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He was being followed.
Or maybe it just felt like he was being followed.
He probably should have turned down those last shots, but he and Chad had been trying to pick up those freshmen girls. Kyle was one more away from beating Brad’s record, and the fruity shots had seemed like a good way to get the little blonde to go home with him.
Of course, it turned out they were travelling in a damn pack, and just when he had the blonde at the coat check, some bitch of a brunette had popped up and all but dragged her away. So now Kyle was walking home – cold and alone and out money, no closer to beating Brad’s fucking record.
He hated the sober friend.
Kyle tugged his coat a little closer and decided to take the alley shortcut. His earlier feeling of being followed was easily discarded; everyone on campus were at various parties, so who the fuck would be left to follow him around?
He still had Kim’s number. Maybe if he called her up, she’d be willing to have some fun. It wouldn’t count towards his record, but at least he would be able to say he’d gotten some action. After all, he didn’t want to be that sad dude that didn’t have anything to brag about at practice on Monday.
Something moved further down the alley. Kyle slowed down for a moment, and then realized with surprise that it was a girl.
The chicks on campus never used this shortcut after the sun went down. Their heels probably couldn’t handle it or some bullshit like that.
“Hey, baby, I don’t think I’ve seen you before,” Kyle called out as they got closer. He didn’t recognize her, and tried to place her age with narrowed eyes. Could she be a freshman? Maybe he’d beat the record yet.
Even if she wasn’t, Kyle was willing to give her a try. She was all blonde hair and a short, flowery dress that showed off pretty amazing legs. Yeah… he’d definitely give her a try.
“I’m just going to a friend’s,” the girl replied, tugging her cardigan around her a little closer, and tilting her head down, so she didn’t make eye contact.
“I could be your friend,” Kyle replied with a grin, grabbing her arm, just below the elbow. The girl stiffened, and he just pulled her into his body. She gave him a single shove, but it was half-hearted at best, and Kyle knew what that meant.
This girl was ready for it.
“I could be a very good friend,” he added, pressing her into the wall of the alley, his knee sliding between her legs. He pressed his lips to hers.
Sharp pain flared suddenly in his neck, and Kyle recoiled from the girl, stumbling back. He reached up, and stared in shock at his hand, that came back bloody. For the first time… probably ever, Kyle felt panic as he looked at the girl. She didn’t look so hot anymore.
She looked fucking terrifying.
Was that his blood, spattered across her face? It had soaked into her cardigan, too, and she looked down at it, picking at the fabric with distaste.
“I liked this outfit, Kyle,” she said.
How do you know my name? He tried to ask, but all that came out was garbled nonsense. The girl squatted next to him, and he reached out with weak fingers to try and bat her away, or maybe to pull her closer, so he could hurt her too.
His arms wouldn’t do what he wanted.
There was something written on her neck, along her collarbone in a dark color. Dark blue? Or maybe a dark gray?
Her soulmark.
Kyle’s was on his ankle, in sparkling pink, and it read I think I could love you. Would it be gone now? They said that was what happened, when one soulmate died – the soulmark of both just disappeared.
Well this is unexpected. That’s what the crazy chick’s soulmark said, and if Kyle had been able to, he maybe would have laughed.
But he couldn’t laugh. He could only die.
Well isn’t this just fucking unexpected.
He thought the crazy chick might have stroked his hair and shushed him as he breathed his last.
---
They were calling the killer The Raven Hunter.
Because of course they were. If there was an ounce of creativity on the university newspaper, it had died along with the editor’s originality, and the mainstream media had picked up the nickname some slacker reporter had given the killer after the second frat boy athlete became a victim.
Now, with lucky number three being found, it was no longer just conjecture that there was a serial killer on the loose… it was being broadcast as fact.
Go to bed early little boys. Don’t want to be the next victim.
Of course that’s not how the media, or the university, was spinning it. No, they weren’t warning the frat boys to hide away. It was everyone. Who knew who the next victim could be? It could be anyone!
Nevermind that Caroline had been pretty clear in having a type.
It irritated her. But she also knew that, after poor Kyle’s demise, there were half a dozen freshmen girls who could finally leave their rooms without provoking panic attacks, so who cared what the media said?
“It’s so scary,” said Camille. The other blonde was in Caroline biochem study group, but was majoring in psychology – something she never let the rest of the group forget. “But at the same time… I wish I could meet whoever did it. I would love to know what makes someone like that tick, you know?”
Hi, I’m Caroline Forbes, and I like pumpkin spice lattes and killing boys that think they can get away with whatever they want.
What made her tick really wasn’t all that complicated.
But Caroline wasn’t an idiot, and as amusing as shutting Camille up would be, she still had things to do. She had a list, after all.
Although she might need to switch it up. Kyle had been the first target from that particular frat house, but the two before him had belonged to the same one, and it might be time to shake things up. Live up to that it could be anyone mentality everyone was already leaning towards.
There was an entire off campus series of bars that she could use as her hunting grounds for the next target. Admittedly, she disliked the thought of hunting without a stone solid plan, but being too predictable could get her caught just as easy. And Caroline couldn’t get caught.
She still had far too much to do.
“This has nothing to do with biochem,” Caroline interjected, when it became clear that Camille was not going to shut up about the stupid frat boy’s death. Really, who even cared? The only good thing Kyle had contributed to the world was his tuition payment, helping to keep the university running. And even that was questionable. “In case you’ve forgotten, we have a quiz next week. And a lab due on Friday.”
“Aren’t you the least bit curious?” Camille asked.
“Not really,” Caroline replied with a shrug. “My grandmother always told me that cities were a cesspool of murderers and gangsters. I mean, she was high on morphine when she said it, but I guess she was right.”
It was a lie; Caroline’s grandmother had died long before she had even been born. But she found that little lies like that were useful in preparing her for the big ones she might have to someday tell.
“Look, Cami, it’s terrifying. And I’m with Caroline – I’d rather focus on studying than on whatever psychopath is doing this.” April, a tiny brunette, shivered and focused her attention on the worksheet they had been given for assistance in studying. “At least I can control whether or not I pass my courses.”
“April’s smart,” Caroline stated, pointing a pen at the girl while meeting Cami’s gaze. “Be more like April.”
“I still think it’s weird to not be interested in the Raven Hunter,” Camille grumbled.
“And I think the Raven Hunter is a stupid name that lacks creativity. You’re outvoted, Camille. Deal with it.”
They managed to get through their worksheets, and even get started on their lab reports before they had to call it a night so Camille could get to her night job, and April could make it home before curfew. Just the thought of still having a curfew in university made Caroline die a little inside, but since April was harmless, she decided to keep her judgmental thoughts to herself.
People back in Mystic Falls would hardly recognize her, being all subtle.
“Are you okay to get to the bar yourself?” Caroline asked Camille as they left the library.
“I’ll be fine,” she replied. “Despite the news’ oversight, this killer pretty obviously has a type. It’s not me.”
Okay, so Camille noticed that. Good for her. Not that Caroline had been worried about the Raven Hunter, obviously. But this campus was a cesspool of disgusting frat boys and their friends, and they were far more dangerous for Camille than Caroline could ever be.
But maybe it was better not to say that.
Camille promised to text when she reached the bar. Caroline didn’t bother to point out that her plan really did nothing about making sure she made it to the bar. Instead, she gave the other woman a head start and then tailed her. She tugged the hood of her jacket up, and pretended to be entranced with her phone – just another student on her way home – and mentally sighed when Camille didn’t look back even once.
She’d been doing this since they’d started the stupid study group and she’d started to grow attached, but Caroline would really appreciate either Cami or April developing even the most minor senses of self-preservation and observation, so she didn’t have to worry like a mother hen constantly.
Caroline intended to return home once she made sure Cami made it safely to work, but she ended up contemplating the bar thoughtfully. Rousseau’s was exactly one of those off campus bars that the students liked to frequent… which made it the perfect location to find her next, non-frat boy target. She knew that Camille worked the bar, which meant that as long as she sat at one of the tables tucked into the corners, there was no way she would notice her… especially not when the place was already pretty busy, and would only get more so as the night went on.
She ordered a beer from the waitress, which she proceeded to not drink as she watched people come and go. At some point, the waitress either realized she wouldn’t be getting any more business from her, or simply forgot she was even still there, and stopped coming by to see if she wanted a refill. Hopefully it was the latter. An overrun waitress wouldn’t forget the pretty blonde that had ordered a beer, and not having to worry about being bothered meant she was free to observe the other bar patrons.
When she was a teenager, Caroline had been easily taken in by a pretty face. A nice smile and pretty eyes? She was putty in a boys’ hands. She had learned the hard way, to look at what was beneath the smile, behind the pretty eyes. She still bore the scars from those lessons, though she no longer hid them with shame as she had in Mystic Falls.
Caroline Forbes had left her small town a survivor, and if Elena Gilbert still liked to claim she had just been a bitter, psychotic bitch… well, that was up to her. Caroline wasn’t the one that had let herself fall in love and blindly believe that a man would forever be honest with her because her words were Elena, you have to believe me.
Caroline could still remember the half-crazed look in her ex-best friend’s eyes, when she had claimed that the words clearly meant that her and Damon’s relationship was going to be built on a foundation of honesty, and that Caroline could take her lies elsewhere.
Almost three years and two more accusations of sexual assault, Elena still liked to believe that. The rest of the small town had been rocked by the truth, however – town pride Damon Salvatore was a serial rapist, and they had turned Caroline into a pariah for telling the truth.
By the time they’d realized it, Caroline was already at university and realizing that Mystic Falls didn’t have the monopoly on serial assaulters who would never be punished. She gave the town enough time to do a phone interview with Andi, one of Damon’s victims who wasn’t nearly as easy to shut up as Caroline had been, just to make sure his life was well and truly ruined.
Sometimes, the system worked.
Most of the time, it took far too long. Caroline’s method was infinitely more effective.
But those hard learned lessons in Mystic Falls meant she knew what to look for. She could spot the predators, the ones that thought they could get away with ruining a girl’s life, and while she might not be able to save the girls themselves… she could damn well get them the justice they deserved.
She wrinkled her nose as she took a sip of the beer, reminded that she actually hated beer, especially when time and the overcrowded heat of the bar had left it room temperature. Cold beer wasn’t her favorite, but she could at least drink it. Lukewarm beer was basically just overpriced piss.
Her gaze caught on a man near the bar. At first glance, Caroline almost looked right past him, writing him off as cute, but harmless… but her instincts hadn’t become finely honed for nothing, and something about him had the hairs on her arm raising.
This man is not safe.
And not in the typical way that the predatory assholes Caroline targeted weren’t safe… this was a case of like recognizing like.
The tiger that realized it had encroached on another tiger’s territory.
He hadn’t noticed her, at least not that he was showing. He was too busy charming a pretty brunette. Caroline recognized her from a political science course she had taken as an elective in spring term of her freshman year. She was smart, a little bit mean, and not at all the type to be taken in by some frat boy at a bar.
Caroline was also pretty sure she was giggling at whatever the man was saying.
Dirty blonde curls, a nice smile with dimples. If Caroline had to guess, she’d say his eyes were probably blue. He was wearing a Henley, and was incredibly cute… but the girl he was flirting with was no one’s fool.
Yet Caroline watched as she let herself be led away by the man, like a dumb little lamb to her dumb little slaughter.
She hadn’t intended to actually hunt again tonight, just to identify potential targets. There had been a couple times, where she had been able to prevent anything from happening at all, and putting the fear of God into the idiots that had thought to try something to begin with. They got a second chance at life, and regular visits from Caroline, unseen and unheard, just to be sure they were still behaving themselves.
Maybe tonight could lead to one of those situations.
Or maybe the man is harmless, and brunette poli sci girl is just gonna get some.
Good for poli sci girl if that was the case… but Caroline’s instincts were still on alert, and everything in her said that there was something about this man.
He will eat you alive.
Caroline hadn’t felt like prey since she was sixteen and made a victim, and then the town pariah. It felt as bad now as it did then. Later, she’ll blame what happened next on pure spite, because she refused to be a victim, or to be prey, ever again, and she needed to show herself that she wasn’t.
So when the blonde man led the poli sci brunette into the alley where drunk university students went to make out and sometimes more… Caroline followed.
She’d learned how to blend in, and how to stand out, exactly as she needed to. So pretending to be halfway to drunk wasn’t that difficult. Just some university student who needed fresh air, and a little too buzzed to care that it left her surrounded by couples making out and feeling each other up.
Caroline would never understand the appeal of being shoved up against some gross brick wall to be kissed. Did no one think about what that could do to their hair.
God, bathing must require a god damn detox to make sure nothing from the wall stuck around.
Caroline stumbled forward, and braced herself against said wall with her fingertips, wrinkling her nose and trying not to think about what she could be picking up through the contact. Down the alley, Dimples was leaning into poli sci girl, seemingly staring into her eyes. He leaned in to say something in her ear… and then –
Her eyes widened, and she opened her mouth in a silent scream, so sound coming out of her throat. Around them, bodies continued to entwine, and no one seemed to notice the way that poli sci girl was screaming in silent agony, the way she began to turn pale.
No one but Caroline.
She wanted to go on the attack, to save the girl, but instinct had her pulling back into the shadows. She didn’t know if she waited for five minutes, or ten, but it felt like an eternity. And then poli sci girl was wandering past her, back into the bar, while Dimples made his retreat down the alley.
And Caroline had a choice.
She probably made the dumb one.
Dimples continued further into the shadows, until the music of the bar could no longer be heard, and Caroline followed. The butterfly knife that had been an “I’m sorry we’re getting divorced” present from her father was a warm weight in her palm. When she was seventeen, she had finally gotten him to teach her how to use it. It was too late, really, but had given her the favorite tool of the Raven Hunter.
She still hated that name.
The hair on her arms was still raised in awareness, and so, for once, she didn’t give her target the opportunity to repent. Instead, she went on the immediate attack, slamming the knife into his throat, making sure she severed his jugular. It would be ugly and messy, but at least he would never do to another girl whatever he had done to poli sci girl.
She would have to search his corpse afterwards, see if she couldn’t find whatever it was he had used to drug that girl. And she had to have been drugged.
Caroline’s expression was empty as she watched the man stumble away, his hands clutching his throat. She always watched for that moment, the moment when the life left their eyes entirely. It was the only part of the whole process that she enjoyed.
But that moment never came. Instead, the man stood upright, his throat covered in blood, but no longer actively bleeding.
Caroline slashed it again, and had the discomforting sense that the man let her, as though he were amused by her, and toying with her. Letting her believe that she had the upper hand, just because he could.
“Why won’t you die?” she hissed, slashing again when the bleeding stopped once more, and the man began to chuckle, a hand clutching at his ribs. Caroline froze, and she knew that her eyes had to be half wild, his blood making strands of her hair tangle and stick to her neck.
“Well this is unexpected,” he chuckled, his voice rich and accented.
Heat flared on her collarbone, and Caroline grabbed at it with fingers curled into claws. She gaped at the strange man, and inside, a voice chanted.
Nononononononononono. This isn’t possible. NO.
“No,” she murmured, stumbling back from him. “No fucking way.”
“Ah, love, don’t tell me you’re one of those types that denies the obvious.” One second he was at least five feet from her, the next he was right in front of her, one of his hands grasping her wrist, the other reaching up to run a finger along her collarbone. She knew what he would be seeing now. The dark gray of her soulmark, well this is unexpected, had turned to a burned black.
It was what happened, when the words were spoken. The words that would decide the very course of the soulmate relationship. They may be spoken in the very beginning, or not for years. But eventually they would be spoken.
Caroline Forbes had met her soulmate.
And he was exactly the type of man she had decided to eliminate from the Earth.
---
His soulmate was a pretty little thing.
With blood on her face and clinging to her hair, she was downright delectable even. Half feral, and wholly his.
The words on his ribs – why won’t you die – had been there since his youth. As a boy, they had alarmed him. Once he had been turned and gotten a few years of experience under his belt… well, then they had intrigued him.
Who was this creature, he had wondered, that would believe herself able to kill him?
After over a millennia, he finally had his answer. His soulmate was a murderous creature with a butterfly knife and a vicious light in her eyes that made Klaus downright gleeful. Rebekah liked to say that his soulmate would be a crazed bitch, and that was exactly what he deserved.
Klaus had never told her, but he’d rather enjoyed the thought of it himself.
“Now Love, why don’t you put the knife aside, and we can have a chat. Perhaps over a drink? We just came from a bar after all.”
He assumed the girl had followed him, anyway. He was certain that he had seen her, sitting at a corner with a beer that hadn’t at all suited her. There was something about her that was eye catching.
Perhaps that bloodthirstiness, that had lurked beneath her skin, now out for the whole world to see.
She moved to strike a third time, and Klaus sighed, catching her wrist with his hand. He squeezed, just enough to make her grip on the knife loosen, and caught that with his other hand. It was a nice piece of work, and he noted with some amusement that the knife had a galaxy pattern on the knife blade. It was almost whimsical in a way.
“An interesting weapon,” Klaus noted, impressed with the blade’s perfect balance and keen edge. “Do you sharpen it yourself?”
“Are you seriously trying to talk knives with me?” she demanded, trying to tug her wrist from his grip. Klaus just raised a brow and kept her carefully in place with little effort. “I’m going to kill you.”
“Well, you certainly tried,” Klaus replied airily. “And failed. Quite terribly. If it’s any consolation, had I been human you would have been wonderfully successful. As it is, I’m difficult to kill. One might even say impossible.”
“Everyone can die,” she replied, baring her teeth in a mockery of a grin. “Some people just take a little longer to kill. But that’s okay; I’m stubborn.”
The heel of her boot was actually rather painful. And surprising enough that he actually released his hold on her. She dove for her knife, but Klaus had preternatural speed and incredible strength on his side. He was behind her, an arm wrapped around her waist, lifting her off her feet, before she was even aware he had moved.
“Now, Love… you should know that I’m not everyone.” Klaus kept her in his grasp, and leaned down to breathe in her scent. He had to admit, beneath the sweat and musk of the bar, it was quite lovely. She would probably taste delicious. “And your little attack made me lose my snack. Now I’m rather peckish again.”
She stopped struggling against him, and Klaus gave a pleased grin. Finally, she was listening to the instincts that must have been screaming at her since she first set eyes on him. Her whole body was tense, and remained so as he lowered her back to the ground, and slowly released his hold.
“Are you going to kill me?” she asked, her voice incredibly soft.
“My own soulmate?” Klaus replied, raising a brow. “Do you really think that little of me?”
“Yes,” she replied, her gaze shooting to him as he stepped to her side. “Yes, I think I do.”
“Smart girl.” Klaus felt a pleased grin tug at his lips. “But your fear is unnecessary. I find that, at the moment, I prefer to have a functioning soulmate.”
“Lucky me,” she murmured, her eyes darting around, clearly looking for an escape. Klaus sighed at that, because even his soulmate, intelligent as she clearly was, managed to fall victim to a human’s hubris. She should have realized by now there was no escape from him, yet still she searched.
“What is your name?” Klaus asked, managing to draw her attention from their surroundings. Being pinned by her gaze was interesting. He had expected her to be half wild with fear, but instead her expression was cold and shuttered, even if her pulse still raced.
She remained silent, and Klaus cocked his head, considering her. After a moment, he lifted the knife he still held, and her eyes darted towards it, before returning to his own. In a smooth move that he had learned from a soldier that he’d had a brief, interesting acquaintance with, Klaus closed the knife, hiding the blade away, one handed, and then held it out to her as a peace offering. She hesitated for a moment, before she snatched it from his hand, and then put some space between them.
He allowed it; he wasn’t a heathen, after all.
“Caroline,” she finally replied. “My name is Caroline.”
“Caroline,” he repeated, savoring the way the name rolled off of his tongue. It was an older name, in this world of modern sensibilities. He wondered if she had an old soul to match it. “I am Klaus.”
“Klaus. Okay. What now?”
“Now we have a conversation, Caroline. About how you tried to kill me.” Klaus leaned against the brick wall of a nearby building and gave her a genial smile. While he viewed humans as beneath him, he did like to stay up to date on what was causing a stir amongst them. In this particular college town, one that Rebekah had decided she wanted to visit in her foolish quest to feel something like a mortal, there was an undercurrent of fear because the campus, the main source of business, was being haunted by a killer.
Klaus had known many a serial killer in his day. His own brother, Kol, had spent a few years haunting the streets of London before such predators had even been given a name. He’d enjoyed playing with the humans that tried to chase him, until Elijah had finally brought the whole charade to an end by dragging the entire family elsewhere.
But he had known others as well – had found it interesting, to meet the men (and they were almost always men) who had hunted and killed their own kind for nothing more than their own sick, twisted desires.
Klaus was also not a stupid man. He could do simple arithmetic, and one plus one was always two. If he was wandering this college city, only to be stalked by this slip of a woman who tried to kill him… well, the math was easy.
The Raven Hunter, a foolish, unoriginal name if ever he’d heard one, was Caroline.
“What did you do to that girl?” Caroline hissed, her cold expression gaining some heat. Her grip tightened on the knife, and he knew that if she had half an opportunity, she would bury it in his throat again, regardless of whether or not it would successfully end him.
Caroline was enraged.
Klaus had known many a serial killer in his time; he had even made a bit of a study of them. Yet he could not recall any of them ever showing this rage, tempered by a cold sanity that said she knew exactly what she was doing. She knew exactly who she killed. She knew exactly what the outcome would be, if ever she was caught.
And Caroline didn’t care at all.
“Girl?” for a moment Klaus was genuinely confused, so enthralled as he was with his little soulmate. Then he remembered what had prefaced their whole meeting – the bar, and his midnight snack, for which he still needed a replacement. He’d lost entirely too much blood. “Ah, yes… the delightful Susanne. Susan? Perhaps it was just Anne. No matter, I rarely ever remember what my food is named. I took a little bite, and then I sent her on her way to get herself the aid she needed to mend her hurts. You see, with a certain Hunter lurking in the city, I thought it best to not add another method of murder to the table.”
“Food,” Caroline repeated, and her heartbeat skipped. She was still hot rage and cold sanity, but now another emotion was leaking in, one that gave her scent a distinct metal tang that Klaus usually loved; in this case, he thought it vaguely distasteful, however. “What the hell are you?”
He considered her, and her humanity. She was so very fragile, so very mortal… and so very much a weakness he couldn’t afford. Not when his enemies lurked around every corner, seeking a way to, if not end him, at least irrevocably damage him.
He could kill her himself. Now, before there was time to actually grow fond of her. He might mourn the intrigue, but it wouldn’t do any permanent damage.
Yet, he was loathe to do such a thing.
In a moment, he was in front of her, cocking his head once more.
“Why do you kill?” he asked, compulsion layering his voice.
“Why do you want to know?” she shot back, and Klaus took a step back in surprise. He surveyed her closely, and then his gaze caught on a bracelet that dangled from her wrist. He lifted it, and considered the charm that dangled there.
“Vervain,” he mused. “And yet you ask what I am?”
“It’s for luck,” Caroline shot back, tearing her hand from his grip, and cradling the bracelet with her other hand. “From my dad. What’s vervain?”
“So many questions, Caroline, yet you’ll give me no answers. That’s hardly fair.”
She biter her lip as she considered it, nibbling on the skin. Klaus rather wanted to do that himself, but he figured it might be too soon for that.
“They’re not innocent,” she said at last. “The boys I’ve killed. They’ve attacked other girls. Hurt them. And I’ve given every one of them the chance to make a different decision. If they would have walked away when I was there… I would’ve given them the benefit of the doubt, that maybe they could change. But they haven’t.”
“An avenging angel,” Klaus mused, eyeing her with something akin to delight. Oh, he so loved a noble soul. He loved what they could become when granted power beyond their imagination. “And I was meant to be another target? You didn’t give me the opportunity to walk away, Love.”
“I knew that you weren’t like the others,” Caroline replied, and she opened the knife. Klaus watched her hand closely, but rather than attack, she closed it again. It was with some interest that he observed her do it again. And then again. All the while seemingly unaware of what she was doing.
A nervous habit, then.
“I knew that if I didn’t take advantage of the element of surprise, I’d never kill you.” She let out a humorless huff of laughter. “Clearly, it didn’t work anyways. I answered your question – now answer mine. What the hell are you?”
“Vampire,” Klaus said simply, though of course the reality of him was more complicated. But he could explain the intricacies later. “Why have you made it your role to be the avenging angel?”
“Wait – vampire? You can’t just say vampire and then move on! That’s… vampires shouldn’t be real.”
“Yet we are. And if your bracelet is anything to go by, your father is aware of that. I’ll admit, that is interesting, and we’ll revisit your family later. But for now, I wish to know about you. What is your driving force?”
“I… Christ. Vampires.” She ran a hand through her hair, and stumbled back from him. She looked like she wanted to turn away, but her instincts would let her give him her back. “Is this some sort of joke?”
Klaus sighed heavily, and then let his monsters face show. He double fangs dropped, his eyes turned yellow, as the veins beneath grew black and prominent.
He expected her to scream. They often screamed, when they first saw what a true monster looked like. But then again, Caroline had shown that she could not so easily be placed into the box of “typical” and he supposed it shouldn’t have been a shock when she stepped forward and then slowly, incredibly slowly, reached up to touch him.
She started beneath his eyes, feeling the veins, and then her fingers moved down, until they hovered before his mouth.
“Are they real?” she finally asked.
“Find out,” Klaus replied, a challenge in his voice.
She reached out with just one finger, and then recoiled with a hiss, when his fang pierced her skin. Klaus’ tongue darted out, tasting the drop of blood left behind.
He was right – she was delicious.
“Holy shit,” she said, her eyes widening. “Holy shit.”
She looked like she may start to panic, now that she was truly faced with the reality of the supernatural, so Klaus grabbed her wrist and twirled her, so her back was pressed to his chest, and she could no longer see him.
“Deep breaths for me, Caroline.” When she did as he ordered, her continued to murmur against her ear. “That’s my girl. Now… tell me about what made you turn into the Raven Hunter.”
“It’s a terrible name, isn’t it?” she asked, her voice shaky. He was all too aware that she was still playing with her knife, but she had yet to try to attack with it again so he allowed the nervous motion. “But whatever, I don’t care. I just… no one should be a victim like that. But too many are. And we’re never believed, not until it’s too late, and there are more victims. So… I’m the jury and the executioner. And I keep their victims limited.”
“Because you were one?” Klaus asked, and though he normally would not particularly care about such things, the fact that it was Caroline, his soulmate, who had be hurt in such a way…
Well, Klaus wanted a name.
“Yes,” Caroline replied, her voice barely loud enough for even him to hear. “So I hate it. Absolutely hate it, when I meet men who think they can do whatever they want.”
It was the steel in her voice, that should have been his warning. But Klaus had been told that he had a bit of a temper, and that it sometimes affected his ability to think clearly. Perhaps his siblings were right, because he missed the way that Caroline opened the knife once more, and then failed to close it again. Instead, she drove it back into his thigh.
He had to give her props, she was exceptional at hitting her targets. Had been human, she would have severed the artery in his leg. She spun towards him, and that cold sanity was gone from her eyes now, replaced by the pure intent to kill.
If Caroline had been hunting him before, it was nothing compared to this pure intent to end him now.
“Hell,” he muttered, moving out her way to let his wound heal. It was a matter of seconds, and was more an irritant than actual damage, but he had to admit to disliking the whole situation.
It rather felt like she’d been getting the better of him throughout the entirety of their meeting, and he didn’t at all enjoy it.
He grabbed her by her throat, not enough to damage, but hard enough to make breathing a little difficult, and pressed her into the wall.
“Stop,” he hissed. “We both know you won’t win this.”
“Fuck. You.” Caroline ground out in reply, trying to stab the hand that held her throat. He responded by removing the knife from her grip, sending it skidding across the alley.
“If you don’t stop, then I’ll decide not to offer you the ability to end every one of those boys you so loathe without ever worrying about be caught.”
Apparently those were the magic words, because Caroline stopped struggling, and when Klaus released his hold, didn’t go on the attack again.
---
Without every worrying about being caught.
The fear of being caught had always lurked in the back of Caroline’s mind, but focusing on it too much would have torn down her resolve and left her unwilling to do what needed to be done. So though the fear lurked, she had simply refused to acknowledge it.
And now, here was a man who claimed he could remove that hear entirely.
Her soulmate.
Klaus.
“Being caught is always possible,” she said at last, because her mom had always told her that, if something seemed too good to be true, it was.
Then again, Liz had also told her vampires and monsters weren’t real. Yet apparently Caroline’s dad had known otherwise.
Had Liz known as well, and simply lied?
Caroline had already known that monsters were real, she’d just thought they wore human faces.
“Not if you can compel away the memories,” Klaus replied. It galled, that he was able to turn his back to her, when Caroline was unable to do the same to him. He knelt down, and picked up her knife, and then tucked it away in his pocket.
Her hand felt empty without its comforting weight.
“Compel?” she asked, tapping her fingers nervously against her thigh. She needed to move. Adrenaline was keeping her far too aware of everything.
“I can’t tell you all my secrets, Caroline. Not unless you’re like me.”
A monster echoed in the back of her mind.
Then again, Caroline was already a monster, wasn’t she? The monster that hunted other monsters.
Why not make it more literal?
“That girl,” she began, because it was something she couldn’t let go and –
“Will be utterly unharmed,” Klaus waved his hand away. “I compelled away the memory of her ever having met me, and the wound was not life threatening. Though I do sometimes kill them. I am a monster, Love.”
A monster that was offering her the ability to be one as well. She clenched her fists, and Klaus noted. He leaned back and contemplated her.
“I have never raped a woman,” he said at last, his words very precise. “I have fed off them. I have killed them, though usually I reserve that for those that do my family harm first. But I have never raped one.”
It was grating, to hear that word used. Even in her own mind, Caroline rarely used it. It was so… ugly. She hated it, and everything it stood for.
She felt her shoulders relax with relief, and she buried her face in her hands, letting out a slow, almost sobbing breath.
“Okay,” she said, nodding with her face still buried in her hands. “Okay.”
“So… shall I make you a monster?”
Caroline dropped her hands and considered Klaus, before she shook her head.
“No. I already made myself a monster, but I’m not going to make a decision about more tonight.”
“I’m your soulmate, Love.”
“That’s nice. But I’m still not making a decision. Even the worst people in the world have soulmates. And I’m not going to be like those blind fools.”
I’m not going to be like Elena was what she meant, but if she wasn’t ready to let Klaus make her like him, then she definitely wasn’t ready to tell him all the dirty details of her history. Instead, she held out her hand.
“My knife, please.”
“And why should I? When you’ve stabbed me… how many times now?”
“I won’t again. Not tonight anyway.” Caroline continued to hold out her hand. “But I prefer to have it on hand. I still need to get back to my dorm, and there’s all sorts of monsters hiding in the shadows. More than I realized, apparently.”
Klaus sighed, but he placed the knife in her hand.
“Well then, shall I walk you back?”
They got rid of the worst of the blood still on Caroline’s face, and some quick hair adjustments hid what was spattered there for the most part as well. Other than that, Caroline had to trust Klaus when he swore no one would question her during a leisurely walk back to her dormitory.
Klaus was… charming, when he wasn’t showing the monster to the world. If she hadn’t witnessed it all herself, Caroline would have never pegged him as anything more than a human. He was incredibly good at appearing harmless when he wanted.
And charming.
Had she already thought about how charming he was?
“Was anything you just told me the truth?” she asked when they reached her dorm. Because he had told her his favorite color was dark green, he enjoyed football – the European kind, not American, he had been to multiple Beatles concerts, and he had four siblings, of which he was the middle child.
“Well, Love, I suppose you’ll have to get to know me better, find out for yourself if I keep my story straight.” Klaus grinned at her. “Perhaps we can start tomorrow. I’ll admit, I have a fair bit of time on my hands, since I’m just here due to Bekah’s whims. What do you say?”
“Are you seriously going from offering me… well, what you offered me, to asking me to go out with you?” Caroline cocked her head at him. “You don’t seem like the dating type.”
“Well, since you turned down the initial offer, I figured I’d give this way a shot. Isn’t this what soulmates are meant to do?”
“Soulmates are both also typically… you know” – Caroline gave a furtive glance around, before she leaned in – “human.”
“True,” Klaus agreed, leaning in to her as well. He gave his own, exaggerated look around, before he winked at her, his dimples showing. “They’re also usually not, you know – serial killers.”
Okay, point taken. Caroline would need to adjust her concept of what this whole soulmate thing would be, because the typical stories probably wouldn’t apply to them.
They would have to create their own path.
It was that thought, and the adrenaline that hadn’t quite left her yet, that made Caroline lean in further, and press her lips against his. It was meant to be a quick peck, just sort of testing the waters, because he was her soulmate and they should at least figure out if they would work sexually, right?
Klaus, it turned out, was the bossy type. Because what she initiated as a quick peck, he took over, turning it into something hotter, far more sexual. Caroline’s back was pressed to the wall of the dorm, next to the door, and she grasped his neck. His lips were warm against hers, and it was easy to let her body melt against his. Because he was really, really good at kissing.
And it would be easy – so easy – to let it go further. But… Caroline didn’t do one night stands. Not since high school and everything. So she pressed her hands against his chest, and backed up, reaching behind her for the door.
“I’m going in,” she said, and it probably said something about her that she wasn’t alarmed by the fact that his eyes glowed that eerie gold at her again. “Alone. And tomorrow we can do things. Whatever. The soulmate stuff. Tomorrow. Not tonight.”
“Fine. Tomorrow then.”
Caroline watched him walk away, and as he went, she heard him whistling Twist and Shout. It made her give a laugh of disbelief.
Her soulmate was a fucking vampire.
He had, possibly, seen the Beatles perform live. Multiple times. Even though he didn’t even look thirty.
He was a murderer. Multiple times over.
Then again, so was Caroline.
Maybe fate did know what it was doing with them.
---
“You’re going to date this wench?”
“This wench is my soulmate, Bekah. Watch your mouth.” Klaus didn’t look at his sister, as he focused instead on getting the dip of Caroline’s Cupid ’s bow just right. Her face was half-feral in the sketch, blood spattered on her cheek, and in her hair.
“Good Lord, Nik… are you already planning on turning this girl into a monster?” Rebekah peered over his shoulder, to see what had him so focused. Klaus was tempted to hide the page, but the damage already been done, so he just continued sketching. “Elijah will never approve.”
“I don’t have to plan to do anything,” Klaus replied, lips curving into a pleased smirk. “It turns out my soulmate is already perfectly suited to my tendencies in that regard. She’ll make a spectacular vampire.”
“And have you asked her opinion on this?” Rebekah’s voice grew sharp, and Klaus sighed and finally turned to look at her. She had her hands on her hips, glaring at him as she was becoming more wont to do in these days where she was almost desperate for the humanity they had lost centuries before. She’d get past it, as she had every other time she’d gone through the phase, but they all had to tolerate her pouting until then. “What if she doesn’t desire vampirism?”
“Not everyone is so damnably attached to humanity as you are, Rebekah,” Klaus replied, closing the sketch book and setting it aside. “In fact, most – be they vampire or human – far prefer the benefits of immortality. As you will again in a year or two once you inevitably fail to win over whatever human boy it is you’ve decided to fixate on this time. Next time it will be a vampire. And rinse and repeat.”
“Perhaps this girl will weigh immortality against the realities of spending forever with a prick like you and realize that it’s not worth it,” Rebekah spat in return. “Lord knows I’ll be warning her off with tales of how inept at basic decency you are.”
“Please. She’s a woman, Bekah. Your record says that you won’t be able to string together two kind sentences in order to warn her. You’re far too terribly jealous of your own sex.”
Klaus stood from his chair and checked the time. It was nearly noon, and Klaus knew that Caroline would be leaving her biochemistry class soon, after which she had two hours free.
He planned to monopolize those two hours.
A quick glance in the mirror left him content with his appearance, and he ignored Rebekah’s scowling and arguing as he headed for the door.
“I’m not sure when I’ll return. If our brothers wander back, be sure to keep this our little secret, Bekah. Elijah is such a wet stick, and Kol such an irritant.”
He didn’t expect Rebekah to keep it secret at all, of course, but he also didn’t really expect either of their brothers to bother popping up any time soon. Last he’d heard, Elijah was in Europe chasing after the ghost of Katerina Petrova – now a rather diabolical vampire who called herself Katherine Pierce. And Kol was off doing whatever Kol did, and Klaus didn’t particularly expect to here from him in the next decade. They always got along best when contact was kept to a minimum, with long periods of time in between.
It was quick work, to get to the campus, and from there just another handful of minutes to the science building, so he could wait for Caroline outside her classroom.
Soon enough, the room began to empty, and there was Caroline, flanked by another blonde and a brunette. It took her a moment, as they appeared to be deep in conversation, but when she noticed him there, she froze.
“Caroline?” the blonde asked.
“Study group, next week. I remember,” Caroline said. “I just… have a thing.”
She didn’t wait for her companions’ response, instead grabbing Klaus’ hand and dragging him behind her. Klaus could have stopped her, of course, but he found it amused him, to see where she would take him.
“What are you doing here?” she hissed over her shoulder.
“I’m here to date you. Remember, Love?”
“Yeah, but – I never told you my schedule!”
“The benefits of immortality, remember?” Klaus finally dug in his heels, and tugged her back so that when he sat on a bench, she was pulled down to sit flush against him. “Compulsion grants me the ability to get whatever I want. Including your class schedule. Not that they keep the information so closely under wraps. It’s alarming almost.”
“Klaus, you can’t just show up on my campus.”
“And why is that?”
Caroline floundered. She opened her mouth, clearly to say something, and then froze, snapping it shut. Opened it again… shut once more.
“I… we’re… you’re…”
I’m a serial killer and you’re a monster, was what Klaus imagined she wanted to say. But then again, no one knew either of those, leaving them both free to do as they would.
“This is weird,” she said at last. “Like, really weird, Klaus. You have to acknowledge that.”
“Caroline, Sweetheart, I am over a thousand years old” – he grinned at the way she gasped and gaped at him – “for me to consider anything odd, it has to be truly spectacular. This? It’s more… utterly expected.”
“No one has ever said that about my… hobbies,” Caroline muttered, but Klaus noted with glee that she didn’t move away from him. Instead, she cuddled closer, resting her head on his shoulder. “I mean, obviously I’m the only one who knows, so I’ve never said it. But I can’t imagine if anyone did know, they would consider it expected. I don’t look like the type.”
“They rarely do,” Klaus pointed out.
He glanced down at the top of her head, and thought he could almost feel her eye roll.
“We need to stop discussing this.” She tried to get to her feet, only for Klaus to tug her down again, so he could press a kiss to her hair. She huffed, and he let her get up the second time she tried, standing up as well. “I’m hungry. Let’s go eat… wait, can you do normal eating? Or is it an all…”
“Liquid diet?” Klaus drawled out as Caroline trailed off.
“Yeah. That.”
“I can eat,” Klaus replied. He didn’t add that he hadn’t bothered to eat human food in… centuries, perhaps? He couldn’t really remember.
What did humans even eat in this day and age?
She took him to a cafeteria, and he simply followed her, figuring he would stick with her choice. He considered the stir fry she had ordered, one with shrimp and a sweet and sour sauce, and was somewhat grateful that the mix of scents in the room meant he couldn’t determine which one exactly belonged to the mess he was about to eat.
Or pretend to eat. He wasn’t sure he’d actually be able to put it in his mouth.
“So, besides creepy stalking me, what do you actually do?” Caroline asked as they took a seat.
“Argue with my sister, mostly. Sometimes I make Machiavellian plots in my dark lair.” Draw you. He decided not to mention that last one, not yet.
Caroline nodded as he spoke, but Klaus noted that her attention was no longer on him. Instead, she had focused her gaze over his shoulder, her expression cold, like it had been the previous night when she’d gone for his throat with a knife.
He glanced over his shoulder, to see a table of young men, several in jackets with the school’s Raven mascot on the back.
“Do you know them?” Klaus murmured low.
Caroline jolted her attention back to him, gave a weak smile, and looked down at her plate.
“I have a list,” she murmured at last. “At least three of those boys are on it. But I have to move slow or else…”
“Or else draw attention to yourself,” Klaus murmured, eyeing the tables around them. No one could hear what the spoke about, something Caroline was clearly aware of. “You have a simple solution for that.”
Caroline just shrugged, but continued to watch the young men out of the corner of her eye.
---
It was weirdly… normal, dating a thousand year old vampire.
Except that he was, you know a thousand years old.
And there were times when he would say something, refer to someone from centuries ago as an old friend, and she would be reminded of exactly what she was dealing with.
It was surreal, and yet it was also as normal as she’d felt since arriving at university. She was actually dating, not just going to class and then committing murders. Admittedly, some of those dates involved stalking the names on her list… but it was a bonding effort.
And then, she got the call.
“Where is she?”
Camille looked up from where she paced in the hospital’s waiting room. When she saw Caroline, she all but threw herself into Caroline’s arms. They had never exactly been hugging acquaintances, but Caroline decided to suck it up for the moment, and give her best attempt at comfort.
“She’s getting the kit done. The police were already in here. The bastards.”
Camille didn’t call people bastards. Camille believed everyone had trauma that explained their wrongs away; it drove Caroline insane, but it was pretty much her strongest personality quirk.
“What happened?”
“They tried to gaslight her, like it couldn’t possibly be their fucking football hero that hurt her.” Camille pulled back and began to pace again. “She stuck with her guns, and they tried to kick me out. We wouldn’t let them.”
“Good,” Caroline replied. “Good. Who was it?”
Camille told her, and it was on Caroline’s list. She managed to keep her anger under control as they were let in to see April. She said all the right things, in exactly the wrong tone, but seeing April with a black eye, talking about getting the justice Caroline knew she would never see…
Rage had been Caroline’s constant companion since she was sixteen. On that night, she decided to truly embrace it.
“When you said you could give me immortality,” she said to Klaus on the phone, as she walked down the street. “Did you really mean it?”
“You’re my soulmate, Caroline. It’s easier for us both if we share an eternal lifespan. Though I suppose I should give you fair warning, that once you’ve turned, control will be difficult.”
“I don’t care,” Caroline replied. Her feet had led her to the frat that the football star belonged to. He was named Chad. There were two others from her list in there – a Mike and another Kyle… and entire house that would be willing to protect all three. “I don’t want control.”
She wanted to burn the world down.
---
A better man than Klaus would have convinced her to wait until anger wasn’t her driving force. Anger was a fleeting beast, after all. Vampirism was forever.
But Klaus was not a better man. He was cruel and selfish, and he wanted to see her with the monster in eyes and blood on her face. He wanted to take her to bed and not worry about breaking her.
“How does this work?” she asked, and some apprehension began to show through the rage.
“Do you wish me to talk you threw it, or to just get it done?” Klaus replied.
She wrinkled her nose in thought, before she gave a sharp nod, and Klaus had to admire the way she stuck with a decision once she made it.
“Just do it. You can explain it afterward.”
Killing had never been difficult for Klaus. Turning a vampire had been even less so. He’d thought this would be no different, and it wasn’t – at first.
He caught her by surprise, the bloodied wrist he pressed to her lips. She swallowed some, and then promptly gagged, glaring at him with distaste.
And that was when he suddenly hesitated.
Because the next step was killing her. And even knowing that she would come back, the act of killing her was… distasteful. And probably a piss poor start to their eternity, or some such ridiculous nonsense of Rebekah’s that was apparently rubbing off on him.
“Do we just wait or…?” Caroline raised a brow at him. “Because that was gross, so…”
“The next step is death,” Klaus replied, running a handle over his chin.
“Okay. So, you’re super strong. Just… punch my throat in or something.”
“Neck snaps would preferable,” Klaus replied, now rubbing his hand down his face. “Just give me a moment.”
He dropped his hand to see Caroline staring at him.
“Death?” she asked, looking rather pale.
“Yes, death. Since vampires are undead.”
“Okay,” she repeated nodding her head. “Death. That’s… that’s terrible. But I’ll come back, right?”
“You will,” Klaus agreed. “I just need to…”
And still he hesitated. Caroline cocked her head, a small smile curving her lips.
“You kind of don’t want to do it,” she noted. “That’s… like, weirdly sweet. And surprising. And kind of makes me think better of you.”
“Just give me a damn moment and I’ll-”
Her knife was in her hand in a flash of blade, and then that blade was thrust into her throat, in a spurt of blood that hit Klaus in the face, and then spilled onto the rug of his den as her body slumped to the ground.
“Nik – bloody hell, is she bleeding out on my rug?!”
“Shut up, Bekah,” Klaus growled, because of course his sister would choose now to appear. The worst possible time. He turned Caroline’s body over, and cradled her in his arms. Her eyes were wild, and she made gurgling noises, the kind he often took great amusement in.
From her, they disturbed him.
“You should have let me snap your damn neck,” he snapped at her. Caroline blinked up at him, and raised her bloody hand up. She managed to reach his cheek, leave smears on his skin, before it fell back to her side, her head slumping as life left her.
She had spectacular aim, even when aiming at herself.
“She ruined a perfectly good rug, Nik,” Rebekah hissed, and Klaus’ gaze shot up to glare at her. His sister snapped to attention and took a step back.
“Bekah… Shut. Up.”
He lifted Caroline into his arms, not at all caring about the mess he left behind them as he carried her away.
She would awaken comfortable and in a damn bed, his sister and her complaints be damned.
---
The world was different somehow when Caroline opened her eyes.
Everything seemed clearer, yet not at the same time. As though she were looking at the world through lenses that weren’t quite right.
“I feel sticky,” she said to the air.
Klaus was there suddenly, and he helped Caroline to sit up. She looked down and winced when she saw that her clothes were soaked with blood. She liked that top. And those jeans.
She had punctured her own throat.
With a gasp, she lifted her hands to her throat. They came in contact with skin that was sticky with blood, but otherwise whole.
“Holy shit,” she whispered, staring at Klaus with wide eyes. “Holy shit. Wow. I’m a vampire.”
“Not yet.” It wasn’t Klaus that responded, and Caroline’s almost got whiplash, with how quickly she turned her head to look at the doorway. Another blonde stood there, gorgeous and dressed in a dress that fit her perfectly. She was looking at her nails, as though she couldn’t be bothered to even look at Caroline as she spoke to her. “There’s another step.”
“Bekah,” Klaus growled, and the woman, Bekah, went still at the threat.
“What’s the step?” Caroline asked, looking between the two. Bekah… that must be Rebekah. His sister. And Caroline was meeting her covered in blood.
Lovely.
She wouldn’t think about it too hard.
The two siblings appeared to be engaged in a staring war, and Caroline gave a frustrated huff.
“Next step – what is it? I don’t care who answers, as long as someone does.”
“Human blood,” Rebekah finally said, obviously using the answer as an excuse to be the first to look away from the staring battle. “In order to complete transition, you must drink human blood in the next twenty-four hours.”
“Okay,” Caroline said, nodding. Her gums ached, and her throat felt parched, as though just the mention of blood was enough to awaken the urges. “Okay. I want to eat frat boy.”
“What?” Rebekah demanded as Caroline crawled off the bed. She went poking around, finding the bathroom through one of the doors. She left it partially ajar, so she could hear the other two, and began to strip. “My brother gives you immortality, and you’re already ditching him for other men? Classy.”
“I’m going to kill the entirety of the frat my friend’s rapist belongs to,” Caroline announced, making sure that Rebekah could clearly hear her. “And then I’m going to kill every other asshole on my list. And I’ll leave their heads piled outside the Dean’s door.”
“Hell,” Caroline heard Rebekah mutter before she stepped into the shower. “Your girlfriend is insane, Nik.”
“Isn’t she magnificent?” was Klaus’ reply, before the water made it so Caroline could hear nothing at all.
She made sure to take her time, and clean all the blood off of her. It was nearly an hour later, when the water was running clear, that she stepped out and wrapped herself in a towel.
Rebekah awaited her in the room, sitting on bedding that must have been changed while Caroline was getting clean.
“I brought you some options,” Rebekah stated, motioning at three dresses hanging in the walk in closet. Caroline immediately grabbed the flowered sundress that showed off her legs. When she covered it in frat boy blood, the effect would be dramatic. Wonderful nightmare fuel, for boys that would never dream again.
“Thank-you,” Caroline replied politely. Since Rebekah didn’t seem about to give her privacy, Caroline just shrugged and began to change. There was a small bag filled with underwear from her dorm room, that Klaus had apparently retrieved.
Yet another thing to just not think about too much.
“I don’t like you,” Rebekah announced as Caroline checked her reflection in the mirror.
“You don’t know me.”
“I don’t,” Rebekah agreed. “But I still don’t like you. On principle. However, I can appreciate a good grudge mission. So I’ll help you murder these little boys.”
Caroline turned to look at her contemplatively.
“I don’t think I like you either,” she said at last. “But I’d love your help.”
---
“Shit, man, I can’t believe they actually questioned you about that little bitch. Like you can’t get laid whenever you want.”
“I know, right?” Chad rolled his eyes, but grinned at Brad, slapping his back. “But the chief told me it’d be fine. They need to fill out the paperwork, though. You know how it is.”
“It’s not fair,” Mike spoke up. “The way they can come after us like this. Just because they regret it after having some fun doesn’t mean that we should have to deal with them.”
Chad would have agreed again, but a scream came from the front door, and so all three of them went running.
His first thought was that these hotties looked like they could be fun.
His second was, where is Kyle’s head?
Then one of the blondes, in a short dress with flowers on it, turned slightly, and there was something in her hand and –
Oh. That’s where Kyle’s head is.
“What the fuck?” Mike asked, staring in horror.
“Hello boys,” said the other girl, the one not in flowers. She cocked her head, and Chad realized she was a monster, with black eyes, and… and…
Were those fucking fangs?
“That one is mine,” Flowers said, pointing her finger at Chad. “That’s the one who will make me complete my transition.”
“Then get it over with already.”
Flowers used a knife. It was a hazy realization, because she’d used it to slice Chad’s throat. Then she pressed her lips there, and when she pulled back, she was a monster with fangs, too.
“This is for April,” Flowers said, and buried her lips into his neck, tearing his life away even faster than he could bleed out.
He didn’t even have time to remember who April was… there had just been so many, after all.
---
“You may actually fit this family,” Rebekah mused, as she stood beside Caroline, watching as she very carefully stacked the heads of more frat boys than either of them cared to count in front of the Dean’s office. Rebekah had compelled several students and staff into forgetting them as they carted heads across the campus. The bodies were left behind in a bloody hellscape in the frat houses. “Even if I don’t like you.”
“Stop talking, I’m trying to concentrate.” Caroline held her tongue between her teeth as she carefully, oh so carefully, placed Chad’s head atop the pyramid. She stepped back and clapped her hands happily, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Perfect! Or should we add decorations? I used to plan dances at my school, before everything fell apart. I’m sure I could pull out some of that knowledge.”
Rebekah contemplated it, then wrinkled her nose.
“No, that would just be tacky. We’re never tacky, Caroline.”
“Just psycho and murderous?”
“This was your idea. I just tagged along.”
Caroline hummed her agreement, and then turned as steps came towards them. Rebekah didn’t bother turning, already recognizing who approached.
“Well, that’s appropriately macabre,” Klaus noted, joining them. Caroline turned back, and melted into Klaus’ side when he wrapped an arm around her. Rebekah wondered if she even noticed, how easily she let the most dangerous man alive hold her. “Good job, Love.”
“Right?” she glanced up at him. “But you’ve been holding out on me. I only have two fangs. You have four.”
“Ah, yes… one of those secrets I mentioned. It involves a witch and a curse. I can tell you while we leave.”
“I suppose we can’t stay any longer,” Rebekah agreed with a heavy sigh. “I hope you appreciate the sacrifice I’ve made for you. I liked this place.”
“There are more,” Caroline replied, and her gaze turned cold, her smile mirthless. “There are always more. And I want to kill them all.”
The look Rebekah shot her made Caroline thank that maybe, just maybe, her dislike wouldn’t be permanent.
“Where to next then, Sweetheart,” Klaus asked.
Caroline gave a smile, because she was immortal now, so who cared if she was found guilty, or was suspected, in these crimes?
They would never catch her.
The world seemed brighter, and she wondered if it was her mind playing tricks, or if it truly was, now that she had a vampire’s sensibilities. And Klaus… Klaus looked…
Delicious, in a way that was far different from those frat boys. She had wanted their blood, and their lives, and had felt near gleeful to rip both from them. But now that their heads were piled and Caroline had finished her transition, she was becoming more aware of the differences in the world around her.
The differences in her.
And when she looked at Klaus, she wanted his hands on her.
“Oh Lord, save me from the sex drive of a newborn. Nik, don’t touch her – ugh!”
Caroline didn’t really care if Rebekah was disgusted or not. After a thousand years, she’s pretty sure the other woman has seen worse than her brother pulling his soulmate in for a kiss that she can feel right to the soles of her feet.
Her response was to push him back, so he slammed into the door of the Dean’s office, and then she pressed her lips to his, her hands running down his chest, luxuriating in how his muscles tensed and then released under her fingertips.
“This is a rather public display, Love. We could shock the janitors.”
“The heads will keep them distracted.” Talking took their lips too far apart. Caroline wanted to stop talking, so she shoved her tongue in his mouth instead – a sign to stop talking.
Klaus ran his hand along her leg, and up under her skirt. Caroline shivered at the skin-on-skin contact and, when he pressed her fingers against her through her panties, she undulated her hips, still unwilling to remove her lips from his in order to talk.
Klaus picked up the non-verbal signs she was throwing out, however, and moved her underwear aside so he rub his thumb against her clit. Caroline purred into his kiss, and then pulled back, blinking at him somewhat in surprise.
“Did I just purr?” she demanded, pretty sure a sound like that had never come from her throat before.
“Perhaps… should we see if you can do it again?” He kissed his way along her jaw, and down her neck. She whimpered when he removed his hand from her underwear, and then, swear to God, a growl tore from her throat. But Klaus just chuckled against her neck, and boosted her up, so she could wrap her legs around his hips. Once she was secure, her back against the wall, his hand returned to its previous activities, and, again, Caroline purred.
It might have been embarrassing, but she was too busy feeling good to care.
He kissed his way down her neck and chest, to the top of her dress. When he seemed far too content to just tease her nipples through the top with his (entirely too talented) lips, it was Caroline who shoved the cloth down and all but ripped her bra off to allow for actual contact.
“Patience, Love,” Klaus murmured, pressing kisses around her areola, his forefinger thrusting into her, matching the far too slow movement of his thumb on her clit. “I want to savor you.”
“We are against a wall,” Caroline replied, grabbing his face, so they could make eye contact. “We could be interrupted at any time. If I wanted to be savored, I would have told you to take me to bed. Fuck me, Klaus.”
His eyes darkened, and then turned gold, and like it had that first night, the hairs on her arms rose, and she was far too aware that she was pinned to the wall by a predator far more dangerous that she was.
It made her want him even more.
Her grip in his hair was tight and rough, and their next kiss was all sharp teeth, and hard demands. Her fangs dropped, and she didn’t care if they sliced him open. She wanted them to, and the metallic tang of blood on her tongue just made her hotter, made her want more.
Another finger joined his first inside of her, and his movements became rougher. It was exactly what Caroline wanted, and she tilted her head back, leaving her neck bare to Klaus. He took the offer, those double fangs – so different from her own – sinking into the soft skin.
When he pulled back, and Caroline managed to open her eyes to look at him, his mouth was smeared with her blood, and his eyes were laser focused on her. He released his hold on her, and she was held up by the grip of her own legs, and his body pressing hers back into the wall, as he struggled with his pants, before he finally just tore his belt and the button of his jeans off in frustration.
Moments later, he finally replaced his fingers with his cock, and her grip on his hair tightened even more. It had to be painful.
She didn’t care.
The sharp edge of pain just made everything better.
Their hungry growls and pants, and the slap of skin on skin soon filled the hall. If any of the janitors did pass by, Caroline wouldn’t have known. Judging by the lack of outcry over the pile of decapitated heads, she assumed that they got lucky, and no one happened by.
Maybe they could hear their sex noises and decided not to investigate.
When she came, she released her grip on his hair to dig her fingers into his shoulders instead, and he buried his face against her neck, biting again as he quickly followed her to climax.
“Holy shit,” Caroline breathed, staring at the roof, letting Klaus continue to support her weight. “Holy shit. Vampire sex is amazing.”
“It’s technically vampire-hybrid sex… but semantics, I suppose.”
“Hybrid…” she trailed off, as Klaus used a finger to tear the skin of his own throat, and the most delicious smell filled the air. Better than two households of terrified frat boys.
It smelled like ambrosia.
And Caroline had just worked up her second appetite.
Klaus let her body slide down his, and she lapped at the wound on his neck, closing her eyes and savoring the sweet taste of his blood. Then, she dug her fangs in, and drank until his hands carefully pushed her away from him.
“There,” he murmured, his thumb running over the veins under eyes. Caroline licked her lips, and let the monster slowly drain from her, now that it had been fed in all the ways it needed. “That’s better. If I ever drink from you, blood sharing is required. I’m quite poisonous to you, you see.”
“Poisonous… you know what. Later. Right now I want the afterglow.”
She licked the blood from his neck, and let him straighten out both of their clothes.
“Where shall we go next?” he asked, pressing a nuzzling kiss beneath her ear. “I’m sure you have so much more you want to do.”
Caroline felt her lips curl into a slow, vicious smirk.
“Oh, I have an idea.”
---
Mystic Falls.
What an interesting coincidence, that the same town had birthed them both.
What perfect symmetry that they would both bathe the same town in blood.
Though, in Klaus’ day it had been a mere village.
“Rebekah has apparently found my brother Kol in her travels,” Klaus said to Caroline, as they sat in his car, observing the sleepy town. Rebekah had left them alone in the hallway outside the Dean's office, and then left entirely for Europe, searching for what she claimed were brothers with better taste. Really, she was just giving them some privacy - Klaus thought his sister might secretly approve of his soulmate, though she'd never say as much. “He’s a hellion, and half the time I want to kill him.”
“I bet I’ll like him,” Caroline replied, throwing him a quick smirk. “Let’s join them, when we’re done.”
“And when will that be?”
Caroline’s gaze focused in on a man leaving the nearby bar. He was stumbling, and Klaus bet, if they were next to him, he would reek of cheap scotch.
“In short order. That’s him.”
It was incredible, how easy it was to work with Caroline. Klaus had never been interested in hunting with another – his vampire’s lone nature seemingly outweighing the wolf’s desire for pack.
But Caroline? Caroline pleased all the parts of him, and all the parts of him wanted to hunt with her.
“What the hell?” the man – Damon, Caroline’s personal demon – asked when Klaus shoved him into an alley. “Who the hell are you, Damon?”
“He doesn’t matter, Damon,” Caroline spoke up, already awaiting them. She looked pristine and innocent, dressed in a pale blue dress and white sandals.
Klaus wanted to eat her up.
“I’m the one that matters,” Caroline continued, letting the monster leech into her eyes, until Klaus could believe her a fallen angel come to wreak divine justice on them all. “Remember me?”
He never got to answer beyond muffled screams.
When they drove away a hour later, the school had gained a much needed decoration, in the form of a makeshift pike mounted with Damon Salvatore’s head. It had been Klaus’ suggestion – a ridiculously dramatic one.
Caroline had loved it.