Hello, my lovely readers! Sorry for the late delay, things have been hectic, but I soldiered on to give you all the next chapter you've been waiting for, so here it is for you all to enjoy. Also, I am very happy with the reviews, Follows, Faves and views, something I am grateful for you all and that always keeps me writing.

Now, review response:

-xenocanaan: I'm so happy you love Gwen, and I always try to give her a few things to show her cute and innocent side before the drama sets in. And here is another chapter that I hope you like!

-FreakingLEM: "As you wish." I love The Princess Bride, so I had to find some way to incorporate it into the story. I'm gonna try to try and show it a bit more in different ways.

-Love . Fiction . 2020: Thank you so much. glad you liked it!

-Undercoverlikeaspy: I'm so happy to learn that there are still fans of the original story, so I thank you ten times over for the support that I don't deserve but that I greatly appreciate. And I can't thank you enough for the love and support of this new story, so I hope that I keep up the good work.

-GhostGypsy: Glad you liked it! Also, Gwen's magic is based more on the elements, which makes it elemental, but she has other skills through it, which I will be showing as the story progresses, since I have yet to actually show her true potential.

-GreenLilly: I'm so happy that you love it! And yes, I wanted to establish some bonding between Gwen and Rebekah that makes sense and not forced for the sake of the story. Also, I am so excited to give you guys the chapter where Kol finally makes an appearance, but we need to get through Homecoming and the whole Stefan war first, but I am working hard to give you guys the meeting between my two lovebirds. Don't worry, Juniper will be back soon, but she does have a life and I want to get that sorted before delving into her any further. And I'm giving you guys a bit of the history of faeries of Mystic Falls in this chapter, but there is a lot more to tell in the future, so stay tuned for that.

Disclaimer: I own nothing from The Vampire Diaries and claim no ownership over anything pertaining to it.

smoky days

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"For the millionth time, June," Gwen chuckled as she held her phone to her ear with her shoulder, her hands busy pouring some tea into a mug with the midafternoon sun shining on her back through the kitchen windows. "Things are all right over here." Her mind went to the wound on her forehead that–thankfully–was no longer there due to the paste she had made that accelerated the healing process, having only needed a few days for the cut to completely disappear without a trace. The paste also helped to clear away any bruises or cuts that marred her skin, smoothing out any evidence of her wounds. "I'm fine and so is everything else." And that wasn't a lie since things were fine…presently.

"Are you sure?" June asked from the other end of the line.

Gwen smiled and she could practically see Juniper frowning, unconvinced. "Yes, so stop worrying. Rebekah and I have everything under control." She cleared her throat. "So, how are things in Chicago?" she asked, curious to know about the break-in. "Is the store still standing?"

"It is, thank goodness," Juniper said as she released a heavy breath. "The police let me in to see if anything was missing, and there isn't. They're still investigating with no leads as to who it could have been."

"Do you have any idea who it could have been?" Gwen asked her friend.

"No, but it wasn't random. Whoever broke in was looking for something," Juniper sighed, a bit stressed with the situation she found herself in. "I'll need to wait until the police finishes gathering evidence to get a better look around the place. I also need to start getting everything ready to sell the place."

"You'll call if there's anything I can do," said Gwen. "I can even get Nik to help."

"Not necessary for now, but thanks. It's going to be a while before I have everything sorted and meet up with you guys," Juniper began to explain before she chuckled. "It's going to be odd no longer being tied down somewhere after so many years getting by on my own, but I'm looking forward to some excitement." She exhaled deeply. "I owe a lot to Missus Bixby for taking me in, so making sure she's comfortable for what remains of her life with the money I'll get by selling the store is the least I can do for her. Granted, I also have to be prepared if she doesn't want to sell, which would mean that we'll have to work out what would need to be done if that were the case."

"From what you've told me, she's a very sweet woman," said Gwen. "It'll all be all right."

Juniper chuckled. "Ever the optimist."

"Someone has to be," countered Gwen. "Besides, I can't wait to see you."

"Oh, you're so sweet," Juniper cooed. "So, the resident gang of misfits hasn't been giving you any trouble?" she asked.

"None whatsoever," Gwen responded as she dipped the tea bag a few times into the mug filled with steaming water. She dropped the teabag in the mug, along with a cinnamon stick. "It's been pretty quiet, but that isn't actually a good thing." She picked up her mug in her left hand and held the phone to her ear with the other before she began to make her way to the library, glad that there was no one else in the house, which had been the norm for the past few days–not that she was complaining.

Humming, Juniper said with her voice filled with worry, "You're right about that, so just stay alert." The witch wasn't known for sitting still, so being too many miles away and unable to provide any support did nothing to calm her nerves. "Has Klaus contacted you guys?" she asked. "I imagine he has a decent number of werewolves-turned-hybrids at his beck and call by now."

"I do not doubt that he's turned quite a few werewolves with whatever amount of the doppelgänger's blood he took with him," Gwen answered as she sat on an armchair in the library with her legs curled up beneath her, making herself comfortable in the room she felt most serene, now balancing her mug on her thigh. "The last time I talked to him was yesterday, but it was brief," she said, taking a sip of her warm tea as she recalled her conversation with Klaus the other day. Once he had assumed that she was safe under Rebekah's watch so far, the Original hybrid had provided few details about what he was doing before hanging up in his haste to deal with some werewolves he was turning. "But he did mention that he was coming back to Mystic Falls after finding one more pack of werewolves to turn."

"Such a greedy man," Juniper huffed. "He should be careful not to push his luck. Word will spread and what he's doing won't give him any points in the werewolf community."

"I can imagine," said Gwen, knowing that Klaus was infamous for a reason. "Can you blame him? If Mikael is running around somewhere after so many years of nothing more than a passing thought, then it shouldn't be a surprise that Nick's paranoia is way past going through the roof." The fact that Klaus was so scared of someone had Gwen curious as to what such a person looked like if they made an invincible immortal run in fear, but the thought came and went as she realized that it was best not to put a face to a man who hunted down his own flesh and blood. "I'm worried about him," she sighed.

"I'm sure he's fine. I may have a bit of a taxing relationship with him, but I admit that he is quite resourceful, so he'll be fine," Juniper assured the young girl. "Don't tell him I told you that. I wouldn't hear the end of it."

Gwen chuckled as she took another sip of her tea. "You know, he hasn't said it out loud, but I think he likes you a bit, even though he might still find you annoying and thinks of ways to kill you now and then."

Juniper laughed. "That's good to hear, but the reason I am not dead at his hand is because of you. He cares about you too much to cause you any more grief than he already does."

"He's a big softy once in a while," Gwen said with a small laugh.

"Softy?" Juniper snorted. "There are many words that can describe Klaus, but I never thought that I would hear someone describe him as a 'big softy'." She paused. "But, when it comes to you, he does a one-eighty, so I can see that happening."

With a smile on her lips, Gwen hummed. "Maybe." She heard the echo of a door opening and closing, signaling someone's return to the boarding house, which had the young girl's shoulders tense up as she held her breath. "Someone just got back."

"Who?" asked Juniper, intrigued.

Gwen stayed quiet as she waited for whoever arrived to make an appearance, hearing footsteps getting closer to the library. She hoped that it was Rebekah and not either of the Salvatore brothers or any other person who seemed to know that the house was always left unlocked, and her prayers were heard when she saw the blonde Original vampire enter the library with a distressed look on her face as her eyes zeroed in on Gwen, prompting the latter's brows to furrow with concern before she asked, "Bex?"

"Rebekah?" Juniper asked. "How's she doing at school?"

"It's quite eventful," Rebekah said with a bit of edge to her voice, having heard Juniper through her enhanced hearing. She locked eyes with Gwen as she approached the young girl. "Now, I would love to catch up, but I need some help with a bit of homework." She gave Gwen a pointed look that had the young hybrid curious as to what could have caused such a look of worry to appear on the Originals' face.

"Okay," Gwen told Rebekah with a nod before she addressed Juniper. "I'm going to have to call you back, June. Bekah needs help with something."

"All right. Go hit the books or whatever," said Juniper. "I'm just going to enjoy the rest of the day at a police station. Call if you guys need anything."

"We will. Bye," Gwen said and hung up the call before she looked up at Rebekah with eyes frowning in concern, leaving her phone on the coffee table. "What happened?"

Rebekah sat on the couch next to the armchair Gwen was sitting on. "We have a problem."

Gwen released a weary sigh. "I already told you that the red dress was the best one. You can't tell me you got more to choose from." She recalled how Rebekah had bought–or compelled–for herself too many dresses the day before. She spent the entire day helping the Original choose a dress for the Homecoming Dance, not having realized how picky the blonde could be, but Gwen did understand that this was a very important event for Rebekah. And the young half-breed would be lying if she said she wasn't looking forward to it as well. "And I already picked mine, so forget about me doing a runway show for you again," she quickly added, not wanting to pose any more dresses than she already did when she had picked out her own after the first five she surveyed.

"No, no," Rebekah sighed with a slight roll of her eyes. "I trust your judgment and I approve your dress." Gwen raised an eyebrow at this, but the vampire waved her off with her hand. "Look, that bloody wench of a doppelgänger approached me at school today with rather disturbing news."

"Really?" Gwen frowned as she leaned back against her cushioned seat, holding her cup to her lips. "What did she want?"

"She confirmed that her little gang of imbeciles do have Mikael and plan to wake him," Rebekah said, her eyes wide with panic as her right leg bounced. Her entire body was on edge as the face of her father appeared in her mind, which made her sick to her stomach.

Gwen choked on her tea as her mind processed what Rebekah had just said, so she pulled her mug away from her lips and placed it on the coffee table as she coughed a few times to clear her throat. She wiped her mouth with the loose sleeve of her lilac sweater before directing her frown at Rebekah, her heart missing a beat at the name that had Klaus skipping town. "What happened?" she asked with urgency as she planted her feet on the floor, turning her straightened body to completely face the vampire. "What did she say?"

"The stuck-up bitch thinks she knows better, speaking about waking my father as if he will be their savior," Rebekah fumed as she stood up from the couch to walk around the coffee table to pace in front of the fireplace with Gwen's eyes following her movements. "I just want to wring her little neck and tear out the hearts of her blasted posse," she seethed, wringing her own hands in her anxiety.

"I don't understand. There's been no news about Mikael for years," said Gwen, feeling thrown off by the revelation. "Nik told me that it's as if he disappeared from the face of the earth. I find it hard to believe that these people were just that lucky to have found him."

"She said something about him rotting in an old cemetery in Charlotte," Rebekah recounted, trying to remember everything that Elena had told her earlier at school during her cheerleading practice. "That they'll wake him."

Gwen raised her eyebrows. "Wait," she said, causing Rebekah to pause in her pacing. "They haven't woken him?"

Rebekah shook her head. "No," she answered. "She said that she wanted a reason not to."

"That doesn't make any sense," Gwen said with a slight shake of her head, finding it odd that the people who want Klaus dead haven't unleashed the one person who could make their wishes come true. "Did she say anything else?"

"A bit too interested to know about my family after showing me some carvings we made a thousand years ago," Rebekah huffed, her arms folded over her chest.

"Carvings?" asked Gwen.

Rebekah nodded. "My family lived here in Mystic Falls after we left the Old World."

"Really?" asked Gwen, surprised by this. Klaus had told her a bit about his mortal life and how he and his family were turned into vampires, but she never dared to ask more due to the pain she always saw in his eyes. He only ever talked about his past when he was in the mood and only bits and pieces. "This town seems to be the center of a lot of supernatural history."

"Yes," Rebekah said, a bit offhandedly in her daze. "And it appears they found the cave that was regularly used to carve the everyday event, but it's all written in runic, so it'll take them a while to figure it out." Her shoulders sagged with a heavy exhale. "I think she wants me to make it easier for her."

"Why would they waste time trying to figure out what happened a thousand years ago?" Gwen asked herself, now being able to connect a few dots as she slumped back against her seat. "They don't know what to do."

"What do you mean?" asked Rebekah, raising an eyebrow.

"It's just that they're scurrying about as if Mikael wasn't what they wanted," Gwen said as she looked up at Rebekah. The young fae simply found that nothing about what Elena told Rebekah made sense, not when she imagined that they would have unleashed Mikael as soon as they found him to get rid of Klaus. "And I also don't get why they want to learn more about your family."

"Well, she wasn't lying about Mikael and this cemetery he's supposed to be in," Rebekah countered, having failed to detect any falsehood in Elena when they spoke to each other. "Also, what she said would explain my father's absence in the last few years."

Gwen nodded with a hum. "I'm not saying that she lied, but it's a bit odd that they have the means to kill Nik but refrain from doing anything."

Rebekah had to pause at this, her mouth hanging open as she thought about how true Gwen's words were. If Mikael had been awakened and had been told about Klaus and her own whereabouts, she would have known by now. "Still, we don't know much of anything, so we're at a disadvantage."

"But they don't know something," Gwen argued. "Otherwise, they wouldn't be looking into your past and that of your family."

"That is true," Rebekah agreed.

"Why don't we give an inch, but get a mile out of her?" Gwen suggested. She elaborated when she received a perplexed look from Rebekah. "We should invite her over, see what she knows and what she wants. That way, we also get some information out of her and go from there."

Rebekah's lips finally broke out of the thin line they were in and turned into a grin. "And here I thought that you were just a nice girl."

Gwen shrugged with a small smile. "I don't see the harm engaging in a little 'mean girl' power struggle."

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As his eyes shifted from picture to picture, Alaric felt the prickling sensation of a headache beginning to take root in the back of his head, prompting him to rub his hand over his face to clear his vision from any haziness or dizziness. He cleared his throat and blinked a few times before his attention went back to the pictures spread out over his kitchen's island's counter as he worked to label them all. While he had named a few of the carvings he took pictures of with post-it notes, it didn't help that he made a mess in his apartment with all of it. There was progress, but it was slow. He was able to identify the characters of the story the cavern walls had written on them, which would then help him start figuring out what was being told.

At a knock on his front door, the history teacher looked away from the photos and turned to face the door, calling out, "It's open!"

Bonnie opened the door, stepping inside the apartment before closing the door behind her. "Hey," she greeted with a smile.

"Hey, Bonnie," Alaric greeted with a kind smile of his own.

"Got your message," Bonnie said as she approached him, her brows furrowing with curiosity when she found the many pictures of the cave that she had been to that were piled on the dining table and any other surface in the apartment.

"Yeah, uh, sorry the place is such a mess," Alaric said with a sheepish look as he gestured to his home and how disorganized it all was, not just because of the pictures but also because of the training gear he got out for Elena and the equipment he used to take photos of the cave. "I'm a bit obsessed," he chuckled, a bit embarrassed to show that he was fascinated by their discovery, which showed the historian within him.

"I can see that." Bonnie nodded as she looked around before reaching into her purse and pulling out Elena's necklace, which she presented to Alaric. It worried her how the item had not been destroyed with the combination of her magic and that of her grandmother, which had her thinking that there was a lot of power in the small pendant. "I brought the necklace that wouldn't die."

Alaric hummed as he grabbed the necklace, inspecting it. "That's great." He looked up at Bonnie and noticed how the small smile she mustered was a forced one, reminding him of what Elena told him that transpired the night the ghosts had materialized. "You okay?" he asked the young witch.

Bonnie pursed her lips. "Been better," she sighed, still unable to talk about what he was referring to.

"Listen," Alaric began as his fingers played with the necklace's chain, "Jeremy is an idiot. And I know this with certainty because I was once a 'Jeremy'." He gave the teenager what he hoped was an encouraging smile, which she reciprocated. "Trust me, we learn…eventually."

"So," Bonnie breathed, wanting to change the subject. It wasn't that she wasn't grateful for Alaric's words, but she would rather not think about her relationship with Jeremy and how he chose another girl over her, having thought that he would be the one to never hurt her like that. "Need any help?" she asked, wanting to take her mind off her problems.

"Actually," Alaric said as he picked up a photo and showed it to Bonnie. "I've been staring at this image all day, wondering why it looked so familiar." He held up Elena's necklace that was twisted around his fingers next to the photo held by his other hand, and Bonnie could see that there was too much of a resemblance between the carving and the necklace to be a coincidence. "I was right."

"It's the same design," said Bonnie, nodding.

"Your grandmother said this necklace belonged to the witch that put the hybrid curse on Klaus, right?" Alaric asked her, receiving a nod of confirmation. "Well, this symbol is repeated all across the wall," he said as he dropped the photo and necklace on the kitchen island while gesturing to the other photographs. "I've been trying to figure out what it meant." He picked out another post-it, writing a word on it with a Sharpie pen. "And now I know." He put away the pen and stuck the post-it on the picture that had the same design as Elena's necklace, showing Bonnie that it stood for 'witch'.

Bonnie frowned as she realized something. "Grams mentioned something about the witch that had messed with the gateway to the Other Side, making me think that this witch is connected to the Originals."

"Probably from centuries ago," Alaric said as he shook the photo before dropping it by the other pictures he had already labeled and picking up another that Bonnie recognized. "This one is also all over the place, if not more." He stared at the photo in his hand that showed the carving of a star with seven points.

"Yeah," Bonnie said, remembering how this had been the symbol she touched when she went to the cave, which resulted in her witnessing the strange vision she deducted was from a long time ago. "The one made with faerie blood."

Alaric nodded and wrote 'faerie' on another post-it before sticking it to the picture. "My thoughts exactly."

"Have you been able to find out anything about them?" Bonnie asked him, feeling a bit ridiculous for saying 'faerie' and not think about the popular Disney character, which takes away all seriousness from the situation.

"I tried to do some research, but there's too much data," Alaric explained. "There are too many mythologies around the world, and it doesn't help that the first thing that pops up is Tinkerbell." This had Bonnie chuckling, imagining how frustrated Alaric must've been during his research. "I thought that your grandmother might have had something about them hidden away in her things."

"I looked around, but there's not much," said Bonnie, since she did search through her grandmother's belongings for anything about the mystical being. "All she knew and wrote about was that faeries are old...very old. They're like the oldest creatures on this planet and probably the center of magic itself, and that they were the ones who introduced magic to humans."

Raising an inquiring eyebrow, Alaric asked, "They taught humans magic? As in, they made people witches?"

"It's all I could find in Grams' notes, but yeah," Bonnie told him. "Thing is that their species became too afraid and secretive to share anything they knew with anyone after they began being hunted down, so it was impossible to learn about them."

"Now they're extinct," Alaric sighed.

"It's sad, you know," said Bonnie. "Grams described them as pure beings with a harmonious relationship with Nature, but they were targeted by everyone." She frowned with tight lips, put off by the behavior of other witches toward faeries. "I understand why vampires killed them, but I don't understand how witches could do them any harm when they were also connected to Nature."

"It goes to show that there's good and evil in everyone," said Alaric.

Bonnie nodded, but she wasn't at all reassured. "Yeah."

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Gwen hummed a tune as she fiddled with the stereo on a desk placed in a corner of the room with a surround system. It had gotten too quiet for her as she and Rebekah waited for Elena to arrive at the boarding house, so she decided that listening to a bit of music would do them and their nerves some good. Out of all of the CDs she saw neatly stacked around the stereo, she chose Bon Jovi's Slippery When Wet, which was one of the many other of Bon Jovi's albums that she saw, which had her thinking that one or both of the Salvatore brothers was a fan of the iconic rock band. After inserting the disc and making sure the volume wouldn't destroy their hearing, Gwen went about pulling open every curtain in the room as "Let It Rock" began to play in the background.

Rebekah entered the room, her eyes finding Gwen's. "Now that is better music." Her head bobbed with the song, liking the tune and the singer's voice.

"I thought we should lighten up the place a bit," Gwen explained, humming along with the song's lyrics.

"You think she'll come?" Rebekah asked, sitting on the couch in the parlor room as she slumped back into the cushions, staring at the screen of her phone that displayed the text she had sent Elena to meet up at the Salvatores' home half an hour ago. She was getting impatient with having to wait for the doppelgänger, already abhorring the thought of spending time with the brunette. "Although, I would prefer if she didn't. I don't know if I will be able to keep myself from squeezing that thin neck of hers." She huffed, "You should have seen how smart she thought she was when she threatened me with Mikael. She was lucky that we were at school." She became so angry when she was threatened.

Gwen raised an eyebrow at Rebekah as she sat beside the vampire after finishing her task with the curtains to allow the afternoon sunlight to filter in, having gotten annoyed with how dark and gloomy the place was. "I know you don't like her, and I don't expect you to start after today, but we're on a mission."

"I know," Rebekah huffed as she turned off her phone. "I need a little pick-me-up," she stood up to serve herself a glass of bourbon since there was some in a glass bottle on a table behind the couch. While she wasn't a fan of the Salvatore brothers at the moment, she was grateful to them for having something to drink in almost every room.

"Look," Gwen began as Rebekah came to stand in front of her with a glass filled with amber-colored liquid. "All we have to do is find out what she knows about Mikael."

"That's another thing that worries me," said Rebekah, taking a generous sip of her drink. She scoffed as anger surged through her body. "Why couldn't he just stay decayed in whatever hole he was in for the rest of eternity. It's not like he's missed, let alone beloved."

Having noticed the slight tremble in the blonde's voice and how her hand that held her drink shook, Gwen knew that fear seemed to overwhelm Rebekah when confronted with anything that had to do with her father, and she couldn't be blamed. Also, the young halfling's plan only went as far as figuring out what Elena knew about Mikael. She had to think about what to do next, but she figured that she would do that after getting whatever information the mortal doppelgänger had to offer. Still, she imagined that she would simply call Klaus and let him think of a plan, should one be necessary.

"Oh," Rebekah spoke up when her ears picked up on a car's engine, causing Gwen to perk up and straighten her back as she looked up at the Original vampire. "I believe our guest has finally deigned to grace us with her presence."

"Okay," Gwen said while taking a deep breath, giving Rebekah a pointed look. "Remember, try to be nice. We'll throw her out as soon as we get what we want."

Rebekah rolled her eyes as she mumbled into her drink, "Whatever." And then she finished the rest of her drink in one last gulp, enjoying how the liquid warmed her up on its way down to her stomach.

The front door opened and closed, revealing Elena striding into the foyer as she looked around, coming to a stop when her eyes landed on Gwen and Rebekah. While it was no surprise that Gwen was there, Elena had thought that Rebekah wanted to talk to her alone. And it was now that she realized that she should have been aiming to talk to Gwen first and figure out what she knew before going to Rebekah since the halfling was less of a threat to her life.

"Hello, Elena," Gwen greeted with a small smile, leaning back against the couch.

Rebekah's greeting was a huff under her breath as she walked over to the bourbon to fill her glass once more.

"I was invited over," Elena announced with a shrug of her shoulders, "to talk."

"Yes, unfortunately," Rebekah sighed into her drink as she looked up at Elena, taking a sip of her drink. "Want some?"

"I'm not here to drink," Elena almost scoffed, a bit impatient with wanting to know more about the Originals, which she hoped would help her and her friends figure out how to kill Klaus if they knew how they were turned into vampires.

"Then, what do you want to talk about?" Gwen asked, her eyes narrowing.

"I'm here to talk about why you don't want me to wake up Mikael," Elena said matter-of-factly.

Gwen nodded and asked, "Okay, then how about you tell us why you haven't woken him?"

Elena frowned at Gwen, feigning confusion as she gulped down any nervousness. "What?"

"Well, you say you have him but haven't woken him, which is what I don't understand since he would solve whatever conflict you have with Nik," Gwen stated, keeping her eyes on Elena. "So, why haven't you woken him?"

"I'm not stupid," Elena argued, keeping her voice steady and her head held up high to appear confident. "I wouldn't be so careless to wake up another Original with a not-so-stellar reputation on a whim. I want to know more about him and see if he can be reasoned with before a decision is made." She glanced at Rebekah with a bored expression. "If you're not willing to share, then I'll just take my chances with Mikael and bring him here, see what he has to say that you don't."

In her mind, Elena saw her bluff getting a different result than her being shoved hard against a wall by the neck with Rebekah's face morphing into vampiric features for a few seconds in her anger. The doppelgänger gasped for breath as the Original's grasp on her throat tightened and her back exploded with sharp pain. The brunette mortal tried to claw the vampire's hand off her neck to no avail while wheezing, but Rebekah still held an impassive look on her face as her left hand kept a relaxed hold on her drink.

"Rebekah!" Gwen gasped as she jumped off the couch and ran over to the Original's side, glancing at the choking Elena before her eyes settled on the blonde. "Let her go, Bekah," she demanded.

"Why?" Rebekah scoffed with a smirk, her eyes roaming over Elena's face that displayed nothing but fear. "We kill her, we solve our Mikael problem since she seems to be the ringleader with everyone eating out of her hand. This will also get everyone else off our and Nik's backs. Then, we can get on with our lives."

"You can't," Gwen insisted.

Rebekah turned to her right and matched Gwen's frown with her own. "And why not?"

"I don't want you to be daggered for another ninety years, that's why," Gwen explained with her swept bangs falling over her left eye. "Think about what Nik will do when he finds out."

The centuries-old vampire could see the agitation in Gwen's hazel-green eyes, which was born out of worry for the blonde, something that surprised Rebekah, given that she could not remember when someone was this concerned for her–truly concerned. There were too many years to count and too many people to remember, but Rebekah couldn't recall anyone outside of her brothers who would have fought or even made an attempt to keep a dagger out of her heart. And while she would have enjoyed squeezing the life out of Elena, the vampire realized that Gwen was right. Killing the doppelgänger would only anger her brother and most likely land her inside of a coffin with a dagger in her chest for an indefinite amount of time.

After taking a deep breath to calm the fire in her blood, Rebekah turned back to face Elena and loosened her tight grasp on the brunette's neck, watching as the doppelgänger greedily sucked in precious air back into her lungs. Rebekah inched her face closer to the brunette's frightened one until their noses were inches away from one another, her quiet but cold voice telling Elena, "You do not threaten me." While Elena's face was devoid of any emotion, her heart was beating too fast as she recognized the darkness in the blonde's eyes that told her that she shouldn't push her luck. "You'll learn what I allow you to learn, and you'll tell us what we want to know." Her eyes lost their ferocity as she pulled away from Elena with a raised eyebrow. "Now, isn't that a fair trade?"

Elena's neck had enough room to allow her to nod before she was released. If it wasn't because she had been pushed against a wall that she used to support herself with, Elena would have crumbled to the floor due to how wobbly her legs were. She coughed a few times to test her tender throat as she reached up to her neck, knowing that a bruise would form later and that she would have to explain it to Damon, already dreading that conversation and the overprotectiveness that would surely follow. Her eyes then watched as Rebekah made her way to the stairs, leaving her glass on a table on the way after downing its contents.

"Honestly," Gwen huffed as she scowled at Elena. "What were you hoping to gain by bullying her like that?" At Elena's silence, the halfling rolled her eyes in annoyance. "Take it from me, the last thing you ever want to do is threaten an Original, no matter which one. And trust me, she would have killed you, so you're very welcome." She then left the doppelgänger to follow Rebekah up the stairs.

Elena exhaled a weary breath as she collected herself, coming to terms with the fact that her previous plan to manipulate Rebekah into giving her information was not going to work. It also didn't help that she now had to put up the farce that they had Mikael when they didn't know where he disappeared to with a way to kill Klaus, especially when Gwen was too observant for her liking and already appeared to see right through her. Still, she was not going to back down, not when there could be another way to get rid of Klaus. And so, she steeled herself and forced her legs to carry her up the stairs, following the sound of drawers being opened and closed that led her to the last room she wanted to be in.

"How fun is this?" Rebekah chuckled as she looked into the drawers of a dresser in Stefan's room, her eyes scrutinizing the youngest Salvatore's fashion sense.

"Really?" Gwen asked from where she sat on the edge of Stefan's bed, her legs crisscrossed.

Rebekah glanced at Gwen with a pout. "Oh, you won't resist doing the same after you get yourself a boyfriend, which we will need to work on for Homecoming."

"I am fine going on my own, Bex," Gwen told her friend.

"Nonsense. You need a date," said Rebekah, rummaging through a drawer. "I would suggest one of my brothers, but that's out of the question."

Elena leaned against the doorway with her arms crossed over her chest, her body stiff and uncomfortable as she sighed, "We shouldn't be here." While the room had once been like a haven of hers and Stefan, she now felt like a stranger with her skin crawling, feeling like she was invading her former significant other's privacy. And this saddened her heart, disliking how a weight had settled in her chest while being in a place that held nothing but good memories of her time with Stefan.

"'Course we should!" Rebekah argued, sending Elena an unimpressed look. "Come on, like you've never wanted to snoop." She picked out gray underwear before holding it up for the other two girls to see. "Boxer briefs," she stated before she bundled it up and placed it back in the drawer. "A lot has changed since the twenties."

Elena wanted to scoff in distaste but held herself back, opting to ask, "Are you gonna root through his stuff all night or are you gonna start to tell me your story?" She was getting annoyed that it was Rebekah looking into Stefan's things without a care in the world. She recognized that her annoyance was mostly due to jealousy, but she pushed it back.

Rebekah sighed as she made her way to a desk near the window. "You really are no fun, which makes this boring." She glanced at Gwen, who was looking over a book she found on the nightstand that was titled, Moby Dick. "How do you suppose we should go about making this more fun, Weny?"

Gwen looked up from reading the book's summary, her eyes shifting from Rebekah to Elena. "I don't know," she hummed as she thought about a way to get her answers, placing the book on the bed next to her. "Someone can ask a question. After the answer is given, the other person gets a turn and must get an honest answer." She shared a knowing look with Rebekah, both knowing that it didn't matter if Elena lied since the vampire would be able to sense any deception.

"What if someone lies?" asked Elena, not liking where this was all headed.

"Well," Rebekah began and gestured to Gwen, "Weny can't lie, so just ask her for confirmation. Nik's told her enough about my family to know what is true or not."

That was partially true. Klaus had spoken about his family before, but he didn't get into detail when telling Gwen a few things about his past, and Rebekah knew this. This was only a way to give Elena false reassurance, but it also allowed Gwen to twist her words whenever it was needed to steer clear from being forced to tell the truth.

"Guests go first," Gwen told Elena.

"Well, Elijah said that your father was a landowner in Europe," Elena began as she took a step into the room, watching Rebekah sifting through the things on Stefan's desk. "How did you guys end up here?"

"My parents had just started a family when a plague struck their homeland," Rebekah answered as she picked up a few papers she fleetingly read, finding out that they were research papers from school. "They lost a child to it. They wanted to escape and protect their future family from the same fate." She glanced at Elena. "Our turn. Where did you say you found Mikael?"

"In a cemetery in Charlotte, North Carolina," said Elena before she quickly asked, "So, how did you end up here? This part of the world hadn't even been discovered yet, right?"

Rebekah let out a small laugh as she looked at Elena. "Not by anyone in your history books." She put down the papers back where she found them. "But my mother knew the witch Ayana, who heard from the spirits that nomadic faeries had made their home on a mystical land imbued with their magic, making everything flourish and pure, which led my family here, where we lived amongst the faeries and people blessed by the gifts of speed and strength."

Gwen grew curious about this, given that Klaus never mentioned it before. "Gifts?"

"Werewolves," Rebekah clarified. "They were our neighbors. My family lived in peace with them, as well as with faeries and natives for over twenty years, during which time my family had more children, including me."

"You make it sound so normal," Elena remarked.

Rebekah had a wistful smile on her lips while recalling memories of a distant past as she came to stand by the window, watching as the sun began its descent behind the horizon. "It was, only that once a month our family retreated into caves beneath our village imbued with faerie magic to keep us safe. The wolves would howl through the night as they ran alongside the faeries, and then we'd return home by morning."

"Faeries and werewolves?" Gwen asked Rebekah with furrowed brows.

"Witches use faeries. Vampires eat faeries," said Rebekah. "Werewolves accompany faeries since they were somehow connected to Nature in a more symbiotic way." She shook her head. "I have no idea how to explain it." Her smile turned sour as she remembered what had marked a turning point for her family. "One full moon, Klaus and my youngest brother Henrik snuck out to watch the men turn into beasts." While that wound on her heart had already scabbed, there was still a dull throb of pain whenever she thought about her younger sibling. "That was forbidden, and Henrik paid the price. No magic could save him, not even that from the faeries." She could still hear her mother's wails and the grief that had struck her family, almost crippling them all. "And that was the beginning of the end of peace with our all of our neighbors," she said, turning to face Elena with a blank stare. "And one of the last moments my family had together as humans."

Silence engulfed the room, so Gwen broke it by clearing her throat and turning her attention to Elena. "Now, what happened to Mikael that he ended up in a cemetery?"

Elena shrugged. "We don't know yet. He was in chains and desiccated in a tomb."

Any other question that was going to be asked was forgotten when the vibrating sound of a phone filled the room, which had Elena reaching into her pocket in search of it.

"You better get that," Rebekah sighed, now realizing that her eyes had watered, which she had failed to notice while going down memory lane. "That'll be Damon checking up on you, I imagine."

Elena looked at the caller ID and saw that it was indeed Damon, so she turned her back on Rebekah and Gwen to answer the phone and speak with the oldest Salvatore, allowing the other two girls some time for themselves.

Rebekah picked up a book from Stefan's desk and opened it to find that it was one of his diaries, something that intrigued her as she made her way to the bed. "Now this is interesting," she said as she lied down on her stomach next to Gwen, her eyes skimming over the words written on the white pages.

Gwen turned to her side to get a better view of Rebekah. "You okay?" she asked, having noticed the vampire's change in demeanor.

"Yes, I am," Rebekah exhaled heavily, her eyes focused on the diary to try and avoid showing any vulnerability, having noticed how Gwen picked up on people's emotions rather well. Still, she wanted to be honest with the half-fae and open up, if only little by little. "It's just been a while since I thought about my origins. It's kind of hard to stop talking about it once I start, being swept up by the dreary memories."

"I hope there were some good memories worth remembering," said Gwen, wanting to know more about the blonde's past, which included knowing more about things that Klaus neglected to share. So far, she had already heard about what Rebekah had mentioned, except for the part where faeries lived with werewolves a thousand years ago.

Rebekah smiled up at Gwen. "Sparse, but they were wonderful." She chuckled as she remembered how she used to play in the woods with her siblings. "The best ones were with my siblings. My parents weren't always good to us, but I did see them try to do their best now and then."

"Did you know any faeries?" asked Gwen.

"Of course," said Rebekah as she put down the diary for a moment, keeping it open on a page she was interested to read. "My mother became good friends with a widowed faerie called Linah who had two daughters around my age. Lilith was the oldest of the two with a rebellious nature and a compassionate heart, whereas Lilwen was kind and selfless. Their home was close to our own, so we became fast friends," she paused and snorted. "My brother also became friends with them, if only for another reason."

"What do you mean?" asked Gwen.

"My brother Kol had a thing with both, but not two-timing. It was more like he was oblivious," Rebekah explained. "Lilith was his best friend. She was in love with him to the point of obsession, but he was madly in love with Lilwen and she was madly in love with him, but they took their time with the confession of such feelings. It caused a bit of tension for all of us for some time since the sisters were good friends of mine and my siblings."

Gwen was hesitant to ask, but she did. "What happened to them?"

Rebekah sighed with a dull smile. "They died."

Just as Gwen opened her mouth to ask Rebekah to elaborate, Elena's voice rose as she yelled, "Damon!" She wanted to do more than yell. "How could you let him out?"

"Trouble in paradise?" Gwen asked Rebekah, whispering.

Rebekah grinned as she picked up the diary once more. "I think paradise just got too small for two Salvatore brothers."

End of the chapter!

I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter that is more of a first part and the second part will come in the next chapter, so feel free to express your thoughts and opinions without any reservations.

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See you all in the next chapter!