"When I was human I was sent to England by my father. Banished for having a child out of wedlock. There I met Elijah and Klaus. Two of the Original vampires, though I didn't know it at the time."

Lia hummed. "The Originals. I've heard a little about them but I never paid much attention to vampires. There are so many more dangerous creatures. I'll have to do some research."

"I stayed with them for a while but it wasn't for a long time that I found out what they were planning. They needed my blood, the doppelgängers blood, to break a curse. They were going to drain me of my blood and dispose of me like I was nothing. And so I turned myself into a vampire and ran. I've been running ever since."

"And when was this?"

"1492."

Cordelia tilted her head. She hadn't been able to stop thinking about her ghost dream since it had happened. And Katherine was awfully close to Katerina. "Over 500 years. A lot can change in that time. Like names. Did you ever have a different one? Katerina, maybe?"

"Where did you hear that?"

"In my dream."

Katherine scoffed. "Yeah, right."

"You know, people have always wanted me dead. Especially the Wiccan. When I was 5 they almost succeeded. My heart stopped, I was dead, no one quite knows how I came back to life but I did. And ever since ghosts have been able to enter my dreams, talk to me or show me things."

"And what was your dream about?" She leaned forward staring into Lia's eyes. Though she was good at not showing it, Lia knew she was afraid. 500 years of life could give you a lot of enemies.

"There was a vampire in a house and he slaughtered everyone inside. Your family, I presume."

"Who ... who was showing you this?"

"I don't know. It was strange. Normally they speak to me but there was only one word. Katerina. Since I met you so soon after I figured it had to be you."

Katherine looked away and Lia let them sit in silence for a few minutes. She knew this must be hard for Kat who tried to always act stronger than everyone else. "Do you think it could one of your siblings? I assume you had them, I saw the bodies."

"They wouldn't want anything to do with me. I got them killed."

"That was 500 years ago. From my experiences being dead can change things." Kat obviously needed time to process so Lia stood up and walked towards the door. "I'm going to call and get started on that research. Make yourself at home."

◽️▫️◽️▫️◽️

Care vamped to the carnival surveying the area. She could smell the blood even from where she was but she pushed it down.

Lia was right. She was a control freak. And she was going to use that to her advantage.

She listened, tracking Damon and following his voice. She clenched her fists when she saw him, images of what he had done coming back.

She forced the thoughts back. She was Caroline Forbes and she was not weak.

Damon glanced at her, barely paying attention. "Hey Blondie, they let you out?"

She would wipe that smug smirk off his face. "I remember." He looked at her now, confused. Before he could ask anything Care continued. "I remember how you manipulated me, you pushed me around, erased my memories, fed on me, raped me."

"You're crazy." Care could tell he was nervous by his tone. Good.

"Memories have been coming back to me, in pieces." That wasn't technically true given Lia had siphoned off his compulsion as soon as she had come to town but she couldn't let him know that.

"You can't remember. It's impossible. I mean unless you're becoming a-"

Before he could finish his sentence Care vamped forward and pushed him to the ground. She pulled out a wooden dagger that she had made with Lia stabbing him in an inch from his heart.

He screamed and Caroline gave him a sadistic grin. "If you ever get near me again, I won't miss."

With that she yanked out the dagger and sped off. She knew Elena and co would show up at her house asking why she would ever do that but that was a problem for later.

◽️▫️◽️▫️◽️

Lia looked up from her book as she heard a small gasp from Katherine. "Who are you?"

Lia grinned running over to the living room. Addy was turned to her facing Kat. "Adeline Walker. But call me Addy. You must be Katherine."

"She's my friend." Lia told Kat.

"Best and only friend."

Lia rolled her eyes. "The too clever fox is back once more."

Addy grinned pulling her into a hug while Kat furled her eyebrows at the nickname. "It's a whole thing," Lia and Addy said in unison. 

The nickname came from Shadow and Bone where it was the nickname for Nikolai Lantsov due to him always being able to come out on top of every situation. And it fit well given her patronus.

"Where is the newly turned vamp control freak?"

Before Lia could respond there was a rush of wind  and Addy was thrown back into a hug. "Addy!"

"I can't believe you turned into a vampire without consulting me."

"Sorry. What was I supposed to do? Call you?"

"Just because I don't have a phone doesn't mean you can't contact me. What about the Iris Bead?"

"It was a very sudden decision. Lia was there."

"Oh, please. That makes it worse. Lia's insane, you shouldn't trust anything she says."

Lia chucked a pillow at Addy. "I'm her sister, thank you very much."

"I know, I feel bad for her. Having to deal with you her whole life. Must be exhausting."

"Says the person who spent every summer and holiday with me."

Addy smirked, sending her a wink. "I felt bad, you don't have any friends."

"Neither do you."

Care rolled her eyes. "You're both pathetic losers, we get it. Now can we move on."

Lia and Addy turned to Care with identical offended looks. Lia sat down on the couch before shrugging. "I mean, she's not wrong."

Kat sat down on the couch with a laugh. "Well you certainly provide entertainment."

Cordelia grinned, raising her eyebrows towards the others. "I know how we can make this night more entertaining."

She went into the kitchen pulling out a couple bottles of firewhiskey. "No." Care said upon seeing the bottles. "That stuff burns."

"Your tolerance has improved as a vamp, what better way to test it."

Addy smirked pouring herself a glass. "Let's do it. Life's more fun when you're a little bit drunk."

They got more than a little bit drunk. Katherine said that she couldn't get drunk so Lia bet 100 dollars that she could get her drunk.

The amount of alcohol consumed was enough to kill three grown men and made Kat a little bit tipsy. Currently they were arguing about who was better at murdering people as Badder than the Bad Boys by Peyton Shay played.

"You are all teenagers. I've killed way more people than you all. There's no way you can beat me."

"One time some witches were trying to capture and torture me because of Lia and I drowned the entire coven." Addy giggled like the memory was hilarious.

Not to be outdone Lia stood up dramatically. "While when I was 8 two witches tried to kill me and I decapitated them and sent the heads back to their family."

"I faked my death by trapping 26 vampires in a tomb and pretending I was with them causing Damon to try to save me from 150 years."

Addy pouted. "Quite diabolical and hilarious sure but you didn't even kill them. When I was sixteen the Wiccan sent a pack of werewolves after us and once we escaped them I hunted down all the witches and slaughtered them one by one."

Lia rolled her eyes. "None of you can beat me. You may have killed a lot of people but you were old. When I was two my father tried to murder me. But jokes on him cause I killed him instead." She started cackling like a hyena at her words while Addy slapped her.

"You always use that but it doesn't count. You didn't ever know what you were doing."

"I still did it."

Caroline groaned. "I never thought I'd feel so left out because I'm not a mass murderer."

Addy smiled. "Don't worry Care-Bear you'll get there someday. I believe in you."

Lia pushed her off the couch. "No. She's my sister, I must protect her innocence."

"You know I'm older than you, right?"

"Yeah well my innocence was destroyed when I was five and decided to read Shakespeare. Oh and all the people trying to kill me I s'pose."

"Yeah well because of you people have tried to kill me too so don't act like my life is so great."

"Touché. You know what we should do. We should practice fighting with knives."

"I think you had a little bit too much liquid courage."

Addy shook her head. "I think it's a great idea." She grabbed Kat and dragged her into the weapons room. Lia and Care followed behind.

Lia grabbed a throwing knife tossing it in her hand. "Catch." She chucked it at Kat who grabbed it with quick reflexes and threw it back.

Addy caught it using magic and smirked. "We should have a competition. Witches vs Vamps. Don't get stabbed."

They all must have had a bit too much alcohol because they agreed to it and it turned into a full flung battle. Lia would throw a knife and Kat or Care would catch it and throw it back. One of the witches would toss it back with their magic and so on. At one point Lia thought they had at least 5 knives in the air and the same time.

She didn't know when she fell asleep but she must have because she found herself waking up on her couch.

She looked around but there was no one else there. Cordelia groaned. She wasn't awake, in fact it was the opposite.

She waited for the ghost to show themselves and finally a young girl who couldn't be much older than 7 walked into the room and jumped onto the couch. She had brown hair the same shade as Katherine and light blue eyes.

"I assume you're one of Katherine's siblings."

"Her youngest. Evangeliya Petrova. But you can call me Eva."

Before Lia could respond she felt another person enter her head. That was unusual. She never had two visitors in one night.

Another girl, this one around 10-12 came into the room. "Eva."

Eva leapt up tackling the new ghost in a hug. "Vic."

Lia sighed. Now she had two of Kat's siblings invading her head. This girl had darker hair and brown eyes and she held herself in a very Katherine way.

"What are you doing here?" Eva asked.

"Well I realized you must have entered her head yesterday and I thought maybe I could find you here. It's been too long."

She turned to Lia. "Viktoriya Petrova."

"Cordelia Forbes, though you already know that. Is there a particular reason you wanted to talk to me?"

Eva started to pace back and forth. "I wanted to thank you. I know Katerina isn't the nicest and she can be hard to be around but she's a good person, really. She's just been alone for far too long."

"Well I find your sister quite fun to be around. She's clever and anyone who can keep up with me in wit is a delight to be around."

Viktoriya smiled. "Tell her that we love her. And that our deaths were not her fault."

"Of course. Now if you could leave my mind it would be appreciated. I don't actually get any sleep with you in here and I already didn't get sleep last night."

They nodded but neither looked eager to leave each other. They whispered a few things to each other in Bulgarian and Lia sighed. "I'm going to regret this."

"Once a week you can enter my mind and talk."

The sisters gave her identical grins. "Really."

"Yeah. Yeah. Whatever. Just leave."

"Of course." Their presence faded and Cordelia finally faded into much needed sleep.