Grace - Elijah Mikaelson -

Chapter 75

...

She heard children laughing from afar.

Two, little brunette beauties, a girl and boy were hopping around a large garden. They held their little hands and giggled care freely. 

"Come on, Jer, we have to run faster." 

It was exactly how Elena had been this age. She had played often with Jeremy outside, but her little brother could never be fast enough for her liking. But Jeremy still loved it. 

Grace remembered that she always had refused to babysit when her parents asked her to. Of course, she was a steadily annoyed teenager at that time. Sometimes, Elena's friends, little Bonnie and Caroline came over to play, too, and it had been hell a lot of responsibility to take over. At that time Grace only wanted to lock herself in her room and read, but in the end she always agreed with a dramatic eye roll.

Whenever she saw the children play so innocently, she forgot her worries and she realized that she loved her siblings so deeply, she could watch them play all day. It was a little quell of happiness within the confusing times of being a teenager.

Smiling, Grace stepped down the stairs to their garden. The old wood squeaked as usual, but it made it feel like home. 

"Don't run too far away, you two." 

She called after them. But when the children heard her voice they flinched, stopped in their tracks and turned around with frightened expressions. 

"Stay away from us! You're a monster!" 

Elena's high pitched voice yelled. Jeremy was hiding behind her. 

A frown appeared on Grace's face and it seemed as if the carefree atmosphere shifted abruptly. Dark clouds were hiding the formerly shining sun, the woods that spread around the garden immediately seemed darker and threatening. The flowers that had been in full bloom died.

She raised her hands and saw them smeared with blood. Her eyes widened in shock. When she looked up again, she saw a pile of bodies in front of her. Some of them were still breathing and begging for their lives, but it was only a matter of time before the last glimpse of hope would vanish from their eyes. 

Grace couldn't save them, because those were the people she already killed. She recognized some of their faces, but to her shame she realized that she didn't couldn't even remember most of them. She killed so many since she became a vampire, but she didn't knew a thing about them. Were they missed by a family or friends? What were they told what had happened to their loved one? 

They could pass her and never know that they were facing a murderer. Grace would never get punished for her since. 

"We don't care of you die. We don't need you." 

Elena and Jeremy suddenly stood in front of the corpses and they both glared at her. The vampire breathed heavily and she couldn't bring out any words. She wanted to turn around and run, but when she swung around, she saw that fire was consuming her home again. 

Grace fell to her knees, unable to do anything and suddenly, everything went quiet. Her siblings' voice vanished, the crying and groans from her victims disappeared. The heat that came from the fire wasn't to be felt anymore. 

When she opened her eyes, all Grace saw was darkness.

She felt that she was trapped in a very confined space, there wasn't much air left for her to breathe. 

Panic overwhelmed her and she desperately pressed and punched against the lid of the coffin, but it just wouldn't move a bit. She didn't really understood what was going on, but her survival instincts kicked in. For a moment she didn't even feel the throbbing wound on her neck.