𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 23

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Annalise had walked back into the shack with a cup of clean water and made her way towards Elijah who was thrashing and turning relentlessly.

"Drink."

The vampire takes a small sip but immediately starts to gag and cough. The original is awfully pale and incredibly sweaty. The heretic soaked another rag to place onto his forehead.

"Forgive me. Please." Elijah gasped out. "Don't be ridiculous. You have nothing to be sorry about." Anna told him as she wiped his face.

"Are you sure you don't want to rest somewhere that isn't a swamp?" the brunette raised a brow. "It's best for me to stay away from people while in this state."

Annalise merely nodded as she rinsed a towel with cold water to place on his chest. The Mikaelson began to cough once again.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. I am sorry for stringing you into all of this."

The girl shrugged, "I don't mind."

"Anna, please. This fever will make me unstable. And once the hallucinations begin, I'll start to see things. You must leave me here." Elijah told the Martin heretic.

"You've really started to hallucinate if you think I'm going leave you like this." she scoffed.

Elijah lightly chuckled as he reached up to gently caress her wrist. It was a sudden action and it caught the heretic off guard. The vampire made soft circle movements with his thumb. Annalise felt a small smile creep onto her face.

The Martin heir continued to wipe down Elijah's forehead with a cloth when the vampire suddenly started hyperventilating but this time he left his mind open and Anna could see what exactly had crossed his mind.

The image could be seen for only a split second but it was a woman in a bathtub just as a younger version of Elijah walked in.

The scenery faded and the original gasped, "Celeste."

Anna bit her tongue to keep from saying anything, but the immortal girl was a tad jealous but due to her pride would never admit it.

"Celeste. Whoever she was, she was definitely a sight for eyes." Anna tried to lighten up the atmosphere. The woman was beautiful there was no denying that.

Elijah looked concerned and embarrassed, mostly embarrassed. "Did I let you enter my thoughts? I'm not well. I should go. This is-"

"This is fine, Elijah. You're ill and I'm taking care of you." Annalise cut him off.

And the routine continued, the brunette witch would rinse the towel clean to place on the vampire once more as she watched over him.

Elijah shivered and groaned in pain as another memory hit him. "Anna, please. This fever. My mind is flooded with these torturous memories. You have to leave."

"What is your issue? You don't like people taking care of you?"

"There are consequences for those that care. I will not have you pay that price."

"I know plenty about consequences and I don't care. I'm not leaving you here." Anna firmly spoke, she wasn't easy to persuade when she had completely made up her mind. She said she was staying and that was what she would do.

"You should not have returned."

Annalise nervously gulped, did she have to be bothered right now?

"Our blood runs through this territory."

The Martin witch tried to ignore the voices as Elijah laced their fingers for comfort.

"The blood you shed."

And it was that line, four words that brought down Anna's mental barrier for a mere half a second but it was enough time for Elijah to see a memory.

"I beg of you, don't do this. No! Please!" It was Anna she looked exactly as she did now. No more than 17, thrashing in what seemed as a concrete table with her hands bound. A few witches surrounded her as a figure came out from the shadows but the image faded before he could see who it was.

The girl quickly recomposed herself and closed off her mind once more. The scene left Elijah shocked, he had never seen that look in the girl's eyes. Her eyes said it all, the way she felt. Hopeless, lost... and scared.

"Anna."

"Don't even mention it." the heretic seethed. That was not something she wanted Elijah to see. It was the moment that defined Annalise and made her who she is today, someone who didn't trust easy and resented her emotions. She had them of course she did, she just hated the way they would make her feel grief, pain, and anger. Like a wave washing over her, and she couldn't get her head above the water in time before it would begin to drown her.

Elijah did as she asked and did not speak of it. He knew something had made the girl vulnerable in the moment. It pained him seeing such a frightful expression on the Martin girl, the tears that streamed down her eyes as she thrashed to free herself.

"Don't try looking into it." She knew Elijah was thinking of it, trying to figure out what had happened to her. But she was not ready to open up about that part of her life.

An hour had passed and Annalise was standing in front of the Bayou looking out into the water, her vamp hearing caught the scream Elijah let out. The heretic ran to the shack to see the original panting heavily.

"Elijah?"

The Mikaelson begins hallucinating that she's Klaus and grabs her in a choke-hold and pins her against the wall. "Niklaus! I'll kill you, you bastard."

Anna feels the vampire using all his strength. She may be more powerful than him but she definitely wasn't stronger. The girl raised her hand inflicting a painful migraine on him. Elijah groaned as he fell to the ground and clutched his head.

The Martin witch flicked her wrist making his neck snap with magic. She rubbed her throat as she looked down at him.

The girl groaned and lifted up his limp body and placed him back on the bed.

The sun had went down and Annalise had set up a fire outside. The girl watched the flames with intensity. She rubbed her hands together as the sound of the wood crackling filled the atmosphere.

The heretic heard a twig snap and quickly stood defensively.

"It's just me." Elijah reassured.

The brunette looked relieved, "Elijah, are you okay?"

"My neck feels fine and the fever is broken."

"That's good. Means we can finally get the hell out of here." Anna walked past the vampire going towards the car.

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Elijah and Anna pulled up to the driveway of the plantation yet sat there in the car not making any move to get out.

"Let's hope Nik is sane at the moment." the girl broke the silence.

The Mikaelson weakly smiled, "Quite the awkward little adventure, wouldn't you say? I'm sorry I tried to hurt you. I would never want that."

"It's alright, nothing I can't handle." she thought of her next words carefully, "What happened to Celeste?"

"That's not important."

"Okay, one thing is not wanting to talk about it the other is lying. I saw the way it affected you." Anna softly said. She would never push him to speak of it if he wished, she knew what it was like to have memories one wished not to revisit.

Elijah sighed and reluctantly placed his hand against Anna's temple and opens his mind to her.

Elijah rushes into the bathroom, where he finds Celeste underwater, sunk down to the bottom of the tub. Elijah desperately tries to save her by pulling her out of the water, but it's too late- she's dead. Elijah begins to sob over her lifeless body.

"It was a cruel and bloody time to be a witch, courtesy of my wonderful brother."

Annalise furrowed her brows, "She died because of Klaus?"

"She died because of me. Because I cared too deeply for her. I had allowed my brother to slip through my grasp. I loosened the reigns while Celeste consumed my every moment. I had abandoned him in the name of my own happiness. Celeste payed the price."

A quiet moment passed over the two, an awkward moment.

"Francis."

Elijah turned towards her with a confused look in his eyes, "What?"

"That was the name of first man I loved. As of today the only man I've loved so deeply." Anna stared ahead.

The vampire's lips parted in realization. "He was killed because of me. We all carry guilt and shame, but maybe we don't have to carry it alone." Anna looked over at Elijah and softly smiled.

She had never spoken to anyone about Francis, not directly. His death still pained her to this day.

"Seems neither of us have had luck in the love department." the Mikaelson teased to lighten up the mood.

Annalise laughed and it struck something in Elijah. Her smile was truly a masterpiece.

The two heard commotion going on in the house and decided to finally step in. They open the front door to see Rebekah and Klaus arguing as the hybrid held a silver dagger.

"Elijah's home. There's only one dagger. Which one of us will you be punishing today?" Rebekah spat at her brother.

"I contemplated a game of eenie-meenie-miney-moe. You betrayed me. My own sister!" Klaus shouted at her. Elijah loudly spoke up, "Niklaus, don't you dare!"

The hybrid then points the dagger at him, "Perhaps it should be you, brother! Stealing away everything I hold dear. From my best friend to my child!"

"This has nothing to do with Anna."

"It has everything to do with her! She's adored you since you've decided to implant yourself in her life. My friend who always stood by me that now stands by you! And added bonus no, doubt with the way Hayley trusts you more my child, my blood, will grow up to call you father!"

Annalise furrowed her brows, she didn't realize she was so dear to him.

"Is that what it is? You are once again worried that you will be left behind? Has history taught you nothing? We don't abandon you, Nik, you drive us away!" Rebekah shouted.

"Is that so? What have I done lately, other than cooperate? I bow down to you, brother, to make up for daggering you. For the greater good of our plan to reclaim our home. Looked the other way, sister, while you repeat the same cycle with Marcel. Falling again for a man you shouldn't be with, while he controls the empire that we built! That he took! Now, I make no excuses for past sins. But in the one moment when you two could have chosen to stand by me- to believe in me, to believe my intentions for my own child were pure... you chose to stand against me, to side with my enemies." Klaus ranted on, his voice wavering with many emotions- too many emotions.

The hybrid took a deep breath as he looked over his siblings, "I wanted our home back. Now I have it. So, I'm going to live there. And the two of you... you can stay here together and rot. Annalise can stay with whoever she likes. I don't give a damn anymore." he shoved the dagger towards Elijah as he made his way out the porch where Hayley was sitting.

"You're coming with me, little wolf."

"Why would I go anywhere with you?" she scoffed as Klaus opened the door to the car. "Because, Hayley, that child you carry is the only thing on this earth that matters to me. Now you can fight me on this, but you will lose. As will anyone else who tries to stop you getting in this car."

The pregnant werewolf softly sighed as she reluctantly got in the car.

Anna turned as they drove off. Nothing could never be let at peace.

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