CHAPTER FIFTEEN


May 2013

At first, she had tried rinsing off at the sink, using a wet towel to get the worse of soot and blood from her face and neck. But the towel just got redder and redder, and there were crusts in her hair, and she actually felt herself getting dirtier, and before she knew it, she had stripped off her clothes and stepped into the shower.

When the warm water hit her, her whole body shuddered with pleasure, and it was more than just the washing away of dirt and blood and grime. It was more than the trauma of the short-lived battle, or the aftershocks of a ritual she didn't completely understand. It was everything. Prison Worlds. Vengeance plots. The foreshadowing dreams of Lily Salvatore, and the heretics and her own mind-warping, obsessive anxiety about Kai Parker wanting his pound of flesh…

that finally, finally sloughed off her skin and down the drain.

She lifted her face to the spray, and felt like if she was being baptised. Despite the beer she had downed, her throat still felt itchy and dry and she gulped some water, not caring. She ran her fingers through her finally-clean hair, and touched her neck. A flash of memory. Kai's teeth buried into her flesh. Her fingers twisted in his hair, holding him there, as he growled, gnawing her. Her hands guiding him down her body, shuddering with each rub of friction until his mouth latched over her scar–his scar. Shakily, she touched it now, trying to feel for teeth-marks, and was it her imagination but did it feel slightly tender still? She remembered her own teeth sinking into his wrist, his neck, his chest… Her stomach tightened. The steam was rising, and it wasn't from the deliberately tepid water. She put her hands against the wall of the shower, balanced herself.

No.

"Bonnie?"

She started. How long had he been out there? She turned off the water. There was silence. She peered hard at the glazed screen and wondered if it was see-through. "Yes?"

"Are… are you having a shower?" The stupid question came from a voice that sounded strangled.

"Do you mind?"

"No, I just didn't think…"

Think what? That stripping naked in his hotel suite could make her more vulnerable than when she had been allowing – urging – him to feed on her?

That aside, as a matter of pragmatism, a year or so of living a co-ed dorm liberated one from certain inhibitions. You need to shower? Grab the first empty one you see or risk being late to the cafeteria, a seminar or an exam. If you have to trip over the cute guy to do so, so be it.

She suddenly wondered if Kai had even gone to college.

She heard him shuffle, and wondered again if he could see her. The thought sent a wicked thrill through her that she refused to analyse.

"I… I did the cleaning spell on your clothes. Been a while. It could be better. Then it could be worse. I would have folded them too, but I figured your… stuff… would be somewhere in there so it's kind of just lying in a pile, so it might look messy but it's really not, so don't dismiss it out of hand-"

With a sigh, she realised he wasn't stopping any time soon. She grabbed the bathrobe hanging off the hook, double-tied the knot and opened the door.

His prattle shut off abruptly, his mouth and eyes rounding as his entire body seemed to freeze with shock. Unnerved, she paused, but when he just kept gaping, she hemmed impatiently and walked around him, trying not to bristle as he swung on his heels, keeping her in his line of sight. She picked up her clothes where, as he said, they lay on the counter in a heap. Sceptically, she lifted the bundle to her face and sniffed them tentatively, then dug her face in, inhaling deeply. Freshly scented with her favourite orange-water fragrance. How had he known?

"Not bad," she said grudgingly, glancing at him and noting the white shirt and dark pants he wore that looked like a variation of his wrecked tuxedo. He was also still staring.

Hugging the clothes rather defensively to herself, she walked into the room she had woken up an eternity ago. She threw her things on the bed, and was about to sort them out, when she remembered that her underwear was somewhere in the pile.

Bonnie glanced over her shoulder to see him still goggling at her. At least, he'd finally closed his mouth. She resisted the urge to fidget, wondering what he saw. In 1994, she had thought his lingering gazes had meant only one thing – until she discovered that she was just a means to an end. After that, she had never been sure how much of his single-minded focus on her had been manipulative, or merely situational. And now that, no doubt after 18 years of solitary confinement, he had satiated himself with a steady diet of curvy blondes with legs for days, was he judging her short, skinny frame and finding her lacking?

Why the heck did she care anyway?

"Do you want something?" she snapped.

Kai started, jolting out of whatever mental comparison he had been making. "Do I want…" His wide eyes ran over her face, down her body and back, slanting quickly to the bed behind her before he looked away. He reddened, then paled, his skin blanching. His face was partly in profile now, and she could see his Adam's apple bob painfully. "Our talk… we're still… er… talking? Like you said. Before? Remember?"

She sighed, sitting down abruptly on the bed. "I guess," she said grudgingly. "But obviously, not right this minute."

His gaze snapped to her, the beginning of a smile on his face, then it faded, and he looked away again.

What?

"G… good because I ordered pizza." He chuckled slightly. "Somewhere in the restaurant, the chef is cursing me out, but I wanted something fast. Is there anything special you'd like on yours? You're not allergic, are you? I knew a witch who was. It's rare enough but it happens. And not just something regular like peanuts or lactose intolerance, I'm talking real bummers like rice or chocolate. Can you imagine being allergic to chocolate? Kill me already. Not that I think they'd put chocolate on pizza, but I mean, if they can put pineapple then I guess…"

How could he still be hungry? After their blood-sharing ritual, Bonnie still felt strangely full and the thought of food nauseated her a little. "Another drink will be fine. I'm not actually hungry."

He finally met her gaze, his face a picture of horror. "That's crazy… Look, I'll order a sandwich at least. You have to eat—"

"I don't know how you can think of eating anything after…" She stumbled, then cleared her throat, and finished her sentence brusquely. "Everything."

She held his gaze, lifting her chin to let him know that she was not in the least affected by what transpired between them.

Then she blinked as that slightly glazed expression passed over his face again, his face flushing until his ears were bright red. Either she was really bad at this or…

He wasn't unaffected.

Bonnie felt a thrill of shock and — against her will — gratification.

He rubbed the back of his neck, a nervous gesture that was almost as surprising as that blush. "Maybe it was my gluttonous appetite that satiated you. My blood is high-calorific, after all." A tiny twinkle blinked in his eye.

She scoffed, her mouth twitching against her will.

He smiled hesitantly. She almost returned it before she checked herself, and looked away. She felt his gaze touching, burning through her face.

She sprang to her feet. "Are we done yet? Or do you want a show?" Tugged at her robe.

She didn't think it was possible, but he turned even redder, his face so bloodshot that she almost felt worried for him. Muttering nonsense, he backed up, bumping his shoulder into the doorway. She raised her hand and slammed the door in his face.


June 2014

New Orleans

Kai could feel her staring at him as Freya held court, introducing her guests in turn, and he refused to meet her gaze. Not while his head felt like it was on fire, like he wanted to jump out of his body.

She shouldn't be here. Why was she here?

"Ms. Bennett, I have heard so much about you," Vincent said gravely, almost reverently as he took Bonnie's hand. "It is an honour to finally have a face to match the legend." Kai shoved his hands into his pocket so he won't accidentally declare war on the Nine Coven of New Orleans by knocking down their Regent because he held Bonnie Bennett's hand too long.

Not that he could blame Vincent. In her shoulder-baring blue dress and curls swept to one side of her neck, Bonnie looked… She looked

The sight of her was physically painful, so he watched her companions instead. Caroline Forbes was shooting subtle curious glances in Kai's direction, even as she shook hands and smiled at Vincent. Donovan was glaring at Kai with open hostility, ignoring whatever Rebekah Mikaelson was saying to him. The Salvatores were nowhere in sight, which was surprising. Surely she hadn't come to New Orleans with Inspector Gadget and Miss Humanity-Switcheroo as her only backup? Damon was a tool and Stefan was a ripper, but at least they were useful in a fight.

Against his will, his head turned back to stare into a dark green gaze that was already fixed on him.

A fist seemed to tighten around his heart and in violent retaliation, he pushed his anger forward again.

The green eyes widened in alarm, and she finally looked away.

The murmur of polite introductions and syrupy compliments died down, and it took Kai a moment to realise that they had all fallen silent because they were staring at him.

Kai fought against the burn of mortification. "What? I know all of you and I'm hungry."

Freya frowned. "Your tardiness is the reason we delayed commencing nourishments."

"Considering I was dragged here in the first place, be glad I showed up at all." He glared at Vincent. "An ambush? And here I thought we were friends."

Vincent gave him a long-suffering look. "No one is ambushing you…"

"We didn't know you'd be here," Donovan, of all people, spoke up. He threw a betrayed glare in Elijah's direction and stepped forward, moving in such a way that he conveniently blocked Bonnie from Kai's view. "Trust us, if we had, we won't have come."

Kai scoffed. "Sure."

"Gentlemen, please be calm. We only assumed that as you share a common enemy…" Elijah started.

"… not according to him," Donovan said, still in the same belligerent tone as he glared at Kai. Why was the mundane doing the talking? "He had his chance to help and blew it. We don't want him involved."

Involved with what? "And this is up to you, why?" Kai asked coldly.

Forbes side-eyed Donovan, her face unreadable. Kai was almost certain that the mundane was not speaking for the Mystic Falls misfits. But whatever Forbes privately thought, the vampire chose to back him up. "Matt is right, Elijah. We can't do this if we don't trust you to keep this between us. And that means…" She looked almost apologetic as she gestured towards Kai.

"We have shared no information with the Praetor," Elijah said quickly, "and we won't without your consent. We had assumed…" The tension in the air couldn't have escaped him. Couldn't have escaped anyone, really. And it wasn't just due to the concentration of powerful witches and powerful vampires in the relatively confined space. Vincent and Freya were watching with a narrowed gaze, and even Rebekah Mikaelson was positively vibrating with avid curiosity. "But clearly, we were wrong. I propose we shelve all business aside, enjoy each other's company—" Donovan snorted — "as much as reasonably possible, then separately convene later to discuss our plans."

When no one said anything, his gaze swept the room. "Any objections?"

There was a long pause.

"None from us."

Kai's neck almost cracked as he swivelled it in the direction of the clear voice speaking from somewhere behind Matt Donovan. Caroline moved to the side so that Bonnie could step into full view, one hand on her friend's arm; and once again, Kai felt those green eyes regard him. Felt his throat clench in reaction.

"I'm sure we can survive one dinner together." Her voice was as cool as her gaze. The words were an obvious challenge, aimed directly at him.

His hackles rose. "I'm game if you are."

The tension went up another notch.

Freya was still frowning and when she started to speak Kai half-suspected that she was about to call the whole thing off; but Elijah took his sister by her elbow and murmured something in her ear. She turned to stare at him, then they both turned to stare at their guests with identical speculative expressions.

Kai didn't like that. He didn't like it at all. And he could tell from Bonnie's appalled face as she noticed them too, then her quick glance at and away from him, that neither did she.

"Shall we take our seats?" Freya suggested.

Bonnie and Caroline were having a quiet discussion. They seemed to come to an agreement because Caroline nodded reluctantly and walked alone to the table. Bonnie walked up to Rebekah Mikaelson and whispered something to her.

The Original nodded, murmured something to her sister, and started leading Bonnie away. The mundane seemed to protest this – his hand reaching for hers – but Bonnie turned, patted his shoulder slightly and shook her head. He let her go, but not without a sad little stare at her retreating back.

Kai watched her go, too. Watched the lines of her body in that blue dress as it crossed the courtyard. Watched the dark band around her wrist that peeked through her gold and sapphire bangles. Watched to see if she would look back.

She didn't.


Bonnie had prepared for the Mikaelson's demands, their threats, their treachery. She had told herself which lines she would and won't cross to get Elijah on board with their plan. Had a Plan B in the form of Matt, for recruiting Rebekah. She had even sent an email to Elena – giving nothing away, but laying the groundwork if she'd ever have to resort to what she threatened Stefan with, and use the Cure that now flowed in the doppelganger's bloodstream.

She had prepared for everything and anything that New Orleans would throw at her.

She hadn't prepared for Kai Parker.

She had half-expected Rebekah to lead her to a bathroom as Gothic as the rest of the building. Did Originals even need to use the bathroom? But thankfully, the conveniences were modern, with gleaming tiles and faucets and roomy enough for Bonnie to hide out until she got some equanimity back.

She splashed her face with cold water and stared at the mirror.

She had pointedly asked Caroline not to accompany her. Her friend would, with all the good intentions in the world, probe and pry and demand to know how Bonnie was, what she felt seeing him, maybe this was a bad idea, etc. until Bonnie broke down. Not that it would have taken much for that to happen.

At least, she had finally stopped shaking. She had no idea how she had held it together long enough to walk out of that courtyard with a semblance of dignity. When she had realised that that internal alarm hadn't failed her –

And why was that, anyway? Why was she so acutely, unerringly aware of his physical presence?

– she had undergone a sort of localised shutdown. Her body had gone into autopilot, going through the motions – smiled and nodded appropriately as she was introduced to Vincent Griffin, spoken sanely because no one had recoiled in shock and horror – and otherwise had given the appearance of someone whose head and heart weren't reacting almost violently to the unexpected guest in their midst.

The last time she had seen him in a suit, it had been battered and bloodied from the massacre at his sister's wedding; and even then, there had been something dangerously appealingly about him; but now… It wasn't the clothes – although he cleaned up nicely. It was the man himself with his hard body, and sharp-jawed face underneath the week-old scruff, radiating waves of energy that apparently resonated with something primal in her.

She remembered the way he had looked at her, his grey eyes hot on her face, until it turned furious. She closed her eyes at once against the sting of tears and splashed even more cold water on her face.

What was he still so angry about? What she had done – tried to do – in Portland was a mistake, and she had apologised for that. Sort of. Kinda. Well, maybe she hadn't actually got round to saying the words… or acting apologetic… but considering the fact that he had hexed her –

– or branded her –

– with no retaliation on her part, surely they had come to their own weird understanding about it?

And he'd been angry even before she had tried to… take Caroline's advice. Angry because she had dared to come to Portland in the first place. Angry that she had been, apparently, outrageous enough to consider that he would do something about the damned heretics that his coven and he in particular were responsible for!

She was glad she'd been the one to throw the challenge of sitting for dinner in his face. Bonnie Bennett was many things, but she was never going to be a person to run away from a confrontation. No matter how gut-twistingly torturous it was guaranteed to be.

She turned off the tap and grabbed a handful of paper towels violently.

"Don't take it out on the paper towels."

Bonnie glanced through the mirror at Rebekah Mikaelson, standing against the door with her arms folded, and a smirk.

"Don't creep up on me if you don't want your brains fried," Bonnie warned. She pulled out her pocket makeup case and started fixing her face. "I've come a long way since the high school girl you knew all those years ago."

A strange look – a cross between wistfulness and amusement – passed over Rebekah's face. "I don't doubt that, Bonnie Bennett. You know, one of the – admittedly numerous – things I regret from Mystic Falls was that you and I never got to be better friends."

Bonnie looked over her mascara brush to peer at the other woman's face, scanning for the mockery that she was sure to find there. But she was a better actress than Bonnie realised because she looked and sounded sincere.

"Ha ha," Bonnie said drolly. "What did we have in common, Rebekah? Unless you count your family pushing me around as our connection?"

"Oh, I dunno… A passion for cheerleading… Awkward relationships with our problematic witch mothers who constantly let us down… The persistent urge to dagger Elijah for being such a self-righteous, hypocritical, manipulative, chauvinist pig…"

The laugh that tore out of Bonnie surprised her.

A tentative grin flickered across Rebekah's face. "Like I said… you and I might actually have been friends."

Bonnie's nose crinkled. "I think you actually killing my best friend might have been a permanent roadblock."

"You sure? It wasn't for Matt."

Bonnie rolled her eyes and snapped her makeup case close. "Yeah, but I couldn't buy what you were selling to him."

Rebekah's eyes squinted in outrage and Bonnie pivoted quickly, hot on her toes for the Original's unpredictable temper.

But the blonde deflated with a snicker. "Are you a hundred percent sure about that, Bonnie Bennett?" She smirked again, this time slowly, more deliberately, as her eyes swept Bonnie from her bun down her curves, to her high-heeled shoes and back to her face – or her mouth, to be more specific.

Bonnie froze. "Did you just hit on me?"

Rebekah kept smirking. "Whatever happens in Europe, stays in Europe, right?" She pressed a finger to her mouth. "My lips are sealed."

While Bonnie kept gaping, Rebekah pushed the door open. "Come on. Dinner's getting cold and if you think Elijah is OCD, wait till you see Freya in a mood."

Dinner. With Kai Parker. In the home of the Originals.

The near-serenity of the past few moments quickly deflated, leaving behind a cord of anticipation in Bonnie's stomach, and an awareness that she could feel in her very pores.

She flexed her fingers against her dress, wishing she could do magic. A charm. A hex. Anything to let out this tension.

"Are you OK?" Rebekah asked, almost worriedly.

Bonnie smiled, bright and hard. "Just starving. Let's go."


While Bonnie and Rebekah Mikaelson were away, Kai almost convinced himself that he could go through this evening without losing his mind.

As long as one wasn't thinking how there was a possibility they were being served human flesh, the food was exquisite. The company was scintillating – the Mikaelsons were deviously intelligent and being around them always kept his wits sharp. Freya and Elijah were avoiding any mention of the Genovas lounging in their dungeon. Kai also didn't care to bring up that discussion near hearing distance of the Mystic Falls' crew after being so clearly told to mind his own business, but it was amusing to keep trying, and keep watching the Mikaelsons deftly deflect his attempts. Vincent Griffin was wearing his Professor cap and holding a sort of mini-court at the other end of the table, regaling Caroline Forbes and the mundane with his usual grave charm.

"Will Stefan Salvatore be joining you tomorrow?" Freya asked Caroline at some time.

Kai's ears pricked at that.

"No. The Salvatores are keeping an eye on things back at home." Caroline looked at the Mikaelson Head suspiciously.

So Dumb and Dumbass were definitely not part of the Mystic Falls delegation? Interesting…

"You've met Stefan." It wasn't a question.

"Briefly."

Huh. That was cryptic even for Freya.

"When–"

"Praetor, you've had dealings with the Salvatore brothers, haven't you?" Elijah asked.

Kai resisted the urge to bristle. The other man's insistence on Kai's title should have been taken as a sign of respect, but Kai suspected it was anything but.

"Quite sure you know that my coven and Mystic Falls have worked together in the past, Elijah."

"Kai's sister married our former high school teacher, Alaric Saltzman," Caroline Forbes said. "And that's just for starters." Her gaze was a bit too knowing for Kai's comfort.

"Yes," Freya said. "We should have remembered that." She gave her brother a look that made it clear that when she said 'we', she really meant 'you'.

Elijah returned her look with a put-upon expression that Kai would have found amusing under any other circumstances.

"And now?" Freya prodded. "Not to bring up a sore topic—"

You sure about that? Kai thought angrily as she studiously ignored just about everybody's pointed glare.

"—but as your common enemy has returned, isn't it logical to unite forces again?"

Kai considered his answer as he cut into a suspicious-looking slice of steak. He could feel Matt Donovan's eyes on him. Kai had caught a few glances from that corner. Half-wary, half-furious. What was the man's problem anyway? Kai racked his memory and recollected a bar fight, and an unsolicited Memorian spell, and he cringed. He won't have thought that worth a year-long grudge but apparently he was wrong. The cop was clearly waiting for Kai's answer so he could pounce on it.

"Freya," Vincent said, and when he caught her gaze, he shook his head.

Freya frowned, but surprisingly, fell silent. Wow. Guess Kai had underestimated Vincent if that particular ball and chain worked both ways. Wasn't that just adorable? Pity though, that he couldn't give the cop the fight he clearly hoped for.

He stuffed his mouth and chewed with extra vigour. The food tasted like beef, but who knew?

The cop scowled. Vincent and Freya exchanged indecipherable looks. Elijah smirked. Then he lifted his head. He and Kai got to their feet at the same time, followed soon by the other men.

"Bonnie. Rebekah," Elijah said to the two who had just stepped into the yard.

Kai had, of course, felt her approaching the courtyard before she was even in view. A wave of magical awareness had seemed to throb in him when she was near. As her orangey scent – that reminded him of that aborted dinner and her pressed between him and his front door – filled his nostrils, he told himself he won't gawk at her. That he'd only spare a perfunctory glimpse to nod his acknowledgement and then keep his eyes steadfastly away.

He glanced her way – and he couldn't look away. In the dim courtyard light, everything about her glowed – the streaks of red in her dark hair, the smooth skin of her shoulders, her arms, her legs. Even her smile, as she silently acknowledged the other guests, glowed. She grinned up at the steward that pulled out her chair, at the mundane on the other side of the table, even at Freya by her right. But not once did her eyes even flicker in Kai's direction. Quite a feat, considering that she was – as his luck dictated, of course – seated directly across from him.

Freya told her to try the soup, and she indulged with a smile. She smiled her thanks to the waitstaff – and at this point, the effortless way she gave smiles to everyone but him was nothing short of deliberately spiteful – then took a spoonful. It was only as she was about to mouth a spoonful, that she glanced at him.

Caught staring, he couldn't look away. Her eyes widened; but she lifted her chin, holding his gaze as she swallowed her soup, her red lips smacking together with a hum of appreciation.

He tore his eyes back to his own food, and tried to quieten the sudden roar of blood rushing through him, pooling in his groin.

Damn her, he thought furiously, as he started busily cutting the steak into frustrated little slices.

"Miss. Bennett, now that I remember," said Elijah Mikaelson suddenly in a way that made Kai tense, "you freed the Gemini Praetor from his Prison World?"

Kai looked up and sure enough, that look of speculation was back in the Original's face.

Bonnie's spoon, half-way to her mouth, paused. It was a flicker; in the next moment, she had finished the motion and was making a show of swallowing thoughtfully. But Kai had seen it – her flinch.

One year later, and the memory of that Prison World still so haunted Bonnie that Elijah Mikaelson's faux-innocent comment triggered her pain. Kai swallowed against the tightness in his throat.

"That's not exactly what happened." It was Donovan that replied Elijah, his cop voice on. "You need to compel yourselves better spies."

Kai bit back a grin, feeling an unexpected rush of gratitude towards the man.

"So the rumours that when the Other Side collapsed, you, as its Anchor, moved on to his Prison World, are not correct?" Elijah probed. "You are a witch again, are you not?"

You are walking a very fine line, ally mine. Kai violently stabbed at his plate and pondered how best he could kill the Original with minimal repercussions on his hard-won treaties and the general vampire population.

Matt started speaking, but Bonnie cut him off. "Yes, I am." She slanted a glance at Kai, then turned to Elijah. "Something that you obviously knew before you invited me here."

It was Elijah's turn to glance at Kai. He cleared his throat. "Perhaps, we can talk more after dinner."

"I don't know, Elijah," Bonnie said coolly. "You seem pretty set to talk now. Let's just have it out, shall we?"

If the look on the Original's face was anything to go by, he had neither expected nor wanted that reaction. "Perhaps, after dinner, Miss. Bennett," he said, disgruntled.

Kai didn't even bother to hide his snigger as he downed some more steak.

"Is there anything we can talk about?" Rebekah sounded exasperated.

"I agree. As much as I love hearing my own voice," Vincent said, "it would be nice for all of us to share in the conversation."

Freya glanced at him. "Debatable," she said with a tiny smile, "but I believe this is something that some of us are unaware of: At the start of this month, the Augustine Society was officially reconstituted."

Someone – Kai suspected the mundane – dropped their cutlery on their plate with a loud clatter.

The Mystic Falls trio exchanged appalled glances as everyone else on the table observed them keenly. Of course, this would be news to them. They were always too preoccupied in their bubble of a town to keep up with the dealings of the rest of the supernatural world. Even though they really ought to have put two and two together and made the connection between the change of ownership of the Whitmore College and the revival of the Society.

"Augustine?" Donovan asked. "I thought that they were…"

"… brutally murdered by some of their own vampire guinea pigs?" Kai said smoothly, even as he wondered to himself why he was bothering to shield Damon Salvatore. Then he saw Bonnie's shoulder visibly relax with relief, and he got his answer. He hated being so predictable, even if it was only to himself.

Freya cleared her throat. "The Regent and I have been engaged in negotiations with representatives from the Society. After several discussions, we finally agreed to host their Inauguration Ceremony here in New Orleans." She ignored Kai's sharp glare. "This city is a boiling pot of the supernatural community and several factions will be able to attend. It will give us all an opportunity to express concerns and past grievances with the Society, and hopefully move past them to discuss future mutual prospects."

Kai opened his mouth to tell her exactly what his concerns were – when Caroline Forbes's strained voice spoke over him. "We are talking about the same Augustine Society that kidnap vampires to experiment on? To torture?"

"Obviously, their mandate has changed. All my siblings are vampires. I could hardly wish to associate with a society that tortured my blood."

"How can you be sure of that?"

Freya, who was about to bite into her food, paused mid-eating, clearly taken aback by Forbes's questioning. "By the means at my disposal," she said as if that should have been obvious.

"Which are?"

Freya stared harder. "Means that I am obviously unable to explain in any detail to… a person without the appropriate disciplina."

Bonnie slanted narrowed eyes at her.

"Believe it or not, I'm a lot smarter than your research told you." Forbes was not backing down and Kai looked at the blonde vampire that he had dismissed in the past with newfound respect. "And all I'm hearing now is that you have no way of knowing anything about these people that you're about to get into bed with."

The Mikaelson Head regarded Caroline Forbes as if she couldn't decide between being insulted or amused.

"The plan," said Vincent kindly, "is to evoke a similar treaty with the Augustine as the one currently existing between the Nine Covens, the Crescent Pack, the Seelie Court, the Human Faction, the Mikaelsons and finally, the Gemini Coven." At the look of surprise from the Mystic Falls crew, he elaborated. "Sometime last year, our various supernatural factions came to an understanding. In the end, we are all creatures of the Night World. As Mr. Parker reminded us when he proposed the treaty, we have more in common than we have differences; and we achieve our goals faster than allies, than as foes."

Kai shifted his gaze from Elijah to the woman next to him and was not surprised to see her already looking at him. Her eyes were shadowed, but he could spy the glint of speculation – and was that admiration? – in them.

This time, she was the one who broke their gaze. It was hard to tell in the dim light, but she looked like she was flushing.

He felt momentarily light-headed.

Forbes had not let up. "Last I heard the Augustine were a bunch of human academics, not supernaturals."

"The Human Faction of New Orleans is also recognised in our treaty. Theoretically, every mundane has a drop of magic in them," Vincent Griffin, warlock academic explained. "You literally cannot exist in this world without magic."

"With all due respect, Regent," Forbes said in a tone warning that what would come next would be very far from respectful –

"What my friend means," Bonnie said quietly, her clear voice cutting through the heated discussion, and Kai's sternum, "is that our experience with the Augustine was horrific. They didn't just hurt vampire friends of ours. They hurt humans as a means to an end. They were a walking-talking morality lesson that not all monsters look like monsters."

"If you're referring the late Dr. Wes Maxfield," Vincent said, gravely, "no one is arguing that. But he was an eccentric and an anomaly. The Society was formed to protect mundanes from the supernatural, not use them as collateral damage. And now the Society's mandate is to protect mundanes with the supernatural. Part of our negotiations included full disclosures of all their methods, and full approvals of said methods in exchange for supplying them with voluntary subjects. Their days of kidnapping and torturing people are over."

"OK. What the heck does voluntary even mean–"

"Hey, think about it, Care," Matt Donovan interjected quickly. "The Society is making a comeback whether you like it or not. They existed for hundreds of years before in secrecy. There's nothing stopping them from doing that again. That they're trying for transparency is a good thing. The way I see it, this arrangement gives you some oversight and you get to share whatever new knowledge their research digs up."

"Contrary to popular opinion, being supernatural doesn't mean being mediaeval," Kai said mildly. "Any reputable coven, or faerie court, or even some of the older lycan clans in Europe and Asia have their share of scholars, archivers and researchers. Groups like The Strix and Kingmaker also come to mind."

Elijah glared at him, the reminder of those last two organisations hitting the nerve that they were meant to. Kai widened his eyes in mock innocence.

Donovan frowned at him. "Few more eyes never hurt."

"Depends on what those eyes are looking for. A way to help sentiency in general? Or just another way for mundanes to get more power?"

"What is wrong with levelling the playing field? You guys have magic, literal magic. And super-speed and super-strength and can heal in seconds. Mundanes have nothing. Doesn't that strike you as a bit unfair?"

"Because the most advanced mundane societies are bastions of fairness and equality?"

"Witch covens protect mundanes," Vincent said gently. "We keep the balance."

"In theory, yes," Donovan declared. "My reality has always been somewhat different."

He didn't notice the hurt look that his witch friend threw at him. The way her face twisted; her eyes widened; before she stared down at her plate with slumped shoulders.

Kai did. Until then, he had engaged the mundane out of perverse boredom – like putting obstacles in front of an ant, mischief without malice. Now he felt like squashing that ant with his finger. He wanted to lean over and bash Matt Donovan's head into his soup bowl.

"Your reality?" Kai derided, opting to verbally, not physically injure Bonnie's mundane BFF. "You have chosen to surround yourself with the same supernaturals that you're condemning. Doesn't that strike you as, oh I don't know, fricking hypocritical?"

"You have no-"

"Matt…" Forbes said.

He ignored her, his bitter gaze locked on Kai. "Don't even go there. You have no idea what you're talking about."

"Don't I? Explain it to me then. Explain what you are even doing here. What exactly as a mundane do you bring to this table besides… I dunno… your badge, and your Glock? That is the sum total, isn't it, of the mundane heritage – crooked politics and lead pellets?"

The mundane was looking at Kai as if he won't mind pulling out that gun right now. "Mundanes bring far more than that to the table. But I guess you won't know anything about what's been happening in the past two decades, would you, Mr. 1994?"

Kai rolled his eyes. Pathetic comeback. He was almost embarrassed for the guy.

"Also… their heritage?" Donovan continued. "You're a witch, you're not immortal, you don't turn every full moon. It's as much your heritage as it is ours."

"Funny how your kind forgot that during the witch trials."

"Oh come on!"

"I know, right? Pesky little historical facts messing up your persecution complex. I guess we should be thankful that you humans evolved from killing us to merely contorting elaborate explanations for things you don't understand because you lack the humility to exist in a reality that you're disadvantaged in."

Donovan's face went as red as the blood-spiked wine in the vampires' cups. "Mundanes are not disadvantaged!"

"No, you're just dinner here on any other day."

The rest of the table, tense but silently watchful of this conversation, now winced as one.

"Why you-" Donovan was half out of his chair when Vincent clasped a firm hand on his shoulder.

"Sit," the Regent said firmly.

"Matt, please," Rebekah said quietly, putting a hand over his own.

"Come on, Matt," Forbes added.

Very, very slowly, and definitely still wishing for that Glock, the mundane sank into his seat.

Kai shrugged, and reached for the bowl of potatoes. He ignored Vincent's disapproval, and the stink-eyes coming from the two blonde vampires.

What Kai couldn't ignore was Bonnie's disappointed face staring at him as she made it damn obvious on whose side she was.

Something dark and ugly twisted inside him and he looked away.

There was a long, uncomfortable silence.

"Would anyone sample the fruitcake?" Freya asked weakly.

"Don't mind if I do," Kai said, perking up at once and gesturing to Elijah to pass him the platter. He took a huge slice.

"Delicious, Freya," he said honestly, between swallows. "Did you have the baker compelled to following the exact recipe or just compelled to make the best cake possible?"

She gave him a frosty glare. "No one was compelled."

"Hear that mundane?"

Bonnie inhaled angrily.

"I'd really love to know," Rebekah said, in a shrill voice before someone exploded, "about high school? Where did everyone end up?"

"The Regent of the Nine Covens, the Praetor of the Gemini Coven and the Bennett Witch are not interested in a 'Where Are My Cheerleaders Now?' run-down, Rebekah," Elijah sneered.

"Come now," the Regent said, frowning at Elijah, before turning to his sister with a more genial expression. "We're all friends here and Rebekah wants to hear about the ones she made in Virginia."

Finally, Kai felt the weight of Bonnie's disapproval lift from his direction, as she turned to Rebekah with an overly-bright smile. "Penny, remember her, the one that always lost her pom-poms? She joined the Academy with Matt and Tyler."

"What?" Rebekah shrieked. "Really?" She turned to Donovan for confirmation.

It was an obvious ploy, but of course, the mundane took the bait, letting himself be led out of the confrontation.

Coward.

The drivel about cheerleaders and cadets and pom-poms passed over Kai's head. None of the names that came up had been important enough for Bonnie to mention during their stint in 1994, so Kai had no knowledge of them. Still affronted at the topic, Elijah contributed with a few jibes that were obviously meant to deflate his sister. But the other three rallied around her, and she glared triumphantly at him in return. Meanwhile, Vincent gamely participated; causing Freya, who was completely out of her depth, to smile at him gratefully.

The whole situation was more entertaining than an episode of the Kardashians and between it and the delicious fruit cake, Kai might have been almost happy. If not for the cold presence of the woman across from him.

She had become withdrawn as the dinner lengthened. Although she was still engaged in the conversation – that had now shifted from cheerleaders to college life of which Vincent, who was an actual college professor, dominated the discussion – her contributions were becoming shorter and longer apart. She barely touched her food, nursing the same one glass of wine all through the dinner. Smart girl, Kai thought; like him, she wanted to keep a straight head in this company.

She was also smart enough to keep steadily looking away from him, which made her far smarter than himself.

But what was he supposed to do? She was just there. Impossibly, incredulously there. If he leaned forward, one arm stretched, his hand could cover her delicate fingers where they held the stem of her glass. Could curl them open, brush his rings against his own brand on her wrist, slip into the hollow of her palm. He already knew the texture – soft, but scarred with knife cuts that she had suffered before she had learnt to heal herself properly.

He knew how those scars felt against his skin.

He swallowed hard and stared down at his empty plate. The sugar rush or whatever it was that had entered into his head a while ago was dissipating. Despite all that he had stuffed himself with, he felt hollow. Bereft.

"Was provoking the mundane really necessary?" Freya whispered.

Kai pushed his brooding aside long enough to scowl at her. "Blame it on the a-a-alcohol."

The reference went over her head. "Are you intoxicated? You've barely consumed two glasses."

"Perhaps I would be if you served better wine." He grumbled. "At least Klaus knew his liquor. Is it bad taste or are you just cheap?"

She wasn't listening. Her eyes were on her sister, who had just burst into giggles. Freya pursed her lips. "My apologies for the present conversation. Without my influence, I am afraid that my sister has grown rather… frivolous."

"I never understood why vampires went to high school," Kai mused. "College, I get, what with the drinking and the parties with free booze… but high school? That's just hell. Is it some sort of vampire penance? Self-flagellation for an eternity of sins?"

Freya seemed to consider his rambling, then opted to dismiss it. "Well, be that as it may…" She cleared her throat. "Concerning the topic of the… Society… there is something I would ask of you."


The ongoing conversation was rather interesting. Bonnie was surprised to realise that Vincent Griffin was a college professor, but then on reflection, it made sense considering how easily the man could enrapture an audience. It was amusing, because he had originally said he didn't want to do all the talking, but that was what ended up happening as he gave an amusing recap of a conference paper he'd given while the others listened, raptured. Bonnie wished she could be a part of it.

Instead, she concentrated on sipping her wine as slowly as possible, letting the alcohol burn a trickle down her throat, while she surreptitiously watched him murmuring with Freya Mikaelson.

A few moments ago, he had been looking at her, his hard gaze all but burning two holes through her face. Then the Mikaelson's newest – or was it oldest? – member had called his attention and now they were urgently discussing something. Bonnie strained her ears to hear, and she caught the words – "accord" and "bloodline". None of it made any sense to her.

What the heck is Kai Parker doing in NOLA?

Nothing to do with her, if that first tense three-way conversation between Bonnie, Elijah and him had been anything to go by. She didn't trust the Originals any more than she could throw them but their motives made sense. Expecting the Gemini to want to work with the Mystic Falls was logical. They just hadn't anticipated for Kai's vindictive, pig-headed, petty…

Bonnie closed her eyes, took in a deep breath, and forced herself to think of something else.

So now that the Praetor wasn't going along with whatever the Mikaelsons planned, where did that leave Bonnie? Even now, she was aware of a kind of tension between her and Elijah. Was it from losing whatever he had expected to gain or leverage with the Gemini? Or maybe it was just tension from their dealings in the past? Bonnie didn't know. It also didn't escape her how now, as Freya monopolised Kai, Elijah seemed to be studying Bonnie's face intently. He had done that several times during the dinner – switched gazes from each of them, watching for –

What?

Bonnie was almost afraid to find out. Lord knew what she had already revealed in those few moments of shock when Kai's presence had blind-sided her.

She had to be more on her guard. The last thing she needed was to show any vulnerability in this house, before these people.

Whatever he was doing here, his timing couldn't have been worse.

Freya Mikaelson said something that made him smile a little. Barely a proper grin, just a curl of the corner of his lip. It was hard to see beneath a shave that was almost a week late, but it was there. Bonnie put down her glass, knowing that she needed to make it last the night, and watched them. Freya Mikaelson was beautiful, with the sharp features and confidence of a woman in her early thirties. And no woman with eyes would miss how good he looked in that suit. Nor fail to notice – or daydream about – the almost hypnotic way he gestured with his ringed-fingers. To imagine how it would feel to run her fingers through that zig-zag streak of white running from his crown to his nape.

With a deliberate effort, she pulled her gaze away.

"A summer in Europe is more than just bar-hopping and bungee jumping," Vincent was saying.

"It wasn't," Caroline interjected. "At least not for all of us…" Her voice turned mischievous. "Elena studied a new language and changed schools. I got some art into me. Went to exhibitions. Visited museums, churches… Bonnie, on the other hand…"

"… I got some art too," Bonnie cut in, throwing her friend a stink-eye.

Caroline's eyes widened innocently. "That's what I was about to say!"

"I went along with you to a lot of those exhibitions. I also visited some old European covens and learnt some new magic."

With a jolt, it suddenly registered that the long-lost Mikaelson sister shared the same name as one of Bonnie's friends from Europe. Against all the surprises this evening kept throwing, this wasn't significant but it was odd that in a year, she'd met two witches answering that name. Though for all she knew, maybe the name was really popular with European witches.

The two women were so different, it was almost funny. Bonnie imagined dark-skinned, bright-eyed Freya Sinclair present at this dinner, and swallowed a snicker. With her devil-may-care smile and bawdy jokes, Freya would have enjoyed scandalizing her cool blonde namesake, while Freya Mikaelson's stilted speech and correct manners would barely hide her outrage.

"Did you make it to Northern Germany by any chance?" Vincent asked. When the girls nodded, his eyes brightened. "You must have visited the Schleswig Cathedral then? Noticed that controversial fresco?"

Bonnie was about to shake her head no, when she noticed Caroline nodding. Huh. When Vincent looked at her expectantly, she found herself floundering. To make matter worse, she realised from the silence on her left, that even Freya's side conversation had paused, anticipating her answer.

Was this a trick question? What was she supposed to have noticed about the fresco? Bonnie barely had any memory of visiting the cathedral. She supposed she must have – Elena and Caroline dragged her to a lot of places. And before she had ditched them for Freya and Nora, the two witches had also been part of the group of five. But Bonnie must have lost that memory between nights of bar-crawling and a revolving doorway of European men.

She had kept a journal – at first Elena's, then Nora's insistence – but how was she supposed to just remember off the top of her head?

"We went to so many places…" Caroline said, to Bonnie's immense relief.

"But Ms. Bennett would remember the Cathedral." Freya Mikaelson spoke up, making Bonnie's heart quail. "I mean, I would for obvious reasons, but any witch would."

"Well… obviously…" Bonnie said.

Across from her, she heard a soft snigger. When she threw him a dirty glance, he was staring innocently at the sky.

"Don't be so vain, Freya," Rebekah drawled. "Just because you're named after the goddess Freyja doesn't mean you're her incarnation. The drawing of her riding on a horse has as much to do with you as a hymn of my Biblical namesake has to do with me. This will be something of a shock to you, dear sister, but you are not really a goddess, no matter how much you demand our worship."

"Rebekah-" Elijah said sternly as Freya inhaled sharply.

Their youngest just flipped her hair, and blithely changed the conversation. "Forget boring museums and churches. You've seen one faded drawing on a wall and you've seen them all. Can we talk about the shops? Which countries had better shoes?"

Vincent smiled. "You can buy shoes anywhere, Rebekah. But no matter how many lifetimes you've lived, you only get to experience something for the first time. Mr. Donovan, you did not follow your friends to Europe?"

"It was a girls' only thing," Matt replied. "But I have been to Europe before," He smiled at Rebekah who batted her lashes at him.

As the conversation moved on past her, Bonnie eyed Rebekah Mikaelson. The blonde Original chatted easily with Vincent and the others, oblivious to the fact that she had saved Bonnie from an embarrassing question. Or was she? Really oblivious? If Bonnie didn't know better, she'd have sworn that Rebekah had acted deliberately.

First, her strangely warm welcome. Then the weird tête-à-tête in the bathroom. And now this rescue? One was a coincidence, two was a pattern and three was definitely another mystery that Bonnie needed to solve.

She sighed and watched her friends laugh at something the Regent said. Unlike her, who was too acutely aware of the men in this place that she had checkered history with – Elijah Mikaelson and him – they were obviously having a great time. Even Matt had gotten over whatever had brought him so close to a declaration of war a few moments ago. Bonnie glared at him as he laughed now. Nice to see how quickly he had recovered now that Rebekah was throwing her full charm at him. He did remember she was a vampire, didn't he?

'My reality has been quite different?' What did that mean? He had suffered losses – but so had Bonnie; so had Caroline; so had everyone else in their group. Empirically, he'd lost the least. Everyone had lost a family member but Matt Donovan was the only non-orphan in their group. Did he ever consider that? What the heck had got into him to say the things he did? Was it really just dislike of their present company or was there something more deep-seated about this resentment?

And regarding the present company that Matt hated… what the heck had he meant going after Matt that way? There was no way he could have expected Matt to ignore his barbs about mundanes. Even more aggravating was that Bonnie did share his concerns about the Augustine Society. She had actually been on his side. Caroline, too. But that was because the Society had proved themselves to be evil – not because they were mundanes. He and Matt had turned the topic into a mundane vs. supernatural debate unnecessarily; and Bonnie seriously doubted if Mr. Malachai 'I was a technical mundane for the first 40 years of my life' Parker even believed half of the elitist garbage he had spewed. Bonnie was disappointed in him – then disappointed in herself that she held him in enough regard to be let down by him.

Her fingers tightened around the table cloth, and she eyed Kai Parker, head bent again in conversation with Freya Mikaelson, with all the spite she held in her heart.

He must have sensed her looking at him, because he raised his head. Stormy grey eyes held hers, pinning her, drawing her in. She felt like if she was drowning in his gaze, sinking right to the bottom…

"April Young is starting at Whitmore this Fall, right?"

Rebekah Mikaelson's clear voice cut through the haze that had fallen over Bonnie, jerking her back to reality with rude abruptness.

Matt was already looking her way, his blue eyes wide with alarm. Caroline seemed to have dropped a utensil, the clatter loud on her plate. Silence fell over the table, as the startled reaction of the Mystic Falls's visitors caught on with the rest of the gathering.

Rebekah looked from one to the other, her eyebrows raised.

Caroline cleared her throat. "Y-you remember April Young?" she asked weakly.

"Remember?" Rebekah laughed. "We've been IMing and Facetiming since I left Virginia." At the stares that followed, her voice raised defensively. "What? I wasn't bloody hurting her. She's my friend. The only person there who was ever nice to me."

Matt choked.

Rebekah rolled her eyes. "I had to earn your friendship, remember?"

There was another terse moment, another quick switch of gazes between the three from Virginia. Bonnie was conscious of Kai's eyes boring harder than usual into her face, but for once, it didn't distract her.

Rebekah was beginning to look upset. "What? What is it?"

By silent agreement, Bonnie and Caroline looked at Matt. He sighed.

"When last did you hear from April, Becks?" he asked gently.

"A month ago. No. Two months ago. She was getting ready for homecoming and wanted my opinion on her dress… I saw her pictures on Facebook but since then… I don't think she's even updated…" She looked from one to the other, with increasing upset. "Did something happen to her?"

Matt cleared his throat. "Becks…"

She gripped his arm. He flinched. "I demand that you tell me at once!"

"She's dead," he whispered.

She let him go with a sharp cry. Tears filled her eyes, rolled down her cheeks. She didn't bother wiping them off. "No."

Bonnie felt her own throat constrict.

"Yes. She was…" Matt looked at Bonnie; and she nodded at once. Rebekah deserved the truth. "She was murdered by the heretics in our town. She and her boyfriend, Ronnie Marten. They were walking home from a football game. They were just… at the wrong place at the wrong time…" His voice trailed off bitterly, and Bonnie remembered their working theory about the heretics' agenda.

Window dressing.

She fought back a wave of nausea.

"The heretics… from the Gemini coven." Rebekah's blue eyes turned hard. Her head swivelled slowly to…

Bonnie blinked; and the Original was gone.

"Your coven. Your responsibility."

Moving faster than the eye could see, the blonde immortal had left her seat and was now standing behind the Praetor's. Her hand was wrapped around his throat.

The table seemed to ripple with shock.

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't rip your bloody head off?"


Under other circumstances, this might have been amusing – scintillating even. 18 years spent in one's personal prison world where he constantly chased death had all but erased Kai's sense of mortality. When he returned, he had had to remember to be conscious of it – remember that he couldn't set himself on fire, step off the top of a skyscraper or any of the other perks of immortality that the prison world had given him. Then just as he was getting the hang of that, he had undergone his full Redimio as Praetor. While not making him completely invincible, it certainly made it harder for him to die.

At least, it should, but for one small unorthodox act on his part.

"They don't call this place the Abattoir for nothing," he mused, trying for a smile as he looked up at the livid demon face, all fangs and red eyes, that snarled upside down at him.

"Rebekah, sit," Freya said sharply.

"Regardless of provocation, we do not eat our guests," Elijah added mildly.

"She was my friend," his sister yelled, sobbed. Tears, snot and spit were falling from her face. Some of it landed on Kai's.

Gross.

"Rebekah," Vincent said gently. "This won't bring your friend back."

"I said sit!" Freya shouted.

"I don't care about your stupid treaties!" Rebekah cried. "You're just as bad as Klaus. Wanting to control everyone and everything to suit your own interests. Not mine. Never mine." She sobbed harder, and more stuff fell from her face. "She might have been just a mundane, but she was my friend and they were his responsibility; and since no one's ready to explain why he shouldn't pay for her death, then I will…" Momentarily, he felt her nails break his skin.

Freya stretched her arm and power – a heartbeat too late.

A rush of energy, familiar and elemental had whooshed over Kai's head at the same time that his own defensive magic kicked in, reacting before he had even made the conscious decision to port. The noose-like grip on his neck vanished, as well as his chair, and the table before him, and the next moment, he was on his feet at the other end of the courtyard, his back to the dinner.

He whirled around to see two things – Bonnie Bennett on her feet, her arms stretched out, her fingers splayed out and pushing power that sent ricochets through every bone in his body –

– and Rebekah Mikaelson, screaming with her hands on her head as she crashed into a column at the far side of the yard.

The floors above it rumbled, stones crumbling. Then a floor was collapsing on top of the Original, rubble flying whichever way as it buried her.


July 2013

Schleswig, Germany

"… And here we find the famous image of Freya, riding on a cat. The Norse goddess is still widely worshipped today. Her realm Fólkvangr is believed to be where veterans go after their deaths, if they are lucky. If they are not, they go on to Valhalla where they join the Einherjar to prepare for the Ragnarök, the battle to end all battles…"

"English please," Bonnie griped as she flipped through her translation guide, trying desperately to keep up with the tour guide's rapid drone.

"Americans," Nora scoffed beside her and shoved the pamphlet in front of Bonnie's face. Bonnie blinked at the list of relevant translations tabled and snatched it.

"You're welcome," Nora sing-sang.

"Don't hold your breath," Bonnie grumbled. It was Nora's and Freya's fault that Bonnie had rolled out of bed with a splitting hangover-induced headache, and no time to brew a suitable potion. She'd have skipped today's tour completely if she wasn't already skating on thin ice with Caroline and Elena.

She eyed the other girl's glowing skin and bright eyes with resentment. Decked in a Church-appropriate jersey dress and her signature opal necklace, Nora looked unjustly pristine. "How come we both went bar-hopping last night but I feel like shit and you look like you went to bed at 10?"

"My pure heart?"

Despite herself, Bonnie giggled. Then quickly stifled it when one of two old men in front of her glared at her over his shoulder.

Despite the high walls and enormous windows of the Cathedral, she felt stifling hot. Or maybe it was just the oppressive state of being in a holy place when she felt far from the state of grace. Or it could just be the fugly clothes Elena and Caroline had insisted on her wearing for this tour.

The painted murals, intricate marble pillars, rich tapestries, and stained glass images of saints made this place a tourist hot spot. Nora had invited herself and Freya along because she insisted that this place had pagan history as well and was important to the covens in the region.

Bonnie wished they could have just left her in the hotel to sleep.

"Talking about pure hearts," Freya said as she walked up to them, utterly oblivious to the frowns of disapproval at her late-coming. "I thought this was a Church. Are those yonder titties?"

Bonnie peered hard at the mural in question. The wall was too far away from where the girls lingered at the back of the crowd, and her headache wasn't helping her focus. She shrugged. "I'm sure yours are better, Freya."

Freya flipped her long curls over her bare shoulders – a blatant violation of the recommended dress code for the venue. "That goes without saying. But I came here expecting to see the titties of a goddess. Who just happens to be named after me. I demand my money back. And the goddess renamed."

Nora snickered, causing both old men in front of them to throw them a baleful gaze.

"Sorry," Bonnie whispered, embarrassed.

Freya snorted. "Sorry, grumpies," she said in a whisper loud enough for them to glare at her. She threw them a nasty smile that had them scuttling away to the rest of the group. "Thank goodness. Why didn't they go up front from the start? Hang out with the rest of the do-gooders?" She lifted her chin in that general direction. "Do Caroline and Elena even know that school's out for the summer?"

Bonnie glanced at her friends. While Elena's face was upturned, all but drinking in every word from the tour guide's mouth, Caroline kept turning back to glare at Bonnie and the other two girls.

"Careful, Blondie," Freya murmured, "you keep making that face and if the wind changes, you'll be stuck with it."

Caroline's gaze went from disapproving to pissed off.

"You remember she's a vampire? She can hear you, you know," Bonnie cautioned.

"So?"

The tour guide seemed to have finished his lecture, and to Bonnie's immense relief, the group seemed about to move on. The sooner they were done, the sooner she could go back to her hotel room and sleep off the day. When a familiar voice piped up.

"Does the Georgian Calendar predict when the Ragnarök will occur?"

The tour guide all but puffed at Elena's question, his eyes shining as he launched into a second lecture.

The three stragglers bit back a collective groan. Heck, even Caroline gave Elena the side-eye.

"Your friend is very… keen," Nora said, diplomatically.

"She's been on this kick since we got here," Bonnie muttered."This whole Church expedition was her idea, part of the Almighty Schedule she wrote up at the start of the summer. When she's not learning some weird language, she's into this. If I didn't know better, I'd swear she's found religion."

Freya glared at the side of Elena's head. "Or maybe the bitch just needs to be the centre of attention everywhere she goes?"

"Hey," Bonnie snapped. She and her friends had their differences, but there was a line. "Take that back. Elena's never done anything to you."

Freya looked like if it would physically hurt herself to show any kind of remorse. Instead, she flipped her hair and stayed silent.

"Someone skipped her morning brew," Nora said quietly, shifting unobtrusively until she stood between the two girls. She put her hand on Bonnie's shoulder, placatingly, then turned to Freya. "Freya…"

Freya shied away. "Dirty sinners like me don't feel comfortable in places like this. You can find me at the nearest pub."


June 2014

New Orleans

Kai dunked his head under the running tap for a good ten minutes before he was satisfied that he had got most of the eau d'Origine out.

When he was done, he stared at his wet face, and told himself to calm down. So she rushed to save me from an Original. That should just about fill the Bonnie Bennett To the Rescue quota for the day. Double points for ex-enemies and sociopaths.

He nearly ripped off the paper towel from its holder to wipe his face. When he stepped outside the conveniences, he asked one of the perpetually hovering stewards for a towel for his hair.

He was still drying it when he found his way to the drawing room.

"–think I shall someday host a dinner that doesn't end in disaster?" Freya was musing, sounding resigned. She was perched on the arm of Vincent's chair.

Vincent chuckled. "Not a chance."

She laughed, and bent her head down just as he lifted his up for a deep kiss.

The ache in Kai's chest intensified at the sight of them. He relieved it by fake-gagging.

The two broke off and shared a look of amusement before Freya stood up to meet him. "Praetor, I sincerely regret Rebekah's behaviour. Accept my apologies, and sincere gratitude for your help with the disaster. Rebekah is in her room now, under confinement. It was very considerate of you to recover her. Elijah and I had every intention of helping but we were caught unawares."

Elijah had grabbed his sister and vampire-fled before the debris started flying. Caroline Forbes had done the same with her friends. That left Kai and Vincent to magically contain the wreckage to the affected wing, so that the entire building was not pulled down. After that, they had unearthed the pile of rubble that buried Rebekah Mikaelson. Kai would have been happy to leave her underneath it all, but his guilt couldn't let him be. He had satisfied himself with grumbling every step of the way as he worked alongside Vincent.

Kai glanced at Elijah, who was standing at the far side of the room, clearly trying to ignore the love birds. "Could have used some of your muscle back there."

Elijah flicked the hems of his sleeves, saying without words what he thought about soiling his expensive suit to dig out his flesh and blood. "Someone needed to pacify our guests."

"What are Vincent and I, then? Chopped liver?" Kai turned around the drawing room. The artificial fireplace was lit, and the armchairs were carefully arranged around it. Above the fireplace hung a Renaissance-style painting of a crowded landscape. Other than the furniture, it was empty except the four of them. "Where are they anyway?"

Bonnie was still here; he could feel her presence, throbbing nearby. Her recently spiked magic hadn't abated. It was almost as if tendrils of it were reaching out for him.

Without waiting for an invitation, he walked to the decanter on a nearby table, and poured himself a shot with shaky hands.

"In some other room like this. Waiting for me," Elijah replied. "I reassured them that you and Vincent were more than capable of handling the situation. Ms. Bennett was quite… concerned about you two. Shall I inform her that you are in good health?"

Kai took a gulp of his drink, feeling the burn down his throat.

It had been her magic that had attacked Rebekah, just before he did his vanishing trick. He had recognised it before he had seen her on her feet. It had all been over in moments, but the charge of adrenaline he had had as her magic spiked, was still gushing through his blood. It was a good thing that her friend had spirited her out of that place. Kai had no idea how he'd react if she was still grabbing distance from him now.

He took another gulp. Then downed the entire glass.

"Praetor?" Elijah probed.

Kai slammed the empty glass down. "What the fuck are you up to, Mikaelson?" he snarled. "What are they doing here?"

"Nothing that concerns you."

"Unless you're going to flat out lie to me that they're not here about the heretics in Mystic Falls, then it does concern me. And I have your sister's claw marks on my neck as proof."

The two older Mikaelsons grimaced in unison.

"Rebekah is rather… emotional," Freya admitted.

"Emotional?" Kai echoed, disbelievingly.

"The downsides of an eternal adolescence. I assure you that my sister will be brought to line. Meanwhile, we three have matters of business to discuss." She flicked a glance at Elijah. "You should see to the party from Virginia."

Elijah gave his sister a stiff smile, nodded in turn at Vincent and Kai, and took his dismissal as graciously as he could. Vincent shut the door behind the Original.

Kai turned to Freya. "What are you offering B… the Mystic Falls townies, and most importantly, what the heck do you get out of helping them?"

Freya blinked. "Are you asking us to break the confidentiality that our guests expressly requested us to keep?"

"You should have thought about that before you ambushed me with them." He glared at Vincent.

Vincent shrugged, unrepentant. "We didn't know they were coming when I invited you. It was a last minute decision that made sense at the time. It wasn't supposed to be an ambush."

"When Stefan Salvatore contacted me," Freya added, "I immediately recognised your commonalities. It seemed a pragmatic conclusion to combine resources. I did not anticipate their objections."

"If by objections, you mean come hell or high water, would rather die than ask the Gemini Praetor for help…" Vincent snarked.

Kai snarled. "But you're in on this?"

"I'm not the one with the bad history with…" Kai had no idea what his face must have looked like but it was enough to make Vincent's voice trail off, but not to stop smirking broadly.

Freya made a sound like a badly suppressed snicker. "If you wish for their confidence, you need to request it from them. Meanwhile, we have our own business to discuss." She set a sage candle on the table.

Distracted, Kai stared. "Privacy spell? In your own home?"

"When you live with vampires, family or no, you place a premium on confidentiality." Freya said baldly as she lit it. "Now, about the Seelie Court and their vagabond shapeshifters…"


"Bonnie, calm down."

"I am calm!" Bonnie snapped.

Caroline snorted, elegantly sipping the glass of wine she had helped herself to. "You could have fooled me."

Bonnie ignored her, as she continued her pacing across the worn carpet in the drawing room that Elijah had left them in. She felt like if her skin was on fire, her blood hot and pounding with magic, wanting to be unleashed. The fear and rage she had felt when Rebekah had attacked Kai…

She put her hands on her face and swallowed a sob.

"Kai's fine, Bonnie," Caroline said gently. "He did his cloaking trick and got out of harm's way before you even got to your feet. I don't think he was ever in any danger."

"I know he's fine," Bonnie admitted, her voice coming out thick and hoarse through the fingers that were still pressing into her face. Of course, she knew how he was. She could always sense him when he was near; and now she felt him, close, alert, unharmed. Hopefully nowhere near the demolished wing.

She sighed loudly.

A warm hand on her shoulder made her lift her hands. She looked at the proffered drink, then up at Matt's blank face.

"You're in shock," he said quietly. "This will help."

"I'm not some newbie witch, Matt," Bonnie retorted, but she took the drink gratefully. It helped calm her somewhat, at least enough to stop feeling like she needed to rush through the building until she could see he was safe with her own eyes. Then perhaps, rush past him to find Rebekah Mikaelson and eviscerate her.

She took another gulp and started pacing again.

"Bonnie…" Caroline started.

"What?"

Caroline opened her mouth, studied her friend, then shut it. After a moment, she said, more to Matt than Bonnie, "So April and Rebekah remained friends all this while. Call me a pushover, but I felt sorry for her."

"That was no reason for her to go about attacking people," Bonnie growled.

"Well, she had a point," Matt retorted. Bonnie glared at him for that but he didn't back down, his face stern. "She did. If the freaking Gemini leader had done something about the heretics, they wouldn't be running loose now, piling up bodies to cover up whatever it is they're really up to."

"He did do something about them. He nearly died taking them out last year."

"Obviously, he didn't do a very good job, did he? Or they won't be here now. You know, there's a big chance that that wasn't a slip up on his part, right?"

Bonnie almost threw her glass in his face. "Not this again, Matt."

"Think about it, Bonnie. He was supposed to have killed all of them but somehow two survived. And now they're killing Gemini exiles. Sometimes the most obvious answer is the right one."

Bonnie blinked at him, then turned to Caroline who, to Bonnie's relief, was staring at Matt with an incredulous expression, then turned back to him.

"So let me get this straight. Kai almost dies killing four of the heretics. But he spares two so that…? What? He can keep them in his pocket for a year, and set them on the same exiles that he's currently pardoning? And all parties involved got over their differences. You know – the small matter of them torturing him for days in 1903 or him murdering their siblings and –" She held her tongue in time. Even now, as angry as she was, she reflexively stopped at spilling the truth about Lily Salvatore.

"And what?" Matt demanded, belligerently. "This has never happened before? We haven't been betrayed because we took sides only to find out that these so-called enemies had more in common than we thought?"

"Guys," Caroline started but Bonnie overrode her, her own temper flaring again.

"OK, Matt, you need to hold it right there. I know you hate him but you weren't there. You weren't in 1903 when I found him. You didn't see what they did to him. You weren't at Jo's wedding and you sure as hell weren't with Kai afterwards. You have no freaking idea what you're talking about. So keep your stupid theories to yourself!"

Matt flinched like if she had slapped him. Caroline's gasp was the only sound in the dead silence that followed.

She threw Bonnie a warning look but while guilt smote Bonnie enough to look away from that stark hurt on Matt's face, she still felt a great deal of justified irritation at him. She downed her glass and walked to the fireplace, flopping into one of the armchairs. She folded her arms and gazed steadily at the fake fire.

Caroline got to her feet. "Matt… We're all upset. She didn't mean it that way…"

"Sure, she did. I'm just the stupid, useless mundane." He started marching towards the door.

Bonnie whirled around. A sad, yet still angry ball lodged in her stomach. "That's not true, Matt and you know that. I don't know what's got into you lately." She looked at Caroline imploringly for help.

But Caroline was watching Matt with narrowed eyes, looking rather ticked off herself. "Did you really mean half of the things you said at dinner or were you too caught up in your pissing contest with Kai Parker?"

Matt turned to her with a stubborn look on his face. "I meant every word. Look, don't take it personally, Care, but I've–"

"Don't take it personally," She mimicked. "One of my closest and oldest friends and ex-boyfriend, in case you've forgotten, wants to support the Society that kidnaps and cuts up people like me… the Society that kidnapped and cut up Elena – another old, close friend and ex. I think that's exactly the kind of thing that people should take personally, don't you, Bonnie?"

Bonnie crossed her arms and stared at him stonily.

Matt threw up his hands. "So you two are ganging up on me now? I'm not even–" He turned around.

Neither girl said a word to stop him.

His hand was on the doorknob when he halted. His shoulders rose, then fell. "This is the point where I'm supposed to swear I'm catching the next flight home." His voice was as hard as his face looked when he turned around. "But Mystic Falls is my town too. You guys may think that Kai is right and I don't bring anything to the table but mundane or not, I'm seeing this through."

"An excellent suggestion, Officer Donovan."

The three spun around to see Elijah Mikaelson standing in the open doorway, neatly folding his handkerchief into his breast-pocket. "Especially as, I daresay considering recent discussions, this would be of particular interest to you."

"Really?" Matt asked, suspiciously. "Why?"

"As my sister Freya explained at dinner, the Augustine Society's Inauguration Ceremony is their attempt to win over the supernatural community. There will be speeches; there will be exhibitions; there will be auctions. They shall aggressively court whoever they regard as a power player in our community and they desperately wish to court Ms. Bennett."

Bonnie started. Caroline and Matt exchanged sharp glances.

"Bonnie?" Caroline asked slowly.

"Are you surprised? As you heard the Regent say, Ms. Bennett here is something of a legend in our world. A Bennett witch. A former Anchor. Perhaps legend is not appropriate. Phenomenon would be more apt."

"Why didn't they ask me directly?" Bonnie demanded. "Why am I hearing this from you?"

"Because letting my family vet their guest-lists and have the discretion to act as a middle man between them and certain personalities were part of the conditions of hosting this event in New Orleans." Elijah smiled, his eyes glinted. "When I got that call from Stefan Salvatore, I took advantage of the opportunity to vet you."

"You asked us all to come to New Orleans… so that Bonnie could come to a party?" Caroline asked slowly.

"Ms. Bennett and her friends, of course. There is one little thing, though…"

Bonnie tensed. Because she knew Elijah Mikaelson didn't make her fly across the country to attend a party. Whatever he was about to say next, she wasn't going to like it.

"As an honoured guest, you will be afforded VIP access to the Society during the Ceremony. I would appreciate it if you used your privileges to retrieve an object from the Augustine and deliver it to me."

Identical expressions of alarm filled Caroline's and Matt's faces as they turned to Bonnie.

"You want me to steal for you?" Bonnie asked quietly.

"Technically, you would be recovering for me something that was mine and my family's from the first."

"You want me to steal for you from a Society that puts people like me under a microscope?"

Elijah took out his handkerchief, smoothened out the wrinkles, and folded it neatly. "I am so glad we understand each other."


A torch in hand, Freya guided him down the winding steps that led to the cold, damp dungeons where the Genovas were being kept. The flickering yellow light touched on the damp walls, the red stains on the stones, and startled the crows that apparently lived there. Then there was the ever-present putrid smell of things that had no doubt died there.

"I can see that your home lives down to its name," Kai muttered with a shudder. His collar was still damp, and he felt the cold keenly. "Here's a fun fact: the word dungeon came from the French word 'don-jon' which meant the keep, the tallest, most secure tower on the grounds. As opposed to, say, this literal pit of despair."

Freya heaved a long-suffering sigh. "It serves its purpose. Enemies of my family who leave here will not be so eager to return. You of all people should appreciate that there are worse places to be incarcerated."

Kai thought of his Prison World. "At least I had central heating." An association of ideas made him ask, "How is your dear baby brother, Klaus?"

It was her turn to scoff. "You care for his well-being?"

"Yes," Kai said honestly. "There's this small matter of the vampire genocide that his death would bring about so…"

It was a pragmatic concern. The specific vampires affected – and the witch affiliated with these specific vampires – had nothing to with it.

"He is safe… and safely out of harm's way. No doubt he will be extremely irate when I eventually let him out." She tsked. "Reason and my brother do not get along very well. He did not see the advantages of the treaty; only the limitations. He has thrived on sowing chaos for so long, the creation of so many alliances – even alliances that attempted to include him – made him apprehensive."

"Tell me about it." Kai grumbled, remembering a brief but impactful encounter with the Original Hybrid. He thought his covenwas paranoid, but Klaus Mikaelson took it to a whole 'nother level.

He looked over his shoulder at the window of light that filtered through the trap door, getting smaller and smaller. He imagined that thread that seemed to connect him and Bonnie getting thinner and thinner as well. He knew she was still nearby. But he could no longer tell how close, or if she was even still in the building, or just in the general area around the Compound.

Seemed appropriate. Him sinking to the depths and losing track of her, his self-righteous angel.

She had certainly felt like an avenging angel this evening, when she had unleashed her power at Rebekah Mikaelson.

He turned his gaze from that dimming light, and his morose thoughts. "While we're on the subject of Mikaelsons who've tried to murder me, where is your baby sister?"

"Safely ensconced in her chambers. She will do you no harm, I assure you."

Kai rubbed his throat gingerly. "A bit too late for that." They still hadn't discussed the small matter of Rebekah Mikaelson's attempted murder of him being a stark violation of one of the tenets of their treaty. He was keeping that card to play later.

"Will you at least consider meeting with the Augustine in person?" Freya asked abruptly.

He eyed the back of her head, wondering if the vamp blood her siblings were no doubt slipping into her wine had curdled in her brain. "Er… like I said upstairs to you and the Regent… that would be a No." He intended to send an Envoy, but nothing more. He had no intention of attending; the Gemini Praetor's presence at their Inauguration would imply Gemini endorsement of the Augustine Society.

Freya sighed heavily. "They will not like it. That is not what they wished."

Kai shrugged. That was hers and Vincent's problem, not his.

The steps stopped at a spot half-way down a narrow corridor. The walls were high, perhaps as high as the length of the entire building. Close to the top were narrow windows, a metre wide every other metre from one end of the corridor to the other. The moonlight coming through them barely touched the opposite walls, and the only light came from Freya's torch. Before Kai and Freya were a row of cages, lining the opposite side of the corridor as far as the eye could see.

Freya turned left, and started walking, Kai on her heels. With his senses alert, he could detect the presence of all manner of creatures behind those bars. Most of them were asleep, or unconscious, or just wallowing in too much despair to show any sign of life.

What a remarkable place. What could the Genovas possibly be running from to warrant choosing this over a full pardon?

He'd give a great deal to know who else was here and why.

"There is no prisoner here that's being held in violation of the treaty," Freya said, apropos of nothing.

"Thought never crossed my mind," Kai said blithely.

Moments later, she stopped walking. She placed her torch into a holder inserted in the stone wall between two cages, then drew Kai close to a set of the bars.

"Isach Genova, Danielle Genova, Timoth Genova, come forth."

Something in the deep recesses of the cell seemed to stir. Kai clutched the bars, and peered hard into the darkness, trying to make out what seemed like two… no, three… forms inside. Two sat facing each other, their backs against the wall. While the third lay between them on the ground. Feet together, arms clasped over stomach, it was spread like a corpse.

Quickly, he curled his fingers into a fist, then opened them. Witch-light glowed in his palm, illuminating the corridor; some nearby wretched creature hissed away into the shadows, and the two sitting in the cell shrank back. He ignored them, focusing completely on the man on the ground. To his relief, he noticed that his chest lifted and fell slowly, almost imperceptibly. He was still alive.

But still…

"He's not waking up soon."

The voice was scratchy with disuse, yet familiar. Kai gaped at the grimy looking person sitting against the left wall.

"Danielle?"

"Malachai?" She got to her feet, squinting against the light. "Wow, you look half our age."

She looked twice her own. The pale-skinned, black-haired Genova looks did not go well with starvation and lack of reliable plumbing.

"Dani, come back," whined the other sitting figure.

"Quiet, Tim." She rolled her eyes at Kai. "You remember Tim? We all played games together as children."

Yeah, he remembered. If by 'all' she meant Josette, Josiah and the other witches their age and if by 'games' she meant the cruel pranks that Danielle Genova – the cool kid that knew all the illicit hexes – liked practising on everyone's favourite guinea pig syphon.

"How can I forget?" he said sweetly. He nodded at the figure over her shoulder. "Wake up your old man and gather your things. We're going home."

She snickered. Behind her, Tim joined in. Ah, Kai remembered this, too. The private jokes. Usually with him as the punchline.

"Care to share?"

"He's not waking up anytime soon," she repeated. "Sleeping Beauty curse. The moment he sensed you in this house, he started the spell. He's bound his consciousness to this cell. If you move him, he dies. And don't bother trying to siphon it out. The curse is the only thing keeping him alive."

What the fuck? He whirled on Freya. "You kept witches prisoners without putting in wards to suppress their magic?"

"We did," Freya insisted, looking surprised.

"Perks of being a family skilled in the dark arts," Danielle crowed. "We can circumvent your pesky wards."

Freya's lip curled with distaste. "Whatever they did, it wasn't enough to escape."

"Well, he found an exit all the same." Kai frowned at the figure on the ground. Was there anything going to go right for him this evening? First that extremely unexpected encounter and now this?

He considered hexing Danielle's smug face, and only narrowly changed his mind. "If you don't mind Freya, can I borrow a little sage? I'd like to speak to my witches in confidence."

"You can always just take them," she said, looking put out. "They are yours to claim, after all."

He examined the two in the cage. They looked like a pair of trapped rats. He didn't fail to see the flicker of hope that crossed their faces.

"Nope." Kai grinned as that flicker died. "I think they're good right here."


The cloying scent of burning sage filled the poorly ventilated dungeon.

Kai had conjured a small stool and straddled it, letting the witch-light float above him like his personal halo. Freya had left with her torch, although she insisted on hovering at the foot of the steps. Did she think he would try to prison-break some other Mikaelson captive? Kai wished he had the spare time.

He had also asked her to raise the iron bars. She had been sceptical, which made Kai feel slightly insulted, but had done so.

He now regarded the Genovas unfiltered. They looked even more pathetic. Whatever clothes they had been captured in were worn and dirty. Apparently the Mikaelson Penitentiary did not provide laundry services. Nor five course meals if their prisoners' bony frames were any indication.

"You two. Start talking. Now."

"There's nothing to say," Tim managed, his voice still hoarse. "We'd been living in Puerto Rico for years, hiding from our…" He cleared his throat. "… let's say creditors."

Kai sneered. "Creditors. Diplomatic."

Tim coughed. "According to Isach, he went into exile with Joshua and the others when you became leader. After Joshua convinced everyone to accept you as coven leader" – Danielle make a sound of derision – "Isach joined us. We moved around a couple of times across the continent. We even considered going to Europe. The family has property there, but it belongs to the Tony branch and Tony Junior was already residing there and refused to take us in."

"Snobs," Danielle said glumly. "Explain to me why they got a 'sabbatical' but we got 'exiled'?"

"Because they swore their allegiance to their new Praetor," Kai told her. "Dumbass."

She glared. "Really? Or were you just too weak to go through with your threats? I heard Luke broke you."

Kai flinched.

She noticed and her eyes glinted with malice. "You're toothless now." She turned to her husband. "I told Father that we could go back, didn't I? That if our Almighty Praetor hadn't murdered Bethany Stewart, then Father had nothing to fear."

"Fear what?" Kai snapped.

"What do you think? You were a spiteful little monster who went from pulling out beetle legs to his little siblings'. Won't any sane person fear you, Malachai?"

He was getting sick and tired of people throwing his past in his face.

His fingers curled into a fist; and the bout of aneurysm took her to knees with a scream. Tim stood up, yelling and Kai flexed his wrist. The man crumpled to the ground.

"I could have performed a Revocation on all the exiles the moment the Council completed the Redimio.[1] Instead, I sent out venia and what I get is…" He drew a sharp breath. This was pointless. He was just proving that they could get under his skin. He lifted the hex, gave them a moment to pull their sorry selves together. "Timothy, you were saying?"

The other man whimpered, but one glance at Kai's steely face and clenched fist, and he pushed through. "We were hiding in South America, getting by with as little magic as possible so as not to draw your focus on us. Now and then, Isach would go back to the States."

"Why?"

"I don't know," he said nervously. "He kept his business to himself. I knew he was in touch with some of the other exiles. I guessed he was meeting with them."

"Which exiles?"

"Tim," Danielle said sharply.

Her husband fell silent, switching nervous glances from her to Kai. Apparently, the unspoken threat of another aneurysm was not enough motivation.

Very well.

"I can always perform a Veritork on you." Kai grinned, showing teeth.

They shrank back.

"You won't dare," Danielle snapped, but her voice shook. "I don't even believe you know how."

Kai's grin broadened. "Luke must have performed several. It's in my head, somewhere. I'll keep trying until I get it right."

Tim raised his hands. "I will tell you everything I know! I swear I will!"

Kai locked his fingers over the back of the chair and leaned forward. "I'm listening. Who was Isach in touch with?"

"Our family. Uncle Anthony. He sent a few letters to Tony Junior, but he and his wife never wanted anything to do with us. His old Envoy buddies," Tim stammered his words, not noticing Kai's jerk at that. "The Stewart Chief. Her sister. The Briggs… I overheard him arguing with Patrice Lang once, but I don't think they ever spoke again after that. Also, the Pr… Your…" He glanced at Kai, and trembled.

"Your father," Danielle finished spitefully.

"Thanks," Kai said coldly, "but I kinda figured that out myself." There was a long pause during which Danielle looked mutinous and Tim looked ready to faint. "Did you happen to overhear any of these discussions?"

"No," Tim said quickly. "He always burnt sage. He was very discreet, very careful. He kept a journal meticulously that we tried to… skim through… But even that was encrypted. A week ago, he told us all to pack and return to the States. I already knew about the venia from our friends in exile across the country. We thought we were coming to accept it. We wanted to accept it," he said earnestly. "We did! But the moment we arrived in New Orleans, I realised what he planned and it was too late. Danielle and I had got into trouble with Klaus Mikaelson a few years ago when we traded him some… artefact." He cleared his throat nervously and Kai knew that by 'artefact' he meant 'dark object'. "It had unexpected side effects. Completely unforeseeable, but Klaus held us responsible for them. He was one of our most persistent 'creditors'. We had barely been in New Orleans for an hour when the Mikaelson minions swooped in us and Isach surrendered without a fight." He finished with a gasp, having spoken longer in one breath than he must have for days.

He gasped again when Kai rose to his feet and stepped inside the cell. Both of them shrank away, Danielle's bravado fading. Kai barely noticed; he was too busy gagging from the god-awful smell that had assaulted him as soon as he crossed the invisible line between prison and corridor. The wards that muted the prisoners's magic must also keep the smells within the cell. He felt like retching, and from what he spotted on the ground, the others must have given into the urge at least once or twice. Trying not to think about all the things that combined to create a stench this foul, he crouched to his haunches next to Isach Genova's body, and studied the old man.

Typical Genova look, although grey hair had nearly edged out all the black. He was familiar-looking. Not in a striking way like the Stewarts, nor the Briggs, nor fondly remembered like old Uncle Ben, nor even a loathed face like Patrice Lang. But Kai knew he must have seen him a few times in the past. Someone who had certainly passed through the Parker house a handful of times while Kai grew up.

He also looked about the same age as Joshua Parker. So that made him another Envoy who had served with his parents.

And he had left a message for Patrice Lang saying that he was stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea.

The deep blue sea was clearly the Mikaelsons, whom Isach had chosen to die as their prisoner rather than accept an unconditional pardon from the Gemini Praetor. But who or what was the devil? Kai himself? Had Isach been so terrified or outraged at having to swear allegiance to a syphon that he preferred to damn himself? Or had he feared the heretics?

Or Joshua Parker?

What was Joshua's plan here? All these envoys who had been trained with him. All – save one – remaining in exile. All dying in exile. Or at least willing to risk death than return to the coven.

Briggs. Briggs. Stewart. Lang. Genova.

The string of names almost sounded like a nursery rhyme.

He stretched his hand over the man's head, probed his essence. There was always a chance that the spell was a bluff, and Kai could siphon it off with no ill effects. But a desperate Envoy would not have taken that chance.

He rose to his feet, and stepped out of the cell. The rush of stale dungeon air felt like a relief.

"Aren't you here to collect us?" Danielle asked, finding her courage now that Kai was retreating.

"Your uncle is the only one I want and apparently, I can't have him. So – no."

"No! That's not fair!"

"It's… not?"

"We never even got a chance to receive a venium, much less reject it! We'd have accepted if we got the chance!"

Kai tsked. "I sent out venia a week ago. Before then, you had a year to return to Portland and swear allegiance. You've made your bed, friends. Now you lie on it."

She rushed at him just as he stepped across the border between her cell and freedom. The bars fell sharply, almost slicing off her face.

"You can't do this to us! You can't leave us here!"

"Malachai, I beg you!"

Kai guffawed, then turned to Freya who was standing some metres away. With a wave of his hand, the burning sage extinguished. "Thanks."

The Genovas were still yelling curses and pleas as he walked away. Kai snuffed out his witch-light, plunging them back to the single gloom of Freya's torch. After a while, the curses lowered to wails.

"You're really going to leave them here with us?" Freya asked, dismally.

"For those two? I'd pay you to keep them." His mind was racing ahead as they started up the steps. "Think you can spare one of your bratty siblings for me?"

"For what?"

"Transit. Of the mental variety. I need a ticket into the old guy's head."


May 2013

Mystic Falls

The blood had been just enough to revive them and they were already failing by the time it was over. As gratifying as it was to watch these monsters so vulnerable, it got boring after the first hour. There were only so many hours in the day and he had a wedding to attend.

Thankfully, Iceman didn't disappoint. The meanest and the strongest, he woke first. His creepy eyes blinked hard against the unfamiliar surroundings. In a flash, he was on his feet, his teeth bared as he rushed towards the fresh meat sitting cross-legged at the far side of the room–

–and smashed into the invisible barrier between them.

"Watch out for the glass," Kai sing-sang.

The heretic rubbed his nose, scorn written all over his face. He walked up to the barrier, his hands feeling for the length and breadth of it. Kai watched, curiously. After a while, the man splayed his fingers flat on the invisible wall, and his eyes started glowing as his palms turned red.

"Er… Iceman… yoo hoo?"

The heretic deigned to glance his way.

"I won't do that if I were you. That is the only thing keeping you in this reality. You suck up that barrier and you get yanked right out of this place."

"Do it," hissed a voice from behind Iceman. Kai inclined his head to see Cherokee rising from the floor, pulling himself up against the wall. "I'd rather go back there than stay in this cage."

As Iceman hesitated, the other insisted, eyes flashing. "I cautioned you, but you did not heed. None did. He was never going to free us."

"A gold star for Cherokee."

"Do not call me that, you viper. When I lay hands on you–"

"When? I don't think you understand what the situation is here. Right now, this is what they call, the classic 'tables are turned' scenario. You are now at my mercy."

"Do it, Lucius." The twins were up now, propping each other to their knees.

"Free us from this place."

"I'd rather expire than grovel to the Gemini once again."

"Is it just me," Kai mused, "or do you two share a brain? Because the way you talk is hella creepy."

"We were not always compassionate towards you," and it was Medusa that was up now, her arms stretched out wide and imploring. There was a barrier between them, but Kai still felt his skin break out in gooseflesh. "Our hunger turned us to beasts. Our envy of your magic made us mean. But whether you will it or no, we are brethren. We are outcasts alike. Abandoning us is abandoning yourself."

"So," Kai said through stiff lips, "when you fed on me, and drained my magic, and got into my head, and gave me nightmares, and I dunno… did everything you could to break me… that was just tough love?"

She frowned, confused. "I cannot comprehend your speech."

"Neither can I, lady," he retorted. "Because yours… is full of bullshit."

She definitely understood that, if the way her face stretched tight with fury was any indication. "I will crush you underfoot and ground you into powder, you insipid little brat."

"I like you better this way." He smirked at the furious faces and felt so pleased. "Scarface, any last words?"

Scarface didn't condescend to reply. He turned to Iceman. "Do it, Lucius. Get us out of here. We were liberated once, and we shall be liberated again. Our beloved Lily is free and safe, and for that we shall hold fast."

Iceman nodded, then pressed his hands against the barrier.

"Er… excuse me? Did either of you mention Lily Salvatore?" Kai piped. "Something about her being safe and free?" He threw back his head and laughed as outrageously as he could.

The six seemed to turn into stone.

"He has killed her," Gingerdee whimpered. "He has killed our mother!"

"Be silent," her brother whispered harshly. "Show no weakness."

Kai raised his eyebrows. It was the first time he had seen them actually speak to each other and not just finish their sentences to someone else. He had been half-joking about the shared brain dig. Until now, he really hadn't been sure that the twins weren't the result of some twisted Gemini-merge-ceremony-gone-wrong.

"If she is dead," Medusa said quietly, "then at least she is at peace. I'd rather she was dead than cast out to another Prison World, languishing alone and forsaken." Her eyes spat rage at Kai. "Do you hear me, Traitor? I am glad you have killed her. I only wish you could kill us, too and end our misery."

"Oh, but he can't," Cherokee said, throwing Kai a sly glance. "No one can. Surely by now, the Praetor"– he said the word mockingly –"has realised the purpose of the Prison Worlds."

Kai smiled grimly at that.

Cherokee turned to his family. "You are right, dear Narcissa. Lily's free through her death. But we shall live. And one day, we shall be free."

"You'll never be free," Kai hissed.

"Do it, Lucius," the other five yelled at Iceman.

"Oh, I won't do that if I were you," Kai snapped.

"We won't stay here and be tortured –"

"–and tormented by you," the twins said.

"Your mother is not dead!"

They froze. They were a mismatched bunch these six, but at that moment, they wore identical expressions of mingled hope and horror.

"She is… alive?"

"You know, one thing that really popped out to me when I was doing my homework at the Archives in Portland was just how fucking expensive Prison Worlds are. Not in mundane money, but in magical firepower."

As they gawked in confusion, Kai continued. "You know the first Architects died for every World they built? Took a lot of trial and error to figure out how to correctly harness the celestial energies, the right formula for the ritual to activate an Ascendant, the precise adaptation of Qetsiyah's original spell to create a World that would serve its purpose and no more? And I won't even go into how long it took for them to figure out that the Worlds needed to be tailored to size or they would be unstable, and let's not forget the fail-safe to self-destruct once they were emptied if you didn't want a magical cataclysm to…"

"What is this drivel?" Gingerdee muttered.

"Has he gone mad?" Gingerdum worried.

Kai pointed his index at them like a teacher giving a gold star. "That's exactly what I wondered about the Praetor that locked Lily in your Prison World. Why waste a Prison World on a Ripper when a good ol' stake through the heart can solve that problem? Like I said – darn expensive and the sheer amount of time to construct one. The coven really reserves them for things they can't kill. Invincible heretics… rogue Praetors…"

"Is Lily alive or not?" Iceman roared. "Tell us now!"

Kai steepled his fingers under his chin and leaned back in his chair. "In a moment. Just sharing some of the scintillating information I found when I was designing Lily's Prison Word, special Ripper Edition."

He watched the glimmers of hope on their faces give completely to horror, and he grinned.

"Turns out that the only reason why she was in 1903, not isolated and killed off was because the coven wasn't sure what her dying would do to your sire bond. Would it cut you off or make you even more unstable? I can't imagine why anyone would think the latter is even possible. You've all pretty much maxed out on the Psycho metre…"

Scarface growled. Medusa was clenching and unclenching her fists as if she imagined them around his neck.

"Still, it didn't seem right, you know, to lump you guys together. You might take comfort in each other or something and I won't want that, would I?"

The twins snarled.

"It took the better part of the month to get it done, then I had to set this place up for you – more about that in a second – and convince the Council to agree to donate the much-needed magical batteries. But in the end, it was worth it." He kissed the tips of his fingers and flicked them. "Bellissimo!"

Cherokee growled. "You vile creature."

"Well, they say there's no accounting for taste. After all, I only added in certain ripper perks like an eternal decanter of blood that refills every day and follows her around no matter where she goes. Just the right scenario for a self-hating, previously teetotaling ripper to gorge herself out and wrack herself with guilt over and over and over and over…"

The hulking Neanderthal staggered back as if from a physical blow as the twins threw themselves on the glass. "Shut up!"

"Imagine the depths of self-loathing, of self-hatred. Imagine how many times she will keep trying to kill herself and keep failing. Imagine how she won't even be able to desiccate because there will always be that one bottle of blood. Everywhere she goes. Just the one bottle following her around like her shadow. She'll never be away from it. She'll never be free of her own addiction."

Medusa was crying now. Iceman, too. Scarface looked stonily ahead with glassy eyes. Cherokee's head was bowed. The twins were smashing against the barrier as if they could pass through it by sheer force of will.

Pathetic.

Some, not all, of this was true. There was an Ascendant, currently spinning its gears in Portland, with Lily Salvatore and her firstborn's name on it. Kai had genuinely not known what the ripper's death would do to the heretics, and it just seemed economical to kill two birds with one stone – keep her alive and settle his score with Damon Salvatore. As for the ripper perks, that would make Damon's eternal cohabitation with his mother a little more interesting. Many times while Kai worked on the gears of the Ascendant, he had amused himself with mental bets on how long it would take before Lily started ripping off her son's head.

However, he hadn't got round to powering the Ascendant. His priority really, had been the heretics, in preparing this place for them.

That was twelve hours ago, before he had heard Bonnie's heart stop beating.

Funny how much could change in such a short time.

Now, Lily's Prison World was moot. The ripper was dead; her victim had, by some bizarre, incredulous miracle, survived; and even though he still hated Damon Salvatore, Kai didn't feel a burning need to lock up the man who killed Bonnie's murderer.

However, it was a shame that all that brilliance would never be realised. It was only fair that he shared it with such a captive audience.

And they were captive, weren't they? Now this was a work of art, a complicated bit of magic that Kai was especially proud of.

"Lily… Mother… Lily…"

Kai thought of the woman's warm heart beating in her son's hands; and his own words haunted him.

'Death is too good for her.'

"Oh, and just to make you all feel better? I destroyed the Ascendant. And since she's not a witch, has no magic of her own…" He tut-tutted.

"Get us out of here!" Scarface roared suddenly. He rushed to the barrier and smashed his palms against it. His already defective face seemed to deform even more as he started siphoning.

Kai tsked. "Yo, Gorgeous? You don't have anywhere else to go. The Ascendant in this world is gone. Destroyed. If you break through, you won't get back to 1903 and you won't get out either."

Scarface stopped. "What?" he growled.

"You'll be scattered across all the narrow passages between reality and every possible dimensional gateway out there. That's like an Ascension that never actually gets you anywhere. Imagine riding an elevator that never opens on any floor. By yourself. For all eternity."

As they stared at him in horror, his smile broadened. "You were boasting a while ago of being indestructible, right? Go ahead and break yourselves out and let's see how much you enjoy immortality in Hell."


June 2014

New Orleans

"Tell me you're not considering breaking into some Augustine vault for Elijah Mikaelson."

They stood at the foyer, watching the car approaching. Matt had given her his jacket, and she wrapped it around her tightly, not so much because of the slightly chill New Orleans evening, but to shield herself from his overbearing scrutiny.

"What's taking Caroline so long?" she whispered nervously, as the valet parked the car, tossing Matt the keys. She stretched her senses as far as she could, probing. But it wasn't for Caroline, who had stopped to use the conveniences, that she was searching.

Where was he?

Elijah had told her that Rebekah was safely sequestered in her quarters, warded in by Freya. But the fact remained that she had almost killed him. And now Bonnie could barely sense him, her connection to him faint. Was he still in the Compound? Had he left? How could she know he was safe?

"You're seriously going to ignore the question?"

Bonnie sighed, giving up her mental detour. The tension between her and Matt from earlier had not abated; but right now, Bonnie was more tired than upset.

"Matt, I don't know yet. I told Elijah I'll give him an answer in the morning because obviously, I need to think about it."

"There's nothing to think about, Bonnie. We can't steal this thing for him. Assuming, of course, that we don't get caught, violate whatever treaty Mr. Gemini and the rest have drawn up in this place and get thrown into some dungeon to rot! We can't let the Mikaelsons have this power, whatever it is. It's unethical."

"It's also kind of unethical to let the heretics keep killing people, Matt."

"It's still not worth the risk, Bonnie. You know I have your back in this–"

Actually, Bonnie hadn't known so it was nice to have the reassurance.

"– but in the end, it's your neck that's on the line if this thing goes south."

"That's why Elijah's asking me to do it," Bonnie said quietly. "I'm not a New Orleans witch. I've signed no treaty. If I'm caught, he can easily deny any knowledge of this."

"Leaving you out to dry? How is that better?" She bit her lip and said nothing. But something in the heat rising on her face must have given her away because his eyes narrowed. "Or is he banking on someone else bailing you out?"

A cold awareness only warned her a moment before Elijah Mikaelson appeared like a ghost beside Matt. "Officer Donovan."

Matt started at once, his hand going to his hip. Elijah glanced at the motion, then across at Bonnie, and she could see in his face that he was remembering that ugly conversation between Matt and him at dinner. She flushed and looked away, feeling inexplicably like if she was being disloyal to Matt, who was still her friend even if he was currently acting like an ass.

"What do you want, Elijah?" Matt asked warily.

The Original smiled genially. "Caroline asked me to invite you to the conversation she's currently having with the Regent."

"I'm not interested."

"I insist."

"Look, Elijah–"

"I'll be fine, Matt," Bonnie said quietly. "You go ahead."

She half-expected him to argue but instead, he just scowled at her, then walked away, shouldering Elijah deliberately.

Bonnie watched him go. What was up with him?

Elijah dusted off an invisible fleck of Matt-dirt from his shoulder. "Interesting reaction. I suppose I could have come up with a better excuse to get you alone."

Bonnie didn't return the smile. "If you pressure me for a decision now, then my answer will be a No."

Elijah's smile oozed condescension. "Do you have any alternatives? I understand that these heretics are hard to kill."

"Don't let my problems keep you up at night," Bonnie snapped. Because I'll be damned if I let you back me into a corner.

Some of her anger must have shown in her face because he raised his hands in surrender. "We're at cross-purposes here. It's not my intention to browbeat you, Ms. Bennett. You asked for time to consider my request and I will respect that. What I wanted to discuss was something else entirely." He hesitated. "Something of a more… intimate matter…"

Bonnie blinked, surprised. For the first time since she'd known him, Elijah Mikaelson looked nervous. "What matter?"

"Well… While you were the Anchor…"

Bonnie looked away before he could see her flinch. How easily he said it. Just as he had done earlier at the dinner.

And just like before, he was oblivious, still prattling words that Bonnie barely heard. Not that Bonnie could rightfully single him out for blame. Everyone had been oblivious. Even her friends.

Everyone, that is, except him.

"… when she died?"

Bonnie blinked. Elijah had stopped talking, and was looking at her eagerly – almost desperately.

"When who died?" she asked, not caring if it was obvious that she hadn't been paying attention.

Elijah sighed, his eyes flickering with pain. "Katerina."

Oh.

Now Bonnie remembered. Elijah and Katherine Pierce had been something to each other, hadn't they? Only given the choice between Katherine and his family, Elijah had chosen his family – first all those centuries ago, and again when he left with them for New Orleans. Katherine had remained in Mystic Falls and consoled herself with chasing Silas-like immortality and, when that failed, enacting her twisted 'vengeance' on Elena. Which led to Elena force-feeding her the Cure. Which led to her dying from her newfound mortality. The ultimate survivor, Katherine Pierce had fought her death to the bitter end.

But in the end, she had lost.

"How did she die?"

Bonnie eyed him. "Why? Is that another condition to our deal? Vengeance for her death? After all this time?"

"No," he said quietly, heavily. "It's not a condition. It's a… I knew she was dying and… I wasn't there. My brother—" He laughed bitterly "— who hated her, was. To gloat, I suppose. Thanks to your friend, Caroline, Katerina was spared that much. But he was there, and I wasn't. She died surrounded by enemies."

Not the first time, Bonnie thought. Elena had sat by Katherine's death-bed and given her absolution. Katherine had paid that back by body-jacking her. Her own daughter Nadia, who had loved her beyond any merit of hers, had also been there, to help her survive through Elena. Katherine had showed her motherly affection by letting her daughter die of werewolf bite.

"What do you want, Elijah?" Bonnie mused. "For me to assuage your conscience? Make you feel better? Tell some cute little platitude to the bereaved?"

He was silent for a long time. Bonnie watched, expecting his anger. But when he spoke, he sounded sad. "I do not remember you being this hard, Ms. Bennett."

"No, you don't. You remember a little girl who let you and the Salvatores push her around like a chess piece. A little girl you were ready to sacrifice so you and your millennium-old siblings could live even longer. Forgive me if I don't have any softness for you. My mother is doing very well, thanks for asking."

He flinched.

Bonnie locked her jaw. "Katherine Pierce is dead. A lifetime of double-dealing and back-stabbing and sacrificing every random person to survive finally caught up with her. She cared for no one, not even her own daughter, and she died as she lived – miserable and alone and–"

Afraid.

"Bonnie, what are you doing? Let me pass through! Why won't you let me pass through?"

"I don't know! I don't control it!"

Katherine screaming, fighting tooth and nail as It dragged her into the darkness.

Oblivion was supposed to be a void. An empty, lifeless darkness where nothing remained. Whatever had taken Katherine hadn't been a void. Hadn't been empty. Hadn't been…

…Dead.

"And what?" Elijah asked, desperately. "When the Other Side disintegrated, did she survive? Did she find a loophole like you did?"

Bonnie inhaled deeply, struggling to push that haunting, harrowing memory out of her head. But she…

… was back in those heartbeats of time after Katherine vanished and Bonnie stood petrified before that altar. Her hair lifted from her neck and it wasn't the wind; her skin crawled but it was a warm night; stench filled her nostrils but the air was clean, tinged only with incense.

She felt It, circling her, scrutinising her…

Considering her.

"… as did Damon? My brothers…?"

Bonnie exhaled sharply; and she was in New Orleans, in the foyer of the Mikaelson's compound, talking to one of the most insensitive people she had known in her short life.

"No," Bonnie said abruptly. Whatever had taken Katherine, Wherever it had taken Katherine, Bonnie knew with atavistic certainty that there was no coming back. That was no other Other Side. That was no Prison World. That was The End. "She did not. I saw her – go. Katherine Pierce is gone, Elijah."

He closed his eyes. Despite everything, a flicker of sympathy ran through Bonnie. She couldn't help it. She was right. She owed this man nothing. Not even kindness. But…

She couldn't help it.

"She found Peace," she lied. His eyes flew open, mingled hope and incredulity warring in them and Bonnie shrugged, selling the lie with indifference. "She always said she was the ultimate survivor. Don't ask me how she did it because I don't know. All I know is that… she found Peace. She wasn't sucked into Oblivion."

"I…" He stretched out his hand, maybe to hold her but Bonnie took two smart steps backwards. He let his hand fall, feebly, to his side.

The whole moment was surreal. She had never seen this man so vulnerable. It made him human, and she didn't want to see Elijah Mikaelson that way.

"If I had known this was so important to you, I would have made you pay for it," she said, only half-joking. "I don't suppose you'll let me off this heist you're planning?"

"I wish I could. Believe me, Ms. Bennett, when I say that I ask this for the benefit of us all."

Bonnie scoffed. "Yeah, right."

He chuckled softly, bringing out his handkerchief to dab at his face. Once again, Bonnie stared. It was the first time she'd seen him use it to wipe off something besides blood.

It took her a moment to remember to look away. She stared at the wide expanse of land and probed her senses. She was almost startled to find him at once. Wherever he had gone to, he was now back in the Compound.

She sneaked a glance at Elijah. The handkerchief was back in his breast-pocket; and he looked generally more composed. She was torn between asking him what the Gemini Praetor was doing in New Orleans or finding more about his mysterious sister.

"I always thought that your brother Finn was the oldest," she said, deliberately choosing against instinct.

"So did we, until recently."

"So… what's Freya's story?"

Elijah smiled. "Some other time, I'll share." At Bonnie's irate face, he raised a placating hand. "It's the kind of story I'd like to tell you, perhaps over dinner, before you leave the city?"

Bonnie was tempted to say no at once – her curiosity wasn't worth keeping prolonged isolated company with Elijah Mikaelson. But on the other hand, knowledge was power. And it would be worthwhile to find out if his sister and the Gemini Praetor were any kind of item. Not for any personal reasons, of course, just to understand how alliances lay. How exactly were these treaties held in place, anyway?

"Besides, Officer Donovan would probably not appreciate me monopolising you for much longer."

Bonnie rolled her eyes. The way things stood between her and Matt now, she doubted that. "Was anything you told him about Caroline and the Regent even true?"

"Of course. Though I failed to add that I tempted Caroline with the idea that she could get information about Klaus from the Regent." At Bonnie's look, he elaborated. "I made it very clear to her that I meant you no harm. I just needed a private audience. I might have given her the impression that I wanted to talk about Elena."

Elijah always had a soft spot for Elena. Bonnie would have been less surprised if this conversation had been about her.

"How's Elena anyway?" he asked. "I haven't seen her in almost a year."

"Three years, you mean?" Bonnie corrected. "When your family left my town."

"Pardon. I meant that you haven't seen her in a year, have you? Since your time in Europe?"

Bonnie tensed. "If you're trying to get information from me about Elena's whereabouts, then save it. I don't know where she is and even if I did, you're the last person I'd tell."

Elijah shook his head ruefully. "I wish her no harm. All I'll ever ask you of Elena is to send her my heartfelt regards." A shadow fell over his face. "In many ways, she and my Katerina were much alike. Before she spent five hundred years running from a man determined to punish her for not conceding to be his victim," – his voice cracked – "and from my anger for not putting her faith in her would-be-murderer's brother, Katerina was an innocent, hopeful girl, not unlike your Elena." He sighed heavily. "Yet Elena rose above her circumstances and Katerina… did not. If she had had an iota of faith in me that Elena had had in the Salvatores…" Elijah bowed his head. "Requiescat in pace, Katerina."

The last words were whispered faintly. Bonnie swallowed and looked away. His words had struck a nerve but she couldn't dwell on it. Something was pinging her subconscious – and she knew by now what it meant. He wasn't just here, he was near. She was turning to look when –

Faster than she could blink, Elijah loomed above her, barely an inch between his body and hers, his cold hands on her neck. She'd have screamed if she hadn't completely lost her breath. For a heart-stopping moment, she thought she had miscalculated. Been duped. He hadn't lured her friends away, to get her alone for some ridiculous chit-chat about Katherine's last moments. That had just been a ploy to lull her into letting her guard down so he could kill her. The Augustine didn't want the presence of a Bennett witch at their Ceremony. They wanted her still-beating heart…

His cold lips brushed against her cheeks. First the left. Then the right. His hands lifted from her neck slowly. He stepped back.

Even then it took a moment for her heart to stop racing, for the momentary panic to abate. Then she felt it, hot and burning on her back, the sensation of not being alone – and her fear left her.

She didn't even need to turn to know what – who – it was.

"It was a pleasure seeing you again, Ms. Bennett," Elijah said softly. He looked over her shoulder. "She is all yours, Praetor."

He smiled that same creepily speculative smile he had worn throughout dinner. Then he turned on his heel and disappeared into the night.


Kai and Freya had split up. She, to find her brother, and he, to find Bonnie. Of course, that's not what he told himself when he followed that inexplicable pull that connected him to her. He told himself he wanted to know exactly where she was so he could know exactly where to avoid.

But then he had found himself witnessing that cosy little one-on-one; and the even cosier embrace they shared at the end and he had been… curious.

By curious, he meant he had felt like porting behind the Original and snapping his neck.

"Hope I'm not interrupting," he blatantly lied as he came to stand beside a column a few metres from her.

She bristled, elegant spine straightening with indignation. "Clearly, you're not." She angled her chin towards Elijah's departing back.

Kai looked, too, remembering, too late, that he needed the man for the Genovas downstairs. Then he glanced at Bonnie Bennett. She was already watching him, her eyes studying his form, then lifting to stare at the top of his head, reminding him that it was still wet from earlier. Her face was unreadable. Caught staring, a little frown line formed between her eyes and she looked away from him.

She didn't walk away, though.

Kai knew he wasn't going anywhere.

"Enjoying the fresh air? Couple hours inside a thousand-year-old structure with a dubious building inspection log would do that to you."

To his surprise, rather than ignore him as he half-expected, she said quietly, "I'm waiting for my ride."

His eyebrows raised at that.

Why was she alone? Were the Mystic Falls misfits so useless that they couldn't stick by her side for a few hours and left her by herself in this house, to be mauled by random Originals? His newfound respect for Forbes took a sharp dive. As for the mundane, he couldn't sink any lower in Kai's estimation.

He didn't need to wonder who had draped that jacket on her. Not Elijah, who probably slept in his dark blue suit. Not Vincent whose clothes had their own names. No, this cheap black thing that hung over her body practically screamed underpaid mundane cop.

Kai scowled, remembering how she had been angry over the stupid quarrel with her stupider friend, and locked his fingers together so he won't give in to temptation to yank off the offending material, pause for a long moment to drink in the sight of her bare shoulders, glistening bronze in the moonlight, and then cloak her with something more befitting – his own jacket, for starters.

His eyes slipped down to her right hand clutching the lapels together, traced the familiar dark band that inked her wrist, then went back to her face. Her delicate profile looked as strained as he felt.

He wondered if she was feeling half the cock-screw of emotions working through him now. Or if his presence here merely irritated her.

"What are you doing here?"

"What are you up to?"

They spoke at the same time. Paused at the same time.

Then she covered her face with one of her small hands, and shoulders started shaking. Kai stared, took a moment to understand what she was doing, and then let out a surprised laugh.

She slid her hands half-way down her face, and he could see her eyes shining. "What a pair of–" Bonnie managed that much, before she lost her breath to an attack of the giggles.

"–busy bodies," he finished with a snort. He felt light-headed and discretely leaned against the column beside him for support.

For a long moment, they just stood there – Bonnie still not looking at him while all he could see was her – and acted like normal people, sharing an accidental joke.

The moment passed. She wiped her face discreetly, and wrapped her jacket closely, like armour. He dug his hands deep in his pockets, so that he wouldn't do it for her, and tried not to look too desperately in her direction.

"OK," she said seriously but her eyes were still shining so maybe the humour was not quite done. "You go first."

He snorted softly at her imperious demand. Now she wanted to share? To say she had no business with highly confidential Gemini affairs was a gross understatement. It was bad enough that the Mikaelsons were involved in the situation with the Genovas. And even though she would probably argue that the connection between the exiles and the heretics made it her concern, she'd still be wrong.

He really had no obligation – and no business – sharing anything with her.

"The Mikaelsons are keeping three Gemini witches prisoners." When her head whipped around, he laughed, raising his hands. "Hold onto that white hat, cowgirl. This isn't a rescue mission."

"Like I was offering," she said, rolling her eyes before she looked away.

Yeah, right. But he knew better than to say that out loud. Not with their history. "They are well within their rights, for a change. The witches are exiles." He noticed the way she started, her eyes widening. "The Coven isn't obligated to help them out of their mess; and take my word for it, these people are not the good guys here. If anything, they're getting off easy. Klaus Mikaelson would have murdered them on sight if he'd been here when they turned up."

"So why are you here?"

He ran a tired hand through his damp hair. For some reason, that caught her attention, her eyes lingering at the top of his head even after his hand had fallen to his side. "I'm looking for information." He raised his hand as she opened her mouth to ask another question. "Your turn."

"We're taking turns, huh?" she mused.

A rush of heat went south immediately at the unintended innuendo. Once again, he felt light-headed.

Thankfully, she missed it, her face still pensive.

"I need a favour from the Mikaelsons," she said finally.

"Which one?" She hesitated, and he tsked. "Easy enough to guess, Bon. Not Freya. She's a recent addition and there's nothing you'll ever need from her witchy-wise that you can't do yourself and better." He felt a flare of satisfaction when she blushed at that. It hadn't been intended as a compliment – just a statement of fact – but it certainly delighted him that he could at least have that effect on her. She was no longer the same woman who immediately distrusted anything nice he had to say about her. Now he said nice things to her, and her face went all soft and rosy.

She had turned to look at him, her eyebrows rising and he realised with a flush, that he had stopped talking to just stare at her.

"So it's the Originals you came for," he went on quickly. "Looking to recruit something closer to the top of the food chain to fight your heretics?"

"Your heretics, you mean," Bonnie snapped. Some of the softness leached away.

His mouth twisted. "You're in good company. That appears to be the popular opinion here." He rubbed his throat.

Her face softened again, this time with concern. "How's your neck?" she asked gently.

"Seen worse," he said gamely, even as he soaked up her kindness like a sponge. "You should have seen the other guy. Thanks for the rescue, earlier," he added.

She shrugged and looked away, but not before he saw another flush of pink coating her cheeks. God. If she kept doing that, then no one could blame him for reaching over to cup her face in his hands and –

He dug his fists harder into his pockets, felt his knuckles pop, and made himself look at something else – the ground. Her ridiculous shoes. The jacket swamped her but he could see a few inches of skin, delicate ankles. He sighed.

"You're not the least bit worried in this place, are you?" Bonnie mused.

"Depends on what you're referring to. Was I worried about the kind of meat I was served in a house that's called The Abattoir? Extremely."

Oh my goodness, had he just got two giggles from Bonnie Bennett in the space of minutes? He felt surreal.

"Worried about the Mikaelsons." Her voice was still lilting with amusement. "Your so-called Nefandus Bestia. You literally just got attacked by one a while ago and yet you're back."

'Back' huh? Subtle, Bonnie, but you're not going to catch me out that easily. "You should have been here for the 'team building' workshops Klaus and I did last year. This was nothing."

Her lingo hadn't escape him. It was the last thing he expected to hear Bonnie Bennett, of all people, use to refer to vampires; and he wondered where she had picked that up from.

"I've seen Rebekah Mikaelson string up D… a vampire and torture him for days because he was mean to her. Don't underestimate her."

D– as in Damon Salvatore? Kai tried to choke back a snicker, suddenly feeling a surge of affection towards his attempted murderess. Judging by the wry glance Bonnie shot his way, he didn't quite succeed in hiding his amusement.

"Thanks for your concern," he said sincerely. "But that's what treaties are for. Mutually assured destruction."

"What does your treaty with the Mikaelsons involve? Magic for protection? The secrets of the Gemini for Klaus's blood? Betrothals?"

A brief image of Liv and Kol Mikaelson tying the knot crossed through Kai's head and he almost laughed out loud. It would take less than the honeymoon for both parties to discover that suggesting the union was the equivalent of an act of war.

"Think of it more like symbiosis. Witches, vampires, werewolves, faeries… If we spent less time warring each other and more time working together, we might actually gain more ground."

"I still can't wrap my head around your coven forming treaties with the Originals. With vampires of any nature."

Neither could the Council, he thought with a grimace. Technically, the coven's treaty was with Freya Mikaelson, witch and Elder of her family, not with her vampire siblings.

"I won't pretend that prejudices in my coven don't still exist but we're evolving." Or rather he was making them evolve, which he felt was the same thing. "Not all vampires are mindless predators. Not all witches are altruistic balance-keepers. Rebekah's hostess manners might need work but she was reacting with grief for a dead friend. You can't get more relatable than that."

Her eyes widened with astonishment and he felt a sharp pang of – gratification – dejection? It was nice to amaze her with the fruits of his hard-won empathy but fuck it, how long would she still expect to see that monster from years ago?

On the other hand, had he given her any reason not to? He remembered their meeting in Jo's house. It was barely a week ago but it felt like an eternity. It was the first time in a year that they'd been face to face. She had wanted his help, had been desperate for it. And both times he had turned her down flat, with no explanations. He had left her with the impression that he hated her so much that he won't do his job. Jo had warned him and he hadn't listened.

Could he blame her for never quite seeing him, as he was now?

Something nagged at him suddenly. "The girl Rebekah mentioned… the one she was so upset about? April Young? You told me about her in Portland, right?

Her face tightened, no doubt remembering that conversation as well. "She was the heretics' first victim."

"She and her boyfriend, Ronnie Marten."

"Y-yes…" Her voice trailed off, something like realisation crossing over her face.

"You sounded like you knew the girl pretty well but what about the boy? Were you close, too?"

"No, he went to Grove Hill High… I think he was a linebacker for the team? Just an everyday boy-next-door kid. They made a cute couple." Her voice caught. "His parents were devastated. They buried April, as well."

It took him a second to get why. "She had no family," he said heavily.

Bonnie was blinking rapidly, one hand half-covering her face. "Her mom died before she was 12. Her dad got duped into killing himself and now… the entire Young family is wiped from existence."

His stomach churned with guilt.

It had been a year. And in his head, he knew the truth – that he wasn't ever going to forget, that he shouldn't ever be allowed to forget. But life did this tricky thing with memories, where they'd fade, and his heart would fool him into thinking that everything was OK now. He had made restitution. He was making amends. Making himself worthy. Now he could move on, couldn't he? Could even try for a bit of happiness.

Then bam! Something would remind him that nope, he was an unmitigated asshole and a ruiner of lives and he didn't deserve diddly squat.

He exhaled sharply, pushed his morose thoughts away. They'd be back in time to give him a beating but now he needed – as selfish as it seemed – to enjoy this. "Betcha you're wishing I didn't have that pesky link or you'd have let Rebekah finish the job?" he half-joked.

"Why else do you think I rushed to help?" She snipped.

He scoffed and covered his mouth with a hand. "White hat," he coughed. Loudly. He couldn't help it. She practically set herself up.

She scowled at that, which was an improvement over being weepy. "You already had it under control anyway. Were you even in any danger?" she accused.

He shrugged. "I might have been." He ducked his head so he could look at her face through his lashes. "You saved my life back there."

She snorted. "Yeah, right." But it almost sounded fond. Amusement and exasperation danced over her face.

For a fraction of a heartbeat, he felt that coil inside him that magnified whenever he was near Bonnie Bennett loosen; he was almost at peace. Not completely though. That would have been impossible. In fact, had he ever been around this woman and not felt like exploding?

A memory flitted through his head then – her head on his chest, feeling her breath soft against his skin. That hotel room a year ago.

Yeah. OK, that time.

Her face had tightened again, and she had gone back to looking away from him. He wondered what had been on his own face that had given him away. He studied her profile with some resentment. A bit hard on the neck, wasn't it, holding conversations like this? How nice that she only seemed to reserve this pose for him, in her clearly hell-bent resolve never to look him the eye for longer than a few seconds. After all, she hadn't had any reservations getting up close and personal with Elijah Mikaelson a while ago. How flattering that she considered Kai far more deadly than a millennium-old vampire.

"So how is an Original going to kill a heretic?" He asked harshly.

Her eyes narrowed, picking up his sudden mood swing. "Tell me more about these exiles you're interrogating," she countered.

He snorted. "I think I told you plenty already. You're the one playing your cards close to your chest."

"I asked; you answered. You asked; I answered. It's your turn now."

"Now isn't this familiar? I bare my soul while you remain the oyster." Familiar bitterness crept into his voice.

Familiar shutters fell over her face.

In the blink of an eye, the camaraderie of a moment ago had mutated to animosity.

What else was new?

She walked over to sit down on one of the porch seats and he knew that was his cue. The conversation was over. He had his own stuff to do anyway. There was an Original to track down and rogue witches to interrogate.

But he stood his ground, stubbornly. Her presence here ate at him, and not just because of his hyper-sensitivity to her, the way her proximity tortured him. More urgently, he needed to know what kind of danger she was about to waltz herself into. Because whatever she wanted of Elijah Mikaelson, she wasn't getting it for free.

Elijah Mikaelson, the ancient vampire with the reputation of literally razing down cities to preserve his family, and Bonnie Bennett, a powerful witch with a propensity for martyrdom.

A horrific match made in Kai's personal Hell.

His eyes rested on her wrist, his chest twisting with both possessiveness and avarice at that black band. He had been mad enough to latch that on her, hadn't he? It only followed that he'd take some responsibility over how she might end up using it.

He was opening his mouth when the others showed up.


"Bonnie! Sorry to keep you waiting for so… Oh." Caroline's high-pitched greeting ended abruptly as she took in the person standing beside her friend.

"Are you OK, Bonnie?" Matt asked brusquely.

Bonnie took her time to face them, watching instead as the shutters fell over Kai's face. Her heart sank with disappointment. At him.

But mostly at herself.

She turned around and watched her friends approach her. Caroline looked like someone who wasn't sure if she was interrupting something. Matt looked like someone who was sure – and was determined to.

Bonnie had never been so unhappy to see either of them.

Along with them came Vincent Griffin, Regent of the Nine Covens. He smiled at Bonnie. "I'm glad I caught you, Ms. Bennett. Praetor, still here?"

Kai shrugged, turning from Bonnie, but not – she noticed gratefully – completely leaving her side. "Not quite finished my business. And you?"

"I was hoping to find Ms. Bennett here…" He smiled at her. "Have a few minutes to spare?"

First Elijah. Then Kai. Now Vincent Griffin. She was going to need a pocketbook to keep up with all these impromptu confabs!

"Bonnie's leaving," Kai said abruptly.

His authoritative tone immediately got her back up. "I am?" Bonnie asked with some asperity.

"I'm beat myself," Matt declared pointedly.

Bonnie looked from one to another with equal dislike. How lovely to be reminded that regardless of personal differences, men could always find common ground in telling a woman what to do.

"You can go on, Matt," she said glibly. "Caroline and I will stay for a while longer."

A pair of angry faces glowered at her.

Caroline was biting back a smile; and Vincent Griffin's eyes twinkled as he stretched his hand out to her.

"A few moments, I promise," he said, his voice lilting with suppressed laughter. Near her, Kai's body was one straight, angry line.

It provoked Bonnie.

She took Vincent's hand and let him pull her to her feet. "We can take as long as you want." She stepped close to him, near enough to feel the immense power radiating out of him, and slipped her hand up his arm until her fingers hooked around his elbow. Her bangles shifted, covering her brand and it seemed appropriate. "All night if need be."

Matt made a strangled sound in his throat. Caroline choked back a laugh – or a scream. Bonnie ignored them; her eyes were fixed on the half-amused, half-alarmed expression on Vincent Griffin's face but her attentiveness was on the man standing behind her, boring bullet-holes in her back.

Any angrier, she thought hysterically, and he'll be growling.

The faint buzzing of a phone was a welcome relief to the incredible tension that had suddenly built up in the air. With an apologetic smile, the Regent dropped her hand to reach into his jacket pocket. "Griffin," he said smoothly as he stepped away.

It was a short conversation, and Bonnie – whose eyes stayed on him because between Matt's disapproval, Caroline's mirth and Kai's anger, there was no safe place to look – watched as his smile turned downwards.

He switched off the phone, and she already knew what he was going to say. "I'm sorry, Ms. Bennett. I have a little emergency… Perhaps some other time?" He looked anxious. "You won't be leaving New Orleans soon, would you? There are a lot of things I would like to discuss with Sheila Bennett's grand-daughter."

"You knew my grand-mother?" Bonnie asked, surprised, although by now she should be used to this.

"Only by reputation. Rumour has it that you are her chosen heir. And if the other rumours are true, you've certainly more than lived up to her expectations."

Bonnie felt her face warm. "My family is not a coven, Mr. Griffin. We don't have heirs or rulers."

"Please call me Vincent." They both ignored the snarl-like sound that Kai made. "There is truth in what you say, but maybe not the way you understand it. The Bennetts are not a coven, no. You're more like a dynasty."

"Of what?"

A small smile flickered over his face. "Save me a dance at the Inauguration Ball. We will have a lot to talk about then." He bowed slightly, and then looked over her shoulder. "Praetor? You will want to come along for this."

"I will?" Kai said, his voice icy.

Vincent's mouth twitched. A short silent conversation seemed to pass between the two men. Kai conceded. He walked past her without looking back, his heat brushing against her, making her skin break out into goosebumps. She clutched Matt's jacket tightly.

Vincent smiled slightly, nodded in turn to the Mystic Falls guests and followed Kai. He caught up with the other man, and they walked side by side into the house. Bonnie followed him with her eyes. The dim hallway light reflected off the zig-zag of white in his – ridiculously spiky, wet, and she'd admit it, sexy – hair. It was the last thing she glimpsed before both men faded into the darkness.

Yet in her mind's eye, she could still track Kai as he moved further and further away from her, her awareness of him like a cord stretching thinner and thinner with every passing second.

"Come on, Bonnie!"

With a start, she registered that her friends were calling from the car. While she had stood there, gaping dreamily after Kai Parker like an idiot, Caroline had got into the front seat and Matt stood by the back door, holding it open for her. Mumbling some gibberish to save face, she bundled herself inside. She was reaching for the door when Matt slammed it shut. Hard.

"Hey!"

"Sorry," he said insincerely as he got into the car.

That did it! "What the hell, Matt? What's your-"

"You won't believe what the Regent told us about the Mikaelsons!" Caroline cried, turning around her seat to stare at Bonnie with gossip-bright eyes.

Gossip-bright with a tint of please-stave-off-this-fight-for-when-I'm-not-here-glow. Apparently, she'd got over her own disagreement with Matt from earlier and was trying to play the Neutral Party.

Well, Bonnie thought as she glared at Matt's mutinous face through the rear-view mirror, she wasn't going to be distracted –

"Do you know that Freya resurrected Kol?"

OK, that could do it.

"What? How's that possible? He died as a vampire on the Other Side. He should have been sucked away with everyone else."

"Apparently, he caught the same break that you and Damon had. Esther Mikaelson made a deal for her dead children with the witches here. When the Other Side collapsed, he was ported into the NOLA Ancestral Plane. A bunch of stuff happened that Vincent Griffin clearly didn't want to go into, but Freya eventually got Kol out of the Plane and back to life. He's been walking and talking with the rest of humanity for over a year now."

"What about the other brother? The older one, Finn?" Matt asked nervously.

"The one you killed?" Caroline mocked. Matt winced. "Vincent said he found… Peace? Or something? He didn't cross back."

The hair lifted at the back of Bonnie's neck.

"Bonnie, what are you doing? Let me pass through! Why won't you let me pass through?"

"He found Peace?" She echoed.

Caroline shrugged. "Or something."

They were driving past the main gates now. Bonnie sat at the edge of her seat, and stretched her senses out.

"Any idea if Stefan knew this?" Matt asked.

"I'd like to think that if he did he would have mentioned it to me. But I'd be lying to myself."

"Awww, Care…"

"Stefan and Damon were in NOLA last Summer, while we were in Europe. Did any of you know that?"

Bonnie remembered what Freya Mikaelson let slip during the dinner. "I had no idea. What was he here for?"

Caroline explained what the Regent had told her. Vampire armies from the sirelines of the Originals, paranoid after the deaths of Kol and Finn Mikaelson had wiped out almost half of their population, had congregated at NOLA. "Once everyone knew what happens when an Original dies, the oldest vampires of each sireline got convinced that it was only a matter of time before one sireline tried to eliminate the others… so they started the Sire War. On Elijah's line was the Strix, a society of some of the oldest vampires in the world. Think Vampire Illuminati. On Klaus's was his very first sire, a powerful vampire called Castle who moonlights as a CEO. Think private military contractors and war mongering. Then for Rebekah was Aurora del Martel, an aristocrat, powerful, insane, and preserved by obsessed cultists. Actually, I thought she sounded awesome."

The Sire War, on the heels of everything that had come before – because eventful didn't begin to describe the Mikaelsons's return – almost tore NOLA apart.

Caroline's voice shook slightly. "If Klaus had died, everyone in his sireline would have died, including me. But Stefan didn't feel I deserved to know that."

"Maybe he didn't want you to worry," Matt offered. "I mean, Klaus obviously didn't die, and you were in Europe at the time. Stefan probably figured that there was no point bringing it up."

Caroline scoffed.

"Where is Klaus anyway?" Bonnie wondered, staring hard into the darkness as the car wound past the wrought-iron gate that encircled the Compound.

"Well, that's the other thing. You see, Klaus wasn't too happy about Kol's return. Apparently, he's still happiest with his family when they're in coffins." She scoffed but her voice was suspiciously fond. "He and Freya clashed over that, amongst other things. At first he was over the moon, to find their long-lost sister. A witch, too. You know how Klaus loves his witches."

"Where did this new witch sister turn up from? Was she also in some spelled coffin like Esther?" Matt asked.

"I might as well have been pulling teeth for all the intel the Regent gave me on that. What matters, though, is that Freya turned out to be every bit as badass and bossy as Esther. She wasn't willing to let Klaus run things the way Elijah did, and the two were constantly at each other's throats. I'm not going to lie, she got on my nerves. For the record? I have officially established that I will never get along with anyone called Freya, and you are both banned from using that name on any of your kids. Calm down, Matt," she said when he choked a little. "Still, I would have paid to see her, to see anyone put Klaus in his place."

"Mmm… hmm…" Bonnie murmured.

"Then the last straw was when Kai Parker" – she paused when Bonnie looked sharply at her.

"Go on," Matt said through gritted teeth.

Caroline's eyes slanted warily from one friend to another. "Well," she continued slowly, "the Gemini ended the War. And afterwards, they wanted to form a treaty with the NOLA factions. Klaus point-blank refused. The new rules spoilt his fun, he said. He didn't have to honour any pax, he was the Original Hybrid and he answered to no one." She rolled her eyes. "Eventually, Freya asked the Gemini to…" She mimed slamming a door and throwing away a key. "And that's why we won't be seeing him anytime in the near future."

"Kai threw Klaus Mikaelson in a Prison World?" Matt sounded grudgingly impressed.

"I dunno… But wherever he is, he's not coming back soon." Distracted as she was, Bonnie picked up on the touch of mingled sadness and relief in Caroline's voice.

"So let me understand this… He puts Klaus in a Prison World to get his precious treaty signed, but his own heretics are too trivial for him to be bothered with?"

"Of course, you'd see it that way, Matt," Caroline snapped, exasperated.

They started bickering, speaking around a topic that Bonnie didn't fully follow. Probably because she wasn't trying to; and she was no longer in the mood to fight with Matt.

She had known the instant she stopped feeling his presence; the moment their connection, stretched thin through magical space and time, severed.

She slumped back to her seat.

Why was he really in New Orleans? Would she ever know? Probably not. Earlier, he had started to confide in her. Had told her a great deal more than he had to, considering everything. But when he had asked her for the same, she couldn't reciprocate. Yes, she and her friends had all agreed back in Mystic Falls that they won't share their plan to trap the heretics via Original compulsion with anyone outside the group and especially the Gemini. Even Tyler had had to be excluded. But the truth was that Bonnie hadn't even been thinking of that when she clammed up.

Kai's perceptiveness was uncanny. Far too many times, he had easily pried apart the onion skins of her life with very little information. Where he was concerned, her self-defensiveness was hard-worn and instinctive.

Even if later – like now – she came to regret it.

She sighed.

"Alright there, Bon?" Caroline asked.

"Yeah," she said quietly, staring into the passing darkness. "I'm fine."


Elijah's sniffed delicately, his nostrils flaring. "I detect the scent of sage."

Kai had got to his feet as the man stepped into the drawing room, and now he walked across to where he stood. "Shouldn't you be used to the unfortunate downsides of hyper-awareness by now? Thanks for showing up eventually. I've only been waiting for almost half an hour."

Elijah brushed away invisible lint from his suit sleeves. "That should have given you, my sister and the Regent just enough time to have yet another private meeting. Witch business seems unusually hectic tonight?"

"I hear a question there, Elijah, and the answer is 'Mind your own business'."

Elijah's eyes narrowed but perhaps the stated vampiric awareness clued him in that Kai wasn't in a good mood, and he had the sense to hold his peace.

Kai had felt it when that invisible cord snap. Felt it when Bonnie slipped out of his reach. It was ridiculous how bereft it left him feeling, considering that a few hours ago he hadn't even known she was here. But where Bonnie was concerned, he had long learnt that logic played no role in his emotions. Between that and the talk he just had with Vincent and Freya, Kai was in a black mood.

They walked in silence through the building, following roughly the same route that Freya had taken earlier when she led him to the dungeons.

"I didn't know you were more than casually acquainted with Bonnie Bennett," Elijah remarked.

Kai turned his head slowly, gave the other man a level gaze. Was he for real?

"It's odd, isn't it? How these connections can either make matters simpler or extremely complicated."

"How exactly does she expect you to kill the heretics? No, scratch that. What I want to know is what the fuck you're asking her in exchange for your help."

"I also hear a question there, Praetor, and the answer is 'Mind your own business'."

"Heretics business is Gemini business is my business," Kai said through gritted teeth. And for the record, dumbass, sarcasm is implied. You can't say you 'hear' a question that I actually said out loud!

"You can take it up with my sister but I am quite certain that your treaty does not give you the right to poke into the private affairs between me and my old friends from Virginia."

The combination of 'private', 'affairs' and 'friends' was either an unfortunate coincidence or a deliberate attempt to make Kai's blood boil. For the second time that evening, Kai weighed the pros and cons of obliterating Elijah Mikaelson from existence.

They reached the trap door that led to the dungeons. Elijah paused.

"You should hear your heart, Praetor. It's like a freight train racing off a cliff. And if you grind your teeth any harder, I might need to give you the number of a dentist I once ate. Would you rather do this with Rebekah? Perhaps you'll find her company more agreeable?"

"Shut up and get on with it," Kai snapped.

Elijah opened the door with a smirk. As he descended, he murmured, "And they call us vampires over-emotional…"


Damon called as they were approaching the hotel. He and Stefan were at the Grill. Bonnie started telling him about Elijah's demand, when he cut her off.

"That is great news about Portland, B. We're keeping our fingers crossed for you and the old witches."

She and the others exchanged confused glances.

"Damon… are you alone?"

"Depends on what you mean by alone. It's a slow night in the Grill and the service here is worse than usual. We're sharing drinks with little Miss Parker and she'd like a word or two."

"Liv? Is she still in town?"

"Hello, Miss Bennett."

Bonnie froze. This time around, she recognised the voice at once.

"Georgiana Parker," she said quietly.

Caroline's head swivelled around so fast that Bonnie winced. Matt started turning his head, remembered he was driving, and instead eyed Bonnie frantically through the rear-view mirror.

Bonnie put on the call on speaker.

"Flattered that you remember me," the cool, clipped voice filled the car.

"How could I forget?" Bonnie asked, staring at Caroline's wide-eyed face. "Our landlord's been asking where to send the bill for the broken window."

"The window…? Ha ha. Amusing." She sounded anything but. "Your manner of speech in this time still requires some accommodation on my part."

"I can forward you some urban lingo websites. But first… What the heck are you doing with my friends?"

"Keeping each other company. Fret not. The two Salvatore gentlemen are not in any danger, at least not from my person. They found me in solitude at the local tavern, and generously offered me free liquor and companionship. As you should have ascertained, they and I have a great deal in common. We share the same mother."

Lily Salvatore's pale fanged face flashed through Bonnie's head, making her shudder. "I can arrange for you to join her, anytime," she whispered.

"That is precisely what I desire."

"W-what?" Bonnie stuttered. Was this another Silas situation? A Big Bad with a death wish? "You want to d–?"

"I wish to do commerce with you, Miss. Bennett. In exchange for complete access to your Expression magic, my brother and I shall depart from your home town and never be heard or seen again."

Matt braked too hard as he pulled into the parking slot but neither girl cautioned him. Both were also reeling with shock.

"And then what?" Bonnie demanded, remembering a conversation with a certain coven leader in Portland. "Go somewhere else to be predators?"

"In contradiction to what you have assumed of us, my brother and I have no intention of drawing the ire of the Gemini upon our heads. We are already uncomfortably conscious of the proximity of the Council Envoy. Indeed, it baffles one why the Praetor has withheld from a full offensive for this long–"

"Tell us about it," Matt grumbled, sotto voce.

"– but that is a question of when, not if. We have no intention of remaining here when that event takes place. Gemini resources are immense but they are not limitless. If we moved to somewhere more peaceable, and gave them no cause to pursue us, I believe that they shall leave us be."

Caroline snickered, incredulous. "They leave you be? That's some seriously warped reasoning you have going on, lady," she whispered.

Of course, the heretic's ears picked that up. "Ms Forbes, I do not comprehend that speech nor do I care to. What is of import to me is your decision regarding my proposition. Yield unto us your Expression, Bonnie Bennett and we cease to be a predicament."

"I will give it to you-" Bonnie ignored the rapidly shaking heads of Matt and Caroline "- only if I know what you need it for."

Georgiana laughed sharply. "My dear Miss Bennett, are you obtuse? I must say you have not quite lived up to the reputation I had been impressed upon about you."

"Just answer the question," Bonnie snapped. Bitch.

"I already did. You failed to pay attention. Your ancestor's magic is the only thing powerful enough to break through planes of existence. It was the same magic that created the Other Side, and every other dimensional plane had been in imitation of that magic. Thus, it has the potential to transcend dimensional borders. If harnessed properly, it could be a means of transit through worlds without the aids of conventional gateways. All worlds, including–"

"–Prison Worlds." Bonnie's heart thumped. "So you want me to use Expression… to free…"

"My mother." For the first time, something like emotion seeped into the heretic's voice. "Aid me in the liberation of my mother and I promise you on her own beloved, sacred head, that our family will never bother you or yours again."

Caroline was staring so hard now that she had stopped blinking. Matt's eyes were almost jumping out of his head.

Bonnie swallowed hard. "I-I need to think about it."

"You have three daybreaks as the duration of your consideration. Beyond that, or in the event you respond unfavourably, I shall murder someone you hold affection for. Three daybreaks, Miss Bennett and no more."

There was a long pause. Then Damon's unimpressed voice filtered through the speaker.

"You could have just said 72 hours, weirdo. Sounds a hella lot more precise. Especially when you factor in time zones and daylight saving time. You got the memo, BonBon?"

Bonnie swallowed. "Yeah."

"That's it?" Matt asked. "They just want Lily? What about the witches? The ritual?"

"How the heck would I know, Deputy Doony? Stefan and I were just minding our business here, and by the way, the service sucks, you need to hire some new people–"

"Ask her, Damon!"

"The bitch's gone. We got word that she was in the Grill, we came here to keep an eye on things, and she called us over. For the record: there were no drinks offered. Like I'd waste good money on that basket of crazy. Although, you know what they say: the crazy ones have the best se– hey, Stefan!"

"Matt." It was Stefan speaking now. "Maybe the list of names wasn't a Kill List. Maybe it was what Liv said – Quentin Parrish compiling a list of witches in exile. She's left town by the way, took off this morning. And according to Tyler, no new information about this yet. It was a nice theory, but it's looking more and more like the simple explanation is the only explanation."

"Better sleuthing next time, Deputy Doony!" Damon's voice called.

"Shut up," Bonnie said, reflexively.

"What did Elijah want?" Stefan asked.

Bonnie told him then about the Original's demand. She kept her narration brief, and omitted all the extraneous details about the dinner and the guests. Matt's and Caroline's eyes were heavy on her – no doubt noticing her glaring omission of the Gemini presence in New Orleans – but to her relief, they said nothing.

When she was done, one of the brothers let out a low whistle.

"The Augustine is staging a comeback?" Damon sounded amused.

"Damon…" Bonnie warned.

"Don't Damon me. I'm just curious, wondering how that's even possible, considering, you know…"

"Your generational mass-murdering?" his brother said drolly. "Clearly, you weren't as thorough as you'd like."

"I'd better get right on fixing that then."

The three in the car swapped worried gazes. "Damon, this isn't the time or place for you to do anything rash," Bonnie warned.

"Oh come on, Bon," he said glibly. "I was just pulling your legs. You guys are all so easy. I'm a retired psychopath, remember?"

"Stefan," Caroline pleaded.

The loud sigh on the other side of the call was clearly from the younger Salvatore. "I'll keep him in line, guys. I… I'll try."

"Now you've got Steffie on my case, can we move onto the important thing? Whatcha gonna do about Elijah's indecent proposal, witchy?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Caroline asked.

"Obvious to you, Barbie. I say the Devil you know is better than the heretic you don't…"

"You want Bonnie to hand this thing to them and risk–"

"Risk what? 'I'll pay you Tuesday for a burger today.' If the Mikaelsons use it to start a war ten days, ten months, ten years from now… we'll figure it out."

"Why are we even considering this?" Caroline insisted. "If all they want is Expression to free Lily… we can do that, right? I mean, she's not my favourite person, but she only went crazy because she missed her family. And they're going crazy because they miss her. If anyone can relate with that, it's me," she finished quietly.

"I'm with Care," Matt said, raising his voice. "I'm not keen on Bonnie being used to steal anything from the Augustine."

"If we bring the crazy family together and we can finally have some peace, it seems fair to me," Caroline insisted. "Heck, it almost sounds too good to be true."

"If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is, Caroline," Stefan said sternly.

Her eyes narrowed. "Really, Stefan? You want to patronise me now?"

"I don't patronise you, Caroline."

"Oh my god, just stop, OK? I wasn't going to bring this up–"

"She says as she brings it up," Damon said sotto voce.

"–But you lied about going to NOLA. You fought in a war that could have killed Klaus, and I would have died without ever knowing why!"

There was a dangerous silence.

"Stefan, what is she talking about?" Damon asked, his voice sharp.

"Don't you pretend, Damon," Caroline warned.

"I'm not–"

"Damon. Caroline. I can't…" Stefan let out a noisy breath. "I didn't lie."

"That's the angle you want to play? We're in a relationship! A lie by omission–"

"Stefan, what is she–"

"Caroline!" Stefan shout was so loud that the three in the car jumped. On the other end of the call, the background noise seemed to dull. He muttered a low curse. "Can we please just talk about the problem we have right now? Or are we going to spend the next half hour arguing about Klaus Mikaelson?"

Caroline's face went crimson. "This isn't about Klaus!"

"Isn't it? Because you're talking about stuff that happened in the past when the heretics are our clear and present danger. We need to decide what to do about their offer. I say–"

"You don't get to say anything, Stefan!"

"Caroline, can we please just put our issues aside for one–"

"This has nothing to do with our 'issues'. You don't say anything because it's not up to you. This is Bonnie's decision. She's the one with Expression and she's the only one who can decide what to do with it. Not everything I do is about you, Stefan Salvatore!" And with that she switched off the call. Then slammed the phone on the dashboard with a shriek.

Matt grimaced. "That's my phone," he muttered, trying to catch Bonnie's gaze. But she wasn't looking at him. Or thinking about Caroline and Stefan's drama.

Stefan was right about one thing: The heretic's offer was too good to be true.

Because Lily Salvatore was dead.

But Caroline and Matt didn't know that. Only a few people on this side of the veil knew that truth. For all sorts of frivolous reasons, they had kept it a secret for a year. But now that the heretics had revealed that finding Lily was their only motivation…

Suddenly that secret had become deadly.


May 2013

Whitmore

Later, Kai would remember that night in flashes of colour. Black, white, blue and red.

Lots and lots of red.

The red of Bonnie's blood wasting on that dirty floor and soaking through his shirt. The red of Lily Salvatore's veiny heart, still throbbing in her son's fist. The red of Stefan Salvatore's gut blood from where Kai had staked it, pinning the man into the ground.

But also the red of the ambulance as he rushed through the ER. The red of the flashing lights as the orderlies tried to pin him down, mistaking the blood on him for his own. The red of Jo's cheeks as she fought her way through the confusion before he hurt too many people, and led her brother to Bonnie's private ward.

The red of the blood feeding her body through tubes. The glint of red in her black hair where it lay spread over her pillow, her face – no longer so deathly pale – calm and peaceful under the sedation Jo explained she was under.

That's when the blue came in. The blue of his sister's scrubs, Elena Gilbert's shirt as she lay with her head on Bonnie's bed, her fingers entwined with Bonnie's despite the tubes and wires that wanted to bury her. The tiny blue flowers of Bonnie's hospital gown.

Jo said something to him as he stood by her window, his hands pressed against the glass and staring, drinking in the sight of her like a man dying of thirst, looking at an oasis. Out of his reach but just the fact that it was there… He couldn't hear and would never remember what his sister said then; and after a while Jo left, leaving him with Bonnie.

He had no idea how long he stood there, watching her, waiting for her. The hospital staff passing by stared at him curiously but let him be; maybe because Jo had explained his presence, or maybe they took one look at his blood-stained clothes and tormented face and knew better.

Some stood beside him and stared too. Through the daze in his head, he heard words like 'medical miracle', '100% neural recovery? I don't believe it!', 'know for sure when she wakes up', 'why does Gilbert get to stay? She's not even an intern!'

At some point in time, Jo came to give him a clean shirt and a bottle of water.

"Go home, Kai."

He blinked at her. "What?" His voice sounded scratchy in his ears, as if he hadn't used it in a long time.

She rolled her eyes. "Drink. You've been standing here for five hours. You're weirding out the interns."

He wanted to tell her not to bother, that her interns were idiots who would not make it past the first year. But his throat was too thick and for one of the rare times in his life, words were scarce.

Five hours! He took a deep breath. There was a lump the size of a rock lodged in his throat. "When will she…?"

"Not before morning, maybe not until noon." His sister's voice was kind. "I'll call you the moment she wakes up. You can come and see her yourself. Now drink some water."

Her kindness almost undid him. Warmth seeped into him as he felt, for the first time in decades, a sense of almost amiability between him and his sister. He blinked hard, fighting the stupid tears he thought he'd mastered by now, but it was a losing battle. Remembering the bottle in his hand, he drank just to hide his face.

If she noticed anything, she pretended not to see. She walked into the ward, brushing his shoulder slightly, almost comfortingly as she did so. He watched her check Bonnie's monitors, read her blood pressure and pulse. He watched the caring way Jo brushed back Bonnie's hair. Watched the gentle way she touched Elena's shoulder, trying to wake the girl, then deciding to leave her alone.

By the time she was out with her clipboard, he had pulled himself together somewhat.

"Still here?" she asked, one eyebrow up.

He cleared his throat. "Call me when she wakes?"

Jo nodded.

He nodded too. "OK, then… I'll…" He ran a tired hand through his hair, cringed when he touched bloody crusts. "OK."

He was turning to leave when his sister called him. "Kai?"

He spun around. "What?"

She was looking at him with her brows furrowed, her face scrunched with something between pity and wonder. "What did you…" She checked herself.

"What?" he demanded.

Jo hesitated, then she squared her shoulders. "Thank you. I don't know what you did to bring her back, but thank you."

Kai swallowed hard against the constriction in his throat. "Don't thank me." He blinked hard. He remembered the black shadows of the Salvatore dungeon, his hand around Lily's white neck, squeezing bones and magic as he siphoned the necromancy that had kept her life long past her expiration date. He remembered the wild schemes he had plotted between the Grill and the Salvatore House, all the ways he was going to destroy her.

"I didn't do this," he said to Jo's puzzled face. "I went after… I didn't do this."

"Then who did?"

Kai shook his head. He had no idea. He wished he did, so he could thank them. He owed them his life.

He turned his back on his sister's shocked, almost-frightened face, and walked out of the hospital.


June 2014

New Orleans

The stench of the dungeon masked the smell of fresh blood. And perhaps for the vampire, there were already so many dead things down here that two fewer heartbeats didn't register.

So they were almost at the cell when they realised what had happened.

Tim Genova was propped against the bars, one arm trapped between his body and the charmed metal. His front was soaked with red. His other arm flopped uselessly at his side, his fingers inches away from the ground where his heart lay on the floor in a red, veiny pool.

Danielle was on her back, staring blindly up at the sliver of light that hit the wall across their cell. Where her throat had once been, nerve cords still wriggled like bloodied worms.

Kai grabbed the bars next to Tim's face with clenched fists, and let his fury ricochet through the cell, and down the dark corridor, rattling all the cages and causing a wave of alarm through the inmates.

"Praetor–" Elijah said, warningly.

"Who. did. this?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Elijah whispered, staring at the corpses. "Your heretics tracked them here."

Fury and frustration and, yes, grief churned inside Kai.

He had hated them, but they had been Jo's friends, Joey's friends. He had grown up with them, known them all his formative years, and now they had been murdered under his watch.

He looked past them to the old man who still lay on the ground, with his hands folded. The difference now was that rather than a dusty, dirty floor, Isach Genova was lying in a pool of his own blood.


When they trooped through the hotel, Matt suggested a pow-wow in his room to talk things over. Both girls cried it off.

"We're beat, Matt," Caroline said, when they paused by his door. "Tomorrow morning, five am sharp."

He looked slightly put out, but he nodded and said good night. The air between him and the girls was still strained.

Caroline looked over at her friend as they walked down to their rooms.

"You OK?" Caroline asked, quietly.

Bonnie nodded.

"Do you want to talk…"

Bonnie rubbed her eyes. "I just want to sleep, Care…"

Caroline pouted slightly. "OK." They reached her door. "See you in the morning then…"

Even if Bonnie wanted to ignore the tinge of disappointment in her friend's voice, she couldn't miss the look on her face. She trudged down the next few doors to her room, her shoulders slumped.

She was tired. She was exhausted in every way possible – physically from jet lag, psychologically from the minefield of a dinner and Elijah's proposition, magically from the Rebekah incident and emotionally from… too many to even list.

And mentally, her head was buzzing. There were fragments swirling in there, supposedly disparate pieces of knowledge that now seemed to be fitting like parts of a jigsaw, if only she had the clarity of mind to put them all together.

What she needed was to have a hot shower, throw herself on her 1000-count Egyptian cotton bedsheet and sleep for the recommended 8 hours. When she woke, she'd have a big breakfast, New Orleans style, and most importantly, a clear head to just think and decide what to do about the ultimatums looming ahead.

What she didn't need, barely two seconds after she had taken off her shoes, was to hear a knock on her door, and open it to find Rebekah Mikaelson in her doorway. The Original was still wearing her evening dress, but it was ripped and blood-stained. Behind her, the passageway was empty.

Magic reflexively wrapped around Bonnie, ready to unleash itself.

Rebekah held up her hands at once. "I come in peace and bearing gifts."

Bonnie made to slam the door, but Rebekah grabbed the handle, holding it open with vampiric strength.

"Aren't you going to listen to what I have to say?"

"What could you possibly have to say that would interest me?"

Hurt flashed across the immortal's face. "I get it. You're mad at me because of the thing you have for Kai Parker." She ignored Bonnie's outraged gasp. "If you could just take your brain out of your vagina long enough to hear me out, you'll soon know that I am making you an offer you can't turn down."

"Oh really?" Bonnie retorted, ignoring the derisive comment. She let go of the door to put her hands on her hip. "Amuse me, then. You have exactly one minute to talk before I finish what I started at your house and bury you for good."

"You're not at least going to invite me in?"

Bonnie scoffed.

Rebekah pursed her lips, looking like if she had changed her mind about whatever brought her here. Then she sneered. "Fine. It's easy enough to figure out that you're here in New Orleans to ask my brother's help to fight your heretics. Knowing Elijah, he's drawn up a contract asking for the still-beating heart of your firstborn and asked you to sign it in the ink of your own blood."

At Bonnie's silence, she fake-gasped. "Oh no, it's even worse, isn't it? Well, allow me to counter his offer. Rather than sell your soul to my devious brother or wait the interminable number of days for when he's pencilled you into his archaic organiser, how about I follow you to Mystic Falls this very night and kill your heretics for you?"


June 2013

Whitmore College

The clock tower had stopped ticking.

Kai could tell from the watch he still wore. It was out of fashion. These days, people used their phones to keep time and for just about anything imaginable. He'd get used to it, and with everything else that was strange and wonderful in this brave, new decade. But he didn't need a nifty Stopwatch app to know how long it'd been. He could log the time with his heartbeat.

It had been eight days, nine hours and fifty-four minutes.

He was waiting at the foot of the steps leading out of the hall where, per the schedule that his new brother-in-law had slipped him, Bonnie had her Archaeology class.

Brother-in-law. Kai tried the phrase again in his head and chuckled internally. That would take some getting used to. As well as being treated semi-decently by the guy. More than semi-decently, to be honest. Alaric Saltzman had practically been in tears when they 'accidentally' bumped into each other after the not-wedding. There was even a split-second of sheer panic when Kai thought he would get a hug. Thankfully, Alaric had pulled himself together and even managed to look slightly suspicious when Kai asked him for a little information.

He had still given Kai what he wanted though – Bonnie's schedule. Interesting how far a little gratitude could go. Almost as effective as cutting a deal, definitely more effective than threats of violence. Plus the bonus of not needing to worry that he'd get screwed over later.

So there was some truth to the saying about flies and honey.

Eight days, nine hours, fifty-nine minutes. No, eight days, ten hours, three seconds.

The campus was relatively quiet. From what Alaric told him, most of the Spring exams were over. The only classes that were running now were the few that would be allowed to extend into summer. Apparently, the university calendar had been skewed because of some major construction projects it had scheduled. There were already signs of it – the decommissioned clock, scaffolds and barrier tapes dotting the landscape. He worried how that would affect Bonnie's plans to catch up with her coursework over the break. He told himself that he had a right to worry, to wonder about these things in her life. They were – they had something. Girlfriend and boyfriend sounded both too forward and at the same time too juvenile to describe their connection. But there was a connection. An undeniable, inexplicable connection that had overcome the most harrowing of starts. This… misunderstanding was just a roadblock that they'd get over.

It couldn't be over when it had barely even started.

Eight days, ten hours, and eleven minutes.

The two hours he sat on those steps waiting for Bonnie felt longer than the 18 years he spent in 1994.

The doors to the hall flung open and students poured out. He rushed to his feet, and the full brunt of apprehension that he was holding at bay rushed back into him. As he moved forward, his eyes scanned the crowd for someone petite, short-haired and drop dead gorgeous. He was cloaked, but no one bumped into him; the magic of the spell, and some inner mundane instinct made them move around and not into him.

Finally, he caught sight of her at the top of the steps. She was dressed in her usual shorts and loose blouse, her hair covering her neck.

A breath he didn't know he was holding escaped.

It had been eight days, twelve hours and twenty-two minutes since the last time he saw her.

She wasn't moving with the crowd, but standing still, in conversation with an elderly man who looked like a Professor. Coming nearer, Kai realised it was less a conversation and more Bonnie listening, her shoulders tense and her head bowed while the man lectured her about her missing coursework, and her failing grade.

After a while, he finished with a pat on her shoulder, and went back into the hall. Bonnie heaved a sigh and looked straight at where Kai stood.

He uncloaked himself.

She didn't even blink. "What do you want?"

He rubbed his hands on his pants, his nervousness returning. "If the mountain won't come, and all that…" He tried to laugh, then trailed off when her stony face didn't flicker.

"I'm busy, Kai," she said at last, and moved past him, careful not to touch him. She started walking briskly, hurrying down the steps. The end-of-class mob had cleared; now, only a few people milled around the sidewalk.

He followed her. "Problem with school?" he asked, trying for casual. "I guess you can't play the 'I was supernaturally incarcerated for most of the semester' card to get extra credit, right? Come to think of it, playing any kind of 'I was incarcerated' card is a bad idea. Won't want that on your university record, right?"

She said nothing, as she all but ran down the steps.

"Or you could always ask your vampire friends to compel your Professors. Oh wait, you'd see that as taking the easy way out, right?" He tried for a laugh that came out strained. "Boy, if I had your magic when I was in college, my memories of that place would be totally different. Didn't anyone ever tell you to use what you have to get what you want?"

"You would know all about that, won't you?" she muttered.

He probably wasn't supposed to hear that, but he did. His heart unclenched a little. "She speaks," he said softly.

Her shoulders tensed. She had clearly realised her mistake, definitely furious with herself for rising to the bait. They were at the sidewalk now. The parking lot was a good distance and her legs were too short to outpace him. It didn't stop her from practically jogging ahead of him while he merely strode along. It would have been amusing if not for the panic clutching his chest.

"We need to talk," he said, dropping the attempt at casual banter that was clearly not working.

"I don't think so, Kai."

"No, we really do. Because if you think I'm going to let you jump into conclusions about me so that you can justify knifing me in the back again-"

Bonnie coughed – or choked on her laugh, he couldn't say. "It's not rocket science, Kai. Two plus two equals your fault. I figured it out."

"Really?" he said, exasperated, to her back. "Care to enlighten me?"

Her answer was to walk faster.

"Remember what happened the last time you refused to hear me out?" he shouted.

She stopped.

"If you're worried about me coming after you, then don't. Because I. don't. want. to. ever. see. you. again."

Each word was like a gunshot to his heart.

"So take your creepy coven and your creepy self and get the fuck away from me."

No, this was not happening. He was not going to lose his chance with her. He was not.

"Bonnie," he said; and when she didn't answer, he grabbed her elbow and spun her around.

The charge wrecked him, working its way from his wrist to his shoulder. He could tell from the sharp gasp and her eyes, wide and wild, staring into his own that she felt it, the exact same thing.

"Bonnie," he pleaded weakly.

"Don't you ever touch me again," she hissed. She yanked her arm away and turned back to walking away from him.

He swallowed hard, once, twice, then followed her.

"Leave me alone, Kai!"

"Not until you give me a chance to explain.

"I said it already – you don't need to."

"Then tell me what the heck you think I did!"

She stopped so suddenly that he almost ran into her.

When she rounded on him, her eyes were so furious that he took a step back in alarm.

"You. went. back. and. brought. them. here."

When he said nothing, she took a step forward, forcing him to move back. "Didn't you?"

He swallowed again. "You overheard me and my father talking. How much did you hear? I used a muffling spell. Did you counter it? You shouldn't have been able to…"

She raised her hand in one tired gesture and his nervous prattle tapered off.

"He said he found 'evidence' in the apartment across yours. That he was furious because he vouched for you. You took him inside, and I didn't hear any more. But that was enough. When we… I was in your apartment the day of Jo's wedding, I thought there was somebody in the flat across. The neighbours, I guessed, but it was something else, wasn't it?"

He couldn't speak.

"I got my friend at the Sheriff's office to do some digging, and he confirmed what I already figured. The apartment was not rented. I put the rest of it together. How the heretics got out of 1903. You had let them out, and you were keeping them prisoners in there. I don't know what you planned to do with them, Kai. Kill them for real since they couldn't die in the 1903 Prison World. Torture them. Play diabolical games with them in your own turf. But whatever you planned, you lost control of them. They escaped and went after everyone in your coven." Her eyes swept over him, her face cold with scorn. "What did I miss?"

"They escaped?" He repeated, weakly. "They didn't escape, Bonnie. You still haven't figured it out, have you?"

"Figured out what?"

Don't say it, the still sane part of his brain whispered. Don't.

He closed his eyes, forced himself to breathe in deeply. Walk away, Kai. Don't do this. You can still fix this, but only if you walk away now.

"Forget it," he muttered and turned away.

Her hand on his wrist tugged him back so fiercely, he nearly stumbled. She was always stronger – physically and mentally – than she looked.

"Figured out what, Kai?" she asked, threatening.

He looked at their connection. Even now, with all this anger between them, he felt that current running between them. "What happened to the no touching rule?" he snarked.

Her eyes narrowed into slits, and her grip tightened. "Answer the fucking question. I want to hear the bullshit you'll try to spin out of this."

Fuck his good intentions.

"OK, Bonnie," he said, his voice smooth as poison as he yanked his hand away. "You asked for it."

She stood with her hands on her hips, chin lifted and defiant. But something like fear seemed to flicker across her face.

Too late.

"You were in my apartment before the wedding, searching for an Ascendant that no longer existed because of your insane idea that I was planning to lock you up in the Prison World–"

"Insane?"

"–and so what did little Busy Bonnie do? What she does best. She meddled. She snooped through my things until she found the focusing point of my barrier axis."

She furrowed her brow, confused, and he smiled insincerely. "The strand of my hair you found in my bedroom?"

Her eyes widened, as panicked realisation dawned. "I thought you missed it…"

He went on as if she hadn't spoken. "I didn't miss it, Bonnie. I was using it to anchor the barrier spell that kept the heretics under lock and key. You distilled it, conjured a tracking spell with it that led straight to the focusing point of its axis, the only spot where the barrier could be shattered." He watched her face ashen, and told himself to stop. That it wasn't her fault, not really, and nothing good would come out of what he said next.

But he couldn't help it. Frustration at her obliviousness; and resentment of her sense of complete self-righteousness propelled him. "Even with that, it wasn't yet a disaster. I was dealing with syphons so of course, I had wrapped everything they could lay their hands on under layers and layers of cloaking spells that they won't dare leech because of what would happen if they brought down that barrier the wrong way. But then – then – then – you being the Busy B that you are, you cast a Bennett-powered Revelation spell that – guess what? – stripped all those layers, leaving a big red X for the heretics to safely siphon the barrier and escape."

Her jaw dropped, horror filled her eyes. "What?" she gasped.

Kai said nothing, just glared down at her, angry at her, angry at himself, angry at the whole damned situation.

He had put the pieces together even before he hijacked Matt Donovan's memories. The coincidence of her in his apartment, looking for the Ascendant coupled with the obvious explanation that the heretics freed themselves by siphoning off the focus of a barrier axis that they shouldn't have been able to find had only led to one conclusion.

He hadn't done the Memorian spell to confirm this. He had done the spell to make sure that no one else ever could.

She blinked hard, looked away, then looked back at him. "You're doing this? You're putting this on me?"

He ran a harried hand through his hair. "I'm just stating the facts," he said quietly.

"The facts?" Harsh, disbelieving laughter tore out of her. It was thick, as if filled with tears.

His heart throbbed, and he reached for her. "Bonnie…"

She recoiled. His hands fell helplessly to his sides.

"Bonnie…"

"So this is my fault?"

"I'm only saying that if you hadn't been so paranoid–"

"Paranoid?" She shouted, making him jump. "After you stabbed me in 1994 and left me to die–"

"I already told you that I didn't-"

"Yes, of course. How could I forget? You know how to kill people and that was not it. You just wanted the satisfaction of abandoning me and driving me to the depths of desolation and despair, not something 'easy' and 'juvenile' like plain old murder. I mean, based on that alone, why ever would I think you won't still be thinking of carrying out some long-term nefarious plot to get back at me?" She finished, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Because I told you we. were. even!" He growled.

Bonnie growled right back, her eyes bright and shining. "Forgive me, Kai, for not believing your sense of justice was greater than your thirst for vengeance! Clearly, I wasn't completely wrong. You might not have wanted to get back at me, but you sure wanted to get back at the heretics, didn't you? 'Even with all that perspective, I still wanted to get even'?" He recognised his own words from the hotel room and shame filled him. "'Crush their skulls… suck out their souls…' How's that working out for you, anyway?"

The words he wanted to utter were stuck in his throat.

She wasn't done. "You practically confessed it. I just didn't understand how far… Do you even care about the people that died in your little revenge scheme? Your people? Or are you just happy you got even in the end? Congratulations, then."

The pent-up guilt exploded into rage.

"I had everything under control. If you hadn't broken into my apartment, put your nose where it didn't belong, casting revelation spells, messing around with my magic, maybe none of this would have happened!"

"Stop saying that! Stop trying to–" She squeezed her eyes tight, her jaw working furiously as her hands opened and closed at her sides while he watched helplessly. He needed badly to hold her, and he wanted badly to shake her.

When she opened her eyes, they were empty. "And you wonder why I can't fully trust you? Stop fearing you?" She laughed that painful little laugh again. "You haven't changed. Not really. You're still the same vindictive, vengeful, cold-blooded snake you've always been."

"So we're a perfect pair, aren't we?" he asked hoarsely. "Because you're still the same judgmental, self-righteous hypocrite you've always been."

"How dare you?" Her hand flew out, and the blow cracked against his jaw, making him see stars. He laughed, which made her eyes flash. He was glad for it. He'd rather her angry than that frightening emptiness. He was ready for the second slap and grabbed her hand an inch from his face, using it to yank her up against him.

"Let me go…"

"Lie to my face, Bonnie. Tell me you've never known what it is to want to get even so badly, you don't care about the consequences? You don't care who it hurts?"

"I have never-"

He did shake her then. "Did you think about the consequences of letting a ripper out when you and Damon were scheming to trap me in 1903? Or did you just not care?"

"I didn't know Lily was a ripper!"

"You didn't know because you didn't want to know!"

"But you did!" She all but spat at him. "Why did you let her out?"

He glared at her, the maelstrom of emotion he felt for this woman almost exploding in his brain. "You. fucking. know. why."

She swallowed hard, and looked away.

When she spoke again, her voice was defeated.

"I can't do this. We can't do this."

His heart kicked up a riot. No. Please… no…

"Can't you see? We're not… This can never…" She swallowed again, determinedly not looking at him. "Let me go, Kai."

He didn't want to. Even as furious and frustrated as he was now, the idea of letting Bonnie go was enough to send him over the edge. If he let her go now, he'd lose her. They'd never be able to come out from this.

"No, Bonnie…" Please…

Her eyes were screwed shut, her mouth twisted with pain, and the silent motus caught him unawares. The shove carried him across the sidewalk, landing so hard against a container of construction materials that he blacked out for a few seconds.

By the time he got to his feet, and pushed through the crowd that had formed around him, she was gone.


[1] Ascension/Coronation/Swearing-In/Binding of the new Gemini Leader