The Apprentice (The Originals/The Vampire Diaries)

Chapter Twenty-One

 A long time before, when Annette was only sixteen, Mikael told her something she never forgot.

 "If anything happens to me," he had said, "I want you to go live your life. Live it and enjoy it. You deserve a chance to enjoy life."

 But Annette had no idea how she could enjoy anything now. The one person who meant anything to her was murdered before her very eyes. In her dreams, the scene would replay over and over again, and she cry once she awoke. For months, it was a never-ending cycle of grief.

 She left Mystic Falls the morning after, with goodbyes and apologies from Elena Gilbert and the Salvatore brothers. None of them meant a thing. The only thing that could make her better was for Mikael to return to her, but it couldn't happen. The was no white oak stake left, so she couldn't avenge him by killing Klaus. It was ironic, the way Mikael met his end. He was murdered by the one he spent so much time attempting to murder.

~~~~~~
 
 After about a year, the grief was still fresh. Annette had spent her time in Europe, still hunting and killing vampires the same way she had when he was with Mikael.

 Mikael. Not a day went by when he didn't enter her thoughts. She realized too late how much she had loved him, how much he truly meant to her. And only in the last few days together did she realize it all. He had fallen in love with her as well: she had seen it in his eyes, in the way he looked at her. The kiss they had shared played over and over again in her mind, how wonderful it had been to feel his lips pressed against her own.

 But he was gone. She wasn't going to see his smile again, feel his arms around her, hear his voice.
 
 Yet she couldn't seem to move on.

~~~~~~

 Annette sat in a restaurant in Paris one afternoon. She knew the place, as she and Mikael had been there a few times, nearly a decade before.

 Mikael. Every time she thought of him, she felt a pang of pain in her chest. There always seemed to be something around every corner that reminded her of him, no matter where she went.

 She glanced up when she heard the door to the restaurant open, and was surprised to see Rebekah Mikaelson enter, with a young blond man at her side. Rebekah looked over and saw her, and they locked eyes. She heard her say to the man she was with, "I'll be there in a minute."

 Rebekah sat down across from Annette. "I didn't expect to see you here."

 "And I did not expect to see you," Annette replied. "How are you, Rebekah? Who's the new man?"

 "His name is Matt, but I don't see how that's important. Have you kept up with the news from Mystic Falls?"

 "No, of course not. Why? Has something happened?"

 "Oh, quite a few things have happened to our family since my father's death. To start, my mother came back."

 Annette's eyes widened. "Esther returned?"

 "Yes, she returned and attempted to kill us all, which would have destroyed the entire vampire race. Wonderful mother, wasn't she? We took care of her. Finn and Kol are both dead, both murdered by Elena Gilbert and her little ragtag team of friends. And we realized something." Rebekah leaned closer. "When an Original dies, their entire sire line goes with them. It happened to Kol and Finn, so I suppose you can't be from either of their lines. And Elijah called me to say he and Nik are going back to New Orleans. Apparently, Nik's gotten some poor little werewolf pregnant with his hybrid baby. Not very unlike him to do something as stupid as that. Anyway, how have you been?"

 Annette shrugged. "Not terrible."

 "Hey." The blond boy, Matt, came over to the table. "Is everything all right here?"

 "Yes, it is." Annette stood from her chair. "You two can take the table. You have given several things to think about, Rebekah. It was nice talking to you."

 Annette walked slowly down the street. The sire lines. Where did she fit into that? She had been sired by Lucien Castle, who had been sired by...by Klaus.

 She was part of Klaus' sire line.

 If she and Mikael had succeeded in killing Klaus, she would have died as well.

 And Esther had returned. What if Mikael were still alive, and had gotten the chance to be with his wife again? What would have become of Annette? She suddenly felt jealously towards the Mikaelson matriarch. What was so wonderful about her, so great that Mikael would have spent a thousand years attempting to avenge her death?

 Love, she realized. That was what it had to be.

 "Excuse me," she heard. "Are you Annette Chevalier?"

 Annette turned to look at the brown-haired woman who was now standing next to her.

 "Who wants to know?" she asked.

 "I do," the woman replied. "My name is Nadia Petrova. I am looking for my mother. She goes by the name of Katherine Pierce, but her real name is Katerina Petrova."

 Annette was stunned. This woman was the daughter of Katherine Pierce? But as she looked closely, she could see a resemblance between this woman and Katherine.

 "I suppose you are a vampire," she said.

 "I am. I became a vampire to look for my mother. You have met her, haven't you? You were the apprentice of Mikael, the hunter. I know he met her."

 Annette flinched at his name, but said, "I know her. I would look around Mystic Falls, Virginia, in America. That's a likely location you'll find her in."

 Nadia nodded. "Thank you, Mademoiselle Chevalier."

 As she walked further down the street, she wondered if it was possible for hybrids to actually have children. It had to be if Klaus could father a child. Oh, if only Mikael had been a hybrid as well. They could have had a child.

 Mikael. His name continued to echo through her mind. It haunted her endlessly. And sometimes, many times, she thought she could hear him calling her name.