Chapter 09
“Edward, what did you do?!” Rosalie screeched as Bella was being brought before her and Carlisle. Rosalie didn’t look all too pleased, but Bella felt fine. Super fine, if she had to be honest.
“I didn’t do anything and watch your tongue, sister,” he countered and nearly threw Bella onto the table, causing her to giggle. “Or do you want to follow Jasper and Alice to the cells?”
Rosalie dropped her head. “My apologies, Prince Edward. I shall make my leave while you and King Carlisle will look after my daughter.”
Bella didn’t want Rosalie to leave. If she was going to be left alone with the King and Prince, bad things were going to happen, but she felt fine now, who cared? Was Edward going to feed her again? She had loved the small, round things she had found underneath his pillow after his night with one of the women of the compound. She wasn’t of age yet, and Edward had needs. Needs Bella couldn’t wait to satisfy.
“We need to pump her stomach,” Carlisle said as he grabbed a hose and opened Bella’s mouth, shoving it down her throat without hesitation. It burned, and Bella wanted to gag, but she’d been taught not to. She could take this. “How irresponsible of you, Edward.”
“You said to keep it there, this was all a test for her. She’s still too curious. I can’t have her like this.”
“Don’t worry,” he attached something at the end of the hose and Bella could feel how her stomach started to feel funny. How the hose hummed and how there was water coming out of it before it got sucked out again. “We’ll just leave her here for a couple of hours, she’ll be fine, the drugs will be out of her system soon.”
Would she? She could barely breathe as it was, and she was fully conscious.
Oh, she was having a nightmare again, wasn’t she?
She woke up, startled and gasping for air, almost as she still could feel the hose in her throat. She needed to throw up. Scrambling out of bed, she managed to reach the bathroom and threw up. As she had a nearly empty stomach, it was mostly something slimy and something red. Metallic tasting. Blood.
Bella remembered that after the incident her nightmare was from, she had to throw up but had to swallow it because she wasn’t allowed to. She could vividly remember the taste of her own blood as the hose had done some damage to her throat that only went away after a couple of weeks.
With last night’s incident in the bathtub and now waking up like this she couldn’t help but wonder if she was cursed somehow, to relive things that had happened to her in the past. If so, she didn’t want it.
She did feel better than the night before so she fixed herself up, shed some of the extra layered clothes and decided to join everyone for breakfast. Despite her not wanting to eat but only wished to drink tea, she was going to force herself to have something because she doubted that her stomach would like to suffer through another round what she just suffered.
“Good morning,” she greeted Jeri and Rebekah as she sat down in her usual chair and poured herself some tea.
“Morning,” Jeri replied with a small smile. “You certainly look better than last night.”
“I feel better.”
“Good, because I was just filling Rebekah in about what happened.”
“I was cold, I fell asleep in your bath and had a nightmare.”
“Should I call Nik to come back?” Rebekah asked worried as she looked at Bella. “He’d want to know this.”
“No, why? I feel fine now.” She grabbed a pancake and started to eat it, but not quite liking the taste of it. It tasted like mud, and it didn’t slide down her throat that well, however, she was going to soldier on. “I don’t think he’ll appreciate it to be called back only because I wasn’t feeling so well last night.”
“You know he’d come back in an instant.”
“Exactly and that’s not necessary.”
She had to blink when Elijah and Jessica came into the room as for a moment; it looked as if it were Carlisle and Esme. That was ridiculous, of course, they weren’t here, not as far as they were aware. She swallowed the remaining mud pancake away with her tea and was glad that it had only been a flash. I’m cursed, she thought.
If this was going to happen every time Klaus went away, out of New Orleans, she was going to go with him. She was wondering if he was suffering the same. “Have you heard from them?”
“Of course not,” Rebekah replied as she took a sip of her freshly poured blood. “They’re probably having too much fun to send us a message. I was thinking of inviting Cami over today, what do you say, Bella? The four – five – of us to have a pamper day.”
“Oh, I’m out,” Jeri groaned. “No pampering and all girl bonding shit. Nope.”
Bella wanted to say that she was going to join Jeri instead, but Rebekah was faster. “Nope, you’re staying.”
“And here I thought that maybe Bella would find it interesting to see me work. I get the feeling that she hasn’t been instructed much about witches.”
“She hasn’t,” Rebekah sulked. “Witches are… a convenience.”
“Ha!” Jeri snorted and looked at Bella. “Don’t worry Bella, you’ll love it, magic is actually very pretty when not used to figure out someone else’s mess.”
~o.O.o~
After supplying Jeri another sample of her blood because the witch was ‘curious’, she entertained her with some beautiful spells with lovely colors. She even had one to write on the wall with, and that was fun. Of course, Bella was ridiculously human, but it had been fun to watch.
Bella knew that Kol loved magic for what it was, beautiful and fun. He had told her about his human life and his second shot at it, and even though he missed it terribly, he was grateful that he didn’t have to die again. Or at least had a better chance of defying death in his original body. He liked to have fun, and Bella could tell that Jeri was the same way. They were perfect for each other.
And it was a good thing Jeri was around, she wasn’t as careful with Bella as the Mikaelsons. Had Bella gone to Rebekah to ask for a hot bath, she would have said no, but Jeri had shared her bathroom. She wasn’t made out of porcelain; she’s been through a lot more than a simple too hot shower – should she ever shower that hot again. It wasn’t needed. Not anymore. Or was it? She wasn’t quite sure.
But she liked Jeri because of that. That didn’t mean that she was still afraid of her for the same reason.
“Oh, that’s interesting,” Jeri said after two hours of testing and entertaining the human girl. “Well, not interesting, but potentially dangerous. Are you sure you’re okay?”
Bella blinked at her. “I’m just suffering from Klaus withdrawal.”
Jeri smiled at that. “I get it that you’re smitten with him, and that’s cute, but are you sure you’re okay?”
Bella shrugged as she thought for a moment. She felt as if she was being stabbed with a million stabby things reminding her of the many times Carlisle stuck her with them, and there was a little bit of nausea, but she felt fine. “Yes.”
Jeri let out a frustrated sigh. “Look, if I’m going to figure out what the fuck they did to you, you need to be honest with me. Tell me what you feel. Your recent blood looks like it’s falling apart, as if it’s deteriorating. Klaus’ blood is out of your system now. His blood, not the tainted version you have. Your blood seems to be fighting to be separated, but that’s impossible since it’s your blood.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Imagine a slice of bread. Now soak it in water. It’ll soak it all up but becomes soggy and not the same. That’s what’s happening to your blood,” she explained and then eyed her again. “So do not tell me you feel fine, surely you must feel the effects.”
“I—”
“Bella, it’s crucial, alright? From the looks of this, this happened almost overnight.”
“I’m cursed.”
“Yes, that’s obvious.”
Bella blinked at that, she knew? “I— it’s nothing, really. Minor things. My dreams, they’re getting more real as if they’re a memory, and I wake up feeling as if it had just happened.”
“Okay,” she turned to the Grimoire. “I think I’ve seen a variation of that in here, somewhere. Just keep me posted when things change.”
Bella hopped off the table and nodded behind Jeri’s back. Surely it wasn’t that important; she just wanted something to do. To make sure Klaus would get pissed off and kill her so she’d evolve. That was it. “I’ll be in my room, I’m going to the kitchen first to get something to eat.”
“Yeah, sure,” Jeri replied absentmindedly as she kept eyeing the book and the blood.
After picking up some cold pancakes from the kitchen and a cup of warm tea, Bella made her way to her room but decided to go to Klaus’ study. Even though he wasn’t there, the fireplace was alight, and she felt cold again. She carefully placed her food in front of the fireplace and went looking for her blanket on the couch.
She smiled at that; it was her blanket. He had gotten it for her for their late nights talking, and as she wrapped it around her on her way over to the warmth, she could smell him on it. She sat there for a while, munching on her pancakes and realizing that her tea had turned cold. Drinking it anyway, she then made her way to the couch and laid down for a nap. It was nowhere near bed time yet, she still needed to have dinner and then be awake for a few more hours, but she felt tired.
And guilty.
She shouldn’t have eaten the food or drank the tea, she hadn’t even asked permission yet to get it, would Elijah or Rebekah be mad at her? What about Jeri? It wasn’t as if Jeri had anything to say about it, she was an outsider, just like Bella was. Jeri would have said ‘go for it’, Bella knew that much.
She had it so good here, why was she trying to self-sabotage herself?
She pulled the blanket over her head as if she was trying to block out her thoughts.
“What did we say about hiding?” Rosalie’s kind voice sounded. “You can’t do this, Bella, the King won’t be pleased about it, and he’ll hurt us all.”
“But mom, he hurt me yesterday!”
“I know, bunny, but I can’t do anything about it. Now come out of your hiding spot, he’s waiting for you.”
Bella crawled out from underneath her bed and dusted herself off. She was wearing a beautiful dress with flowers, and her hair was perfectly braided, she felt like a princess. But she was scared. But she couldn’t let her mom and dad get hurt because of what she refused to do so she had to do this.
“Now, remember, you’re not allowed to speak.”
Bella nodded. If she did, the King would hurt her parents.
Rosalie took Bella’s hand and brought her to the main building, to the clean white room that she had been in the day before. When the King had hooked her up to a machine and flushed her blood and then hurt her with electric shocks because she had ‘died’. Dying was scary. Her vision had become blurry at first, and her heart had been trying to pump blood that wasn’t there and it had hurt so bad. She didn’t want to go through that again.
She wanted to cry, but she wasn’t allowed to do that either. She didn’t want to be here, why was she here?
“Thank you, Rosalie, you may go now,” the King spoke quietly as he lifted Bella up and placed her on the chair.
“Please be careful with her, she’s still hurting from whatever you did yesterday.”
“Silence, woman. Go back to doing your duties as wife.”
Bella was strapped onto the chair in a second as the King used his speed to do so and then smirked. She wanted to wipe that smirk off his face. Permanently.
“I’ve lived a lot of years, and I always refrained from harming humans,” he spoke quietly with that same smirk on his face. “However, since you’re our human, I don’t see why I can’t satisfy my curiousity how the current modern variety will hold up to particular experiments. Yesterday was entertaining, today will be even more so.”
Things were attached to her head and her arms, and she wasn’t sure what it was. She couldn’t see, her head couldn’t move. Something was forced into her mouth, and she had to blink away her tears because it hurt. She couldn’t swallow properly or move her head. This was scaring her.
“Now let’s see what happens when I flip this switch…”
Bella fell off the couch as she convulsed and hit her head against the coffee table. She managed to let out a scream, but couldn’t stop her body from moving. She couldn’t stop herself from shaking.
Rebekah was the first one to get to her, pushing away the coffee table and holding Bella as she convulsed. Bella tried to focus on her and managed to see that she was worried. “Call Nik!” Rebekah shouted to someone else who was in the room. “He needs to come back now!”
Bella blacked out then and stopped convulsing. Rebekah carefully lifted her off the floor and placed her in Klaus’ bed while Elijah was calling her brother. The girl was in rough shape, just like that. It looked like she had vampire bites all over, and that pissed Rebekah off. “Who came in here and bit her?”
“I don’t think anyone did,” Jeri said as she climbed on the bed. She sprinkled a mixture of herbs on Bella’s body to soothe the effects of the spell for her and keeping her in a slumber for her sake. “I suspected something was off a few hours ago; her blood seemed to disintegrate or to separate from the magical components. I found a spell in the Grimoire that the witch had scribbled ‘CC’ next to. It took me a while to realize that it meant Carlisle Cullen, actually, it was Becky herself that gave me the answer.”
“What is it?” Rebekah gently caressed the loose strands of hair out of Bella’s face.
“Excuse me, Niklaus wants to hear this as well,” Elijah said, placing the phone on speaker on the bed. “He’s on his way home.”
“I identified most of the spells used in the potion from tales you’ve told, from tests I’ve done on the blood and from tales Bella told. Becky validated them,” Jeri explained. “One of them being the most important one; Klaus will be the death of Bella, and her savior.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Klaus demanded through the phone.
“That Becky wasn’t a particularly bad witch, just a scared one, but oh so crafty. To be honest, I’m impressed,” Jeri said cheerfully as she saw another bite mark appear on Bella’s arm. “She knew that one day, you’d come back to New Orleans. This is why she used your blood for this. She hated the Cullens and hated to work for them, but it meant protection and a hefty sum of money. When you’re knee deep in debt, you’ll do just about anything.”
“How do you know this?”
“I summoned her spirit when Bella went down for a nap, no biggie,” she replied. “How about you kill me as a thank you?”
“Just keep talking, you’re testing my patience,” Klaus growled.
“While you’re well known for your monstrous behavior. Becky knew that all of you had a soft side as well and that upon returning to New Orleans, you’d eventually find her. She used your blood to bind her to you so that you’d be her salvation and ruin everything Carlisle would do to her. Reverse it. That part of the spell kicked in when you fed her your blood. Once it was out of her system, she started to have nightmares that seemed too real, almost as if she was reliving the memories. She’s probably been in a lot of pain for the last couple of days, and none of us noticed.”
A stream of expletives could be heard coming out of the phone from both Kol and Klaus. When they finally shut up again, Jeri continued. “Long story short, she’s dying. So it’s up to you if you want to save her.”
“And how am I supposed to do that?”
“Turn her.”
Klaus could be heard sucking in a breath. “Is there another option?”
“No. Either you turn her, or she permanently dies.”
“Niklaus, how far away are you from New Orleans?” Elijah asked as he picked up the phone again.
“A couple of hours but Kol already suggested we’d get rid of the car and run our way home to shorten the trip.”
“Do that, brother,” Elijah urged him as he saw Bella’s body spasm. “It’s not looking good.”
~o.O.o~
He could smell her blood the moment he set foot in the courtyard. He and Kol had quickly fed before they returned home after their long run, but he could smell her blood. Rushing to his study, he found everyone in there, holding a quiet vigil for Bella, who lay upon his bed dressed in a big shirt and some underwear, nothing else.
Klaus quickly observed the room and noticed a mountain of laundry, stained in red. “What happened?”
He wanted to rush to the bed and kneel down next to his Bella, but he had already rushed over from where he and Kol had gotten out of the car. Her heartbeat was faint. There were bite marks all over her body, some still red from recent appearances. There was blood seeping out of tiny marks made by syringes. Not much, but enough for him to worry. If this was a glimmer of the Cullen’s treatment of her, he didn’t want to know what he had missed.
“Internal bleeding, it came out of her as if it was her period on steroids or the Niagara Falls,” Jeri murmured, placing a new cold, wet cloth on the feverish Bella. “I’ve managed to stabilize her somewhat, but you don’t have long, Klaus. I’ve made her sleep, and I can wake her up again, but I have no idea for how much time.”
“I’m going to kill them,” Rebekah muttered, having watched the onslaught of the reversal first hand. Jeri had made another analogy about Bella’s condition; with the spell intact and without having fed on Klaus’ blood, Bella was like an M&M. With the spell fallen away, the M&M was now breaking apart and even affecting the peanut inside. She had wanted to wake Bella or have Jeri wake her, so she could tell them if she was in any pain. If she needed anything, but Elijah convinced her that it was probably better for Bella if she was oblivious to all of this.
It was, but it didn’t mean she had to agree with it.
“Has anyone asked her?”
“No, we let her sleep,” Elijah squeezed his brother’s shoulder. “We figured you should be the one to tell her what’s going on and what her options are.”
“Leave us,” he demanded as he sat down on the edge his bed, looking at Bella over his shoulder. He needed to think really hard about this and very fast. Jeri and Kol stayed in the den. That wasn’t what he had wanted, but maybe it was for the best seeing as Jeri’s magic was the only thing helping Bella right now. Rebekah, Elijah, and Jessica were in the hallway but had closed the door. Not that it would count for privacy due to vampire hearing, but he always appreciated the gesture.
It surprised him that everyone had seemed to take a liking to this all too human and all too of an innocent young woman. The look on Kol’s face spoke big and elaborate stories. He was putting up a brave face, but he didn’t want Bella to leave, and Klaus wasn’t certain if he wanted her to leave, either. Not out of fear as what might happen to him. He had survived the Hunter’s curse. He could survive the spell being broken – and his heart with it would probably break in a million pieces as well.
She was human, but she was not. She’d never been around humans apart from those in that crazy cult, but even then, it was unlikely. Bella had always been surrounded by supernaturals, and that made her one, in his opinion. She was beautiful, honest, and there was this spark inside of her that was just waiting to be ignited. Maybe becoming a vampire would help her realize that she was less fragile than she thought she was and dared to do things, such as going outside. Or a simple boost in her personality.
Not that Klaus wanted it to change that much. If he had to be completely honest, he was enamored by her fragility and how she held herself up, proud. Those beautiful brown eyes of hers lit up whenever she saw him. That smile of hers was intoxicating and her scent…
However, he was hesitant. As with Marcel, he didn’t want her to live the life he was leading. Death and destruction. Darkness. If he’d thought of Marcel as pure, then what was Bella? Angelic? He didn’t want to ruin her. He hadn’t actually ruined Marcel although he did stab him in the back. Would Bella do such a thing? No, she wouldn’t. She’d be afraid to hurt anyone, it would be a task to get her to drink from a human.
He loved her now, but would he love her forever? She’d already become a part of their family. Would he be able to deal with her for the rest of her vampire life or would she be in danger as should she be a vampire, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill her when pissed off? No, he wouldn’t hurt her, ever. Nothing would change.
He’d still take revenge on the Cullens because of her. Even if she were gone. If she’d stay, she could help, and he’d help her rip off that Edward’s head and stuff it up Carlisle’s ass. But her revenge shouldn’t be the only reason for her to turn.
He wanted her to stay. As his.
But only if she wanted to. He wasn’t going to force her. This was going to be her choice.
“Jeri?”
“Yes?” Jeri walked into the bedroom, finding Klaus in the same position as they’d left him, on the bed with his back towards Bella.
“How much pain would she be in if you’d wake her now? Would she be coherent enough?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Jeri ran her hand through her hair. “I mean… she’s a tough cookie, really tough. She’d probably act as if nothing’s wrong while her body deteriorates. As I said before, I spelled her to take the edge off the pain but… I don’t know. She’d be in a lot of pain, I guess.”
“Very well, then she and I will have to have a chat while she’s transitioning,” he said as he looked at Jeri. “Do you have a syringe on you?”
“No, but I’ll get one,” she smiled at him before leaving him again.
Klaus moved on the bed and carefully pulled Bella’s unconscious form into his lap, covering her with a blanket as she felt cold. “I’m so sorry, my love,” he whispered in her ear, hoping she’d somehow hear it. Kissing the top of her head, he could feel how her body slightly shook and then continued to tremble. He was going to kill the Cullens. Even if there were some good ones, he was going to kill them all.
“What did you want with this?” Jeri asked as she returned.
“Take some of my blood, please, then inject it into her. I don’t want to wake her up if she’s going to be in so much pain,” Klaus replied as he held out his arm to her.
“I might have to do that twice, to be safe.”
“Nonsense.”
“Twice, to be safe,” Jeri said as she pushed the needle into his arm and withdrew his blood. She was more careful with injecting it into Bella. “And a harmless spell for good luck,” she added after muttering something before she injected her with the second dose. He had wanted it to do it this way because right now, Bella was still very much out cold, and he wanted his blood to take. To be sure that it would heal her up and change her. All he needed to do now was to snap her neck.
Just like that.
Her beautiful, fragile neck.
The sound of her bones crack was louder, somehow. Or maybe it seemed louder because it was so god awful quiet. He could feel the life drain out of her body, her heart had come to a full stop, and he really hoped he hadn’t done the wrong thing.
She rolled over on the bed and was surprised that she had rolled into someone. Opening her eyes, she blinked when she saw that it was Klaus. Sitting up and the room came into focus, everyone else was there as well. “Oh, that’s not creepy at all,” she muttered as she looked at them. “Watching me sleep?”
“More like waiting for you to wake up, love,” Klaus crooned and looked her over. Over the past few hours, he’d watched her body heal itself, turning those pale cheeks pink again, and all the bite marks removed from her. “How are you feeling?”
“I… feel fine?” she guessed. She did feel fine, how was that possible? She looked at Jeri and smiled at her. “Did you do this?”
“There wasn’t anything I could do, Bella,” Jeri replied with an even voice. “We called Kol and Klaus back so Klaus could save you.”
“You did?” she smiled back up at him.
“Not quite yet, love,” he gently rubbed her back. “But for now, we’re all glad you’re feeling better. Let’s have breakfast, I think we all could use a good cup of tea right about now.”
She softly kissed Klaus and left the bed. “I’m going to get changed, I doubt you’ll want me to be at the table in—” she looked down at herself and shrugged. “Nothing but a shirt and underwear, apparently. Why is that?”
“Things became a little messy last night,” Jeri answered with a smile. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
“I don’t know… having my pancakes and then laying down on the couch, I guess?” Bella said after a while. She gratefully took the pair of sweatpants that Kol held up for her and got into them, making her look a little bit more presentable. “Why?” She could tell that they were all hiding something and were watching her carefully. She had felt uncomfortable before, but this was at the top of her list right now. “Just tell me, please. Something’s going on, and you’re leaving me out of it. I don’t like it.”
Kol smirked. Bella was feeling better, her lethargy of the past few days gone, and now he hoped she’d stick around. “You know what? I think this is a talk that Nik and Bella should have in private. I’ll bring you some breakfast, but you two need to discuss this.”
When the door opened, Bella could hear the hinges squeak, and it sounded as if Carlisle was using a saw of some sort to cut something in her body. Wincing, she stumbled back, holding her head.
“It’s alright love; I’ve got you,” Klaus said as he helped her back to her feet and gently placed her on a chair. “That door has always been a slight annoyance, but you’ll get used to it eventually.”
The door closed again, and Bella angrily looked at Klaus. “What is happening?”
“You fell ill,” he said as he kneeled down in front of her, leaning on her knees with his arms. “Rebekah found you convulsing on the floor after you fell off the sofa, and it went pretty fast after that. They called Kol and I back because you were fading.”
She blankly stared at him for a while as her brain started to connect the dots. “Save me… Kol said you saved me. You bit me?”
“No, I haven’t. Jeri helped me to get my blood into you before you… passed.”
“So I’m dead? I’m… how? Why am I still here?”
“You’re in transition, love. You were in so much pain last night that it wasn’t wise to wake you to ask you… this was the next best option. You could either choose to die or to live.”
She blinked at him. “You asshole! What was the talk about loving humans, respecting them and things like that? You violated me!”
“You still have a choice.”
“I shouldn’t have to have that choice, do I?” She pushed him away from her and started to pace the room. “Haven’t I been through enough? Why couldn’t you just let me go?”
He got to his feet and looked at her as she kept pacing the room. He didn’t want to grab her because he might hurt her; her anger was fuelling his. Why was she unthankful? A lot of humans would love to have taken her place to get the choice.
“I mean, seriously, Klaus. You can’t just play God like that. I thought you were different than that,” she stopped pacing and looked at him. “Why couldn’t you just let me go?”
That was the second time she asked him that and despite admitting it to himself, he wasn’t quite sure what her reaction would be if he’d tell her. However, she needed to know, she didn’t have a lot of time. “Because it is impossible for me to let you go, Bella. Not because you’re a charity case because you’re far from one. I wouldn’t know what to do without you.”
She huffed and rolled her eyes at him. She had done it before, but there was more fire behind it. Klaus mentally braced himself for if it’d come out today. “You’re a thousand years old, Klaus. You’d be fine without me.”
“Don’t you want to stay?”
“Of course! But my life ended. And now it has to end again. I mean, I’d be so bad at being a vampire. I don’t even dare to go out on the street!”
“You’ll be stronger as a vampire. You could handle whatever would come your way. You won’t get sick anymore. You’ll be faster. You don’t have to rely on others to protect you because you will be able to do it yourself – although that won’t stop neither of us to still do that for you.”
“I know what a vampire is, Klaus,” she murmured as she looked at her feet. “I’ve suffered at the hands of a couple of bad ones for most of my life. And then I saw the beauty of it when you took me in,” Bella lifted her head to look at him with a big smile on her face. “You’re such a great person, Klaus. You’ve shown me kindness, warmth, happiness. You’ve shown me a better way of life; you were fixing me, building me back up from the ground. I kept telling myself that I was so lucky, so fortunate. There was nothing more that I wanted than to spend the rest of my natural life with you.”
“Bella I—”
“I’m not done,” she walked to him and pulled him down for a kiss before continuing. “I’m so afraid that I’m not a good enough person to be a vampire. I’m… what if I turn, and I end up being like the Cullens? Rotten? And then you’d leave me. Or you’d kill me because it’s easier to break a broken vampire, isn’t it?” She could feel the tears rolling down her cheeks. “And if I do turn, and I’m alright… what if in a couple of years you’d find someone more interesting? Prettier? And you’d forget about me?”
He was silent as he struggled to keep his temper contained. Her wanting to leave, to die, hurt deeply. “You couldn’t be more wrong, love,” he murmured as he lifted her chin to meet his eyes. “If you’d ever listened to a single story I told you, you’d know that I don’t like to turn people myself, and when I do, it’s because they mean something to me. Like, Marcel. He begged me to turn him, and I did, because, after all, he was family. You are family. You…” Klaus sighed as he released her. “I don’t turn people because, in the end, all they want to do is leave. Marcel stuck around but not before stabbing me in the back a couple of times. My siblings? Elijah and Rebekah have left me countless of times; they still want to leave. And I don’t blame them. Soon Kol will want to leave because he’d want to show his catch of the month the world, have her meet other witches. And me? I’m supposed to let that happen. But not you, Bella. Please. You can’t leave me too.”
Of course, why not? She nodded as she wiped away her tears. She couldn’t leave. Over the months, he hadn’t done anything simply for his enjoyment. He hadn’t been selfish towards her; he had given her all the space and time she needed, and now he wanted one selfish act; he wanted her. Unless of course, she’d be bad or if he’d lose interest. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to stay, she wanted to be with him, she really did, but she couldn’t quite explain what she was feeling. Instead, she was crying again. The thought of her leaving him hurt her too, maybe more than him leaving her. She didn’t want to leave him. But she was scared.
“I get it that you’re frightened, love, but please, everything will be alright, I promise you. Let’s not hurt each other by talking about leaving one another.”
Bella huffed and then nearly vomited when some disgusting smell wafted in through the open window. “What’s that? Oh, that’s disgusting.”
“Your pancakes.”
“No!” she said shocked. “You can’t tell me that that horrible smell is the smell of my pancakes.”
Klaus laughed. “It’s not. It’s the smell of coffee.”
“Oh good.”
“Everybody still alive in there?” Kol opened the door and peeked around the corner. “No bloodshed? I’ve brought pancakes and tea. Sorry, Nik, holding off on the blood so she can still make a normal, rational decision.” He placed the breakfast on the table and smiled at Bella. “But I’d really love it if you’d stick around, little mooner,” he winked at her. “Imagine all the fun we could have without worrying about one of us getting hurt!”
“You smell like coffee,” Bella said as she scrunched her nose. “You’re disgusting, Kol.”
“I am?” He grinned as he took a step closer to her. “Hi,” he breathed out in her direction. “How are you?”
“Leave me alone,” she said, stepping back and pinching her nose. “You stink.”
“I think he smells delicious,” Jeri muttered darkly as she followed behind him.
“He makes me want to throw up right now,” she said as she kept walking back while Kol kept walking towards her. “Go away, you need a mint.”
“Oh, doubt you would want me to do that,” Kol said with a grin before looking at his brother. “People in transition and new vampires are so much fun!” He fumbled in his pants and held up a roll of peppermint. “I’ve got a mint, are you sure you want me to take it?”
Bella nodded as she bumped into the wall. Kol was standing toe to toe with her now, and as he unwrapped his mint, she realized she had made a big mistake. The scent was even worse, stung her nose the moment it hit. “No, stop!”
“Too late,” he grinned and popped it in his mouth.
“Stop overwhelming her senses, brother,” Klaus warned him. “As you said, we want her rational still.”
She managed to duck away and ran towards her pancakes. “Evil, so evil,” Bella muttered as she rolled one up and took a bite out of it before spitting it out again after a few chews. “What did you do to the pancakes?” she breezed as she looked at Kol. “Did you make them with mud? I like pancakes, and you decide to ruin them?!”
“It wasn’t me, darling,” Kol laughed as he munched on his mint. “It’s the change of human blood in your system that’s killed your taste buds.”
“No, you did this, you did this to annoy me!” Bella threw a pancake at him. “You’re a stupid pancake, Kol!” She threw another at him, and it hit him straight in his face.
“You hear that, Nik? I’m a stupid pancake!” Kol kept laughing as he peeled the food off his face. Bella looked just about ready to blow; this was fun. So much fun! “But you know what? This pancake tastes delicious.” He folded it and took a bite out of it. “Hmm… tastes so good, Bella, you have no idea what you’re missing.”
She was just about to throw another pancake at him when she smelled something delicious, almost as if it was calling out for her, and it was close. It wasn’t the tea, although it smelled delicious too, she figured that if the pancake didn’t taste good, the tea wouldn’t either. This was a sweet smell; she could feel how she was salivating in her mouth. “Is that blood?” She looked at Jeri, who was standing at the table and walked towards her. “Oh my God, you smell delicious.”
“Yes, she does, darling,” Kol said as he stepped between Bella and Jeri. “But until you decide to stick around and be Klaus’ Drusilla to his Spike, you’re not going to taste blood.”
“I don’t want to be his Drusilla,” Bella looked up to Kol and pushed the pancake she was holding in his mouth. “I want to be his Buffy. But seeing she’s not a vampire, I suppose I’ll have to settle to being his Drusilla, I don’t know.”
“How about just be the Bella to his Klaus, huh?” Jeri said kindly as she looked around Kol. It was nice and all that he wanted to protect her from the transitioning girl, but she didn’t need protecting. She was going to be fine even if Bella killed her. Less trauma for the girl, and more fun for Jeri. “And what kind of person are you, Bella? Would you like a ring, bracelet or necklace? With your clumsiness, I think a ring would be best…” she looked at Klaus and smiled. “A ring so she won’t turn crispy in the sun? You know, in case she says yes?”
“I have a question,” Bella said as she had given up on Jeri, Kol was in her way, and that sucked. “I can’t believe I haven’t asked this before, but how do you get your blood?”
“It’s freshly squeezed out of one of our servants every serving,” Klaus replied as he had calmed down somewhat. His brother was a menace, but at least he also knew how to interrupt without it being an interruption.
“Do they volunteer their blood?”
“Bella, you’re not going to drink animal blood, are you?” Kol groaned as he turned around to watch her walk back to Klaus. “That’s disgusting.”
“No, no animal blood, absolutely not,” she shot at him before looking back at Klaus. “You compel them?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t want that. But I don’t want innocent people to die either, so how is that going to work?” She put her arms around Klaus and looked up to him. “I feel like I’m a little bit too demanding…”
“Oh, no you’re not love, and you raise a valid point,” he ran his hand through her hair. “We know what your stance is on compulsion or any other method of control, and I was thinking that maybe we should indeed stop doing that to our servants.”
“What?” Kol sputtered. “Nik!”
“They get paid for serving food, they get paid for everything, and we compel them to forget that we’re vampires the moment they walk out the door. Why not have a change in diet? I’m pretty sure that there are deviant humans out there, we could keep them in our basement and feed off of them, have them donate their blood,” he said with a smirk. “You know, those bastards who don’t get picked up by the police, I’m pretty sure that New Orleans has a fair amount of them.” Klaus looked at Bella again and smiled. “Would that be satisfying for you, love? Should you turn and need to feed that it’ll only be on a bad person?”
“I think that would be great,” she smiled up at him.
Oh, he was so grateful for Kol and his wickedness, he was. Just like that, he had eased Bella’s mood again and coaxed her out of her head. “Alright love, was there anything else you were worried about?”
“Are you sure I won’t become like them?”
“No,” he smiled at her. “You simply turn into a stronger version of you. I have to admit, the first few days won’t be very easy because you’ll be ravenous and moody, but as you level out, you’ll find yourself whole again.”
“Although, if you lose your quirks, I’ll be the first one to pester you to just fake it then,” Kol added playfully as he finished eating the pancakes. “You won’t change. Everything gets heightened, and you’ll have to find a way to deal with them. Easy peasy after what you’ve been through.”
“Now,” Jeri said as she moved closer towards Bella and Klaus. “If you’ve made your decision…” she got her knife out of her pocket and slid open her wrist. “Have at it.”
“Oh, that does smell good,” Bella said as she looked at the blood flowing from Jeri’s wrist. She wanted to take a sip but found herself unable to move as Klaus held her tightly. “Klaus!”
“What are you doing?” Kol demanded as he pulled Jeri back to him and quickly covered her wrist with a cloth. “Have you lost your mind?”
“What? She’s going to turn, and that will make me the only mortal in this building. No thanks. And you promised.” She sulked as she poked Kol in the chest with a knife. “Just as I promised to be on your side, you and your family’s side, forever. Someone like me could come in very handy for you guys.” She pouted when Kol took away the knife. “Besides, she’ll have a few sips of my blood, and she’ll turn. It’s not like she’ll actually kill me. She won’t do that.”
“She has my blood running through her veins, Jeri. If anything, she won’t stop,” Klaus said with a low growl as Bella was struggling against his hold.
“I don’t care! I’d rather have her drink from me than she has to do it from a stranger. Her first time is special!”
“And what if it doesn’t work?” Kol asked quietly. “What if she does kill you, and you don’t come back?”
“I will come back, I have your blood in me. And with my family history? I’ll definitely come back as a Heretic. I’ve done my research, trust me. I’ll be here.” Jeri thought for a moment. “You know what? Maybe it’s safer to wait until the moon’s out. The full moon is always stronger, more chance for me to survive it the way I want.” She held up her wrist for Kol to heal. “Or you know, she could have a few sips now, complete the transition and then she can feed on me later.”
“She’ll kill you, Jeri.”
“And I’ll come back, you halfwit! And if you two are going to stop me, then you’re mistaken. I’m powerful enough to stick the both of you behind the wallpaper and have Bella feed on me anyway, I’m playing nice here.”
“You’ve lost your mind!”
“No, I haven’t. I have wanted to do this ever since I heard of the coven’s demise and the destruction of Mystic Falls by the Heretics. I want to do good, Kol. Help people. It’s what I do best. As a Heretic, I can function on my own without drawing power from anyone magical, it’ll make me stop feeling like a leech. You know this. I told you this.”
“I know but…”
“And Bella here, she’ll be hungry. Starved. Have you even stopped for a moment and thought about how a kill would change her life? I’d rather have her first to be me than some random stranger you guys picked up on the streets. I come back; it won’t be as hard on her considering I’ve been trying to get you fuckers to kill me all this time. I love this crazy family but boy, you people are idiots sometimes.”
“Please?” Bella looked up to Klaus, a hopeful look on her face. “I’ll be good, I promise.”
“It’s not you I’m worried about, love,” Klaus said as he held her closer. “It’s her.”
“After all she did for you, for us, you still don’t trust her? I do. I appreciate her honesty and her treating everyone equally. I don’t think she’ll do anything to hurt Kol or you, or the rest of your family.”
“You’re just saying that because you want her blood.”
“No, I’m not,” she said as she shook her head. “You can’t see it, can you? She has nothing but respect for you and your family. She has a big mouth and speaks out of place, but she speaks her mind and changes yours on occasion because she has valid points. She deserves to change, Klaus. She is willing to give me her blood now, and I can have more later.”
“So it is about the blood.”
She hit him in the chest with her fist. “I trust her more than I trust Marcel.”
“She has a point,” Kol said, and then playfully smirked. “And if it doesn’t work out, Niklaus, at least we’ll have a challenge in killing her.”
Klaus growled lowly as he leveled his eyes on Jeri, ignoring another punch coming from Bella. “You feel more confident around the full moon?”
“Well, sure, I can draw power from that to speed up the process of me healing. But I doubt anything will go wrong,” she said with a shrug. “But she needs blood now. She needs to complete her transition because right now she’s doing fine, but you know very well that the longer she waits, the weaker she gets, and she won’t be able to drink blood at all. She’ll probably won’t get hungry until tonight anyway.”
He took hold of Bella’s wrists as she wanted to punch him again and smiled at her. “Love, that didn’t hurt me at all but did you work through your anger?” He asked amused. “Finished your little tantrum?”
“It wasn’t a tantrum; I was trying to prove a point.”
“You can prove a point without hurting people, love.”
“And you just said I didn’t hurt you at all,” she beamed up at him. “So how does that work?”
He had to admit, he was slightly amused by this Bella. She was antsy and wanted Jeri’s blood, but her heightened senses weren’t allowing her to be so closed off. He hoped it’d stick once she fully turned. It was adorable. “Are you sure, love? Do you really want to complete your transition?” He wanted to know she was sure, but he couldn’t even be happier as of this moment.
“Klaus, I want to stay with you,” she smiled up to him, so much love was in her eyes that filled his heart with glee. “I want us to become better together. I want to continue what we’ve started and be part of your family. So I can annoy Kol the way he annoyed me.”
“Very well then. Just a sip. You can have her all to yourself tonight.”
Kol scowled at his brother as he wrapped his hand around Jeri a little possessively. “I take offense to that! She will be mine!”
Jeri huffed as she swatted his hand away from her. “Does it really have to take someone else’s drinking my blood for you to agree to this? Idiot. Tough. The girl will need to feed, and she’s going to do that on me. If you want to have some of my blood, you two better share.”
“I’m still not liking it!”
