A/N: Hello. It is I, back after a very long hiatus. Life happened. I lost time, and subsequently lost inspiration as time passed. Then inspiration struck, as it usually does, in the middle of a particularly busy day when you don't have time to act on it. I somehow managed to hold on to that inspiration and I present to you an updated version of Lilith. As of 22 Dec 2017, all chapters have been updated with edits and revisions. The storyline is mostly the same, with a few small changes that I think makes the story better. Please give it a read, and thank you all for sticking with me for this absurdly long period of time.
1417, Africa
Artemis and the dark-skinned woman spoke in a tongue that Kol wasn't able to comprehend, but from the looks on their faces, he could tell that the topic of conversation was serious. The other woman raised a knife, which set off a series of alarm bells in his head. She brought the knife across Artemis's wrist, and began to collect the blood that flowed from it.
"What are you doing?" Kol asked with alarm, taking a step forward.
Artemis held up her hand. "It's fine," she told him. "My blood, the blood of a succubus, holds special properties for witches. In exchange for my blood, we get safety. Atai welcomes you to the village, although with skepticism. If you drink or harm anyone in the village, they will not hesitate to kill you, but if you show interest in their magics, then perhaps you will find a friend in them."
"Their magics?" Kol asked, his brows raised.
"They believe we are balanced," Artemis replied. "By taking parts of the life force of others, we make up for our extended lives."
"An interesting take," Kol mused, holding out his arm for Artemis to take. Together, they walked arm and arm into the tiny village.
When Bonnie woke in the morning, she was alone on Artemis and Kol's couch. She could vaguely remember the details of last night. Damon had brought her here, after she had let Ric bite her. Artemis and Kol had stayed with her all night, on the couch, and held her while she cried. Now, she could hear them laughing from the kitchen. Slowly, she rose from the couch, and made her way to the other room. Music played softly from hidden speakers as Artemis moved about the kitchen, flipping pancakes on the stove. Kol sat on the counter, popping blueberries into his mouth, laughing at something that Artemis had just told him.
"Good morning, Bonnie!" Kol greeted with a smile on his face. "How are you feeling?"
"Better," she admitted, as Artemis set a plate of pancakes down on the table. Bonnie sat down and tentatively took a bite, before deciding that they tasted positively amazing.
"Would you like some bacon too?" Artemis asked. "I'm afraid it's turkey bacon. Kol and I are getting old. We have to watch our arteries."
Bonnie smiled as Kol laughed, and nodded her head. It was strange to see the two of them act so normally, with someone like Alaric on the loose, whose strength rivaled that of the Originals. But there they were, sitting down with her at the kitchen table with their own stacks of pancakes, as if life just kept moving on. She realized that this felt normal, that the two of them were trying to bring as much normalcy as they could to their abnormal existences, and she could appreciate it.
"I should go over to Elena's," Bonnie told them as she finished her stack of pancakes. "They're probably just finding out that Ric has come back."
Artemis nodded. "Of course," she said. "We'll walk over with you."
The sight of Stefan, Damon, and Nik pacing on the Gilberts's front porch was certainly an interesting one to see as Bonnie, Artemis, and Kol approached the house. It was hard to miss the gaping hole in one of the front windows, or the splintered fence post that Damon had slung over his shoulder.
"Okay, how about Damon sneaks in and distracts Alaric while Stefan grabs Elena and carries her to safety?" they could hear Nik suggest.
"Oh, that's a great idea," Damon retorted sarcastically. "What's to stop me from being killed instantly?"
Both Artemis and Kol could tell that Bonnie was nervous when she stepped forward. "What's going on?" she asked. From the bit of conversation that they had just heard, it sounded as though Elena was with Ric, and Bonnie knew that that was not a good combination.
Stefan looked at her with pity in his eyes, before stepping off of the porch to stand in front of her. "Ric has Elena and Caroline at the school," he told her gently. "Right now, we're trying to figure out a way to stop him and get them back, but Klaus isn't being very helpful." He turned his head to shoot the Original hybrid a look.
Nik grinned. "All I want is my doppelganger, and I'll be on my way," he said lazily. "It's not my fault that my mother's invulnerable little creation is, well, invulnerable."
Kol's brow furrowed. "Brother, you and I both know that a truly immortal creature does not exist," he replied. "Does he not have our same weaknesses?"
"To sunlight, yes," Nik answered. "But our dear sister and Caroline stabbed him with a white oak stake, yet he still lives. You can see why I'm eager to grab my doppelganger and get the hell out of dodge."
An idea dawned on Bonnie, her eyes widening at the realization. "What if there was a way to stop him until we can figure out a way to kill him?" she murmured, causing everyone's attention to snap to her. "The spell my mother used on Mikael…"
"Are you sure?" Stefan asked, a look of concern etched onto his face. "That's some pretty serious dark magic."
Fire flashed in Bonnie's eyes. "I'm sure this is what I want to do, if it keeps Elena and Caroline safe," she bit back, tired of everyone underestimate her power. "All I need to do is call Abby and get the spell from her."
"Just to be clear, the sun sets in eight hours," Nik told her. "If you don't succeed by then, Elena will be dead and I will be gone."
"Then I won't fail," Bonnie stated firmly, meeting Nik's gaze.
They all knew the plan. On paper, it was simple. Damon, Stefan, Nik, Kol, and Artemis would all attempt to restrain Ric, and allow one of the ones who had drank Bonnie's blood to make a connection to his heart. Kol had tried to protest Artemis's inclusion, but Artemis had shot him a glare.
"I can look after myself," she reminded him. "I'm not about to go back to being helpless."
The five of them snuck in through the south entrance of the school, with Damon and Stefan heading down the science hallway and Nik, Kol, and Artemis taking the foreign language wing. They would end up on either ends of the English/history wing, where Ric's classroom was. There were footsteps, and Nik quickly darted out to snatch Caroline out of the hallway. One of his arms wrapped around her chest, while the other hand went to cover her mouth.
"It's okay, it's okay," he whispered to her, as she struggled feebly against his grasp. "It's me. You're okay. You're safe."
He took his hand away from Caroline's mouth, revealing burns that mimicked a Glasgow smile. Her hands that had clawed at Nik's arms bore holes that seemed to go all the way through, and dripped with blood. Kol could observe the fear in the girl's eyes as Nik gently stroked her hair, as Artemis gently took her hands in her own, working a small dose of healing magic.
"You have vervain in your system," Artemis whispered. "It's blocking some of your healing factors. This should help a little bit, but you need to get some rest."
"We'll save Elena," Nik told her gently, noticing that she almost seemed ready to run back into the fight to save her friend.
"I can't just leave her here," Caroline bit back in a whisper, looking back at Nik. "Not with you."
Kol didn't miss the brief feeling of hurt that flashed across his brother's eyes. "You're wounded," he said quietly. "You need to make yourself your first priority."
"You can't fight this battle right now, love," Nik whispered. "Elena would want you to live."
That statement seemed to ring true with Caroline, as she took a step away from Nik and gave a small nod in understanding. In an instant, she was gone, out to the parking lot, and out to safety, and Nik and Kol snapped their heads in the direction of a sound that Artemis couldn't hear.
Damon and Stefan's bodies lay on the ground in the hall as the three of them rounded the corner and sprung into action. Artemis and Kol were each able to grab Ric's arms, as he snapped at them, while Nik went for the hunter's heart. Artemis and Kol pulled his arms upwards and back, leaving his whole chest exposed as Nik's fingers sunk in with a squelching sound.
But Ric was stronger than they were, and flung them off of his arms, sending Artemis and Kol crashing into lockers on opposite sides of the hallway. Nik, clearly surprised by the turn of events, found his hand ripped out of Ric's chest, before he was flung backwards, crashing into a nearby doorway. In an instant, Ric was on top of him, thrusting the white oak stake down towards Nik's heart, but Nik was quick to stop the stake from going any further, groaning at the immense strength he had to use to keep himself alive.
"Stop!" Elena shouted. "Let him go, or I'll kill myself."
Ric's attention turned to Elena, but only for a second, before it was back to his struggle. "Put it down, Elena," he commanded the teenager calmly.
"Why?" she pressed. "Because you still need me alive? There's a reason why Esther used me to make you, isn't there? She didn't want you to be immortal, so she tied your life to a human one: mine. That way, you have only one lifespan to kill all vampires, and then you'll be gone. So when I die, you die too. That's it. It has to be."
Ric didn't get a chance to answer, as Kol, recently recovered from being knocked unconscious, blindsided Ric with a right hook that knocked him to the other side of the hallway, sending the stake in the opposite direction. Nik scrambled up and after the stake, but Ric was quicker to recover, latching onto Nik's ankle and flinging him in the opposite direction, before preparing to square off with Kol. Neither male noticed Artemis inching towards the stake as they traded blows. It wasn't long before Kol, weakened after being thrown against the lockers, found himself in a headlock, his neck snapped before Ric let him fall to the ground.
That was when he felt the stake pierce his chest, through one of his lungs. Behind him, Artemis quickly muttered a chant that reversed the healing power she had used on Caroline. Instead of enhancing Ric's healing process, she hindered it, delaying his clotting factors and decreasing his pain threshold.
Artemis let out a deep exhale as Ric writhed in pain on the floor, his lungs struggling to draw oxygen. She figured she had at least ten minutes before his body would heal enough to allow him to get up and move. Her back ached from where it had come into contact with the lockers, and her energy felt drained, yet she knew that she had to press on. Kol wouldn't wake for a little while, meaning that she had to drag him the short distance to their home.
"You shouldn't be a part of this, darling," she mimicked. "It's too dangerous for someone like you."
Yet here she was, the living one, at the end of the battle. With the strength that she had left, she lifted Kol off the ground and into a fireman's carry. His arms swung limply as she trudged to the parking lot, straining under the weight of her husband.
He woke with a groan, not out of pain, but out of remembrance for what he had told his wife before the fight. She sat not too far from him, reading War and Peace, and sipping on a cup of tea. Their eyes met, and she smirked. Clearly, she remembered what he had said to her as well. Kol grabbed the two blood bags she had placed on the coffee table next to the couch he lay on, and downed them quickly.
"Didn't want to take me up to bed, darling?" he asked playfully, draining the last drops of O pos from the second bag.
Artemis snorted. "I healed Caroline, got thrown against the lockers, prevented Ric from healing, and then dragged your dead ass all the way back here," she deadpanned, peering over the top of her book. "Plus, I made sure you were on the couch, instead of the floor, and that you had blood bags when you woke up."
"Look, Artemis, if this is about before, I'm sorry," he told her, shifting his position so he could sit on the couch. "I've just seen you get hurt a lot since I woke up, and I don't like seeing the people that I care about get hurt."
She closed her book, and set it down on her lap. "Look, Kol, I know that you care, and I know that you're trying to look out for me, and I appreciate it, I really do," she said. "But you have to remember that I was alive for thousands of years before I met you. I know how to pick my battles wisely."
"I trust you," he replied, rising to his feet and moving to stand in front of her. He held out his hands for her to take, and pulled her into his arms. "I trust you completely, but as your husband, I'm going to keep worrying. It's the only thing I can do."
"I love you," she whispered against his shoulder.
"And I love you," he murmured.
"I have something to tell you," she said, pulling back slightly in his grasp so she could look up at him. "The principal of Mystic Falls High School called while you were out. Apparently, they're in need of an emergency long term substitution, as Alaric Saltzman has informed them that he can no longer keep the position. I'm the new history teacher, and guaranteed an interview for the position when it formally opens up."
"That's amazing!" Kol exclaimed, beaming at her. "Mrs. Artemis Mikealson, history teacher at Mystic Falls High School.
"Mmmmm I like the sound of that," Artemis hummed, closing her eyes.
Kol grinned. "Yes, Mrs. Mikealson," he whispered in a seductive tone, before sweeping her off her feet and carrying her upstairs.
They woke in the early morning to the sound of knocking on their front door.
"Were you expecting anyone?" Artemis mumbled, wiggling out of Kol's grasp.
"No," was his quiet reply. His eyes slowly opened as he pulled himself into a sitting position, and watched as Artemis pulled on a pair of spandex shorts and a sweatshirt. "That outfit, darling…"
She smirked, grabbed a pair of sweatpants out of the closest open drawer, and threw them at him. "Put some pants on, Mr. Mikaelson."
Artemis left the room and bounded down the stairs, just as whoever was at the door knocked again. She threw it open and was surprised to see Elijah, Finn, Sage, and Rebekah standing on the other side.
"Who is it… oh" Kol stopped short at the bottom of the stairs, his eyes widening as he took in the appearance of his family standing on the doorstep.
Elijah was the first to speak. "We need to talk," he stated simply.
Artemis stepped aside, and gestured for everyone to enter. "I'll put on the kettle."
