3rd Person POV
Triora, Italy

The location of the last witch trials of Italy, known as 'The Salem of Europe' and Kaitlyn was here. The place she had caught a glimpse of her lover in. She wondered why he was after witches, let alone some of the most ancient ones.

On the third hour of looking around all the old buildings in the crooks and crevices of the town, she finally found a trail of blood leading her to a half-broken building at the end of the town border, overlooking France. France. Paris. Her thoughts trail off to their engagement in Paris before she gets snapped out of her thoughts by the loud yells echoing from inside.

As she walks into the establishment, her hearts begins to pound loudly against her ribcage, threatening to burst out. She was going to see him. This time it wasn't a vision. He was real and so was she. Being face to face with each other for the first time in two years.

"Live wasn't kind to you," she hears Klaus' villain-voice echo through the halls, "I was kind enough to grant you the peace that death might have to offer you."

As soon as she catches a glimpse of his, leaning against a pillar, talking to a dead body, she speeds towards him and holds him against a wall with her hand wrapped around his neck.

"Why don't you pick someone your own size for once?" she smirks at him as he stares at her in shock for a second before quickly recovering from it.

"Hello, love,"  he greets back as Kaitlyn releases him, "to what do I owe this pleasure?"

"Might be pleasure for you," Kaitlyn scoffs, "it's an obligation for me."

"Oh really? So you're not here for yourself?" Klaus asks with a raised brow, "here to see me cause you miss me?"

"No," Kaitlyn replies bluntly as Klaus' face falls for a second before he puts up his unaffected face again, "I refuse to miss the guy who promised me 'forever' twice and left with a week on that, twice."

"Well then, what is this obligation?" he questions.

"Hope," she says as Klaus falters again, "you know, our daughter? The one who spent her birthday crying for her father yesterday? The one who's graduating in a few months and all she wants is for her father to be there, or at least call and tell her how proud he is of her? You remember her?" she quizzes, trying to rile him up.

"Of course I remember her!" Klaus snarls, "she's the reason I am here!"

This time, it's Kaitlyn's turn to falter. Of course, she had guessed that his disappearance had something to do with Hope but to hear him confirm it was like all her worst fears were coming true.

She nearly lost Ryan once when Chris passed away, two years ago she nearly lost the twins and now...she could be losing her own daughter. 'How did her life get to this,' she wondered to herself.

"Wh-what did you say?" she asks in a fearful voice as Klaus realizes what he had said.

"Nothing," he dismisses while changing the topic, "how did you find me?"

"It doesn't take a lot to find you when someone knows you. That's why Eli's gotten so close to finding you so many times," she retorts as Klaus smirks at her.

"Yet he's never found me like you did. So, you've studied my old tricks," he responds.

"Oh please," Kaitlyn scoffs, "I had four kids to raise, along with having to deal with both my family and yours. I barely had time to even think of you," she lies. And he can tell. Although that doesn't mean it hurts any less to hear the words coming out of her mouth, or the rough exterior she has put on before him. He could tell she was hurting as much as he was but it was as though there was this wall between them that stopped them from being close, even when they stood just a few inches apart.

"Yet you're still wearing the ring I got you," he points out in a monotone voice.

"Because I don't give up on my people," she replies, "so tell me, now! What's wrong with Hope? What did you mean by she's why you're here?"

Klaus averts her eyes, turning around and settling down on a couch as Kaitlyn speaks again, "Klaus, tell me! She's my daughter too, I deserve to know."

"What did you call me?" he asks with an alarmed look on his face.

"Huh?"

"Did you call me Klaus?" he asks again as she shrugs.

"It's your name," she responds in a carless manner, although she knew what he was trying to point out.

"Not to you, never was to you. Even when you hated me, you never called me Klaus," he says before getting up and walking closer to her. As he goes to reach out for her hand she moves back and crosses her arms over her chest, glaring at him.

"You're covered head to toe in someone else's blood, don't touch me right now," she states as Klaus feels his heart drop to his stomach. Of course she was being hostile towards him. He left her, without notice, again. He promised 'forever' and disappeared, again. Except this time, he had more promises to uphold than last time and he still left, leaving behind Kaitlyn with the burden of carrying all those promises by herself for the past two years.

"I...I can't tell you," he replies, trying to fight the overwhelming feeling to just reach out to her and hug her, kiss her, love her and tell her he didn't want to leave her. That he didn't have a choice. That he would give anything to go back home with her. But he knew he couldn't and so, he'd have to do the one thing he did best-  push his loved ones away before they hurt him or ended up getting caught in the crossfire.

"What do you mean by you can't tell me? She's my daughter, Klaus!" she yells out in frustration.

"Is she?" he yells back as Kaitlyn wears a flustered look on her face, "is she really your daughter? Where were you when she was going to die the same day she was born, when she had to live with a parents' love for so many months on end, when Esther tried to end her, when Dahlia tried to take her away, when the Hollow nearly killed her? Huh, where were you then?! It was me, Hayley and my family who went through hell to protect her while you were having fun in Mystic Falls with your little lover."

Kaitlyn stares at him awe, being unable to comprehend his words. Was this real? Did he really just say that? How could he?

"How.dare.you?"  Kaitlyn whispers, "how dare you?"

"Am I wrong? Didn't Kol tell you about everything that was happening in New Orleans and yet you weren't there, were you? Didn't you even once feel like reaching out and helping the people you'd so proudly call 'family' once?" Klaus asks rhetorically as anger overtakes Kaitlyn. In one swift movement, Kaitlyn tackles Klaus, straddling him while holding a wooden stake over his heart, one that she always carried with herself.

"Which family are you talking about, Klaus? The one that left me when I needed them the most? The one that never bothered to check on me even years later? Yes, Kol told me everything but you know when he did that? He did that after I came back from the dead to hear I lost my fiancé as well as my best friend and that now I was one of those blood-sucking 'abominations' now. The next thing I knew, I handed my kids over to Caroline, told her to watch them and I asked Kol to take me to you all when he told me you were all in some mystical sleep that no one could break and that he somehow survived because of a protection spell Davina had placed on him a long time ago.

"As for Hope, she is as much mine as she is Hayley's. Just like the twins are as much Jo's as they are mine, whether she birthed and raised them or not. I was fighting for my life here, Klaus. Fighting against travelers, a crazy sociopath, literal devils and whatnot. Oh, let's not forget Rayna, didn't Stefan visit you back then? He wouldn't admit it but I knew he was there. You had one kid and all of the oldest supernatural entities back you up, Klaus. While I had three kids and the most powerful villains trying to take our lives, so...I'm sorry I didn't show up and clean your mess while leaving behind my own.

"Let me tell you this once and once only, do.not.ever.drag.my.kids.into.this! I love them and I'd die for them...I have once and I'd do it again. And my kids include Hope now, so stop riling me up the way you're trying. Do not blame it on me or I will put this white oak through your heart," she threatens before getting up and brushing off the dust form her skirt as Klaus stands up in front of her too.

"I can't tell you," Klaus repeats again as Kaitlyn rolls her eyes at him, "because telling you, or anyone would put Hope in more danger,' he adds as her face falls.

"What? How? Is everything knows, we can find a solution quicker," she points out as Klaus shakes his head 'no'.

"It's a curse and the more people know about it, the more it affects Hope. That's all I can tell you," he informs her.

"But...how do I help if I don't know what's wrong?"

"You don't help, you stay out of this," he tells her, "go home and keep our daughter safe while I handle this."

"Handle what? You're just going on killing sprees and all they're telling you is that they don't know anything, that they didn't trigger this curse," Kaitlyn says as Klaus raises his brow at her, "don't ask me how I know, I just do. I need to know what we're up against."

"And risk endangering Hope? No, thank you," Klaus retorts as Kaitlyn sighs, being torn between what decision to make now.

"Okay fine, don't tell me. Who are you going to kill next?" she asks as Klaus looks at her suspiciously, "I just want to help our daughter like you do, no bad intentions, I swear."

"Just go back home, Rose."

"No, Nik. I'm not going back without you. Your daughter has been a wreck for the past two years because she wants her dad with her, so let's just speed this up, kill these people at double the speed and get it over with," she retorts.

"Some on these could be innocent people," he points out, knowing she hated to hurt anyone unless she absolutely had to.

"Not innocent if they're putting my baby in danger's ways," she fires back as Klaus sighs, knowing there was no way to change her mind now.

"Follow me, then," he says as the lovers embark on their journey to find answers and get brutal, if needed, as long as it meant protecting their child.

༆☼︎☾︎ꨄ︎☽︎☼︎༆
Paroldo, Italy

"We need to find her, Gideon," Bellatrix says anxiously, "we need answers. I...I need to know why Matilda has been lying to us for all these years now when she knew who Kaitlyn was all along."

"She might still be here. We could try to spread the around and see if we find her?" Gideon suggests.

"What if Mathilda finds out?" Bellatrix asks in a paranoid tone, "she's bound to find out, she always does."

"Bella, you need to trust me on this, okay?" Gideon assures, "you stay here and keep Mathilda busy, I will find her and I will talk with her, see how much she knows about who she is. I will come back with news, I promise."

Bellatrix nods hesitantly, placing a chaste kiss on Gideon's lips before walking back into the main room to keep Supreme Mathilda and Alatar distracted while Gideon looked for Kaitlyn.

༆☼︎☾︎ꨄ︎☽︎☼︎༆
Triora, Italy

"Where is this hovel we're looking for?" Kaitlyn whines yet again as Klaus rolls his eyes at her.

"If I knew where it was, I wouldn't have been looking for it, love," Klaus retorts as Kaitlyn glares at him.

"You know, I'm getting major flashbacks from when you dragged me and Stef to the Smoky Mountains to find Ray's werewolf friends," Kaitlyn reminisces as a smile creeps up on Klaus' face.

"Ah yes, the good old day," he says as Kaitlyn nods.

"Everything was a mess but things were still better then. At least I didn't have to live with the failure of not being able to protect my own children," she sighs, "oh and, I don't know if you know but...Stefan's back."

At this, Klaus stops dead in his footsteps, staring at Kaitlyn with wide eyes as if she had grown two heads.

"Wh-what? Back as in?" he quizzes.

"As in, back. Back for good. My mother cast a spell on the Supernatural Plane to make it happen. Stef and Care even renewed their wedding vows a few months afterwards," Kaitlyn informs him as he tries to process the news, slowly beginning to walk again.

"What else did I miss?" Klaus whispers then, knowing that a lot of things must've changed over the past two years. His family had gone through many things that he wasn't there to experience with them.

"A lot but also not a lot. Ryan graduated and lives in NYC now, with Madeline, of course. Bekah and Marcel are still in Paris, Kol and Davina are thinking of adopting and Freya met someone," she tells him as he nods.

"They sound happy."

"They are...but that doesn't mean they don't miss you, Nik. Because they do. Every event, every family dinner- no one mentions it out loud but deep down everyone's thinking of the empty chairs on the table. You, Elijah...Hayley," she mumbles.

Klaus sighs in sadness before their destination catches his sight, "we're here. Maybe you should wait outside," he suggests as Kaitlyn glares at him before walking ahead and into the building, leaving his to catch with her with his vamp-speed.

༆☼︎☾︎ꨄ︎☽︎☼︎༆
Salvatore Boarding House, Mystic Falls

"Hope, are you sure we should be doing this?" Josie asks frantically as they set up a spell in Hope's dorm room.

"I need to know where mom is, Jo," Hope responds as Lizzie nods before adding, "besides, they're all keeping a secret from us, can't you tell? Even Ryan knows something we don't, and I don't think it's fair to us that they hide stuff from us all the time."

"Maybe we should just try asking Ryan," Josie suggests as Lizzie scoffs.

"Like he'd ever tell us," she retorts, "look, it's a safe spell. We're going to be alright and if anything, this is good practice for us."

With a sigh, Josie nods as the twins sit on either side of Hope and begin siphoning from her, all chanting a projectile spell that could help them see where Kaitlyn was, without being seen themselves. The twins had gotten some of Kaitlyn's blood from the infirmary and used it to make the spell stronger.

They notice their sights getting blurry as darkness engulfs them before they find themselves in an unknown location. They can hear familiar voices down the hallway as they walk towards the source of the sound.

What they see shocks them. There were two bodies on the ground, dead. Klaus had his arm wrapped around a man's neck while Kaitlyn had her foot place over a man's chest, as both of them lay whimpering under their grips.

"Look dear, the sooner you tell us, the better for you," Kaitlyn shrugs.

"Better for you as in, the lesser painful death," Klaus smirks as the man's eyes widen in fear.

"I...I swear, I don't know what you're talking about. None of us activated the spell, it wasn't us!" the man yelps.

"That's what everyone's been saying," Klaus spat.

"But someone must've activated the curse. If it wasn't any of you then who was it?" Kaitlyn asked through gritted teeth.

"It wasn't us! Please, I have a small daughter, please she already lost her mother a long time ago, please don't take her father away too," the man pleads.

"Then tell us what you know!" Klaus growls again.

"I don't know anything!"

"Then you're of no use to us," Klaus says before plunging his other hand into the man's chest, "maybe you'll remember what you know if I pull your heart out of your chest?"

"Nik, stop it," Kaitlyn warns, "let him go."

"What?" Klaus asks in a flustered tone, "let him go?"

"Yes, let him go. I don't think he's lying."

"Of course he's lying!" Klaus yells while tightening his grip on the man's throat.

"Nik! Let him go!" Kaitlyn exclaims while vamp-speeding to him and pushing him off of the man.

"What are you doing?" Klaus growls in anger, "we need answers and your sympathy will only get in the way! I was doing fine by myself, if you're going to stick around, you have to do this my way. Or every second you spent being sympathetic, our daughter suffers!"

At this, Hope, Josie and Lizzie gasp. 'Daughter suffers'? Were they talking about Hope?

"Wh-what are they talking about?" Josie whispers.

"And why are they doing this?" Lizzie quizzes while motioning at the bodies and whimpering men on the ground with blood spilled across the floor. Blood dripped from Klaus' hands and blood covered both Klaus and Kaitlyn's clothes.

Before they can deduce the matter, Kaitlyn and Klaus' bickering it interrupted by another voice echoing through the hollow room.

"I see you've found him," the voice speaks.

Kaitlyn and Klaus immediately turn around to find the source of the voice, only to come face-to-face with Gideon, the new 'friend' Kaitlyn had made.

"And I see you've found me," Kaitlyn smiles, "I thought your coven doesn't 'get involved in external matters'?"

"They don't," Gideon agrees, "but I'm not my coven. So, here I am. I need to have a word with you, alone."

"And who might you be?" Klaus chimes in, wondering how this man knew Kaitlyn and why he wanted to talk to her alone.

"Nik, this is Gideon," Kaitlyn introduces, "he's the one who helped me figure out how to find you. Thank you for that," she thanks Gideon as he nods in acknowledgement.

"What did you need to talk to me about?" Kaitlyn inquires in confusion, not knowing what he could possibly want with her.

"It's best if we speak alone," he states while looking at Klaus, who was already glaring at him.

Klaus reaches out to tightly hold onto Kaitlyn's hand, intertwining it with his, "whatever you have to say, say it to the both of us," he snarls. It was no secret Klaus never liked or trusted other men around his love, let alone a stranger she had just met a day ago.

Kaitlyn's attention snaps to their intertwined hands. This was the first time they were this close to each other in over two years. It all felt so familiar and simple yet so complicated and distant, all at once.

"It's about your family, Kaitlyn," Gideon states as all the others' eyes widen in shock.

"M-My family?"

"Yes, your family," Gideon nods, "I know you are the daughter of Lady Catherine. But she's not your only family...you're more special than you realize. And I can help you find them, take back what's rightfully yours," he tells her.

Kaitlyn stares at him blankly, not being able to process all this information at once, "I...I don't- I don't care. I don't need another family. I have one and that's what I'm here for," she replies, "if you really want to help, Gideon, help me with this curse. I...our daughter is in danger, so please, if you can help, help us."

"What curse are you talking about?" Gideon quizzes with a frown, not having heard anything about it, back at the coven.

Kaitlyn motions for Klaus to tell him but he shakes his head 'no'.

"The more people we tell, the more quicker this acts," Klaus reminds her as she sighs in frustration.

"Gideon, it was your coven who told Nik about this. How come you don't know anything or this?" Kaitlyn asks him in return.

"I wasn't around then, and even now, I am not exactly the most trusted in our coven. Supreme Mathilda would banish me if she knew I was here, let alone to help you of all people," he scoffs.

"Why me?" Kaitlyn inquires, "I mean...what did you mean by 'you of all people'? Why does your Supreme hate me when I've never done anything to any of you?"

"You've done more to her than you are aware of, Kaitlyn," Gideon answers.

"What do you mean?" Klaus chimes in.

"I believe you are aware of your pure-blood genes?" Gideon asks as Kaitlyn nods and Klaus' eyes widen in shock.

"You- you're what?" he stutters as Kaitlyn looks back at him.

"Oh yeah, forgot to tell you. Apparently I'm witch royalty. Pure-blood and all," Kaitlyn shrugs as Klaus' eyes widen even more in shock and Gideon smirks at his reaction before clearing his throat.

"You're a Hart, Kaitlyn. Relative bloodline to the Hoffmans," Gideon states as Kaitlyn nods, "and our coven...it is the last remains of the Hoffman bloodline. Supreme Mathilda...is actually Mathilda Marie Hoffman- your aunt," he explains as Kaitlyn gasps at the news and Klaus just looks flustered with all the news, having had interacted with the Hoffmans a few times in his thousand-year long life. 

"What the hell," Kaitlyn mumbles in shock of what she had just been told. There was more to her family? Here, in Italy? "tell me what you know, Gideon," she orders as Gideon nods and motions for them to follow him outside.