The Other Mikaelson- Book 2

Chapter XXXVI

Instead of rushing through them, the three had begun to break their way through the tombstones, when they finally broke into a room full of candles.

"We've passed through here twice already. We're running out of time," Keira sighed. Elijah punched through a wall in frustration.

"Then we move faster," Klaus said. Suddenly, a different voice appeared behind them.

"Or smarter," said Hayley. Everyone looked shocked, and Elijah rushed forwards and touched her face to make sure she wasn't an illusion.

"How are you here?!?" he asked in disbelief.

"The baby..." said Klaus as he realized.

"The babies blood..." Keira started. "You died with the baby's blood still in your system. She's in transition."

Elijah looked horrified. "Which means she has to drink the blood of the child if she is to survive."

"To be reborn a hybrid," said an overwhelmed Klaus.

"I don't care about me. I'm gonna go find our daughter," Hayley left, and the three followed quickly behind her.

Keira, Hayley, Klaus, and Elijah all walked through the cemetery, finally getting closer the the baby through hearing the witches chanting. As the got to the center, Monique, Abigail, and Genevieve all chanted as Genevieve held up a knife over the baby.

"NO!" Hayley yelled. Elijah picked up an urn and threw it at Genevieve, which knocked the knife out of her hands. The four ran towards them, making Monique and Abigail quickly grab hands and channel the ancestors.

"La mère, le père, le frère, la sœur... La mère, le père, le frère, la sœur..." Abigail chanted. Monique thrust out her hand, and, Celeste Dubois, Papa Tunde, Bastianna Natale, Mary-Alice Claire, Davina's mom, and all of the other ancestors appeared as ancestral spirits.

"You fools! To come against us in our place of power in our strongest hour? You don't face three, you face us all!" Monique yelled as hundreds of dead witches appeared and surrounded them.

The witches pushed their enemies back with magic. While Klaus ran left, the girls ran right, and Elijah ran forwards, everyone was faced by more and more spirits. Klaus saw the most, mostly because he had killed many of them, while Hayley and Keira cornered Genevieve. Hayley fought with Genevieve as Keira saw a metal fence. She went back out to where Elijah was and vamp strength threw a spike at Abigail, impaling her in the stomach. As she coughed up some blood and died, Monique gasped and some of the spirits disappeared. Monique ran to the knife, picked it up, and prepared to kill the baby on her own.

"NOOOOO!" Hayley yelled , groaning in pain under Genevieve's pain infliction curse.

Suddenly, the devils star, a cursed object that caused a thousand cuts on someone's body, was embedded into Monique's stomach. With a shocked expression, she fell to the ground, and bled to death. The four turned, to see Marcel. He sped up to the baby, picked her up, and sped away. Klaus followed.

Later on, when Klaus was speaking with Marcel, Elijah, Keira, and Hayley chained up Genevieve.

"Why?" Hayley asked angrily.

"The Ancestors left me no choice-" Genevieve said, terrified.

"You were willing to sacrifice an innocent baby for more power?"

Keira suddenly realized and Genevieve smiled weakly at her realization. "It wasn't their decree," said the Original. "It was her decree."

"Whose decree?" Elijah asked.

"I'm surprised you have to ask," the witch laughed darkly. "After all, you were the one who convinced your siblings to consecrate her on New Orleans soil."

Hayley looked stunned. "Esther."

Keira looked down. "Mother."

"So, not even death can stop my mother from seeking the annihilation of her own flesh and blood," Elijah said angrily.

Genevieve looked down and began to cry. "This isn't the end. As long as that child lives, the witches of New Orleans will never stop coming for it. Esther will never stop coming for it. It has been decreed-- your baby will be consecrated among her ancestors. She will not live." Everyone glared at her as she began to bleed from her eyes. "They're coming for me, I can feel it. I failed them. Understand-- I just wanted to live. Tell Klaus... I'm sorry."

She started to cough up blood. Hayley looked angrily at her for a second, before picking up the knife from earlier and stabbing her in the stomach.

"I'm not," she said furiously as the witch died.

~~~~

Back at the compound, Klaus walked into Hayley's room with Hayley and the baby, having talking privately from the nursery.

Keira stared at the baby, before looking up at her brother. "She's beautiful."

Klaus held her out. "Do you want to hold her?" Keira smiled warmly and cradled her niece for a moment, before handing her back to the mother.

"We should have felt our mother's hand in this. We should have known she would not be bound by anything as obvious as death. And now she has control of the witches. They will never stop," Keira said.

"No," said Klaus. "Nor would I expect the Guerrera wolves to back down. Hayley and the child are wolf royalty, and as such, they are a threat to Francesca's claim to the leadership. They will never be safe. What was it you said to me earlier? That I have made enemies every day of my miserable life? Well, the worst of them are within these borders, brother."

Elijah sighed in frustration as Hayley walked back into the nursery, rocking the baby.

"I have brought into the world a weapon they can use against me," Klaus told his siblings.

"Then we will arm ourselves! Brother, we have fought every adversary in this town, and we have won. And we'll fight them again, no matter who they are! We will make this home a fortress," Elijah replied.

"I will not have her live her life as a prisoner."

"Then we should leave here," Keira said. "As we did before. We leave, together. All of us."

"Wherever we go, however far we run, those who seek power and revenge will hunt us! They will hunt her. She has inherited all of our enemies with none of our defenses," Klaus replied.

"So, whether we stay, or we leave-- we condemn her."

Hayley walked back in with the baby. "There's a third option. I grew up in a warzone. My parents thought they could protect me. But, in the end, they were slaughtered, and I spent my childhood alone and unloved. I made a promise, to my baby, and to myself, that she would not grow up like I did. That she would grow up safe, and loved. And yet, here she is, on her first day in this world, with a grandmother who is bent on sacrificing her-" Hayley began to cry. "And a-a mother who has to drink the blood of her own baby to survive transitioning into a hybrid. And I'm the one who loves her the most. I think the only thing to do is... send her away... while we stay behind and clean up the mess that we've made."

Elijah stared at her. "No! This is insane. You heard Genevieve-- so long as she lives, that baby will be hunted." 

"Not if no one knows she lives," said Keira suddenly, looking at Klaus. Elijah stared at him as well.

"What do you intend to do, brother?"