I do not own TVD or TO.
Sorry for the delay.
I hope you enjoy this chapter.
Amara's screams grated on her own nerves. She hated the sound but she couldn't stop; it was the only noise she was capable of producing. The pain had started with a tugging that turned into ripping. It had felt like she was being torn apart at the seams. Invisible cracks and fissures appeared on her skin letting the blood flow in slow trickles that remained unseen.
"What did you do?" Elijah glared up at his youngest brother. He couldn't remember the last time he had felt so frantic. He couldn't remember the last time he had struggled to breathe.
Kol shook his head and spoke loudly enough to be heard over the screams of his sister-in-law's screams. She hadn't screamed like that the last time.
"I didn't do this. It wasn't me." He still sprang into action and began double checking every aspect of the spell he had cast with the aid of Caroline who confirmed that everything was just as it had been before.
"It's identical," Caroline murmured.
"I don't know what's wrong with her." Kol raked his fingers through his hair.
"It's got to be a coincidence," Freya knelt beside the screaming brunette.
Amara's voice cut off as she grew hoarse, but it was clear from the contortion of her features that she was still in agony.
For one long moment the compound was silent before Hope began crying upstairs. Amara's vocal cords healed at the same time allowing her to renew her otherworldly screeching creating a competition with the baby to see who could scream the loudest.
She didn't know how much more of it she could take. It was on the verge of her black out that she realized what had happened. Through her eyelashes she saw a spirit suddenly appear in front of her and walk away.
Somebody had torn a hole in the veil. A jagged tear had been created in a wall that was only ever meant to have one door allowing lost souls to leak out. Every spirit tore at her body as they had on the way in; it was a never ending stream of the dead: a torrential waterfall.
"Shh…"
Klaus bounced on the balls of his feet in an attempt to soothe his screaming child. He looked up when Caroline walked in.
"What's going on?"
"The spell worked, but something else happened to Amara," Caroline frowned. "It's like she's in agony."
She reached over and pulled Hope into her arms when the screams fell silent. Within moments the infant began to calm; she shoved a few fingers in her mouth and took a fistful of Caroline's blonde hair.
"How'd you do that so fast?" Klaus tilted his head. He watched Caroline rub small circles on the baby's back.
"Babies take comfort from things that are soft and warm," Caroline shrugged and pressed a kiss to Hope's head. Her first job had been babysitting the neighbor's kids.
"I'm warm," Klaus cocked an eyebrow.
"But not soft," Caroline murmured. She adjusted her hold on Hope and looked to find the baby's eyes glued on her father. "You're all hard plains, sharp angles and rough stubble."
"And here I was starting to think she likes you better than me," he smirked.
"Well I am friendlier," Caroline's eyes sparkled. She turned somber when she caught the worry behind his expression. "Hope loves you, Klaus. It's just that for the longest time she only had Rebekah, so sometimes she just wants something soft. She hasn't taken her eyes off you."
He nodded. Stepping closer he placed his hand on Hope's back and watched her blink up at him sleepily. Sparks raced up his arm when Caroline's fingers grazed his hand.
"Are you ready to go back to daddy?" She tilted her head slightly to look at the baby. The movement placed her cheek an inch from Klaus' chest.
Hope took her fingers from her mouth and reached for Klaus.
They did the baby swap, but Caroline found herself unable to move when Hope kept her fingers tangled in the blonde curls.
Esther's eyes darted between her daughters. She didn't need her magic to know that both loathed her.
Freya's hatred ran much deeper than her sisters; the elder daughter had been carried away and watched as her loving mother did nothing to stop it. She felt abandoned.
Rebekah felt betrayed. Her feelings had turned sour after Esther had tried to kill them all at after the ball. It had only grown worse after she had turned Alaric.
It was a shame really. She hadn't wanted to alienate her children; she'd merely wanted to protect them, and then later to reverse the mess that she had made.
"Why?" The question was directed at Freya. Her elder daughter had joined them after taking a last look at the passed out doppelganger.
Esther could just make out the profile of Elijah where he was carrying the brunette; she had at first taken for Elena, through the hall.
"Why what?" Freya crossed her arms.
"Why did you bring me back? Why did Elena Gilbert kill me?"
"That wasn't Elena," Rebekah rolled her eyes. "And Kol was the one who brought you back."
"As loathe as I am to admit it," Freya's eyes flickered over Esther with disdain, "we need you. We need your blood to kill Dahlia once and for all."
"Kol…?"
Rebekah went into the short explanation of Elena and Kol, and finished with the child her sister-in-law now carried. She tilted her head when she saw something like defeat flash in her mother's eyes. It was the light that came from learning you had fought a long battle only to learn it had been for naught.
"I should have just killed her," Esther muttered. "Driving a wedge between them wasn't enough."
"Mother?" Rebekah straightened slowly and regarded the matriarch with growing suspicion. Her mother sounded like she had expected something like this to happen.
"I wanted to protect you all," Esther inhaled slowly. "To keep you safe from the pain that I endured," her eyes darted to Freya, "so I turned you to keep you from having children. And then the witches on the other side learned the doppelganger could provide you all with the opportunities I kept you from."
Rebekah's mouth popped open.
"And your solution was to try and kill us?"
"Completely destroying the balance of nature in the process," Freya added.
"I wanted to undo the evil I had set on the world. I thought using Elena to make the hunter would solve two problems," Esther inhaled slowly. "She would either live and distance herself from the lot of you, or she would die in which case she would be incapable of allowing any of you to have children. Only now you tell me she's carrying Kol's."
"We assume," Rebekah gritted her teeth, "can't think of another reason Dahlia would take her."
Elijah paced behind the couch and listened to the stuttering heart of Amara. She had been unconscious for an hour and each second of it felt like an eternity to him. She'd stopped screaming but the pain was still visible across her sweaty brow.
The last time he had felt so useless had been when he was forced to remember killing Tatia and rushing to his mother for aid. Kol seemed as incapable of helping Amara as their mother was Tatia; he took solace in the knowledge that she was a true immortal and incapable of dying.
He was just about to open his mouth and ask the question when he was interrupted. It started as a small vibration moving under his leather shoes but within the span of three seconds it intensified.
The very foundations of the Abattoir shook beneath them.
Kol gripped the leg of the couch and the top of the coffee table while trying to remember what humans were supposed to do during an earthquake. He jolted when strong hands took hold of his arms and pulled.
He lifted his head and found he was three feet from his previous spot that was now occupied by a shattered light fixture.
"I believe you're supposed to be under a table," Elijah pulled a few shards of glass from his arm. He had jumped back in front of Amara after pushing his brother out of the way.
"I'll keep that in mind," Kol got to his feet. He would have sought out shelter but the earthquake appeared to have stopped as quickly as it began. The chaotic sounds died down to be replaced by angry feminine voices, and he recognized them both.
Klaus gripped the sides of his head and thanked whoever was listening that he had let Caroline talk him into leaving Hope in her crib to sleep. He liked to think he would never hurt his own child, but he was certain he wouldn't have been able to hold onto her when the witch struck.
He was sad to say he knew the pain of an aneurism well. It was hardly the first time a witch had set his mind on fire, and it likely wouldn't be the last. However, he couldn't remember angering any of the local witches lately.
Through the slits of his eyes he tried to focus and managed to make out the outline of a petite brunette. There was a tall man several feet behind her but he couldn't make out his features.
"You did this on purpose," Davina shrieked. She lowered her hands enough to ensure he was capable of hearing her.
How much did he have to hate his little brother to switch the ashes?
Caroline held Hope to her chest and braced her body in the door of the nursery. There wasn't a table in the room so the door was the next best thing; luckily the structure of the house meant the arch under the door was safe.
She straightened when the shaking stopped and moved out to the balcony and the sound of a screaming girl.
Caroline froze at the top of the stairs. She could think of several people who might have found the sight of Klaus on his knees screaming in agony oddly cathartic, but the sight made her heart skip and her blood run cold.
She held Hope tighter and turned slowly to the witch who was hurting him. Her mouth popped open.
"He didn't do it," there was no hesitation in her voice, "he didn't switch the urns."
Davina turned slowly to Caroline as she descended the stairs. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously; the only thing that kept her from attacking the blonde was the baby in her arms.
Caroline swallowed and inhaled slowly. Her eyes flickered from Davina to the man behind her as footsteps rounded the corner.
"Klaus didn't switch the urns; I did."
Hope blinked sleepily and wrapped her fingers around Caroline's necklace. Caroline carefully detangled the chain and lowered the child's hand.
Kol rounded the corner and froze in his tracks. His blood boiled in his veins as his eyes locked on their morning guests.
"Kol?" Finn's eyes grew round.
"Finn!"
"Kol?" Davina blinked at the newcomer. He appeared no older than twenty and looked a bit like Elijah… he looked a lot like Elijah.
Davina's eyes flickered to his hands when he clenched them into fists. There was a glint of metal on his left hand that made her heart stutter and her lips shift into a frown. Several questions popped up in her mind but before she could ask a single one his eyes narrowed and a loud crack sounded behind her. Glancing over her shoulder she saw Finn drop with a broken neck, and caught a glimpse of Freya on the balcony with Rebekah.
"Nik," Kol inhaled slowly to temper his anger, "kindly get a dagger."
Ten minutes later Klaus had laid Finn out on the floor a few feet from Amara's couch.
Davina stood in the doorway unable to speak at all. Every question she had stuck in her throat. How was he alive? Was that actually a wedding ring? What was he doing? Why was he dragging a knife across Elena Gilbert's palm?
She watched along with everyone else as Kol executed a few complex spells. She didn't recognize the language he was speaking in but she could feel the shift of magic in the air, and she knew everyone else was able to see the dark shadow.
It rose under the sleeping brunette's skin and flowed down the length of her arm. The shadow floated out from the tips of her fingers and rushed through the air to settle over Finn.
Davina hadn't known darkness could pulse, but the shadow did. The movement put her in mind of a beating heart before the black seeped into Finn's grey skin and he was left as he had been: desiccated.
It was Elijah who finally broke the silence.
"What the bloody hell did you just do?"
The Mikaelsons turned to stare at him with wide eyes. It was a rare occasion when Elijah swore.
"I helped her." Kol's eyes left his brother to give a pointed look to Amara. With baited breath he waited and counted in his head.
One…
Amara's brow smoothed out.
Two…
She took an unencumbered breath.
Three…
Her eyes fluttered open.
Four…
Amara sat up slowly and looked at Kol when he released a relieved sigh. She looked around the room quickly as she stood up and strained her ears only to come up with nothing beyond the beating hearts in the library.
Kol stood slowly and brushed off his knees. He knew the struggle to hide his anger had been in vain when he turned to Davina and her eyes flashed with surprise and a hint of fear. He stared through narrowed eyes and gritted his teeth, not trusting his voice to come out in any semblance of a respectable tone.
He had known what had happened the moment his eyes locked on Finn, and he was genuinely afraid that if he started he would wind up literally knocking some sense into Davina.
Davina managed to find her voice under his glare.
"How are you alive?"
Amara pushed her hair behind her ears as her eyes darted around the room. She spared the teenage witch a quick glance and an even quicker response before returning her gaze to the corners of the room; try as she might she couldn't locate anyone that wasn't alive.
"He has an exceptionally powerful and stubborn wife."
"You are married then?" Davina's eyes darted to his hand. Her only reply was a curt yes. Heat settled low in her stomach. "Why didn't you just ask her for help?"
Kol exhaled slowly. That was a question he could easily answer without screaming.
"I didn't think she could, and I didn't know until she brought me back that her traveller's curse was broken." Kol inhaled slowly and exhaled. He opened his mouth to 'gently' tell her how stupid she had been but before he could the air around her shifted.
For a moment the ground shook, and when it still Davina was gone.
"Kol," Amara worried her bottom lip.
He twisted around to face his sister-in-law. Her dark eyes were narrow with suspicion.
"What did you do to me?"
"I undid Qetsiyah's spell."
Amara took a step towards him as dread dripped down her spine.
"You destroyed the Other Side?"
"Of course not," he shook his head, "in spite of what you might think I'm not an idiot. I just moved the anchorage." His eyes sought out his eldest brother's grey features. "I might have a bit of a vindictive side."
"I bit?" Amara cocked an eyebrow. "What did he ever do to you?"
"He killed me."
"So did I."
"We've been over this," he spun to face her. "That was not your fault." He looked over his shoulder to Caroline. "Next time someone wants to resurrect the dead, and it's not Ellie or me, what do you do?"
Caroline flashed a small smile.
"Give them ashes from the fire place."
The crystal urn shattered into a thousand pieces on the floor of the crypt. The fractured pieces sliced into her knees and palms as she fell to the floor with a choked sob.
She had thought he actually liked her, but he had been leading her on. He had kept her close to watch her for his mother, and that was the only reason.
She couldn't remember the last time she'd felt so humiliated or angry. She wanted to make him pay, and she wanted to make his wife pay as well because she must have been in on it too; she had to have known.
Davina froze on the floor and tilted her head as a disembodied voice circled around her. The soft tones were almost smoky in their intensity, or maybe that was the effect the sound had on the air.
She hadn't realized she had been speaking out loud until the voice whispered in her ear.
"You'll need help if you're going to make them pay."
"Who's there?" Davina swallowed and peered into the gloom. She thought she saw the flicker of a shadow pass through a beam of sunlight before there was nothing.
"I've seen witches come and go for millennia from the Other Side, and Alenka is one of the most powerful witches the world has ever known."
Davina stood up and felt a shiver race down her spine.
"Why do you think the gypsies were cursed?"
She twisted around in the vain hope that she could find the body from which the voice was coming.
"You let me out Davina, and I can help you."
"How?"
"Just let me in."
Her fingers ran over the neat line of stitches with a light touch as she counted. Thirty-two stitches had been used to close the three inch cut. Her nail caught on the last one. She grimaced as the thread tugged at her skin; it was a strange pulling sensation that made her stomach clench but thanks to the anesthesia it didn't hurt.
She had thought the cut was longer. She had been hoping it would take more time, and that Dahlia would leave her alone during the procedure but she had been unlucky on both counts.
She was torn from her thoughts by the voice of the doctor.
"Can you tell me how you did this?"
She nodded and swallowed while straightening up. She had thought she'd have to tell the tale and had come up with something that might keep her in the hospital around other people for a while longer.
"I tripped and my arm scraped the dresser," she flashed them a nervous smile, "I guess the edge is sharper than it looks."
"Elena?" Dr. Garcia frowned.
Elena bit her bottom lip and shrugged one shoulder in what she hoped was a sheepish gesture. She didn't want them learning she'd done it on purpose; she wanted to be hospitalized not institutionalized.
"I was feeling a little light headed; maybe it's connected to my amnesia." Elena blinked when something flickered in Dahlia's eyes, but her face maintained its look of concern.
The fear in her eyes was very real when she turned back to the doctor.
"Is my baby okay?"
"We're gonna take a look," Dr. Garcia smiled reassuringly. He pressed a few buttons on a monitor and instructed Elena to lift her shirt. After squirting some cold gel on her stomach he waved a wand over her abdomen.
She'd had very minor doubts that the woman had lied to her, and they were mainly due to the fact Elena knew Dahlia was lying about something, but they flew away when she looked at the screen.
Dr. Garcia smiled and pointed to a small shape in the upper corner of the screen.
"Here's your little one. I'd say you're about eight weeks along."
Elena blinked at the screen as a tear spilled down her cheek. She tuned back in when the doctor called her name.
"It looks like everything is alright, but your blood pressure is a little high. That might have caused the dizzy spell, and I'd like to admit you and keep you overnight just to make sure everything is alright."
Elena's heart stuttered and the monitor caught the skip, when Dahlia agreed that an observation might be a good idea.
"We'll get her in a room," Dr. Garcia glanced up from the chart, "and there are roll away cots if you would like to stay with your… niece was it?"
No, Elena looked up from when an intern was wrapping a white bandage around her arm. Her heart skipped again when Dahlia declined the offer.
"I want to take a look at that arrhythmia too," Dr. Garcia frowned.
What do you think of this latest chapter? The next one is going to focus on Elena with small flashes to the compound. I never intended to have Dahlia last a long time but the after math will stick around for a bit.
Anyone remember what I said about a potential crossover/cameo? Can you guess what it is after this chapter? Because it's coming in the next.
First mini-reappearance of main villain. Can you guess who it is?