Disclaimer: I don't own Vampire Diaries in any shape or form. But I do own my OC.
A/N: So, this is the episode where Aliyah finishes telling the story of how she became a vampire and the whole hybrid curse thingy. I may even start Bad Moon Rising as well. I know a lot of people guessed that it was Elijah and I'm so glad I got positive reviews with that. There's many more twists to come with Aliyah's backstory, so I hope I keep getting positive reviews!
As for me updating, I did say last chapter that I just started university again, so my time to write is limited. I'll try to knock out a chapter a week, but between my three stories, that means I may only be able to update this story once in two or three weeks. I am really sorry, but I need to keep updating my other stories or I'll never finish them and the chapters for this story are ridiculously long and drawn out. Pretty much every single chapter after this exceeds 10K and most of them are 20K and up. But, I'll try my hardest :)
Reviews:
Katherine Sparrow: I know a lot of people guessed that it was Elijah :) I thought he'd bring the most drama to the story, because Kol just wouldn't care, or he'd use his and Aliyah's previous relationship to screw with Klaus. I can't wait for all of the Originals to come in Season 3. It should be interesting!
TetraGirl: Ooh, I have a lot planned for the Alijah relationship, don't worry. I'm actually starting to write Rose now, so we'll get to see Elijah soon and what happened between them, I promise. Yep, I'm really gung-ho about the Caronliyah trio now, and we'll see plenty more scenes between them. As for Bonnie preventing Tyler from breaking the curse, unfortunately, she won't be, but you'll have to wait and see what part she plays in him becoming a werewolf and him turning.
PracticallyCharmed: Thank you so much! I'm so glad you liked it and Aliyah, Bonnie and Caroline. They're now the main characters in the story and they'll have plenty of scenes together ;)
Aiphira: Glad you liked it!
Skyeward MusicLover: Well, it had to be an Original. I don't really see her with Finn. So, it had to be Elijah or Kol. Kol's younger than her, so it wouldn't have worked. And Elijah adds a lot of drama to the Nikliyah relationship, not to mention, I think Klaus has this feeling of inadequacy with Elijah, with Tatia choosing Elijah and Klaus being the bastard son and Elijah being legitimate.
NicoleR85: I'm glad you liked it! I'm keeping my mouth shut on Alijah because I want their relationship to be a surprise when I get around to it in the story :)
Werewolfe22: Well, Elijah never knew about Klaus and Aliyah until she told him and that was after they had been married for awhile. But that'll be explained in this chapter. I have no idea who to pair him up with. Definitely not Caroline, because I've got another person in mind for her. And I disagree, I think it's the other way around. I wouldn't want Caroline with Elijah, because he has a tendency to fall for the Petrova doppelganger and Caroline deserves to not be second to Elena with someone and that won't be Elijah. But I really do love the Carlijah pairing. It's one of my guilty pleasures. I'm tossing up between Kalijah and Elijah/OC (maybe one of Aliyah's fledglings). Kalijah is problematic because of the way that I've characterise Aliyah and Elijah's relationship and a lot more went on in 1492 between the four of them. But, who do you think Elijah should be with?
Guest: Thank you so much!
bigdloveztexaz: Thank you so much! I'm glad you're liking the backstory. There's so much more to come, 'cause I've been a bit tight-lipped about Aliyah's backstory.
lilnudger82: I'm so glad you took a chance on the story :) Damon and Stefan are just baby vampires and they think they're so strong around Aliyah ;) I like the idea of Aliyah playing the manipulator behind the scenes, making things go her way without anyone finding out. I think you're spot-on about Elena. I hate the fact that she's such a martyr and she's not a good martyr. If she were a good martyr, she'd get hurt or she'd die (and she really should've, considering the stunts she pulls) and no one would come to save her. But because everyone comes to save her, it becomes really tedious and annoying because she wants to save everyone's life but they all get hurt because of her. Aliyah and Damon have this really snarky relationship with innuendos that Klaus will get super annoyed about. And I hope you like the Tonnie in this story!
Elin: There's a lot of stuff that happened in the 10th century between Klaus and Aliyah and Elijah which will be revealed soon. I know a lot of people guessed that Elijah was Aliyah's first husband :)
PrincessMagic: Thank you so much! Elijah and Aliyah will be very good friends in this. They may not be married anymore, but Elijah and Aliyah rely on each other in a way that makes Klaus very jealous about the nature of their relationship. They're like best friends with something more attached.
tate4eva: I'm so glad you liked the Caronliyah bonding :) I know a lot of people guessed that Elijah was Aliyah's first husband. And I really wanted to put in the baby Bonnie and baby Tyler adorable scene because it kind of highlights their relationship, they're meant to be, pretty much.
NikkiChaos: Oh, you're so sweet, thanks! I'm glad you like Bonnie's development in the story. She's going to be this major powerhouse by the time we get to The Originals. And I'm glad you like Aliyah too. And you can relate to her, which is a giant plus in my books. Klaus has a lot of layers in this story. Aliyah really gets to him in a way that no one else can and I hope this chapter makes Klaus' real sort of personality clearer with how his motivations work. I'm trying to keep as much close to my chest as possible because I love suspense and I've pretty much worked out what's going to happen so I'm on the edge of my seat, waiting for everyone's reactions to what I've planned. Aliyah's kind of self-contained. She sticks to herself. She loves a very finite amount of people. But she can be very bloodthirsty, especially when you mess with her family. I think it's because Ayanna and her ended badly, she kind of latches onto family, like the Mikaelsons, her fledglings, Bonnie and Caroline now. Thank you so much for your review, it was so lovely!
Guest: Thank you so much!
aria: Thank you so much and I hope you like this chapter!
Lady Syndra: I think Bonnie had a few chances to walk away from Elena and Sheila's death was one of them and I think that could've been the proper catalyst for Bonnie walking away because by the time Abby was turned, Bonnie was too much invested in everything. So, I used Sheila's death as a way to get Bonnie to turn away from Elena, Stefan and Damon, so that she could be a part of the Original group. I think what I was going for was Bonnie always being aware that Elena and the Salvatores indirectly caused Sheila's death and her holding onto that resentment. That way, it makes it easier for me to pull her away and bring her into the Original camp.
King and the Lionhearted: Yep ;) Elijah and her definitely had sex and we may even see an excerpt from their sexy times in this chapter ;) I'm sure I'll end up going into greater detail later on.
mickeymouseftw: Thank you so much!
BeaAdriana: You've pretty much got it on the head. I think it would be worse than Tatia because Aliyah's still alive and it'll always be a point of contention between the brothers. Klaus had Aliyah first but Elijah married her first, so there'll always be irrational jealousy from Klaus. I think it'll be interesting to play with the whole werewolf-hybrid mate trope and how Bonnie's magic reacts to Tyler becoming a werewolf. I never liked the way Bonnie treated Caroline when she first turned, mainly because I hated the fact that Elena got a free pass in Season 4. Caroline's transition was traumatic enough without Bonnie being judgemental on top of that. I'm in the process of writing a Elijah/OC/Klaus threesome/crossover where the OC actually calls Bonnie out on what she put Caroline through in the beginning of Season 2. I'm tossing up between Stebekah and Mabekah but I feel like neither of them deserve Rebekah, because they've screwed with that girl enough, so I'm not sure. I may end up going with Stebekah because Stefan's an alright character and I don't want him to die with a fiery passion like I do with Damon or crawl into a hole and hide for the whole of eternity like I do Elena.
LoveLeesa: Thank you so much!
HaruHarry: Thank you so much! Don't worry, we'll see bits and pieces of present-day Klaus in the next couple of chapters before he makes his grand entrance in The Last Dance.
Stormdancer
Chapter 12
Redemption Song
"Wait, Elijah?" Caroline's eyes widened. "Like, really dark-haired, handsome, older Elijah we just saw in your memories?" Aliyah nodded with a small smile. "He's pretty hot, Lee-Lee. You could've done worse." She grinned, trying to make Aliyah feel better as she spilled her darkest secrets to two people whom she was afraid would judge her for the choices she had made in her long life.
Aliyah laughed. "I could've, that's true." She mused, rubbing the back of her neck, sheepishly.
His head fell onto her shoulder, his nose grazing the curve of her bare shoulder as his muscled arm wrapped around her waist. She threw her head back and laughed, the low purr filling the modest hut that he and his brothers had built for them. Her fingers trailed up his naked back and weaved into his dark, shoulder-length waves, untying the few braids in his hair and sweeping the locks away from his distinguished face.
"Isn't this nice, husband?" Aliyah purred, his sinewy form curling on top of her. "After such a hard day at work."
Her head tipped back and her frame rubbed against the soft fur of the animal pelt they were lying on.
"Yes, lying with one's wife beside the warm fire is definitely one of life's pleasures." His voice was a low, pleasurable rumble in her ear. His lips brushed the shell of her ear.
She bit her lip, coyly, her dark eyes flashing, and she parted her thighs with a wicked smile on her face. His head dipped down and kissed the honey-coloured skin of her stomach, his nose grazing her navel as she slid down her body, finally stilling when her thighs were draped over his shoulder and he was face to face with the heated, damp flesh between her thighs.
"If you make me beg-" Aliyah began.
Her words broke off in a tortured whimper as he finally ran his tongue over her, a pleasant smile on his handsome face. She threw her head back and cried out in pleasure as he lapped at her sweet taste, smirking to himself as she wailed like a siren above him, thrashing against the ground, her fingers curling against the fur of the animal pelt.
The ground cracked beneath them as her magic lashed out, her eyes rolling back into her head. She arched her back and pressed her thighs against the side of his head, her fingers tugging at his hair.
"Oh, you are magnificent, my love." Aliyah slumped over, a breathy chuckle falling from her lips.
"So, what happened next?" Bonnie leaned closer, eagerly, the complexity of the story gaining her attention.
"Well, there was no protest and Elijah and I were married." Aliyah explained. "And to keep the peace between the brothers, at least on Niklaus' part, I distanced myself from him. And life went on for around a year. We lived in peace with the werewolves. Every full moon, we would all go down and hide in the caves under what is now the Lockwood cellar, while my mother would place a barrier over the entrance to the caves so that the wolves couldn't get inside."
"So, what happened?" Caroline asked.
Aliyah's teeth dragged over her lip. "One full moon, around a year after I married Elijah, my youngest brother-in-law, Henrik, convinced Niklaus to sneak out with him and go and see the werewolves transform. He was always so interested in things like that. Niklaus always was his favourite and he could never deny Henrik anything. So, they went out into the forest and Henrik was horribly slaughtered by the wolves."
Caroline and Bonnie covered their mouths with their hands as they watched a desperate, broken Klaus carrying Henrik's mangled body in his arms as he rushed back into the village.
He didn't look older than twelve.
"Niklaus never forgave himself for what happened to Henrik." Aliyah said, quietly, her hand splaying across her stomach. "Esther broke that night. It is a horrible thing to lose one's child." She said, thoughtfully, running her hand through her hair. "There does not go by one day where I do not think of Henrik. He was such a sweet boy. Full of life and quick to laughter. He was kind and gentle. He was much too young." She murmured.
"I'm so sorry, Aliyah." Bonnie whispered.
"Anyway," Aliyah cleared her throat and blinked away any tears that had formed after she mentioned Henrik. "My mother-in-law was determined to not lose another child, so she and Mikael went to my mother and asked her to cast a spell on their children and myself that would make us stronger than the wolves, so that we could defend ourselves and the village. My mother refused to help Esther. She knew what it would do to the balance of nature were she to assist in creating something like vampires. So, Esther, blinded by her own grief, stole the spell that Qetsiyah created, the immortality spell, and adjusted it so that the recipients would gain powers that would aid them in a war against the wolves."
"So, wait, our ancestor was the one who devised this spell in the first place." Bonnie gulped in a huge breath of air.
Aliyah nodded. "My mother inherited the spell as part of her legacy. She refused to help Esther. She understood that the balance of nature had to be maintained at all costs, and by creating creatures such as vampires, it would be tantamount to destroying the balance to have such creatures walking the Earth. As my mother would not help her and she knew that if she asked me, I would first seek counsel from my mother before attempting such a spell, Esther felt that she had no other choice but to steal the spell from my mother and perform it herself." She explained.
"However, nature chose to fight back and gave us weaknesses for every power we received. Esther used the Sun as the symbol for life and the white oak tree, one of nature's few eternal objects, as the source of immortality. After we awoke as vampires, the sun that had given us life burnt us, our thirst was insatiable, and our neighbours could close their doors to us. Vervain flowers that grew at the base of the white oak tree burnt us and protected the humans from our compulsion. The white oak tree, which had given us our immortality, could also destroy us." Aliyah said, grimly.
"So, your mother-in-law was the one to create the vampires?" Bonnie murmured, biting her lower lip as she processed this information.
"Yes." Aliyah nodded. "One night, Elijah and I visited Esther's home for dinner. We were eating drinking wine, when suddenly Mikael grabbed his sword and ran Elijah through. Kol and Finn tried to stop him, but he killed them too. He stabbed Rebekah in the stomach and then he turned on me. I remember using my magic on him and trying to run away, but he was too quick for me and he stabbed me in the heart. All I remember was the pain and Niklaus screaming my name before he too was killed." She murmured, her eyes glazing over as she remembered everything.
Caroline and Bonnie swallowed back the tears, as they watched all of them being murdered in front of their own eyes, tears finally falling when they witnessed Aliyah gurgling on her own blood, before collapsing onto the floor of the hut, dead, her hand curling once, desperately, before it slackened.
"When I woke up, the only thing that I could think about was the thirst." Aliyah whispered. "My father-in-law dragged in some girl from the village and sliced her wrist, forcibly feeding us the blood so that we would complete what the spell required for us to transition into vampires. It was then we realised that Mikael had also had the wine." She said, darkly.
"The wine?" Bonnie's brow furrowed.
"The wine was the reason why we were turned into vampires." Aliyah explained, gently. "Mikael then killed himself and returned as a vampire in transition. He had already completed his transition before he did the same to us."
"Why was the wine the reason you were turned into vampires?" Caroline asked, softly.
"There was something in the wine that bound the immortality spell to us and turned us into vampires. The wine will make you understand exactly why Elena is so important to all of this and why she and Katherine exist." Aliyah said, quietly. "Anyway," She said, before either Bonnie or Caroline could interrupt her or divert her attention. "We all drank the girl's blood, completed the transition and became vampires. The first time we ventured outside, the sun burnt us and we were forced to remain inside until my mother-in-law made us daylight rings out of lapis lazuli." She said, knowingly. "The hunger was unbearable." She murmured. "But, for me, the worst part was losing my magic." She whispered. "I wanted to die. I would have died." She said, honestly. "I almost killed myself, fashioned myself a stake from the white oak tree, but Elijah stopped me before I could do something stupid." She cracked a smile. "He told me that, if I gave our new life a chance, he would never let me fall. He has spent a thousand years protecting me from myself." She said, wistfully.
"But everything changed when Niklaus killed his first person in his bloodlust." Aliyah said, quietly. "He was a good man, Niklaus. I don't care what anyone else says, I know him better than anyone. As a human, he was kind and gentle and he loved life and there was a time when he didn't have a cruel bone in his body." She explained, slowly. "But then, the truth of him was revealed after his first murder."
"What do you mean?" Caroline said, confused.
"Do you remember what I said about werewolves?" Aliyah asked, suddenly. "I said that the gene passes through a bloodline and for the curse to be triggered, the person must kill another human being." She said, gently. "It was when Niklaus drained his first villager that he triggered the werewolf curse. We learnt the shameful secret that Esther had been keeping to herself for Niklaus' entire life. Niklaus was the product of an affair that Esther had with one of the wolves from the neighbouring village. Of course, when Mikael found out, he slaughtered Niklaus' biological father and the rest of the werewolf village, thereby igniting a war between the species, which only worsened when the vampires found out that a werewolf's bite on a full moon is fatal to vampires."
"But that's impossible." Bonnie shook her head. "What would that make Klaus? A vampire or a werewolf?" She asked, curiously and with the slightest bit of dread.
"It makes him both. A hybrid." Aliyah said, bluntly. "Deadlier than a werewolf or a vampire."
"A hybrid." Bonnie breathed, sinking back in her chair and running her hands over her face.
"How is that even possible?" Caroline whispered, running a hand over her damp forehead.
"Do you remember how the hunger felt last night?" Aliyah asked, slowly. "How it felt as though you would collapse if you didn't get just a single drop of blood? How it felt to finally sink your teeth into the carnival worker?" She murmured, her eyes flashing as she herself remembered the all-consuming bloodlust she had experienced when she had first turned a thousand years ago. She remembered what it was like to sate her hunger, to have that first drop of blood fall onto her tongue.
Bonnie looked uncomfortable by the tone and subject matter of the conversation and shifted in her seat, her stomach churning at the thought of having the metallic taste on her tongue.
Caroline flinched, guilt settling low in her stomach, as she remembered watching the light leave the carnival worker's eyes. She also remembered the taste of his heady blood on her lips, how good it felt to finally satiate her hunger. She wondered, absentmindedly, if the worker had a family: a wife, maybe a few kids. She had taken him away from them.
"It was exactly like that for us as soon as we changed." Aliyah purred. "And Niklaus succumbed to the hunger just as all of us did, of course, Kol and Rebekah succumbed long before he did." She mused. "He drank a villager dry and suddenly his bones started to break. He collapsed and his eyes turned gold. I remember being so terrified for him. I thought he was about to die, that something had gone wrong with the spell, that I would lose the man I loved the most in the world, and my heart started to break." She whispered, almost to herself. "Elijah and Mikael dragged me away before I could see him transform, but I managed to track him for the next few days as he killed numerous villagers in his wolf form." She said, quietly. "It wasn't his fault." She said, quickly, seeing the judgement rising in Bonnie's and Caroline's eyes, determined to defend her husband at least for some of his actions.
Niklaus had done some terrible things in the last thousand years and there were few that Aliyah could not defend no matter how much she tried, but this was something she could justify.
"He… he didn't realise what he was doing." She whispered. She swallowed hard. "Finally, he turned back into a human… well, human form… and he was… appalled at what he had done." She tucked her hair behind her ear as she ducked her head down.
"That was when Mikael came." She said, slowly, swallowing back the torrent of emotion that overwhelmed her. "He and Elijah," She bit through the bitterness that swelled up inside of her as she remembered how Elijah, her honourable, sweet, good Elijah, had been the one to help Mikael tie Niklaus down. "They pinned Niklaus down as Mikael forced Esther to cast a spell on him."
"What was the spell?" Bonnie's eyes searched Aliyah's and she swore that she had never before seen the women so distraught at the thought of her memories.
"She bound his true self." Aliyah explained, grimly, crossing her arms over her chest in a defensive gesture. "She cast a spell on him that bound his hybrid self, making him simply an Original vampire like the rest of us. If he breaks the curse, which has been his single motivation for a thousand years, he would be more powerful than an Original vampire or any werewolf." She tipped her head back, letting the sunlight stream through the canopy and land on her toffee-coloured skin. "If he breaks his curse, he can sire his own bloodline. A race of hybrids, so he'd never be alone."
He's never been alone. She thought, bitterly. But he'd never see it like that. And I'm sure that he sees me leaving him as further confirmation that it's only him against the world.
"But you helped him, didn't you?" Caroline asked, carefully, having drained the last drop of blood from the bag and now sipping at her tequila, ignoring the burn in her throat. She was stunned at the delay in which the alcohol affected her. She had almost finished the glass of potent tequila, yet she couldn't even feel a buzz yet.
"Yes, because I love him." Aliyah said, mournfully. "But I left him. I washed my hands off all of his drama." She shook her head. "I love him a great deal, but I'm sick of waiting for him to become even more powerful. I am sick of giving up everything for him and for him to treat me as if I'm just another weapon he can use whenever it suits him." She said, darkly, her resentment showing clearly in her voice.
"So, how can he break the curse?" Bonnie asked, curiously, determined to change the subject as she could see it was upsetting Aliyah.
"Well, Niklaus must sacrifice a vampire and a werewolf on a full moon." Aliyah shrugged, leaving out the last convenient ingredient to the ritual. "If he manages to break the curse, he will be stronger than any other Original vampire, and he will be truly immortal."
"Wait, but I thought you said that tree that Esther used in the spell to create all of you could kill you?" Bonnie's brow furrowed, trying to put the pieces of a complicated story together.
"Yes, a stake made from the wood of the white oak tree, would kill us." Aliyah explained.
She jumped to her feet and tipped one of the chairs beside her onto over to the side, exposing the legs of the chair to her. She broke one off and shredded it until she was left with a shard of wood in her palm. She held it up to them.
"Any wooden stake is fatal to a vampire." Aliyah turned to Caroline, soberly. "A wooden stake to the heart will kill you, Caroline." She said, seriously. "But I wouldn't worry too much, part of me helping you adjust to your vampirism will be me teaching you how to fight with your new strength and speed." She turned to Bonnie. "And don't think you're getting out of fight training, either, Bonnie girl. It's my firm opinion that every single woman should know how to defend themselves." She said, grimly.
"But, I have magic." Bonnie protested.
Aliyah shrugged. "There were times in my human life where my magic didn't always work on command. Sometimes, I was entirely too scared for my magic to work properly and I was almost hurt." She said, slowly. "I want you to be confident in your own strength were your magic to fail you at some point in your life. I'll be there to protect you if you need me and I'm sure Caroline will be as well, but I'd feel much better if you knew how to protect yourself." She said, sweetly.
"How did you learn how to fight?" Caroline asked, interestedly.
"Well, both of Niklaus and Elijah thought I should know, in case neither of them were there to protect me." She grimaced, remembering how she had rolled her eyes at that a thousand years ago, yet when it had come true for her, she had regretted every single moment in which she had scoffed at their lectures. "It's one of the few things that they have managed to agree on." She shrugged. "Anyway, a wooden stake will kill any vampire if they are stabbed in the heart. However, with an Original vampire, we can be staked in the heart, but all it will do is neutralise us temporarily. We will start to desiccate and appear as if we are dead, but we will be able to revive in a few hours and pull the stake out." She explained. "However, as the white oak tree was used as a part of the spell that turned us into vampires, a stake made from the wood of the white oak tree can actually kill us if we are stabbed in the heart." She said, slowly.
"Can I ask you a question?" Caroline asked her, hesitantly.
"Of course, pretty girl." Aliyah crooned.
"Why are you telling us any of this?" She asked, curiously. "I mean, do you really trust us with knowing all of this. You just told us how to kill you." She said, pointedly.
Aliyah laughed. "One, Bonnie's magic cannot affect me due to the protection spell my mother placed on me, so I have nothing to fear from her or any other witch. Two, Caroline, while you are a vampire, you are a baby vampire and I am much stronger than you. Three, I do honestly care about the two of you. I don't have much family left in the world, but I'd like to think that the two of you are part of my family." She said, determinedly. "Four, my family and I burnt the only white oak tree in existence a millennia ago, soon after we were turned into vampires. None of us liked the idea the tree that consisted of the only weapon that could kill us being in existence." She shrugged.
"So, you're pretty much immortal." Bonnie's eyes widened. "I mean, if the white oak tree doesn't exist anymore, there's nothing that can kill you or your family."
Aliyah shrugged. "Pretty much." She pursed her lips. "However, there is exactly one white oak stake in existence."
"What do you mean?" Caroline frowned. "I thought you said that you and your family burnt down the only white oak tree in existence." She said, pointedly.
Aliyah nodded. "We did. But, we underestimated something or rather, someone." She said, grimly. "We underestimated the anger that Mikael would bear towards Niklaus for being a bastard." She growled low in her throat. "Before we could burn down the white oak tree, Mikael managed to fashion himself a single stake from the wood."
"But he's your father-in-law." Bonnie protested.
"Yes, he's my father-in-law. He is the father of my first husband and three of my in-laws. And he is Niklaus' stepfather. However, after we were turned into vampires and Esther's indiscretion was revealed, all Mikael was driven by was killing Niklaus for what he represented." She said, darkly.
"But it's not Klaus' fault that Esther cheated on him." Caroline scowled and crossed her arms over her chest. "I mean, what the hell was she doing when Mikael blamed Klaus?" She snapped.
"In all my life, and I have known Mikael since I was born, I have never known him to be one that listens to reason or logic. And do not think that Esther escaped for what she had done." Aliyah raised an eyebrow. "As soon as Esther finished binding Niklaus' werewolf side, Mikael tore her heart out of her chest." She said, grimly.
"What?" Both Caroline and Bonnie breathed.
Aliyah swallowed hard, the lie slipping easily off her tongue. It was easier that admitting the truth of what had happened that day, what she had witnessed and what she had forgiven. She wondered if this is what loving Niklaus had turned her into. A woman who turns her back on one of the greatest atrocities that her husband committed.
"Mikael killed Esther due to her infidelity. Mikael always was a prideful man." She shook her head. "Even as a human, and that was magnified once he was turned into a vampire. He slaughtered the whole werewolf village and Esther's lover because he couldn't stand what his wife had done to his honour and pride. She had betrayed him and their marriage when she fucked a werewolf. He started a millennia long hatred between werewolves and vampires because of his stupid pride; it wasn't exactly a long shot that he would kill Esther, but it was still quite unexpected. Niklaus and I watched as it happened. It happened so quick that there was nothing we could do to stop it.
"Your father-in-law sounds like a real dick." Caroline slumped back in her chair, downing the last of the tequila in her glass.
Aliyah chuckled at Caroline's candid words. "There must have something good that Esther saw in him for her to fall in love. She once told Rebekah and myself that Mikael used to send her poems when he was courting her and he would carry the jugs of water for her when she came back from the well." She muttered, looking off in the trees. "After he killed Esther, my father-in-law took off in a rage with the last white oak stake. He has hunted us down throughout the centuries for mistakes none of us made willingly. There have only been a few times where he has been close enough where we can say he almost killed us."
"Your father-in-law has been hunting you for a thousand years." Bonnie said, slowly.
"He's been hunting Niklaus for a thousand years." Aliyah amended. "But we all chose Niklaus' side and he bears a special sort of hatred towards me." She shrugged.
"Why?" Caroline frowned in confusion.
"Because I represent everything that went wrong in his life." Aliyah said, darkly. "I am a mirror image of everything that happened to him."
Caroline and Bonnie exchanged bewildered looks.
"What do you mean, Lee-Lee?" Bonnie asked, slowly.
"Well, Esther and I have more similarities that I'd care to admit." Aliyah grimaced.
"Okay," Caroline said, slowly. "I think we need to take a time-out here. I'm confused. How are you and Esther alike? No offence, from what I've heard about your mother-in-law, she's a Grade A bitch who let her husband beat on her son and did nothing to defend him, and then she cursed him, even though she was the reason you guys became vampires and Klaus become a hybrid in the first place. And you... you're awesome. I'm not seeing the similarities here."
"Well, think about it." Aliyah said, pointedly, ducking her head to hide the smile that curved the corners of her lips at Caroline's fervent defence of her. "We were both powerful witches in our own right. We both had good, honourable, strong warriors as husbands – which were desired characteristics in a potential husband back in the Viking age – and Mikael certainly thought he was one and Elijah really was." She said, wistfully, her fingers stroking the one of the wedding rings that remained on her finger.
It had been a thousand years since she had last since considered herself as Elijah's wife and yet she could never bring herself to remove the ring, resolving to keep it on her person so as to remind her as to what she was before bloodlust and cruelty overtook her mind and turned her into a someone who was so different to the girl that Niklaus had fallen in love with as a boy and Elijah had fallen in love with as a husband.
"Esther was married to Mikael, who apparently loved her very much, and I was married to Elijah, who truly loved me very much. We both betrayed our 'good, honourable and strong husbands' for a beast. Esther betrayed Mikael for Niklaus' biological father and I betrayed Elijah for Niklaus – at least that's what Mikael believed." She shrugged. "I hate to admit it, but even I see the similarities." She pursed her lips, feeling her anger start to simmer low in her stomach. "And, unfortunately, so did Mikael. So, while he has spent the last thousand years hunting down Niklaus for something that is no fault of his, he has spent the last thousand years hunting me down for making the same mistakes that his wife did." She said, grimly. "Something that is actually my fault."
"But that's not fair, I mean, he was the one who arranged the marriage between you and Elijah." Caroline protested.
"That doesn't excuse what I did." Aliyah shook her head. "I am not one to deny what I did to Elijah. He truly was heartbroken when he found out about my feelings for Niklaus." It was as if something heavy was crushing her lungs and her heart, making it hard for her continue her story. "And, in those days, a woman honoured her husband, she treated him like a god." Aliyah said, simply, leaning back in her chair. "I did love Elijah. He was my husband once." She said, pointedly. "I suppose, in Mikael's view and in mine, I betrayed him for Niklaus." She murmured. "I really do hate the fact that I can be compared to the likes of her." She grimaced.
"You don't like Esther much, do you?" Caroline said, knowingly.
"There was a time when I looked at Esther as if she were another mother to me. She was… very good to me when I was growing up. She treated me as one of her own children. But she succumbed to dark magic later on. It twisted her. It made her different to the woman who had practically raised me. She was always aware of my relationship with Niklaus. Only she and Kol were aware of it before my wedding to Elijah." She swallowed hard. "I never really forgave her for that. She could have saved the three of us a great deal of heartache if she had just spoken up and vetoed the arrangement." She whispered, shaking her head. "She wasn't afraid of Mikael in the way I or Niklaus was. He wouldn't dare hurt her at the risk of her using her magic on him." She ran her hands through her hair.
"She turned her back on Niklaus." Aliyah said, simply.
Both Caroline and Bonnie knew that, while Aliyah may offer alternative explanations as to why she despised Esther, Aliyah's true hatred of the woman stemmed from the fact that Esther had abandoned Klaus when he had needed her the most. They both marvelled at the absolute loyalty and devotion she had to Klaus, despite being separated from him for over eighty years. They wondered exactly how their reunion would go ahead. When they wrapped their arms around each other, would it be sweet and affectionate or would it be biting and painful? Could it be that those two were destined to be with one another? Aliyah didn't seem to be able to give him up for anything.
"That is something that I cannot and will not forgive. It was her job to protect Niklaus from Mikael's wrath and she did nothing. It is a mother's job to protect her children." She hissed. "Even from her own husband, if the situation calls for it." She shook her head. "She cursed him, made him weak in the face of a father who has always hated him. She denied him his true nature. Perhaps he would have been different if she had just showed that she trusted him not to become a monster." She shook her head. "Her death was horrific and I do honestly feel regret for the way she died. But she played a dangerous game, with her husband, with her son and with magic, and she paid the price for what she did. She imposed this curse on all of us, she washed her hands off a son who had done nothing but love her, and she received her punishment for what she did."
"Can I ask you a question, Aliyah?" Bonnie asked, hesitantly, pushing herself forward in the chair.
Aliyah smiled at Bonnie. "Of course, Bonnie girl, go ahead." She said, encouragingly.
"Do you still love Elijah?" Bonnie asked, dread simmering in her stomach.
"I will always love Elijah." Aliyah said, simply. "I grew up in a time where wives held their husbands in high regard. And Elijah was never cruel to me the way he could have been after he found out that I wasn't a virgin on our wedding night. He was quite forthcoming about the issue, despite his own lack of experience and belief in virtue." Aliyah shrugged. "He never held it against me. I grew to love him, especially when I started to distance myself from Niklaus. I had never looked at Elijah in that way before. He was always an older brother to me. Mind you, I once denied my feelings for Niklaus because I was certain that he could never be anything more than my best friend." She mused. "So, yes, I suppose I do still love Elijah. I was his wife when we were turned into vampires, so any feelings I had, for either Niklaus or Elijah, were only magnified, especially with the loss of my magic. Elijah helped me adjust to not having my magic after we turned into vampires. He made sure that I didn't do anything stupid after I turned, like attempt to commit suicide."
"But, was it really that bad?" Bonnie asked, quietly.
Aliyah nodded, wryly. "I've come to terms with it now, but there was a time in which I couldn't stand the thought of myself. I couldn't look at my reflection without flinching away. Imagine what it would be like to turn into something that went against your very being." She raised an eyebrow. "I felt wrong. I felt sick. I killed people and drank their blood and in the next moment, I wanted to die." She hissed out through clenched teeth. "It felt so nice to drink the blood but I knew that with ever drop that fell onto my tongue, I would more and more damned." She shook her head. "My eyes would change and my fangs would descend. Remember how it felt to look in the mirror last night, Caroline." She said, dryly. "I would look at my reflection in the river as I washed all of the blood off and I would think about how sickening I looked."
Caroline swallowed hard and felt herself ache for Aliyah. She leaned over and wrapped her arms around the older woman, feeling the bond between her sire and her throb between them. She remembered how it felt to look at herself in the mirror last night and wondered if it were that much worse when you despised every inch of what you had become. She hadn't even known Aliyah for all that long, but the woman had been kind to her. She had cared and she had listened. She had protected her. She wondered if there was something supernatural to this connection she had with Aliyah, now that the woman was the one who had sired her. She didn't think she would mind if it turned out there was some mystical bond between a vampire and another vampire they sired. Aliyah was her friend and nothing would change that. She was determined to stand by the side of the woman who had helped her get through the worst night of her life.
Aliyah was slightly startled by the fond embrace that Caroline gave her. She hesitantly wrapped her arms around her fledgling, stroking her hair much like she had last night. She swallowed hard and her eyes met Bonnie's tired and worried ones. Bonnie reached out with one of her hands and took hers, squeezing reassuringly, telling her silently that her story wasn't changing anything about how much Bonnie cared about her.
Bonnie shook her head. "Klaus couldn't have been okay with it, right? I mean, after the two of you got back together again?" She asked, curiously.
Aliyah chuckled. "No, he wasn't. He still isn't. It's still somewhat of a sore point between the three of us, but since Elijah and I ended our marriage, Elijah has never once attempted to proposition me. Niklaus trusts him with me to a point, because Elijah is the only one of his siblings that has never faltered in his belief to him." She explained.
Caroline smirked. "Don't know how he could be okay with it. I mean, that's not to say that I think you would cheat," She said, hastily, making Aliyah smile. "And even if you did, no one would blame you because Elijah's pretty hot." She took in a deep breath before she started to babble, seeing that Aliyah was close to laughing at her, but feeling her insides warm as she realised that she was the one responsible for her sire being happy, especially after the anguished look that had passed through her eyes while she was regaling them with her story. "But if I was in love with a guy who had married and slept with my sister, I wouldn't be okay with them being friends. I'd probably be jealous all the time." She said, dramatically, letting her head lean against the chair.
Bonnie shuddered. "Don't know how Elena and Stefan do it." She grimaced, her skin crawling.
Aliyah started to laugh, throwing her head back, the dark, silvery sound echoing through the trees. Bonnie smiled at the sound, worried that Aliyah bringing up all of these bad memories in her story would change her mood, indefinitely. But Aliyah managed to keep her mind detached from anything that would sink her into a deep despair. Her past was her past. There was nothing she could do about it.
Caroline looked between the two, thoroughly confused by the reference. "What? What do you mean? What does this have to do with Stefan and Elena?"
Aliyah chuckled, wiping the tears from her eyes. "I believe Bonnie's referring to Katherine. And Stefan."
"No." Caroline's eyes widened, dramatically. "No way. Stefan and Katherine?" She said, incredulously. "Stefan used to date the she-bitch from hell?"
Aliyah cackled. "I've never heard someone call her that. I think I may just use that. Oh, Caroline, pretty girl, you are going to be so amazing when I'm done with you." She said, proudly. "And yes, Katherine and Stefan had somewhat of a relationship back in 1864, when the Salvatore brothers. Unbeknownst to Stefan, Katherine was also seeing Damon at the same time."
Caroline grimaced. "Wow. That's entirely too much information." She still felt her stomach churn at the thought of Damon, especially now that her mind was clear as to what he had done to her. The sick bastard.
"Anyway, it was only after Stefan transitioned into a vampire that he found out that Katherine had been compelling him to love her." Aliyah explained, throwing her arms over the back of the chair and crossing her legs. "She had also been compelling him to drink her blood for weeks. He and Damon, when Katherine was captured by the Founding Families in 1864 to be burnt alive in Fell's Church, attempted to save her and they were shot and killed. Both of them came back to life and had to complete the transition." She clarified. "I was the one who carried their bodies from the woods and brought them to Steven's Quarry. Stefan woke up and I explained how he was to complete the transition."
"So, Stefan and Damon have slept with Katherine, who's the spitting image of Elena." Caroline said, slowly, attempting to process all of the information. "That's kinda gross, if you think about it." She grimaced. "How can Elena know if they're looking at her and actually seeing Katherine?" She shook her head.
"She doesn't." Aliyah grinned. "That's what makes it so funny." She smirked.
Caroline shook her head, unable to prevent the small, endearing smile forming on her face. "You're kind of a bitch, you know that?" She said, playfully, her eyes flashing, wickedly.
"I am." Aliyah nodded, proudly. "I'm a thousand years old, darling. I have to be a bitch." She shrugged. "And I don't like Elena all that much. But what she did was stupid. Why would someone deliberately get into a relationship with a man who was seeing your doppelganger?" She shook her head in disbelief.
"So, why were you in Mystic Falls in 1864?" Caroline asked, propping her elbows on her thighs and resting her head on her upturned palms. She wondered how drastically her life had changed that she was able to talk about the woman sitting opposite to her, one of the first vampires to exist in all of history, who had been passing through her town in 1864, while her best friend's evil twin was shacking up with two brothers, one of whom was currently going to her school and was said best friend's boyfriend, and the other whom had horrifically brutalised her.
"I was looking for Katerina." Aliyah said, simply.
Bonnie frowned, her brow furrowing as a thought occurred to her. "You said you knew Katherine as a human? How did you meet her?" Bonnie asked, curiously. "I mean, why is she so important to all of this? Why were you looking for her in 1864?"
"Well, she came to my home in 1492, where I was staying with Elijah and Niklaus. Rebekah and Kol were somewhere in Europe, but the three of us set up shop in England at the time." She pursed her lips, her eyes glazing over. "When I first saw her, I have to admit I was startled. She was the spitting image of someone I had known when I was human." Aliyah said, simply, her teeth dragging over her lip when she remembered the tingling sensation on her skin and the feeling of a weight settling low in her stomach when she had seen that familiar olive skin, doe eyes and oval face.
"Wait," Bonnie's eyes widened, dramatically. "Does that mean that there's another doppelganger, even before Katherine, someone else with Elena's face?" She asked, incredulously.
"Well, there was." Aliyah corrected. "But she's been dead for a thousand years." She said, simply.
"Who was she?" Caroline asked, quietly.
"Her name was Tatia. Tatia Petrova. She was comparatively new to our village, unlike myself, Niklaus, Kol, Rebekah, Henrik, who had lived there our entire lives, and Elijah and Finn, who had spent majority of their life in the village. She arrived at our village when I was around eighteen. She was a year younger than me." Aliyah mused.
"You didn't like her, did you? That's why you don't like Elena. I thought it was because Katherine managed to piss you off the way she does everyone else. But it was Tatia all along." Bonnie said, knowingly, her eyes lighting up in epiphany.
"Well, Tatia and I did not get along." Aliyah said, bluntly, reaching out and touching their hands.
Caroline and Bonnie were startled, rearing back in shock and disbelief, when they saw the spitting image of Elena, with braided, messy hair, and a long dress, arguing with Aliyah's past self, the latter's hair wild around her face, fists clenched as she attempted to control her magic.
"Tatia was fiercely coveted by many of the men in our village." Aliyah began to explain.
"That sounds about right." Caroline muttered under her breath.
Bonnie and Aliyah chuckled at that.
"Mind you, I never really saw the attraction." Aliyah shrugged. She winked at Caroline. "I may be biased, but I definitely find you more attractive than Elena." She waggled her eyebrows and Caroline blushed, making Bonnie grin. "I have to count personality and Elena's personality, in my opinion, has much to be desired." She grinned.
"So, why didn't you like each other?" Bonnie asked, curiously.
Aliyah licked her dry lips and shifted in her seat. "Tatia… already had a child by another man before she was married." She explained. "In those times, that would cause a normal woman to be ruined beyond repair. No man would marry a woman who had already lost her virginity before her wedding night." She murmured, ignoring the horrified yet angry looks she received from Bonnie and Caroline. "Hey, I never said I agreed with it." She protested. "Not to mention, I'm not exactly the person to defend that stupid value." She muttered to herself. "Anyway, despite Tatia having a child by another man, her beauty was enough to blind the men in the village to her faults. Of course, it didn't endear her to the women in the village, but she managed to draw in a few girls onto her side with her charisma. But, mostly the older women looked down on her. She revelled in her ability to tempt men, knowing that any man would drown themselves in order to have a chance to be her suitor." She growled. Her shoulders slumped. "There was even some time where Elijah, himself, was quite taken with her." She bit out, the familiar jealousy she had experienced gnawing at her bones. "However, she was seeing many other men at the same time." She growled low in her throat.
"Please tell me that you did something to her." Caroline pleaded.
"No," Aliyah laughed, shaking her head. "I didn't. You see, I didn't have to." She smirked. "While Tatia had the eye of many of the eligible men in the village, she truly wanted Niklaus." She said, proudly.
"And Klaus wanted you." Bonnie said, knowingly.
Aliyah nodded. "She tried very many times to seduce him, but it never worked. He was quite faithful to me. Anyway, she attempted to make him jealous by allowing Elijah to court her. Of course, that all stopped when Elijah and I were engaged." She shrugged. "He never even looked at her again." She murmured, smiling to herself. "Of course, our marriage only gave Tatia cause to try more of her tactics with Niklaus. But for some reason – and I've never actually brought myself to ask Niklaus what the answer was – he denied her time and time again." She went quiet, dragging her teeth over her pouting lower lip. "I wouldn't have blamed him if he had chose to take comfort in her. I was, after all, his sister at that time. Nothing more." She said, quietly, almost as if she were reassuring herself. "As there was no seduction technique she could use on Niklaus, she then attempted to lure Elijah away from me, determined to at least steal one man from me if she couldn't Niklaus. And it would be the greater humiliation for me if it were to be seen that my husband was cheating on me with her." She explained.
"Did… well, did it work?" Caroline asked, hesitantly, wondering what the best way was to broach the question of whether her husband had actually cheated on her or not.
"Well, no, not really." Aliyah shook her head. "Elijah was definitely faithful to me the entire length of our marriage. The problem was that others were suspicious of him, even if I were not. My mother-in-law doubted Elijah's strength in the face of Tatia's womanly wiles." She admitted. "While she didn't believe that Elijah had done something as dishonourable as bed Tatia, she believed that, one day, Tatia's seduction attempts would finally work, as she was already aware that Elijah used to have a 'thing' for Tatia before we were engaged. I resent Esther a great deal now. She is the reason why we were all turned into vampires in the first place and tore my magic away from me," Aliyah's voice turned cold and bitter. "And, to add insult to injury, she had the nerve to deny Niklaus of his werewolf side and she allowed him to take the blame for the mistakes she made. But back then, before vampires and hybrids and curses, while I was married to Elijah and even before that, she truly did see me as a second daughter."
Aliyah spoke, despondently, and both Bonnie and Caroline could tell that Aliyah did truly mourn Esther and had loved her, dearly, despite everything the woman had done. They couldn't imagine what that felt like. To live your life, knowing people a certain way and to realise the darkness that laid underneath the surface. To live such a long time and to remember people in a certain way and have those memories destroyed by what people became.
Aliyah bit her lip and ran her hands through her hair. "She told me, the night before we were turned into vampires, that she would stop 'that meddling whore' from ruining my marriage." She swallowed hard. "It wasn't until later that I realised what she had actually done." She whispered. "I never liked Tatia. She would go out of her way to make Rebekah cry. She would turn the village girls on my sweet sister-in-law and watch as they descended on the poor girl. You would not believe how many times I comforted Rebekah after a particularly scathing run-in with the Petrova chit." She spat.
"Why did Tatia hate Rebekah?" Bonnie asked, quietly, trying to imagine another evil Elena duplicate the way Katherine was. But Katherine was manipulative and cruel, a kind of cruel that had come from surviving as a vampire for hundreds of years. Tatia just seemed like some petty, teenage girl, like Caroline was when she got into her 'Queen Bee' mode.
"Rebekah, like myself, was a witch." Aliyah explained. "But she was still in training. She didn't know too many spells, but she knew quite a bit about the theory behind the magic we practiced. The village, in that time, had very mixed feelings about our magic. There was a sort of double standard going on. The villagers never minded my mother, myself or Esther practicing magic. For one, my mother was quite respected in the village as a healer and a prophet. Not to mention, but they relied on her to protect us all from the wolves on the full moon, as my mother was the only one powerful enough to cast the barrier spell on the caves." She explained. "As I was training under my mother, the villages held that same regard for me. Especially after I healed a young boy from a knife wound." She murmured. "Esther was quite the powerful witch in her own right, therefore, the villagers were quite wary of her. And… there were also a few rumours that my mother-in-law dabbled in dark magic that made the villagers quite scared of her."
"But if they were scared of Esther, wouldn't they have been scared of Rebekah?" Caroline asked, confused.
Aliyah shifted in her seat. "Well, not really." She drawled. "You see, while Rebekah demonstrated the gift of magic, she never did much with it." She explained. "She never went out of her way to learn magic the way I or Kol did. But she did know a few spells, just not enough to make the villagers cautious around her. Kol knew quite a bit." She said, proudly, her affection for her youngest, living brother-in-law showing.
She would never admit it to him, but she truly did adore Kol in a way that the rest of her family found absolutely maddening. They never understood it. The two were a complete contrast, yet there was none other in the family that Kol trusted more than Aliyah. The woman who was meticulous in the way she slaughtered – leaving absolutely no recognition that the human was killed by a vampire – and was only savage in the way she dealt with her victims when she was particularly livid at someone – which was more often Niklaus than not – and the man who couldn't control the extent of brutality he would use when devouring his meals.
"So, the other village girls, headed by Tatia, thought of her as a weak link and Tatia knew that hurting Rebekah would get to me, so she started to hurt Rebekah on purpose." Aliyah shook her head in disbelief as she remembered how catty teenage girls could be. All of that just seemed pointless to her, nowadays. "So, yes, partly the reason I don't like Elena is because I sometimes find it hard to differentiate the Petrova doppelgangers." She pursed her lips. "Not to mention, it seems to be a part of genetics for them to come between brothers. While Niklaus never had those feelings for Tatia, there was a period of time, before my engagement to Elijah, that Elijah felt that Niklaus may have feelings for Tatia because of the way he was acting. Of course, what he didn't know was that the reason why Niklaus was acting happier than usual was because of me and not because of Tatia." She rubbed the back of her neck, sheepishly.
"So, you're the one who actually came between Niklaus and Elijah." Bonnie said, pointedly.
Aliyah nodded, reluctantly. "I suppose it is a fair assessment to say that. Just know that I never did any of it intentionally, and I was never with both of them at the same time. The moment that Elijah and I were engaged, I ended my relationship with Niklaus." She bit her lip. "I could never do that to Elijah." She said, sincerely. "He meant entirely too much to me for me to be able to betray him with his own brother." She shook her head. "I was only with Niklaus twice after Elijah and I were engaged. Once the night before our wedding – which I know was a stupid idea – and once after we were turned into vampires. I'd like to think that the second time only happened because of the bloodlust, " She ran her hands through her hair. "But you're right. I was the one who came between Niklaus and Elijah, even though Esther thought it was Tatia, Elijah thought it was Tatia, and even Tatia thought it was her for some time." She murmured. "If I regret one thing in my very long life, it is what I did to Elijah. He was the one person I never intended to hurt." She said, hoarsely.
"So, what exactly did Esther do to Tatia?" Bonnie asked, dreading what the answer would be, a little stunned by what Aliyah had revealed about her own past.
She wondered if she should apologise for hurting her feelings. She could see by the sharp shards of pain in her eyes that Aliyah was truly sorry for what went down between her, Klaus and Elijah a thousand years ago. She never did any of it on purpose. She was just a woman stuck in a position she couldn't get out of. So she did the best she could with what she had at her disposal.
Bonnie didn't want to be this. She didn't want to be the girl who judged everyone before she found out the full story. She was ashamed to realise that she had judged Aliyah a little harshly during her story, especially when she had confessed about what had happened between her, Elijah and Klaus.
Caroline's pursed her lips, feeling a stab of pain as she thought about every single horror Aliyah must have experienced over her long life. She had loved a man and had been forced to marry his brother. She had fallen in love with her husband and had been turned into a creature that went against her very nature. She had hurt her husband, unwillingly, when she had been unable to ignore the yearning she bore for her first love. She was plagued with the guilt of what she had done to the brothers for her entire existence. A part of her longed for Elijah, her dearest friend and the man who had helped her through her transition, and she was forced to stamp down on it and spare the feelings of the love of her life. She had spent the last thousand years shutting down everything she felt.
"Well, the wine that we all drank on the night we turned into vampires?" Bonnie and Caroline nodded. "It was laced with Tatia's blood." She confessed. "It was used as the binding agent in Esther's spell that turned us into vampires."
"Wait, so, Esther killed Tatia to make you all into vampires?" Caroline gasped, her hands flying to her mouth and her eyes widening with shock.
Imagining Elena dying in front of her was enough to make her nauseous.
"No, not for that particular spell." Aliyah shook her head. "However," She drawled. "The curse that Esther placed on my husband to keep his werewolf side dormant required…" She pursed her lips. "More complicated ingredients." She hedged. "Esther channelled the power of the full moon into a moonstone that would bind the curse, but she… that night, she drained Tatia of all of her blood and used it to act as another binding agent for the curse." She confessed.
"So, what does this have to do with Elena?" Bonnie cocked her head. "I mean, if Tatia died a thousand years ago, what does this have to do with Elena?"
"Haven't you noticed that Elena and Katherine and Tatia look exactly the same?" Aliyah raised an eyebrow. "There's a reason for it. It's a magical occurrence that arose after my mother-in-law cursed Niklaus."
"What do you mean?" Bonnie shifted in her seat, her moss-green eyes staring at Aliyah, intently.
"There is only one way that Niklaus can break the curse." Aliyah explained. "A witch must channel must channel the power of the full moon into the moonstone that Esther used to bind the original curse. This would release the spell bound in the moonstone. Then, Niklaus, as he is both werewolf and vampire, must sacrifice one of each, a vampire and a werewolf. Their blood must be spilled over the moonstone to break the curse. Niklaus must then drink the blood of the human doppelganger in the birthplace of the doppelganger until the point of her death." She said, grimly, watching as Caroline's and Bonnie's faces contorted into expressions of horror.
"Elena." Both Caroline and Bonnie breathed, their hands flying up to cover their mouths with shock and horror.
"Yes." Aliyah nodded, stiffly. "She is the human doppelganger and once he finds out about her, my husband will have every intention of killing her so that he may break his curse." She said, lowly. "The curse must be broken in the birthplace of the doppelganger, so I have no doubt that Niklaus will be coming here, to Mystic Falls." She grimaced. "Both, to collect me and to drain Elena." She said, darkly.
Bonnie jumped to feet and stalked around the chair, the fire illuminating the golden hues of her face, making her eyes crackle with sparks as her magic thrummed around them.
"How can you be okay with this?" Bonnie snarled, her eyes flashing. "I know you hate Elena, but we're talking about your husband murdering an innocent girl!" She spat.
"I am not okay with this. There is nothing okay about what Niklaus will do." Aliyah growled and stood up. "In 1492, Katerina Petrova came to my house and Niklaus was overjoyed." She spat. "Here was a young girl, not even twenty yet. She was in exile after her father had kicked her out after she had a child out of wedlock." She explained, shaking her head. "She was completely alone. So, Niklaus plotted to keep her with us." She said, darkly. "She was the first human doppelganger we had seen. All three of us marvelled at her likeness to Tatia." She shook her head. "We knew that this would be it. Niklaus would finally be able to break his curse and I was happy for him." She said, honestly. "When you've been a vampire for as long as I have, your morals start to degenerate. At the beginning, I was fine with Katerina's death as long as it meant that Niklaus could finally break his curse. I just wanted to be done with all of the drama. I wanted my family to finally be happy after all those centuries." She said, wearily.
"But she was just a kid." Caroline protested, her eyes sharpening, wondering if she was talking to the same woman that had comforted her when she had felt so bad about herself. "She was our age. You're so nice to us, but you really didn't care if Katherine died?" She asked, incredulously.
"I said 'at the beginning'." Aliyah corrected. "She was quite sweet as a human. She appeared to be quite innocent and naïve. She was full of life and all she wanted was to be loved in return. I started to like her quite a bit and I found myself not wanting her to die for such a stupid reason." She confessed. "The vampire that found Katerina and brought her to us fell in love with her. I may have encouraged him to help her escape. Of course," Aliyah shrugged. "Niklaus had no idea I had done something like that. He would've killed me. Katerina and Elijah formed a sort of relationship in 1492." She hated the way jealousy burned her stomach when she remembered the soft smile Elijah had given Katerina. "And Niklaus believed that he had been the one to help her escape." She shook her head. "My husband, the everlasting paranoiac." She chuckled.
"So, you helped Katherine escape from your husband." Bonnie said it more to herself than a question. "But you hate her. Why do you hate her if you helped her escape?"
"I never helped her escape." Aliyah shook her head. "I merely suggested to the vampire who was head over heels in love with her that it was too bad she had to die for the curse. So, he told her everything. Katerina ran. But, I overestimated Katerina's innocence and naivety." She growled, annoyed at herself for the way she had misjudged Katherine. "In a sneak attack, she managed to drink vampire blood and kill herself, thereby changing herself into a vampire." She shook her head. "Too many peoples' lives were ruined that day."
"I hate her because she stole the moonstone from Niklaus that day. She's been running from him ever since." Aliyah explained, grimly. "That was why she ran from Mystic Falls in 1864. She knew I was coming from her and she ran before I could arrive." She gritted her teeth. "She doesn't have the moonstone anymore. Otherwise, she would be gloating how close she is to achieving her goal. I hate her because she hurt Elijah. She was simply using him as a way to exist in a society where one was given worth by those they were allied with, especially since she was completely alone and had a pretty face. And mostly, I hate the way that no one else seems to exist to Niklaus if the bitch was in the room." She bit her lip. "Bonnie, do you remember how you asked me if Klaus was okay with my relationship with Elijah?" Aliyah asked, suddenly, turning to Bonnie. Bonnie nodded, nervously. "If there is one thing I have figured out in a thousand years, it is that any jealousy that Niklaus bears towards Elijah because of our marriage fades away in light of Niklaus' possible triumph." Aliyah spat.
"What do you mean?" Bonnie asked, carefully.
Aliyah shook her head, suddenly weary from all she had revealed. "I can't talk about that right now." She waved off. "Look, all the two of you need to know is what Niklaus intends to happen when he arrives in Mystic Falls. Katherine intends to have everything ready on a plate for him when he comes. In 1492, Katherine stole the moonstone from him. That and the doppelganger are the only pieces of the puzzle that have evaded him. And now, Katherine has found them for him. The moonstone must be somewhere here in Mystic Falls; otherwise, Katherine wouldn't be bothered to come here. Elena's here and the sacrifice must be done here as this is her birthplace."
"So, how do we do it?" Caroline asked, fearfully. "How do we stop Klaus from killing Elena?"
Aliyah's shoulders slumped. "That's where the problem begins." She said, darkly. "Elena is the only casualty here that cannot escape her fate. But I will do some research." She said, reassuringly, seeing Bonnie's and Caroline's forms relax somewhat as they realised that she would indeed help them, even if she didn't care for Elena at all. "My feelings for Elena aside, I don't want her to die because of Niklaus." She murmured, emphatically. "I love Niklaus with everything that I am, but I will not let him cross this line for his ambition. Even if it makes me worse than Esther." She swallowed hard. In his eyes.
If I help Elena, if I go against Niklaus, he will hate me and I will have to spend the rest of our existences knowing that as the truth.
"Aliyah, you're not worse than Esther. You're amazing. You're the only reason I got through my Grams' death. You've been the closest thing I've had to family since my Grams and I don't know what I'd do without you. I need you to be in my life." Bonnie said, sincerely, moving forwards and throwing her arms around Aliyah, resting her head on her shoulder. "Thank you. For saying you'll help Elena. We know… we know you don't like her." Her voice was slightly muffled by Aliyah's shoulder.
"Thank you, Aliyah." Caroline said, soberly, taking a seat on the arm of the chair Aliyah was sitting on, draping her arms over her shoulders and resting her chin on Aliyah's head. She felt Aliyah's hand slide up and weave into her hair. "For being there for me last night. I don't think I would have survived if it weren't for you protecting me. I'm glad you're my sire and no one else. I'm so sorry, you deserve better than what you've gotten in the last thousand years." She said, mournfully.
"He was a child." She breathed, and felt her chest cavity convulse under the weight of her anguish, remembering the beautiful, little boy who would pick flowers for her and pin them in her hair, and she almost whimpered, remembering the first time she had seen him with blood staining his lips a ruby red. "A child who did nothing wrong, a child who spent his entire life trying to prove himself to the man whom he thought was his father. He thought it was his fault that Mikael didn't love him the way he should." Aliyah looked at Bonnie and Caroline, brokenly. "Don't you see how sick that is?" She whispered, her eyes pleading. "My husband is a monster," She hissed. "But underneath all of that anger and paranoia and death is still the sweet boy who taught me how to shoot an arrow, who used to immortalise my face on parchment and who loved me more than he loved himself." She shrugged, a single tear falling down her cheek.
"I love him, madly. I may work against him, but I will never stop loving him. I am incapable of that."
A/N: I feel like this chapter was a little disjointed and I'm sorry if it felt confusing to you. I kind of wasn't pleased by the way this chapter went out, but I hope you liked it. So, Aliyah married Elijah and I hope you liked the smut between the two. I wish I could have done a Nikliyah one first, but this one really spoke to me. I like pointing out the similarities between Esther and Aliyah in this story and I will expand on it when we see Mikael and Esther again in Season 3 and The Originals.
I hope you liked my characterisation of Aliyah's past. She and Katherine have an interesting relationship which I plan on expanding in the next few chapters. Some things happened in 1492 that Aliyah's not willing to disclose yet. And Elijah, Niklaus and Aliyah have an interesting relationship and backstory. I hope you guys don't mind that original love triangle, because it really is over now. While Aliyah still has a lot of feelings for Elijah, she made her choice and her choice was Klaus and she's stuck with it for a thousand years.
Oh, by the way, I am eager to know what you guys think should happen in my version of The Originals. So, let me know your ideas.
Anyway, hope you all liked the chapter and don't forget to review!