A/N: Late as usual I'm afraid. I don't know if more people share this problem, but my FF connection hasn't been great lately. They keep asking me if I'm not a robot, which, well, it's fine, if it didn't mess with the site's ability to load. Like at all.

Anyway, I hope it fixes itself, and in the future, I'll be able to read stories and upload my own in a quicker version.

Now, for chapter fifty, it's not the longest chapter I've uploaded. But it does feature both Klaus and Kol, so I hope that makes up for it somewhat. As for this version's chapter, I will reupload it somewhere this week, since it hasn't been properly checked yet.

Either way, I won't keep you for much longer. Enjoy the newest chapter, and like always let me know what you guys think. Your reviews are wonderful.

Lots of love,

Anna

o.O.o

Chapter Fifty, A Little Death

Gathering two Originals, one of whom I didn't know the first thing about except for his name, was odd. I'd led both men, after reluctantly inviting Kol inside, into the kitchen. The dishes from dinner were still in the sink, crumbs, and smudges scattered around the counter and over the stove and I busied myself with making tea. Outside were the familiar noises of traffic, a trashcan being filled, and the occasional bark of a dog. It was almost unsettling how domestic the situation felt, and I settled across the two men, putting a tray with a teapot, matching teacups, and a tea box in front of them.

No man had said anything as I'd offered tea, nor did they say anything as I sat there in front of them, fingers clasped around my cup of unsweetened Earl Grey. My skin prickled in the silence.

"So, what did you mean— an expert on magic?" I asked, peering into Kol's handsome face.

"Like I said, Sweetheart, magic interests me. I have a vast knowledge of the subject."

"Because of your mom? Or because you were a witch?" I asked, my mind almost purring in agreement. I thought I remembered him having been a witch as a human.

"I like this one, Nick," Kol grinned. It wasn't a nice grin.

"Yeah, okay, thanks I guess," I mumbled, I still had my pockets full of distilled vervain grenades and the taser felt like a solid weight in my hand. "But you're still a vampire. How can you help with magic?"

"We know witches, don't we brother?"

"You mean Greta," I answered.

"Don't you think I've already asked Greta, Luv?" Klaus asked and I wrung my hands together.

"Oh."

"I, on the other hand, have a lot more experience with magic," Kol grinned. I thought he meant he'd slept with several magic wielders and I wetted my lips. Klaus was silent, his eyes still smoldering and I realized he wasn't happy he had to resort to asking his little brother for help.

"Okay," I asked, crossing my legs and my fingers twitched against the table. "How do we do this?"

"I hoped you'd ask." He said, his inconveniently handsome face grinning at me.

"For God's sake— What do you want in return?"

His grin turned predatory and he leaned forward, "Depends. What are you offering?"

"Is this you trying to get laid?" I asked. I couldn't keep the snooty tone out of my voice.

"Nah," he laughed and pushed his chair aside, pacing the kitchen. I followed him with my eyes. He was peering at the unopened wine bottles on the window sill, his mouth puckering in a frown, and after a second cocked my head to the side.

"If you're looking for the stronger stuff, try the third cabinet to your right."

Klaus let out an almighty sigh when his brother wrenched the cabinet open and clucked. I supposed he'd found John's booze stash and almost laughed when Klaus dropped his head in his hands. Kol had emerged with what was probably the only bottle of Rum and took a long swig straight from the bottle.

"Well, that's better," he sighed, pacing through the kitchen, bottle still in hand. "Tell me about this ring, Sweetheart."

"It's like this family heirloom made by a witch hundredth-and-sixty years ago," I explained. "The ring brings the wearer back to life when killed by something supernatural. Ergo it only works on your regular human. Any supernatural being wearing it would make its power ineffective," I explained.

"Hm," Kol muttered, taking another long swig. "Who made it?"

"Emily Bennett."

"Ah, Bennett witches. Such a good, powerful magical line."

"I suppose,"

Kol didn't seem to have heard me and suddenly turned to me, pointing the Rum bottle at my chest. "Elijah told me that your baby brother isn't the only one who went batshit crazy."

"No," I agreed, "Samantha Gilbert did too," I explained. "She was alive in the twenties last century."

"And she died because of the ring?" Kol asked, running his hand through his hair, sweeping it back out of his face.

"No, she died wearing the ring. Damon Salvatore killed her— I think."

"Ah, yeah, Damon—" Kol muttered and his expression turned sour.

I was not sure what Damon had done this time around to make him this unpopular already. Knowing the eldest Salvatore, I suspected he'd said or done something stupid and rash. But to be honest, I had no idea why he was still in Mystic Falls in the first place. I wasn't sure why Stefan was either, although I supposed that could have had something to do with helping Caroline.

I picked at my fingernails while I said, "Anyway, Damon killed her and that's when the blackouts and the killings started. I know that there are some herbs which might help but—"

"Herbs are only temporary." Kol drolly replied and his lips pulled back, showing all his teeth.

"What?"

"I might know of something—"

"You do?"

"Hm, hm," he agreed and he threw me an impish grin, dimples cutting into his cheeks.

Klaus cleared his throat, obviously able to read his brother like a book. "Kol!"

"Oh, stop being a stick in the mud, brother." He replied bossily. "What's the fun in all of this, if we can't play for a bit?"

"I'm not sleeping with you."

"All in due time, Luv." Kol replied waving his hand uncaringly and I felt righteous anger curl into my stomach. Biting down on my shredded inner cheeks, I curled my fingers into fists, my right leg jiggling up and down in an attempt to calm myself. "No, what I want is— hm," his eyes flitted to Klaus, who looked ready to start pulling someone's spine out through their nose, and I knew I wasn't going to like his next words, any more than Klaus would. "Yes, I know! I want your blood."

I stopped breathing and didn't blink. "Come again?"

"Kol," Klaus warned, his voice taking on the 'I will dagger you' tone, but Kol was only staring at me. Daring me, unblinkingly, his lips pulled back into a twisted grin, splitting his face in two. I felt something inside me respond. Something ancient reared up at his silent dare, and my knuckles blanched around my cup of tea, my stomach tensing.

"Fine," I responded coldly. "By all means, you can have it."

"Okay—" Klaus huffed in indignation but I had already gotten to my feet, pushing past the grinning Original and moving to the knife block. My hand was steady, it didn't tremble when I took out a steak knife and I turned to face the vampire. The lamplight danced in Kol's eyes, his irises black his expression mocking. I could tell he was thinking I would back down any moment now, his mouth already upending into one of his predatory grins, and I pressed the knife point against the pad my middle finger.

When Grayson was still alive he took great care of all the kitchen ware. He loved cooking, enjoyed slaving over difficult dinners, and, almost as an afterthought, kept everything in pristine condition. The steak knife was no different, sliding through the first layers of flesh and I watched the blood well up from the small cut. "There. Now what do you know?"

"Honey—"

"I'm not that naive Kol, you get a drop of my Doppelgänger blood, my oh-so-powerful, oh so potent Doppelgänger blood, only when I get something in return."

"That's enough—"

"Oh, leave it," I grumbled. "He wants to know how far I'll go. I'm not squeamish of a little blood."

"Honestly Nick! Don't be so—" Kol mumbled, his expression elated. "Oh calm down," he decided, turning to his brother and I watched Klaus's eyes turn amber, my blood dripping to the floor. "I was just teasing." His eyes met mine again, seizing me up finally really looking at me, and I— I stared right back. "Oh, you and me, Sweetheart, we're going to have so much fun together."

"Right, I'm sure," I replied mildly and wiped the blood away on my pants.

"Magic, Sweetheart, is bound by rules."

"So there should be a loophole."

"There always is," he agreed and sat down on one of the stools again.

Klaus said nothing, but if looks could kill, Kol would have been daggered, staked, and burned ten times over. I ignored it mostly, pushing the journal I had left untouched on the kitchen table to Kol. "This is the only thing I have. I know there must have been a Grimoire, but I have no real idea where it is, other than that it's probably at Sheila Bennett's house."

Kol grinned, looking at me as if I had proposed a great adventure. I was mildly regretting having opened my mouth and inviting him inside in the first place.

It was a humid May morning when I let myself inside Sheila's house. Apparently, with Bonnie's descent into vampirism and Sheila's death, the house was no longer owned by any human and both Klaus and Kol stalked in after me, no invisible barrier stopping them.

It didn't seem there had been anyone recently, layers of dust covering the cabinets and the wooden photo frames on the wall, but more importantly, it didn't feel welcoming. There was a strange, sweet dampness to the air even my human nostrils could pick up on and I wrapped my arms around myself.

"Do you feel that too?" I asked, and Kol stepped up next to me, bumping his shoulder against mine.

"Don't worry about it. Most witches aren't keen on us vampires."

I swallowed. I didn't think they were so keen on me either. Not that I didn't deserve that. We passed a kitchen, which was all wood and I let my eyes flit over the table I once had been sitting on when Sheila had delved into my mind all those months ago. There was still a teapot and corresponding cups on the counter and for a second I let myself picture Sheila Bennett there, cooking for herself, or perhaps for Bonnie and Caroline. My stomach churned.

"Sweetheart, do you know where she kept the Grimoires?"

"Erm," I shook my head, hoping to keep my troubled thoughts at bay, and dragged the nose of my sneaker against a knot in the wooden board beneath me. I knew Sheila had kept the grimoires in the living room, neatly ordered in a large mahogany bookcase. I wasn't sure if that was still the case. Digging my teeth into my lower lip, I waved in the direction I thought the living room was.

The two men already moved towards it and I inhaled deeply. Nervously, I lifted my hair, pushed it up in a high ponytail, and followed after them. I'd been right. Sheila Bennett's living room was cozy, with a cabinet on one wall laden with silver-framed photographs, and a large bookcase on the other, filled to the brim with grimoires. Daylight poured in through the pale curtains, slanting over the books and I craned my neck.

"My they have quite the collection," Kol remarked, voicing out my exact thoughts.

"Yeah," I nodded, eyes flitting up and down over the bookcase. The grimoires were all exquisitely bound in dark leather, some newer than others. Licking my lips, I selected a book at random, reverently opening the cover and flicking through the pages. I wasn't sure how someone was supposed to work through them. There wasn't much logic to them and I could not use magic to aid me. I had no idea where to start. I doubted Kol and Klaus knew either, but the younger Mikaelson trotted towards the bookcase, taking out several grimoires, and sunk down to the floor, sitting cross-legged in front of it, flicking through the pages.

Klaus remained in the doorway, silently observing as we flicked through the pages of grimoires. His blue eyes fixed on my face and then on Kol's and— after a while, I managed to get distracted by the grimoire I was reading.

It was Kol who found it. He read through the grimoires much faster than I did, his stack of books growing twice as fast as mine did. We'd been in the house for over two hours and I'd been on my sixth grimoire. My head had started to ache and I was distracting myself moodily, staring at the large watercolor, hanging over the mantlepiece.

"Elena," Kol said and I turned towards him.

He was grinning at me, dark strands of hair blew across his dark eyes and I pushed the book from my lap and crawled toward him. He gave me an amused look and I could see myself reflected in his pupils. It felt somewhat unearthly.

"Did you find something?" I asked slowly, feeling my face flush.

"Depends," he remarked, "Is that the ring?"

He showed me the grimoire he was reading from and my eyes widened. There, in perfect detail, was a drawing of the Gilbert ring, taking up the entire page, and my lips drew back in a smile. "Yeah, that's it! You actually found it!"

"No need to sound so shocked." He muttered and I sat down next to him, eyes flitting over Emily's slightly uneven, spider-thin handwriting. She'd drawn up the magical blueprint of what I assumed was the spell to create the ring, but— it was difficult. Lines and triangles were drawn with measurements and words it a language close to Latin. I had no idea what it all meant.

My shoulders tightened as I lifted my gaze to Kol's. "What does this all mean?"

"I can't say I know exactly, Sweetheart," He inhaled deeply through his nose, tilting his head back.

Pale eyes met mine and Klaus cocked his head to the side. "What does it say, Kol?"

"Well, the Bennett Witch describes this ring almost as if it's sentient. Like it binds the spirits to it—"

"I think I heard something about the spirits roaming the other side and looking for their bodies?"

"You sound unsure."

"That's because I am," I admitted.

"Our clairvoyant doesn't know everything." Klaus drolly replied.

I rolled my eyes, and scooted forward, bumping our elbows together and tapping a horizontal line. "What does this even mean?"

"It's a pentangle." He explained and I frowned. He drew his fingers along the other lines and finally, I saw it, cocking my head to the side. A five pointed star. "It's symbolizes the elements."

"There are five points," I remarked. "There are only four elements."

He nodded, wordless and calculating. "Agreed. The fifth is the binding element. To return someone from the death not once but whenever something supernatural is involved, it needs a stronghold."

I exhaled, long and loud, and frowned. Of course, it did. And it was probably not something easy to obtain. "A stronghold?"

"Like a binding."

My eyes widened once more. "So if we figure out what binds it—"

"It makes things easier." He agreed.

"What's this?" I asked then, tapping my index finger on another drawing. It looked almost like a ghost and Kol frowned.

"It could be the binding," he replied.

"So it's bound to a ghost—" I opened and closed my mouth as realization hit and a nonplussed expression morphed Kol's features into hard lines. "The other side," I whispered. "Emily bound the rings to the realm where all supernatural go when they die. It makes sense too, because how else would a normal human be able to get there? From what I gathered, they should have moved on instead."

A quick grin slipped across Kol's lips. "Not bad little Doppelgänger."

"I'm not little."

"No," he agreed, looking me over lewdly. "I guess not."

"Try anything and I castrate you. Super healing or not."

His eyebrows rose in amusement or surprise, I wasn't sure. "Feisty," he murmured, but this time it was lacking the sexist tone he'd used whenever he was trying to push someone's buttons. "You really are nothing like Katerina," Kol muttered and when I looked up to stare at him he had already turned to his brother. "This one lacks self-preservation, brother. I don't think I've ever heard some human threaten me with neutering before. Especially not since I'm much stronger—"

"You're not actually a danger for me, now, or are you?"

"I could disembowel you," he drawled, and rubbed his index finger and thumb, "like that."

"I'm pretty sure that would lead to you daggered for a few centuries, or me haunting you."

He sniggered. "Like I said, feisty."

"Yeah, yeah," I muttered and pushed myself up on my knees. "What do we do now?"

"Well, if the stronghold is the Otherside, we have to break it."

"You mean, destroy the ring?" I asked.

"Well, as it is sentient. If it binds a living to it, to bring it back, it can easily give access to someone from the— other side."

"Right, so someone could possess him from out the grave," I said.

I'd known that of course. But I hadn't known the ring was sentient. My eyebrows furrowed together. How could a ring be sentient though? Was that just a semblance— a shard of the witch who created it? Or did it become sentient because Emily bound something to it. Something that could turn a normal mortal to a supernatural, even if it was just temporary?

"Kol, if we break the connection will that be enough?" I asked, toying with the hem of my shirt.

"Well, it should stop the influence," he remarked. "Without the connection— however, that is only when it didn't take hold inside of the human— Jeremy." He continued.

"So you think it is like possession."

"Like a golem," he remarked.

"They're from mud, Kol," Klaus replied scathingly from his spot at the doorjamb. I had almost forgotten he was here too, looking rather— upset. Angry? Annoyed? You'd think I'd be able to read Klaus better than this.

"Golems exist?" I asked and brushed a loose lock of hair behind my ear.

"They're made by witches to do their dirty work. They're not actually alive though." He said.

"Okay, and how do you get rid of one?"

"You kill the witch who made him," Klaus replied uncaringly.

I pressed my lips in a tight line. "Well, that's a foregone conclusion, I'd say. The witch is already dead." I turned to Kol again. He'd gone back to reading over the spell. "But, you actually do think it's like a possession?"

"Alike," Kol agreed. "It's more like intercommunion. The ring takes some of the wearer's life force, storing it away and returning it when necessary, but if it can take something from someone it can also return something. I supposed it somehow stored something where it had first taken it."

Frowning, I tried to gather where I'd heard that before. Warm sunlight poured in through the partly open curtains, and dust motes floated in the bars of light. I curled my legs up and drew my arms around my knees. Eyebrows furrowing together, I tucked my chin in the hollow between my joined knees.

"Like a Horcrux," I realized and Kol blinked owlishly at me.

"A what?"

"No, it's fiction. Harry Potter fiction. But it's basically a spell to put a soul shard in an inanimate object. It's dark and it can possess someone."

"Well, that actually sounds quite accurate." He said and drew his index finger along the parallel lines of my ribs. I narrowed my eyes at him. "I do know a few witches."

"You've been in a coffin for a decade." Klaus snorted and I watched him out of the corner of my eye as he seated himself on the low coffee table. He leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees, his chin leaning on his intertwined fingers. "It will be another two if you keep up the familiarity with my Doppelgänger. However what witch would you be able to ask anything of? They should be long dead."

"Yeah, yeah," Kol grumbled and shut the grimoire with a thud. "I still know several witch families."

"And you think one of them would be able to help with this?"

He grinned sinfully and I curled my feet up and under my legs. He pushed the book in my hands and tapped its spine. "Oh I know they will be able to."

Klaus seemed to draw the line with that, probably considering that much exposure to Kol Mikaelson on one day was more than enough. With a tight expression, he shoed us out of the living room. Outside the sky had darkened with clouds, dark and heavy with rain, and my lips twisted in a tight line.

"Do you have a cellphone?" I asked Kol, who in turn lighted up like a Christmas tree.

"I do!"

"Perhaps we should exchange numbers? Then you could call me when you find something?"

Kol grinned and offered me his phone — a black iPhone — with a small bow. I took it and, as I climbed into Klaus's car, I entered my number. Kol sat in the passenger's seat, and Klaus moodily settled behind the wheel. As he geared up, pulling out of the parking lot, into the rain-clogged street, I stared outside. My breath fanning out over the window and I moved my hand up, touching the tips of my fingers against the glass. I drew a smiling face on the patch of window glass made misty by my breath.

We actually had a chance to find a cure for Jeremy.

I wetted my lips. My phone beeped and I absentmindedly reached for it. Caroline's name was glowing on the display. I tapped the text message and my eyebrows rose. Bonnie was back in town for her mom's funeral and I felt my heart skip a beat.

Oh—

(To be continued…)

A/N: I'm not sure if anyone is surprised at this point with me breaking off at something of a cliffhanger stage. Either way, the chapter was becoming too big, so I cut it into two parts. As far as I'm concerned it worked better this way. One part about the search of the Grimoire. And another about Bonnie's return to Mystic Falls. Nevertheless, I hope you all enjoyed it so far, and I'll try to update the story at the end of this week. This means, that if I don't have problems with the connection, the next chapter will be out either Friday or Saturday.