✔ The Way We Burn || Kol Mikaelson (Complete)

Chapter 34

Warning: I would recommend re-reading the last part of the prologue before this chapter as this one and the next will deal with it from Kol's point of view.

Also, Buda is one of the three towns who later became known as Budapest - with the other towns being Óbuda and Pest. Buda was the capital of the Kingdom of Hungary.

***

October 1409, Buda.

Kol never felt the dagger being removed. Instead, he slowly regained consciousness. First came the familiar emptiness inside him. Then, the strong smell of dust and blood filling his nostrils and making its way mercilessly through his dry, aching throat, all the way down to his lunges. Finally, just as his fingers twitched, was the disgusting realization that he was covered in dust.

He opened his eyes wide and took a gulp of air, one trembling hand slowly reaching for his throat. He was so thirsty. And furious. So furious that his other hand crushed a piece of the coffin he was lying in, into small, sharp pieces.

Around him were unfamiliar walls and standing by the coffin, also unfamiliar, was a young human woman with a blank stare. If it weren't for her eyes blinking every once in a while, Kol would have thought she had been frozen in time. Unfortunately for her, she wasn't. She had just been compelled to become his helpless lunch.

As he slowly got out of the coffin, a dull ache spread through his thirsty body. He could almost feel his muscles creaking, protesting against his every moves and begging for blood. The more he struggled, the more furious he became.

The woman was very young, her blood abundant and tasty and just enough to appease his thirst. But not his anger. Even with her throat torn apart, as she died under his teeth, compulsion didn't allow her to show fear or even uttered the slightest sound.

And it enraged him. Because it was a painful reminder of the horror he had felt when Niklaus put the dagger in his heart.

To think that day had started so well. His wife had been back to him for only thirteen days. Thirteen days spent killing witches who worshiped the monstrous immortal Silas. Once they were done with their murder spree, they had decided to grant themselves a break.

Lying lazily on the cover of their bed, Kol had watched his wife applying her makeup and had teased her about the mischief her younger self had done.

"It might have been centuries for you since then but darling, for me it has only been two years," he chuckled while Nora was painting her eyebrows. "Even now, I can't believe you managed to convince me to go to that university dressed as a woman."

Nora put down her brush and giggled. "I remember! The first "woman" to ever go to university. You compelled so many people for that."

"While you merely dressed as a man and everyone believed it."

Sitting at her dressing table, Nora glanced down at her chest and cupped her breast, her lips pursed in a pout. "Actually, I'm a little offended. I mean, I don't look like a man, do I hon?"

Choking with laughter, Kol hopped off the bed and walked to her, hugging her from behind and kissing her neck. Their eyes met in the mirror.

"I compelled those people to see you as an ugly man," he confessed with a smirk, his hand slowly sliding up to the side of her breasts.

Later, they went to a little tavern where they had their dinner. The atmosphere was good. Discarding travelers and drunkards, they danced and he made her twirl around the place, never getting bored of her joyful giggle and her 'I love you' whispered into his ear.