22I don't own these characters which is probably a good thing, because I don't think I'd ever leave my house for writing about them.
I was rewatching 4X13 Thursday night and I started thinking about the relatively short span of time between when Klaus tells Caroline that she's hallucinating and when he heals her…
Just suspend your disbelief for a moment for the duration of this drabble and picture time stretching out before you so that mere seconds could actually be a longer span of time…
The Wolves (Act I & II)
Someday my pain, someday my pain
Will mark you
Harness your blame, harness your blame
And walk through
With the wild wolves around you
In the morning, I'll call you
Send it farther on - Bon Iver
Klaus had stood there for the better part of the night staring at the grotesquely charred remains of his brother. His mind began to torment him again and replayed the conversation he'd had earlier with Elijah...
Klaus' phone began to ring. It was finally Elijah calling him back.
"Niklaus, what's so urgent? I tried to reach Kol, but he is not answering and neither is Rebekah."
Klaus realized that he'd been last on Elijah's list of siblings to contact and now he had to be the one to tell him about Kol...
For a moment he slipped out of time, back in his mind to when he was human...
Klaus was running through the forest with Henrik's lifeless body, cold and heavy and weighing his human arms down so much he thought he'd have to stop. But he couldn't stop. Henrik's body had grown cold, his arms and legs had started to stiffen and his breaths were no longer rattling through his small chest. All Klaus could think about was the very first time he'd held his baby brother.
It had been almost impossible for his mother to bring Henrik into the world. Esther had labored a full day and night before Henrik finally came squalling out, a bundle of alabaster skin with inky black hair and rich brown eyes the color of velvety earth. And when Klaus had finally held him, the last of the Mikaelson's, he'd promised Henrik that because he'd fought so hard to come into this world that he would always keep him safe...
He couldn't lose him, had to get Henrik back to the village in time. Klaus reached the clearing, screaming for help and Elijah was standing there. He looked back and forth between the dark haired remains of his youngest brother to Klaus. And the devastated look on Elijah's face had made Klaus acknowledge the truth he'd been denying for hours as he ran with Henrik in his arms. Henrik was dead.
Klaus was pulled from the painful memory by Elijah's voice on the other end of the phone. "Niklaus... what is it? Where is Kol?"
"Elijah... I didn't make it in time. Elena and Jeremy, they set a trap for Kol. They overtook him..." Klaus couldn't continue as his vision began to blur and his voice failed him.
"Niklaus... you don't mean? Nik... NO!" The all consuming pain that was evident in Elijah's voice ripped Klaus' insides to shreds.
"YOU... you and your need for these godforsaken hybrids! This is your fault, Niklaus!"
Elijah practically seethed.
"Elijah, I..." Klaus began, but again what could he say?
"Do we all have to die for you, Niklaus? Rebekah and I too?" The question was spit at him before the line went dead.
"I'm sorry..." Klaus whispered to the empty house.
Klaus sat there looking at the phone, unable to keep his chest from heaving with the rage and anger he hadn't been able to reign in since he'd witnessed Kol's body consumed with flames. Before he understood what he was doing, he'd crumpled the device like a piece of paper in the palm of his hand. Metal and glass shattered and crawled through his flesh. The pain of it brought him back...
He hadn't expected to see her walk through the door after he'd sparred with that excuse of a hybrid she called herself in love with, but there Caroline was in all of her light and unadulterated perfection. And just the sight of her extinguished some of the roiling fury that brewed within him.
Klaus had tried putting on a veneer of indifference, but when Caroline maligned him; when she'd berated him and baited him, he lost it. And because of his mindless senseless actions, Klaus was going to have to watch the one thing that had ever given him a moments peace, in all his years as a vampire, perish because of him.
He'd picked Caroline up from the floor, giving in briefly to the need to cradle her in his arms, knowing that this would be the last time he'd have the chance to. Knowing his mind was made up and fearing it at the same time.
He couldn't deny her words when she'd spoken of his love for her. But he feared the venom ravaging her body was also corrupting her mind when she declared that because he loved her, she believed he was worth saving.
"You're hallucinating." Klaus' voice drifted to her as if from a distance.
Caroline's body was in agony and burning all over. The hot fiery sensation of the venom that coursed through her veins began to make her feel lightheaded and she gave into the sensation. "I guess I'll never know…"
She drifted just outside of herself, hovering over her body and before she realized it, Caroline was standing on the other side of the sofa opposite Klaus. Looking down at herself dying, she watched the growing conflict on Klaus' face as he struggled to keep his eyes off of her.
Caroline felt a gentle pull on the side of her where she stood and she looked down into the warm light brown eyes of a young dark haired boy. He was pale with striking features and the dark wavy hair, that just touched his shoulders, contrasted with his fair complexion giving him an ethereal presence.
"Hello." His voice was young, untrained and heavy with a familiar accent that conjured images of an old world, but physically he didn't appear to be older than twelve.
"Hi…" Caroline returned his greeting cautiously.
"You're Caroline." He smiled with his eyes as if pleased with himself and his cheeks colored slightly as the cleft in his chin teased her.
"Yes. Do I know you?" He vaguely reminded Caroline of someone. She just couldn't make herself remember.
"No." He shook his head and his sable hair danced around his face.
"Am I dead?" Caroline thought aloud as she looked over the back of the sofa at herself beginning to fade.
The boy's angelic face took on a somber quality. "No. Not yet."
"What's happening?" His frown worried her and she caught herself wanting to make him smile again.
He looked up at her, his brown eyes gleaming. "He called for me, Niklaus. He asked me to come for Kol, but Kol is already gone. I was here when you came with the other wolf. I saw what happened..."
His voice was sorrowful for a moment and he sighed before smiling slightly. "Kol is with Finn now and I cannot follow them." He told her. "But I can still help Niklaus."
Caroline felt herself growing ever weaker in her body and a little stronger in the place where she stood in spirit.
"You're dying…" The boy announced matter-of-fact, "but Niklaus will save you."
Caroline was sure he was mistaken. "No he won't. He wants to get revenge. If he lets me die, he will have taken everything away from Tyler. The way he believes Tyler took everything from him."
His expressive brown eyes glanced over at Klaus and studied him for a moment. The boy's face was thoughtful, nostalgic and he smiled once again before his chin quivered and he looked as if he might cry. "No. He doesn't want that."
He turned his tearful gaze back to Caroline with his eyes shining bright. "He wants you to live. He loves you." He proclaimed fiercely.
" I have always known it would be you. Niklaus does not understand it, he does not even believe it, but it is true." The conviction in his voice made Caroline's heart clench.
"What's true?" How could this boy know anything about Klaus or her for that matter? She wondered to herself and at the same time felt as if she was being pulled even more forcefully than before.
The boy swallowed and his adam's apple bobbed visibly against the creamy skin of his throat displaying a beauty mark she hadn't noticed before. "He has to save you. It is the only way. If he lets you die, then he truly loses everything." He clenched his fists by his side. "I have to help him."
"How can you help him?" Caroline had already pleaded with Klaus to save her and now she was slipping further and further away from herself, from him.
The boy sighed heavily, his eyes drifting back to Klaus, "If he would only hear me…"
He took a deep breath and continued. "He talks to me. He asks me the same question every year." The boy shook his head a little and dropped his gaze. "He doesn't realize that I can hear him. When I try… when I try to answer, he blocks me out."
"What does he ask?" Caroline was curious. He was so lovely, this boy that believed Klaus would save her, and he was so sad that she wanted to embrace him.
The boy took another deep breath and then let it out slowly. "Every year… Every year, he asks me why I did it?" He looked back to Klaus. "And I tell him, but he never listens to my answer. He always blocks it out…"
The boy turned to Caroline then, his expression forlorn, "Niklaus believes that he was supposed to die there, but I had already seen it… I had already seen him with you. I knew what I had to do, so I stepped in front of him when the wolf attacked."
Caroline couldn't believe what she was hearing. The boy continued as she heard herself on the couch in her final moments before she succumbed to the venom.
"It was my idea to go see the men turn into wolves that night." He couldn't maintain eye contact with her and he looked back to Klaus, his eyes apologetic. "Niklaus took me a long way from our village to a clearing high atop a cliff, where we could watch the pack hunt from a safe distance. But there was a lone wolf, separated from his pack. He was vicious and starving…"
The boy's slight body tensed as he told the story and Caroline couldn't help putting her hand on his shoulder and squeezing a little. The moment she touched him, the scene before her changed. She was no longer watching herself die on Elena's couch with Klaus watching over her. She was transported back in time to a bright cloudless night. She felt the crisp air on her bare arms and the wind wisp through her hair.
She stood with the boy as a different version of Klaus emerged before her very eyes. He wore a tan tunic and pants with boots and a long blade at his hip. His hair was long blonde waves that whipped about in the strong wind and stood out bright against the moonlight as he bent over and tried to start a fire. When he cut his finger on the flint stone he was using, she was actually able to smell his blood on the air and her breath caught in her throat with the realization that she was looking at human Klaus.
"Let me do it, Nik." An identical version of the young boy emerged from behind a tree and kneeled down beside Klaus. "I've been practicing."
The boy held his hand over the small bundle of twigs and as he deeply inhaled the night air, the small gather of wood began to smolder. When he exhaled, a fire danced briefly in his brown eyes before the bundle of wood went up in flames.
Klaus marveled at the boy giving him a brilliant smile before ruffling his hair. "You're going to be powerful, you are. Even more than mother or Finn or Rebekah. You'll be so strong."
The boy looked bashful and shook his head, the expression on his face held a knowledge that he didn't divulge. "I don't think so."
"I know it." Klaus assured him. "I finally brought you out here tonight, because I may have to leave you before long." Klaus clasped the boys face in his hands and his fingers caressed the soft planes of his cheeks. The agony on Klaus' face as he spoke to the boy called forth a similar misery in Caroline and she found herself balling her fists because of it.
"I fear Mikael no longer wants me around and I wanted to bring you out here before you took it upon yourself to come alone." Klaus smiled a little then and stood up to walk back to the fire.
"I may not get to see you become what you're meant to." Klaus closed his eyes and dropped his head, his sadness apparent.
The boy walked up beside Klaus and touched his arm causing Klaus to look down at him. "Nik, you will be happy one day. I know it. I've seen it. You will meet a girl and you will think that she is the brightest and most beautiful part of your life. You will love her... more than anything."
Klaus' spirits seemed to lift a little because he smiled a little brighter at the boy and kneeled before him once more. "I'll never love anything more than I love you."
The boy returned Klaus' smile and put one hand on Klaus' shoulder before pressing his other hand to Klaus' heart. "You will love her, more than anything and she will love you in return."
Klaus' look of indulgence changed to disbelief, but she could see the hope glittering in his eyes. He was so open, that his feelings were tangible and Caroline began to feel herself unravel as she witnessed this uncharacteristic human display of vulnerability.
That was when Caroline heard the low growl of a wolf, desperate and menacing. The sound made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She knew it was close and when she turned her head to look behind them she spotted the mongrel as he stalked up on them carefully. His fur was black as the night, his eyes were empty and soulless and he bared his teeth as he circled around the tree. Klaus grabbed the boy and pushed him behind him and into the tall grass just as the wolf leaped, reaching out with his claws bared...
And that was all Caroline was allowed to see before the boy stepped away and her hand fell away from his shoulder, breaking the connection.
"We were out in the open and he could smell us. I was supposed to stay hidden in the tall grass while Niklaus distracted him, so I could run back to the village." The boy's voice began to crack and his jaw quivered with the effort to keep from crying.
He looked at Caroline with the tears he'd tried so hard to hold back, now streaming down his sweet face. "This is why I jumped out to distract the wolf, because I could always see him with you." Caroline gasped at this revelation, the girl he told Klaus about all those centuries ago was her.
"I loved him. I could not bear the thought of Niklaus being attacked by the wolf and I didn't want to watch him die." The boy looked back at Klaus, not even bothering to wipe away his tears. "That is why he has to save you."
He stepped away from her and seemed to materialize on the other side of the sofa directly in front of Klaus. He looked down at Klaus' bent head in front of him and placed one hand over Klaus' shoulder.
"Nik, listen to me. Do not block me out this time. You must save Caroline." The boy looked down at Caroline's struggling body and then back at Klaus. "Please, Nik. You have to save her NOW! I can feel her getting stronger on this side. You do not have much time left!"
Caroline felt the temperature in the room increase and as she looked at the boy, his raven hair began to swirl in the gusts from the heat. He looked back to her body again, and with the same flame burning in his eyes as when he started the fire before the wolf attack, he cocked his head to the side with a determined clench to his jaw. He placed his other hand over Klaus' heart and shouted, "DO IT NOW, NIK!"
Caroline watched as Klaus rose from the coffee table in front of her dying form. He gently raised her upper body with reverence and positioned himself behind her. She could feel his fingers as they sifted soothingly through her hair. She watched as he glanced down regretfully at his bite mark on her neck and clenched his jaw tight before biting into his wrist and pressing it to her lips…
The boy smiled brilliantly then with tears still making his brown eyes sparkle. "Caroline, you have to go back to him now." He sighed softly. "I can only take the memory for so long. You will remember… when you start to care for him in return, maybe not for a while yet." He shook his head a little and the expression on his face brought Klaus' to her mind instantly.
"I cannot see those things specifically, so I'm unable tell you when it happens. But I want you to know that you are changing him." The smile he gave her was so sweet and so hopeful that she delighted in it. "He is never going to be perfect, but you are changing him, everyday."
Caroline began to feel herself being pulled in the opposite direction of the boy and it scared her at first because it was peaceful where she was, but then the hunger began to invade her mind.
"He will draw you a picture of me one day, my Nik. He has not drawn pictures of me for a long time now." He gave her one last radiant smile. "But he will do it for you and when he does, you will remember this. Tell him, Caroline... Tell him that I did it, because I love him. Tell him that I did it, because I could see him with you."
I hope you enjoyed reading this and that you're not doubled over in pain in a fetal position right now. Leave me your thoughts on it in the form of a review ;)