We decided that we would wake the heretics the next day inside of the house. Since Henrik had turned and still did own the house, anyone could enter. They all looked so sad, sitting in dessication. I had been the one to wake them from their eternal slumber. I waited and waited for the blood to finally make their system react and wake them up.

Around noon, the first heretic woke up. The girl had curly brown hair and a bratty look on her face. She gasped as she awoke, the blood finally kicking in. She looks at me and then at the room where she sees the rest of her heretic family with blood on their mouths.

"Who the hell are you?" She questions, moving towards a blonde girl.

"My name is Astrid Mikaelson. I promise, I am not here to hurt you. My mate and I got you and the other heretics out of the prison world," I explain. She bends down to the blonde woman. "What is your name?"

"Nora, my name is Nora," She says blankly at the girl before whipping her head to me again, "How did you get us out? More importantly, why did you get us out?"

Her being reactive and angry was something that I had suspected. After being trapped in such a cruel prison for so long, I would not expect for her to trust me right away. She had been treated horribly and would need a long time to heal, just as I had.

"Well, I think the Gemini made a mistake imprisoning you all," She looks confused. I sigh. "Look, Nora, I get that you don't trust me. I doubt that you trust anyone but your family. I just need you to understand that nobody in this house is going to try and hurt you. I would dagger any one of my siblings who even had the thought of hurting a heretic. My family knows how much getting you out meant to me."

"Dagger? Wait!" She put her finger up before asking, "Why the hell do you care about heretics anyways? Only a witch could get us out of that prison and no witch would even dare."

"I look out for my own," I state. She looks relieved. The girl that she held started to wake. "Look like she's waking. I hope that everyone here knows that they can't hurt me."

"Are you- Are you one of us?" Nora asks, wanting desperately for the answer to be yes. "Are you a heretic like us?"

"Who do you think was the person who coined the phrase heretic?" I laughed. It had been so long since I had originally been called that. The Original with magic, magic that she stole from supernatural entities. I truly was the Original abomination of magic and nature. "Who is she?"

"Mary Louise!" She touches the girl's face as she wakes from her hungry slumber. "Mary Lou, we're safe. We're out! Somebody came for us! Mar!"

The girl opens her eyes at once and looks at her covenmate. At this point, I was pretty sure that they were in love. Oh, how they would be happy to hear that they could be openly together in this century. In the past, my female lovers and I would have to sneak around and act like really good friends. It was a crying shame, Nik always liked my female lovers.

"Nora," She gets up and kisses Nora straight on the mouth. Ok, so they are together. All good, we'll get them a shared room. "Where are we?"

Nora looks to me, not really knowing herself where she was. I laugh at the two. "Mikaelson family residence. You two will be safe up in your own rooms. Make sure not to feed on Jeremy, the resident human. Henrik seems very fond of him," I wink at the two.

"Wait, Jeremy is a boy's name. Henrik is a boy's name," Mary Lou, or Mar, tried to piece together what I was insinuating. I laughed again at the two who looked very confused.

"I think that my brother and Jeremy are cute together. Yes, two boys. It doesn't matter very much anymore, ladies. Be free and homosexual all you want. Some may still stare and whisper in disgust, but it's not banned anymore. I think that in the next few years they may even let you two get married if you so wish. I mean, I've personally had a few female lovers. I don't have a preference. Although, my mates are both men," I inform the two. Mary Lou almost looked like she was going to cry at the knowledge that her and her lover would be able to be together.

I took a sniff and realized that not only were they lovers, they were mates.

"I see you two are a mated pair. We can wait for everyone to get up-" My sentence was cut off by a woman waking, opening her eyes to the three of us.

"Val," Nora rushed over to the girl. "Get up, you dumbass."

The girl, Val, looked very frightened by the scene. I sighed and put my hands up as a sign of peace. "Val, I promise, I'm not going to hurt you. My mate and I broke you out of that damn prison world. Fucking awful place, it seemed like. Anyways, I'm a siphoner as well as an Original Vampire, so I'm kinda the OG Heretic."

"An Original? I thought you said you were a Mikaelson?" Mary Lou looked unimpressed by the idea that I was indeed an Original. I couldn't blame her, Nik seems scary to everyone and I doubted that many good stories had been spread about our family.

"I am a Mikaelson. The Mikaelsons are the Originals. Sons and daughters of Mikael, the Original hunter. I killed him a few months ago, so you don't have anything to worry about. My family isn't as bad as everyone makes them out to be. We're powerful, but we aren't some malevolent force to be reckoned with. We mostly protect our own. Since you guys are like me, you are invited into the family. That is, if you wanted to live here and be with a family. We can protect you against the Gemini coven, which we know has made at least 2 prison worlds. One for the 1900s, and one for the 1990s," I explain and offer them.

While Nik had been opposed to the idea, at first claiming that adopting a bunch of people in such a short amount of time would be risky, he softened up once I told him about what usually happens to siphoners when they are found out. It was usually death or torture. For me, it had been both.

"The Original Heretic does have a nice ring to it, doesn't it?" Damon waltzes in the room. "My name's Damon. This is the Salvatore boarding house."

The blondish girl, Val, had tensed up when Damon said the name Salvatore. Either she knew Lily's last name or she knew the family from before she turned. Honestly, it could be both knowing that bitch Lily.

"You wouldn't happen to be related to Stefan Salvatore, would you?" Val asks Damon, who perks up.

"Baby brother and my angel's second mate," Damon smirks. I frown.

"I found him first, Damon, you're the second mate," I remind him. Damon laughs and speeds over to me, kissing my lips sweetly. "Second is said to be the best, though."

"Ooh, don't let Stefan hear you say that, angel, or he'll try and prove himself and get all broody and overdramatic. Wait till he flips all of his hero hair. Anyways, what are your names? I need them so I can pick out nicknames," Damon asks the group.

"I'm Mary Louise and this is my mate Nora. Val is the only other one of us up right now. Oscar is next to Beau and Malcolm is by the window," Mary Lou introduces herself. "I'm glad that your mate helped us out. We will be eternally grateful."

"None of that, Mary Lou, you're practically one of us. I am grateful that you are here and that you are reunited with your mate instead of desiccating in that old house," Mary Lou looks sad as I bring up that house. "Hey, remember that nothing can get you while you are with the Mikaelsons. I am willing to promise you Always and Forever if you choose to stay. Even if you don't want to stay, you will always be on good terms with me. That is, if you don't attack my family," I warn in a playful tone. She smiles and nods.

"Can we stay, Nora?" Mary Lou asks her mate. "I think this Always and Forever business sounds good."

"We decide as a family, remember? We will stay with the Mikaelsons for now and decide together when our brothers wake," Nora tells her mate before turning to me and asking, "Where is Lily? She is our leader."

I sigh, knowing that this was going to happen. Damon growls and leaves the room. I walk over and put my hand on Mary Lou's shoulder and explain, "I don't think it would be good for Lily to join us due to what she did to my mates. I don't know if you know this, but Lily is my mate's mother. She left them alone with an abusive father while she went off with all of you. Damon does not blame any of you for what she did, but he is hurt. Most of his life he has thought his mother was dead and had made peace. Knowing that she formed a new family makes him feel abandoned, which he was. It was wrong what Lily did."

"She left her own son for us?" Mary Lou asks. I nod. She shakes her head, holding Nora's hand. "Why would she leave her own children? If I had children, I would never leave them. Knowing what happened to me-" she cracks, tears forming in her eyes. Her mate tries to calm her, kissing her head.

"It's okay, you don't have to tell me your story right now. Just know that you will be safe here. Nobody can hurt you. No witches or vampires would dare mess with the Originals. If they do, they end up dead and I gain some more magic," I comfort her.

Things were going to get much more complicated.