Someone prepares Kieran’s body for his funeral, which is very well-attended. The casket is open, but when Klaus arrives, it’s closed. He opens it to find a baby inside. As he’s leaning over to pick her up, someone stakes him through the back – Mikael. It’s a nightmare, of course.
Genevieve takes the Harvest Girls on a walk, talking to them about death. Field trips have changed a lot since I was in school. Genevieve explains that when ancestral witches like them die, they don’t go to the Other Side with the rest of the supernatural beings. They consecrate the earth and recharge its power. Davina asks about humans. Genevieve tells her that some find peace and some don’t.
She needs to go to Kieran’s wake, so she sends the girls to the Lycée to think about the ancestors who could be walking beside them. Davina and Abigail leave, but Monique stays with Genevieve. She doesn’t get why Genevieve is going to the wake. Genevieve tells her that when someone in New Orleans dies, the factions call a ceasefire and pay their respects. Monique thinks she just wants to see Klaus. Genevieve says she needs the Mikaelsons to trust her so she can get closer to them. Monique guesses that she wants to kill the baby. Genevieve won’t confirm that, just saying she has to fulfill the ancestors’ wishes.
Kieran’s wake is at Rousseau’s, and there’s live music and lots of drinking. It’s not exactly a somber affair. Cami tries to thank Klaus for everything he did for her and Kieran, but he would prefer gratitude in the form of alcohol. She asks why he’s so mopey. He admits that he’s been having dreams about Mikael. Obviously his anxiety about becoming a father is manifesting as nightmares about the only father figure he ever had. Cami’s surprised to hear Klaus acknowledge that he’s going to be a father. Klaus looks across the room at Marcel and says he knows more about the difficulties of fatherhood than Cami would think. She sarcastically comments that “parenting” Marcel worked out great for Klaus, so why should he make any changes for the baby?
1810: Klaus meets with Marcel’s father, the governor, to tell him he won’t be returning Marcel to his custody. The governor will grant him his freedom. This isn’t a request, it’s an order. The governor knows he can’t fight Klaus, so he gives in. He says the boy isn’t worth anything to him anyway. As they leave, Klaus asks Marcel if it’s true that the governor is his father. He knows what it’s like to have a hateful father, and Marcel should remember that he can choose his family beyond just those he’s related to by blood.
Present: Marcel tells the wake attendees that Kieran was always committed to the Quarter, even before he became a priest. He know the city needed him. They still do. Cami gets overwhelmed by emotion as everyone toasts to Kieran, and she goes to the kitchen for a moment alone. Francesca finds her there and asks about the key Kieran usually wore around his neck. She needs it, since she’s taking over Kieran’s spot as head of the human faction. Cami doesn’t give a crap about the key and is offended that Francesca’s brought it up at Kieran’s wake, so even if she knew where it was, she probably wouldn’t tell Francesca.
Cami leaves the bar as Hayley arrives. Elijah has joined Klaus in a booth, where Klaus complains that the wake is too cheerful. Elijah sarcastically says they could grieve the way Klaus does: “Denial, rage, and hoarding coffins in basements.” When Hayley sits with them, Elijah teases his brother further by warning Hayley that he’s in a bad mood.
She asks about the moonlight rings Oliver and Jackson have been trying to get their hands on. She’s itching to do something to make Oliver back off his idea of starting a revolution. Klaus tells her to enjoy this day of peace. P.S. He’s going to make her move into the Compound. “Awesome. Then we can do that thing where you lock me in the tower, I escape, there’s drama, and then you two both realize that I’m very capable of looking after myself,” Hayley replies. Klaus says he’s working on the rings. They’ll find whoever’s responsible for the attack in the bayou, and Hayley will move into the Compound. But right now, alcohol.
Klaus toasts to Mikael and his “impeccable Freudian timing.” Elijah asks him to elaborate on that. Klaus thinks Elijah wants to make fun of him, but Elijah doesn’t. He’s been dreaming of Mikael, too. He sees Genevieve across the bar and guesses that she’s been messing with them. Klaus decides that they should celebrate their day of peace by committing murder.
The brothers follow Genevieve to Jardin Gris and ask her why she’s giving them visions of Mikael. She claims innocence but they don’t believe her. She offers to get answers for them, and Klaus gives her the go-ahead. When she leaves, he tells Elijah that he needs a witch to make moonlight rings for the werewolves. Maybe they can get answers and a favor at the same time.
Davina wants to hold a séance at the Lycée and try to contact Tim. Abigail agrees to help, but Monique thinks it’s dumb. When Davina cuts herself to drip blood onto Tim’s violin, the candles she’s lit all blow out. She hears violin music and feels a hand on her shoulder. But the person she’s summoned is Mikael, not Tim. The windows of the room shatter as he disappears.
After the wake, Cami and Marcel stay back at Rousseau’s to toast to Kieran alone. Also, Cami has to stay with his coffin all night in some tradition I don’t know about. She mentions the key Francesca’s looking for, and when Marcel asks what she told Francesca instead of what she’s talking about, Cami realizes he knows about it. He reveals that he had Josh steal it. Cami doesn’t like that he took something that was supposed to be hers because he thinks he’s protecting her. Marcel promises to tell her everything, but she says she doesn’t want to know.
Genevieve goes to the Compound and tells Elijah that he and Klaus aren’t the only people who have been having visions of dead people. The Other Side is crumbling. Klaus confirms this, having gotten the news out of Bonnie. So basically, Mikael is facing being pulled into nothingness (like Vicki), and he’s living out what might be his last days haunting Klaus and Elijah. Klaus looks forward to his permanent departure. Genevieve asks him if they can have some alone time the next day, after Kieran’s funeral. Klaus won’t commit to agreeing, and Elijah hopes he has a better plan in mind to control her than “playing hard to get.”
Francesca finds Hayley on her front porch when she gets home. Hayley thinks Francesca was behind the bayou bombings. When Francesca tries to blow her off and go inside, Hayley attacks her bodyguard to show she’s not to be messed with. She mentions that the man who brought the first bomb to the bayou had a big debt to one of Francesca’s casinos – a debt that coincidentally disappeared after he died.
Francesca says she absolved the debt as a kind gesture to his family. Hayley can dig into Francesca as much as she wants, but she won’t find anything. Also, she should behave herself because the werewolves have been talking about her like she’s royalty, which makes her a target. When Francesca goes after someone, she doesn’t miss. Hayley heads out as Monique watches her from down the street, using a voodoo doll for a spell.
The next day, as soon as Kieran’s funeral is over, Cami asks Marcel about the key. She decided she should know what’s going on, considering the chaos she’s constantly in the middle of. He tells her the key leads to something that can be used against the supernaturals if they get too out of control. Marcel let Kieran keep whatever it is because he knew if Kieran deployed it, it would be as a last resort.
Cami says that Marcel could have just asked her for the key. He asks if she would have given it to him. He searched all over the city, including the O’Connell family’s tomb, but he doesn’t know where this supernatural weapon is. Even if he found it, he wouldn’t know because he doesn’t know what he’s looking for. Cami guesses that he came to the funeral to find out if she has any ideas. Marcel promises that he came because he lost a friend, and another friend is now grieving that loss. He’s only there for support.
Everyone goes from the church to a second-line procession through the Quarter. Hayley is a little under the weather, as if she has a cold, but still thinking about the bombings. She asks Klaus and Elijah if they think she was the target. Klaus has no doubt that she was – if he were starting a war with the werewolves, she would be his first strike. Elijah’s like, “If you really want her to move into the Compound, don’t bring up death.” Klaus says that if it comes down to it, he’ll drag Hayley to the Compound like a caveman.
Hayley quips that it just took one dream about Mikael to make Klaus want to be a good father. He tells her he’s not going to become Mikael – this “cycle of misery” ends with the baby. She reminds him that the baby is both of theirs. She goes further up in the procession to talk to Cami, telling her that Kieran was kind to her and her people during the big storm. Cami guesses that Hayley wants something. Hayley apologizes for the timing but asks if Kieran mentioned Francesca before his death. Cami wants to stay out of all the supernatural stuff, but she also hates Francesca, so she promises to let Hayley knows if she hears something.
Hayley steps out of the procession, feeling worse, and suddenly starts coughing up blood. Genevieve notices and alerts Klaus just as Hayley collapses. The two of them and Elijah rush Hayley to the Compound, and Genevieve offers to do a spell to help her. Elijah doesn’t want her getting too close, but Klaus points out that Genevieve was a nurse. Elijah realizes that Hayley has stopped breathing. He can hear the baby’s heartbeat but not Hayley’s. Hayley finds herself on the Other Side, where she’s greeted by Mikael.
As Kieran’s body is entombed, Cami slips away and goes to Sean’s tomb. Marcel follows her and she tells him that Sean didn’t get a funeral. Their parents washed their hands of him and let the city bury him with John Does and criminals. Cami wondered why Kieran didn’t have him buried with the other O’Connells. Now she thinks he kept Sean separate so he could bury something with him. “I’m going to need a sledgehammer,” she announces.
Genevieve tries to revive Hayley, but even after Klaus feeds her his blood, her condition doesn’t change. Elijah has a tantrum. That’s not going to help, dude. On the Other Side, Mikael welcomes Hayley to his Hell, where he’s stuck watching Klaus for eternity. Hayley realizes she must have died, and she panics at the thought of the baby being dead, too. Mikael tells her the baby never had a chance, what with Hayley’s unsavory bloodline merging with Klaus’. She fights him off and her eyes glow yellow. She knows she can’t be dead – if she were, Mikael wouldn’t be trying to kill her.
Elijah is too impatient to wait for Genevieve to save Hayley, so he decides to take her to a doctor. Genevieve says that will break the spell she’s working on, and they’ll run out of time. Klaus asks if the baby will survive if she’s born now. Genevieve tells him that Hayley would bleed to death if Klaus did his own version of a C-section. He says he won’t let the baby die. Elijah replies that he won’t let either of them die. As Genevieve continues her spell, she has a vision of Monique and her voodoo doll and figures out what to do.
Hayley tells Mikael that Klaus already beat him. Mikael rants about Klaus and how weak he is. Hayley breaks a piece of the staircase banister so she can arm herself with a stake. Mikael thinks Klaus and Hayley should both die now, before they have a chance to ruin the baby, which they’ll inevitably do. He keeps trying to zoom to her, but she keeps getting out of his way. She puts the stake to his neck and says her daughter has an advantage that Klaus never did – she’ll never know Mikael. Hayley revives and tells Klaus and Elijah that Mikael tried to kill her.
Once she’s cleaned up and recovered a little, Klaus praises her resilience. Hayley says she’s going to move back into the Compound, but she doesn’t want bodyguards or to be ordered around. She asks what will happen after the baby’s born. She won’t let Klaus try to take her away. He asks her to come with him to a little room right next to hers. He’s already decorated it as a nursery. He tells Hayley he wants her to live there so they can raise the baby in one home. She jokes that the two of them, the baby, and Elijah all living together sounds like a bad reality show.
Klaus brings up Hayley’s encounter with Mikael. She wonders why he calls Mikael his father when that’s not really true. “He’s done damage only a father could do,” Klaus replies. He asks what Mikael said to her. “Nothing true,” Hayley tells him. After Klaus leaves, she sees that he’s put his painting of the city in the room.
Elsewhere in the house, Genevieve tells Elijah that Hayley and the baby are both fine. He thanks her, adding that he can’t forgive her for what she did to Rebekah. He’d like her help with something else, though. Apparently pregnancy keeps werewolves from transforming during the full moon. After the baby’s born, Elijah wants to give Hayley a moonlight ring so she never has to transform again. He’ll give Genevieve access to Esther’s grimoire to use the spell if she’ll make the ring.
Marcel and Cami find a box in Sean’s tomb. It’s empty, but Cami’s code, which Sean taught her when they were kids, is etched on the inside of the lid. She won’t tell Marcel what it says. She thinks Kieran taught Sean the code, which means he was always meant to be brought into this. Now it’s Cami’s responsibility to take over for Kieran.
Genevieve finds Monique at the Lycée and blasts her for hexing Hayley. Monique argues that she was doing what the ancestors want, but Genevieve says the baby needs to be consecrated in the earth so the magic from her witch heritage will fuel the community. She has to be born before she can die. Genevieve next goes to the City of the Dead to communicate with the ancestors, begging them not to make her kill a baby. The ancestors respond by making her eyes bleed and tossing her around. Genevieve takes back her plea and promises to do whatever the ancestors want.
Downtown, where the second line is continuing, Klaus tells Elijah that Hayley has agreed to move back to the Compound. He spots Marcel down the street and tries to avoid his gaze. He asks if Elijah thinks he’ll find peace when Mikael is gone for good. Elijah hopes so. Mikael isn’t the only person haunting Klaus, though – he should make peace with the living.
1835: Marcel wants to know why his father hasn’t released his remaining slaves, since authorities have ruled that they should be freed. The governor asks if Marcel’s vampire family has turned him yet. Marcel attacks someone for whipping one of the slaves, so his father shoots him.
Present: Marcel and Klaus watch each other from a distance.
1835: Klaus offers Marcel his blood, but Marcel doesn’t just want to be healed. Klaus has always said that they choose their family. What is Marcel to him? When Klaus daggered Rebekah, he said he would turn Marcel. If he won’t do it now, he should just let Marcel die. Klaus doesn’t want to make Marcel like him and risk him losing what makes him good. But Marcel is fully aware of who and what Klaus is, and he’s ready to become like him. Klaus gives Marcel his blood, then breaks his neck.
Present: Marcel leaves without approaching Klaus, who catches up to him anyway. He reminds Marcel that his 24-hour reprieve to be in the Quarter is almost over. Marcel says that even though he lives across the river now, he’s still in the game. He knows Klaus is plotting something that has to do with the werewolves. Marcel thinks that whatever happens will end with him and his allies dead. Maybe Klaus is going to sic the wolves on them, then request their allegiance again before he cures them. Marcel says that won’t happen.
Klaus says it’s Marcel’s choice, just like he chose to bring Mikael to town. Marcel knows better than anyone what it’s like to have a father who hates you. Klaus spent decades trying to make up for what Marcel’s father did, so where did he fail? “Maybe the scars just ran too deep,” Marcel says. As Klaus leaves, Marcel says Klaus didn’t fail him. He taught Marcel everything he knows. One of the things Marcel learned is that he can’t afford to be weak when he has strong enemies. He’ll fight Klaus and the wolves and whatever else comes his way until he’s dead. Klaus knows and expects that.
Elijah checks on Hayley, who’s watching the second line from her window. She tells him that she’d be mad if someone threw a party after she died. He notes that she almost did die. He can’t remember ever being so scared in 1,000 years. Hayley doesn’t respond, so he starts to leave, but stops when she says his name. She goes to him and they finally, FINALLY kiss. But then he zooms away. Coward!
Davina is alone in the Lycée when a wind blows in and the wound she got from her spell with Tim’s violin begins bleeding again. She thinks this means Tim is there, but it’s Mikael again, this time in ghost form. He tells her Tim moved on, and he’s sorry for what Klaus did to him. Mikael claims that he’s the only person who can rid Davina of Klaus forever. But first, she needs to bring Mikael back to life.
Etc.: I’m torn between thinking Mikael isn’t an interesting enough villain to bring back and adoring Sebastian Roché and wanting to watch him no matter what he’s in.
Just once in my life I want to be in a situation where I get to say, “I’m going to need a sledgehammer.”
I love how Hayley’s like, “I’ve decided to move back in,” and Klaus is like, “That’s a great decision you came to all on your own!” A win is a win.
An Eternity of Misery 