CHAPTER 9: THE GRIMOIRE HEIST
The void visions had become a nightly ritual Kol could do without.
He jolted awake for the third time that week, purple energy crackling around his hands, Esther's face burned into his retinas. Not the mother from Kol's memories—calculating and cold—but something older, buried deeper. A grimoire hidden beneath Lafayette Cemetery, wrapped in spells that tasted like maternal disappointment and forbidden knowledge.
And that symbol. Always that symbol, marked on pages the void whispers screamed warnings about.
The grimoire manifested without prompting, floating beside his makeshift bed. Pages turned themselves to display a single word: Tonight.
"You've been seeing them too," Kol murmured. Not a question.
The visions are fragments of dimensional knowledge bleeding through your connection to the void. Your mother's grimoire exists in a state of quantum uncertainty—hidden but not lost, protected but accessible. The void wants you to find it.
"The void wants a lot of things. Doesn't mean I should deliver."
This isn't a request. It's inevitability. That grimoire contains knowledge you'll need for what's coming. Knowledge I cannot provide.
Kol sat up, running hands through his hair. Outside, New Orleans slept its uneasy supernatural sleep. "You're saying I need to rob my dead mother's magical safety deposit box."
I'm saying you need to acquire resources before your enemies do. The ancestors know the grimoire exists. Celeste knows. Eventually, someone will claim it. Better you than them.
"Can't argue with that logic." Kol manifested a notebook—actual paper, not magical—and began sketching. "Alright. Let's plan a heist."
Four hours of preparation transformed vague void visions into actionable strategy.
Kol spread his notes across the attic floor, corporate security analysis meeting supernatural infiltration. The grimoire hovered nearby, providing magical expertise while Kol contributed modern tactical thinking.
"Ancestral spirit patrols," Kol muttered, marking patrol patterns on his hand-drawn cemetery map. "They sweep the perimeter every fifteen minutes, focusing on the main gates and family tombs. But here—" He tapped a spot near the Deveraux vault. "Ley line convergence creates a blind spot. The magical interference disrupts their detection spells."
Correct. Window of opportunity: approximately ninety seconds before they compensate for the disruption.
"Ninety seconds to locate the cache, break Esther's seal, and extract the grimoire." Kol leaned back, studying his plan. "This is either brilliant or suicidally stupid."
The grimoire's pages slammed together with force: BRILLIANT.
"Your confidence is reassuring."
I have spent two weeks analyzing the vision fragments. The seal protecting your mother's grimoire was designed to keep out Klaus, Elijah, Rebekah—her other children. But you and I share a unique advantage.
"You know her magic."
Better. I understand how she thought. Every spell she created followed patterns, logical progressions that made sense within her worldview. I can predict the lock's structure. You just need to reach it.
Kol reviewed his plan one more time. Void-step into the cemetery's blind spot. Navigate to the Deveraux tomb using Esther's memory fragments as guide. Break the seal with the grimoire's help. Store the stolen grimoire in void storage—a pocket dimension function he'd only recently discovered, where objects simply... vanished until recalled. Void-step out before the ancestors noticed.
Simple. Direct. Completely insane.
"Let's go steal from my mother," Kol said, standing. "That's a sentence I never thought I'd say."
Family therapy would be cheaper, the grimoire noted drily.
Despite everything, Kol laughed.
Lafayette Cemetery at midnight tasted of death and old secrets.
Kol stood at the edge of the blind spot, void sense extended to monitor ancestral patrols. The spirits moved in predictable patterns, their attention focused outward toward potential intruders. None expected someone to simply appear in the center of their territory.
He took a breath, focused on the space beside the Deveraux tomb, and stepped.
The void swallowed him. Cold. Infinite. Familiar now in a way that should terrify him but somehow felt like coming home. He fell through the darkness, reality bending around his intent, and emerged exactly where he'd visualized.
Fifteen percent magic, drained instantly. Worth it to bypass every ward and alarm between the entrance and his target.
The cemetery was silent except for the whisper of wind through stone angels and the distant murmur of ancestral voices. Kol moved quickly, following memory fragments that weren't quite his—Esther visiting this spot, performing rituals, hiding something precious beneath layers of earth and magic.
The Deveraux tomb loomed before him, marble stained with age and New Orleans humidity. He knelt at its base, fingers finding the seam where stone met earth. The void sense prickled—here. This was where the cache lay hidden.
Kol pressed his palm flat against the seal. Power thrummed beneath his touch, ancient protection spells woven with maternal possessiveness. Keep out Klaus. Keep out Elijah. Keep out anyone who might misuse her life's work.
But she'd never anticipated a son who could commune with sentient grimoires.
His own grimoire manifested, pages flipping rapidly as it analyzed the seal. Information flooded Kol's awareness—spell structure, power sources, the precise incantations required to dismantle each layer without triggering alarms.
"Show me," Kol whispered.
The grimoire's pages glowed, projecting a three-dimensional diagram of the seal's inner workings. Kol studied it, fingers moving through the projected light, memorizing the sequence he'd need to disarm it.
Then he began casting.
Layer one: Blood ward. Required Mikaelson blood to even attempt access. He pricked his finger, let three drops fall on the seal. The first barrier dissolved.
Layer two: Temporal lock. Had to be opened at specific moon phase. The grimoire provided a bypass spell, tricking the lock into believing it was the correct night. Second barrier down.
Layer three: Password protection. A phrase in Old Norse that Esther would have known her children couldn't guess. But Kol's memories included centuries of his mother's preferred phrases, and the grimoire cross-referenced them until finding the match.
"Vilja til völds," Kol murmured. Will to power.
The final barrier shattered.
Stone ground against stone as a hidden compartment revealed itself. Inside, wrapped in preservation spells that had kept it pristine for decades: Esther's personal grimoire.
Kol grabbed it, fingers closing around leather that hummed with accumulated power. This was his mother's life work—every spell she'd invented, every dark secret she'd uncovered, a thousand years of magical knowledge compressed into one book.
And it was his now.
He shoved it into void storage, feeling reality warp to accommodate the object. The grimoire simply ceased to exist in this dimension, tucked safely in that pocket of nothing where only Kol could reach.
Ancestral voices grew suddenly louder. They'd noticed something—not the theft yet, but the disruption to the cemetery's magical ecosystem.
Time to leave.
Kol focused on his attic, on the familiar smell of old wood and Davina's leftover coffee, and stepped—
The void pulled him through space, depositing him safely back in his sanctuary just as ancestral spirits converged on the Deveraux tomb, searching for an intruder who'd already vanished.
Dawn filtered through the broken window as Kol examined his prize.
Esther's grimoire lay open on the floor, its pages filled with elegant script and intricate diagrams. Hundreds of spells—necromancy, blood magic, curse work, protective wards. Knowledge that could reshape New Orleans' supernatural landscape if wielded correctly.
His own grimoire hovered beside him, absorbing spell after spell from Esther's work. The weekly ten-spell limit didn't seem to apply when learning from another grimoire, just from witnessing active casting. A loophole Kol intended to exploit thoroughly.
But then he reached the center pages.
The symbol from his void visions stared back at him, etched in ink that seemed to shift and writhe. Beneath it, a ritual written in a language Kol recognized from his memories but couldn't quite read—something pre-dating even the Old Norse Esther usually preferred.
He focused on the pages, trying to parse their meaning.
His grimoire slammed shut with such force it cracked the floorboards.
"What—" Kol started.
The grimoire reopened, pages blank except for a single sentence in bold letters: NO. YOU'RE NOT READY. ATTEMPTING TO TRANSLATE THIS WOULD DESTROY YOU.
"That's not ominous at all," Kol muttered. He tried turning Esther's grimoire's pages to examine the ritual more closely.
His grimoire physically interposed itself, blocking his view. I mean it. Whatever that spell is, it's connected to the void in ways even I don't fully understand. The whispers scream when I approach it. Leave it alone.
Kol studied the book's agitation—pages rustling violently, genuine fear radiating from it. The grimoire had never refused him before, never actively prevented him from learning.
"Fine," he said, closing Esther's grimoire. "But we're coming back to this. Eventually, I'll need to know what scared you so badly."
When you're ready. Not before. The void gives gifts and demands prices, and some costs are too high for what you'd gain.
The warning settled over Kol like a shroud. He pulled out his phone—an iPhone 4 that still felt impossibly archaic compared to the technology from his original timeline—and photographed the sealed pages. His phone's camera was terrible by 2024 standards, but it captured enough detail for future analysis.
The attic door opened. Davina climbed the stairs, carrying coffee and what looked like fresh beignets. She froze when she saw the grimoires, the magical diagrams still floating in the air, the aura of power clinging to everything.
"What did you do?" she asked.
"Robbed a grave," Kol said cheerfully. "Want breakfast?"
"You—what?" Davina set down her offerings and approached, eyes widening as she recognized some of the spell diagrams. "Is that Esther's work? Your mother's actual grimoire?"
"Borrowed, technically. She's dead. Not using it."
Davina stared at him, then started laughing. "You are completely insane. You know that, right?"
"Been told." Kol pulled her down to sit beside him. "But look at these spells. Protection wards we could use for the witches. Curse-breaking techniques that would counter ancestral magic. Blood magic rituals that might help free the Harvest girls."
Her laughter faded as she studied the pages, brilliant mind immediately grasping implications. "This is... Kol, this is incredible. With this knowledge, we could—"
She stopped mid-sentence, fingers hovering over the sealed pages in the center. "What's this?"
"Something the grimoire won't translate." Kol pulled the book away gently. "Trust me, we're not touching it. The void whispers get loud when I even think about reading those pages."
Davina met his eyes, searching for lies or deception. Whatever she found there made her nod slowly. "Okay. If your grimoire says it's dangerous, I believe you."
They spent the next hours cataloging spells, Davina providing context about New Orleans magical traditions while Kol cross-referenced with his inherited memories. Coffee went cold. Beignets disappeared. The grimoire recorded everything, pages filling with knowledge at unprecedented speed.
Above the attic, beyond their perception, the void whispers grew louder.
"Not yet. Not ready. Convergence approaches. The child must come first. The brother must arrive. Only then will the sealed spell's purpose become clear."
But Kol couldn't hear them anymore, too focused on the present to notice warnings about a future rapidly approaching.
In Lafayette Cemetery, ancestral spirits discovered the broken seal and empty cache. Their fury shook the city's magical foundations.
Someone had stolen from the ancestors' territory. Someone had claimed knowledge meant to stay buried.
And someone was going to pay.
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