Summary: Alone, scared and magically, impossibly pregnant, Caroline found herself running towards the one refuge that she knew could keep her safe. But first she needs to save him. Canon divergence from TVD S7 and TO S4
AN: Canon divergence from TVD S7 and TO S4, and inspired by "Years ago, when the girls were really little, I was in trouble. I was scared, I just, I put the girls in the car, and I drove. And I ended up in New Orleans... looking for you." Even prior to that I've referred only to very loose canon, so please give me the leeway on canon-related objections and timeline changes. I just need to get this out.
Title is the last line of Neruda Sonnet VIII. /Sonnet-VIII:-If-your-eyes-were-not-the-color-of-the-moon
In Your Life I See Everything That Lives
Part 1
Overgrown vines snaked through the railings and crept up the stone walls, latching on to crevices where soil had settled after dancing on the wind. The incessant rain did not help. The humidity that greeted Caroline when she first arrived had been a shock to the system. While slowly her body adjusted in the last few days, the flora had relished in the ecosystem it provided. Without the regular manicures of a gardener and a landscaper, wildflowers sprung uncontrolled in crevices.
It was almost beautiful.
If she had the chance, she would keep them just as they grew, where the wind or the birds dropped their seeds unplanned. Cultivated flowers could not reach so high, bring color and bloom is such surprising patterns.
Caroline reached for the stark sign hanging haphazardly on the gate, condemning the place. For all the planning that had been done, this step is what neither she nor Hayley had resolved. Vampire and hybrid between them, neither of them had the powers of a witch. Caroline was reluctant to draw anyone else in danger for decisions of her own making. Both women just had to hope that the events from the year before had rendered the compound public, and would be open to Caroline without invitation.
She made a move to step over the threshold, thwarted by an invisible force keeping her out. From outside she heard not a sound, wondered if the whispers had been correct, if she was wasting her time here.
She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath. Inhale, exhale. Even if it were unnecessary for her survival, the calming technique had been the reason she was still alive. It was how she controlled herself when she first turned, how she managed emotions that could otherwise spiral. How she lived.
Maybe her infamous control is also what would get him through.
Caroline certainly had the easier job in the plan. She could not imagine the carting bodies, machinations, and dealing with the Mikaelson siblings when she was part of the murder of one, had been rivals with another, and barely knew enough of the other two that she thought there was only one other left.
She placed a hand on the gate.
'Come on. I am doing you a giant favor, and I know you're caught up in this unwillingly just as much as I am, but you really must cooperate here.'
For the longest time, nothing happened. And then, Caroline's lips curved when she felt the warmth emanating from the palm of her hand. She opened her eyes and saw the golden glow from her hand and the gate, then the light was gone, burrowing into her veins. She pulled the body bag strapped across her chest closer. She stepped into the compound with no further issue.
'Thank you.'
Her heart sank as she drew deeper still, standing now at the center of the courtyard, right at a broken spell boundary. Her heart ached, having heard the whispers out in the streets. She knelt on the terracotta floor. The scent of blood, of so many creatures' blood and death, rose from where they had seeped into the porous pavement. Despite the efforts post-mortem to clean up the evidence, the doubts from earlier were wiped out.
Ever since that day in the forest when she faced her reality, the genuine connection he so desperately demanded that she claim, there was no going back. Caroline wanted to live a life, and he agreed to let her live her dream of a college life, of the basic human experiences that would need to take a backseat if she took him up on his offer. That he agreed to part then was clear to both of them when he looked into her eyes, sinking inside her, then her fangs burying into the pulse point of his neck, that this was a waypoint of divergence before the eventual interlock, one final intersection where their paths would converge and that was the road to that nameless time.
She knew his scent, would recognize him from anywhere. His blood, his sweat.
His damned tears.
They were all over the place.
The freshest of which were right here in this circle where he had been chained up like a wild animal. Her eyes flickered. She hoped fervently he got several of them before whatever they did to him. From the stench of blood around her, at least she knew he was unbowed. They could trap him, make him bleed, but they could never defeat him. Not really.
But just as pain fades, and love erodes will with time, Caroline needed to get him out fast. She had watched him deteriorate before her very eyes when Silas managed to worm his way into his mind. What Klaus did not lack in physical strength, his mind and heart were vulnerable. Caroline was certain that this nemesis would know that this forced solitude, knowing his family was under threat, was going to be a worse punishment.
Caroline was just grateful that this egomaniac was so full of himself and his own decisions that he was so lulled into the comfort of knowing that with the Mikaelsons gone and Hayley under surveillance, there was no need for guards to be stationed in Klaus' prison.
Klaus was here.
The deathly silence was more terrifying.
She made her way through the catacombs, moving deeper and deeper beneath the compound. Caroline could hear the drip, drip, dripping of water, suspected once more that it was raining up in the streets of New Orleans. It should have been soothing, but the constant drip but seeing water from nowhere and recognizing the incessant noise had no pattern to it, just like the haphazard plant growth above, began to grate.
Caroline paused before the rusted gate. In the back of her mind she wondered what gates were doing in the catacombs. It was not like the bodies buried would rise and escape, then remembered who and what she was, and the supernatural folklore that hounded Louisiana just as much as Virginia, and chalked it up to the need for protection by the living. Stories would be made up afterwards of trying to shield those who passed from graverobbers.
But Caroline could see which side of the gate the padlocks were designed to be placed. It was to keep undesirables in, not out.
Her breath caught in her throat when she saw him. Lying still, so still, chained up. Her eyes burned, and she could feel her chest blossom with sudden, biting hatred for this man, this vampire that she did not even know, but absolutely heard had taken the Mikaelsons down—some farcical king who would do this to Klaus, when Klaus still owed her centuries.
Caroline threw open the gate, rushed towards him. Caroline knelt before the still body, noting the open, blank eyes staring unseeingly up the dank ceiling. She placed her bag on the floor beside her, taking out one of the blood bags that she had brought along with her. Caroline placed her hands on his cheeks, rubbing some warmth into his cold skin, hoping he would wake from the trance.
"Wake up, Klaus. We have to get out of here."
He was as dead to the world as every other corpse in the catacombs.
There was no response. How long has he been in this state? He was not desiccated, and he did not seem—gone. Caroline lowered herself down and looked into those blue eyes. He was unresponsive, but he was in there. She leaned forward and whispered in his ear, "Wake up, Klaus. I need you. Tell me what to do." She glanced back at him. He did not move, did not gather himself to do as she asked.
Then, she saw the lone tear crawling down the corner of one eye, tracking down and clearing a path of moist skin where his face had been soiled by the dirt mixed with dried sweat, vanishing into his blonde hair.
He was there.
She picked up a blood bag and unscrewed the cap, then placed it under his nose. If he smelled it, maybe he would regain consciousness enough to drink from it. He did not stir. She put the spout of the straw in his mouth and squeezed some of the blood out, only to see the blood trickle down the side of his mouth. She needed to get the blood into his throat. Caroline took the blood into her mouth, then placed her lips over his, pushing the blood in and letting the precious, nourishing liquid trickle down his throat.
Less waste, but far too slow and ineffective.
She just needed to take him. They would figure out the rest later. Caroline reached for the chains. They disgusted her. Chains were not meant to hold him down. The moment she touched them, they burned her palms. Caroline gritted her teeth and hold on, smelling the singing flesh of her skin. Her brain screamed at her to let go. She stifled the scream of pain and held on, willing the passengers in her body to fix it for all of their sakes. Caroline pushed away the guilt niggling at her. Twice now today she had forced innocent souls to act on her behalf. But they were all in this together, thrown without their consent right in the middle of this.
Just as she was able to step into the compound uninvited, Caroline felt the moment that the chains lost their magic. Now unspelled, she was able to break the chains off, releasing his arms and legs from the shackles placed on them. Caroline broke apart the collar that held his neck, touching the skin of his neck gingerly.
Cursed and catatonic he might been, but at least his healing skill worked as his skin sluggishly healed the scrape and bruising.
Caroline placed a hand over his chest so she could carry him away. Immediately, her hand glowed over his chest. Her eyes landed on the hole torn over his shirt, crusted, dried blood ringing the cloth. She ran her palm over the skin and recognized, deep inside her, without magical foreknowledge but hearing the screaming in her gut courtesy of the souls resting inside her. They had helped her through, and she made a mental note to treat them to vanilla milkshake if she and Klaus made it out alive.
Her body drew out magic, tendrils of smoky light floating up from inside his chest. Caroline's brows furrowed at the sight of the dark glow, unlike those that had been siphoned from the gate and from the chains. She started and jerked her hand back. Whatever that was, felt too pleasant, too ecstatic, as the magic entered her. There was something inside him causing this state of catatonia, but she was not going to draw dark magic into embryos.
She lowered herself once more so she could speak directly into his ear. "I'm so sorry." And then she placed a kiss on unresponsive lips. Caroline forcefully thrust her hand into his chest cavity, searching for the object. A gnarled, guttural cry exploded from his throat. Caroline began to pull out the blade. His gaze slammed into her, confused, wild. The bone blade clattered to the floor. Then, Klaus was no longer in front of her. She felt him flush against her back before she heard him. Caroline felt the sting of his fangs burying into her neck, drawing her blood like a savage, pumping venom into her veins.
There were no best laid plans when it came to Klaus Mikaelson.
She should have known he would find a way to screw everything up, even when it came to his own rescue.
Caroline's vision darkened. Klaus in his normal state of mind barely did anything halfway. One could not expect better from this feral Hybrid savagely woken from a year's curse, chained and torn from his family, with an open chest wound that only now sluggishly began to heal. With the last of her consciousness, Caroline gripped his hair with her fingers, then placed her open palm on his cheek.
The pulse of light from her hand was the last of energy, stored and built up from the powers siphoned from objects since she arrived. Fortunately, the magic that had been spelled into the compound had been strong enough. Klaus was thrown off from her neck and against the far wall. Her body folded limply on the cold stone floor.
~ o ~ o ~ o ~
His chest was a hollow bloody mess, the pain of having the blade pulled out was like tearing hell into space and the manic scream that escaped him was a gift and a shame. He had been drowning in permanent agony, pulverized by the dark magic that trapped every muscle sinew, vein and cell inside of him.
A thousand years and Klaus was not simply a student, but a master, of the religious movements of the world. He had sat in the back of a church pew and listened to the Latin masses in every century, and heard in many languages as the arms of the church reached to every part of the globe, the same warning as it drew more and more in.
That was why he knew, trapped in his sorry punishment, that the Devil was real and the Devil came to him that night, transformed into an angel of light. Deep and drowning in his catatonia, a translucent film shielding the clarity of his vision, yet still the Devil knelt before him, looking like her, wrapping around him and she cupped her face, whispering in the same voice from his dreams. The Devil came for him wearing her face, tempting him to give in and let himself be sucked into hell.
The warm drop of blood coating his tongue and his throat, delivered by a poisoned kiss.
When his consciousness seeped back into his body and he could move, he was weak, confused, still hazy as he stumbled onto his feet. The angel of light stood with her arm drenched in his blood, and his thirst propelled him to that familiar, seductive curve of her neck. Klaus bit into her neck, his mouth flooded by the sweet taste of home, drawing blood deeply, feeling her essence pump life back into him, quenching a need that drove him to depths of despair. She was the Devil and she delivered him from the humiliation that Marcel had driven him.
And then his body careened off her, expelled by magic and Klaus slammed backwards to the wall, sending bits of stone down with him when he fell to the ground. His vision began to clear and he collected himself. He glared towards the figure crumpled on the ground, a mess of tangled golden curls and blood.
He would recognize her scent anywhere.
Even the Devil could not imitate that fragrance. It wrapped around him when he dreamed.
Klaus flashed towards her, then gathered her in his arms. The bite mark was nasty. He had nearly torn her open, and the venom darkened the edges with infection. He had come close to completely draining her, if not for that pulse of energy that she could not possibly possess. Despite his limbs still weakened from his prolonged incarceration, he held her close and ran.
tbc