Nik and I watched from the doorway of Davina's cabin as her friend was checking on Davina.

"Should we get her to a hospital?" I asked him. He looked up at us, well more importantly at Nik.

"Oh. Hello, darling. Back to huff and puff and blow the house down?" he asked.

"You know, it's funny how often a person's sharp tongue can end up cutting their own throat." Nik said unamused.

"Oh, back off NIk." I told him.

"Yeah, she's right." The kid chimed in. "You know, you may want to try a bit of lavender under your pillow. Does wonders for stuck-up pillocks with anger issues."

"Kid. Shut it." I ordered him. "Don't push me. My nerves are quickly fading and you're dancing on a little one."

"I promised not to kill Davina. I said nothing of this insolent sod." Nik reminded me and I rolled my eyes as the kid smirked.

"Come with me." I said pulling Nik away from the cabin door. "We came here to kill Mikael, not this kid. I want the keys so we can take Davina to the hospital with the kid right next to her holding her hand." Nik nodded his confirmation.

"Fine." He told me.

"Thank you. Now give me the stake and the keys." I told him and he gave me a look. "Stake and keys."

"Now why would I hand you both?" he asked me starting to joke around with me.

"Nik, she's hurt and I'm really worried." I told him.

"Quite the mother wolf." He said handing both items to me. "Go get the car. Let's take her to hospital."

"Thank you Nik." I said giving him a quick kiss before going to the car. "Oh, we also need to talk about undaggering Kol. We need him against your mom." I went to the car door and opened it when my head was slammed against the window knocking me out cold.


When I came to I found myself staring at the ground with my arms dangling above my head. I tried to look around but only saw ass.

"What the hell?" I asked no one in particular.

"Finally awake are you girl?" asked a very familiar voice. Mikael dropped me on the ground before grabbing my arm and drug me through the woods near the Bayou.

Mikael! Nik will find you and kill you again!" I told him angrily.

"Oh, he will. But, I will be ready." He told me.

"How are you even awake? You should be passed out with as much pain as that blade causes." I said.

"I have fought more pain than anyone, living or dead." He told me clutching Papa Tunde's blade in his other hand. "But, once I feed, I shall be restored." My eyes widened at his words.

"If you kill me then Nik will rip you apart!" I said trying to pull away from him.

"Not you." He sighed impatiently before holding the blade against my neck making me freeze. "You, my dear, are leverage. Once I threaten to dismember you in front of him, Klaus will hesitate. And, in that moment of weakness, I shall end him."

"You're crazy!" I told him. "You only hate him because his only flaw in your mind is that your wife couldn't keep her legs shut for another man!"

"Hush!" he told me enraged. "You are the enabler of the weak! No wonder he seeks your company." In the distance we could hear music and he smiled. "I hear music. And, where there's music, there's food." He drug me further through the woods, where we came upon a game of several dozen people, all of whom were wearing various Halloween masks and partying around a large bonfire. Mikael grabbed me by the back of my neck and forced me to look at them. "Well, well, well, well... What have we here? Hillbilly Halloween. Oh, perfect." He snapped my neck and I fell to the ground dead.


When I came to the sun had risen and I was being dragged into a run-down warehouse.

"Will you stop knocking me out?!" I asked him angrily.

"You know, I used to try to convince Nik that there was good in everyone, that you really did care about him, deep inside, once." He threw me onto the floor and I looked up at him. "He told me I was naive, that I could never fathom how deep your hatred ran."

"I didn't always hate him. When Klaus was born, I was overjoyed. I thought, "This one- this one has the eyes of a warrior. He will be worthy." But, my hope was short-lived. And, when I found out that he wasn't really my son, my relief was GLORIOUS. But, that passed with the knowledge that he was begat of a beast." He told me.

"His mother being a major slut was not his fault!" I shouted at him.

"Everything that followed was because of Niklaus' obsession with the wolves! He ventured out to watch them turn under the full moon, and he took my youngest son, Henrik. He was but a child, and he was torn apart." He reminded me.

"It was an accident!" I shouted. "They were kids!"

"An accident? AN ACCIDENT? HE MURDERED MY WIFE! HIS OWN MOTHER! Who sought to cleanse him of his beast-like nature! He betrayed me. He turned my entire family against me! And yet, you defend him?" he asked me. I rose to my feet so I could stare him in the eyes.

"She deserved it! She slept with another man under your nose and you were completely oblivious until you forced him to become a vampire!" he pinched his nose in frustration as I yelled louder. "He just wanted to be a son his father could be proud of! And what do you do? Toss him aside the minute you learn the son you raised wasn't biologically yours!" he started laughing hysterically at my words. I hadn't even noticed I was crying in my anger until I was wiping the tears from my face.

"Let me hazard a guess— you are becoming one of these alienists, right?" he laughed.

"Not a bit. I'm his wife and they're called therapists these days, and, to be honest, you could do with some time on that comfy couch. I'll introduce you to one." I told him.

"Actually, my dear, since— he moved towards me wincing in pain. "— my wound does not appear to be healing, what I could do with right now is some food." My anger was quickly replaced with fear as I back away from him.

"You-you said you wouldn't kill me until Nik was here." I reminded him making him smile.

"Yes, I did, didn't I? And although the blood of a full belly makes for good fodder—" his face vamped out as I tried moving away from him faster. "— in times of need, even the devil eats flies." He hissed before using his vampire speed to get behind me. He bit into my neck and I screamed in pain and terror. When he finally got off my neck he stuck his hand in my chest and held onto my heart. He turned me towards where Nik walked in with half a shovel in his hand. Mikael and I both knew the only reason I was standing was his hand on my heart. Nik's face was furious and he pointed the handmade stake at Mikael.

"You're gonna pay for hurting her." Nik threatened. Mikael withdrew his hand from my body and dropped me to the floor as Nik watched.

"Aw, how sweet. The cur whines for its bitch." Mikael said holding Papa Tunde's blade in one hand and the white oak stake in the other. "I'll be sure to drain the rest of her right in front of your eyes, just before you burn." Furious, Nik leapt a dozen feet into the air and lunged at him with his makeshift stake. He tackled Mikael, but they both quickly rose to their feet in defensive positions. They attacked each other once again before Mikael pinned Nik against the wall and was struggling to stake his chest. I felt pathetically weak on the ground, but not only did Mikael have his hand around my heart, he'd also taken a lot of blood when he drank from me. Just as Nik was about to be staked by Mikael, he kneed Mikael in the gut and face pushing him away before they resumed fighting. Nik then tackled him, the two of them bursting through a concrete and brick wall into the next room. I stood up weakly trying to think of a way to help my husband when he kicked Mikael to the floor. He then straddled Mikael, and though he tried to stake Nik while he was down, Nik easily turned the stake on him, and mustered up all his energy to break his grip to kill him.

"Not as weak as you remember, am I?" Nik asked him before breaking the stake out of his grip and going to stake him. But Mikael, playing as dirty as usual, threw Papa Tunde's blade at me. I was prepared for it to hit me, but I was going to try to catch it, when Nik caught it before it stabbed me in the face. Nik and I shared a look before Mikael stole the stake back. You know when you feel the world falling apart and swallowing you whole? I'd thought the only time I felt that was when we had to give Katherine and Nikolas to Rebekah to be protected from the witches. But as Mikael stabbed Nik in the chest with the white oak stake, what was left of my heart shattered. I'd watched Nik desiccate before, but that was nothing compared to this. I felt my eyes widen and my mouth fall open as Nik shrieked in pain and fell to the floor.

"NOOOOOOO!" I shouted as Nik stared at me while desiccating. I wouldn't remember crying until later when I finally wiped away the tears. I got up and went for Nik only to be backhanded by Mikael, which threw me backwards before I landed on the floor once more. Mikael and I stared at Nik's body with different emotions as we waited for it to burn. But it didn't.

"Why aren't you burning? If you were dead, it would burn. BURN!" Mikael growled. Suddenly, Mikael looked elsewhere and left. I instantly crawled over to Nik's body and stared at the stake in his chest.

"You don't get to leave me alone." I told him as I grabbed it and started pulling it out. "You don't get to leave this fight until I say you can." The stake was hard to pull out, but I was putting any and all the strength I had left in me. "We need you! Me and Nikolas and Katherine and Elijah! So you don't get to die today!" I pulled the stake out and held it in my hand as I watched the desiccation slowly recede and the color return to his skin.

"What do you think you're doing?" Mikael asked me. I looked into Nik's beautiful blue eyes and felt mine grow cold at the sound of Mikael's voice. I stood up and turned to him gripping the white oak stake tightly in my hand.

"Getting ready for Round Two." I said before attacking him. He'd fed on human blood recently not to mention the hillbilly's and my own blood while I was still feeling like crap. But I was pissed. How dare he try and take my husband from me! How dare he try to take my children's father from them before they really got to know him! I kicked him in the chest, forcing him back before trying to kick his face. Yes I was trying to kill him, but I didn't want him having the stake and using it on me or Nik. He grabbed my foot before it reached his head and pushed it, and me, away from him forcefully. The force pushed me back a little, but I ran at him with my Hybrid speed and appeared behind him, biting into his neck. I needed the blood and the extra dose of werewolf venom wouldn't hurt. I tried to stake him while I was feeding on him, but he saw it coming and broke away from me and wrapped his arms around me, restricting the movement of my upper body.

"You have a warrior's heart. Perhaps I'll keep it as a souvenir." He told me.

"Go ahead and try you son of a bitch!" I shouted at his face. He was about to bite me again when we were forcibly separated. I ended up looking at Marcel's back as he stood between me and Mikael. Marcel started hitting Mikael over and over so quickly that he was too disoriented to fight back right away. Mikael eventually knocked Marcel flat on his back and grabbed Nik's discarded makeshift stake and pointed it at Marcel's heart.

"Now, ENOUGH! This night has been a long parade of fools. I'll enjoy killing every last one of you." Mikael told us. Suddenly Nik awakened with a gasp and I made sure to stand between him and Mikael, still holding the white oak stake. Suddenly, Hayley arrived and threw a chain around Mikael's neck and yanked on it so hard it knocked him off his feet.

"Yeah, I wouldn't bet on it." He told him before hitting him in the face with the chain. Nik jumped to his feet and stood beside me. Marcel and Hayley soon fell in line behind us and we were even joined by Davina. Nik and I stood side by side with the others standing behind us, and I knew we had the upper-hand in this fight.

"It's over, Mikael. You're outnumbered. Are you going to beg for your miserable life?" Nik asked him making Mikael laugh.

"You think having people makes you strong? It proves how weak you are. Come find me when you don't have fools, women and children fighting your battles." Mikael threw the scrap of wood at us before speeding away to heal. I looked up at Nik and sighed in relief. A short time later we were alone in the same room and he was checking me over for injuries.

"I'm fine." I told him. I looked at his chest and noticed his would hadn't healed yet. I placed my hand close to it and saw him wince. "Sorry.

"Don't be." He told me gratefully. "You pulled the stake out in the nick of time. A moment longer, and I would have been done for."

"How would I have been able to look our family in the eyes and tell them I could have saved you and didn't?" I asked him. Part of me was hoping he hadn't heard me yelling at his desiccated form the other half didn't care. He was alive with me, and that was all that mattered. Nik put his hand on my neck where Mikael had bitten me and rubbed it as though it was aching.

"He hurt you. For that alone, I will kill him." He told me. "You know, in a thousand years, I think it's the first time I've seen him run."

"He's weak." I told him, but before he could say anything Hayley and Marcel joined us.

"And, he knew he was outmatched." Hayley said pulling me from Nik and giving me a huge hug.

"We checked the perimeter, and he's definitely gone." Marcel said and Nik sighed.

"I appreciate your assistance." Nik told him.

"Well, hey! You die, I die. Just call me selfish." Marcel said smiling at him.

"Yeah, you die, a lot of people die. But Klaus? We have another problem..." Hayley told us.


That night, I was standing on the balcony looking over the French Quarter in a robe after the very long shower I'd taken. My hair was still wet, but even with the water dripping down my neck and the cold air making me shiver, I didn't care.

"Nicole." I felt Nik at my back as he placed his arms on either side of me, pinning me between him and the railing. "How are you feeling, love?"

"Better now that I have the stench of Mikael off me." I told him leaning into his chest. "He was wrong."

"About what?" he asked me.

"About you being weak." I told him. I turned my face to him and saw him looking out into the city with an unreadable expression. "People don't make you weak, Nik. They make you stronger. We chose to protect those precious to us, our family, and that makes us stronger than he will ever be."

"He was still able to stake me." He reminded me.

"When you were fighting alone." I added. "Once you had allies, he couldn't touch you and knew it. So he ran like a dog." I turned in his arms and placed my hands on his face, cradling it gently as though he would break at any moment. "He is weak in a way you will never be. You have always had our siblings to help you while he has had no one." He moved his hand from the railing to my back and pulled me close to him. "You are wrong you know." He gave me a confused look.

"About what?" he asked.

"That I'd changed." I said. "I'm still me and nothing will change that." He crashed his lips to my own and pulled me inside.