"Nothing is with me now but a sound,
A heart's rhythm, a sense of stars"
- W. H. Auden, Compline
In which Charlotte Salvatore wakes after a 145 year slumber and is thrust into a supernatural world before she can cope with the modern one.
(THE VAM...
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Charlotte and Katherine sat together at the table near the door in silence. Charlotte was a little too overwhelmed by the events of her first day back alive to say anything, her mind racing with everything that had happened and everything that might still. Katherine fiddled anxiously, wracked with outward boredom and inward terror.
Klaus had left them soon after compelling Charlotte and since then they'd been alone. Shortly after he left she tried to leave, a foolish amount of hope in her heart that the compulsion hadn't taken and she'd be free.
It hadn't worked of course, she knew really that it wouldn't, but she couldn't exactly not try.
Her heart had thundered desperately in her chest as she'd pulled the door open, a glimmer of hope filling her. One that shattered instantly when her foot refused to pass the doorstep, an invisible wall barricading her in. Katherine watched on with sympathy, having tried the very same thing the first time she was alone too.
So here they sat, Katherine leaning on the back of the chair head on her hands, Charlotte with her legs tucked to her chest and her arms around herself. They didn't speak a word nor shift from their places, not until the door slammed open suddenly, loudly, and their heads shot to it to watch Klaus storm into the room, bristling with anger.
"Where's Maddox" he snapped, "he should be back by now."
"I don't know," Katherine answered, "What are you doing?"
As Katherine pried for information, Charlotte shifted forwards, feet falling to the ground. She too wanted to know the fate of Elena and subconsciously she leaned closer in hopes it might help her learn more.
Klaus hardly acknowledged the, pulling a computer out and looking at a video on the screen, from which they could hear a woman screaming in the distance. He didn't notice the way the fear flashed momentarily across Katherines face, not the scrunch of distaste and concern that flew to Charlottes.
"Where is Elena?"
"I sent her off with Greta. It's almost time."
Charlotte didn't know who Greta was, but by the fact that she stood with Klaus, and at the way Katherines expression shifted, she knew it wasn't good for Elena. Charlotte wanted to know more, but she didn't have the gall to ask, still afraid of Klaus and what he might do.
For the second time, the door swung dramatically open, the perpetrator this time even more surprising than the last. Charlottes hand flew to Katherine's, desperately seeking the willpower to hold her from leaping towards their visitor.
Klaus, by comparison, hardly reacted, waiting a beat before leaning back in his chair, and then another two before he spoke, his eyes still trained on the screen as though he couldn't care to even look.
"I wasn't aware you'd been invited in."
Damon Salvatore bristled in the doorway, his ever-present cockiness coming to play as he grinned, stepping closer, "I've come here to tell you to postpone the ritual."
