I watched from the balcony overlooking the courtyard waiting for Nik just as everyone else was. Marcel had finally joined the world from his room with a bottle of bourbon in his hand not even bothering with a glass. I looked up when I saw Nik walk into the compound with another man a smirk on his face.

"Dearest brethren, your attention, please. No doubt, you're all surprised to see Thierry Vanchure, who's supposed to be rotting in the Garden for the crime of killing one of our own, and I personally decided to issue him with a pardon. I hope you'll all welcome home Thierry." Nik announced. Thierry smiled and gave Diego a hug as everyone welcomed him back to the fold. I saw Nik smirk up at me while talking to Marcel before addressing the crowd of vampires. "Now, as you all know, the witch Davina is no longer with us. Without Davina, we can no longer monitor the activity of our witch neighbors. However, since their Harvest failed, their magic will soon be gone forever. Until then, I say we keep them on their toes. Diego, I wonder if you might lead a rousting in the cauldron." Diego smiled and started to plan with the other vampires and Marcel grabbed his bottle and started to storm towards his room before Nik stopped him. "Marcel, I'd hoped you would join Diego."

"Nah. I'm gonna take a personal day." Marcel told him before he pushed past Nik and left. Nik scowled annoyed.


Hours later Nik and I walked into one of the room in the compound to find Marcel still drinking alone.

"Ugh, is this what's it's come to? I bear the full weight of our kingdom while you pout like a child." Nik asked him.

"You wanted to be king. Besides, you look like you got it covered." Marcel told him.

"If the men see you shirk your duties, they're likely to do the same." Nik told him and I rolled my eyes at his words.

"I told you, I am not in the mood for vampire hijinks." Marcel told him.

"No. You'd rather sit wallowing in sorrow for your lost little friend." Nik said.

"Don't push me right now." Marcel warned standing and put a finger in Nik's face.

"I am sorry Davina is gone, okay? I'm sorry. But this mournful attitude is unworthy of you, and it's boring to me." Nik said.

"Nik…" I started but was cut off by Diego entering the room.

"Hey, guys, we got a problem." He told us.


We all went into the Cauldron as thunder rumbled overhead. We saw two vampires, both desiccated, and both with the same magical symbol carved into their foreheads. Their bodies laid inside a magic circle created with salt, with runes drawn inside.

"We came to mess with the witches, just like you said. And these two, they went missing. Found them like this, not even staked. Just dead." Diego explained.

"That's two more of my guys gone. Nice job, Captain." Marcel said to Nik before taking another look at the dead me and putting his hood up and walking away.

"Where are you going? Someone has to account for this!" Nik said.

"You want revenge, get it yourself. That mark is tied to some bad mojo." Marcel said before he turned to the rest of the vampires. "Any of y'all got any brains, you'll head back to the compound and stay the hell out of this." Marcel then walked off and Nik turned to Diego.

"We're gonna find whoever did this, and I will show them what suffering is." He swore before looking to me. "Nicole you are confined to the compound until whoever did this is killed." He told me and I gave him a look. I was about to speak before looking at the dead vampires once more before nodding.


Hours later Nik, Elijah, Diego and many other vampires congregated in the courtyard, discussing the current situation of the two dead vampires as I watched on.

"Ah! Someone will die for this." Nik said.

"Remarkably, I don't disagree. However, I would like to know where they learned such dark magic." Elijah said making me curious.

"I had hoped never to see that symbol again. I recall it is the signature of a fool who once stood against us." Nik said.

"Clearly, some upstart witch is salvaging old tricks." Elijah told him.

"I'll do for him as I did the other." Nik said before turning to Diego. "Diego, when night falls, I want you to gather every vampire in the Quarter. Get me the head of whoever did this and put it on a stick."

"Yeah. That's gonna be a problem. Everyone is freaked out, man. We haven't had witches killing vampires in a long time. Marcel made sure of that." Diego told him.

"Marcel has run off like a scared child. You lot are left with me. Now, who of you will fight to defend our home?" Nik asked looking around and seeing no other come forward. "Not a single one of you will stand with me, so afraid are you of this new threat? You should know better. I'll handle this myself." Nik said before storming off. I sighed before going to Davina's old room and sat on the bed before Hayley joined me.

"Hey." She greeted.

"Hey. Distract me?" I asked her.

"Well we could try and find Celeste or at least why Davina was drawing her much." She offered and I nodded.

"Let's do it." I told her. We walked to Davina's old bedroom and started looking through her old sketches. In fact, that's where we were when Elijah walked in on us.

"There you two are." He said.

"Here we are." Hayley said.

"Davina's drawings." Elijah said gesturing to the sketches.

"Yeah. Morbid, I know. We were just thinking... we never figured out why she drew those pictures of Celeste. Anyway, I'm just killing time, now that Nicole's on vampire lock-down and I'm not leaving her alone for an instant." She told him.

"I don't need anyone to babysit me. I'm a grown woman." I reminded them both.

"I'm still not leaving your side." She told me like a worried mother hen. I rolled my eyes at her with a smile on my face.

"Whoever did this, we will deal with them. It won't be long." Elijah told us.

"I'm not worried. Just think it's kind of funny that it took some big, supernatural threat for you to even come into the same room as me." Hayley told him and I tried my best to tune out my friend and my brother.

"I do apologize if you feel neglected. I have been occupied. My siblings are in some quarrel. Niklaus remains agitated." He told her.

"That could be because we don't know who is doing this newest terror on the city and Marcel is still being all depressed." I explained.

"So Klaus is a dick, and you want to be a good big brother. So we can't hang out. That sum it up? I get it, Elijah. It just seems like a really crappy deal." She told him. He soon left and I looked at her confused.

"Why can't you hang out?" I asked her.

"He has it in his head that him not devoting his full attention to his brother will put me in danger." She said before rolling her eyes.


Sometime later Hayley, Elijah and I were in the courtyard as Elijah tried to call Bekah for the hundredth time.

"Rebekah is not answering her calls." He told us finally.

"You worried about whoever killed those daywalkers still being out there?" Hayley asked him.

"Frankly, I'm worried that she had something to do with this. She's very displeased with Niklaus, perhaps even conspiring with others." He said looking at the newest member of our ranks.

"You think she conspired with Thierry?" I asked him.

"She admitted it." He said as we joined the vampire. "Thierry, is it?"

"That's right." He confirmed.

"My sister is rather fond of you. Strange, she's not typically drawn to unremarkable men. Would you care to explain your sudden magnetism?" Elijah asked him with a smile on his face.

"I don't know what you're—" Elijah, annoyed, cut him off by grabbing him by the throat and pushing him against the wall.

"You can either tell me what you know, or I can distribute tiny pieces of you throughout the Quarter." Elijah said to him.

"She asked me to keep an eye out on witch stuff. I found something, and when I showed her, we were jumped by some guy. He desiccated her with his touch." Thierry told him.

"Like a coward, you left her." Elijah said angrily.

"What was I supposed to do, fight some warlock that took out an Original?" Thierry asked him.

"Where was this, exactly?" Elijah asked him.

"The docks, warehouse 57. I was just doing what she asked. You cannot tell Klaus about this." Thierry said and I gave him a look.

"Actually we can." I told him before Elijah snapped his neck and allowed his body to drop to the floor. "But we shall take it into consideration. I'm coming with you." I told my brother.

"No. Stay here. The compound is safe." Elijah insisted.

"Rebekah is my family and in trouble. I'm going." I told him stubbornly.

"If Nicole goes, I go." Hayley told him.

"Do not leave my sight. Understand?" he told us and we nodded before we left for the docks.


At the docks we found Bekah in the middle of the warehouse Thierry told us. We ran towards her desiccated form while Elijah was on the phone with Sophie.

"Rebekah!" Elijah went to kneel next to her, but couldn't get across a barrier made by salt.

"Oh, what's happening?" Hayley asked.

"Boundary spell." I told her.

"Someone is channeling her. Typically, it's a lethal process, but because she's an Original, she can't die. Instead, she's an endless source of power." Elijah said.

"So what are we supposed to do?" Hayley asked.

"You have to get her out of there." Elijah said to Sophie on the phone. "You're not listening. We cannot enter the circle. There's some kind of confinement spell... If I can't remove her, we can't break the link." He told her before putting her on speaker phone.

"It's a convoluted spell. It's like a witch's recipe. You can spoil the balance by adding a more potent ingredient. A mystical binding agent. I don't know, volcanic ash, rock salt... anything up to and including eye of newt." She told him.

"What about the blood of a witch?" Elijah said looking at me.

"Do you have the blood of a witch?" she asked him confused before he hung up on her.

"I need a favor." Elijah said to me.

"The baby's a quarter witch." I said offering him my wrist. He bit into it gingerly to draw blood. We walked towards the magic circle together and held out my wrist, letting the blood fall on the magical boundary line. It started to fizzle and deteriorate going clockwise before meeting at my blood again. Elijah quickly picked up Bekah and brought her out of the circle. Hayley and I held hands before they both vamp-sped us back to the compound.


That night, Nik and I stood on the balcony overlooking all the vampires he commanded as he spoke to them.

"Not long ago, you all united against me. You failed. Since then, in my benevolence, I have wiped the slate clean. Yet, it seems clear you think that I am the one who needs to earn your respect, your loyalty. You're mistaken. It is you who must prove yourselves to me. Our community is under attack. I require soldiers. I need warriors, not cowards. Each of you has a decision to make. You either fight alongside me or you leave now." Nik told them.

"We don't owe you anything. If staying in the Quarter means living under your rule, I'd just as soon get the hell out." Thierry called up to him. We watched as a handful of vampires joined Thierry and walked out of the compound. Afterwards, Marcel, Nik, Sophie and I were all talking in the study upstairs.

"I got to admit, I thought you'd lose a lot more guys than that." Marcel told him.

"Well, good riddance to them, I say. We've no room for slackers or cowards in our kingdom. Now that you've regained your composure, let's move on to the next item of business, shall we, with a little help from our dear friend Sophie." Nik said.

"I got no reason to help you, and I sure as hell don't have a reason to help him." Sophie said motioning to both vampires.

"But you have reason to help me, since it was me you held hostage." I told her.

"You'll only live as long as you're of use to me, and right now, your best use is to explain why a witch I killed has come back for revenge. Come on. Resurrected witches with vast power?" Nik asked her.

"It's the Harvest. To die and be reborn. I don't know how, but someone jacked that power, and they used it to bring back four witches... Just not the right ones." Sophie told us.

"So there's still a chance? If we can get that power back, we can save Davina." Marcel asked.

"Let's concentrate on the immediate problem, shall we? Papa Tunde wants revenge. He'll continue to attack us, channeling power from the vampires he sacrifices. He kills, he grows more dangerous. So how do I end him? He needs sacrifices to gain power." Nik explained.

"Hmm. You keep him from killing any more nightwalkers, that's a start." Sophie told us.

"Unless he finds the one place with a load of vampires ready to be sacrificed." Nik said looking to Marcel, but we all knew what they were talking about. The Garden.

The boys and I quickly made our way to the garden, but we were too late. All the vampires were dead, sacrificed by Papa Tunde.