Excerpt from the ██████████████████ of Leonie Astraea Zhurong:

A Letter Addressed to Her Daughter

...

..

… my daughter, you are my whole world and I hope that I've lived long enough to hang the stars over where which you take shelter.

I know that the idea of the afterlife's quite popular in those books you so enjoy lately, at least during the time of which I'm writing this to you, and that you entertain thoughts of where I was Before. I know that some have their protagonists catapulting off the side of the building, or hit by a semi, or stabbed in the back by a shadowy figure… I know that some people are fond of starting from the darkness and outwards as something bare and brand new. I know that I've never told you of my Before and I know that it's been your greatest fear since that you might've Pulled me from a time before my end.

The matter of which I've appeared, did not abide those worries.

Irene, my dear, I hope my words hold strong to you because I know that I will never have the chance to tell you my story. My Before is, and never will be, your fault no matter what you think. There was no butterfly effect, no magic, no conspiracy. Instead it was my wedding night, and though you were not born and Of That World, I still apologize to the you that I've failed and thank you for Pulling me. Irene, you're a powerful witch and I don't want you to ever forget that. Nor let anyone take that away from you.

I was getting married poolside to the man of my dreams. To the man you grew up calling a stranger until the very end. It was beautiful. Him, in his tailored suit. Me, in that dress you first saw me in. Before it was dyed red and dirtied—not by your spell but by the fall, it was a striking white and detailed in flowers and lace. Your father tailored his outfit to match my dress in excess. The pool where we met was blanketed in petals, the stench of death masked by the perfume of hydrangeas and teakwood.

You were the agent of my aubade of a life. We kissed and were murdered by the priest at dawn. Something about the cyclical nature of beauty and recreating the image of Millais' Ophelia with the one-hour bride. The psychopath threw me into the pool where the petals parted to reveal the still bleeding body of our ringbearer. My last look at my husband of one hour was of his body tackling the deranged man and then I was dragged down until I was pulled back up.

I was Dead and then I wasn't.

Irene, when I first laid eyes on you, I cried not because of the shock of having just been dragged out of the earth instead of heavily chlorinated water (ok maybe a little), but because you were the image of my unborn child grown up and actualized. I did not avoid you for months because I was horrified of your power, but because I feared I could not be the mother you'd need me to be. I was traumatized and that manifested in the most horrible of behavior that you absolutely did not deserve. My talented and beautiful Irene who pulled the mother she's never had at the request of an aged letter through worlds. You deserve the entire universe in your hands—I hope I, at least, gave you a galaxy of your own.

When I took in what was around me, the sharp smell of wood and surrounded by melted candlewax and eyes, I did not know what would become of me. What the you, who looked so much like the man who protected me till his last breath, who's death did us part but still brought me you, the perfect mix of the best parts of my first love and the coward that once had the gall to go around the world and call herself Lee Astraea… I did not what to expect. But now at the end of my life, I finally do.

Zhurong Xia Ai, my beautiful and sweet Irene, you disgusting little goblin and my ever precious daughter. I named you after the waterlily leaves and my hope you will remember me as I am and not what I become— that you know my love. Remember that bit of poetry. It's the last bit of beauty I have left to gift. I didn't drown nor was I suffocating. You were the one who pulled me back up.

My little teenaged witch, I hope you take these lessons to heart and remember that to me and to the very end, you will always be my North Star. I hope I gave you everything as a mother and a guide, the line that completes your constellations. I hope my time with you was all you ever dreamed for and more and don't worry

We'll meet once again as star dust.

(or until Taaimaa grows bored again and plucks our souls right out of the cosmic cycle of reincarnation or whatever )

...

.

" Well then, kiss me, —since my mother left her blessing on my brow,
There has been a something wanting in my nature until now;
I can dimly comprehend it,—that I might have been more kind,
Might have cherished you more wisely, as the one I leave behind. "

— "The Old Astronomer to His Pupil", Sarah Williams

.

one.

The day Elena makes her deal with Elijah, Irene cut her own.

Sort of.

"I want you to stay away from my mom."

It probably wouldn't have sounded as bad if it weren't for the fact that she was hiding behind a pillar when she said this, holding up a shovel like both objects would serve as a barrier to shield her from the Original. In her mind, it did.

Across from her, Elijah looked almost annoyed.

"Irene," never mind he was beyond ticked. "Don't be ridiculous. Put the shovel down before you hurt yourself."

Irene's only response was to lift the shovel higher. Her heart raced in her chest as she watched Elijah's annoyed expression break for something else. It was a small shift, but after all the time they spent together while he and her mom were whatever they were, it was a shift that she was able to spot easily. She almost didn't notice him take the shovel out of her hands and toss it off into the bushes.

Almost.

"I believe we're overdue for a talk."

"No," she stopped the man before he could get any closer, one shaky hand outstretched in the space between the two of them. Both of them dreadfully aware that she was shaking like a leaf, "we talk right here but you're not calling the shots. Not anymore."

Irene swallowed down the lump in her throat and tried to ignore how deep the pit in her stomach seemed to fall. She wasn't stupid enough to think that the fact that her heart was literally on its way out her chest was something Elijah wouldn't notice. In fact, a small twisted part of her that knew of his status as the Noble Original was counting on it. She wouldn't have spent all night writing this exact speech unless she was 100% sure that it wouldn't at least affect this man in some way.

Not with the kind of relationship he had with her and her mom.

Maybe in another world and in another time, she would have let what she learnt about the man slide and live on with her life. But this wasn't that world, and this was her mom she was talking about.

If there was one thing in the entire universe that motivated Irene more, it would be her mom.

"Very well." Elijah frowned, eyes sliding away from her tremor to glare into the depths of the garden. His fingers idly playing with the silver cufflinks she bought for him before falling to his sides. Her heart beat its way up her throat again.

Bastard. Don't let it get to you.

The two of them were both pointedly trying not to look into the house. The one that she just stalked Elijah out of after he left to take a call. The one that her mom was waiting for the both of them inside of because one left to take a phonecall and the other fled with the excuse that she had to go diarrhea.

"Are we just a convenient cover for you?"

"Irene-"

"Answer the question, Elijah." She stepped away from the pillar now, with her arms crossed and right into his space. Unsure if it was because it would help mask her nervousness or to keep her from unconsciously reaching out to him. Maybe before Elena found herself in her mess of a life, she would have ran for just that. Irene had adored the man her mom was not-dating-but-'seeing', whatever that meant, and had one point pondered if it wasn't immature of her to ask if she could count on him like a father. She was still in high school after all… But with everything going on, even before Stefan walked into Elena's life, she had never had that stable father figure. Elijah was the closest thing to it.

And then Elena got kidnapped and here they were.

"You know my answer," Elijah sighed in frustration. "Irene, I would never use your mother like that. I would never use you either. The two of you have nothing to fear from me. On this, I swear."

"How can I believe that?" It hadn't even been a night since Jules' pack died. Her mom had come too close to finding out just what Irene and her friends were up to. Arriving at the boarding house not even an hour after Elijah slaughtered the wolves, it took both Damon and Alaric to distract Leonie enough to completely miss her trying to desperately magic blood out of the carpeting and dispose of the bodies. She almost forgot the absolutely fury Elijah rained on the wolves when he saw her withering on the floor beside Alaric, bloody and barely conscious. Ignored as he swore at Damon right after and forced his blood down her throat. Later that night, Leonie had told Irene that she smelt something strange in the house when she came to pick her up and the teen had lied through her teeth and joked about how that was just Damon's usual stench. Trying not to think about how it was Elijah, himself, who told her to even go to the boarding house in the first place to pick her up, "I don't want the same word you gave to Elena. I don't want anything from you. In fact, I know that the two of us were never included in your first deal with her anyways."

"Irene." Elijah cut in, "I wouldn't have let anything come close to you or Leonie."

It was said with so much finality that Irene had to pause. While it was true that nothing happened to her family during the time that Elena was first kidnapped (for him!), it was mostly because that entire time Elijah had spent in their company. In fact, the only time that nothing really happened was when Elijah wasn't in their house watering the plants or waking up her mom or anything of the sort.

Irene clenched her fists. Any of those other happy incidents wouldn't have mattered much anyways. Irene dealt with them all, and most of them were because Damon sent them their way on accident. The culprit himself was only minutes to follow when he realized what he'd done.

Her mom was none the wiser and Irene wanted to keep it that way for as long as she could.

"But don't you see? Eli-jah", her throat caught on the name, the man only stiffened at the reminder that she used to say it without any hesitation and even with a hint of affection. Now, she was sure that it was an affection for a man who didn't even exist in the first place. "You've already used us. How else would the town welcome you in so openly if it weren't for the fact that you were close to 'Mystic Fall's Most Successful and Emotionally Available Bachelorette'" She rolled her eyes at the title. "You have the town's trust because of my mom, and you know what you know about Elena because of me."

And what a fool she was when she realized that the fact the only reason why Elijah ever knew there was a Petrova doppelganger alive this century was because of her and her constant flow of photos to his phone. Why Elijah even showed up in Slater's coffeeshop in the first place. He was the one she ranted to because her mom was out on a work trip. He was the one listening in on her phone call with Damon when he told her that Elena was off on her suicide mission.

"Were you ever planning on telling us that you were a vampire. An Original?"

Elijah's white fists were all she needed to see to know her answer.

"Irene…"

"Were you ever even planning on telling my mom?" She plowed on, frustrated that this man was hesitating now in the face of his modern affair. Whatever speech she had written and rehearsed entirely thrown out for her new spiel. She was on a roll and each word burnt on its way out of her heart, "What were you going to do when Katherine came back? Were you just going to leave us because your first love was suddenly back? Elijah, what were we to you?"

Because when it came down to it, it was always about Elena and her doppleganger ancestor. This whole mess started because of that woman, Elijah followed only to collide into her and her mom. This trainwreck of a situation would've never happened if it weren't for that and might've ended long ago as nothing but a passing sidenote in the love story of Elijah and Katherine slash Elena in whatever weird fiction God wrote them all into.

"I would never do what you're insinuating, Irene." The man stood up straighter and suddenly she wasn't speaking to the man she had spent years bonding with but the Noble Original Vampire that Damon and Rose and Elena had all told her about. The man with a thousand years under his belt. The hesitation gone for stern words and a façade she knew was built on manipulation and blood. This was the vampire, not the man. "I've honor and to do that would be a disgrace to Leonie. What happened between Katarina and I do not matter in the face of what goes on between your mother and I."

"Doesn't it though? Elijah, listen to yourself. The minute Katherine is as accessible to you as my mom is, who are you going to choose? She's not her replacement and she's not going to be. Not to some Victorian vampire lady you've been chasing after for what? Three hundred years?"

The Original sneered at that, whether it was at the clear dig at him or at her mother she would never find out because she forced her voice louder than his when he started his retort.

"I'm making that choice for you, Elijah, and I've decided that I don't want you to be anywhere close to my mom. It doesn't matter anymore—we're not like you and Katherine and Damon and Stefan. We're not indestructible and my mom… Elijah, you cant say that you would never put us in any danger because you know that's not true now that your brother's coming. I don't want my mom to get into the crossfire.

So please. Stay away from us."

my dudes, i'm only publishing this now or else i'm going to keep hoarding these chapters for another 4 years ahaahah

I had a weird moment while editing this chapter that I realized just how Hong Kong Cantonese the name "Leonie" sounds, so I guess that's what she is ahahah… Not that Zhurong is even a real Chinese last name anyways but I got a plan for that -peace sign-

This is very in medias res, that's on purpose and tis my style. If it's a little confusing, no worries, it is to me too but we gonna learn how to fill in the blanks at the same time my dudes and also the fact that in medias res and unreliable narrators are just my MO

mar20/2020 - unbeta'd