chapter fourteen,

stretching and hitting him in the face with their hand. Looking to his left, he saw Marian lying beside him, her face still scrunched up as she brought her arms back down.

"You just hit me in the face," he complained, rubbing his hands up and down it in an effort to try and wake himself up.

"What time is it?" she asked him.

Jeremy reached for his phone on his bedside table, rubbing his eyes so he could read the time. "Nine-thirty," he said.

"It's too early!" she groaned loudly, turning onto her stomach and resting her arm on top of his chest. She quickly retracted it, sitting up and looking at him for the first time that morning. "Oh my God!" she shrieked. "Why aren't you wearing a shirt?"

"I don't sleep with a shirt on," he defended, her panic causing him to rush his words.

"Why not?"

"I just don't!"

She went to speak back to him when her phone buzzed. She picked it up, her eyes widening when she saw ten messages and two missed calls from Damon. "Shoot, I forgot that he was supposed to pick me up this morning." She quickly called him, taking the covers off her and standing up, one arm crossed around her body. Marian looked back to Jeremy to see him still sitting there with a stunned look on his face. "God, put a shirt on!" she exclaimed.

"Good morning to you too, pretty girl," Damon answered on her phone.

"Not you," she cringed as Jeremy stood from the bed, moving to his wardrobe to find a shirt. She couldn't help but steal a glance at his bare chest. Bonnie may have stolen him away from her, but that didn't mean that she couldn't wish it was her instead.

"Was it Jeremy? Has he finally realised that you're way more fun than Bonnie?" Damon asked. "Especially, I'm sure, in the bed—"

"Damon!" she interrupted him. "What the hell! Don't bring that up ever again!" Despite being raised as such, Marian and Damon's relationship in the 1800s had been anything but Christian and pure; they'd shared more with each other than any unmarried couple should. Jeremy only sent her a questioning look as he pulled on a fresh t-shirt.

"Look, are you ready to go? I'm downstairs," Damon told her.

"You're here?" She asked with a frown, looking at Jeremy. He glanced towards the door, inching towards it to open it.

"Yup. I've been waiting in the kitchen for about half-an-hour." Marian blinked as he abruptly ended the call. "So hurry up before I leave," he called from downstairs.

Jeremy helped gather her things, picking up her bag from beside his desk and handing it to her. "Hey," he called as she stepped out of his room. She looked up at him, a smile on her face. "Last night ... you said something," he didn't know how to describe it. "Weird."

She laughed. "I'm sure whatever it was, it was a total lie," she dismissed. "I'll see you later," she said, moving towards the stairs. He followed after her, grabbing her arm.

"You said." He lowered his voice. "You said you were related to the Originals."

Marian looked at him for a moment, forcing a smile onto her face. "Like I said, I say a lot of things when I'm high. I practically started a cult in the 70s." Her face reddened as she realised what she'd just told him. He raised an eyebrow. "I've got to go," she rushed, turning and fleeing down the stairs. "Bye!"

"Wait, Annie—" Marian quickly shut the front door behind her, walking quickly towards Damon's car.

"Smooth, Marian," he mused as she sat in the passenger seat, pulling the seat belt across her body. "Real smooth." He started the car, pulling out from the side of the road.

"Shut up," she hissed. "I panicked, okay?"

"Why? Because you stuffed up and told him you're related to the hybrid and Elijah?" Damon taunted. "Which reminds me ... you and I need to have a little chat."

"Now's really not the time, Damon," Marian grumbled.

"Now seems like the perfect time to me," he countered happily. "Because you could be my ticket to getting my dear old brother back."

"I can't do that," she mumbled.

"And why not?"

"Because my uncle needs Stefan as moral support to make his hybrids so that he can—" She stopped herself from telling him about Mikael. Damon couldn't know; not now. As far as anyone in Mystic Falls knew, her family only consisted of Elijah and Niklaus—they believed that her father was dead.

"Marian," Damon warned. "What aren't you telling me?"

She gulped. "Nothing important."

"Don't lie to me, pretty girl."

"Look, he wants to make his hybrids to fulfil his desire for a family because he's ruined his own," she tried, hoping Damon wouldn't press further.

"That's sweet. What were you really going to say?"

"That's it, I swear," she claimed.

"Come on, Marian. I know you enough to know when you're lying," he said. "You know, come to think of it, I don't know what's stopping me from telling everyone about you."

"You wouldn't," she said darkly.

"Try me, pretty girl." He smirked at her.

"Fine," she said sharply. "Fine. I'll tell you, just don't tell anyone. I'm not ready for them to know; not yet. They'll never trust me."

"I don't trust you!" Damon said frustratedly. "I don't know what I can tell you, and what you'll just go ratting on to your uncles. I mean—God, Marian, they're the bad guys here!"

Marian stayed silent for a moment, thinking about what he'd just said. He had every reason to be mad at her; she'd kept a crucial piece of information from him, and it hurt him to have to keep it a secret now that he knew. Klaus had almost completely destroyed him; the girl he loved had died (and lived) in a sacrifice, he couldn't trust Marian anymore—the girl he'd loved for almost two-hundred years—and Klaus had stolen his brother away from him. Of course, he knew that he could tell anyone at any moment, but he couldn't risk losing his best friend and ex-lover; he just couldn't.

They sat in silence as Damon continued to drive, eventually parking outside of her house. She didn't move, thinking of something to say. Marian felt guilty for the pain that Damon felt, feeling responsible.

"I'm sorry," she said softly. "I didn't realise that it was hurting you so much." Marian gave him a small encouraging smile. "I'll see what I can do about Stefan, but I can't promise I'll be able to do anything."

Damon just stared forward, not saying a word as she opened her door and stepped out of the car. She walked to her front door in silence, searching for her keys in her bag and opening it. Turning back before she closed the door behind her, she saw that Damon had left. She leant on the back of it for support as a stray tear fell down her face. Her life was falling apart; Damon hated her, Bonnie had taken Jeremy away from her, Jeremy was close to never talking to her again, and she was no closer to getting her father back.

...

"Marian, love. How nice it is to hear your voice," Klaus said with a grin. Marian rolled her eyes. "However, I must admit you've got impeccable timing."

"What have you done now?" she asked.

"What makes you think I've done anything?" he questioned.

"Because you're you," she said. "You always find a way to screw things up. Take my peaceful life in Mystic Falls, for example—"

"My hybrids are dead," he said, cutting her off. "Every last one of them." He kicked a log, sitting on the ground beside it. "I just don't understand. I did exactly what they told me to do," he continued.

"I'm so sorry," Marian said softly. She knew how much this whole hybrid-family concept meant to him. To her, the hybrids meant nothing more than a way to get her father back, and because of that, she was sad. Her uncle had promised to wake him after Mikael was dead and now it would take longer due to the failure.

"No, you're not," Klaus said.

She shrugged. "You're right," she admitted. Now he wouldn't be able to cling onto the idea of a forced family, and maybe—just maybe—he'd finally seek to repair his own one. "But I know they meant a lot to you." She didn't feel like getting into an argument with him; not now.

He cleared his throat. "How are things with you?" he asked. "How's the healing coming along?"

"I went to a party last night," she said, smiling. She couldn't remember much—it was always this way when she got high—but she knew that she had a lot of fun, and that was all that mattered to her.

"Marian," he chastised.

"Look, I'm alive and well. It's no big deal," she said.

"You didn't do anything stupid and reckless, did you?"

She gulped, thinking back to what Jeremy had said to her. Had she really told them? She had no recollection of it. "When have I ever been stupid and reckless?"

She heard him laugh softly. "I daresay you're worse than your father in that respect, little one."

"That's funny," she said humorlessly. "Wasn't it you who once compared me to an angel?"

"That was five-hundred years ago, and you were six," he reasoned.

She hesitated for a moment. "Fine. Fine, you got me," she caved. "I might have told Jeremy—and maybe Matt, too—that we're related." She couldn't tell him about the joint they'd shared; he'd be furious.

"What's so bad about that, love?" he asked.

Marian shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe the fact that you killed Elena?" she snapped.

"Or is it because of your little crush on her brother?" Marian froze. "Did you really think I wouldn't find out about it?" he taunted.

"I had hoped," she muttered. "He's with Bonnie anyway."

"He wasn't good for you anyway," he told her. She scoffed, shaking her head.

"The last guy you approved of turned out to be a hunter. I really don't think you're a good judge of character," she said pointedly, a laugh escaping her lips.

She heard someone talking in the background. "Marian, love, I have to go," Klaus said. "I'll talk to you later, okay?"

Marian looked down. She'd hoped to speak to him longer; he was the only family she had at the moment—he'd confessed to daggering Elijah—and despite everything he'd done to her, she missed him.

"Yeah, okay. Bye," she said quickly. It wasn't okay with her, but she knew better than to mess with his plans. "I love you." She cringed at the suddenness of it, though her heart beat out of her chest as she heard him respond softly.

"I love you too."

part ii:

tvd s3, ep2, ""

wc: