You're My Everything
Chapter 13: Chambre de Chasse
One by one the Mikaelson siblings came to in the Chambre de Chasse. Confusion run rampant in all of their minds, but anger was prevalent in Klaus' mind. Vincent Griffith had never been shy in voicing his dislike for the Mikaelson family. Klaus was fully aware that he was not the witch's favorite person, but the Hybrid never considered the other man stooping to this kind of low. Didn't Vincent understand that Hope was in danger? Despite the mutual dislike, almost hatred for each other, Klaus had thought that, at the very least, Vincent had had a soft spot for Hope. Hell, everyone had a soft spot for Hope. So why would Vincent do this?
"What, pray tell, is going on? What is this place?"
Klaus turned to look at Elijah. The man with his brother's face but was in no way his brother. If he had been, Hope would still have her mother. Turning away from Elijah without answering his question, Klaus took in the rest of his siblings in turn before his gaze narrowed on Freya. In a blink of an eye, Klaus had his hand on Freya's throat, pinning her to one of the many pillars in the Compound's courtyard, his Hybrid visage threatening to come out.
"Why are we all here!?" Klaus yelled.
"I- I don't know!" Freya sputtered.
"You're lying!" Klaus spat, despite loosening his grip.
"I'm not. Please, Niklaus, I swear to you, I'm not lying. I truly don't know why we're here." Freya pleaded.
"As crazy as it sounds, could this be Hope's doing?" Marcel questioned.
"That's absurd. She knows how dangerous it is to have us all here. Why would she risk her own safety like this?" Rebekah argued.
"Unless she thought she was desperate. She lost her mother... we all came running, consequences be damned. Maybe she thought this would be the best way to keep the city safe long enough for her to get out of New Orleans." Kol theorized.
"That's preposterous." Klaus said with a roll of his eyes.
"Is it Nik? She's a Mikaelson, she intelligent and cunning… maybe even too much for her own good. If she felt backed into a corner, and that the memorials for her mother were in jeopardy by all of us being here, she would do anything to protect her family." Kol argued, not knowing how much he was speaking the truth.
"Hayley was family, of course we all came running." Klaus growled.
"THIS ISN'T ABOUT HAYLEY, NIK! This is about Hope. I saw the look of pure terror in her eyes when I arrived! She didn't want us to come back! She wanted us to stay away! And it wasn't even fear for her own life! It was fear for the city! She wants to protect everyone in New Orleans, and we all went and bloody fucked it up. Yes, Hayley was family, but we could have consoled Hope over the phone. If putting us back into a bloody Chambre de Chasse was the only way Hope could safely get through the memorials and then get out of town without anyone getting hurt, then I bloody applaud her."
"Kol, calm down." Freya attempted.
"Oh, I am calm." Kol replied.
"What Kol is saying sounds completely logical, given what Hope is currently going through." Marcel commented. "If she is behind this, then I'm sure she has a good reason. And I'm sure that once she's far enough away from New Orleans, Vincent will let us out."
"Something tells me that isn't the case, Marcel. I think we need to find our own way out." Rebekah said while glancing around.
"And how are we supposed to do that?" Klaus asked with a glare. "There's nothing bloody here except for us!"
"Let's just think this through and take a look around. It couldn't hurt." Marcel said before making his way out of the courtyard, Rebekah, Kol and Freya following suit shortly after.
Legacies – YME – Legacies
Rebekah flinched as she heard yet another piece of furniture smash to pieces as her half-brother threw it against the wall. Glancing over at Marcel she tried to gauge her boyfriend's feelings on being trapped here, but his mask of indifference was firmly in place, and not even Rebekah could see the truth behind it.
"Do you really think this was Hope's doing, and not Vincent's?" Rebekah asked.
"Yeah, I do. She's as much a Mikaelson as the rest of you, and she will do anything to protect her family. But after Hayley went missing, Klaus returned, causing a lot of stress on Hope and tension between her and Klaus, at least from what Vincent told me. And even though Klaus was in and out of the Quarter in the two months before there was any solid news on Hayley's whereabouts, the stress and tension was still there. Then Hayley was killed, and the first thing that you and Kol did was rush back here. It was already bad enough with just Hope and Klaus being in close proximity to each other, but then add in Elijah after Hayley's death, and then you and Kol almost immediately after that. I wouldn't blame Hope for seeing no other option other than to put us all in here to give her time to get through Hayley's funeral and then to get out of town. She's a smart kid, but the very family that has sacrificed so much to keep her safe were the very people that came running the second Hayley was gone, paying little head to the danger you would be putting her in." Marcel replied.
"So this is my fault?" Rebekah asked.
"Yours and Kol's and Elijah's and Klaus', yeah." Marcel responded with a nod.
"Then why are you here? Why is Freya here?" Rebekah argued.
"I don't know. All I know is that for a family who will do anything to protect each other, you all stupidly did the worst thing that you could have done for Hope."
Rebekah was stunned by Marcel's words. Sure, they had had arguments throughout all the years they had known each other, they had been pissed off at each other, loved each other deeply, played with the other's emotions, but never had he ever said something so hurtful and actually meant it deep down. And with the way he was looking at her as if she were the biggest disappointment he had ever met, Rebekah knew in that very moment that he did, in fact, mean what he said. The man she loved thought that she, and her brothers, were all stupid. Stupidly loyal and devoted to their eternity together. Their cursed vow of Always and Forever. And the worst part was that hearing the words from someone she loved as much as she loved Marcel, it made the truth even more real. Making it something that she couldn't ignore. He was 100% right. Coming back to New Orleans was the worst decision she had ever made, putting her niece that she loved like a daughter into even more danger than she had already been in. The realization that her last act of returning to New Orleans directly contradicted the first 8 months of Hope's life, Rebekah thought of something and hurried out of the room that she and Marcel had been searching for clues in. Making her way to Hope's room, Rebekah started rummaging.
"Bekah? Did you find something?" Marcel asked as he followed her into Hope's room.
"Maybe." Rebekah replied as she looked in every drawer and in every box in the room, praying for some kind of clue.
"What did you maybe find?" Marcel questioned.
"I'll let you know when I find it." Rebekah said. "If I find it, that is." She added as she glanced around her and sighed. "I thought I was on to something." She continued as she stepped toward Marcel when the floorboard beneath her squeaked.
Looking between the floor and her boyfriend, Rebekah knelt down and wrapped her knuckles against the boards, finding a hollow spot and quickly prying the wood up to reveal a hidden compartment. With a deep, unnecessary breath, Rebekah stuck her hand into the compartment and pulled it out, her fingers clutched around a necklace baring the Mikaelson family crest and a key. With a wide smile, she held the key up to Marcel.
"We're locked in. So we have to just unlock the door in the courtyard, and we're free." Rebekah commented.
"Did I hear you found something, Bex?"
Rebekah turned towards the door to find Freya standing there. Something about the way her sister looked completely confused by everything had Rebekah worried that Freya hadn't originally been planning on being here with the rest of them. Almost like Freya didn't even know where they were. It was clear to Rebekah that Freya knew that they were in the Compound, but that her earlier statement of not knowing why they were all here wasn't the full story. Freya really didn't know why, but as Rebekah took in her sister's expression, it occurred to the vampire that something had happened to Freya's memory.
"Freya, are you okay?" Rebekah asked.
"I think so. I mean, I don't know why we're here, and honestly, I'm confused as to why we can't leave, since we're in the Compound, but I'm sure the rest of you have an idea of how to get us out." Freya said with a shrug.
"Well, I think I found something." Rebekah said.
"How many locks were on the door?" Marcel asked, causing Rebekah to jump; she'd forgotten that her boyfriend was still in the room.
"Uh, five, I think." Freya commented.
"But there's 6 of us stuck here." Marcel replied.
"Maybe you aren't locked in here like the rest of us? After all, if Hope is truly behind all of this, which it's becoming seemingly more likely that that's what happened, she would have known that you wouldn't have allowed her to put us all in here." Rebekah said. "Chances are that you are simply here to prevent you from stopping her." She added.
"But if that was the case, then why not just give me a key to get out?" Marcel asked.
"Let's just let the boys know what they need to look for, and we can go from there." Rebekah said as she moved towards the door.
"You can't just keep avoiding me, Bekah." Marcel commented.
"I'm not avoiding you, Marcel! I want to get out of here so that I can apologize to my niece for putting her in danger. Our relationship is not important right now. Hope is."
"That's the issue, Rebekah! Everyone and everything else is always taking precedence over our relationship!"
"What do you want me to say?"
"I think I'm going to go find our brothers and tell them what to find." Freya said softly before she slipped away from the door.
"I want you to say that, for ONCE, you put US first. That you want to figure out what we can do to actually have a chance of making our relationship work as much as I do."
"This isn't the time or place to be talking about this."
"When is it ever the right time? Because you don't want to talk about any change to our relationship. I proposed to you, and you didn't even give me an answer. And now that I'm trying to discuss things, you refuse to reciprocate. If this isn't working for you, Rebekah, just fucking tell me already."
Rebekah couldn't hold Marcel's broken gaze. She didn't want their relationship to be over. But things weren't changing. And if nothing changed, then what was even the point. He was, once again, right, in saying that she wasn't giving as much as she was getting, and that wasn't fair to Marcel. But he was the only man who had ever loved her the way that she'd always wanted to be loved. And they'd been together on and off for so many centuries that she couldn't imagine her life without the possibility of going back to him. If she told him that it wasn't working out, Rebekah had a strong feeling that it would be over for good.
Legacies – YME – Legacies
Klaus was still absolutely livid by the time Freya found him. But when he listened to what she had to say, in regard to what they were looking for, his anger dissipated, only to be replaced with his heart breaking and his face falling. His daughter had been the one to put the entire family into the Chambre. Just the mere thought that Hope had felt like she didn't have any other choice hurt him, but he understood it. He just had no idea where to start looking for his key.
Legacies – YME – Legacies
While it hadn't been very long since they had all arrived in the Chambre, it seemed like they had been there forever. But when the wind picked up, and it started storming in the courtyard, it was clear that the speculation that this was all Hope's doing was confirmed. And that fact was hammered home when the Hollow was yanked out of Klaus, Elijah, Kol and Rebekah. It didn't matter that they were in four parts of the house when it happened. It didn't matter that they were in a Chambre de Chasse so that Hope could take the Hollow back. The Hollow was gone from their individual person, but now completely resided back where she had wanted to be all along: in Hope. The start and the end of the Labonair bloodline. The two bookends of an immensely powerful magical bloodline, at that. And then mix in Hope being part werewolf, and part vampire… the Hollow was more dangerous now than she ever had been. And the only thing that Klaus could think of was that the Hollow was residing in his daughter's, very-much-a-child, body and was alone in a car with a human that Hope clearly had feelings for. And despite his desire to never see his daughter infatuated with anyone, let alone a human, Klaus could only pray that the Hollow didn't trick the boy into doing something that would end up hurting Hope in the long run. Klaus himself, both with and without the Hollow's influence, had done that enough to last Hope a lifetime.
Legacies – YME – Legacies
By the time they all found their respective keys, none of the Mikaelsons had any idea of how long they'd been in the Chambre. It had been dark within the Chambre when they'd woken up, and it had only gotten darker when Hope had taken the Hollow back from them, but time progressed differently in the Chambre than in the real world, and they didn't have any means of telling how long it had been since Hope had sent them in. But when they all put their keys into the locks, and thought that they would be waking up, they were met with yet another obstacle and Klaus growled in frustration.
"Oh bloody hell. Now we're in Elijah's mental maze." Kol groaned. "You know of all the hells I've had to endure…"
"What is the bloody meaning of this!?" Klaus shouted, turning, once again, on Freya.
"I swear… I don't know." Freya replied frantically.
"There's doors with our initials on 'em." Marcel commented, running his fingers over the 'm'.
"What does that mean?" Rebekah asked, glancing at Elijah.
"As much as I enjoy a cherry on top of a scheme, I've got somewhere else I need to be." Kol responded before stepping through the door with a 'k' on it.
As the others glanced around at each other, Marcel and Freya followed Kol's lead and stepped through the doors with their own initials on them, leaving only Klaus, Rebekah and Elijah. While Klaus and Rebekah each stood at their own doors, they shared a look with each other before looking at Elijah again, watching as he fruitlessly tried to pry the red door at the end of the white hallway open. Rebekah couldn't help the pitying look that she gave her brother but knew that there was nothing that she could do.
"It's a bloody door, Elijah! Just open it!" Klaus shouted, getting aggravated with the other male.
"He's needs help, Nik. He had his memories compelled away; he doesn't have the needed motivation to get through on his own." Rebekah commented and Klaus let out a sigh.
"Go, Sister. We shall be along shortly."
With a quick kiss to Klaus's cheek, Rebekah stepped through her door and woke up to Kol and Freya glancing down at her, but no sign of Marcel. A huge part of her wasn't surprised that her boyfriend wasn't there. But as her siblings helped her up, Rebekah shifted her gaze to Klaus and Elijah's still bodies, urging them to wake up. And while it didn't take long for that to happen, what followed was absolutely heartbreaking to watch. Elijah had always been the stoic brother. The reserved one, where Klaus and Kol had always been the wild ones. Elijah rarely ever showed emotion, so to see him struggling with an influx of emotions as all his memories came flooding back, it was something that none of the siblings ever wanted to witness again.
"I just talked to Vincent."
Marcel's words drew the attention of the four, allowing Elijah a moment to himself. But the look on his face was grim.
"How long has it been?" Klaus asked.
"What he had to say won't be easy to hear, but it's necessary. After Hayley's disappearance and then death, you all rushed back to New Orleans. Your mere presence was putting Hope, and the city, in danger. So Vincent, and you Freya, did what you had to do to keep Hope safe. The first to be knocked out was Elijah… then Kol… followed by me and Rebekah… and then when you returned Klaus, Freya knocked you out after you found the rest of us. Freya, you were never meant to have been in there permanently… it was a last minute decision when you lashed out at Hope the morning of Hayley's funerals. Hope felt she had no choice, and honestly, I agree with her. You all knew the dangers of being around Hope, or each other, yet you returned to New Orleans anyway. Hayley was the most important person in Hope's life, and you were all putting Hayley being honored in jeopardy. So after keeping us all unconscious during the funerals so that the Hollow would stay dormant long enough for things to run as smoothly as possible, Vincent woke all of us up just long enough for Hope to channel him and Keelin and put us all in the Chambre de Chasse. She extracted the Hollow from the four of you, and she and Ryan immediately left New Orleans." Marcel explained.
"That's all well and good, Marcellus, but how long were we in there for?" Klaus growled.
"A day. It felt like longer because our minds were trying to attach the time that we were unconscious to the time that we were actually in the Chambre to catch up with what we last remembered." Marcel replied.
"And Hope… where is she?" Kol asked.
"She and Ryan are on their way back to Mystic Falls. With everything that's happened over the Summer, culminating in Hayley's death and funerals, Hope needed to get back to school. Everything that has happened over the last week was planned to some degree, in the order that they happened to ensure Ryan could get Hope back to school in time." Marcel responded. "And no… just because none of you have the Hollow in you anymore means that it's safe to be around Hope. Now that you've each held a part of her, she could try and latch back onto any of you while staying inside Hope. Until Vincent can find a way to safely remove the Hollow from Hope, and destroy it once and for all, you all still need to keep your distance from her."
"What about you, and Freya? Neither of you had the Hollow residing in you." Rebekah commented.
"Something happened to Freya the morning of Hayley's funerals and she lashed out at Hope. Vincent doesn't think it's wise for any of you to be near Hope. I, however, am going to be heading to Mystic Falls with Vincent. While Hope does still need her family, it's simply not safe for anyone she's blood related to, to be around her right now."
"What about Keelin?" Klaus asked. "Where will she be?"
"Keelin is staying here so that she can figure out what happened with Freya."
When no one else seemed to have anything to say, and the only sound was Elijah still coming to terms with his emotions over everything that he had done, Marcel turned around to leave. He didn't see a point in sticking around much longer.
"Marcel, wait."
Rebekah couldn't let him leave without them talking first.
"I have nothing else to say to you, Rebekah. I said everything that I needed to when we were in the Chambre de Chasse."
"So that's it? We're just over?"
"Yeah, we're over."