He throws Bonnie's clothes into a duffle bag while she sleeps, hangers swinging back and forth as he yanks slinky dresses and frilly tops, crumpling them into the overstuffed leather bag and zipping it closed.
Minutes.
That's all he has really before the red marker circles New Orleans.
It is not quite dawn, but Klaus has packed up her little world into two leather monogrammed bags and has finessed a clearing for their private plane to fly them out of the Crescent City in the next half hour.
In his distracted fury to pack he has overlooked the beginnings of an altar Bonnie has created on the dresser. The open grimoire, candles burned down to nubs, fresh flowers and trinkets recently acquired and arranged in a circle of salt. Her own practice.
Glancing at the clock, he braces himself and pushes her gently. "Wake up, Bonnie." He says, his mind racing for the ploy, he will make a game of it, have her pick anywhere in the world for them to travel, she had mentioned somewhere by the sea last night, he will just get her to believe anything other than the fact that he is kidnapping her again.
Her crooked mouth cracks a smile, open and genuine. She sits up on her elbows and he saddles down the bed beside her, leaning in for a kiss. His lips brush her forehead as her eyes adjust to the sight of the room. The opened closet, empty hangers, and ajar dresser drawers. He understands that there are definitely questions but there isn't any time.
Mystic Falls is awake.
"We have a plane to catch, my love."
Bonnie blinks, "Wait, what?" She asks, confused scrambling onto her knees, brushing her hair from her heart shaped-face. And the rapid-fire questions begin, like what is he up to, where had he been, where were they going, why were they leaving now, and the blue and red veins throb at her temples and wrists and along her neck, and he squares his shoulders as his lower-half hardens and his gums itch, aroused by her strong emotions.
"We can discuss this on the ride over to the airstrip," He taps his wrist as if a watch were there, "Now are you going in the nude, love or shall we pull something from the bag? He says hopping up from the bed as if that were the end of the conversation. He knows full well that it is not but he does not have the time to go back and forth with her when they have such a tight window to escape New Orleans.
She doesn't budge from the bed.
"You loved the idea of me taking you away last night," He stresses with a forced grin, his broad hand gripping the side of her neck, his thumb pressed against her full pout to quiet her from asking another question as the bed-side clock ticks and he imagines a teary-eyed blonde reading a eulogy that he wrote and a deranged vampire running into the packed memorial service to yell that the deceased was really alive.
"No." She whispers.
"Come again?"
"No," She says more confidently, throwing the covers from her bare legs, "How else do you want me to say it?" She spits, eyebrows raised, "How about, HELL NO."
He expected her to argue with him, sure, but he had not expected this. And he immediately realizes his error, that he had not thought this through, and it would take more to get her leave on his whim, to be on his impetuous side even though she declared love, she was still Bonnie Bennett, and he wants to laugh, reminded of Mama T's words to him that he would have to give her something to make her come be with him, give her something to leave the dead. And he opens his mouth to speak it, to say the thing but there could be a blue Camaro barreling its way to them at this very moment, and he doesn't have the time, and he entertains the thought of just throwing her over his shoulder kicking and screaming.
Running his hand through his hair, he finally opens his mouth to say the first thing that comes to mind, "Bonnie, I know this is an abrupt change in our plans, but you will have to trust me, while I was away I had considerable time to contemplate my moves in obtaining this rule over this enigmatic city, "He starts, his hand falling to the side of her, enclosing her, "And I do not want it."
Her entire face falls at his admission, and she shakes her head in disbelief before sticking to her guns and saying, "We got him, Klaus, you may not want this crown anymore but we are taking it. And if you don't want it then I'm doing this for the witches, "She says, and he can see the water forming at the rims of her eyes, "I have endured only a glimpse of what the Nola witches are going through here and I just can't leave them like this. We have a real shot to free this city and give its supernatural community a new life, one where they don't have to live in a fear anymore. "
He bristles at her use of we, with it meaning his brother and not him and he is frustrated at her loyalty, at her good heart, at the light of dawn ready to blow his cover, and at his naiveté at thinking he could pull off a coup with an amnesiac Bonnie Bennett. "That was not a part of the plan, Bonnie. You were brought back to this world to secure my authority over the city, not to free the witches, love, let them handle their own battle among their own."
"Am I still only a weapon to you?"
"No, no you are not only a weapon to me, but what is concerning to me is that I am the one who saved you from an eternity of darkness and I am the one who spent hours upon hours training you and developing you to hear you decline my offer to try at a rebellion to free these ragtag witches from my protégé'. That was never the goal."
"It is for me," She states, shoulders squared, "Elijah and I —"
"You and Elijah?" He laughs manically, his pupils darkening, the irises yellow, "And pray tell what does my brother think of your freeing the witches?"
Their eyes meet, and he sees the face that left him hanging in the parlor.
"You bring me here and train me as your soldier, you thrust me off on to your brother, you leave me, and now you want me to ditch it all because it's a Saturday and you don't want to be King anymore," She spits between hot tears, unzipping one of the bags. She pulls out a wrinkled dress and slips it over her naked body, and grabs her purse from the nightstand before dropping to her knees to pull sandals from under the bed.
"This is not up for discussion." He states as a matter of fact, as he realizes he will have to procure another plane for they have missed their window.
"I have to go," She mutters bypassing the hybrid, "I have an appointment with the tailor about my costume." She opens the bedroom door but he slams it shut, hovering over her, crowding her from behind, his menacing frame pressing her into the wooden door, his breath taunting on the back of her neck, "I am not asking you," He breathes, one hand threaded into her hair, his hot mouth on her, his fangs scraping to pierce into the smooth caramel skin as frenzied magic rolls into him.
"Then tell me why, why the change?" She says. He can hear the bewilderment, the fresh tears.
"Leave with me and I will show you, "he says as an almost plea, "Every day I will show you why having this city, the state, the whole god damned continent would not satisfy me." And he thinks of time, how inconsequential it has meant to him for so, so long, and how it was driving his every word now as he fears there is not much of it left with her. "You belong to me."
And in the small space between them, she turns around under his embrace to face him, and she places her hands on either side of his face, the dark veins stretched under his yellow eyes forming dark rivers over the planes of his chiseled cheekbones and she kisses him, her lips pressed passionately against his and she whispers when their embrace breaks, "I don't want to be a piece on your chessboard anymore, Niklaus."
BK
Elijah will chastise her for her tardiness but she will just have to hear him bitch because she has to make a stop before arriving to the masquerade.
Over the phone earlier in the day, they had spoken in code about his brother's return, while she was fitted one last time for her costume.
"Um, yeah, I think, um, "She started and stopped, "I think it's best if I stay away for a while, you know, maybe have a spa day or something, isn't that what people do before balls?"
Elijah assured her that that is what ladies did.
"I will speak to him, Bonnie. But let me be clear in stating that most men would not like to hear of their fiancé's running off with their brothers, but I believe in this case if you decided to do just that, I would find some way to soothe my broken heart.
Bonnie laughed into the tailor's store phone.
"Send the car for me please. I will meet you on Royal, "She said before hanging up the phone and returning back to the stool with pins and needles pricking at her skin.
Like a fairy-tale. Her vampire lover told her she had till the stroke of midnight or he would swoop in on the ball and drag her away from killing the prince, whether the job was done or not.
It was nine now, the ball had started.
And she frantically stalks the streets of the quarter because she has to see her friend and let her know that by end the end of the night the witches would have their victory over Marcel, she was going to end the binding spell he held over their magic.
And also, to say goodbye.
Her feet carry her swiftly through the waves of drunken people and their strewn beads and spilled beer. She peers down alley way after alley way until she sees the red back door of Antoinette's tourist shop.
She raps on the metal intently.
The alley is empty and her knock echoes but no one answers the door. Sighing, she scrounges through her bag, flipping over a receipt, pulling out a pen to scribble, "Meet me at the Mikaelson Gate,'. And she bends down to slip the piece of paper between the weathered crack of the door and the metal frame, and above her a distinct caw, stills her heart, as if the bird was right over her shoulder, and she looks up at the night sky and at the single crow perched above the razor wrapped fence dividing the alleyway from the old townhouses next door.
"Hello," She says, her eyes narrowing on the bird, and then the bird cocks his head as if it understood her, and then the murderous caws of a flock, thousands of them swarm the alley, and she ducks as they beat their wings and fill up every inch of space, a hurricane gust of black wings blind her and blow up her golden shawl over her head. She crouches down under the pain of their pecking, beaks poking at her skin, her shawl becoming sticky with her blood.
"Mort!"
And there is a sudden thunderous pelting of birds against concrete, falling from the sky, carpeting the alleyway. And Bonnie stooped and startled, waiting out her spell of dead birds, braves a peek through her splayed fingers and sees tell-tale boots in front of her, boots she remembers, and she peers up at the outreached hand and the cool blue eyes.
BK
"Tick tock, I should hear chanting by now."
Bonnie stares at the strange hand and the strange mouth, which is moving rapidly. No sound. She is not in the dark dirty alley but inside another mansion, another lavish residence. Boots. The hybrid's heavy boots she can hear clearly on the marble behind her and the stranger's ice blue eyes peering up at her from where he hung in chains, battered and bruised, from the ceiling.
TICK. TOCK.
Her ears are RINGINGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG. Blood? Where was the blood from? She can still feel the beating of the wings and the sting of the pecking at her skin. Her arms are covered in blood, staining her costume crimson. And Feathers, so many feathers, black feathers everywhere, feathers clouding her vision, hovering mid-air.
Grams just showed me this. You're gonna love it. You Ready? A confused brunette concentrates on Bonnie as she levitates feathers. Everything Grams told me is true. I'm a witch.
The tentative hand brushes her shoulder. Vampire. She shoots up abruptly from squatting on the alley floor, flicks her wrist, snapping his neck, his corpse flying, carried by a gust of wind, crashing into a crowded daiquiri stand across the street.
It is time to fucking run.
Her feet kick up feathers as she bails down the opposite end of the alley, away from the stranger, away from death, away from the disorientation of memory.
"I'm still studying the unlinking spell. It's not that easy. Especially under duress."She says to a menacing hybrid.
The red mouth stretches cruelly, "You have been warned. If you're looking for a way to send for help, I will kill anyone who comes to your rescue."
Pulse loud in her throat, she runs for Bourbon, colliding into a group of masked revelers, who drunkenly stumbled off the beaten path into the dank alley. Five of them. Lifting up masks. All smiles. At first. One, two, three, four, five smiles. Her hearing hasn't acclimated to voices yet, just the phantom flapping of crows. They are all wide-eyed and disturbed, their brows crinkled into question marks, standing shoulder to shoulder, preventing her from moving out of the alley, and they seem to be hiding a sixth person in the midst, a girl in a dirty white night gown, her head is shaved, and under the luminescent street light Bonnie can see the purple bruises of bite marks all over her.
They might as well had come with pitchforks for Bonnie.
The mish mosh of witches, women and men, they were the likes of their coven, of their ancestral neighborhoods, the ones belonging to the five covens of the five young witches that Marcel mutilated.
Smiles fade to reveal their vengeance. The pain first starts at her temples. Rolling migraines. Her spine on fire as she convulses from each searing blow of their magic.
A beautiful older woman, same butterscotch skin and mossy green eyes as Bonnie emerges in the cloud of pain. Bonnie sits with her at her breakfast table in a warm bungalow, the morning light shining on them both. "Now that you know what you are," the older woman asks, "What do you plan to do with it?"
She does not need to hear them or be a lip reader to know what they yell out, what they accuse her of as ten palms aim towards her, their magic flattening her to the concrete.
She stutters out Antoinette's name, her insides searing. She just needed them to speak to Antoinette, to quiet them so she could explain, make them understand.
Blood runs from her nose and mouth.
"This is the spell, I just don't know if I'm strong enough "She said, rising from the leather chesterfield, nervous that the hybrid will hurt yet another person she loves. And the hybrid following her closely, "Then you should have a little more faith in yourself, Bonnie.
Limbs heavy and burning, she forces one hand off the ground, stretching it out towards them.
Somnum!
Five fall. Their bodies collapsing, limbs crumpling on top of one another, their faces frozen in horror.
A forced coma. A trapping of their selves in a frozen state. She didn't kill them. She just wanted them to stop hurting her.
Bonnie, exhausted, rolls on to her back, her exhalations rapid and thin. She sees from the corner of her eye, a skittish ghost, the witch in the night gown nervous and aghast at the sight of her kin. The witch rocks back and forth, rubbing her arms, spitting questions at Bonnie, and Bonnie weakly tries to rise, attempts to calm down the witch and let her know despite how things looked, she was really on their side. But before Bonnie is able to croak out an apology, the witch lunges for Bonnie, pinning Bonnie down with her knees, crushing Bonnie's arms, sticking the knife she had hidden in that nightgown deep into Bonnie's ribs.
Frantic, but trapped, tears seep out the edges of Bonnie's eyes. Each breath, the blade tearing at her organs, she mouths without a voice at the raging witch. Go to sleep.
The witch's crazed eyes glaze over, her shaven head lolls backward, and her sinewy frame slumps and falls sideways off of Bonnie's battered body.
Convulsing from tears of relief, she winces, gripping the handle of the knife, the athame is embedded so deep into Bonnie's side that the intricately carved ivory handle is the only piece visible.
"We could have been on the shores of the south Pacific right now. But here you are, stabbed in an alley, "He tuts his tongue disapprovingly, making light of the dark, staring down at the frightening sight that is Bonnie Bennett, "You know love, if you still have the idea of helping the New Orleans witches, then I hope this altercation elucidates for you that they maybe do not want your help."
She would laugh. She would laugh from fucking pure joy, at the sound of his voice, if the reflex didn't kill her.
She can hear. She can hear Klaus clearly.
A weak crooked smile passes across her beautiful face.
A calm rolls over her, at the sight and sound of him. When he caresses her face, she presses her cheek firm into his cold palm. "On three, my love, "He says to her, his eyes yellow and glowing, and he deftly and swiftly removes the knife before the count, and when she screams, he clasps his open wrist over her open mouth for her to drink.
His blood roils inside of her and she vomits it back up, blood spattering in his face. "Well that is interesting, "He remarks, smiling down at her cradled in his arms, his jaunty tone not quite matching the alarm darkening his face.
Words require too much of what is left of her. But she manages to get out.
Knife.
Magic.
Won't close.
"Very well," He says, as if that was that, as if there were no use crying over spoiled milk, scooping her up, gripping her tightly, the gash of her side pressed closed against him, embracing her close to his chest, getting ready to take her to god knows where.
But someone arrives. Someone who dared to come down the damn alley with all the bodies and the blood and dead birds. Someone Klaus is not pleased to see.
The someone speaks. And Klaus orders, "If you care about her so much then you will do as I say. You will shut up and bring your piece of shit around immediately."
BK
Damon barrels the Camaro across town, peering into his rearview mirror, disbelieving the backseat image filling the glass.
The leather of the backseat is slippery with witch blood, as Bonnie lays prostrate across the span of the seat, her head in Klaus's lap, the scent of her blood pungent and intoxicating the small space of the vehicle, making both vampire's fangs ache and elongate.
"I love your costume," Klaus jokes, smiling down at her slack face, "You are a stunning Cleopatra," he remarks, engaging her, trying to keep her with him, to buy them time, to perform a miracle.
Damon yells out for directions. Klaus tells him to cross the bridge.
Bonnie crinkles her forehead, barely nudging her head in Klaus's lap toward the driver.
"Nobody." He answers, his hand covered in her blood and glued to her wound to stop the blood from flowing so freely, its futile he knows, but he has never so felt helpless, the feeling is completely foreign to him.
"She snapped my neck," Damon says to Klaus without taking his eyes off the road.
"Good." Klaus responds, brushing Bonnie's dark hair from her brow, locking his gaze on the intensity in her green eyes slowly begin to fade, "We should be there already. Drive faster."
Damon yells, "I don't know where I'm fucking going."
Bonnie gently, closes her eyes.
"No," Klaus protests, shaking her desperately, "No, Bonnie, wake up, baby, you cannot go to sleep, sleep is death, stay awake." He repeats over and over for her to wake, the aplomb he displayed for her benefit gone, the fear he was disguising now taking over his body and mind.
He calls out to her to come back to him until her eyes flash open.
Damon glances up in the rearview to see Klaus kissing Bonnie's blood-caked forehead and rocking her tenderly.
"I am going to tell you a story to keep you awake, okay my love? But you have to stay with me, "He orders, listening to her shallow breath but strong heartbeat, "You have to use every bit of life you have left to stay here with me and by the time my story is over, you will be healed, safe and surrounded by people you love."
Klaus meets Damon's gaze in the mirror when he says the last line.
And burying his nose into his lover's hair, he deeply inhales her scent, relaxes and begins, "Once upon a time, there lived, a very selfish Lord, who had a cold and vicious heart, who wanted nothing more than to be crowned King. The lord had tried all of his usual tricks to become King, but he made no progress, for no one wanted to be around a Lord, with a cold and vicious heart. But eager for clarity and power, the Lord went to see the oracle, who told him that the kingdom would be his, if he could convince the most powerful witch of the land to deem him worthy of the crown. And this was deeply upsetting to the Lord, because you see, this witch was the kindest and most loving witch and did not like the Lord. She detested him. And with good reason. He was rotten. Especially to her."
Klaus pauses, looking up at the blur of highway lights, and his reflection in the passenger side window. "But nevertheless, the lord went to the see the witch and requested she crown him as King, and as expected, she denied him and told him to never bother her again. Undeterred, he went back two more times, and each time she denied him, and answered the same. Defeated and angry, the Lord went back to see the oracle who told him to try one more time, but this time she told him to bring a gift. But the Lord could not think of any gift that he could offer the witch that she would accept as him being a cold and vicious Lord. So, he cloaked his face and body in a disguise, and this time, when he went to the witch, she greeted him warmly and invited him in, embraced him as a friend and listened to him intently. And when he presented his gift,a promise it was, a promise to always protect her and be loyal to her until time ceased, the witch was so moved, for she believed the gift was a promise from his disguise. And when the cloaked Lord asked her if she would crown him a king, she did not hesitate to magically place the crown on his head."
The car stops. They are over the bridge and Damon has pulled over. He turns around slowly, looking down at the limp body in Klaus's arms. "She's not breathing."
"Follow me," Klaus orders, opening the car door and picking up Bonnie into his arms, "There is still a heartbeat.
BK
The neighborhood is having their own fall celebration. Forget all that masks and high sididdy shit on Royal street.
TherealHarvest moon party is taking place across the bridge.
And the streets are full of people, mostly black and shining, the way black people shine when they get together for a celebration, and some white people too, the curious ones and the ones who know where to go for a good time, and there is loud music playing on each block, Frankie Beverly out of open front doors and some bounce out of rolled down car windows, and there are sidewalk vendors, old men selling charbroiled oysters and crabs, and grandmothers selling fish plates off the steps of the parish church.
But all that joy halts with startled children, abrupt frowns and angry shouts as the vampire and the hybrid carrying a dead and bloody witch in his hands walk into lower riverside.
Cursing and throwing glass bottles, the celebration takes a turn.
"Get the fuck outta our neighborhood."
The men shut down the block and it quickly becomes apparent to Damon that they might not make whatever destination Klaus is heading towards. And then one of the men holding a piece of old wood, shoots the sliver of tree over the streetlight, impaling Damon in the chest, missing his heart by inches.
Klaus carries on through their human blockade, breaking through their shoulder to shoulder formation, despite the threats and the electricity of their magic in the air, and despite a dead Bonnie and a fallen Damon, who he orders between clenched teeth to not retaliate. Bonnie wouldn't want them to harm the witches.
More bodies gather in front of their passage and Klaus continues as if they aren't there, walking towards the house of the one witch who cared to hear him even though she was no longer alive.
But the same kid, on the same bike, who gave him directions the last time he was in the neighborhood rides up and jumps off his seat, bike crashing into the concrete. "Are you lost again?"
Klaus walks around the kid and his bike to Mama T's house. "Bring me Antoinette."
BK
The house is empty, but Klaus can still cross the threshold when he breaks down the door, leaving a healing Damon to guard the entryway on the porch.
All of Mama T's pictures are turned down, the furniture is covered in worn sheets, the knick knacks are cleared from the curio and there are aged marks on the wall from where 'The Last Supper' and MLK lived.
The house is a ghost, and the lights don't work, and Klaus expects at any moment that whatever is underneath those sheets to wake and rise up.
Bonnie is light in his embrace, and when he lays her down on the couch, her blood smears and soaks through the sheet.
He immediately tears Bonnie's shirt, the gash at her side bleeds and bleeds, and he grabs the sheet from the lay-z-boy and tears it into strips, rolling Bonnie from side to side, wrapping the cloth strips around her waist to bandage the wound.
He doesn't think, all action, lifting the shirt off his own back to ball up and prop up under Bonnie's head for her comfort, even though she doesn't need comfort.
She's dead.
Damon peers into the open space where the front door used to be, and he stares into the dark, at Klaus rummaging through the kitchen for candles and at Bonnie, her face soft and still, and there are words stuck in his throat and pain in his eyes, but there is a quiet in the house, that was absent in the car and in the trek through the witches, so that he can finally hear what is propelling Klaus.
"How the fuck does she have a heartbeat?" He asks loudly, to Klaus and to himself.
Klaus sticks the wax tapers into mismatched glasses, lighting them one by one with a plastic Bic, "The heartbeat does not belong to her."
Before Damon can utter the preposterous question that is erupting out of him, a middle-aged black woman appears on the porch next to him, dressed down in tight jeans and a bedazzled top, she pushes past him like he's not a killer, and immediately goes over to the witch's body and asks him why he didn't give her his blood.
"She could not keep it down," Klaus answers flatly, "Where is Antoinette?"
"I'm Paulette. Her auntie," She says, eyeing Bonnie, "The other covens came here wanting us to band with them for what Bonnie did," She stopped, shaking her head, "'Nette went to go warn her and bring her back here."
Klaus rises slowly from being crouched on the floor beside Bonnie's body, his eyes never leaving his love as he flips through all of the emotions and events of the night until he forces himself to stick with what will give him what he wants. He turns his yellow eyes on Paulette and in a careful and measured voice, he says, "Bring her back."
Paulette nods, silent.
More women and girlchildren arrive, huddling around the couch, their brown hands lay on Bonnie and some swarm in and out of the bedrooms, coming back with gifts in their hands, trinkets and herbs and Mama T's bible.
They speak to one another like Klaus and Damon don't exist, they speak to one another like they love each other and they speak to Bonnie like she's one of them.
"Someone call 'Nette and let her know Bonnie here," Paulette says, arranging all of the found items on the coffee table in front of Bonnie, "Lydia, you think you got the mind to help me?"
Lydia, another auntie, who looks like she was partying wherever Paulette was because she is dressed similarly, but instead of flowing braids like Paulette has, she has on a bob-cut blonde wig.
Also, unlike Paulette, Lydia has had a little too much to drink and she struggles out of the lazy-z-boy and slurs when she says, "Yeaaah, but who are we gonna trade her life for?"
All of their eyes settled on Klaus, who to Damon's astonishment, steps forward, ready for them to get to work with expelling him of his murderous soul, but as soon as he did that, the women and girls quickly looked away in anger, and Paulette announces to Klaus, "The Gatekeeper won't let us take a damn thing with you as an offering."
And Damon, who is fed up with being useless in the saving of his best friend blurts out into the room from the porch, "She has a heartbeat!"
Quickly, Paulette drops her ear to Bonnie's chest and raises an eyebrow and turns her face up to Lydia like she should try because she just can't hear the heartbeat and she wants to make sure, and after Lydia does her own examination of a heartbeat and shakes her head, "Ask them where the heartbeat at?"
Paulette turns to Damon for answers, and Damon shoots a look over to Klaus to reveal what they both can clearly hear pounding and pumping blood inside of Bonnie.
"She's pregnant."
BK
He had been told once by Mama T, when he was upset that the resurrected witch he dug up did not recall him, that souls had existed since the beginning, and that with all of those many lives lived, souls did not remember blips, and that he, Niklaus Mikaelson, was in fact, just a blip.
On his knees, at the altar that is his lover's body, while aunties and cousins swarm around the room to bring back the dead, he prays to the gods of his youth, over and over, in an ancient tongue, a tongue conjuring images of winter, wolves, and the smell of the sea.
Eir, læknaðu ástina mína og taktu mig í staðinn,
Eir, láttu barnið mitt lifa, taktu mig í staðinn
Paulette breaks from arranging a candle circle in the middle of the living room and whispers for Lydia's attention, and the women eye the vampire bowed by strong feeling, a strong feeling for a witch. It's a curious sight. The sinewy vampire, praying real words with glowing eyes, fingers splayed over the span of the witch's stomach, asking for everyone in the house and waiting on the porch is asking for.
A miracle.
"She will not return without the child," Klaus says, the waver of his voice going undetected to the present ears, "If the gatekeeper will not accept my soul, then I will give him someone he will."
And when did he first hear the heartbeat? Was it really in the backseat of the Camaro when she ceased to be on this plane, the tiny drum loud and finally known in the silence of the car. Or had it been last night, when he foolishly and recklessly was too preoccupied with covering his lies and deceit that he missed that there was to be a child.
Achild.
In all of his years, and there have been many, too many for a human to fathom, lifetimes and lifetimes, he had never imagined he would be a father, and he just can't quite imagine it now, even with the heartbeat counting down its life in its dead mother.
But that's not true, you had a child once, he was beautiful and courageous and grew up to be…
"Don't work like that playboy," Lydia says, motioning for another cousin to help her lift Bonnie from the couch, but Klaus lunges to his feet so quickly that the ladies drop their hold on the witch.
Damon clears his throat and the tension in the room, and takes up the Mikaelson cause, "Look, I get it everyone is stressed right now about Bon Bon, but if you all can bippity boppity bring her back, then can you get to it? And then we don't have to do all of this," He remarks, waving his hands at the spectacle of Klaus, fangs drawn and squared off from the witches, "I imagine that the longer we wait then the harder it is going to be to resurrect her. So, if Klaus and I need to collect some souls for this Papa, then give us the names."
Lydia rolls her eyes at Klaus, as if saying don't test me, and turns to the vampire under the doorsill, "If she pregnant, she wouldn't have gone to the other side, so there is no trade with Papa."
"Where is she?" Klaus whispers to himself, and to everyone, and to no one at all.
And Paulette places her warm hand on Klaus's shoulder, "The Holy Mother has her," She says with so much hope that Klaus wants to hope too, "The Holy Mother protects women and children in limbo, especially witches with children in limbo, so there is a chance that Bonnie is there holding on until the baby passes, but we won't let that happen, will we ladies?
Heads nod and some speak Amen.
"Um, Paulette, before you go promising shit, we gonna need Antoinette here to complete the circle and we gonna need the baby daddy's blood for this to work.
Shirtless and jeans stiff with blood, Klaus looks about the room, as if he is not sure where he is, and then reaches for the brass bowl on the coffee table and bites into his wrist and lets his blood drain into the bowl.
And Damon narrows his eyes at Klaus, thinking of how many days Bonnie had been down here with him and how many days had she lain under Mystic Falls, and how many days had she lived with the thought that no one was looking for her.
"We have it." Paulette offers a tight smile to onlookers before taking the blood-filled bowl and pouring it past Bonnie's lips.
Blood trickles down the sides of Bonnie's parted pout.
"And here I thought you 'posed to be the future brother-in-law," Lydia snorts with a laugh, "Now do us a solid and li–
Lydia's request is cut short by Antoinette hurling past Damon into Mama T's living room, eyes wild and breathless, repeating, Is she here, Is she here, Is she here, throwing down her bag and keys on the carpet and tugging at her jacket sleeve.
And the scene registers, the vampire posed to strike, the vampire at the door, the strong fear and revulsion from her family and her best friend gone on the couch.
Anyone would have cracked.
Klaus and Damon crash to their knees simultaneously. Clenched teeth and inhuman growls, the youngest of the Guidry girls cover their eyes and step back from the convulsing creatures.
And Antoinette, in her self-righteous anger, holds fast, her outstretched hands magically snapping each vessel of blood in the vampire bodies.
"You vampires bring nothing but pain and death to a witch."
The pain contorts and twists the vampires.
And blood runs down Damon's nose as he pleads, nails digging into the porch, and Klaus gasps, choking on the blood pouring out of his mouth, his body flattened to the carpet.
Paulette jumps up and shakes Antoinette. Stop. Stop. Stop.
With his blood no longer boiling, Klaus leaps from the floor, over the coffee table and grabs Antoinette by the neck, slamming her up against the wall, her feet dangling several feet from the floor.
And hands instantly clamor at his back and neck, claw at his eyes, and kick at his legs, and they all scream for him to let her go.
But he squeezes the strained neck, taut flesh in his hands, thinking all I have to do is press, I have killed hundreds before and I will kill a hundred more. He races through strangled faces and races through the anger. Anger at Antoinette for blaming him, anger at his brother for warning him, and anger at himself because he agrees.
He is death and destruction. He had only dug her up for a crown. All of the tales are true.
And if you could do it over, the madness is that you would still do it the same, you would still scrounge up her lovely bones, you would still lament at the loss of her heart and power in the sewer, you would still fall…
Wind enters the room, the hands don't need to clamor anymore, no need to kick and scream. And Klaus involuntarily drops the lower riverside witch and backs away from her crumpled body, his heart quickening, the hairs on his neck stiff and covered in sweat from the women's hands.
The Guidry women rush in to help Antoinette and the rest continue their chant.
They cast him out. His body knocked to the middle of the street.
Antoinette rushes to the doorway, rubbing at her throat, and croaks, "You!", at Damon, who is still standing on the porch and who didn't bat an eye at Klaus being thrown over his head, "You take him to Marcel's. He has his brother."
And the door, the wooden door that Klaus kicked in, the door that laid sideways, half-splintered, wonderfully and hopelessly locks into the frame, parting the vampires from Bonnie.
BK
The women do the ritual.
Holding hands, they form a circle, and call upon Jesus Mama.
'Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb'
And while their eyes are closed, blood running down the bow of their lips, her body rises and falls, and the baby heart beats, but her eyes won't open, and she won't speak.
'Think she in a coma?'
'No, I think she's just tired.'
The women move her body at Antoinette's request, because she is worried that the vampires will return and take the witch, even though Paulette points out to her niece that Bonnie is loved by those vampires.
'If that's love then she better here staying with us.'
But Bonnie still won't wake and the baby needs to feed.
"You gonna have to meet up with one of them, 'Nette. Gon' head and go look for them, they will give you their blood for her."
Antoinette doesn't have to look far.
She finds one renting a grimy motel room on Dauphine. He dutifully punctures a vein and drips his blood into a solo cup. He writes down his number and says he understands how she feels, he really does, he commends her for being so protective over the witch, but if she can call him when Bonnie wakes, he will be so fucking grateful and he will owe her one.
'You knew her before?'
Turbulent blue eyes squint and his full mouth downturns and he tells her that Bonnie is his best friend, but he hasn't always been the best to her, but he found her, and he is determined to make it right.
'How'd you find her?'
'Marcel. He contacted me and said Elijah and Klaus had her. The rest is history.'
She doesn't look for the other.
Word has it that the streets of the quarter are running red because of him.
Blood pours past Bonnie gums, and her feverish dreams continue.
She dreams of love, in the abstract and in the tangible, she dreams of her father and her grandmother.
She dreams of darkness, of the night and of the tomb, she dreams of pillow feathers floating in the air and of the murky water in a sewer.
And she dreams again and again, of a dark-skinned woman bathed in a spectral glow, inviting her to sit at her feet, to lay her head on her cerulean robes, and Bonnie does and cries in her lap, a daughter crying to her mother of what to do now, how to go on.
The woman only ever smiles at her and tells her that in time it won't hurt.
After two weeks, her eyes flutter open, and there is a ray of sun, dust swirling in its beam, and she opens her eyes wider to the light, even though they are weighty and tired. And her friend, Antoinette, who has been at her bedside for fourteen days, welcomes her back with tears in her eyes, and dips a rag into a bowl of cool water at the night stand, wrings it out and places it on Bonnie's warm forehead.
In time it won't hurt.
And Bonnie sighs, heavy with life, remembering everything.