The scent of fear in the witch's home was a tangible thing, clinging to the dusty air thicker than the smell of dried herbs. Klaus found the one he was looking for not in the quarantined Quarter, but in a small, hidden apartment above a jazz club in the Marigny. Her name was Genevieve, and she was young, with sharp eyes that held a defiance he hadn't seen in the others. Defiance he could work with.
He didn't knock. The door simply splintered inward, and he stood in the frame, backlit by the neon glow from the street below.
Genevieve shot up from her table, a protective hand slamming down on the open grimoire before her. "You can't be here."
"And yet, I am," Klaus said, stepping inside and letting the broken door swing shut. His eyes scanned the cramped space, taking in the candles, the bones, the potent signs of a witch who hadn't fully surrendered. "I require a service. Two, actually."
"I don't work for your kind," she spat, though a faint tremor in her voice betrayed her.
Klaus smiled, a slow, predatory unfurling of lips. "Today, you do." He leaned on the table, his presence making the room feel claustrophobic. "First, you will send a message. A little bird to whisper in my family's ear. Tell them New Orleans is calling. Tell them Niklaus requires their presence."
She shook her head, a desperate, jerky motion. "Marcel will have me killed. You know what he did to Jane-Anne."
"What I know," Klaus said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "is that you are currently more concerned with the living vampire in your kitchen than the dead king across town." He let his gaze flick towards the curtain separating the main room from a small kitchenette. "The one whose heartbeat just sped up quite dramatically."
Genevieve's face went pale. She said nothing.
"Perform the spell," Klaus continued, his tone conversational again. "And while you're channeling, I have a second task. I need you to find two people for me. Two vampires. Their names are Erik and Alex."
A strange look passed over Genevieve's face—a flicker of recognition, then something like pity. She didn't even reach for her tools. "I don't need to look for them."
Klaus's amused expression hardened. "Is that so?"
"I know about them. Everyone who was here then does." She met his gaze, her own steadying with the grim weight of her news. "They're dead, Klaus. They've been dead for years."
The air in the room went cold. The casual power Klaus radiated sharpened into a focused, deadly point. "Careful, little witch," he breathed. "Lies have consequences."
"It's not a lie. They were one of the three rulers of New Orleans. The trinity, they called them. Marcel, Erik, and Alex. They built this kingdom you're so eager to reclaim." She took a shaky breath. "There was a fight. A bad one. Nobody knows exactly what happened, but they were killed. Marcel never talks about it. He buried them himself. If you want their bodies, you'd have to search the Abattoir. That's where he'd have put them."
Klaus stared at her, his mind working, calculating. The Abattoir. His old home. The irony was bitter ash in his mouth. But the rest of it… it was impossible.
He let out a short, disbelieving laugh. "Killed? You expect me to believe that? They are second-generation vampires, turned by my own blood. They cannot be killed by some petty squabble. A wooden stake is a temporary inconvenience. The white oak is gone. There is no weapon."
"I'm just telling you what happened," Genevieve insisted, her defiance returning. "They're gone."
"No," Klaus said, his voice flat and final. "They are not. They are hidden, or trapped. But they are not gone." The certainty in his own voice was absolute. He knew his own creations, the permanence of his bloodline. The idea of their true death by any hand but an Original's was a fantasy. Marcel had done something to them, hidden them away out of jealousy or fear. It was the only answer that made sense.
He studied Genevieve, seeing the truth as she knew it in her eyes. She believed what she was saying. That made her useless for this particular hunt, but not for the other.
"The message," he reminded her, his tone leaving no room for further argument about his brothers. "Now."
Seeing no other choice, her shoulders slumped in defeat. She moved to the grimoire, her hands trembling as she lit a black candle and began to murmur in a low, ancient tongue. The air shimmered. A wisp of smoke coiled from the flame, taking the form of a raven for a single moment before vanishing through the wall.
"It is done," she whispered, her energy visibly drained. "They will hear the call. They will know you are here."
Klaus nodded, a satisfied glint in his eye. He pushed away from the table and walked to the door. He paused, looking back at her where she stood, exhausted and fearful.
"No worries, my dear," he said, his smile returning, wide and terrible and full of promise. "Marcel won't kill you."
He stepped out onto the balcony, the humid night air swallowing him whole.
Down in the street, he looked up at the skyline, his city once more. The message was sent. His family was coming. But first, there was a mystery to solve. A lie to unravel.
Erik and Alex were not dead. They were waiting.
And he would tear the Abattoir apart stone by stone to prove it.