Hello loves!

Now, I think I should put a little warning here. I had the hardest time working on this chapter. It took me about three days where usually it would only take six-ish hours per chapter depending on how complex it's gonna be. I am so sorry if it's not up to my normal standard, I just had insane writers block. I swear, it's like a freaking curse on my soul. Never the less, hopefully the 5000+ word chapter makes up for it

But as always, let's get on with it! I own nothing.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

Eyes darting between her daughter and the door nervously, Evanna sighed and ran a hand through her curly hair in agitation. Davina was supposed to arrive an hour ago. Aria's screams had ceased for a time but they'd soon started up again, sounding not only louder but more… tormented? Fearful? She couldn't quite explain it. All she knew was that whatever the hex was, it was getting worse.

She hadn't yet tried to wake Aria up for fear of something going wrong but if her screams continued, she might have to.

Head lifting and eyes widening in shock, Evanna turned around to look at Aria curiously. The screaming had stopped. Her breathing rate had also slowed. She was waking up, "Aria?" She asked cautiously, walking over to the girl and perching on the edge of the sofa, "Are you alright?"

Slowly, Aria's eyes opened and Evanna breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of sapphire rather than crimson, "Are you alright?" She repeated.

Aria's hand went up to her throat almost instinctively as she croaked out a response. Flashing to the kitchen and returning a moment later with a glass of water, she gently helped Aria sit up and handed her the glass. Aria drank the water greedily, as if she were a starving woman in the desert before she placed the empty glass down on the table and collapsed back down into the sofa, letting out a relieved breath, "No. No I'm not."

Her eyes suddenly snapped open and she looked over to Evanna before her eyes drifted to the wall and shattered picture frames behind her. Her expression dropped and Evanna swore quietly, mentally berating herself for not cleaning them up sooner, "I hurt you." Aria murmured.

"No, no Aria-"

"I hurt you." She repeated, voice strangled.

"I'm fine. Completely fine."

Aria's eyes darted up to Evanna, tears swimming in her eyes and eyebrows knitted together in horror, "I'm so sorry."

"I know you are. I know. But I'm not hurt, I promise." Evanna took Aria's hands gently, "We'll find a way to break this hex, I promise."

~*•°•*~

Marcel nervously paced around the Compound talking to an agitated Klaus on his phone, "I've searched the entire French Quarter. Finn has vanished. I can't remove the barrier that has you trapped until I have my hand around his throat."

Marcel sighed, "I was hoping you had a Plan B."

"Davina. She doesn't know it yet, but she's going to help me break his spell because your daughter has gone conveniently missing." Marcel growled lightly at the implication, "Calm yourself, Marcellus. And focus on your job, which is keeping alive. At least until we learn Rebekah's whereabouts." Klaus sounded… bored, almost.

Marcel paused for a brief moment, before his eyes darted down to his exposed forearm, the werewolf bite rough and painful, "Are you listening to me?" Klaus asked impatiently, bringing him back to reality.

"Yeah. Uh, that all sounds fine and good, but listen... when I was getting the werewolves out, I got bit."

There was a pause on the other end of the phone before a sigh, "I will get you my blood. I will get you out of that house, Marcellus." Marcel nodded, "Whatever it takes."

~*•°•*~

Marcel, sat on a sofa in one of the studies downstairs, glanced down at his werewolf bite in worry before looking up and quickly covering it when Kol entered the room to join him, wincing at the church bells ringing from the outside,

"What's with the church bells? It sounds like the preamble to me own bloody funeral." Kol complained.

Marcel sighed, "It's Carillon Eve. The locals shroud the eyes of angels so the dead can walk among us for a night without judgment. The bells wake the dead and guide them to eternal rest." His tone turned sarcastic, "So, whether you live or die today, you can join the festivities."

Kol scoffed, "Oh, Marcel. You're gonna make certain that I live. I'm the only one that knows how to find Rebekah!"

"I think you underestimate how hungry I am, how much I'd like to appease my hungry friends right outside that door, and just how much I want to keep you away from my daughter."

Kol sat down on the sofa across from Marcel and casually stretched his legs out in front of him before sighing smugly, "And just what would Aria say about that? Because, I'm not one to kiss and tell, obviously." He smiled smugly to himself, "But I think she likes me!"

Marcel's eyes narrowed, "Watch your mouth. Or else I swear, I will drain every vein of yours myself." He snarled, Kol watching after him in curiosity as he left the room, locking the door behind him before his smug expression dropped, and he allowed himself, for once, to feel fear.

Where was Aria?

~*•°•*~

In the Church, Klaus paced around in front of the sacristy, watching Davina as she set up a magical circle with runes made out of salt in front of the first row of pews,

"Haven't you found Finn yet?" Klaus demanded. Davina ignored him.

He tried a new approach, "I must say, for a witch of your calibre, your spells are not particularly efficient."

Davina sighed in frustration and turned to him, "Finn is blocking my locator spell. So, I'm trying something new. But I need to concentrate, and it would help a lot if you would stop standing over me like a stalker."

"No need to be testy, love. We both have the same goal."

Davina rolled her eyes and lit a match, lighting the candles in her circle, "Really? Because my goal is to get Kol out of your house alive before I find Aria who may or may not have been prepared for some freaky ritual by your aunt. Both of which seem to be about number ten on your list."

Klaus smirked, "Number nine, at least."

"What is wrong with you? He's your brother! And she's practically your granddaughter!" Davina practically yelled in exasperation.

"Yes! And, I also have a sister, one who I happen to care about more. After that, I will help Aria as best I can, then consider helping my traitorous brother." Davina rolled her eyes, "So, until he tells me where she is, Kol can rot, as far as I'm concerned. And you might wanna get your villains straight, love, because Finn is the architect of this fiasco. So, pick up the pace! Find out where he's getting his power from, so we can stop it."

Davina raised an eyebrow at his rant before rolling her eyes and beginning to chant, "We du le mon ennemi on ton. We du le mon ennemi on ton."

Coming out of the vision, she frowned in confusion, "I saw… glimpses of him." Davina murmured, "He's combining sacred objects. Totems. Representational magic."

"Where?"

"Lafayette No. 1. The Lyonne tomb."

"And what's he using?" Klaus demanded.

Davina's eyes widened as they flickered up to the Hybrid, "He's channelling your parents."

Klaus smirked, "And here I thought I was the poster-child for least grateful offspring." He remarked before sighing, "Well, then. Shall you and I go crash their little party?"

Davina stood up and began to follow him before the Original stopped in his tracks,

"Now who needs to pick up the pace?" Davina asked in annoyance before her eyebrows furrowed in concern as Klaus suddenly dropped down to the floor, breathing shallow.

"Klaus?"

~*•°•*~

Kol's hand slid along the edge of the wall in boredom, tracing the cracks in the brick as he walked down the staircase. A long, drawn out breath left him as he reached the foot of the staircase, before he froze and paused quite literally a foot from Josh and Gia, both looking positively ravenous.

His eyes narrowed, "You come anywhere near me, and I will give you a headache that will last a century."

"It'll be worth it!" Gia shot back.

Before Gia could advance on him, Kol thrusted his hand out and fisted it, Gia falling to the ground as she clutched her head in agony. The doors to the corridor slammed open and Marcel's eyes darted between the trio, unimpressed.

"Anyone care to explain what's going on?" Marcel demanded, shoving Kol backward and breaking the spell as Gia gulped in breaths.

"Your so-called 'protection detail' was trying to eat me! I think I should teach them a lesson." Kol snarled, reaching his hand out as if to repeat the spell before fog clouded over his vision and he suddenly collapsed, unconscious.

"Uhh, what just happened?" Josh asked.

~*•°•*~

Aria rolled her eyes.

"Hypnotisation?" She echoed, her voice disbelieving, "How is that going to help anything?"

"The next best option is witchcraft but considering Davina isn't here, you've down-right refused to bring the Mikaelsons into this and you can't perform the spell needed on yourself, this is the next best option." Evanna shot back.

"And you just happen to know how to hypnotise people?"

Evanna sighed and Aria paled, "Are you sure you're able to do this, Evanna?"

Evanna nodded. With a small, uneasy glance to her mother, Aria laid down on the sofa, hands resting on her stomach as she closed her eyes.

A minute of silence bar the gentle noise of a clock ticking passed. Aria opened one eye, "I don't think anything's happening." She summarised, lips pursed together in a sympathetic smile.

Evanna sighed, "No. It's not."

"So what else can we do?"

~*•°•*~

Kol looked around his surroundings in confusion, confusion that was rapidly turning into annoyance. Which would probably be anger in a moment or two when his suspicions were confirmed.

"Niklaus." A voice murmured from behind him.

Hearing his older brother, turned around from the spot he'd been standing in the corner before frowning in confusion, "You two."

"What is this?" Elijah asked in annoyance.

Kol looked around the room before his eyes landed on the animal heads mounted on the walls and his eyebrows knotted together nervously, "It's a Chambre de Chasse. A hunt room. It's where witches bring their prey for mental target practice. Our bodies are in the real world, lying dead on the floor, whilst our minds are in here, represented by these creepy animal heads."

Klaus' eyes narrowed, "Let me take a wild guess as to who is the author of this nightmare. FINN! Show yourself!"

The door in front of the three Mikaelsons opened and Finn walked into the room, a small smirk gracing his face when Klaus found himself unable to move any closer to grab him.

"Save your strength. In here-" He gestured around the room, "I am untouchable. My magic, my rules. So, make yourselves at home. We're gonna be here for a while."

~*•°•*~

Her hand connecting with Klaus' face, Davina yelled at Klaus' prone form on the floor, "Wake up! Wake up!" She repeated, slapping him across the face again in an effort to wake him up.

Sighing in frustration, Davina sat down next to Klaus and glared at him with narrowed eyes, "The one time I need you."

Eyes straying to his pocket when his phone began to ring, Davina reached into the pocket and answered it, "Cami?" She asked in confusion.

"Davina? Why are you answering Klaus' phone?" Cami asked, sounding just as confused as Davina did.

The witch sighed, "Because I can't wake him up."

"What? Elijah collapsed, too. What's going on?"

Davina's eyes widened suddenly and she groaned in frustration, "Ugh, I'm an idiot! The spell Finn used was to trap his brothers... Meaning Kol's in trouble." She sighed, "Aria's gonna kill me." She murmured to herself.

"What do we do?"

"I have no idea." Davina worried before her eyes narrowed in contemplation, "But Aria might."

~*•°•*~

Continuing to talk to his brothers while he still had them trapped on the astral plane, Finn looked around the room,

"At the very least, this prison is a bit more comfortable than the box you held me in for..." He sighed in faux thought, "Almost nine hundred years?"

Klaus ignored him and gestured to the heads on the walls, "The heads are a nice touch. Let me guess-" He pointed to the wolf, "I'm the big, bad wolf?" He asked in slight amusement. He then pointed to the fox for Kol, the stag for Elijah and the boar for Finn, "Kol, the wily fox. Elijah is the noble stag, and you, fittingly enough, are the boar! Bit obvious, as far as symbolism goes..."

Klaus turned back to Finn and sighed, "Why are we here? Don't tell me it's about Mother? I didn't force her to drink blood and betray everything she holds dear. That was her choice." He defended.

"This isn't about Mother; this is about you. I want you to know how it feels to be powerless! So, I'm going to take the thing that matters most to you. The city you've come to love so much."

Elijah rolled his eyes, "Are we quite done here? You will release us now."

"I will! After sundown. Because at sundown, when the marchers of Carillon Eve take to the streets, my barrier spell drops. Marcel and his hungry vampires will be unleashed to kill their way through the Quarter! I imagine that, after their atrocities, the supernatural community of New Orleans will be forced to find another place to call home."

Kol scoffed, "Look, I don't care about the city. What I care about is that my very human body is laying at the feet of some very hungry vampires whilst I have somewhere that I need to be!" He pointed to Klaus and Elijah, "Your fight is with them, it's not with me!"

Finn stared at Kol for a moment, "All you care about is your own fragile mortality. But what if you were made vulnerable? What then?"

Finn carelessly flicked his wrist and Kol tensed up as his nose began to bleed. Wiping it away, Kol took a deep breath. His nose would be bleeding in the physical world too.

In front of many hungry vampires.

Most of which loved Aria - too much - and hated him.

Fantastic.

~*•°•*~

Kol wiped the blood off his lip in annoyance and turned back to Finn, "Okay. Point made. Now, nobody loves a joke like old fox-boy here, but if you could just get me back to my body-"

"I must confess, I rather enjoy watching you twist in the wind." Elijah commented, pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket before handing it to Kol, "Not unlike the way you left Rebekah, I imagine."

Finn nodded and pointed at Elijah in emphasis, "Yes! What did you do to Rebekah?"

Kol groaned, "For goodness sake, she crossed me, so I crossed her back! Look, if you could just get me back to my body, I will tell anybody anything that they need to know!"

Finn rolled his eyes and pointed over to Kol, the pain infliction spell rendering him more or less mute immediately before Finn laughed mockingly, "How narrow-minded of me! Rebekah. You don't know where she is, and the only thing standing between you and our sister is this selfish fool. Though, it does make me wonder, what takes up importance over your own flesh and blood?"

Kol's jaw clenched, "I'd just rather not be fed on now that I'm alive again." He said flippantly.

Finn's eyes narrowed suspiciously before they widened and he scoffed, "Is that what this is about? A witch? I should've known you didn't just fail in bringing Aria Gerard to Mother. Tell me, why is it so urgent you get to her soon?"

"It's not about her." Kol denied.

That was a lie. It was about her. It would always be about her.

Finn scoffed, "Well then. I'll leave it be for now. Because you're still not going to get out until nightfall. I'm sure whatever is so dire with her can wait a few more hours?" His last comment was light, almost uncaring even. It only served to make Kol angrier,

"Though, why did you ignore Mother's dire warnings about the girl's twisted soul?"

"She's not twisted!" Kol snapped, eyes blazing as he glared at his oldest brother, a brother he used to look up to, a brother he used to respect. More fool he.

"If anyone here is twisted, it's you. She's a teenager for God's sake!" His voice dropped dangerously, "She – a New Orleans witch – has less blood on her hands than you, Finn, and you've been locked in a box for a good millennium."

All amusement disappeared from Finn's face.

"Maybe it's time for you to go enjoy the rest of your mortal life while you still can."

His voice was cold and biting as he fisted his hand, forcing Kol to wake up from his magically induced coma. The Mikaelson witch woke up, gasping for breath as he shot up from the sofa he'd been left to lie down on rather uncomfortably. Collapsing back down, his heavy breathing slowed until he heard a floorboard creak on his right. His eyes drifted over to Gia, Josh, and then to the other group of vampires around him.

"...Is it too late for an apology?" He asked nervously.

Gia lunged at Kol before he found himself in another room with Marcel – one that was vampire-free.

"Thanks, mate."

"Oh, don't thank me yet." Before Marcel could lunge for Kol, the witch held his arms up in warning, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold it! Hold it together. Just for a little while longer." He pointed to the window nervously, "A few minutes, to be exact."

Marcel frowned suspiciously, "What are you talking about?"

"Finn. He plans to release the lot of you at sundown."

Marcel clenched his jaw and began to pace around the room, "The streets will be jam-packed with people right outside the gate."

"And you'll be half-crazed with hunger." Kol finished, "You'll feed your way through the crowd, and that will be the end of vampires secretly living off the fat of New Orleans."

Marcel glared at Kol before he zoned out, eyes misting up as though he was seeing something that wasn't there. Kol snapped his fingers in front of the vampire's face, "Marcel!" He sighed, "Listen to me. You are outmanoeuvred, out-manned, and, quite frankly, you're… you're out of your mind. We're not going to get out of this alive."

"No. We are all getting out of this alive."

~*•°•*~

Aria sighed as she closed her eyes, still lying on Evanna's sofa just as she had been an hour ago when they'd tried hypnotisation before.

"It's not going to work." She sighed.

She could practically feel Evanna's unimpressed look and her lip twitched upwards slightly.

"You just need to calm down. Your emotions are still all over the place."

Aria's eyes opened suddenly, much to Evanna's chagrin before the vampire noticed the contemplative look in her daughter's eyes, "What is it?" She asked.

"When Dahlia trapped me, she and another witch I met there helped me to regain control over my emotions." She murmured, looking up to Evanna, "Maybe I'll be able to use that training to counteract this hex. It's meant to mess with my emotions, but Dahlia helped me gain control over them."

"But if Dahlia is the one who cast it – and you seem fairly sure she was, how would her own techniques work against it?"

"What else can I try?" Aria asked tiredly.

Lips pursing together but eventually nodding, Evanna helped Aria sit up before perching on the chair next to her, "What was some of the training like?"

"With Dahlia, she focused on finding my anger and using it to calm myself. She used… instincts rather than control. Sudden bouts of magic rather than control over it as a whole. But with the other witch, she helped me by establishing a connection with nature. She'd train me out in the Bayou… Don't ask." She quickly said, seeing Evanna's confused look, "Uh, she taught me how to use all of my emotions to my advantage rather than channelling anger like Dahlia told me."

"Perhaps this would work better outside?" Evanna suggested.

Nodding, Aria stood up and followed Evanna on the small trail to a small forest glade behind her house. Settling down on the floor, Aria took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

"Being outside will help you let your magic loose. You won't feel the need to keep it tethered so as not to let it run away from you, rather you'll be able to let it loose so it can mingle with nature. You need to keep trying, it'll come to you eventually. But you don't need to be afraid of your power, Aria. You don't need anyone's approval."

Freya's words echoed in her mind as Aria slowly took a deep breath in, shoulders calming instinctively. She relaxed herself and let her magic loose. But before she could feel it actually leave her body, her eyes opened slowly as she felt something tickle her left ankle. Looking down in confusion, she screamed at the sight.

Literally screamed.

Evanna was beside her instantly, trying to calm her even as Aria practically ran away from the log she'd been perched on. Even as she tripped over, she kept scrambling back through the dirt, mud coating her nails and rocks scraping her palms in an effort to get away from the log.

Right there in the dirt, was a single black Dahlia flower.

She heard Evanna softly calling her name out, felt the woman's hands on her hair, slowly soothing it back as she shook and held onto her mother like a lifeline, but she could only find herself able to mutter one phrase as her eyes rapidly filled with tears of fear, "She's here."

~*•°•*~

Sighing as Aria once again failed to pick up her phone, Davina pocketed her own before her attention suddenly turned to Klaus when he woke up with a loud gasp.

"What happened? Is Kol okay?" Davina asked worriedly. In honesty, they both knew she couldn't care less about Kol, but at the same time, Klaus knew that Aria was currently the most important person in her life, quite possibly even more important than Marcel; though that was only a guess on his part.

Never the less, Klaus rolled his eyes and scoffed, "Aria's boyfriend is perfectly fine, I assure you. And I'm fine too, thank you for your concern. The same, however, cannot be said for your friends and the people of the French Quarter. Now, I can stand here and explain to you the specifics, or you can show a little trust and come with me."

Davina shrugged and grabbed her coat, "I'm the one who's been waiting for you to move your arse. Let's go!"

She pushed past Klaus before leaving the church and, with a small smile of amusement, the Hybrid followed her out.

~*•°•*~

If the sight of Dahlia flower managed to get Aria to scream, it had nothing on the memories that were flooding through her head. The cruel words Dahlia had said in her training, the methods of teaching that forced her to use magic to protect herself… it all came flowing back and before she knew it, Aria was a sobbing mess on the floor.

All it takes is one tiny mistake, one tiny accident and your powers go from being your family's salvation to their worst nightmare. You need to be able to control them and your instincts. Because you can't love somebody you don't understand, Aria. And do you know what happens when people don't understand something? They learn to fear it. And then they look at it like a monster. You need to know how to control your instincts, and when to use them.

It was by far her biggest fear. Marcel suddenly rejecting her, Davina turning on her as the other witches had, Thierry fearing her. Even Evanna turning on her. Dahlia had managed to pinpoint all of Aria's fears with such incredible accuracy and turn them all into a lesson.

It almost made her collapse out of sheer exhaustion.

It almost made her believe it.

But then Evanna's gentle voice reached her ears. Her soothing words calmed her almost instantly.

And then she remembered another one of Dahlia's lessons.

"Whoever it was that made you feel this way in the past, that you were somehow flawed and unworthy in your powers. You need to take that pain, the fear that they were right and use it as the root of your power. Let it drive your magic and prove them all wrong! But you need to stop thinking about it so much. Magic is about emotion. Summon up that moment, that made you so angry, you would've killed if you could. That is how magic is made.

Listen, Girl, magic is power. Until you can take power, you're not learning anything."

Dahlia told her to ignore the cruelty others inflicted onto her, whilst doing the same thing herself. She'd told her to think herself flawed, broken, untameable.

But Aria wasn't meant to be tamed.

Body slowly filling with anger in a way it never had before, Aria took a deep breath as the fear disappeared. Step one was done. Slowly, she cleared her mind until only one thought remained, be calm. Step two. Now, she had to get rid of the anger. She had to… think of a happy memory. She slowly smiled as she thought back to walking around the Quarter with Evanna. -Not their first time, rather their… fifth time? She couldn't keep track. She thought back to the feel of the setting sun on her skin, the smells of the flowers, the stars slowly getting brighter, the sounds of distant parties, the eating ice cream.

Before she knew it, she was calm.

Before she knew it, her mind was clear.

She felt her eyes open and, though for a moment her sight was blurry because of the tears, it soon cleared and she was able to make out the Dahlia flower. Blank mask dropping as she suddenly smiled widely, she threw herself at Evanna, hands wrapping tightly around the vampire's neck before smiling into the mass of brown curls.

"Thank you." She murmured.

"You're welcome." Evanna replied, tears in her own eyes as she embraced Aria. The vampire's attention drifted to the Dahlia and she smiled.

It was wilted.

~*•°•*~

Aria looked around the French Quarter street, through the crowds of marchers as she desperately searched for either Davina or Kol, having just received worried messages from both. Honestly, she needed to stop leaving her phone on constant silent mode.

"Davina!" She cried out, running over to the witch. Davina turned around in confusion before she caught Aria as the girl practically threw herself at her.

"Aria! Thank God." Davina murmured before pulling back and looking her up and down worriedly, "Are you okay? I've been so worried."

Aria's smile dropped slightly before she forced it back onto her expression, "I'm okay. Perfectly fine."

For now.

Davina smiled before her eyes flittered behind Aria and the smile turned into a coy smirk. Furrowing her eyebrows, Aria turned around and smiled widely. With a literal push by Davina, she crossed the street toward Kol, stopping just in front of him.

"You're okay." He breathed, eyes searching her face in relief.

"For now." Aria agreed.

Before Kol could question her, she reached up and kissed him gently, lips lingering before she pulled away. With a smirk identical to the one that had so often graced the face he was born with, he leant down and kissed her back.

~*•°•*~

Right, now that the chapter's done, I think by now a lot of you will have noticed that I have zero qualms about killing off my characters, which is why I've been thinking about the episode I Love You, Goodbye so much recently. As much as it hurts me to say, I am sticking to cannon with Kol dying and all that, mostly because it creates a clear path into season three for Aria. Side note however, his death is going to lead straight into several chapters consisting solely of Aria-Rebekah bonding time and a little bit of fluff between the duo who I honestly have not been paying much attention to. It'll also lead into Davina becoming the badass witch she should be without constantly looking for Aria's validation (that being something I've recently noticed I've kinda added into her character without meaning to).

But back to the main point. Right now, I'm hovering between heart-breaking and emotionally destroying for Kol's death scene as I've been in a bit of a dark headspace recently, but I wouldn't want to publish something at the level I have it at right now in my drafts. So my question: On a scale of one to ten, how painful should I go? I know I'm the author but right now, I think I need desperate help with keeping things under control. It'd mean the world to me if anyone could review an answer.

As always, thank you to everyone that's been favouriting and following and reviewing the story, it really does mean the world to me.

As Always, SecretMidnightRose