Holy writer's block batman. It was less of not knowing what to write, but more that I had absolutely no motivation or desire to put it down. Ahhhh mental illness, 3

For a quick recap since it's probs needed after two months, at the end of the last chapter Bonnie cast the spell to unlink Caroline from the other world, so she's sent back with the (thankfully) still working cure as Klaus brokenly watches her disappear. Good times.

Also, really late thank you for those that nominated me for the klaroline awards. What an amazing thing to be a new writer and to know that people thought enough of my writing to take the time to nominate. It meant, and still means, a lot. Also a huge thanks for the recent follows and reviews, each one of them makes me smile. That one person who reviewed every chapter made a day at work feel like Christmas lol.

Lastly, there's a little two world action here, so just remember that some folks exist in both worlds and wouldn't be aware of the actions of the other.

Caroline can't get over the bloom of color in her mother's cheeks, the dewy glow that suffuses her complexion. It's such a drastic change from the pallor and sickness that had graced her mom's face as the illness had progressed. Caroline focuses now on this sign of health with a singular intensity, an anchor in the storm of her conflicted emotions. She misses them so much, but her mom is alive and it means everything and what do you do when your heart is in two places?

"Earth to Caroline," her mom says wryly.

"Oh - sorry. I just…" Caroline gestures wildly and her mom nods her head gently in understanding.

"Who do you miss the most?"

"Bonnie," Caroline says without a pause. She shifts on the sofa, pulling her knees up and wrapping her arms around them. "She's...amazing. And it's weird, I don't know - have you ever had that feeling like you've met someone before? From the first second I saw her in that shop it felt like I'd known her for years."

Liz smiles at her, a toothy smile that Caroline rarely got to see, well, before all this. "Well, I've never felt people déјà vu," Caroline points her finger excitedly, signalling agreement at her mom's turn of phrase, "but that doesn't mean I don't believe in it. It's hard to discount anything at this point when there's vampires and werewolves and demon things that look like Agent Smith running around."

Caroline answers with her own grin. She had spent the first two days home bringing her mom up to speed with the events in the - it was still really weird to say this - alternate universe. The cure had acted like a jolt of caffeine, and they had stayed up a few nights talking and laughing, sharing stories. Tonight they're in the Forbes living room, P.S. I Love You playing in the background and two mugs of hot cocoa steaming on the coffee table; where they'll probably stay, because her mom somehow managed to burn the milk. What she wouldn't give for some of Abhi's chai right now.

Liz's eyes turn soft as she sees her daughter with that far-off stare again. "I'm sorry, Caroline."

"For what?"

"I wish you could have stayed. You came back for me."

"Well yeah, that was the whole point! And I'd do it ag-"

"I know, and I'd do the same for you, but that doesn't mean that losing your friends hurts any less." Liz sighs, throwing a hand up in defeat. "I don't know, I mean there wasn't an entry in the parental handbook on how to coach your daughter through the loss of her friends due to traveling via spell portal to another reality after obtaining a magical cure."

"Well, clearly the handbook needs an update." Caroline elbows her mom in the ribs, her eyes dancing before her face settles into a thought. "Yeah, I do miss them. But not more than I'd ever miss you. You're my mom, you know? And I don't want you to feel bad for me making a choice that seriously was no choice at all. I have friends here, Matt and Elena and Stefan, and I'll make new friends in school, you don't have to worry about me, really."

Her mom's eyes flit back and forth, studying her expression. "You sure? What about Klaus?"

Caroline sighs. "What about him? He's like the poster child for who not to bring home to mom. It'd never work, even if it could."

"Since when has that ever stopped anyone?" Liz stands up before Caroline has a chance to respond, grabbing the cooling mugs and bringing them into the kitchen. Raising her voice above the faucet's hiss, she calls out, "how about we go out and get some hot chocolate that doesn't taste like the bottom of my shoe?"

She can hear the smile in Caroline's voice when she responds, and it's enough for now.

"Those 'vicious animal attacks' out on the bayou have anything to do with you?" Marcel's voice sails over Klaus' shoulder as he steps into Lafitte's. The bar is almost as old as the city, and Klaus finds comfort in the worn stone and iron that has borne silent witness to his reign of power through the years.

Marcel watches Klaus order a drink with a studied casualness that doesn't fool him for a minute. He tries another tack. "Heard you were in India, sure seems like an odd time and place for a vacation."

"Well," Klaus spins in his stool to face Marcel, adopting the pompous tone he knows drives the younger vampire mad. "New Orleans only seems like the foremost supernatural hotbed until you remember how ancient the world is. I had some demons to visit."

"Ah, I wondered what would get you out of the city so fast. To whom should I address the thank-you note? Or are threats to you so commonplace you've lost track at this point?" Pulling up a stool next to Klaus, Marcel gives a friendly nod to the bartender.

Klaus lets a note of veiled satisfaction enter his tone. "Oh Marcel, if it were a threat I wouldn't have taken so long! Now, while we both know that diplomacy isn't my preferred mode of action, we also both know I'm devilishly charming. And demons make such entertaining allies." Klaus can't help spinning the tale to his advantage, knowing that only a few people, all under his power, hold the real truth.

There's silence for a minute or two as Marcel digests his story, trying to suss out fact from folly. He adds up the wolf attacks, the anger that he senses just beneath his former mentor's skin, the recent loss of four more of his vampire allies. He thinks back to his conversation with Rebekah when she returned, remembers the transparent gleam of hope in her eyes. Beneath her mask of cruelty she wants to believe in one thing with all her heart, of that Marcel is well aware.

"You know," Marcel says idly, as if discussing the weather or that hot blonde bartender at Rousseau's, "if you actually have a heart still, it wouldn't be that bad to see it."

For a moment Klaus questions, wondering if Marcel and Rebekah's past relationship has led to his sister letting something slip about Caroline, and he turns towards the bar to hide his shuttered expression, tracing the sweat of the glass on the scarred wood of the bartop. He'll have a talk with his sister later, but for now he turns back to Marcel, raising his glass in mock salute. "Oh Marcellus, I didn't know you still cared!"

Caroline slips into the house just past midnight, the scent of fries clinging to her skin from a night at the Grill. She doesn't know how Matt deals with the smell - she'd have to take a million showers if she worked there.

Matt. He was such a good friend, listening to her tale with an incredulous expression through most of it, but all Caroline could do was think that the cut of his jaw wasn't right, the slope of his cheekbone not sharp enough. Part of her wants to go back to a simpler time when she knew nothing of hybrids and pishachas and Klaus Mikaelsons, because it would certainly make settling back into Mystic Falls life a bit easier. Right now the town just feels like a weight around her neck, dragging her down.

It's no surprise then that she finds herself heading for a visit with Myrna the following day. They've already caught up on Skype, but Caroline has a question she hadn't quite worked up the courage to ask until now. Before she loses her nerve, she finds herself welcomed with a bear hug and ushered downstairs to sit at the small card table where all this began months ago, and where all this ends with her nervous question:

"Can I go back?"

A corner of Myrna's thin lips turns up in sympathy. "Oh hon, I don't think so. That spell is the only one I've ever known that even talks about crossing between worlds, and from what you've told me from Abhi's book, it doesn't sound like forces us witches should be messing with." Myrna cuts off Caroline's burgeoning apology with a look. "Not that I regret, for one second, sending you over there, don't even start with me, young lady." Myrna peers at her a moment more. "I'm sorry. I wish I had a different answer for you. Do you want to talk about it? What it was like?"

"I just...I still feel a pull there, like the spell is still active, and I keep waiting to go back and I never will and I just…" Caroline bursts into tears and Myrna's chair screeches as she scoots to Caroline's side, wrapping an arm around her thin shoulders.

"I'll tell you, girl. There's vampires and werewolves and witches and I've even met a fairie or two - which, by the way, TOTAL bitches, stay away if you can - but here's the thing. There is nothing, nothing more magical in this world than the connection you can have with another person. You've had this amazing chance to do just that, and now you have those bonds in your heart to keep, always." Myrna's voice is low and gruff. "And yeah, I'm sure it hurts to not be able to see them again, and it's ok to grieve that loss."

Caroline sniffles into a shoulder that smells like fresh herbs and nods her head in agreement. "It hurts. To meet people that get me, to meet someone that - oh god i can't even believe I'm saying this about a murderous psychopath and I really need to have my head examined - but he, I know I - ugh..."

Myrna's laugh holds a sweetly familiar rasp in it and she pulls away from Caroline, shifting her grip to the girl's shoulders. "You don't even have to say it, hon. We don't control who we care about or why, and we never know who's going to be the one to treat us the way we want to be treated."

"Have you ever been in love?" Caroline's eyes turn curious. It takes a raised brow from Myrna to clue her into the implications of her question. "Oh. Oh my god. I...I don't know...I don't think I'm in love with him, but like...I'm beginning to be? I'm so confused, I barely know him," Caroline mutters, shrugging out of Myrna's grip and standing.

"Hey, it's a lot to take in, I get it. But it's ok to let yourself feel it, even if you can't do anything about it. The feeling isn't just going to magically disappear just because you want it to." Myrna bounces her head from side to side for a moment. "Well, maybe. You are pretty stubborn." It gets the desired reaction, Caroline laughing and sitting back down at the table after swatting a hand at Myrna.

"You're right. About all of it." Caroline sighs, the mood quickly turning back to serious. "I guess I was just hoping there was a chance. Because I can't shake the feeling that things aren't done yet."

Myrna's face turns shrewd. "Ok, you said that stuff about the pull before, but I thought it was just wishful thinking. Now I wonder. Tell me everything you're feeling."

Letting out the breath stoppered in her chest, Caroline speaks, telling Myrna about the sensation of crossing between worlds and how it felt, how it sits now like a memory in her gut. Tells her how her dreams have been dark and troubled, how she wakes with images fleeting but the sensation of dread remains. How her skin feels tight and wrong.

Myrna's tapping the arm of her glasses on the table, lost in thought. "I don't know, Caroline. Some of this could be explained away as just you missing the other world, or a residual effect of the spell, but there's something off about it. I trust your instincts." She stands, grabbing her glass and heading back to the small kitchenette behind her. "Do you want some water?"

"Yes please, I'm surprised I haven't gone hoarse from talking so much. Feel like I've told the story a million times," Caroline says, smiling sheepishly.

It doesn't stop there, though, because talking is all she can do, so she keeps letting it spill out long after Myrna hands her a tall glass. Talks about the sound of Klaus saying her name, the feel of his stubble beneath her lips, Bonnie's face as she spoke the final words of the spell, Josh's way of knowing just when to make a joke, Abhi's caterpillar brows. It's all she has of them now, these memories, and paying homage seems a necessity.

It doesn't hurt that Myrna's the perfect listener, asking questions to prompt more stories, her face expressive in reaction. The mid-afternoon sun flares in through the tiny windows that sit just above ground level before Caroline finally takes her leave, filled with that strange comfort that unburdening thoughts to the right person often brings.

He has forgotten more than most will ever remember. It's part of why he keeps letters from his victims, these reminders of others' humanity that he insists he is above yet yearns for all the same. He is forever taunted by the passion of connection, the loyalty of regard and friendship, the devotion of love. So he breaks these things when he sees them, and revels in the truth of power, for it is the only thing he thinks to understand outside the confused emotions that family engenders.

And for them, his siblings, he always waits, waits to be found out and unmasked as they rise from their coffins and the accusations rest heavy in their eyes. He waits and he watches as forgiveness softens their stares each time and he wonders when his cruel actions will finally spin the wheel to where the bullet rests in the chamber. He pushes away because he only wishes to pull, but that desire is a weakness and a fault deep within him, or so his stepfather taught him long ago.

So it is a hard thing, then, to have the mind wander to her over and over, all the time wondering with incredulity why her face, plain in the face of a thousand years of beauty, is the one he cannot quite forget.

There have certainly been other women who have caught his attention as distractions for the years of boredom, because aside from years of the chase, watching the human struggle is boring, interminably so. The human babe swaddled in blankets, crying his first tears of confused anger grows and lives and dies with a swiftness that seems so useless in the face of the years that crawl by. And Klaus has seen all of human existence, depravity and kindness, unoriginal ideas and feelings called to the highest mountaintop in such short lifespans that forgetting their value seems the only response.

He knows that power is all that remains. And loyalty somewhat, but power is a surety, a point you can control, a weapon to wield against inevitable betrayal, against the sneers of rejection, against the mournful howl of the lone wolf. Power is the only constant. So why is this little blonde distraction proving to be more than just that? Klaus can't quite wrap his mind around it, nor around the idea that all he can think of, all he wants to do, is to see her again.

He picks up the phone and calls Kol. While his brother's knowledge of ancient magic hasn't turned up anything yet, Klaus has an idea.

Caroline wakes up to a soft knock at her bedroom door.

"Hnngh?"

Her mom enters, concern plastered on her face. "Hey sweetheart. It's almost four in the afternoon. You feeling ok?" She throws a hand up like a stop sign. "Wait, vampire. You don't get sick."

Caroline scrubs at her eyes. "Yeah, no. Not sick. Just not sleeping well at all, dumb nightmares."

Her mom is staring at her with that stupid guilty expression on her face again. "Mom, look, I'm fine. I just need time, I promise. It's only been a month."

Liz sits down, scooching her hip next to her daughter's shoulder, and brushes through some sleep-tangled hair. "I have something I want to ask you about." Caroline tilts her head back, looking up to meet Liz's downturned gaze as her mom asks, "what do you think about visiting India, together?"

Her eyes flick downward, unable to meet her mom's stare. "I...why?"

"Because being brought back to life by your mythical creature daughter puts things in perspective. I want to spend time with you, and I think it would help you to make new memories. Plus I'll have a built-in tour guide who already knows the ropes of Delhi."

Caroline pulls herself up, sitting back against the headboard and still not quite meeting her mom's eyes. She's honestly not sure how she feels about going back when she knows it won't be - can't be - the same, but that familiar pull in her stomach tells a different tale. She glances up. "Yeah," she says, determined to smile until she means it, "I think that would be awesome."

"Can I break her other leg? This is so much fun! We should do family trips more often Nik!" Kol's eyes are aglow with a feverish light.

But Klaus is done with Myrna's stonewalling. "No, Kol, this isn't working." He considers the witch's broad, infuriatingly placid face. "Let's try something else. So, Myrna." He clasps his hands behind his back and begins pacing in front of where Kol stands, holding Myrna's arms back in a painful grip. "Lovely house you have here. Very hard to find. Funny, that. No copy of the deed at City Hall, it's as if this place doesn't exist. Kol, what was the name of that lovely employee in Deeds and Grants?"

"Oh! Alison? She was a delight. City employees always have the best kinks." Kol turns dreamy-eyed for a moment. "Did you know that there's no record on file for you ever paying taxes on this property? Alison was quite surprised. I told her not to worry about it for now, because I was sure we would come to an understanding. We will, won't we?"

There's a brief flicker in Myrna's eyes. "Why not just kill me, or burn the whole place down?" she mutters.

"Oh, but personal ruin is the new black! So much more flattering." Kol draws his lips up centimeters from the side of Myrna's face, a clear provocation. "How long have you had this home, this life? It's time for a change, don't you think?"

Klaus has to give credit where it's due - he can see Myrna's internal struggle, but just barely.

"Hand me the grimoire from the shelf over there." At Klaus' incredulous look, she snaps. "Do you want the spell or not? My leg is broken."

Klaus nods his head and runs a hand along the spines in the bookshelf Myrna pointed out. He feels the frisson of energy jump from one of the tomes, a crisp sting not unlike the shock of static electricity. He pulls this one out, carefully keeping it closed as he passes the book to the witch who's now seated at a small card table. He can see she's disappointed he didn't let the book fall open, but a thousand years of treachery has not made him into a fool.

The tinkling sound of glass breaking has them both look up to a bored-faced Kol, who is using his bat as a broom on the countertop, muttering 'swing and a miss' under his breath. Klaus rolls his eyes and turns his attention back to Myrna, who has flipped a few pages in and is tapping her finger on a page thick with handwritten scrawl.

"This is all I've got for you. The only spell that I can think of that can cross between worlds." She looks up with a pleased smile. "Says here only the purest of intentions can make the spell work, so I suppose you're out of luck on this one. Can't say I'm sorry."

Klaus hasn't told her the whole story, of course, so he just smirks at her condescendingly. "That's fine, Myrna. I'll just need you to remove the protective spell on the grimoire and we'll be on our way. You've been a great help." He almost laughs at her narrow-eyed confusion, but Kol is starting to sing in a loud, off-key voice as he smashes the oven door, and Klaus is developing a headache to rival a witch-caused aneurysm.

"Pat-a-cake -SMASH-, pat-a-cake -SMASH-, baker's -SMASH- man, bake -SMASH- me a-"

"KOL! We're leaving." He eyes Myrna as she mutters and passes her hand over the now-closed grimoire. He reaches down and re-opens it in front of her, smiles when the book doesn't react like anything other than what it is. She's as good as her word, and it's too bad, really. This is a witch he would love on his side, but after years of becoming an expert, he knows when he's burnt a bridge, and this one is smoking in the river as they speak.

When their plane lands, Delhi is a city still emerging from the brief slumber of winter, the fog holding on stubbornly to the morning streets. Caroline's heart feels light, dragging her shell-shocked mom into the bellowing din of sound and scent. They're staying at an unremarkable guest house near the university, and Caroline realizes exactly who she inherited her planning skills from when her mom pulls out a guidebook and a notebook with a full page of tightly-lettered bullet points.

There's the Lotus temple one day, Gandhi's home the next, Qutab Minar's ancient tower standing watch over the south part of the old city. They pass through the bazaars as Caroline's stomach flips, half expecting to see a familiar face, friend or foe. Her mom squeezes her hand tight when she notices, and mother and daughter slowly map the streets with new memories. Liz buys a pair of bangles that Bonnie had picked out too, and Caroline slips them on with eyes closed and heart strangely full.

Caroline waits until her mom is asleep before slinking out each evening. The nights are hers to let the mask drop, to unconsciously follow footsteps made in another world. Tonight she finds herself standing in front of Abhi's house, occupied in this world by a family of four - she hears the mother's musical voice lilt from the courtyard, the father's grumbling questions and the two boys' high-pitched responses. It's what Abhi's life could have been, and her heart constricts with the pain of it. Last night she had met the wide-eyed gaze of a teenage girl through the window of the Mikaelson's home, and it is these juxtapositions she seeks out every night, trying to create these new memories while still keeping the old.

Her mom always feigns sleep when she returns, giving her the space she needs. She's grateful for it, and she thinks her mom was right to bring her here. Tomorrow night, maybe she'll visit the baoli.

Of all the Mikaelsons, Kol is the one Josh trusts the least. There's a cold glitter in his eyes that undercuts all the playful humor, as if his behavior is merely a mask for something harder that lies just beneath. Josh has no desire to witness whatever that is, but he's unsure if Bonnie agrees with him.

"Kol, if you don't stop that right now, I will twist your nuts with my mind. No joke." Bonnie makes a shooing motion behind her, where Kol is poised reading Urdu over her shoulder in an irritatingly hilarious Cajun accent.

"Ahh you always have the best pick-up lines, darling." Kol dances away, just in case. He sits and settles back into the cushions resting atop a wrought-iron chair, blowing an errant hair off his forehead with a bored exhale. "So is anyone going to tell me why my brother seems to have swapped personalities with a stranger? Is it really over a girl?"

Bonnie mumbles a noncommittal response to Kol, free now to dive back into her translation. The copy Josh made of Abhi's book, combined with the grimoire Kol handed over earlier have her distracted. Klaus isn't the only one to miss Caroline, and if there's a way to make the universes cross again without disturbing the balance, well, then she's going to help make it happen.

It's late evening and the New Orleans air is thick with the promise of spring. Bonnie has chosen an outdoor bar of all places to read a grimoire, but if there's a place to openly study witchcraft, it's definitely New Orleans. The thick leather tome barely draws a glance from the pack of Tulane students sitting next to them - they're too busy downing bottles of wine as a blues trio plays their pain into the night air.

Kol has surprisingly quieted, head bent over the the copy of Abhi's book Bonnie slid across the table, and Josh is just on the edge of fidgeting when Bonnie looks up from her study, heaviness in her eyes. She blows out a sigh before offering a sad grin that Josh reads the meaning of in an instant.

Because he misses Caroline too.

They peer in through red sandstone arches weathered by the passing of the years. The marble, lovingly carved in ornate screens, is merely polished by time's march, and Caroline wonders if she'll ever be able to be able to wrap her head around a century, or a millenium, or more. She follows her mom into the central chamber, where a long, rectangular slab of marble sits in the center of the room, drawing both their eyes.

"Is that -"

Her mom shakes her head no, glancing down at her guidebook which is beginning to look a little worse for wear. "It says this is a cenotaph, and Humayun's actually buried directly beneath." She looks up and spins around, taking in the room. The decoration is all marble and sandstone carving, and the sparse beauty only adds to the solemn air of the tomb's interior.

It's enough to make someone catch their breath. And so they do, listening as the air whistles in through the patterns in the carved screens. They stand in silent accord, letting this moment settle into their bones, breathing air with the weight of the ages.

Liz breaks the silence with a sigh. "God I - I thought a small town life was enough for me, Caroline. But almost dying, then this trip so far, seeing things like this, I don't know if it is anymore. There's so much I haven't seen." She looks down at Caroline, and her face is so soft Caroline's heart almost aches with it. "You know how you always hear people say they have a new lease on life? I get it now, and I just don't want to take the world-" she nods down at Caroline, "-or you, for granted anymore." She lets out a self-effacing laugh and it echoes absurdly in the solemn chamber. An Indian man scurries through the room, sending an affronted glance back at Liz, and she clamps her mouth shut, huffs bursting through the seam of her lips as Caroline struggles not to laugh herself.

She circles her arm through the crook of her mom's elbow and nudges her with a hip.

"Sooooooo, where to next then, mom? Rome? Paris? Tokyo?"

Her mom raises a wry brow in answer. "Well, not on a cop's salary, that's for sure."

It's midnight, and Caroline pauses at the threshold to the guest house. She feels that incessant throbbing in her gut, pulling her back to the step well, and knows it's time to put this to rest. She's 99% positive it's all in her head, some sort of psychosomatic clarion call of hope that she just needs to face head on. While she doesn't want to forget the other world, it's not healthy for her to dwell, and it's not really fair to her mom, or Matt, or even Elena if her heart isn't entirely...here. It's time to lay this hope to rest, she repeats in her head, but still she writes a quick note and places it on the hallway table before shutting the door firmly, palming the smooth painted wood.

She's almost nervous as she approaches Agrasen ki Baoli, stopping short at the tall fence that surrounds the enclosure. There's a sign in both Hindi and English - 'CLOSED FOR RESTORATION - DO NOT ENTER.' which Caroline promptly ignores, vaulting the fence with a leap. Weeds have taken over the edges of the step well, and a tall plant with broad leaves bent over with their own weight obscures the top of the stairs. The scene looks completely different from what she remembers until she takes the first step down into the well and she sees the flames spread in her mind's eye, hears the harsh, guttural voices of the pishachas. She shrinks back against the wall, willing her heart to stop racing.

This isn't that world. There are no pishachas here. I'm laying things to rest. She repeats the thoughts until they become a mantra, her lips moving as she says them under her breath, pushing off the wall and taking a step down.

The B positive she drank earlier thrums in her veins as she descends, her stomach twisting as if the other world is an eyeblink away. She's beginning to doubt her theory and almost turns back, but stubborn determination pushes her on. This isn't that world. There are no pishachas here. I'm laying things to rest.

The archway through which she found the cure looms closer, a gaping dark hole that even her vampire eyesight can't illuminate. Darkness is darkness, and so she pulls out her phone, flicking on the flashlight app and raising it above her head so it shines down. The second, internal archway appears to be solid stone where the other world's had been crumbling masonry. Caroline feels around, searching for seams, because the pull in her gut is unsurprisingly centered beyond this doorway. Her fingers scrabble over the rough surface, settling in a set of well-worn grooves that feel like fingerprints. The door clicks incongruously, and the stone slides with a shudder into a recessed pocket carved from the stone of the wall.

Instead of a room with a low slab of rock, Caroline is met with a long hallway that channels a hundred meters or so into the rock before hooking left. A tile mosaic glitters in the light of her phone, an intricate mural that spans both sides of the hallway and arches over her head. She recognizes the red of eyes of pishachas in their natural form, sees a pile of what looks like human heads before she stops looking, shaking her head in revulsion.

Her steps are cautious, her feet quiet on the slick, marble-laid floors as she turns the corner. There's a dim, flickering light a few hundred meters ahead, and she turns off her app, letting her eyes adjust to the change in light before moving again. There's a repetitive sound coming from just beyond the light, like metal scraping on stone, but it's unfamiliar enough that she can't quite pick it out.

Shapes emerge as she draws closer to the light - torches, she sees now, the orange light illuminating where the hall enlarges to a circular room, vaulted ceiling tall and stretching surprisingly far up for a structure this close to ground level. There's a huge column in the center of the room, and she sees a shape moving from side to side in front of it, in time with the sound she's been hearing. Emboldened, Caroline pushes ahead, and the shape comes into view at the same time as its oily voice cuts through the air:

"Thousands of years and no one has done what you have, crossed between the worlds." The woman - if she can be called that - says. Her form resembles a pin-up girl, buxom and wasp-waisted, but her movements are stilted and wrong in an uncanny valley sort of way, and the veins spread below Caroline's eyes in reaction to the threat.

"Who are you?" Caroline hisses.

The woman reaches towards Caroline, chains clinking as they trail down from the manacles on her wrist.

"I'm quite sure you know, dearest Caroline."

There's a damp patch of blood at the corner of the woman's mouth and Caroline wonders where it came from before snapping back to the present, her voice shaking in response. "Lamashtu?"

The mother of vampires gives a pleased nod before her face twists. "Let me share what it's been like for millenia, down here, alone aside from those that feed, their worship allowing no more and no less." Lamashtu's smile sends chills down Caroline's spine and she battles against instinct to hold her ground.

Lamashtu slinks in circles around the pillar, trailing chain narrowing the circumference until she can move no further, unraveling again as she retraces her steps. The floor is worn beneath her feet, the pacing of a monster chained eroding the limestone so deeply Caroline can see the tracks.

Caroline waits silently, internally cursing the thousands of inane quips her brain swears would be perfect to blurt out right now.

"So the theatrics are A+creepy and all, but why exactly am I here?"

Shit.

Hair strands stiff with dried blood clack against each other in a rattlesnake's warning as Lamashtu lunges. Her chains pull taut with a ringing clang inches away from Caroline, close enough for Lamashtu's knuckles to brush against Caroline's cheek.

(Time. Interminable waiting and waiting and waiting. The scent of spice brought in on the collar of a village girl, the edges of the priest's robe damp with the morning's dew, you taste these freedoms on your tongue and spit them out as poor substitutes for the real thing. The passage of time festers resentment and rage and hate, and tick tick tick there are no clocks but the death rattle lungs of the leagues you will tear asunder when you gain your freedom and lick your lips it will taste so so sweet)

Caroline staggers back, heaving choking breaths. She feels the madness clinging to her skin and furiously tries to brush it away as Lamashtu's bark of laughter echoes in the chamber.

"I told you I wanted to share. So now you see. You see why i have no choice. Freedom has been taken from me for too long, and you are the one to relieve me of my prison." Lamashtu says in a matter-of-fact tone, as if her logic is inescapable and Caroline has no choice but to agree. As if.

"Um. So gonna go with no on that one."

"Ahhh but you have already freed me, Caroline. Did you know the weak spots in the universe are still drawn to you?" Lamashtu's fanged smile grows impossibly wide as she continues. "You, my dearest, are the first one in several millennia to be able to cross between worlds, and the universe remains tied to your power." Lamashtu cocks her head sharply, the movement so birdlike it's almost comical, and begins running a taloned hand through the air, fingers crooked in a parody of a priest's blessing. The air shudders and splits in the wake of her claws with a faint ripping sound, as if reality is mere fabric torn asunder. Caroline watches as the the demoness grabs at seemingly nothing and pulls, and she sees a room beyond. Her heart surges in her chest as she realizes she's looking at the other universe, the one with Bonnie, with Abhi, with him.

Without turning her head, Lamashtu beckons at Caroline, motioning her closer and murmuring in a voice that coats Caroline's skin like a thick film. "Come along now. You'll do well as my herald. Do tell them that it will be bloody, won't you?" Lamashtu steps almost delicately into the rift and Caroline watches the edges of the portal shudder, growing smaller. A length of chain clatters to the ground, severed from their manacled confines by the portal's crossing.

There's no time for hesitation, and Caroline knows it's up to her to warn them all.

"I'll come back for you, I promise." Caroline brokenly whispers a pledge to her mom before vamping through the rift just before it closes.