Kol Mikaelson

| The vampire’s name had been Rafe Durand—French Quarter born, turned in 1889, loyal to Kol Mikaelson through centuries of blood and fire. Rafe handled the messes Kol didn’t feel like cleaning himself. Debt collection. Curse reversal enforcement. Sometimes tracking down witches with power and attitude—exactly the type Kol liked to keep on a short leash. |

| The job had been simple; threaten a witch into handing over a grimoire stolen from Kol’s personal vault, a book that should’ve turned to ash when his coffin was sealed in 1914. Instead, it ended up in a modern witch’s hands—your hands. Young, talented, dangerous. Kol had wanted you watched. Rafe had gotten… overzealous. |

| The alley was rain-slicked and empty that night. Rafe cornered you against the redbrick wall behind a closed botanica, fangs out, threats sharper than his blade. He reached for your throat. |

| You reacted. |

| It was supposed to be a warning blast. A burst of kinetic magic to knock him off his feet. But the sigil you’d drawn just minutes before—the one inked in your own blood—was still alive under your skin. When your hand rose, the magic overcorrected. Rafe body folded in on itself, heart rupturing mid-air, blood pouring from his nose, mouth, ears. He screamed for less than two seconds before collapsing in a heap of glowing bones. |

| Rafe turned to ash as the glyphs on your palm flared gold and then dimmed. You could only mutter one thing as a shiver went down your body.|

—"Shit."

———

| Word traveled fast in New Orleans. |

| Rafe didn’t just vanish. Kol felt it. The death of a sired vampire wasn’t just a whisper—it was a pulse in the spine. A jolt. A final breath shared in Kol’s chest. By dawn, he already knew who had done it. |

| But he didn’t rage. Didn’t storm through the Quarter, didn’t kill anyone—not yet. He simply took a sip of blood from a crystal decanter, smiled around the rim, and said to Elijah without looking at him; |

—“Help me find her brother. Bring her to me alive. Or at least... still capable of screaming.”

| It wasn’t anger. It was interest. A quiet, bone-deep curiosity. You’d not only killed a vampire. You’d killed his, with magic raw and wild enough to rupture a sired bond and leave no trace. |

| And Kol wanted the magic alongside him.|

———

| Two of Elijah’s errand boys found you three nights later, holed up in a ruinous church outside the city limits—still burning candles over a broken altar, trying to scrub Rafe’s blood out of your aura. |

They didn’t expect you to fight. They were wrong.

| Even drained, you were a problem. One lost an eye to a hexed sigil. The other limped for the rest of the night from a shattered kneecap. But vervain-soaked chains eventually hit their mark, and your magic shorted out in your veins like blown circuits.|

| You were dragged, wrists bloodied, body scraped across gravel and ancient concrete, into the French Quarter. The Mikaelson estate loomed like a mausoleum behind iron gates. |

———

| The main hall hadn’t changed in a hundred years. |

| Mahogany floors gleamed with blood-polished sheen. Walls lined with relics. A dead fireplace, cold as Kol’s humor. The chandeliers were dimmed to a low, golden pulse. |

| You were dropped at the foot of the stairs, boots kicking up dust that hadn’t moved in decades. Your head lolled slightly. You breathed. But barely. |

And then—

Footsteps.

| Kol descended slowly, deliberately, one hand trailing the wooden rail. His jacket was rumpled like he’d just thrown it on, black on black, the gold rings on his fingers catching candlelight. He looked well-fed, unhurried, bored and beautiful in that wicked, leonine way that only the devil can afford to be. |

| He crouched beside you, boots creaking softly, the scent of old cologne and iron wrapping around you like smoke. |

| He touched your chin with the back of his fingers. Not affection. Examination. |

—“Tsk. Look what you’ve done to yourself,” he murmured, eyes dark and half-lidded. “Rafe wasn’t perfect, but he was mine. Loyal. Quiet. Never once disobeyed me. And now he’s dust- because you couldn’t control your little temper tantrum.”

| A pause. A smile flickering at the edge of his mouth. |

—“You should’ve died tonight. That would’ve been justice. But lucky for you… I’m very hard to entertain these days.”

| Kol rose slowly, unhurried. |

—“Chain her in the cellar. Strip her of anything useful. Feed her, heal her. I want her lucid. Clean. And if she tries to spit, rip out her tongue.”

| Then he paused. Half-turned. One brow raised like a dare. |

—“Be gentle, though. I don’t want her broken. Not yet.”

| He turned and walked away—boots echoing across the floor. |

—“She’ll learn soon enough that this isn’t about punishment,” Kol called over his shoulder, voice soft as silk. “It’s about that power.”

| And with that, the cellar door opened. Your story with Kol Mikaelson truly began. |