❝I thought they were just bones.❞
❝If you truly believed that, you would have let her rest.❞
They could bury her bones, but they couldn't bury the truth.
For 90 years, Klaus Mikaelson has been haunted by the memory of the woman he betrayed.
For...
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Paris, 1947
It was raining in Père Lachaise.
A downpour had swept over the city the past few days, an unlifting fog clinging to every building. The city had wept in the aftermath of the war, and it was weeping again now as Rowan stalked its streets. The rain didn't deter her as she moved silently through the empty rows of the cemetery, the water spattering off her umbrella. What did bother her was the silence. It wasn't the dead she'd come to confer with, and her patience was wearing thin.
"I don't have all night you know!" She called to the emptiness.
"You expect me to come to you willingly?" A voice replied, and Rowan turned to see a middle-aged woman glaring at her, brunette hair pinned up high on her head.
"You were so willing last time." Rowan snapped. "When you and your little coven came to New Orleans looking for me."
"When we killed you?" The witch corrected.
"It didn't stick very long, as you can see." Rowan waved a hand to her body. "Not even three years. A sad attempt really."
"I'm sure it felt longer where you were." She retorted, and Rowan's face hardened.
"My compliments on the little pocket dimension prison you built for me. Truly, I'm flattered you went to all that effort to cage me. Shame you couldn't keep me there."
"A shame indeed." The witch's eyes scanned Rowan's body, watching as the blonde dipped her hand into her pocket. "Though we can't take all the credit."
"No, I thought not. I asked some of your sisters about that, actually." Rowan circled her. "Before I killed them."
The witch stiffened. "You-"
"Don't worry, I plan to punish everyone involved, not just your coven." The witch shivered, the chills across her body not from the cold, but from fear as Rowan stalked in circles around her, only an arm's length from her now. "You had to have known I was coming some day. You're the last one, after all." She smiled, pushing back a stray strand of hair from the witch's face.
"Please don't..." She whispered and Rowan tutted.
"I'm disappointed in you lot. So many of you begging for your lives." She shook her head. "Where was mercy when you brought that beast into my city's streets? When you destroyed my family? When you killed me?"
"We didn't know -"
"That I would come back?" She roared. "No, I imagine you didn't think that was possible. But now that I'm here, let's get this over with."
"No, please!" The witch begged, backing away wildly.
"I might have settled for half of you, just taken those who were there that day, left the others as a reminder of my wrath, if you had only killed me... But you came for my son. My family." Her face was thunderous as she followed the witch through the cemetery.
The witch backed away, tripping over her own feet in her attempts to escape, falling on her back and staring up at Rowan in terror.
"Please, I can help you!"
"You think you're the first to offer me something? There is nothing you can give me -"
"I know how to get your powers back!" The witch shouted, thunder rolling overhead.
"I have my powers." Rowan replied, reaching a hand out and using magic to choke her.
"Not all of them." The witch struggled, hands clawing at her own throat. "You can't change, can you?"
Rowan released her. "How did you know that?"
"It took you years to track us all down. If you were at full power we'd have been dead long ago."
Rowan smiled. "Very clever. I'm listening."
The witch thought for a moment, eyes flicking back and forth. "You'll find them where it all began." She replied.
"You think now is the best time to be cryptic with me?" Rowan squeezed her throat again.
"That's all they'll tell me!"
"They?"
"The ancestors! They won't help you!"
"Well that's just maddeningly unhelpful." She rolled her eyes. "Thanks for nothing."
"Wait! I have more, I know where Klaus is!"
Rowan froze, then her eyes clouded over. "I have no interest in that man."
"You don't understand, Klaus is -" She pleaded as Rowan clenched her fist, the witch's neck giving a sickening snap and her body falling to the ground. Rowan didn't care what Klaus was, or where he was for that matter. She had promised Marcel she wouldn't hunt him down. In truth, she didn't know whether she had the strength to face him even if she did.
Kicking the witch to the side, she strolled out of the cemetery and along the Parisien streets, mind pondering over her words. She wandered for an age, her feet leading her while her mind focused elsewhere. When her mind finally reconnected with her body she realised she was at the centre of the Place des Vosges, staring at a large ornamental water fountain. She had been here before with Klaus, the last time in 1913. A hollowness took over her as she looked around, the rain lightening to a small drizzle. She put down her umbrella, shaking the water from it.
"If you're trying to torture me by showing up here, just know you'll have to try harder, love."
Rowan gasped, pulse quickening as she stepped to the side and glanced around the fountain. She realised now what the witch was trying to tell her.
Klaus is here.
He wasn't looking at her though, he was glancing to his left. "Nothing to say?" He asked, and she gaped. "Well, I do. I've had enough of this."
"Klaus?" She whispered, and his head snapped towards her. He didn't look surprised to see her, nor did he look angry. Klaus Mikaelson looked exhausted, drained.
"Of course you've decided to speak to me now! Years I've been waiting, and not a peep. Go on, I'm listening."
"You think I owe you anything after what you put me through? You think I should be the one to come to you?"
"And yet you have. I tried to leave you behind and you've found me here." Rowan's stomach dropped. I tried to leave you behind. It echoed through her. "Why are you still here?" He asked, looking down.
"I have no idea." She replied, turning on her heel and speeding from the fountain as fast as her legs would take her. She wasn't sure if it the rain was starting again, or the tears escaping her eyes that soaked her cheeks. But she was sure when she saw Klaus Mikaelson again, he would never be able to hurt her again.
