After sitting out two episodes, Vincent is back and doing magic in the City of the Dead. He does a spell that sends him to the moment of Inadu’s birth. As he comes out of it, a couple of Hollowers arrive to take Vincent’s ouroboros book, which they say belongs to their master. Vincent won’t let it go without a fight. But it’s witch vs. three other witches, and they get the book.
Elijah spent the night after his resurrection moping, since Hayley’s not talking to him. Rebekah thinks the family should celebrate – Inadu’s dead, Elijah’s alive, and the Quarter is back to normal. Klaus is sure that Marcel will chase them out of town again soon, so Rebekah should enjoy the city while she can. She thinks he might let them stay, but Elijah says they’re going to meet with him to discuss the terms of the Mikaelsons’ departure. I assume the “terms” are “leave town voluntarily or I’ll kill you.” Rebekah tells him they just need to ask nicely. Well, really she means that she needs to ask nicely.
Freya meets Keelin outside her new job after she’s pulled a night shift. Freya announces that they killed Inadu, but not until after she’d gotten into Freya’s head and used her worst fear against her. Freya’s still shaken by the vision of Keelin being dead. It made her think about all the things she hasn’t gotten to tell Keelin yet. But instead or having a meaningful talk, the two go to the Compound and jump in bed together.
Marcel is getting ready to give Sofya her cure when Rebekah shows up to try to convince him to let the Mikaelsons stay in New Orleans. He refuses, since it’s only a matter of time before Klaus and Elijah cause trouble. She tries to charm him, implying that they could get back together, but he sticks to his insistence that the Mikaelsons go. Rebekah asks if their kiss the night before was a kiss goodbye. Marcel calls it a mistake. She needs to leave the penthouse, since he’s just waiting for a witch to come help him with Sofya. “Tell me that you feel nothing for me and I’ll never ask again,” Rebekah says. Marcel just tells her again to leave.
Hayley stops Klaus on his way to Marcel’s and tells him they need to talk about Hope’s future. He replies that she’s a child and they’re her parents, so she’ll go wherever they go. But Hayley wants them to consider what’s best for her. Elijah joins them and Klaus leaves him and Hayley behind for a few moments of awkward silence.
Hope (possessed by the Hollow, so we’ll call her Hopelow) is in her room, staring at a blank sketchpad. She’s uncharacteristically quiet when Hayley comes to check on her. She brushes Hopelow’s hair and tells her that they need to talk about what comes next, and the normal life Hope has always wanted to have. She thinks Hopelow’s quiet because she’s worried about the Hollow.
Marcel injects Sofya with her cure and she immediately wakes up. She’s still in attack mode, so she grabs him by the throat before she realizes who he is. She tells him that being taken over by the Hollow made her feel lost, like she was “slipping away.” Then when the Hollow left, Sofya was surrounded by darkness. She thought she might never get out. Marcel reassures her, but she doesn’t think Inadu is really gone. Sofya can feel her – she’s still out there somewhere.
Klaus, Elijah, and Marcel all go to the City of the Dead and learn that Hollowers took Vincent’s book. Klaus refuses to believe that they’re still loyal to Inadu, since she’s dead. Vincent says that it wasn’t enough to kill her body – the ancestors haven’t been able to imprison her spirit yet. She must have had a plan B. Klaus accuses Vincent of helping her with that. Marcel defends Vincent, fully trusting him. Vincent doesn’t care if anyone trusts him since he’s the only one who’s been doing something.
He’s spent the past couple of days looking for a way to lock Inadu up for good. He used the book to put himself in a trance, where he met with the spirit of Inadu’s mother. He wanted to get the spell she used to put Inadu down 1,500 years ago. The Hollowers interrupted before he could, and since they have the book, Vincent’s out of luck. He’s sure that if he can get the spell and alter it the right way, he can lock Inadu away in the book. Vincent still has a page from the book, and he used it to track the Hollowers; they’re at the place where Inadu was reborn. While Klaus and Elijah head off to get the book, Vincent tells Marcel that they have something else to deal with.
Rebekah catches Hayley brooding and guesses that she’s thinking about Elijah. Hayley knows that Elijah loves her and has made sacrifices for her and his family, but the things she saw behind the red door when she was in his mind make her think that he’s evil “at his core.” She’s worried that Hope will see that Hayley’s okay with it. She can’t grow up in a place where they handle threats by killing people or locking them in dungeons. Klaus texts to warn Hayley that the Hollow is still out there.
Vincent wants to channel Marcel’s power so he can figure out a way to see Inadu’s mother without the book. Marcel reminds Vincent that he said to kill him if he ever asked for the book back. Vincent says he didn’t know that he could handle using that magic again. He’s not a Hollower or Will – he’s not going to go overboard. Marcel agrees to help, and Vincent returns to the moment of Inadu’s birth, but the hut she’s in disappears.
Vincent gets kicked out of the trance and tells Marcel that he was in a place the living aren’t supposed to go. There’s no point in trying again; the book was the only thing powerful enough to let him contact Inadu’s mother. If they want this to work, Vincent will have to die. Well, at least he didn’t try to sacrifice Elijah again.
Rebekah catches Hopelow throwing her anti-magic bracelet in a fireplace. She explains that she needs to be able to do magic so she can be strong for her parents. Rebekah tells her the family will protect her, not the other way around. In a thousand years, the Mikaelsons have never been beaten, and they’re not about to start now. There’s nothing that can defeat them. “Well, there is one thing,” Hopelow replies. She magically makes a piece of a wooden picture frame fly into Rebekah’s heart and temporarily kill her.
Post-romp in the sack, Freya admits to Keelin that she almost ran instead of going to see her earlier. Then she realized that when she dies, she won’t come back like her siblings can. Life is short and she doesn’t want to waste it running. Is this the longest Freya has gone without doing something for someone else since season 3? I think it might be!
Klaus and Elijah go to the cabin where Inadu killed Elijah, and Klaus advises his brother to take a moment to collect himself. Elijah’s ready, though, and he’s been thinking. When this is all over, Klaus, Hayley, and Hope need to go somewhere safe. Klaus doesn’t want Elijah and Hayley to split up, and he’s sure that she’ll be able to get past what she saw in Elijah’s mind. Elijah disagrees. He can’t explain to her what she saw or what he is.
The Mikaelsons were “a thousand years of emptiness, an endless parade of slaughter” until Hope was born. She’s worth all the fights and sacrifices they’ve gone through. Elijah is determined not to put her at risk again. Klaus thinks that getting rid of the Hollow for good will be enough to ensure her safety.
Freya wants to share the good news about her morning with someone, but her mood quickly drops when Hayley shares her worries that they missed something. Inadu took her blood and left her alive – why? Freya notes that she could have used it for magic, such as a locator spell or a linking spell. Hayley is sure she’s not linked to Inadu, and that Inadu would know that Hayley wouldn’t hurt Hope. She gives Freya Hope’s hairbrush and asks her to do a reading with it. Freya quickly feels the Hollow’s magic. She thinks Inadu tapped into Hayley’s bloodline on purpose, managing to overcome the power there and use it as a strength.
Vincent mixes up something that will kill him and gives Marcel a syringe he can use to revive him. They only have an hour – if the last grain of sand in an hourglass falls before Marcel brings back Vincent, he’ll be dead for good. Vincent drinks a neurotoxin and Marcel uses his vamp hearing to detect when his heart stops so he knows when to turn over the hourglass.
As Vincent returns to Inadu’s hut, Klaus and Elijah interrupt the Hollowers during a spell and express their intention to get the book back (and, you know, kill the Hollowers). A Hollower tells them that taking the book back won’t stop anything. There’s already a spell underway. Elijah kills a Hollower, and the spokesman for the group says the brothers have no idea what they’re dealing with. The Hollow has already taken on a new body. Klaus casually says they’ll just kill that person, too, but the Hollower knows they won’t. The Hollow is in “the greatest witch this world may ever know.” Bonnie??
Freya does a spell to keep Keelin sealed in her room so the Hollow can’t go after her. Keelin doesn’t want to sit out the fight, and since she won’t take no for an answer, Freya uses magic to knock her out so she’ll sleep through whatever happens next. Hayley finds Hopelow staring at a chess set and suggests that they play together. Hopelow just stares at her. “I want my daughter back,” Hayley says.
Some Hollowers arrive in the City of the Dead, and Marcel tells them they’ll only get to Vincent over his dead body, which is…you know, not a possibility. More of them gather, and Marcel’s like, “Well, I gave you a chance to leave, and since you didn’t take it, enjoy getting beaten up.” Back at the Compound, Hayley tells Hopelow that no matter what it takes, she’ll get Hope back. Hopelow pulls up her sleeve to reveal that an ouroboros mark is forming on her arm. She says that Hope is still fighting but will give up soon. Once the mark is complete, the Hollow will be in Hope’s body permanently.
She uses magic to send Hayley flying across the room. Hayley starts to wolf out but Hopelow knows she won’t hurt her daughter. Freya comes in and uses a sleep spell to knock Hopelow out. Black smoke leaves Hope’s body as they rush off to fix things.
Marcel fights the Hollowers, unaware that the hourglass is nearing the last grain. A witch almost gets the better of Marcel but he’s saved at the last minute by Sofya. He rushes back to Vincent and injects him before the sand runs out. Vincent reports that he got what they need, but he also got some bad news.
Freya had planned to put Hope in the pendant previously inhabited by Finn and Elijah, but Inadu arrives and breaks it. She announces that Hope belongs to her, then knocks Freya out. Hayley tries to fight her but Inadu’s just a spirit and Hayley runs right through her. Klaus and Elijah return to the City of the Dead and tell Vincent, Marcel, and Sofya that the Hollow has possessed Hope. Klaus gives Vincent the book, telling him it’s his turn to save the day.
Sofya knows from her own experience that Hope will want to give up while the Hollow is controlling her. If she does, Inadu will take over for good. Hope may be strong but she’s still a child. Klaus needs to find a way to reach her. Vincent thinks he can use the book (which is connected to Inadu and Hope) and Klaus’ blood (which is also connected to Hope) to create a spell to get Klaus to her. Klaus will need to keep her going until they can defeat the Hollow.
Hayley tells Inadu that Hope will fight her. Inadu says she can feel Hope’s love for Hayley, but it’s not enough. She impales Hayley with a big piece of wood. Vincent does his spell, which allows Klaus to find Hope inside her mind. Everything there is blue. She tells him that she tried to fight Inadu but everything’s dark and cold, and she’s too tired.
Elijah, Marcel, Vincent, and Sofya go to the Compound and split up. Sofya notices a light flickering before it burns out, indicating that Inadu is close by. Klaus urges Hope to stay awake as Elijah finds Hayley. Inadu pops up and says she killed him once and won’t hesitate to do it again. After knocking him out, she goes after Marcel and gives him the same treatment. But he was just bait so Vincent could get her in a salt circle and neutralize her magic.
Inadu boasts that once Hope gives in, she’ll become more powerful than Vincent can imagine. He tells her that won’t happen. He’s been in touch with the ancestors, including Inadu’s mother, and he knows how to put her back in her cage forever. As he starts the spell, Klaus tells Hope a story to keep her awake. He was a mean, vicious person before she was born, and he loved making people fear him. But the moment he saw her, all he wanted was to be worthy of being her father.
Vincent’s spell starts affecting Inadu, and he tells her that she’s never going to be able to get to Hope again. Once she’s in the book, she’ll never get back out. Klaus admits to Hope that he’s afraid that he’ll “return to the darkness” if he loses her. He needs her to fight the darkness. She promises that she will.
Vincent’s spell makes Inadu’s ouroboros mark start to disappear, but she’s able to summon up some magic and blast him back. Hope vanishes and Klaus is sent out of her mind. With the salt circle broken, Inadu is able to get back into Hope. She finds the book unaccompanied and burns it.
Everyone who’s been knocked out starts waking up, and they all realize that Hope and Inadu are gone. With the book destroyed, Vincent can’t just pull Inadu out of Hope; he doesn’t have a place to put her. The book was the only thing that was powerful enough to hold her. Hayley takes off to find Hopelow, brushing off Elijah when he tries to stop her. She snaps at him not to touch her. He tells her he’s on her side, but she regrets bringing Hope back to New Orleans.
Hopelow goes to St. Anne’s, where the remaining Hollowers have gathered. They all kneel before her. Klaus reminds Elijah and Rebekah that they made a vow 1,000 years to protect each other “always and forever.” Freya and Hope are both part of that vow now. Hope is his “heart and soul,” and they need to find her where she’s fighting in the darkness.
Vincent announces that he might know a way to save her. But the result will be the end of the Mikaelsons – “the end of always and forever.”
Etc.: Summer Fontana (Hope) is really good at the creepy-kid-from-a-horror-movie thing.
I wish we saw more interactions between Hope and Rebekah. I mean, Rebekah raised Hope on her own for months, and since then has barely had any contact with her.
Maybe the Mikaelsons shouldn’t keep wooden stuff lying around the Compound.
Do you think all the Hollowers wear leather jackets because Inadu wants them to or because they decided they wanted to look like a gang? Did they already have leather jackets or did they have to go buy them? Did they go shopping together? Did Inadu pay for everything?
An Eternity of Misery 