Chapter 04
She could feel herself being able to direct herself to where she wanted to be, and while her truck was still at the reservation, she didn’t feel like explaining herself. Bella found herself in the Mikaelson home, in the living room and fell onto the couch upon coming back. Hopefully, she had timed it right and there weren’t two of her around.
“It’s been ten minutes since Jake came to our house to say you disappeared… he gave it ten minutes too,” Kol said as he casually walked into the living room. “I told him not to worry, but I was worried, where were you? What happened?” He helped her sit up and checked her over. “Is that blood! What the hell happened?”
“I’m fine,” she said, tired. “What time is it?”
“Midnight.”
“Of course I’m tired,” she sighed as she swatted his hands away from her. “I got stuck for a little and some vampire thought I was a snack. Taught him a lesson.”
“Stuck? Why? What happened?”
“Ah… uhm…” she ran her hand through her hair and grabbed a pillow to hug it to get some space between her and Kol. “I was drunk, cozy and warm in the middle of a pack of wolves and uhh… I had a vision.”
“A vision?” Kol blinked at her. “How is that possible?”
“I don’t know. The guy who helped me when I was stuck said it had to do with the difference in magic between you and the wolves. More potent or something and I don’t want to have one ever again. It sucked.”
“But how did it make you go stuck? I can imagine it was a panic reaction but how did it make you stuck?”
She played with the corner of the pillow and looked at it as she took a deep breath. “I wasn’t sure at first, but with some help, I discovered that what I saw was the wolves slaughtered by an army of newborns. I recognized a handful from Charlie’s missing children flyers..”
“The Volturi would never allow that to happen.”
“No, it’s Victoria. I knew she was planning something, but this?” She felt the panic rise in herself again. “She’s coming to kill me for what Edward did to her mate and she’s going to bring an army to do so.”
“Not if we stop that right now,” Klaus’ voice sounded as he walked in and looked Bella over before guilt briefly washed over his face upon seeing the blood on her neck and shirt. “Wasn’t your father involved with this?”
“Uh, yeah, he’s having a meeting with other chiefs from the area. He’s back tomorrow.”
“That means that the army is still in its early stages, it’ll be easier to take care of them. Your wolves will be safe, as will you and Forks,” he said gently. “You can help, of course, you’ll be a great asset to us in the fight.”
“That’s great but can you guys tell me how I can suddenly have visions?” Bella asked, feeling a bit… she wasn’t sure how she felt. Included? Edward and the rest of the Cullens always treated her as a fragile being.
“We’ll see if it returns and then work on that, how’s that?” Kol suggested. “But for now, how about you get some sleep and then Nik, Elijah and I will check out what’s going on and think of a plan on how to stop them.”
“My truck is still at the rez,” Bella pouted. “And Charlie isn’t home.”
“You can have the guest room,” Myriam grinned as she rubbed her hands in glee. “With your permission, I’ll go to your home to fetch you some clothes and nightwear while you take a bath. It’s sleepover time.”
Bella’s grew large as she looked over at Klaus and Kol. “Should I be afraid?” She pointlessly whispered, almost terrified of the expression on the female vampire’s face.
“No,” Klaus said impishly. “She’ll make sure you get your rest.”
“Just don’t kill her when she wakes you early in the morning to watch a movie or something,” Kol added.
“I won’t! Look at her! She looks dead on her feet!” Myriam defended herself. “Maybe if she stays over more often. Then I might do that. It’s been far too long.”
“Girls nights are usually done at night, love,” Klaus said kindly.
Myriam huffed. “I’m a rebel. Now go get your brother and assess the situation, I’ll take care of the witch,” she said as she put an arm around Bella and started to lead her up the stairs. “Do I have permission to enter your home to get you some clothes? I promise I won’t do anything but that.”
“Yeah, sure,” Bella sighed. “Or I could just get one of your shirts or something.”
“Nah, it’s always better to be in your own clothes, at least that’s my experience,” once upstairs, Myriam opened the door to the guest room that had an ensuite bathroom. “Welcome to your guest room, Bella, I hope you like it. If not, just tell me and I’ll change it for the next time but I had so much fun decorating it for you.”
“You didn’t just—”
“Do this for you?” Myriam smiled widely. “Of course I did! Who else will come over for a sleepover? It’s not like Rebekah wants to invite the girls from school over and you’re Kol’s only— friend. So yeah, I thought it’d be nice to create something you’d like so you’d feel more at home. Is it too much?”
“A little, yeah,” Bella let out a snort as she tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “I mean… I don’t think I’ll stay over that much and—”
“That’s okay.”
The whole room was in pastel colors, not nauseating, but classy. There were some wooden fixtures like the exterior of the house and the beams she’d seen all throughout the house and the bed looked nice and comfortable. There was a dresser for her clothes, a desk with some books on there and an ensuite bathroom. “Thank you, Myriam,” Bella smiled at her. “You’re insane but this is great!”
“Great! Now get clean, I’ll be back in fifteen minutes. Rebekah’s around, just busy with her latest project but you’ll be safe nonetheless. Do you mind if I burn those clothes once you’re out of them? You don’t want to try to explain to your dad where all that blood came from.”
Bella huffed. “It’s not the first time I’d had to wash blood out of clothes.”
“Likely his clothes, right?”
“Yes.”
“That’s my point,” Myriam pointed out. “See you in a bit!”
~o.O.o~
When she woke up the following morning she was slightly disoriented, she wasn’t in her own room and the sleep had made her memory fuzzy. It took her a moment that she had stayed the night at the Mikaelsons, had survived the night at the Mikaelsons and that there had been no Mikaelson sitting on the bed with her to watch her sleep.
It was great to wake up like this. She felt rested and hungry. Grabbing her phone, Bella panicked when she saw the time. Why had they allowed her to sleep in so late?! She needed to get dressed and pick up her truck and apologize to the wolves. Oh, god, the wolves. She wasn’t sure if she was able to face them after not returning last night. How could she face them like this? She couldn’t rely on Jake having told them, so that was going to be a great conversation.
Jake had sent her several messages asking if she was alright. Her dad had sent her one message that he was going to come home today, which meant she needed her truck to do groceries. And then she needed to study. And deal with— A shit ton of other stuff. And thank the Mikaelsons for their hospitality and…
She had so much to do. So much.
And Bella didn’t want to. She wanted to hide and make it all go away. Again. And that was wrong too. It was better to go ‘poof’. Away. That was hiding, too.
Sighing, she rolled out of bed and got dressed, grateful for Myriam to have gotten her own clothes and made sure she left the bed made up before tentatively making her way downstairs towards the voices. She hated sleeping over – anywhere.
“Hey look who’s awake,” Klaus greeted her. “Just in time for brunch. Rebekah retrieved your truck from the reservation while Kol explained the situation and assured the pups you were alright.”
“You might want to text Jake though,” Kol nodded as he pat on the chair next to him. “He wasn’t really happy and very worried. As expected, he’s your best friend after all.”
“Oh, I just wanted to thank you and—”
Myriam pointed at the empty chair for Bella to sit down in. “So, where did you go yesterday?”
Bella sat down next to Kol and scratched her head before briefly glancing at Klaus. “2016. Out of state.”
“Oh, that’s good, then the vampire who bit you could still be alive. Who was it? I could do with a good kill!” Kol said as he rubbed his hands together in glee. “I’ll make it as painful as possible, I promise.”
She uneasily shifted in her chair. “Can we just talk about something else? I got stuck, I got help and I’m back. And did what you told me taught me to do, erase that vampire’s mind so he wouldn’t remember the encounter and endanger the present.”
“Remembering you or not, you got hurt.”
“I’m fine, I promise,” Bella said and felt Rebekah stare at her so she got some pancakes on the plate in front of her and felt that stare ease up. “I’ll just have to stay away from puppy piles for now so it won’t happen again.”
“I don’t care.”
“Kol, leave it alone, please,” Bella said as she took a bite out of her pancake.
“It was one of us, wasn’t it? And you erased the memory, why?”
“Because whoever it was, told me that if I’d left only a little bit of knowledge about what they encountered, they’d never stop searching or trying to find out who it was,” Bella explained. “It’d drive them mad and it would cause a lot of trouble.”
Kol had seen her brief glance over to Klaus earlier. It wasn’t fair. “And yet, it seems like you told Nik. Again. And you allowed him to remember,” Kol was jealous. Once again his brother knew everything and he didn’t. “So, who was it, Nik?”
Bella couldn’t believe Kol’s…. What was it? Anger? Jealousy? What? He hadn’t been this antagonistic towards his brother before. Then again, during the dinners she had had over at the Mikaelsons they had all been very well behaved for the most part, but this was the first time she realized that Kol could be a ticking time bomb because he didn’t do emotions very well. But why?
Why now?
What would the harm be if she’d free that memory? Likely a lot. If he wanted to kill the vampire who had taken a bite out of her, then he was going to hate himself. On the other hand, it wasn’t fair, seeing as she interacted with Kol in the past and only Klaus knew that. Then again, she basically erased his memory, or her way of a vampire’s compulsion and she shouldn’t have been able to do that on an Original vampire. And she had. Power made them scared and paranoid.
Telling Kol could either be the best or the worst thing, there was no middle ground.
“Tell me Kol. How would you feel if you knew that you may have attacked Bella two years ago? Maybe I’m not telling you that it was I because I’d already met her and already knew and have to help keep the timeline,” Klaus argued, trying to help. “It could have been Myriam and you know how she is when she is blood drunk. Or Elijah when back when mother messes with his head. No. I know but I won’t say.”
“Did I?” Kol asked angrily as he looked at his brother. “Because no one dares to say a name, which makes me think it was me.”
Bella rolled her eyes and looked over at Klaus before sighing and looking at Kol. “Can we like… talk somewhere without them?”
“It was me!”
She sighed and slowly nodded. “But can we talk about that? Just you and me? Not with the rest of your family?”
“No,” Kol said as he pushed his chair back and got to his feet. “I can’t believe you didn’t allow me to remember!” He then ran out of the house, slamming the door in his wake.
“I’m sorry, maybe I should just go and—”
“Stick your head in the sand and withdraw?” Rebekah asked, raising a brow. “Not going to happen, Ducky. I’m sure you had your reasons and Kol will return once he comes to the same conclusion. Don’t run.”
Bella pointed in the general direction of the door. “That was not the Kol I left behind when I went to see the wolves at the Rez. I fucked up.”
“Oh, no, that’s the same Kol alright,” Rebekah replied. “All these months he’s been on his best behavior around you. Patient. Caring. He wanted to help you and make sure that you were alright and had your powers under control,” she explained before taking a sip of her tea. “While he usually tolerates witches and manipulates them to think that he’s not impatient, his behaviour towards yourself was new.”
“When Jake came here to tell him that you were missing, Kol went crazy with worry. He knew he should have never allowed you to go to the Rez. At least not by yourself. But he told you to go because he also knows how much you’d missed your friends,” Myriam added. “Kol truly cares about you, Bella, more than that he’s willing to show at the moment because he doesn’t want to scare you off.”
“Right now he’s mostly angry with me,” Klaus said with an encouraging smile. “He’s jealous. But I’m sure that you talked with Kol about erasing his memory as not to change your present and future.”
“I should have done that to you but you were in Mystic Falls,” Bella muttered. “And since you were already keeping my secret and done well with it, I didn’t care. Seeing as Kol’s my friend, I wanted to preserve that and not change how I met him or whatever. I don’t see any issue with returning the memory of us meeting in Denver, other than the fact that he won’t like how we were towards each other. Mainly because he thought that you send me to him, Klaus, and wanted to have me for lunch. So I wiped the floor with him.”
“Ah, true love,” Myriam grinned. “In all honesty, Kol will come back. He just has a lot of pent-up stress and aggression he needs to deal with at the moment. Vampire and all. Finish your breakfast and go about your day, that’s the best you can do.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yep, and if he doesn’t, I’ll make him,” Myriam said in barely a whisper with a demented smirk on her face. “It’s been a while since I made him do something he didn’t want…”
“And you’re not going to, either!” Bella said shocked. If she was willing to threaten Elijah with cutting off his manhood with garden shears, what on Earth would Myriam do to Kol? “Leave him alone, I can understand why he’d be hurt.”
After breakfast, she thanked the Mikaelsons for their care and jumped into her truck to get groceries so she could start cooking for her dad after cleaning up the house a little. Bella couldn’t help but worry about Kol, so while she was cleaning, she sent him a text message asking if he was okay and if he’d please forgive her. That she wanted to explain.
But she didn’t get a message back. Nor the next day. Bella had, however, received several messages from Jake to which she responded but got annoyed when the number of texts didn’t stop, making her want to change her number just for him. She wanted Kol to respond and hoped he hadn’t done anything stupid.
My window’s open. Come here, let’s talk.
Bella couldn’t help herself. Kol likely needed space but she wanted to make this right for him. And tell him that she’d likely do it again if she’d meet him in the past. To preserve what was now. Because if she’d change one thing, everything could change while she wouldn’t. And Kol knew this. He was aware of the rules and, while he couldn’t remember, he had given his permission.
But she was going to make him remember and then see what happened. She didn’t want to lose him over this. Bella wasn’t sure if she could do this without him or the rest of his family.
It didn’t take long before a slightly agitated looking Kol was standing in her bedroom. “The window? Really?”
“My dad’s asleep,” Bella said as she looked at him from her position on her bed and put her phone away. “Are you okay? Have you calmed down some?”
Kol sighed as he sat down on the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry, Bella, that I got jealous at my brother for knowing what happened. It almost feels as if you two have a secret club that I’m not a part of, but, I do understand. Nik wouldn’t have let it affect his decisions and I would.”
“But it still isn’t fair.”
“No, especially knowing that I have hurt you. I wouldn’t even dare to think that I would do that to you now.”
She crawled to him and settled herself next to him as she took his hand. “Would you like to know? I mean, we’re in the present now, nothing can change.”
“Is that even possible?”
“I think so, yes. I’m not even sure how I managed to do that on you, seeing as you’re an Original vampire armed with potent magic in your blood yourself,” she gently squeezed his hand. “Oh, but you did feed me your blood to heal before I did the spell.”
“Then that must have been it, that extra little nudge.”
“You were an asshole.”
“I’m still one, darling, I just behave myself slightly better these days because of you, because I know what the Cold Ones have done to you and I’m not a saint. Nik and Elijah often tell me to do their dirty work when I’m out of the box.”
Bella smiled then as she looked up to him. “You’re a good person, Kol Mikaelson. And I understood that I met you when you were still a little rough around the edges because you’d been only free for a week at that point. I will try to return the memory to you but I don’t want you to feel any guilt over you thinking I would make a great snack, because I smacked you on your ass for that.”
“You did?”
She nodded with a big smile on her face. “I wasn’t even afraid of you.”
“Something is wrong with you,” Kol let out a snort. “You truly don’t see danger.”
“I do now. But you and your family are a different kind of danger. You protect each other and anyone who crosses one of you will be truly sorry. As long as I don’t do anything to hurt you, I’m not in any danger.”
“We won’t hurt you.”
“Yeah, I know,” she retorted as their eyes locked. “Because otherwise you wouldn’t have told me most of your family’s history. You let me in, and you didn’t have to do that,” she said as she squeezed his hand again. “Just promise me you won’t start hating yourself or get angry with what happened. That was a different situation.”
Kol nodded. “I promise.”
She took his other hand and whispered the spell Kol had taught her to release the memory, nearly falling off the bed as he got up in shock.
“That…” he said as he scratched his head in confusion as he looked at her. “That’s certainly a strange experience… Don’t ever do that again, please.”
“I hope not to, but I was actually thinking that should I encounter you in the past again, to do the same thing. That way you still know what happened, but nothing would have changed.”
“You could allow it to change.”
“But I don’t want things to change.”
“Why not? You were a bitch when I first met you.”
“Yeah, and you were a persistent jerk, who cares? If that didn’t happen, you know, we wouldn’t be where we are now.”
Kol looked at her for a moment before nodding. “Yeah, alright.”
Kol stayed for a few more hours, they just quietly talked about what happened and they both made sure that they were alright. Bella wanted to be sure that Kol wasn’t feeling bad and Kol wanted to be sure that Bella wasn’t afraid of him after what happened.
Bella wasn’t sure why this was so important. Perhaps she just didn’t want to lose Kol as a friend. She liked his company and she wanted to make sure they were okay. Kol was different. He wasn’t like any of her human friends, he was better. And maybe it was because he had hundreds of years of experience being human, or being alive, but Bella simply liked his energy.
It was easy to be around him and his family. More around Kol as she spent the most time with him but apart from Elijah sometimes, she didn’t feel that they didn’t want her around. It felt more real, and there was a real connection. At least, that’s what she thought.
She didn’t dare to voice that thought because right now everything was fine, what if she’d mess things up?
Bella looked to her door when she heard a knock and Charlie’s face appeared. “You’re not up yet?”
“It’s Sunday, dad, good morning.”
“But your friends are downstairs, they told me you guys were going bowling in Seattle today?”
Bowling. Nice one. “That’s today?”
“But Bells, you’re going to have to be careful, alright? Seattle isn’t one of the safest places to go to right now, despite you guys going with adult supervision.”
“We’ll be fine, dad, I promise,” Bella smiled as she got out of bed. “I’ll be downstairs in ten minutes.”
Charlie sighed and nodded. “Not that I’m not happy that you’re leaving the house, again, but…”
“I’ll pack my mace,” Bella said reassuringly. “Promise,” a devious smile appeared on her face then. “Feel free to do the stern concerned dad cop thing to them. Make them squirm.”
“I already did,” Charlie grinned before closing her door again and Bella could hear him go downstairs.
She quickly took a shower and got dressed before heading downstairs. “I am so sorry, I didn’t know we were doing it today.”
Rebekah smacked Kol over on his head. “I knew I should have set the date with you and not him. Men, right?”
“Yep,” Bella kissed Charlie on the cheek and followed Rebekah and Kol out. “Can we stop somewhere for breakfast first then?” She asked before closing the door.
“Sure. Myriam has found out something about your family and it’s not what we initially believed,” Kol nodded as he helped her into the car. “She, Nik and Elijah have already set off, but we can give them a call so they stop at the nearest stop.”
“What new information?”
“The Heretics weren’t part of the Travelers but from a coven of witches who ousted them for being siphoners,” Rebekah replied, bored of it. “Because when you have to get it from other sources, it’s not real magic.”
“Now, the Gemini Coven do have something to do with the Travelers though. It’s easy to see where historians got it wrong. The Geminis cursed the Travelers 2000 years ago for inadvertently creating the Doppelgangers and have watched them ever since,” Kol explained as he started the car and drove off. “And, as it happens, some of the Gemini are still alive and they might know more about your powers or where you come from.”
“Myriam’s going to be so pissed that she didn’t get to tell you herself,” Rebekah let out a snort. “But it’s worth finding out about, right? After we deal with the newborns today?”
“We have school tomorrow,” Bella replied as she fastened her seatbelt. “On top of that, I’m already extremely nervous for going to Seattle which is way out of my 2 hour circle of freedom around Forks. Where would we go to meet a Gemini witch?”
“Not that much further away than Seattle,” Kol mused. “Portland.”
She liked this about the Mikaelsons. Despite them being old and seemingly knowledgeable about everything, they made mistakes too. Such as the Travelers and the Gemini Coven. Then again, mistakes were easily made if the two covens were intertwined in history. Didn’t she write to herself about the Gemini in that letter? She’d have to check. “No.”
“Yes,” Kol smirked. “Live a little. The Volturi won’t know what happened to them if you take care of them. How does going to Volterra during Spring Break sound?”
“I don’t have the money to actually get a flight out there, you know,” Bella countered grumpily. Yes, she did. It was in her college fund, courtesy of the stupid Cullens. “Besides, I’m not ready to face them yet.”
“You will be after today,” Kol smiled at her. “Myriam brought you Laurent’s head to siphon the magic out of.”
“Ew?”
“Yeah, you could use me instead,” Kol nodded. “I told her you wouldn’t like the idea, although it’s slightly poetic. Using a Cold One’s magical essence to take out Cold Ones.”
“I wouldn’t mind using their magic against them but a decapitated head?” Bella retorted, shaking her head. “That’s gross.”
“The venom has dried already, so it won’t hurt you.”
“No.”
Myriam was indeed not happy that Kol and Rebekah had told Bella the news already, but she could add that the Gemini coven and its members were skilled at invisibility and illusion spells and that finding an actual member was going to be difficult. The Gemini had a habit of exiling members who couldn’t practice magic the normal way and many centuries ago had ousted a distant cousin of Bella’s and that they had absolutely no ties to the Gemini. It was going to be even more difficult to find someone because of that but she had no doubt that Kol and Bella could find someone who’d be willing to talk to them.
The further away from Forks they got, the more nervous Bella grew. They were going to take care of an army of newborns, and likely Victoria herself, in Seattle, with the six of them. During breakfast, Klaus mentioned that they had counted at least 50 newborns roaming around the warehouse district of Seattle and Bella was not sure how they were going to defeat them all without getting hurt.
“You need to relax,” Rebekah said from the back seat as they were near Seattle. “You’ll be of no use like this, a ball of anxiety.”
“What if the Volturi Guard is here? Taking care of this problem themselves? And what if they spot me?”
“You’re no longer a silly little human. You’re a witch, and thus, you’re in the clear. And once they see that, they’ll report back to their masters and they’ll leave you alone. You’ll likely get a formal apology too.”
“But I can’t actually do magic without taking it first, and if something happens and we all get split up…”
“You’ll grab hold of a Cold One and you use them instead,” Kol replied. “But don’t worry, nothing will happen and we’ll leave Victoria to you. I have every faith in you that you can do this.”
Bella slowly nodded. “And you said that too when I went to Jake.”
“You wanted to go!”
“You could have said that I wasn’t ready.”
“But you are. It’s just your mind that’s saying that you’re not.”
“It’s okay to be nervous for your first real fight with a bunch of Cold Ones, but you’re going to be alright, Bella. We’ll always keep an eye on you,” Rebekah said encouragingly and squeezed her shoulder. “We’re not going to turn back. Or would you rather have your father and his cops take care of this?”
“No.”
“Then be brave when we leave this car, Bella. You’ll be alright. Besides, with you being nervous isn’t good for any of us, especially not Kol.”
“Bekah!”
“What? You and Nik are always more sensitive to others, especially to those you care about so, suck it up, Bella, we’re going to need Kol in his right mind for this.”
Kol sighed as he parked the car. Bella had never seen them fighting before, and while they couldn’t actually rip out hearts or snap necks to take care of the newborns, it wasn’t going to be pretty. And should anything, anything, happen to Bella, he wasn’t sure if he would be able to contain himself.
He really liked her, but she wasn’t ready yet, was she? Especially after her encounter with him from two years ago. It wouldn’t be a good thing, would it?
“See? He’s already overthinking things because you’re anxious. Man up, Bella,” Rebekah said chipper as she got out of the car. “We have newborns to kill!”
Bella cautiously eyed Kol. “Is your sister always happy when it comes to this?”
“Not usually, but Cold Ones are quite easy to kill and doesn’t really need any thinking, just brute strength,” Kol explained with a sigh. “She has some anger issues to resolve. Boy trouble. Again.”
“Should anyone I know be fearing for their lives?”
“Nah,” he smiled at her. “It’s some boy from Mystic Falls that she liked. No one important. Are you ready?”
“No? It’s a bunch of raging newborns we’re going up against.”
“And unlike us, you can fight them from a distance by dropping them like flies then all we need to do is rip off their heads and start a big fire,” he replied, encouragingly squeezing her leg. “Come, we’ll find you a good vantage point.”
“Wait, what? You’re going to stay with me, right? I want to stay with you guys.”
“Are you sure?”
Bella nodded as she got out of the car. “I’d like to stay near you.”
“So I can fill you up, huh?”
“Feel me up?” Bella blinked at him. “Kol Mikaelson, you’re a pervert.” When she saw the look on his face, she smiled widely. “No, to feel safe. I don’t want to be alone, no matter how fast you are. Or how good your hearing is. I am with you. This is my mess and I want to be there. With you.”
“Are you sure?”
“Stop asking me that. Accept this somewhat sense of bravery and let us do this.”
They walked to the area where the warehouse was where Klaus, Kol and Elijah had located the newborns in just a few days earlier, and the plan was to attack them from both sides. The front and the back. Myriam would be with Kol and Bella, while Rebekah, Elijah and Klaus went from the other side.
Bella trusted the Mikaelsons. She trusted that they knew how to handle things, but she wasn’t sure if she could do this. However, this false sense of bravery that had ignited inside of her for the sake of the heightened emotions of the vampires around her made her move forward. She didn’t HAVE to stick around with Kol. She only had to siphon a little because he was so powerful and it would stick with her for a good 30 minutes. But she felt safer with him.
And she was going to make it easier for everyone to fight the newborns by hopefully incapacitating most of them. It’d be like a bulldozer or something. Or they’d be the one getting flattened.
“Shut the doors, darling. I know that they’re strong enough to kick it in, it’s a psychological thing that would give us some more time,” Kol whispered in her ear before launching himself at a group of newborns, as did Myriam and Bella was left standing by herself.
Bella quickly shut the doors and magically reinforced the walls so that nobody could escape and then felt a little lost for a moment until a newborn ran up to her. Startled, she jumped back and knocked the newborn out like she had done with past!Kol. And almost as if she hadn’t done anything else in her life, it clicked. She shattered the newborn with her magic and continued with the rest of them until she was grabbed and pushed against a wall and her air knocked out of her lungs.
“Well, this just makes it easier for me to kill you,” Victoria breathed in her face. “New friends? What happened to Edward? Doesn’t matter, you don’t deserve to be here.”
Bella could feel her anxiety wanting to take over, but instead, she determinedly grabbed hold of Victoria’s arm, feeling the magic of the Cold One makeup course through her veins. It was a similar rush than when she absorbed some of the magic of the wolves, but it was less chaotic. But it was more powerful. Bella could feel that, too. “Edward won’t care if you kill me, Victoria,” She said as she took a breath, stalling so she could get some more. The rush of the magic felt so good, she didn’t want it to stop, but she also knew she was getting it from Queen Bitch, and that was bad. “So Eddie won’t get hurt if you’d kill me, like he killed your mate, James.”
“I don’t care,” Victoria hissed. “You’re dead.”
“Edward tore him to pieces and turned him into ash,” Bella said in barely but a whisper. “Edward turned him into nothing.”
“Shut your mouth!”
“Guess what?” Bella smirked as she projected her siphoned magic from Victoria out in the open, and she could feel herself unload the magic, losing control over it as she shattered Victoria, and all of the still fighting newborns along with her.
She wasn’t sure how the Mikaelsons survived but she was glad that they did. This wasn’t control. Again. She was absolutely positive that no person should have this much power.
Bella could still feel it coursing through her veins and when Kol approached her, she held her hands up and backed away. “Don’t touch me. I lost control, this is bad, this is…”
“A job well done, darling,” Kol said kindly as he took another step towards her. Oh, they were in trouble alright. She had gotten used to the magic from him, and she could handle that, but Cold One magic, and shifter magic, was something else. Bella looked like she was jonesing for more, or perhaps she was still dealing with the magic.
He’d been wrong in telling her to siphon from a Cold One. They truly needed help, because while he knew a lot about witches, siphoners were different. He could teach Bella spells, like he had, and some sort of control, but they needed to find the experts on this. He could tell that his family was afraid of her, but he had to push that aside. She needed help. “How about we go to Portland tonight?”
“We have school tomorrow,” Bella replied as she scratched her arms. “And I’m fine. I think it’s just because they’re Cold Ones and they’re practically bound together with some shitty magic that I might have over done it and… I’ll just not touch them. Or the wolves. Ever again.”
“Wait for it,” Myriam muttered under her breath, loud enough for the vampires to hear, but not for the human in their midst.
Bella paused for a moment as she took a step away from Kol, observing the ash in the warehouse and realizing that she was responsible for it. Innocent lives. Lives that Victoria had manipulated into doing her bidding. Lives that could have been saved. Likely. “What would happen if we could have saved a few?”
“We’d have destroyed them anyway, Ducky,” Rebekah replied as she warily looked at her brother’s special interest. She wasn’t going to explode, was she? “You’ve heard the stories, newborns are exceptionally volatile in their first year, there is no option to leave them be. Had they been our kind, perhaps. But not Cold Ones. They were gone as soon as they died and went into their painful transition. You ended their suffering.”
“You did a good thing, Bella,” Klaus added with a nod.
“And don’t worry about school,” Myriam smiled. “You’ll graduate, whatever it takes, but, and no disrespect to Kol’s abilities to teach a witch, you’re out of your depth with this. Maybe the Gemini coven has their ways to deal with a magic overload, or perhaps they have records of other siphoners from before they were kicked out,” she said as she calmly approached Bella and gently took her arm. “Which I doubt, because you’re a siphoner surrounded by different kinds of magic and supernaturals around you, but maybe they can help you. I’ll cover for you at the school and with your dad, but you and Kol need to find expert help to make you understand your ability to siphon magic more. There’s only so much we know as your type is rare.” Myriam then hugged her and gently squeezed her. “You’re alright, Bella. You didn’t kill anyone, just relieved them from their misery, and you’re going to find out more about your kind of witch in Portland. With Kol. We wouldn’t normally force you to do anything, but this is important, do you understand, Cherie?”
Bella slowly nodded. “You don’t want me to do things that I will regret later.”
“Or have the power consume you, power trips are a bitch to wean off from,” Myriam grinned. “Absolute power consumes you.”
“But I won’t!”
“Yeah, that’s what they all say. Let’s go home, you can take a nice relaxing bath at our place while I go and get some of your essentials and then you and Kol can leave in the morning.”
Fortunately, by the time they reached Forks, Bella was feeling back to her usual self, but the Mikaelsons still wouldn’t allow her to go back home. Simply out of convenience.
The next morning she and Kol went to Portland to go to the head of the Gemini coven, Myriam had his address from some person and when they arrived at the spot almost three hours later, it was empty. It was a big, empty field. “Great,” Bella said as she leaned against the car. “Now what?”
“They’re supposed to be here,” Kol said as he leaned back against the car as well, causing both of them to stare into open space. “Do I need to remind you that they’re good at invisibility spells and illusions?”
“You think they hid an entire house? That’s insane.”
Kol eyed her before laughing and shaking his head. “They likely used the entire coven to obscure it, you could do it on your own.” He then looked behind him and shrugged. “There’s a car coming, maybe it’s a member of the coven.”
“You really think we’d get that lucky?”
“Why not?” Kol shrugged as he watched the car round the corner and let out a groan. “Well, I was wrong. The bad news is that at least two of them aren’t particularly fond of me. But that’s alright, I don’t particularly like them, either.”
“And the good news?”
“They brought a vampire hunter who knows a lot about the occult. And if they’re here, something’s here,” Kol replied. “Stay behind me, Bella.”
Bella looked at the people getting out of the car after the car rolled to a halt, the one who was on the phone immediately disconnected the call, while the two models had constipated looks on their faces. One had a backpack and a teddy bear was attached to it. What was going on? All three men didn’t look too happy to be seeing Kol, like he had suggested, but what were they doing here?
Speaking of Kol, he looked tense. Perhaps even annoyed. Slightly afraid. It was obvious that he had a history with these men.
“Oh, great, it’s the happy homicidal maniac,” the dark haired model said sarcastically.
“How about you lot get back into your car and back to Mystic Falls?” Kol replied venomously. “I was here first.”
“No, you weren’t,” the other model replied. “I was here four months ago, nothing’s changed. Just a wide open space. Grass. So unless the coven is made out of grass, there’s nothing here.”
“Why are you here?”
“That’s none of your business,” the other one retorted angrily. “What matters is that you’re here, and you need to go.”
“Just because nothing is here doesn’t mean something isn’t here,” Bella said as she tugged on Kol’s shirt to remind him that she was still here. “Come on, they’re just going to have to wait until we’re done.”
“Oh, no, no no, missy,” the dark haired one replied. “We’re here for time sensitive business.”
“Like what?”
“We believe the Gemini coven have a device called the Ascendant. It’ll help free our friend from a prison world of their making,” the man who got off the phone earlier replied, eyeing his friends. “Alaric Saltzman, these two are Damon and Stefan Salvatore.”
Bella blinked at the two brothers. She had heard the stories and then let out a snort. “Is your friend safe?”
“For now, yes.”
Bella nodded then in conclusion. “Then Kol and I are going first,” she said resolutely before pulling Kol along with her and started to walk across the grass until they bumped into a barrier of some sort. Placing her hand on the barrier, she could feel the powerful magic run through it and she sensed that it was a cloaking spell.
Deciding not to take it down, she grabbed hold of Kol’s hand and pulled him along as she stepped through the barrier, revealing a big house, and Kol not with her. Panicking a little, she turned around to see Kol was flat on his ass in the grass with a frustrated look on his face, before looking defeated. “I’ll be fine,” she said to him with a smile, but the look on his face told her that he couldn’t hear her.
She took her phone out to send a message to him when a man appeared from seemingly out of nowhere. “I didn’t know I had guests.” Bella nearly dropped her phone before putting it in her back pocket and looked up. “You must be a witch if you can walk through the barrier like that.”
“I’m Bella Swan, sir, and I’m sorry for disturbing you, but I could really use your help.”
“Swan?”
Bella nodded.
The man sighed and nodded before pointing towards the house. “Come on in, let’s talk. Your vampire friends can stay away.”
“Just one of them, he’s my friend and–”
“An Original. The one who loves witches, I know,” the man smiled at her. “But he also has a temper and I don’t trust him to control it during our conversation. Come, I’ll make you some tea.”
