He thought he'd seen it all, after Niklaus turned him so many centuries ago. No longer the timid, sorry excuse of a human he'd once been, Lucien had relearned the world as a predator, with fangs and a newfound bloodlust, plus all the perks of immortality. His very existence had become nothing short of a revelation, from the taste of an oncoming storm in the air to the thrum of a heartbeat five hundred kilometers away.
The smell of someone else's fear, his own primal state of euphoria with each new body he drained and discarded.
Every known sensation to him had intensified a thousandfold – the passion, the thirst, the rage, the hatred – and for a time, Lucien was content to assume that though he'd become something of a god, with the power to do as he liked and take as he pleased, even the skies had their limits on how much taller he could stand amongst the inferior species of humankind.
But this…this is something else entirely.
He's never felt so bloody alive.
…
It takes a day or so to readjust to the way things are now – brighter, richer, somehow more than ever before – with a heightened clarity beyond what he'd thought physically possible, even as a vampire.
Regrettably, he hasn't much time to stop and smell the sodding roses; he has big plans for the two of them, for him and his love. For her ill-fated brother as well, whose whereabouts, with a bit of luck and some skilled misdirection on Lucien's part, will remain eternally elusive despite Aurora's most determined efforts.
For the family that he'd in turns loathed and idolized, and for this charming little city of theirs, which has only just begun to see its fair share of true monsters.
Still, all things considered, Lucien supposes he can spare a day to revel a while, to bask in the knowledge that he's already won. He takes a certain delight in watching the empire stagger first before fully crumbling, that exhilarating slowing of time to precede their fall, their undoing, that's been centuries in the making now. Let them have their moment to mourn what they've lost, the losses that they have yet to suffer.
After all, he's waited a thousand years, give or take, for this. Delaying the inevitable another day can only prolong the sweetness of its anticipation. A new and improved era awaits them on the other side of things, once the world has been stained with the blood of the Originals and whomever else that gets in his way. The ancestors' lap dog, that killjoy of a regent. Niklaus' love, though he'll let Aurora do the honors. Kol's cute-as-a-button plaything.
Their dear sister, who'd made this all too possible for him, lending an unwilling hand or two and providing the final piece to this prophecy that's doomed her entire family.
Her death would have been quick, a far more merciful affair that what Lucien has in store for the rest of her siblings.
She never did like to make things easy for him if she could help it, his little minx.
…
He's thought often of the Mikaelson witch, if he's to be honest with himself.
The brusque manner in which she'd entered the fold, her easy dismissal of him each time their paths would cross, had all been…refreshingly unexpected, to say the least. As has everything else about her, really, starting with the discovery that despite every indication on the contrary, she has, in fact, been very much alive.
Of course, she'd slept through the majority of the last thousand years or so, much like her beloved brother Finn (may he rest in peace, truly), but Lucien rather thinks she couldn't have chosen a better time to join in the fray, however short-lived he intends it to be.
He'd promised her death – an awful lot of it, to be exact – and he's nothing if not dedicated to seeing things through to the end, particularly when all else has already gone spectacularly according to plan.
He'd taken every possible contingency into consideration, factored in each moving piece on the board and mentally catalogued their individual strong suits as well as their most fatal flaws. Tristan's shortsightedness, Aya's startling lack of objectivity as far as her precious maker was concerned. Niklaus' overly sentimental commitment to his family and their ridiculous notions of always and forever.
Lucien had devoted centuries to making a thorough study of the Mikaelsons and the de Martels, but the single variable he'd failed to account for in all his careful plotting was this wild card in the form of one Freya Mikaelson.
Her presence here had taken him by genuine surprise – a hard feat indeed, for someone who's lived as long as he – though by no means an unwelcome one, for all the untold hazards she posed to his most well-laid scheming. He'd found himself quite taken by this unforeseen…complication, with every inch of her body, from her California blonde curls to the toes of her combat boots, belying an ancient power and a past steeped in more darkness than his own.
He does so appreciate a good challenge.
Perhaps it's careless of him, but Lucien's grown uncommonly fond of her in the rare moments they've shared, with her fuchsia wigs and skin-tight corsets, that smug little edge to her smile, her tendency towards violence against him.
It's a shame, he thinks, that things had to turn out the way they did between the two of them.
As it so happens, Freya had been the most easily manipulated of the lot, despite her stubborn immunity to Lucien's charms and advances. Admittedly, half the fun lies in the chase, and she'd certainly given him a diverting little run while he patiently waited for everything else to fall into its rightful place.
In a delicious twist of irony, her unwavering love for her brothers had provided the key to their ultimate downfall, and it was with no small measure of satisfaction that Lucien sank his teeth into her skin at last, relishing the taste of imminent victory, and of her, darling Freya, whose blood in that moment may have been the sweetest of all.
Of all the deaths to come, hers will be the most lamentable by far – such beauty, such untapped potential between them, to go wasted in the name of collateral damage – but they are more alike than she'll ever care to admit, and if he allowed something as quaint as his affection for her derail his better judgment, she wouldn't be half so merciful in seeing to his own demise.
Still, he might have guessed that she's not without a few more tricks up her sleeve. It would have been foolish indeed to assume that mixing his serum with her blood, plus a dash of ancestral magic, wouldn't come without…certain side effects.