As Long As It Doesn't Hurt Me

Bonnie awoke to her cell phone ringing. Her Klaus Phone (no one else had the number anyway). Originally she thought that would mean it would ring infrequently, but it was always going off for some reason, Klaus wondering what Bonnie knew about this or that or calling her somewhere to do some work, or just making sure she was still around, as if Klaus anticipated that she'd disappear at any moment. Three months later and he still expected her to go running back to Mystic Falls to shout at the top of her lungs that she was alive and had returned to pick up where she'd left off.

"I need you," Klaus said shortly.

Bonnie sighed, flexed her toes underneath her sheets and turned her face toward her curtains. She expected there to be sunlight, but it was still dark. A cursory glance to the digital clock at her bedside read 2:43 A.M. "Where?"

"The cemetery," Klaus answered. "Right away. I've already called a taxi for you."

"Great."

Bonnie didn't rush. She pulled on jeans and a tank top and slipped on some sandals. When she got downstairs, there was a taxi waiting, meter already running. Well, it was on Klaus' dime, not hers. The driver drove her straight to the cemetery, the same one Klaus always called her to.

Cypress Grove had all the usual trappings of a New Orleans cemetery. The above ground tombs, the part grass/part cement pathways, the wrought iron gates surrounding select tombs with entrances paved shut. The tours that walked through during the day had no idea that a few of those tombs had entrances with only the appearance of being shut up and inaccessible. Someone who knew what they were looking for, and had the strength to pick up and set aside one of the doors, would see inside easily.

Bonnie knew which one Klaus was in. The soles of her shoes crunched on the loose gravel, scattering a few wandering bugs as she went. The tomb Klaus liked to frequent was marked Helene Belanger. From what Klaus had told her, she was a witch who'd died in the early 1900s. He said he'd known her, however briefly. Surely she wouldn't mind him putting her tomb to good use.

It was the largest one, built like a small, stone shed. At the top was a stony angel, wings folded across her back and her head bowed in sorrow. Bonnie moved the door with a wave of her hand.

The first person she saw on the other side was Elijah, face illuminated by candles placed in the room's corners. He nodded in greeting when he saw her, and he probably thought it was rude when Bonnie looked abruptly away from him without returning the gesture.

Klaus was on the other end of the tomb, towering over someone kneeling on the floor. This new person was limp and bleeding, hands tied around his back with damp ropes. Vervain, Bonnie assumed. His wounds had already healed, but there was dried blood everywhere, dripping from his mouth and onto the dark front of his shirt.

"I didn't wish to wake you," Klaus said. Bonnie almost laughed. Klaus didn't care about her sleep schedule. He probably just wanted to see what he could beat out of this guy first. "We've exhausted all of our methods of making him talk. There's only so much we can do without killing him. Do you mind?"

He knew she didn't.

Three months ago

"The word on the street," Klaus said, "is that you're dead." Despite being aware of this word, Klaus didn't seem surprised to see her. Maybe he just didn't care. There was no reason to. Bonnie was low on his list of priorities these days. Her being alive or her being dead, meant nothing to him either way unless of course she was here to hurt him in which case this could get messy, but that wasn't Bonnie's intention tonight so all would go well, she hoped.

The word had traveled fast. Jeremy hadn't wasted any time in sharing it, as Bonnie expected.

"Yeah," she said. "I'd like it to stay that way."

After she left the school, she hadn't known where to go. She had to think, figure out what to do. She had to leave town now. Lingering was a recipe for disaster, but she had nowhere to go and no way to get there. Using her credit or debit cards would alert her dad, but Klaus had money. Lots and lots and lots of money. And he was currently in the midst of a move.

"Intriguing," Klaus commented. "Pray tell, why?"

"I just do," she said. Klaus didn't need details to give her what she wanted. They could - and would - operate under the vaguest of explanations, and they'd be happy that way. "I need your help."

That amused him. "I don't offer my help freely," he reminded her.

"I wouldn't ask for it without being able to pay you in some way," Bonnie said. "And I can."

"With what?"

"My magic," Bonnie said. "I'd be at your disposal."

Klaus raised his eyebrows. He definitely knew the value of a good witch, a strong one, one who would help him willingly. Forcing people was so complicated these days, but here was a witch, and not just any witch, but a Bennett witch, offering any magical assistance he required.

"What would you need from me?" Klaus asked, lifting his chin.

"Take me with you," Bonnie said. "To New Orleans. That's where you're going, right? I need to go."

"Why?"

"I need to leave town," Bonnie said. "You take me with you, and I'll help you do whatever you need done. In exchange, you'll give me a place to stay, a place separate from wherever you'll be staying. You'll give me money. Lots of money, for food, clothes, living in general."

Klaus nodded along. It wasn't anything too much that she was asking for, not when he'd had eternities to build up his savings. "Is that all?" he asked.

"I have conditions," Bonnie said.

He made a face, letting out a breathy sigh. "Of course you do," he said. "Go on."

"You don't tell anyone here that I'm still alive," Bonnie said. "That's a secret that I need kept. So don't tell Caroline."

Klaus seemed amused that she expected him to, but Bonnie knew how he worked. He wanted Caroline, in all her glory, and if he thought he could pull her in with tantalizing hints to Bonnie's survival, he'd do it.

If anyone knew she was still alive, they'd want her back. There was no such thing as leaving her alone, not even when that was what she wanted. They'd find her, they'd need her for something, and Bonnie wouldn't be able to say no. Bonnie 2.0 betted on three months. She was at least going to last that long.

"I can do that," Klaus said. "Anything else?"

"Just one more," Bonnie said. "I'll do whatever you need. As long as it doesn't hurt me."

"Define hurt."

"If I'm in any kind of mortal danger, if my life is threatened in any way, I won't do it," she explained. "If it means pushing myself too far, I won't do it. Otherwise, my magic is your magic."

"Even if it means hurting someone else?" Klaus said, raising his eyebrows. He expected her to hesitate, to refuse, maybe to turn around and leave because that's what she was supposed to do. The old Bonnie Bennett would have. The old Bonnie Bennett didn't hurt people, the old Bonnie Bennett didn't come to Klaus' mansion and ask him for a job.

But the old Bonnie Bennett had died beneath the school bringing Jeremy back from the dead, and the one who was here now had a different idea about what was acceptable.

"As long as it doesn't hurt me," she repeated, "I'll do anything."

Klaus examined her for a while longer before he finally stepped forward and extended his hand. "Then I believe we have a deal."

Present Day

It wasn't the first torture job Bonnie had been assigned. This was the third. The first had just been a test (though the wounds inflicted on the vampire Klaus selected had been real and certainly painful) to see if Bonnie meant what she'd said. The second, the real deal. That vampire hadn't survived the encounter.

As long as it doesn't hurt me.

Bonnie wasn't being hurt, someone else was, so surely she was game. Again she'd been struck by the expectation, the one Klaus had, the one Elijah had, the one everyone had. She wouldn't do it. Little Bonnie Bennett, hardcore competitor and winner of all things self-sacrificial, wouldn't magically torture someone just for the assurance of a cushy life in New Orleans paid for by a homicidal Original hybrid with more than a couple of screws loose.

But she'd do it.

She had, twice now, and she'd do it again. If that was what Klaus required, she'd do it. They had a deal.

"What's the point of this little operation?" Bonnie asked. Sometimes Klaus just wanted them to feel pain, from the inside out. Breaking bones and making them bleed didn't do much, not when they'd just heal. And vervain was becoming too typical. It lacked flair, and why sacrifice theatrics when he had a witch on hand? Other times it was less about the torture and more about the information, information that had to be shaken out of them through more sophisticated, more magical, and less...bloody methods.

"Marcel is making plans," Klaus said. "As I told you. This vampire knows them."

"He's having some trouble sharing them with us," Elijah said.

Bonnie took a step toward the vampire. He was broad shouldered and reasonably attractive. He looked a bit thuggish, perhaps chosen more for his brute strength than his intellect. When she got closer, he raised his head to her, and bloody saliva dripped from his mouth on a slow string to land on the floor. Bonnie made a disgusted sound. "Trouble?" she questioned.

"Believe it or not," Klaus said. "All that bleeding he's doing wasn't caused by us."

"He did it to himself?"

"In a way," Klaus said. "Every time he tries to speak to us, he starts coughing up his insides."

So no torture today.

"A spell," Bonnie said, lowering herself to be level with the vampire. The blood stained his chin and neck, his shirt, the floor. He swallowed thickly, painfully. "I'll see what I can do."

She flexed her fingers before putting them against his temples, easing into his mind. She swatted away his discomfort, willed him to relax and smiled as the tension in his body lessened slightly. He wasn't an incredibly cerebral man. Nestled amongst memories of a feeding from last night (the best one he'd had in months) were scores from a football game, a lost bet, a bad fight at the bar the other night, a pretty girl with ink black curls and a sultry smile.

Surface matter, nothing important, not what Klaus was looking for.

Delving deeper, she encountered a blockage of some kind. She pressed against it, and the vampire groaned.

Sorry, she almost said.

She found a small space to wiggle through, eliciting another cry of pain from the vampire. She saw the neon sign of Turbulence, Tyler leaving in a hurry, glancing up and down the street before taking off to the east. In the backseat, Marcel urged the driver after him, calling him Campbell.

It was all jumbled, intercut with sharp flashes of blackness. Each flash seemed to cause Campbell more pain. The images became more complicated, blurring around their edges. They were disintegrating as she watched, taking important bits of his mind along with them.

Bonnie pulled out, feeling him shudder beneath her hands. His body was tightly wound again, trembling slightly. The magic worked on him was strong, and the longer she stayed in his head, poking and prodding at things she shouldn't, the quicker he was going to lose whatever sanity he still had.

But she didn't need to look to Klaus to know he was waiting. She didn't know what she'd tell him. To buy herself some time (and to sate her own curiosity) she slipped into his mind again.

More flashes. Marcel's face swam in the distorted cylinder of Campbell's psyche, smiling about something (which in Marcel's case could mean smiling about anything). The memory faded, going gray and dissolving into pieces as Marcel's voice became slow and slurred. Whatever he said was impossible to make out.

When she released Campbell's mind and stood, he swayed and sounded a low groan.

Tyler was still alive and would probably be staying that way. If he wanted to kill him and be done with it, or turn him over to Klaus, he wouldn't have spelled Campbell to be unable to speak of it.

"I can't do it," Bonnie said. "I can't get past it. If I do, it'll shatter his mind. I won't be able to get to anything either way."

Klaus glowered in the vampire's direction. "You can't break it?" he asked slowly. He didn't believe her. It wasn't alarming. Klaus never believed anyone right away. Paranoia was his thing.

"I could," Bonnie said, "if I'd been the one to put it in place."

It would have been easy for Marcel to get one of the many witches in town to cast this spell. They'd do it with little in exchange, a little leeway, a little slack on the ropes that bound them. The King could give them anything, and they'd take anything he'd give.

"We could look for the witch," Elijah suggested.

"To no avail," Klaus finished. "Whatever witch did this isn't going to confess it, not if it means Marcel will dole out punishment."

Marcel's punishments were death. No negotiations, no sleeping on it, just death in front of a bloodthirsty crowd downing alcohol while watching their king hand out justice.

"Then he's no use to us," Elijah said, picking up his jacket where he'd neatly folded it on the ground and putting it back on.

"Apparently not," Klaus agreed. He cocked his head to the side. "You say it will drive him mad? Going any further?"

"Yes," Bonnie confirmed.

"Then do it."

Whether he was testing her or just exercising his own ability to be sadistic, Bonnie didn't know. Whatever the reason, she entered Campbell's mind again. She pushed past the barriers, watched more images dissolve. There was a blurry hot pink shape that may have been her. If it was Campbell didn't recognize her now, and even if he did, that revelation would be leaving him soon.

When she was done, when examining his mind was the same as looking into a very deep, very black abyss, Campbell became still. He didn't speak, didn't even seem able to. Klaus stepped forward and lowered his face to his. For a few seconds he watched him. When Campbell's mouth dropped open and saliva fell where it pooled on the toe of Klaus' shoe, he stepped backward.

It all happened very quickly. Klaus took off Campbell's head in a blur, spattering blood with a sickening squelch of detaching skin, muscle and bone. He tossed the head alongside the body like trash. "Burn it, will you?" Klaus said, wiping his hands off on his pants and moving to follow a departing Elijah.

When they were gone, Bonnie conjured flames to burn Campbell. When it was done, she blew out the candles in the tomb with a burst of wind, moved the doorway back into place, and left the cemetery. A taxi was waiting, a different one this time, the meter already running.

When Bonnie returned to her apartment, she crawled right back into bed and yanked the covers over her head, falling asleep within minutes. She didn't know how long she'd been out when she was awoken by the annoyingly perky chime of her doorbell. With a disgruntled groan, Bonnie turned over, eyes still closed while she willed her visitor to disappear.

When said visitor's only response was to ring the bell again, Bonnie rolled out of bed and went to the door. She looked through the peephole first and let out a sigh as she rested her head against the door. She would have cursed if the vampire on the other side of the door wouldn't hear her and take it as some kind of compliment. She adjusted her clothes and smoothed down her hair. It was inappropriate to look less than decent (and less than completely in control and capable of burning a few vampires into ash) in front of royalty.

"Hello, Bonnie," Marcel said, leaning against the doorframe and looking wistfully up to the threshold, which he couldn't cross.

"Hello, Marcel," Bonnie echoed, mirroring his movement and leaning against the door. He grinned.

That stupid smile. He was already good looking then he wanted to compound it with that grin, one that could almost make a girl forget she was staring at a centuries old vampire and the self-appointed king of New Orleans who'd probably killed hundreds, if not thousands of people in his life, who'd all but bound the magic of every witch in town, save this one.

"You look lovely this morning," he said. "As usual."

Bonnie blinked. If he was going to ask her about Campbell, she had nothing to say. He probably wouldn't ask though. If one of his went missing, he knew where to look, but he could never declare outright war against Klaus. Not yet anyway. Maybe he was getting closer.

"May I come in?" Marcel asked, as if he didn't know the answer already.

"Nope," she answered. "But I'll come out."

Marcel raised his eyebrows, interested. His smile turned into a smirk as Bonnie stepped over the threshold, and he turned to face her as she leaned against the doorframe. In one smooth movement, he leaned over her, inclining his body just enough that he was a bit closer to her than was normal. He'd never been one for personal space.

"What do you want?" Bonnie asked. She wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of moving away from him. It was in Marcel's nature to try to make you uncomfortable. If he succeeded it was like he'd won a game, and he was the kind of winner to carry around his trophy for days, waving it in his opponent's face.

"Something interesting happened a few nights ago," Marcel said casually. So this wasn't about Campbell then. "This kid I've taken under my wing seems to have lost some time. Or had it taken from him."

Bonnie could have laughed. Marcel? Taking Tyler under his wing? Okay. She kept her face passive and aloof. "That's unfortunate."

"My thoughts exactly," Marcel said. "Do you know anything about that?"

She arched an eyebrow. "How would I?"

He wouldn't admit he had Tyler, just in case he was wrong, not when they were standing right outside the apartment Klaus had given to her, not when she was firmly on Team Klaus. If she spoke a word, she could ruin all of Marcel's plans.

"You're the only witch in this city allowed to practice your magic without my knowing about it," Marcel reminded her. "And my new friend definitely had some magic worked on him."

Bonnie lifted her shoulders in a shrug. "Maybe your control is slipping."

"It's not," Marcel said. Licking his lips, he took a small step toward her. Bonnie straightened her back as he got closer, lifting her eyes to his. He raised his arm to rest it on the wall above her head, still staring at her. If he thought he could make her admit to taking Tyler's memories just by looking at her, he was very wrong.

After a few seconds, she saw him relax, the tension leaving his shoulders. Her denial calmed him. If she wasn't admitting it to him, then she wouldn't be admitting it to Klaus either. And Klaus not demanding that Marcel hand Tyler over meant Bonnie hadn't already shared that information. Bonnie almost wanted to go back into the apartment and find her phone to call Klaus and tell him everything, just so Marcel could watch from the doorway as all his secret plans fizzled into nothing. But she didn't. Just because she couldn't help Tyler didn't mean she had to screw him over completely.

At least Marcel was keeping him alive, Klaus would have other ideas.

When she didn't say anything, Marcel sighed. "Well," he said. "Since you don't know what I'm talking about, I guess it won't matter if I tell him about you. You know how I like to talk about you, Bonnie. You're a great conversation piece."

A change in strategy, an odd one. Marcel knew all about her "death". He could share her resurrection, as it was, with Tyler if he really wanted to. What would he say? You know, Tyler, there's a witch here. Really young, really powerful, risen from the dead. Name's Bonnie Bennett. Ever heard of her?

Tyler would call Caroline immediately. Caroline would call everyone, and Bonnie's sweet little purple apartment would be overrun with people she didn't want to see.

Bonnie narrowed her eyes. She didn't get it, what he was doing, what he wanted her to do. To admit to wiping Tyler's memories? What would that do for him? Give him something to think about when he was unoccupied? She tried the most direct path. "What do you want, Marcel?"

He wasn't a fan of direct, but he still answered her. "He's at the house."

Then he turned on his heel and walked leisurely down the hall, whistling a tune to himself as he went. As he rounded the corner she was just glad she couldn't see the certain smile on his face.

Thanks for reading and reviewing!