CHAPTER 5
Klaus was pissed off when he arrived at the gate of the Lafayette cemetery.
"Sophie Deveraux, show yourself, I know you are hiding in here." Klaus yelled at the gate.
A minute later Sophie came to the gate.
"What is it now, Klaus?"
"We had a deal! You protect my unborn child, I dismantle Marcel's army. And whilst I've been busy fulfilling my part of the bargain, you allowed Hayley to be attacked and almost killed by a gaggle of lunatic witches."
"I had nothing to do with it, I swear. Hayley and I are linked, remember? She dies, I die."
"Then who were they?" Klaus asked now a little bit calmer.
"They are a faction of extremists. Sabine stupidly told them about some vision she had about the baby. Look Sabine is a witch equivalent of a drama queen. You can't take anything she says seriously. And the visions are totally up to interpretation."
"Well, how, may I ask, was this particular vision interpreted?"
Sophie hesitated before saying, "Pretty much that your baby would bring death to all witches."
"Ah, well. I grow fonder of this child by the second." Klaus smiled mischievously. "By the way, Elijah is talking to your witch Davina right now, trying to come to an agreement. Meanwhile, we're gonna take care of these extremists."
"Elijah's talking to Davina?"
Klaus just grinned.
"I'm guessing she'll have plenty to say about that crowd."
Klaus was intrigued. "Do tell."
He had been meaning to know everything there was to know about the witch Davina to use it for his own personal gain. And now there was an opportunity to learn more and he wasn't gonna pass that up. So Sophie better sing like a canary, he thought.
"…so when I returned to New Orleans. My sister told me that her daughter Monique and three other girls were going to be sacrificed at the Harvest ritual."
"What the bloody hell is the Harvest ritual?" Klaus couldn't help but ask.
"It's a ritual our coven does every three centuries so that the bond to our ancestral magic is restored. We appease our ancestors, they keep our ancestral power flowing."
Just then Klaus' cell phone buzzed. He stepped away to answer it. "Wait here!" He told Sophie not to leave.
"Marcel. Bit early in the day for you, isn't it?"
"Something killed a bunch of witches in the Bayou, I need to know who. So I want you with me as you have the only known cure for the werewolf bite."
"Oh, why not? Haven't been to the Bayou in ages. I'm on my way." Klaus pretended to be happy about the quest.
He hung up and told Sophie, "Stay put. And save the rest of your story 'til I return."
Caroline who had heard everything that Sophie had told Klaus about the Harvest walked the cemetery. Her hands and legs were free now. Sophie had told her that there's no point to hold her shackled and chained. The main thing that was going to keep her there was the invisible walls around the cemetery. They had made some kind of a delicate peace agreement where Caroline promised to behave in return for some freedom.
So thinking about the Harvest ritual, how given that magic was real, then the Harvest ritual had to be real too, she suddenly noticed a grave that had a huge red sign 'MURDERER' painted on it. It belonged to someone named, 'Sean O'Connell'.
"O'Connell…?" She muttered as realization hit her.
"So you are siding with a vampire against the other New Orleans witches. Why?" Elijah asked Davina after he had let her know the previous night that he was out of the casket and needed to talk to her. Davina hadn't tried to put him back as he had showed that he wouldn't harm her.
"Because they're liars. All of them."
"Care to elaborate?" Elijah asked.
"They made me and my friends do this Harvest ritual. They said our participation would bring our family strength, health... that we'd forever be celebrated as saviors of the community. But all they really wanted was more power. So, I left before they could get it. Now, they're running out of time, because after the Harvest, comes the Reaping. And if they don't complete the Harvest, there won't be a Reaping. Soon, all the witches in the Quarter will start to lose their power. It will be their spectacular end and they deserve everything they get."
"So would it take to complete the Harvest ritual," Elijah asked intrigued.
"I'd have to die."
Elijah was shocked to learn that.
Sophie was in the cemetery, packing various bottles of magical ingredients into her backpack when Caroline walked in.
"Going somewhere?" She asked.
"The witches who were killed last night, the have to be consecrated. If I don't get to them before sundown, we'll lose the link to their magic."
"Well the sun is high up in the sky, so you have time. I want to know more about the harvest ritual and do you know anything about a boy named 'Sean O'Connell. Is he related to Camille O'Connell by any chance?" Caroline sat down on the bench
Sophie sighed and said, "I don't know anything about Camille, but Sean was Father Kieran's nephew that one of the witch elders hexed because Kieran refused to support the witches doing the Harvest ritual. The hex kept Kieran occupied while the elders continued to prepare for the Harvest."
"What happened to Sean?" Caroline asked already having an inkling where this story was going.
"He ended up killing nine seminary students and then himself due to the hex messing with his mind."
Klaus and Marcel were talking in the bayou bar.
"So all the girls were told that they would put to sleep and they'd wake up more powerful than even. But in real life all four girl were going to be slaughtered. I couldn't have that." Marcel told Klaus.
"You're the one who stopped it." Klaus realised.
"Kieran knew every detail from Sophie. After his nephew's massacre in the church, he was so torn up, he left town just before the Harvest. But on his way out, he came to me, and he asked me to stop the Harvest. He knew I didn't want the witches getting any more power. And I do have a rule about people abusing kids, so, I did what he asked. But I was too late.I could only save one of them Davina Claire."
It was soon after Marcel had finished telling Klaus the Harvest story that Marcel excused himself, saying he needed to take care of something. He promised to be back in a few minutes. But when in 15 minutes, he wasn't back, Klaus grew restless. It was then that Klaus realised that Marcel was stalling him the whole time. Taking him out to the bayou so he wouldn't be able to get to Davina, while Marcel's men moved her.
Marcel walked into the courtyard where Klaus was waiting for him up on the top of a cement barrier.
"Taking me on a field trip to distract me? Pathetic. And obvious. I taught you better than that."
"You taught me to protect what's mine. You will not take Davina from me—- end of story." Marcel retorted.
"It's an immutable law of nature, Marcel, that the strong always take from the weak."
"Oh, if you were so strong, you wouldn't have run away from New Orleans like a little bitch all those years ago."
Klaus jumped down from where he was standing and punched Marcel in the face.
"You've been playing king with a bunch of children for too long. Don't mistake me for one of your nightwalker lackeys, Marcel. I can take Davina anytime I like."
Marcel lunged for Klaus, but he was knocked back down by Elijah, who appeared out of nowhere.
"Marcel, Niklaus, please. Let's all behave now."
"What are you doing here, Elijah?" Klaus asked his brother.
"How did you get free?" Marcel asked him in disbelief.
"Davina so kindly let me leave that wretched attic." Elijah replied to Marcel, then he turned to Klaus, "Come on, Niklaus. Let's go back to the hotel. We have a lot to discuss."
"Marcel-" Klaus started to say.
"Marcel will let us leave. He knows it's in his best interest."
Marcel thought about attacking for a moment, try out his new superpowers but then settled to the idea of letting them leave. He wanted to gear up before the real confrontation. This was not the time.
Rebekah poured several drinks as she talked to Hayley.
"So, what do you think is up with that wolf of yours?" Rebekah asked her.
"I feel like we're connected somehow. I don't know. Maybe it's just some pipe dream that I have of finding any real family out there."
Rebekah gave Hayley a sympathetic look and handed her a drink. Hayley side-eyed her and Rebekah suddenly remembered that Hayley was pregnant and couldn't drink, "Oh right."
So she drank Hayley's glass of bourbon in one gulp before starting to drink her own. "Well, if you ask me, family is a pain in the behind."
Hayley rolled her eyes.
"And as for being in it alone, how dare you?I don't ruin a perfectly fabulous pair of boots traipsing through the Bayou for just anyone."
Hayley smiled and Rebekah downed her second drink. Their conversation was interrupted by Klaus walking through the front door. Followed by Elijah, wearing a huge smile. Rebekah ran over to Elijah and hugged him tight. Elijah saw Hayley over Rebekah's shoulder, and they smiled at each other.
"Elijah! You're safe! Now that you're home, is your first plan to kill Niklaus?"
"That has to wait. We have more urgent matters to discuss. But let me first get cleaned up and changed, alright?"
Rebekah nodded and Elijah left the room, glancing and smiling at Hayley as he did so.
Later, the Mikaelson siblings and Hayley sat in the study where Elijah stood behind the desk and explained everything that he had learned from Davina that day.
"Everything that brought us here to New Orleans was a lie. This story that Sophie Deveraux fabricated, this struggle for control of the French Quarter, this war between vampires and witches, wasn't over territory at all, this was over Davina." Elijah continued to explain. "Eight months ago, Sophie Deveraux and her sister Jane-Anne lost everything, when Jane-Anne's daughter wasn't resurrected like she was suppose to be. Now, four months after that, a young pregnant girl wanders into their restaurant. In addition to carrying the Original Hybrid's child in her tummy, she also tells them about the girl he loves above all. Suddenly, there's a plan: snatch that girl and the pregnant werewolf and all hope is not lost."
"So, Jane-Anne actually sacrificed her life so that her sister can use you to find Davina?" Caroline asked Klaus after he had told her what Elijah learned from Davina.
Klaus nodded, "That's right. If Sophie Deveraux is successful in capturing Davina, she can return her niece back to life. We thought we'd come here to wage a war for power. This is about family. In order to return her niece to life, Sophie Deveraux will fight to the death. That makes her more dangerous than anyone."
"That's messed up." Caroline exclaimed while pacing at the gate. This was getting more complicated by every passing day and she knew she shouldn't think about herself right now. That there were more important things Klaus had to consider moving forward. But she was beginning to think that if things got anymore complicated, she would never get out of that cemetery and back to civilization.
"It is what it is, sweetheart." Klaus told her and then looking at her nervously pacing the cemetery ground while deep in thought, he got worried.
"Penny for your thoughts, love?"
She hit the invisible wall that was separating her from Klaus with her palms in frustration. "I'm never getting out of this hellhole, Klaus."
Klaus put his palms where Caroline was holding hers on the other side. After a long moment of looking at each other and Klaus trying to calm her with his assuring eyes and smile that expressed only love for her, she finally nodded, "I'm calm. I am. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have lost it like that. You have a lot more on your mind that getting me free."
"Nonsense. Now that Elijah's is free and Rebekah is happy with me, I have no one to think about than you. Elijah wants to focus on unlinking Hayley from Sophie now, but the witch is not going to jeopardize her life, so we have time with that. So I can focus on freeing you."
"No, no," Caroline shook her head. "Elijah's right. You need to find a way to unlink Hayley from Sophie. It's more important than me getting a shower." Caroline tried to joke, but Klaus wasn't laughing.
"Not a chance, I have prioritized others long enough. Tomorrow I'm going to take on Marcel and then it will be all over."
"No, Klaus, you have to be smart about this. First unlink Hayley and then the witches have nothing hanging above your head."
"Besides you."
"Klaus…"
"Caroline."
"Fine, fine, do what you want, I'm gonna go and rest. This day, learning about New Orleans witch history has been really tiring." She joked again and walked away.
"Good night, Caroline. Dream of me." Klaus called after her.
"They are called nightmares, Klaus." Was the last thing she said to him that night as she disappeared into the cemetery.
Klaus sighed and smiled before turning around and walking away too.