Chapter 08
“What happened?” When he saw his brother drive erratically and turning around as if something was wrong, they turned around as well and followed him, but when that yellow light came that Klaus had seen only twice before, he realized his question had already been answered. “They took her?”
Kol slammed the roof of the car out of frustration, creating a huge dent in it. “I should have listened to her, I should have. She didn’t think going to New Orleans was a good idea and I should have listened instead of insisting and telling her it was going to be alright and—” He ran his hand through his hair and took a deep breath to calm himself. He was getting hungry and despite the cars driving around them, he could easily stop one and pull out a human for a snack. “I’m going to Forks.”
“Last time it took two weeks, Kol.”
“I know, Nik, but I’m still going. As I told Bella, should anything like this happen again, I was going to get her back and I’ll wait for as long as I need to. They’re likely telling her that she should not do something like this again and give her back.”
Klaus let out a snort and shook his head. “You’re in deep, brother. Good luck then, but don’t feel offended when we’re going to make a wager between us on how long your patience will last.”
~o.O.o~
Bella gasped for air as if her life depended on it. She had felt as if she’d been drowning, suffocated, and it had hurt, but everything was quiet now, she could take a breather. Once her head didn’t feel like it needed to explode or as if it was on fire, she took a dare to look around.
She wasn’t in Charlie’s home in Forks. She was somewhere else. Bella found herself staring at Hades, who had a stern look on his face and it just didn’t match the personality she had encountered two days ago.
“You know, I know I said we were going to meet again soon, but this soon?” Hades said in a disapproving tone, crossing his arms over his chest, staring her down. “Do you have any idea what you did? After I told you that it’s just me up here, that I have my minions in eternal slumber? It’s just me here and you just gave me a shit ton of work!”
She blinked at him then, not knowing what he was talking about.
“Look, the first time you sent a couple of souls my way, I let it slide. You didn’t know what you were doing, but you should know better now,” Hades was still sounding disapproving. “And these aren’t just a couple of souls, either! It’s years and years of battles, natural disasters and murder victims thrown into the water. This is New Orleans we’re talking about!”
Once she was certain the God had ended his speech, she spoke up. “What happened?”
“What happened?” Hades huffed as he pulled her to her feet and directed her towards a large window looking out over some courtyard, revealing a lot of people wearing clothes from different times. There must have been a thousand or more down there.“You can help ghosts to move on and usually, you’re doing a pretty good job by reassuring them, one on one, having them know that they’re going to be displaced for something better.” He gestured to the people below them. “Now, you tell me what happened.”
Bella could feel the color drain from her face. “I told Kol that I didn’t want to go to New Orleans, but he assured me— It started in the city ahead of New Orleans, Slidell, there were about twenty of them and rising once the word got out that I could see them and I told Kol to drive… hoping I’d leave them behind… Before I knew it we were on the bridge and Kol telling me to look at the pretty view and…”
“You were overwhelmed. Absolutely no control whatsoever. Well done. Now there are about a three thousand people ready to be directed to their form of afterlife and you’re going to help me sort them,” Hades replied and started to direct her towards the door. “I was told you had your powers under control, Bella. I guess I shouldn’t have trusted that lying bastard on his word. Tell me, did Helios train you, at least? Guide you? Tell you what you’re capable of?”
“N-no,” Bella stammered. “But he did say that if I ever needed help—”
“Typical,” Hades scowled. “You see, that’s one of the reasons why we dethroned the Titan Gods all these millennia ago. Fucking everything with a hole, no control whatsoever and just mainly fucking about. And don’t even get me started on your mother, she—”
“Your own father ate you because he knew you were going to overthrow him. It was only that Zeus—”
Hades scrunched up his nose. “Quite the trauma, being regurgitated. I can still smell the bile we were covered in. I was the oldest and therefor also the last being thrown up. All the pee and poop of my siblings—”
“EW! I so did not want to hear that!” Bella said appalled.
“We only let Helios out because Circe had managed to escape and impregnate herself with that Salvatore loser. We allowed him to stick around because for all intents and purposes, he was your father, after all. We tasked him with looking out for you and look! You fucked up!”
“You don’t sound like a God, Hades.”
“I may not get out much, but I do roll with the times, young Padawan,” He lead her down a staircase and towards a row of clothing booths. That was the best way Bella could describe them, all with a different sign above the door. “These are portals to everyone’s beliefs, their heavens, sort to speak. Or their hell, depending on what judgement they receive on the other end. Those with no preference stay with us.”
“Okay?”
“Get crackin’, Bella, because I’m going to go and have a little chat with your grandfather about you and by the time I get back, I want you to have sorted at least 500 of these lost souls. You freed them from their Earthly bonds, it’s your responsibility to deal with them.”
Bella swallowed hard. “But, what do I do?”
Hades shrugged. “I don’t know, you figure it out, you’re the smart one! You’ve got everything under control!” And with that, he disappeared, leaving Bella with all the people that she had moved and hadn’t even been aware of.
A desk appeared so she could stand behind that as some sort of barrier between her and them, but she felt like such a loser right now. A child who’s done something wrong and had been placed on the naughty step. But this wasn’t even her fault. It was Kol’s fault; he insisted in going to New Orleans and—
Taking a breath, she stopped herself right there and then. Kol wasn’t to blame for all of this; she could have told him ‘no’ and she could have gone somewhere else. Without him. But without him things were boring. And they were together. Then again; Kol should have listened to her, too. She needed to get to work; the longer she was away from Earth, the more time passed and Kol could do something incredibly stupid.
It was strange how the afterlife worked; all of a sudden she could speak all these kinds of languages and understand them and make herself understood. Most of the people she spoke to were good Catholics. There were a handful of Vodou practitioners and one of the newer souls, a tourist visiting New Orleans when Katrina hit, was Hindu, but she wasn’t struggling with the workload just yet. By number 300 she was getting thirsty though. It was no wonder that Hades had a whole staff of people working for him in the times where the Greek Gods were still ‘a thing’, they deserved their eternal rest, Bella couldn’t imagine having to do this day in and day out.
There were a few tough ones in her first 500 souls; small children made her so sad. Who would want to kill them? Some of them died of accidental drowning, but another part were street urchins who died of the cold. Or were abandoned by their families.
Hades returned when she was working on 499. “How many did you do?” He demanded, relaxing his stance but crossing his arms over his chest and angrily looking at her.
Bella watched as 499, Sarah-Jo Watson, walked passed her and into the Christian booth. “Next one is 500.”
“Too slow,” Hades said as he snapped his fingers. “Two hundred more before I allow you a small break.”
Bella fought the urge to talk back at him. This was her mess, this was what she was supposed to clean up and she wasn’t going to complain about it. And yes, it was likely that the quicker she worked, the sooner it would all be over and she could return to Kol. “How much time has passed on Earth?”
“I don’t know, do I look like a timepiece?” Hades nonchalantly shrugged.
“You’re a dick.”
“I don’t like people,” Hades pointed out. “The sooner you’re gone, the sooner I can get back to keeping to myself…” A smirk then appeared on his lips. “Hmm… I have a great idea that I could do once you’re gone and it involves your mother and the Chair of Forgetfulness. Oh… haven’t used that one in a very long time…”
Bella was about to open her mouth when Hades spoke again.
“Who knows, I might allow you to play fetch with Cerberus for a couple of minutes once you’ve done the 200 extra. He deserves some fun,” Hades shrugged. “Although he’s not as big as you think he might be.”
The thought of playing fetch with probably the most famous dog in all of mythology sounded absolutely fascinating. However, once she reached her extra 200, she opted to simply to keep on going, not to waste any time in fixing her mistake. Hades sometimes helped, but by the time she had gone through all of the souls, she was tired. Exhausted. She felt relieved, but she had the feeling that she could sleep for days.
Bella had attempted to try and make sense of the days in an attempt to figure out how long Kol was by himself with his siblings, but she had given up around the 1500th soul. She was unable to tell, why try to figure out a way anyway? She merely hoped that Kol wouldn’t be daggered again because he pissed off the wrong sibling.
And as much as she wanted to sleep for days, she knew that Hades wasn’t done with her yet and thus, wasn’t allowed to go. “Alright, I’m done, now what?” She sighed as she sat down against a pillar and looked at the God. “Any more penance I need to do? I’ve learned my lesson.”
“Have you?” Hades countered as he squatted down in front of her. “Because frankly, my dear, I think that you’re in need of some control over this side of you.”
“I don’t even want it,” she muttered. “I mean, yeah, I brought Kol back to life and I’ve done some good with it, but it’s too distracting, too… much. I’m not made for this shit.”
He smiled at her then as he reached out to ruffle her hair. “That’s what you get for being raised a mortal and only grown into your powers when you turned 18. You have the mortal way of thinking and that’s alright. I can help you with this. I can’t exactly take it all away as it’s a part of you now, but I could get into your mind and dial this gift way back. Maybe to only being able to see the spirits of loved ones? To help those you love, incase one of your vampires gets staked before their time?”
“Is that even possible?”
Hades nodded. “Helios should have seen this coming a mile away. But I heard he only gave you two choices, huh? You like your vampires too much to leave the Earth and join him and his family and your abilities are so much fun, he should have offered to tone them down until you were full and ready, not to merely take them away.” He rubbed his hands together in glee. “Who knows? I might unlock some more abilities inside of you that are fun! Your mother loved transforming people into animals and that certainly has rubbed off on you, but that’s not all she could do, can do. Let’s find out!”
Before she could object, Hades had slipped inside her mind and she could feel him moving around, tugging on things inside of her, loosening other things, and she started to feel back to normal again. Herself. Not this person with a huge weight upon her shoulders. All the while, Hades was grinning like a lunatic. Bella wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
She wasn’t even sure if she should allow him to mess around in her head, seeing as he was practically at odds with the Titan side of the family. With reason, too. While she was righting her wrong, Hades told her more about the Battle of the Gods, Titanomachy, and the reasons behind it all. Compared to the Titans, the Olympians were innocents; well, apart from Zeus. He liked to sleep around with anything and anyone. There were stories Hades could tell her about his brother that weren’t ever documented by scribes because they were so scandalous.
The Olympian Gods were far from innocent, of course, Bella knew that. But they were quite tame in comparison.
Instead of letting her go once he had messed with her abilities, Hades took the time to teach Bella how to control them; it took quite some time, regrettably, but it was necessary for Bella not to feel like a loose canon. She had believed she had been in control whenever she transformed people into animals, but as it turned out, it was so easy to tip the balance and make unwanted transformations; transformations that could actually kill her subjects when she didn’t want them to die.
One of her new abilities was to turn invisible. Not to really turn invisible, but unnoticable; something in the corner of someone’s eye, not being able to focus on and therefor not to be seen. Something that all Gods could do. To be somewhere but not, and nobody could tell, not even witches and not even the Ancestors.
Bella had told Hades about her plans of going back to New Orleans now that she wouldn’t be able to get overwhelmed by the dead anymore, now that she couldn’t see them anymore. She wanted to go back to her boyfriend. Hades told her that the Ancestors wouldn’t like her presence in the city because she had the power to destroy them; something Hades really didn’t want to dial down inside of her because she might need that power one day. The Ancestors didn’t like it when someone was more powerful than they were, and he warned her that life would be hard for her in the city. However, turning invisible to everyone, would certainly work in her favor when it came to the Ancestors.
According to Hades, the Ancestors were nothing but power hungry dead witches who required sacrifices each year. They didn’t require it, but they did it as to ‘give back’ to those who sacrificed to them. There was this spell called The Harvest that required the practitioners of Ancestral Magic to sacrifice four of their young women every 300 years or so, to the Ancestors, to ensure that the witches could still channel their Ancestors.
Hades thought that was bizarre. Even at the height of the reign of the Old Gods he had hated the sacrifices and offerings made to him, or for him. It was unnecessary, and quite frankly, he had found them offensive. Just because he didn’t like to show his face and his business was the Underworld didn’t mean that he wanted black sheep sacrificed to him. Or blood spilled in his name. People had the power inside themselves to deal with things, they didn’t need his aid at all.
Bella got slightly pissed off when Hades told her that almost two years had passed on Earth during the time she was with him, but accepted it because it had been her punishment, and in return, Hades had helped her a lot. “Now, before I pop you in New Orleans,” Hades said with a playful smile as a bouquet of cornucopias appeared in his hands, “You have to know that I don’t do party favours, but I really liked your company, Bella. I love your work ethic and you’re an excellent student. Should you and Kol ever wish to have children, let me know and I’ll make sure his swimmers can swim again.”
He handed her the bouquet of flowers and before she could say anything, she found herself in the middle of a square near the waterfront of New Orleans, holding the flowers. Freaked out, she left the flowers at the statue of Andrew Jackson and decided to get her bearings. She had absolutely no idea where she was, where the Mikaelsons were and in how much trouble she was with them.
It wasn’t as if she could ask anyone where the famous Originals were living these days because that would draw too much attention. Bella was glad that Hades had returned her bag to her as well; her money and her phone were still safely inside of it so she rented a hotel room and decided to sleep for days first. No matter how badly she wanted to return to Kol, she needed to be awake and not walk around like a zombie. No, her head needed to be firmly placed on her shoulders and not still in the clouds. Or underneath the dirt or wherever Hades’ underworld was located.
It took her a few days to familiarize herself with the French Quarter and it was only dumb luck that when she rounded a corner that she saw her Kol with a young brunette, holding hands, talking softly to each other with that goofy smile of his that Bella had only seen him using on her before and Bella’s heart broke.
However, she wasn’t going to let this one go, Kol was hers. Not this floozy’s. Taking a deep breath, Bella started walking. There was no way that she was going to let Kol out of her sight. She hoped to catch up with him and then walk off with him, leaving the young girl behind. Kol looked good, his ass filled those jeans very well and that jacket… she wanted to rip it all off and reclaim him as hers. Again and again if she had to.
“Hey!” Bella said once she had caught up with them. “Are you done playing? Can we go now?”
Kol turned around in shock. “B-Bella? You’re back?”
“Oh, this is the bitch that left you?” the brunette huffed, looping her arm through Kol’s, staking her own claim on him. “She doesn’t look like much.”
“I had to clean up my own mess, Kol. What made you think I wouldn’t return?” Bella smiled at him, ignoring the midget next to him. “But I guess trading me in for a younger model answers that question for me. Tell me, did you even wait for me to come back?”
“A month!”
“Wow, a whole month! I thought I was worth it to wait at least… two months?”
“Nik needed me and—”
“It’s okay,” Bella said, still not moving from her spot, now addressing the person next to him. “It’s okay, you can let go of him now. He’s going to take me home.” She couldn’t believe how bitchy jealousy made her feel.
The girl opened his mouth but Kol spoke before her. “Bella, your home is wherever it is. Forks, or wherever. It’s not with me. You left me and I’m with Davina now. Deal with it. Go home. Leave me and the rest of my family alone, which should be easy because you’re so good at it,” his words dripped with venom and Bella was slightly taken aback by his words. She couldn’t help but watch him and Davina walk off and by the time she had recovered, she knew that running after him wouldn’t be a good idea.
While his rejection had hurt, she could feel the tears burn behind her eyes, something felt off, and she was going to do everything in her power to make sure her family was alright. And to start with that, she had to disappear and regroup. Observe. Learn things. Find out where everyone was and do some more observing.
This sucked.
“Bit silly of you calling a family meeting when you, the one who called for it, shows up late!” Klaus scolded his youngest brother as he walked into the courtyard.
“Oh, step off, Niklaus, it’s not as if you have anything of importance to do,” Kol shot back at him. “And to those who do, Rebekah, Myriam, I am sorry I’m late but I had to be sure I wasn’t followed.”
Myriam let out a snort as she settled in Klaus’ lap. If anything, she didn’t quite mind leaving her place of employment for a little while; the smell of sex and the energies in her brothel usually made her horny as fuck, and she was going to drag Klaus off to his bedroom as soon as this meeting was over.
Kol had sounded worried and scared when he called her and she was glad that there was at least one thing Klaus had taken from the whole Silas situation a few years back and that was to listen to his siblings, especially Kol, when something was going on. Kol didn’t scare easily, so whatever it was, it was going to be good.
It wasn’t connected to the current werewolf problem the Mikaelsons had been dealing with for the past couple of months, otherwise it could have waited until there was more news. The whole thing was interesting as hell.
“Proceed, Kol,” Elijah encouraged him from his spot near the bar.
“I never thought the day would come where I’d say this, but for once it’s not one of your deranged exes that have come to town,” Kol pointed at both his brothers. “Davina and I were minding our own business today when Bella showed up thinking I’d take her back.”
“Bella’s back?” Klaus wasn’t surprised by this. Before she disappeared they had been a family, he had considered Bella to be family, but as time progressed and she didn’t return like the first time she’d disappeared like that, he knew that she had abandoned them.
At first, he had feared that his brother Kol would turn to his old ways, but soon after Klaus had recalled him to New Orleans to deal with the witches, Kol found his new girlfriend, Davina, who seemed to be more sane than Bella. Also, she was a witch and easier to kill should she betray them like Bella had. A witch who had her powers under control.
Klaus liked it that he was back to being the one to fear.
Granted, Bella was entirely different from them. She played by different rules, and time progressed differently for her when she wasn’t on Earth and she couldn’t be blamed for having been gone for so long. But she did abandon them; she could have fought harder with Kol for not going to New Orleans because she didn’t have the control she needed.
And who was to say she had control now?
Elijah tiredly pinched the bridge of his nose. “We can’t deal with her now, we have a lot on our plate already with the Guerrera’s.”
“I know that, and I told Bella to leave. To leave us alone. I know that she probably won’t do that as she’s so obsessed with us, so me and Davina are going to work on a few spells that will hopefully be able to contain Bella for a long time. Or at least to slow her down so that we can think of a permanent way of dealing with her.”
“That’s a bit overkill, isn’t it?” Klaus spoke up, not entirely surprised by Kol’s eagerness to make sure that Bella wouldn’t do anything to them, but it did sound a bit too harsh. “Has she ever done anything to purposely harm us?”
“Given time, it’s likely she would have or will,” Elijah replied. “We’ve been over this, Niklaus. She’s an immortal demigod, she has powers we haven’t even begun to understand and she doesn’t either. Sentiments aside, she has the power to cause major destruction and we’ll be unable to stop her. Demigods aren’t known for their benevolence, either.”
“Hercules.”
“Oh, please,” Elijah rolled his eyes at his brother. “In comparison to him, then yes, Bella’s a saint. But Gods can’t be trusted. I’ve read everything we have on Gods and ordered first editions of other books that I’ve read too, and Bella does not fit in with the characteristics. She’s an unknown.”
“And she hurt us all by leaving,” Rebekah replied, getting up from her chair and let out a breath. “Very well, I will have my guard up. Thank you for informing us, Kol, but I have to get back to the animal shelter.”
“Davina and I will handle this when she comes back again, I promise,” Kol said sincerely. “I will not allow her to mess with our family again.”
~o.O.o~
A good thing about being invisible was that she could move around without being noticed and encounter people doing embarrassing things. Bella felt like a private detective as she roamed the streets of New Orleans with her notebook. She followed the hushed whispers of the witches as they spoke amongst themselves about a family of drug trafficking werewolves who had been at odds with the Mikaelsons for quite some time now and they were now going to end it for once and forall.
Bella was shocked to find out that they had managed to get Klaus’ blood and fabricate rings that would allow the wolves to control their transformations during the full moon; much like how some vampires were able to walk in the daylight without burning. It angered her, as one of the wolves she’d followed was happily chatting on the phone telling the other person that through this, they had weakened the big bad hybrid.
She had followed Elijah to City Hall where she watched him bribe – no, compel – a city worker to do something and Bella realized that the Mikaelsons were readying themselves for war with the wolves by making sure the Guerrera’s didn’t have any place to hide.
She needed to work fast. It was likely that they weren’t going to fight in broad daylight and seeing as night was about to fall, Bella had to go before blood was spilled. It was easy enough to get inside the house, all she needed to do was to slip in when the door opened and everyone was conveniently gathered in the same room as they discussed their battle with the Mikaelsons. Bella could tell the rings were spelled with Klaus’ blood. For some reason, she could feel it deep inside of her.
Bella smacked everyone against the wall; some went through a wall, but that was alright, she had hit them hard enough to knock them out, for now. She ripped the rings off the fingers of the wolves and put them into a nice velvet bag that she had acquired in a gift shop before taking one of the smaller guys and extended her invisibility to him after turning him into a harmless little puppy that she could carry with her.
Despite her being immortal and part God, her strength, her physical strength, was that of an ordinary human. Bella figured Klaus wanted to spill blood for what these wolves had done to him, so she was going to leave him a little present. If he and his siblings wanted to kill the wolves she’d knocked out, then that would be their decision, their choice. Not hers.
Clutching the still unconscious puppy underneath her arm, Bella decided to make a run for the bus. The full moon was already out and she wanted Klaus to be at full strength and happy when he’d join Elijah, Kol and Myriam in their fight against the wolves. Then again, it was also very likely that Klaus would stay at home and use her offering’s blood as paint. With Klaus, things could go either way.
She also wasn’t sure if the mere act of taking the rings off of the werewolves would have restored Klaus’ strength or that if they needed to be destroyed. It was best to remain hidden for now, Kol had been angry with her as it was, and she was certain that Klaus would know this gift came from her, right?
Half an hour later, she slipped inside the building and carefully made her way through it, trying to find where Klaus might be hiding out. Bella merely hoped that Kol had gone with Elijah and not stayed behind to look after his brother, because that would certainly be awkward. She froze in her steps when she heard scuffling behind her, steps, and when she turned around, she saw that it were the rest of the wolves.
Not knowing if Klaus had protection or not, she smacked the wolves against the brick walls of the building, and the handful that a hard head, she smacked them twice. Knocking them unconcious. There were more on top, but they were being held back by an invisible force. Kol’s harlot was the source of that.
Scowling, Bella managed to find Klaus in his study, quietly painting and seemingly no longer under the influence of people wearing his blood in enchanted stones. Jerk. Had she been that worried about him over nothing?
Bella made the little velvet bag holding the rings visible and threw it at him.
Klaus turned around and caught the little bag, a smirk on his face as he peeked into it. “I thought you were told to leave,” he said playfully, looking around in the hope to see her, but she wasn’t there, or was she? “Learned a new trick, I see?”
She kept quiet as she turned the puppy visible and released it on the floor now that it was conscious. Bella then turned it back into a normal person and she saw the smile on Klaus’ face grow wider.
“Oh, you shouldn’t have! I want to bet that his color will be the right color that I’m missing in this painting!” Klaus launched a brush at the werewolf’s neck and penetrated it, causing the werewolf to fall down instantly. “Wonderful!”
Bella didn’t understand why Klaus was being nice. Was Kol the only one of the family who wanted her gone? Or maybe, whatever the reason was for Kol not liking her hadn’t rubbed off on Klaus.
“Hurry along now, CeilingCat,” Klaus quietly sang as he focused on his painting, using the blood of the slain werewolf. “This will be our secret, for now. But do know that we don’t need your protection.”
She did as she was told and while dodging more werewolves, and, Davina, she managed to get out of the building undetected. She hopped on a train car and rode it for awhile, until she was certain she was as far away from the French Quarter as possible before getting off and made herself visible in an alley. She needed to eat, and think about what Klaus had said.
Scratch that, her next order of business would be to delve into Davina’s life. She had already sussed out where most of the Mikaelsons lived, worked and hung out, and now it was time to focus on the bitch who stole Kol from her. It was likely that she had to do something with Kol’s attitude towards her.
Or maybe this was the case with vampires in general. She wasn’t sure. Picking at her food, she decided to call the best vampire she knew outside the Mikaelsons.
“Damon’s phone.”
Bella blinked at the sound of the voice she heard. Really not the person she expected. “Stefan?”
“Bella? Where have you been?”
“Fixing my mistakes, why do you have Damon’s phone?”
“No, seriously, we’ve tried calling you, where have you been?”
“Stefan!” She had a bad feeling about this. “Did something happen to Damon?”
“Not just Damon. I mean, they have to leave Katherine alone because she’s the Anchor to the other side, but we’re all at risk of getting caught. Especially me, however, for some strange reason they’re leaving me alone, too.”
“I’m coming to Mystic Falls,” she said as she shoved her plate out in front of her. The Mikaelsons could wait, Damon was more important.
“No, don’t. Whatever you’re going to say, or whatever you want to do, you have to let us handle this. It’s still my job to make sure you’re safe and as of right now, I really can’t guarantee your safety in Mystic Falls. There’s this coven of witches called the Gemini and they’ve mostly died out, but a handful still remain. According to Alaric, they’re known for creating prison worlds where they put the most dangerous of creatures and we suspect that they put Damon in one. They’re like the witchy police. Bonnie’s working on finding a way of getting him out.”
“I’m coming.”
“Listen to me, Bella, we’ve got this. I promise you that I’ll have Damon call you when he’s back.”
Bella scowled then, taking a sip of her drink. “I’m not fragile, you know. I could kick ass.”
“I know, but should they find out about you, who knows what would happen? Now, what did you need Damon for?”
“I don’t know,” she sighed, pulling the plate back towards her to finish her food. “I mean, I know Kol’s reputation and how he used to be, but are vampires really that fickle? He saw me disappear before his own eyes once before, I can’t help it that it took me nearly two years to get back! And Klaus, he’s acting somewhat normal, but is this kind of behaviour normal? I mean, didn’t I mean anything to Kol?”
Stefan sucked in a breath. “I can’t say for sure, I’m not him, but he’s Kol Mikaelson, anything is possible. It’s very easy for a vampire to fall back into old habits. Maybe that’s what he’s done without you.”
“But he changed, Stefan. He was sweet and kind and all… manly,” Bella’s cheeks flushed by the sheer memory of him naked in front of her. “I thought what he and I had was something worth waiting for. If not, at least knowing what I am, understanding why it took me so long to get back.”
“What about the others? Have you spoken to them?”
“No… but I might have eavesdropped on Rebekah and Myriam when they happened to cross my path…” Bella sighed again. “Is it possible that I believed that there was a real connection going on when there really wasn’t?”
“Oh yeah, especially considering you involved yourself with a Mikaelson.” Stefan sounded way too happy about that and she imagined her next fry to be him and bit his head off. “On the other hand, you involved yourself with a Mikaelson and they tend to have powerful enemies. You’re going to have to do what you started out with here, observe. Learn. See if something’s wrong. Stay out of trouble.”
“Yeah… okay…”
“And one other thing; from what I saw from your relationship with the Mikaelsons when I was… well… not entirely sane, they do like you. They like you a lot, enough for them to open their home to you. To give you money so you can have things. In all honesty I was glad that Klaus gave that to you because you’ve always refused me or Damon helping you out financially. You were family to them, and they don’t take that word lightly. They wouldn’t have turned their backs on you that easily.”
“So there is something fishy going on?”
“There’s a great chance something is wrong, yes. So, as I said; observe and learn. Stay out of trouble and you’ll soon be knowledgeable enough to fix things. I have to go. I will have Damon call you when he’s back.”
“Thanks Stefan,” she smiled and disconnected the call, feeling slightly better than before. If something was wrong with the Mikaelsons, she was going to find out and make sure they would never do that to them again. No matter if she had to shed blood to do so.
~o.O.o~
For the next few weeks, Bella did her homework. She had plastered a large piece of paper on the wall of her hotel room and drew lines from names to names; mostly following Davina around and seeing where she went. She often went to a little tea shop near the Seamen’s church, a shop lovingly ran by a girl called Ann, and upon further inspection, it was one of the places to get herbs for spells without being frowned upon by other witches.
It was something that Bella had noticed; Davina wasn’t really favored by the other witches in the Quarter; the word was that she had left the coven to start out on her own and then there was this story about how she nearly destroyed New Orleans by not wanting to participate in the Harvest. Now that Davina was hanging out with vampires, she had completely fallen out of grace, but it was Ann who managed to restore a little bit of Davina’s grace by selling her herbs.
Bella was in the middle of eating a beignet on her way to the Regent’s house when she received a message on her messenger app.
TrashPanda: I would have figured you’d contact me sooner. K.
CeilingCat: Been a little busy.
TrashPanda: We need to meet. Come meet me at Jackson Square and let’s look at some paintings?
CeilingCat: When?
TrashPanda: Now?
CeilingCat: Don’t you think that’s inappropriate? Sneaking behind Myriam’s back to meet me?
TrashPanda: It’s just a meeting, Bella, I have some information for you that you might find useful.
CeilingCat: Jokes are lost in text, aren’t they? Meet me in my hotel room. Hades gave me a little present to ward against prying eyes, as an apology for keeping me there so long.
TrashPanda: Now who’s being inappropriate?
CeilingCat: I’ll admit you’re hot but my heart belongs to your brother.
TrashPanda: Well, Kol will be sad to hear that you’re secretly in love with Elijah.
CeilingCat: Ew.
TrashPanda: Of course, should things not work out between you and Kol, and should Myriam and I have a falling out, there’s always the chance that we could try and see if we’re compatible?
CeilingCat: Just come meet me!
