"Cute kid." Damon commented once I was back, still hanging near me as I rubbed my face tiredly.
"He's mine, of course he's cute." To this Damon made a face so I pushed at his shoulder, but this time around the gesture was more playful than violent, the two of us having grown more used to one another out of necessity. We left the work for the night in order to sleep and rest as we needed, knowing that it was better to come back to the task at hand with fresher minds as there was still so much to solve and organise, but I could feel we were getting closer. Just a little longer, and this would all be over and I could go home to my little boy and hold him in my arms again and never have to be separated from him for the rest of our days.