It Lies Within You

Our family lays wounded

   New Orleans 2013

'Always and forever, indeed.'

Klaus Mikaelson revised the old saying.

   *****
   1013
   In the beginning, my family and I decided that we were no more than monsters to others and ourselves at the same time. Our dread only hampered our human emotional festivities that we decided to part ways, avoid harming one another, escape the torment of being nothing but a family of vampires who laid waste to villages and ravaged with no remorse at all.
   I, Klaus Mikaelson journeyed once to the far reaches of the world (rather what I knew of it then) watching, relishing in the joys of new ages and families who held their children with joy. I wanted that more than anything in the world. Once my sister Rebekah screamed her envies at me like a naive child, she left and swore to never return, I guess we all wanted the one thing we could never have.
   My last day of envy was upon the day I found a noble farmer who owned a small parch of land, he cared for livestock, yet people all looked down on him as nothing but a plagued insect. His face was muddy, clothes were rank and covered with the dirt that covered whatever land he held alone. People who looked at him laughed, even spat in his face, he was at the brutal force of men who beat him senselessly, expediting his death with their mercilessness, I was compelled to watch every day, view his suffering and pain without any remorse - none that I showed. One day, he chose to fight back against the two men who beat him till he was near dead. A wooden stick in both of his frail hands, the two men trampled at the sight of his rage, he swung the wood at them both, hitting them, carelessly, each time in penance for the amount of times he'd felt the pain they inflicted on him. The wood broke off, the hilt was broken and he was once again vulnerable, he'd proven no change, but what hadn't changed was how his death was upon him this time.
   It was yet again that the men took his life with the bone crunches of their brimming strength against his fragile body. In that moment, I had a choice - I could have walked away, left him to be beaten to death, or step in and save him from the far worse people who showed him no mercy. Mercy, he got that from me. Both those men had him near death, before I stepped in and showed them what the gods had given as their punishment. Me...
   Before they could lift another muscle, I separated them from their heads, right before the muddy-faced young man. Looking at him, his legs were broken and his face was leaking blood through the corners of mud, even flowing over it like a river, a pool more like.
 "Wh--- What-- Are y-y-y you?" he pleaded me.

     His injuries were the least of his problems; he'd seen me, he knew what I was, and my family and I would never spare the life of any breathing human who'd seen what we were. I could have ended him right then and there, his eyes were watered with tears begging for mercy, he never spoke again out of fear for my existence. I was not able to see what he wanted. Mercy - to live or die?
   I left his side as I prepared to leave. 'Find your family,' I said to myself. I'd have been gone in a heartbeat if I wasn't strayed from the path by the wails and cries of the young man who's mouth was bleeding like a cup spilling.

  "Please, don't leave me." he cried.
    I watched mercilessly as his eyes continued to blink tears and his face became redder by the second. 
   "E-e ... end my p-p pain, p-p-p please." it was a mercy of death, he yearned for.
    "Lucien!" a girl's voice was crying from the distance.
   The young girl had dark brown hair just like him, she darted almost as fast as I could with my new abilities to the man she named, Lucien. By his side, she held his face between her hands, his blood and mud was rubbing off all over her, his hand was fragile; falling out of her hand. She never caught his eye as it was fixed on me, forcing her to watch me like a hawk. Both of them looked like little children who'd just heard a ghost story. Well, they were both staring into the eyes of something far worse than any spectre.
   "Who are you?" the girl was half my height.
    She stared at me like a god. The blood on the ground and the men without heads - it must've have struck that the grim reaper had passed his judgement, and she was looking at his spawn.
   "Call me Klaus." I said brushing a strand of hair behind her ear.
   "Did you ... do this? Did you ... save my brother?" her voice was frozen and she almost choked on the words.
   I touched her on both shoulders, comforting her in someway, but looked into her eyes - possibly her own soul as I blinked once.
   "Yes." I replied her question.
   Lucien was coughing on his blood, his head was forced upright, his sister held onto him for dear life. Family above all, indeed. I gave him my hand. Together, we helped him up and carried him to a poor wooded house next to the muddiest grounds I'd seen. The girl helped her brother inside, I was shut out.
  "Come in." she offered.
   I entered. "A wise decision." I extended my gratitude.
   *****
     A bed of straw was hardly enough for her crippled brother, he lay in pain, sweat forming from him, all over. Almost a fever, his time was nigh. His sister and he seemed to live alone, not another soul dared enter this weak abode.
   "Have you no parents?" I asked her.
   "No. Lucien and I were orphaned at birth, they say our parents came down with the fever, that they couldn't let us catch it. We were put into the care of a noble farmer, and have been living alone since he caught the same thing. I can't bear to lose him to." she cried.
   "What is your name, sweet girl?" I asked.  
    She shook her head at me.
     "I don't know. I was born a while after Lucien, my mother was nursed by the farmer who took us in, but neither of them lived to name me. After a while, I started caring for the creatures and for Lucien whenever he got hurt or ill. He started to call me ... " she paused.
   I stared blankly as she couldn't give her name.
 "  ...   'Hope'." 
   "Hope?" I ask in disbelief.
   She stared back at me, surprised. Clearly, she was naive, I mean what was there to hold onto that meant something more than reason to loathe?
   "What's wrong? Haven't you ever felt any before?" a rhetorical question, she posed me.
     "No, never." my words breathed my soul.
   
   The more time went by, the further Lucien's conditioned worsened. I grew sick myself of having to watch his suffering. I grew more envious for his fate, my heart beat with his - forcing its rate at a thousand times fast, there was never any end in sight. Hope, his sister and I knelt by his bedside, she held his hand as he felt her face, illuminated by the fire we built, his pain soothed from her presence, his face calmed and lit up with the fire. I watched in anguish that their family was broken, but still they had each other. Not that Lucien had much more time, before the night was out .. he would be dead.
   The night was so long. Lucien was still breathing air, his sister lay down by the last embers of the fire, and I was by his side, holding in my hand, the carving knife that I'd kept with me since I abandoned what was once my home. The trees outside had provided me with enough wood to carve a weapon, but instead I found myself carving out what seemed to be memories of my family. First, I carved out a figure of Rebekah, the wood couldn't show her colours, but it was enough to remind me. Then there was Kol, Finn, and finally Elijah, I had just finished carving the shape of his head, before I cut my thumb, I remembered carving my name into the wall, Rebekah had landed the knife on my palm, making me see blood for the first time.
    Yet, all humans are different in appearance, but inside, we're all the same. Blood of our blood. Under the skin, we all share the same blood. I put down the figure to cut myself even deeper, my whole hand was scarred and letting blood flow and fall from me, like snow in the winter time, it stained the straw and Lucien's clothing, soon his face became smeared in a line, almost a scar of my blood. He swallowed, coughed and was suddenly healing, he moved his legs again, they were filled with life, just like his face was. I watched as he rose from his state as though he was reborn. My wound had healed, but my eyes watched in incredulity that I was able to save his life. Blood of my blood, I thought.
   Lucien swallowed pride with his head held high. Admiring his healed wounds and looking to me as his savior. I looked at him with a hint of fear, if I could save his life with a few drops of my blood, what more could happen? Cheating death was impure, something that should never be possible, and yet, me and my family were given the will to live in place of our graves, but I would not let anymore souls have life over death.