Title: i never lost a minute of sleeping
Fandom: The Vampire Diaries.
Characters: Katherine/Elijah.
Prompt: Iron.
Rating: M.
Length: 1297.
Content warnings: Blood, injuries and referenced mental trauma, violence and sexual content.
Author’s notes: AU, set post 4x20. Also written for hc_bingo’s "telepathic trauma". Title from Tina Turner's "Proud Mary."
Summary: Katherine tries to take care of Elijah after Klaus bites him.


Katherine’s tongue pokes out against the corner of her lips as she carefully presses her thumb hard against the open split of skin. He does his best to hold in his hiss, but she can hear it all the same.

"You never struck me as the caretaking type," Elijah says. His gaze is warm as he studies her and she keeps hers lowered on purpose. His arm twitches in her tight grip as she presses her thumb down harder, applying the pressure of a six hundred-year-old against his deep cut.

She lets out a huff. "You never struck me as the type who needed to be taken care of."

When she glances up at him, he gives her a small smile.

Clearing her throat, she bites her bottom lip before she shakes her head and lightens her grip on his arm. He barely flinches and doesn’t sigh out in relief. For him, her tightest grip feels like nothing.

Sighing, she sits back against her knees. She’s on the floor before him in the house that he’s compelled for them. The rug’s stained blood and the couch cushions are soaked with it, too. His suit’s bloodied and torn and he doesn’t look any better.

"I can’t get the splinter out," she says, not looking at him. His blood’s on her fingers and chest and face. It’s drying in her hair.

"It’s okay."

"It’s not okay, Elijah," she says sharply. Glaring at him, her anger only flares at his audacity to not quiver in fear. He simply looks at her with a patience she still can’t quite fathom being bestowed upon her. "You got hurt. Your dumb brother bit you."

He shrugs. "It happens."

"It doesn’t just happen!"

Elijah lets out an amused puff of air. "You’ll be surprised, Katerina."

Running her tongue along her teeth, she pushes herself to stand and hobbles as she paces the rug. She hasn’t had any time to pull off her one pump, the other having been a sacrifice needed to get them out of Elijah’s alleged family squabble.

The way she walks is comical, up and down, hardly formidable for Katherine Pierce. She can feel his gaze on her, warm and amused, and she wants to shove the heel of her pump into his suit to rip it to shreds.

He laughs. "Katerina…"

She turns to look at him sharply and snaps, "Don’t laugh at me."

"I’m not laughing at you." At her glare, he chuckles, and she thinks about ripping his throat out. She continues to unevenly pace, too stubborn to kick off her black pump. "I’m laughing at myself."

She scoffs, pinning him with an incredulous look before rolling her eyes. She continues to pace, her strides growing shorter with every step. Turns out, it’s hard to walk with one heel and apparently a broken toe.

"I am laughing at myself!" he says vehemently. He smiles and she can see blood on his teeth. "It’s not every day I’m rescued by my Katerina."

She stops pacing and crosses her arms against her chest, towering over him. Narrowing her eyes, she shakes her head. "You’re a moron. You ruined your suit."

"I have plenty more."

She takes a step closer to him and reaches out to brush her hand through his bloodied hair. Most of his hair is still wet with parts of it drying with thick clumps of blood.

"You’re a mess."

He closes his eyes and sighs, the tension in his shoulders evaporating immediately. "It’s a good thing I have you to clean me up," he murmurs.

She cards her hand through his hair, trying to break up the dried blood. Listening to his heartbeat, she can tell that he’s scared. It races unusually wild in his chest. His skin feels too warm and clammy beneath her fingertips as she brushes her fingers against his temple.

"How long until the hallucinations start?"

He bites his lip and exhales shallowly. "A matter of minutes. Hours. It’s different every time."

She shakes her head, looking over the top of his hair angrily. "I can’t believe he bit you."

"I can," he says. When she looks down, she can see him peering up at her with a gentle gaze. Katherine wants to tell him she’s undeserving of it, but it gets stuck in her throat. "This is what Klaus does. He acts out."

"And hurts his family."

He shrugs. "It is what it is."

"Do you really believe that?" Katherine lowers herself to her knees before him, resting her hands on his thighs. His pants are torn and caked in blood. No part of him is actually dry or impeccably clean. "He’s trying to get back to you for choosing me."

He swallows thickly. "Let him." Elijah reaches out to brush his fingers against her cheek. His palm is warm against her skin as he cups the side of her neck. "I made my choice and I shall live with it for the rest of my life."

His thumb brushes a stray tear across her skin, smearing a drying streak of blood against her cheek.

"I’m not going to allow Klaus to continue taking more of my life from me," he says. With his other hand, he brandishes a perfectly clean handkerchief from the inside pocket of his jacket. Katherine laughs incredulously as he shakes it and begins to wipe it across her face.

"I won’t resent you if you choose to leave before the hallucinations begin," he says. He wipes at her eyebrow and then licks the pad of his thumb before he tries to wipe away a stubborn streak of blood.

"I’m not leaving," she says, smiling up at him. "I’m supposed to be taking care of you."

He shrugs, smiling. "You were too slow, Katerina. I caught you."

Katherine rolls her eyes. "If anyone was slow, it was the old man in the ruined suit." Sitting up on her knees, she lets him continue to try and clean up her bloodied face. Her hands remain on his thighs as she peers up at him with a fond smile. "What am I going to do with you, Elijah?"

"Hopefully keep me," he says, laughing. "No one else would appreciate me in this suit."

"It’s a very sexy suit," she says. Katherine tugs at the torn lapels of his jacket, sliding her hands up his chest and to his shoulders. "I think you’d look far sexier out of it."

Elijah laughs as he shrugs off his jacket, dropping his handkerchief to the floor. She pulls open his once white business shirt, buttons tearing off, and rips at his sleeve to find his deep wound. She wastes no time in placing her mouth against his open cut and sucks as hard as she can to start shifting that splinter inside of him.

When she feels it sharply press against her lips, she pulls away from him and picks it from her mouth. Tossing it to the floor, she places her mouth against his arm again and drags her tongue over his cut.

"Just to make sure you’re okay," she murmurs.

His hand curls in her hair before he slides it down her back. Before Katherine can even think, she’s on his lap, pressed right up against him. His hands flank her spine, unmoving despite her wriggling on his lap.

He reaches up to brush his thumb against her bottom lip. "Thank you for being here, Katerina."

Although her heart races and she knows she melts into him, she rolls her eyes and smiles. "Take off your clothes, Elijah." When he arches his brow in amusement, she traces it with the light press of her fingertip. "You can thank me in the only way I will accept."