AU: Klaus and Caroline are engaged and soon to be married. All their friends support their happiness, but Elena has difficulty trusting in Klaus's intentions. She hates Klaus with a passion. Little does she know that her hate is just as strong as he...
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His heart constricted in his chest as he stared into Elena's rich brown eyes. How was it possible to see his beloved through the eyes of the woman who was promised to his brother? She looked so broken and vulnerable, so utterly at his mercy... convinced that he was still the same monster she'd known centuries ago. But he wasn't. Elijah had locked that part of him away after he'd lost Tatia, never to open that door again. He was a changed man, though she couldn't possibly have known that.
"How..." he fumbled to find the right words. The shock of this sudden revelation had possessed the moment entirely.
"Please don't punish me!" Tatia cried out. "Please, Master! Not the dungeon... please!" Tears filled her eyes and spilled to the floor as he held her face and felt his heart shatter to pieces. She was terrified, trembling in his embrace as he pulled her to his chest. She continued to beg for mercy to a man who had no desire to inflict the same pain he'd once inflicted on her-so remorselessly, sadistically.
"Niklaus... he took me! I never invited his affections! I... I d-don't understand how I... his b-bed..." She shook her head and sobbed even harder. "I disobeyed you, Master. It doesn't matter how I found myself in his bed. I deserve to be punished. I deserve it. I deserve it. I deserve it..." She ripped herself away from Elijah's arms and rocked back and forth.
He had damaged her. The evidence of everything he'd done to her fragile mind was right in front of him, mocking him. Elijah had no choice but to confront a phantom he'd thought he killed and buried; it had returned to haunt him. Perhaps this was his punishment, he thought. After all these years, the guilt had not been enough. Fate required another price for atonement: to return the woman he'd sadistically loved, broken beyond repair.
How could he possibly reach her mind now and undo all that damage? The Original pushed back his tears and reached for her hand. She recoiled from him as if he had an infectious disease.
"Master, what are you doing? I disobeyed you! I don't deserve your kindness!"
She pushed herself backwards until her back hit a wall, in which she continued her ritualistic rocking.
A broken beauty, Elijah thought to himself. Seeing her like this was like a dagger to his heart. Then again... what if it was merely dark sorcery at work? He knew he wasn't going to get any rational answers from Tatia in that moment. He had to wake his brother.
Elijah was fully aware of his long list of enemies, but he never thought someone would target him like this. He never thought anyone was capable of resurrecting his beloved. There were two victims in this situation: Elena and Tatia.
"Tatia," he breathed her name as softly as a lullaby, but she was unresponsive to his warmth.
As he approached closer, footsteps came down the stairs, demanding the Original's attention.
Freya and Klaus reached the bottom of the stairwell in concern and confusion.
"What's happened?" Klaus immediately gravitated to the woman he loved, pained by the sight of seeing her crying and rocking herself to oblivion.
"Niklaus-" Elijah said, immediately cutting himself off when he realized that he'd been too late.
Tatia had become even more hysterical as soon as Klaus crouched to the floor and touched her shoulders.
"Don't touch me! Don't ever touch me! Never! Never!" she screamed in that same accented vernacular.
Horror washed over Klaus's face as he rose to his feet and met his brother's sympathetic eyes.
"Why is she talking like this? I demand to know what's going on!"
Freya looked at her brother and waited for an explanation.
"It looks like Elena... walks like Elena... but it's not Elena." He paused and switched his gaze back to the shadow of his former lover. "Tatia... somehow... she's managed to possess Elena's body. There's no other explanation. I'm just as confused as the rest of you."
The siblings looked at the broken young woman who kept muttering "bad...punished..." over again like a mental patient.
"How the fuck did this happen!?" Klaus roared. His angry outburst only frightened Tatia more as she cried and hid her head in her arms, afraid that he would harm her the same way "Master" had done.
"Lower your voice, Brother," Elijah sternly said.
Freya decided to finally speak. "She's clearly suffering from some sort of post-traumatic stress." The Mikaelson witch carefully approached Tatia and tried to break through her haze of dementia. "You're okay." Freya smiled warmly. "You're safe. Please don't cry. Can you tell me your name?"
Tatia seemed hesitant, but was finally calm enough to utter, "My name belongs to Master. Master owns my name. Master owns me. I belong to Master."
"Bloody fucking Hell!" Klaus cursed in frustration. "What sort of madness is this? She has no business violating Elena's body and mind." Seething anger radiated off him as he approached his sister. "I want her back, Freya. Do you understand me? Exorcise this evil demon! She has no business rising from the dead only to inflict misery on my family once again!"
It hurt Elijah to hear the contempt in his brother's voice. Tatia was merely a victim of his own mind games; an innocent young woman who fell in love with the wrong man-a monster.
Freya tried her best to convince Tatia to follow her so that she can take her to one of the parlors in their home, but Tatia refused.
"Master must punish me." She sobbed, looking at Elijah for absolution. "I disobeyed him and he must punish me. It's the only way Master will forgive me."
Freya's glittering green eyes were on Elijah now. "What is she talking about?"
"Clearly you've skipped through some crucial years in your timeline, Elijah," Klaus stated. "Well, allow me to catch her up. This broken ghost of a woman is none other than Tatia Petrova-a doppelganger, formerly known as our brother's play-thing. I must say, dear brother, that I never knew the extent of your need for control until now. Killing her was an act of mercy."
"Enough!" Elijah scowled, controlling his fury. "I will not allow you to berate me for the sins of my past. I am not that man anymore and you know it. I can never atone for my transgressions, but your insults will not fix the situation at hand. Her mind is broken-I'm well aware of that. I've never been ignorant to the fact that I broke her."
"I don't give a fuck about the ghosts of your past!" Klaus strode toward Tatia again and began to shake her. "Elena! Come back to me, love!"
His frantic efforts only terrified Tatia more as she cried inconsolably, begging to be left alone. Freya finally intervened and gently eased her brother back. "Klaus, this isn't helping. Elena's gone, but I will get to the bottom of this and fix it. Only dark magic can resurrect those who have passed on. Whoever has done this is certainly a witch or a warlock."
Klaus tried to move past his sister to try and get through to Elena again, but Tatia diverted his efforts and crawled toward Elijah. She sat on her knees and brought her wrists together, raising them. "Please, Master! Please just take me to the dungeon and get it over with. Please, I want my chains! I promise I will obey! I promise, Master!"
Klaus sneered at the disgusting display. The woman he loved would never crawl to him-to anyone. Elena was the definition of obstinate. As much as it frustrated him, he also loved that about her. It hurt him to see her groveling at his brother's feet, begging for punishment. It was so out of character... it wasn't Elena.
"Tatia, please," Elijah said, trying to pull her up. But she was becoming more delusional by the second. Before he could ask his sister for help, she waved her hand and chanted something in Latin...and just like that, Tatia was knocked out.
"Don't worry, she's fine," Freya assured. "It'll just be easier to move her now to a safe place. I'm not sure why or how this has happened, but I'll have it sorted out in no time." She placed a comforting hand on Klaus's shoulder and avoided Elijah's gaze.
