Chapter Text
“I hate you.”
Penelope stares at the ceiling of her room, memories of last night flashing through her mind non-stop like an intrusive Powerpoint Presentation. Her decision to call out to Josie, even though a part of her mind knew it wasn’t the right time to be having that conversation, or any at all. Her defensiveness when Josie blamed her for being buried alive, as if Penelope had ever intended to place her in danger like that. And the kiss. The way her heart had sunk when Josie pulled away, stared dead into her eyes and said those three words; and then the way it leaped in elation when Josie grabbed the back of her neck and crashed their lips together. The way it hurt to watch her leave again at Lizzie’s call.
What do you do when you love someone so much it feels as if your heart will spill over? And then what do you do if that someone wants nothing to do with you anymore?
It’s times like these when Penelope’s carefully crafted exterior persona comes to bite her back. The indifferent, you’re-lucky-to-be-friends-with-me vibe she exerts daily around her posse means that none of her so-called friends really knew the real her, the one hiding behind the wall of sarcastic remarks and precise one-liners who just needs a real friend.
Talking to Lizzie is out of the question if they want the school to stay intact long enough to watch cute Pedro and the other kids grow up. Talking to MG is...possible, but complicated. His infatuation with Regina George’s clone and history with said clone’s twin would put him in a difficult position, and Penelope isn’t nearly as mean enough to force him to pick a side.
That leaves only a single alternative: Hope Mikaelson, the only person in this school who doesn’t give a shit about her and therefore won’t bother to coddle her with pretty words and nice sentiments. Penelope thinks that there are only two things running through Hope’s mind at any given time, and that is 1) avoid unnecessary contact with irrelevant people, whether visual, verbal, or auditory, and 2) I wish my dead, evil-but-not-to-me father would tell me whether he died loving or hating me and if he did love me, why did he accept his death so easily. Or some variation of that.
That’s it. There’s no use in brooding alone in her room when she can brood with someone else instead. Penelope nods once to assure herself that she’s not making a mistake that might blow up in her face, and heads to the room five doors down.
Knock, knock, knock. Footsteps grow closer to the door.
“You’d better have a good reason for botheri – Penelope? What are you doing here?”
Penelope meets Hope’s bewildered and slightly irritated eyes and takes a deep breath, forces out a, “can I talk to you?”
“Oh, um. Sure, what about?” Hope is apparently startled enough by Penelope’s presence to open the door wider and let her in. Her ratty “I LOVE NEW ORLEANS” t-shirt indicates that the girl was about to go to sleep, and Penelope mentally reminds herself to not to stay to long.
Penelope, being Penelope, immediately sits down on Hope’s bed and ignores the other girl’s questioning stare. “It’s, uh, it’s about Josie.”
“Oh. Oh. ”
Hope closes the door and walks slowly towards the bed, trying not to add to Penelope’s anxiety. Penelope would tease her for being so soft if she wasn’t about to break down any second herself.
“Last night, after we literally rescued Josie from her early grave, she and I talked a little and then we kind of argued andthenikissedher.”
Hope abandons her initial attempts at being hospitable and bounces on the bed next to Penelope. “You what? Speak up, would you?”
“You’re not making this any easier.” Penelope shoots a glare at Hope, who just shrugs.
“I kissed her. And then she told me that she hated me. And then she kissed me back.”
“Seriously? Why? Did you do that to mess with her?”
“What? No, I’d never do that, it’s just –,”
“It’s just what?” Hope’s tone grows serious. “Look, Penelope, Josie’s my friend, and you’re, like, kind of too, maybe, I guess,” — “gee, thanks” — “but you both need to get your shit together. You broke up with her, and you know she’s still hurt, so why do you go around teasing her and taking shots at Lizzie whenever she’s around? It’s not fair to her. And I don’t get why Josie never does anything about it, either! It’s like, I don’t know, maybe you guys are still hung up on each other?”
Penelope stares. Opens her mouth, then closes it. Her mind is reeling, partly because of Hope’s sudden exposition, and partly because she’s thinking of whether it’s wise to tell Hope what’s been plaguing her mind since before the break-up.
The knowledge has been eating at her for months now, and it consumed her to a point where she couldn’t stand looking at Josie’s pretty, unaware face and knowing that a terrible future lies ahead.
Penelope turns and leans conspiratorially towards Hope, who immediately leans back in surprise. “Hope, I’m about to tell you something, but you have to promise not to tell anyone about it. Not Josie, not even Professor Saltzman, okay?”
“Yeah, fine, whatever. Stop being weird about it.”
“Okay.” Penelope takes a deep breath and begins to explain. “You know how the twins usually take the day off whenever their mom comes to visit and, like, go to the mall or something and hang out together? Well, four months ago Josie was seriously excited for it because the last time she met her mom was before we dated, and she told me that she wanted to tell her mom about us. And then she cancelled.”
Hope nods, remembering. “Yeah, Lizzie had a freak-out in the kitchen that day.”
“Josie was really upset, too. I went to ask her about it, but she just shut down and went to take care of Lizzie. I - I wanted to do something to cheer her up, so I went to the library to find something about her coven. Josie always complained that she barely knew anything about them, so I thought that it would remind her of her other family.”
“Her coven...the Geminis? They died out years ago.”
“Yeah, there was no one from the coven who I could actually ask, so I thought that if I could find a book about them, Josie could read all about it and she’ll forget about her mom cancelling. Again.”
“Go on.” Hope seems to be getting real interested now that the topic’s veered into witchcraft. Penelope suppresses the urge to roll her eyes.
“Shut up. Anyway, I searched the whole library and there was nothing about them. No tales, family trees, lores, anything. There were, like, twenty books about my own coven and nothing about hers. I mean, Saltzman’s wife was part of the coven, so it should’ve been weird for him to not notice there were no records about them.”
“That is weird. What did you do next?”
“I broke into Dorian’s office and found a supernatural registry, and then I –,”
“Whoa, stop,” Hope interrupts, intrigued. “A supernatural registry? What the hell is that?”
“What does it sound like, dumbass?” Penelope scoffs, and Hope sends her a deadpan stare. “None of his cabinet drawers were locked except the one on the bottom right, so I used the unlocking spell on it. Inside, there was this big book with a leather cover, and I remember the title was in Latin. I’ll never admit that I suck at Latin outside this room but I actually do so I didn’t understand the words. Anyway, it was sort of like a telephone book, but instead of surnames there were records of clans and packs and covens from all over the country.”
Hope has a conflicted expression on her face, as if she knew that whatever Penelope is about to say next isn’t going to be pleasant. “Go on,” she says warily.
“Someone must’ve updated all of it because there were English translations, and the Gemini coven…” Penelope bites her lips, darting her eyes away. She remembers the confusion, the disbelief, and then the sheer anger. The unfairness of it all, how Lizzie and Josie were doomed to fight a war they shouldn’t have to face. Her heart drops the same way it did four months ago when she snuck into Dorian’s office.
“What is it? What did it say?” Hope asks urgently. She moves closer and lays a hand on the Penelope’s shoulder. “Penelope, tell me.”
“I’m not a hundred percent sure because the text was so dense and I was panicking, but there was a passage about a ritual called ‘The Merge’, and it described how the coven chooses their leaders.” Penelope shuts her eyes. “Something about twins, one being stronger than the other, absorbing powers...God, it’s so confusing!”
“Dude, focus. What are you implying?”
“Lizzie and Josie, they’re next in line to lead the coven, right? And they’re twins. They’ll have to do this merge thing and whoever’s stronger gets to siphon the other’s magic.”
Hope’s eyes widen in shock. “All of it? Wouldn’t that kill them?”
“I don’t know. I only got bits and pieces because there wasn’t enough time to read everything, but I explicitly remember the part where they’d have to fight each other. I don’t know what’ll happen to the one who loses, but I know that it’s bad.” Penelope’s voice breaks at the last word, and Hope winces.
“If what you’re saying is true...but there’s no way Lizzie and Josie would ever hurt each other like that, right? They’re twins, they’d do anything for each other.”
“That’s the thing! You know as well as I do that Josie would do anything for Lizzie. She’d sacrifice herself in a heartbeat, and that scares me,” Penelope finishes. A heavy silence settles between them, and she feels as if the air itself was intruding on the secret.
“That’s why you broke up with her,” Hope says quietly. “Isn’t it? You were scared for her, for what Josie’s selflessness might mean when it comes to her sister.”
Penelope sighs. “Yeah. At first it just a little annoying that she would drop everything at Lizzie’s call, but after I found out about this whole mess, I just – I was scared, Hope. I am scared. One part of Josie solely revolves around Lizzie, and the other part is dedicated to shouldering other people’s problems, especially her dad’s. Then what’s left for her?”
“Whoa.” Hope holds out both hands. “Okay, before you spiral further into the rabbit hole in your mind, are you absolutely sure that they both don’t know about this? What if Saltzman already told them and it’s just not a problem anymore? What if you’re worrying for nothing?”
“Think about it. There’s almost zero information on the history of their coven, as if someone’s trying to hide what happened to them. Their mom is always gone doing what, exactly? What’s important enough that it warranted missing their sixteenth birthday? The only thing I can think of is that she was too busy finding a solution for her daughters’ future. And don’t you find it weird that the Gemini coven has never been brought up in any of our classes despite being the only coven to sire siphoners? Something’s being fucking covered up here.”
Penelope rakes her hair in frustration, her heart racing from the sudden outburst. If she weren’t so preoccupied with chasing the trail of her thoughts to its end, she would’ve realized just how worked up she is over the whole thing. Hope, on the other hand, quickly picks up on her agitation.
“Look, this is a lot to process for tonight. It’s late, why don’t you go back to your room and we, I don’t know, we’ll talk about this tomorrow. I know that it’s important to you, and it is to me as well, but we can’t change anything by tonight, so it’s best if we both go to sleep and think it over tomorrow. Sounds good?”
Penelope manages a smirk. “You’re kicking me out of your room? The last time my ego took a blow like that was in middle school.”
“Ugh, for a second there I thought I’d have to rub circles on your back and tell you that everything’s going to be fine, but thankfully you’re still the same Penelope Park I know.” Hope nudges Penelope off the bed with her foot.
“Ouch. Rude. The aggressiveness of a werewolf and the cold heart of a vampire. Very fitting, Mikaelson.”
“Get out , asshole. I’m starting to reconsider letting you be here.”
“Fine, jeez, I’m going.” Penelope looks over her shoulder to Hope with a pillow over one ear just before closing the door. “Although if you were wondering, I’m totally digging your whole Wattpad loner girl thing going on. Ugh, if only I was still in middle school.”
“One, two, –,”
“I’m just saying!”
“Morning, witches.”
Twin glares are shot at her, and Penelope smirks, self-satisfied, as she takes a seat on the desk right behind them. Josie and Lizzie may be fraternal, but there’s no doubt that the two are related by the identical expressions on their faces. Well, almost identical. Lizzie’s is definitely much more loathing.
“Mind taking a seat somewhere else? Not really in a mood to have my soul sucked by a dementor today.”
Penelope scoffs at the insult. “You’re one to talk about demons. Did you plan on roleplaying James Charles this morning or were you just incapable of contouring?”
The blonde scowls, but before she can reply, Josie puts a hand to turn her sister away. “Lizzie, come on, just ignore her.”
“That bow choker you’re using is super cute. Looks familiar, too,” Penelope grins. She sees Lizzie shoot a questioning look at her sister, which goes blatantly ignored. Josie can’t exactly say that they’ve used that very choker as makeshift handcuffs before, can she?
Josie takes a deep breath. “I’ve worn it many times before, Penelope,” she replies without turning around, but Penelope sees the clenched fists by her lap.
“Hmm, you certainly have.”
The door opens, and Dorian walks into class with a hurried “sorry I’m late, guys”, dumping his briefcase on his desk. Penelope decides to let the girl breathe. For now.
“Alright, as you guys have surely heard, Professor Saltzman has allowed offensive spells to be integrated in the practical curriculum. Now, since this is only our first lesson, we’ll start off with a low-level incapacitation spell. Grab a partner and repeat the words that I’m about to write on the board.”
Penelope narrows her eyes in observation. Lizzie has sauntered off to MG’s side, no doubt to his delight, leaving Josie alone right in front of her.
Josie, for her sake, seems to be perfectly aware of the situation, because before Penelope can even open her mouth and ask her to be her partner, the girl calls out to Rafael, who’s sitting a few chairs away. “Raf! Wanna partner up?”
The werewolf casts a side glance behind Josie and meets Penelope’s unrelenting glare. “Umm, sure, I guess.” He says a little unsurely, but moves to approach them.
It’s annoying and clearly an avoidance tactic, but Penelope suppresses the urge to tease her ex again, mostly because it’s not worth it to be mean when Lizzie’s not around to receive it. She’s not going to lie that being dismissed so easily like that doesn’t sting a little, but chooses to keep quiet and scans the room for a potential partner. Her eyes fall on a familiar redhead who’s staring right back at her.
“Seems like we’ve been spending a lot of time together, huh?” Hope says dryly as Penelope drags back the chair beside her. A silent agreement to keep quiet about what they talked about last night passes between them.
“You know, we’re not so different, you and I. I think we’d actually make a good power couple. Platonically, of course. Redheads aren’t really my type,” Penelope drawls, genuinely grinning at their banter. The thought of being friends with Hope Mikaelson has never crossed her mind before, but she supposes that being forced to battle zombies side-by-side bonds people together in a strange way.
“So you come crying to me once and we’re friends now? Didn’t know it was this easy to get into Penelope Park’s coveted inner circle.”
“For the record, I wasn’t crying, my eyes were just...misty. There’s a difference, you know.”
Hope performs yet another of her trademark eye roll. “Whatever. Let’s get on with the spell. I wonder how damaging this one is if we’re allowed to use it on each other.”
As if on cue, MG lets out a loud groan from the other side of the room. The two turn to see him massaging his temples through a bout of pain while Lizzie stands before him with a slightly concerned expression. “So she is capable of having sympathetic emotions. Who knew,” Hope comments, which gets a grunt of agreement from Penelope.
Out of the corner of her eye, as if guided by some mysterious force, Penelope spots Josie and Rafael near the chalkboard, hands outstretched to allow Josie’s siphoning powers to activate. The soft red glow emanating from their joined hands tugs at a string buried deep within Penelope’s heart. She used to be the one Josie always siphoned from, and given their former relationship, the action had felt intimate, as if they were sharing the same breath as raw power moved between their skin.
It’s one of the many, many things on the long list of why she misses their time together.
Hope snaps her out of it. “When you’re done staring at your ex, I’d like to get back on our task here, thank you very much.”
“If you’re so eager to do it, then you start. Hit me.”
Hope moves backwards to make space between them and adopts an offensive stance. She flicks her right wrist backwards and then quickly forwards and recites the incantation. “Phesmatos superos capitis .”
Immediately, a wave of dull pain crashes into Penelope’s head, and she winces, shutting her eyes in an attempt to focus and fight the spell off. She shouldn’t have bothered, for the spell anticlimactically wears off after a few seconds.
“What the hell? I’ve had PMS headaches ten times more painful than that,” she complains, disgusted at the lack of actual offense of the offensive spell. “Is this seriously what Saltzman meant by allowing us to learn offensive spells? What, am I supposed to knock out a vampire with a puny, three-second headache?”
Hope gives her a conspiratorial look. “Wanna make this more interesting?”
“Huh?”
“Phesmatos superos dolor capitis !”
The pain that shoots into Penelope’s head returns with a vengeance, and it feels as if someone is using the back of her skull as a batting target. Her knees wobble and she’s about to topple over if it isn’t for Hope’s steady hand on her arm.
“Shit, Mikaelson,” Penelope hisses through gritted teeth. “Is this revenge for wasting your time last night? I didn’t know you were this vengeful.”
“Keep talking and I’ll leave you like this until class ends.”
“Ugh, just lift it already,” she groans, the pain spreading to her temples now. “I swear to god I’ll come bother you every night from now on.”
“Alright, alright. Just stay still.” Penelope sees Hope raising her arms through half-lidded eyes and stumbles backwards a little. “At least we know the spell works – hey, watch out!”
The two have unknowingly moved near Penelope’s original seat in the middle of the class, and Penelope’s eyes widen as her foot catches on the leg of a chair and crashes into a desk, sending papers flying everywhere.
Hope waves her hands hurriedly to lift the spell and whispers, “Shit, it’s Lizzie’s…”
“NOT TODAY, SATAN.”
The whole class goes silent as Lizzie Saltzman, channeling all her Lizzie Saltzman wrath, stomps towards the two witches and jabs a finger at Penelope’s chest. “If this is your idea of sabotage, then I won’t hesitate to hex your eyebrows off right now.”
Penelope raises an eyebrow. “Sabotage? Lizzie, I accidentally knocked your stuff off the desk. I can pick them up in, like, twenty seconds.”
“Uh, yeah. Obviously so you could burn my notes and have me fail this class, which would get me in trouble with my dad. As if he isn’t already disappointed in me enough.” Lizzie scoffs and stares at her rival dead in the eyes, taking a nearer step. “I see through that black hole you call a soul. Your happiness is derived from making me suffer. Admit it, she-demon.”
“You’re ridiculous, you know that right?”
Hope silently takes a step sideways to avoid what seems to be the beginnings of a physical throwdown, if the sharp glares are any indication. Lizzie looks as if she’s ready to throw hands at Penelope until Josie appears out of nowhere and interjects the situation.
“Lizzie, calm down. It’s not a serious problem.”
“Oh, so you’re taking her side now?” Lizzie snaps. “Nice to know you’ve got my back, Josette .”
“I - I didn’t mean it like that…” The whole class is definitely staring now, including Dorian, who looks as if he’d rather be anywhere else but there. Josie shrinks from the attention, which doesn’t go unnoticed by Penelope.
“Are you seriously going to bully your own sister because she told you to calm down?” She demands, but her eyes never leave Josie. Josie’s staring at her back, wide-eyed, hesitating.
The bell rings out of nowhere, making everyone jump in surprise and drowning out Lizzie’s scathing response.
“Alright class,” Dorian shouts over the scuffle of twenty students trying to leave at the same time. “I’ll see you next week with your Magical History essay ready and proofread by my desk,” he says, and proceeds to narrow his eyes at two particular witches. “Miss Mikaelson, Miss Park, since you were so keen on modifying spells earlier, I’m sure you’ll be just as eager setting the classroom back to its original position.”
Hope exhales in frustration and glances at her partner. Penelope’s still looking at Josie, but her eyes are softer now, almost comforting. “Josie, I –,”
“Come on, Jose,” Lizzie interrupts. “Tweedledumb and Tweedledumber here have a job to do.”
The twins leave, albeit one more reluctantly than the other, and the last students start trickling out as well, leaving Penelope and Hope alone surrounded by overturned chairs and desks pushed against the wall, the usual state of the classroom after a practical class.
Penelope starts dragging the desks back in place, the screech of wood against tile filling the classroom. Hope breaks the silence.
“Just us two again, huh?”
“Wouldn’t want it any other way.”
“Listen,” the redhead says carefully, “I’ve been thinking about what you told me last night.”
Penelope’s eyes snap up. “Yeah?”
“Saltzman’s going out tonight to figure out whatever’s going on with the dagger, and I think Dorian’s coming with him. I overheard them talking in his office this morning.”
“And…?”
“And? Penelope, we can use this chance to break into Dorian’s office and see the registry for ourselves, confirm what you thought you saw. You’ve never thought about doing this again since the first time?”
“Risking my life once was enough. I didn’t want to do it a second time.”
“Okay, but this time, there will be two of us. I can stand guard while you find the book, minimize the chances of getting caught,” Hope explains enthusiastically. As much enthusiasm Hope can physically express, anyway, which is only characterized by a slightly higher voice and widening eyes.
Penelope regards her suspiciously. “Why are you so excited to break into a teacher’s office? I thought you liked being the teacher’s pet.” That earns her a punch in the arm.
“Look, I just know how it feels like to have your family history hidden from you. When that happens, it almost always means something bad is being covered up. Besides, don’t you want to do it for the twins?”
“I’m doing this for Josie,” Penelope reminds her.
“It’s just as unfair to Lizzie and you know it.”
A groan. “Fine.”
“I’ll meet you tonight?”
“Tonight.”
Neither girl notices Lizzie eavesdropping right by the door.