White Oak glimmered in the air, sinisterly reflecting the moonlight, polished and poised. Silence sounded oppressively in the lavish cold room, its terrible echo a herald of damnation to come. The stale tang of death prickled her taste buds teasingly.
Delicate green leaves blossomed into life. The window rattled, carving in, glass raining on the cool marble as wind tore through the room, setting her dark unsympathic eyes alive.
The stake swung down.
Red bloomed on white silk.
Niklaus Mikaelson's eyes opened wide one last time in agonized pain as brilliant green dulled into eternal lifelessness.
Black veins trailed along cold white skin.
Dahlia smirked.
Pain was all he knew. Pain like he had never felt before.
It raced poisonously through his blood, boiling and angry, roaring, ravaging his body and burning. Burning, burning, burning.
Marcel let loose a tortured howl as he sunk down to his knees, the sudden agony hitting him completely unprepared and giving no time to swallow, to withstand. It was like drowning in hot water, alive. Dark brown eyes snapped wide-blown down to his hands, watching horrified as his dark fingertips turned an angry fiery crimson, veins of unforgiving black and red traveling up his naked arms and slowly covering his whole body. Slender chocolate-colored fingers gripped his wrists, and it took every bit of concentration he could muster to slowly look up, face contorted in crippling anguish that was taking the unnecessary breath right out of his collapsing lungs. Worried and fearful brown eyes looked into his, and for the first time Marcel truly wished to see her beautiful real face, to see those pale delicate features surrounded by long lavish blond waves, her tempting pouty pink lips turned up in a tender genuine smile and breathtakingly hopeful blue eyes sparkling at him, trusting him and conveying all the words neither of them could say.
He wanted see her, his first love, to see her in the devastatingly gorgeous body he had fallen in love with as a young boy, wearing the lovely face he had stared at night for night, the lips he had ravished, stealing heated kisses when her brother had been away, hidden in dark alcoves, enjoying the dangerous thrill and deceiving rightness, knowing how deeply and terribly Niklaus cared for them, and how they would not only break his trust but a tremendous part of his heart. And still, now like then, for her, he did not care about his sire's, his adoptive father's, sensibilities. He had made a mistake not searching for her nearly a century ago, and now, he would never have the possibility to make it up to his love, to the only woman who truly got everything about him, the good and the bad, and loved him just as he was.
Even after all this time, Marcellus Gerard was genuinely in love with Rebekah Mikaelson.
And in this moment, he admitted to himself the truth he had fought so long and hard to deny.
He would always be in love with her.
Rebekah was the only woman he could ever let in.
A resigned smile played on his lips as he slowly reached up, cupping her cheeks with trembling withering hands. No matter how she appeared, no matter what body she inhabited, this look … this fearful look, this tender gaze she gifted only him, only when they were alone.
This was his Rebekah.
" I love you", he whispered, his voice breaking.
" No, no, no. Marcel – Marcel, come on, look at me. Damn it! Don't do this, please, you can't – you can't just leave!", she begged him, desperation coloring her voice as her hands touched his face.
He smiled bitterly.
It was not his choice. There was only one reason why this could be happening. He had felt the beginnings of this once before, when Klaus had been mortally wounded. Back then, the Original Hybrid had nearly taken his whole sireline with him; thankfully he had somehow saved himself and survived, but it was enough to bring the message home. Never try to kill your sire – it would prove to be more than detrimental to one's own health.
But somehow … someone …
Marcel smiled bitterly.
Klaus had died.
He could feel it, this emptiness.
Klaus was dead.
And damn it, despite their differences, despite Marcel's help in allowing Klaus to be daggered by Elijah, the former vampire king of New Orleans couldn't help but feel sorrow and grief at the thought of his adoptive father dying for real – alone, unknowing, helpless; and, in death, taking all those he sired with him. The bloodline of Niklaus Mikaelson was about to die, and a small childish part of him regretted nothing more than the demise of the only father he had ever acknowledged as such.
His eyes focused on Rebekah's paling face, and he painfully brushed away the tears tumbling down her cheeks.
But most of all, he regretted not showing her just how much she was loved.
" I never stopped loving you."
His voice was a tormented rasp.
She broke down sobbing, her head resting against his chest as her hands buried in his shirt.
" I love you, too, Marcel … I love you", she choked out.
He felt the burning reach his face and pressed her head against his chest. She shouldn't see this. He would spare her the sight of watching his face turn to ash.
A sharp pain cursed through his body as the fire boiling his veins intensified and he closed his eyes, simply feeling her. Breathing her in. Listening to her agitated heartbeat. Basking in … Rebekah. Just Rebekah.
At least he died letting Rebekah know that he never stopped loving her. That he still loved her.
He pressed a kiss to her hair.
And felt the flames consuming his blood burn him away.
Wide brown eyes stared horrified at the pile of ash that moments ago had been the only man she had loved unconditionally in her long life.
Why?
Why couldn't she be happy? Why did she have to lose everyone she loved?
Why did her bastard brother have to take everyone she loved away from her?
… Niklaus always took those he loved from her …
Tears streaming down her face, Rebekah gulped, a sob breaking free once more as she realized that this time, truly, Marcel wouldn't come back. That he wouldn't mysteriously reappear from the Dead to her, believed lost but in reality alive and kicking, merely too cowardly to face her like a man …
He had turned to ash beneath her fingers.
Sobbing, she clutched the shirt he had worn against her heaving chest.
Why did he have to tell her that he still loved her?
Why did he have to leave her in this excruciating anguish?
Trembling desperately, she hunched over, letting long dark brown curls obscure her face as she pressed her eyes tighter together, shaking so badly she could barely keep herself up.
Why did she have to lose everyone she loved?
Face set, stoic, he turned away from the door frame, away from the sight of his youngest sister mourning the sudden death of her former lover.
He had been alerted by Marcel's scream, and arrived just as his sister and the boy they had once raised as family declared their love for each other for the last time. It had not been his right to interrupt or intrude, so he had kept his silence and took in the situation.
And he had recognized what Rebekah still hadn't fully and consciously grasped, too much in shock to think logical.
Marcel hadn't died because of a spell, a wound or poison. He hadn't fallen to some perfidious plan of Niklaus. No.
The boy had burned because the sire of his bloodline had perished.
Taking the vampires he had turned with him.
Elijah closed his eyes.
Niklaus.
Klaus.
His younger brother ...
His beloved younger brother was dead.
He didn't know how. He hadn't even confirmed it, hadn't hastened to the room they had kept his unresponsive daggered form safely locked as soon as he had understood what was happening, but … he had felt it. He had felt the pain deep within his bones as his brother died, and he couldn't face … the remains.
He couldn't.
Nevertheless ...
His feet slowly dragged him in the direction of the room the coffin was located in.
He couldn't face reality, but he had to.
All he could beg for was that Rebekah would stay caught up in her grief over Marcel a little longer, because if she realized what had truly happened, what Marcel's sudden death meant …
He could barely stay strong enough for himself. His sister's grief would break him.
And as dysfunctional as they were as a family, her sorrow over Marcel would be nothing against the agony of losing Klaus. They had been together, they had been a family for over a thousand years. They may hurt each other, they may proclaim creative revenge and magnificent hate for one another, but in the end, they stuck together because they were bound in love. They were siblings, and nothing, not a dagger to the heart, selfish uncaring plans for domination or heartache could break that bond.
Rebekah wouldn't survive Klaus death unscathed. She would … it would destroy her.
Elijah would know. He felt like his own world had just shattered.
And it would never be whole again.
The evergreen ivy tendrils entwining around the room that should have kept his brother's coffin safe said everything.
They unmasked the culprit without words.
Dahlia.
Their hateful selfish aunt.
… had this been her plan all along? To take out her greatest enemy, the biggest threat while the allies of her adversary did the dirty work and laid the basic for her plans? Subduing the one who would become a feral rabid beast before he allowed their disgusting aunt to lay even one single finger on Elijah's niece?
He felt sick.
Elijah had seldom been happier and prouder to have gone against Klaus than he had been when he had helped Hayley and Hope escape with the wolves into the Bayou. Keeping them save from the murderous witch and just as murderous Original Hybrid.
Elijah had also never been as guilty or as horrified of himself as he was now, because he knew without a shadow of a doubt that if he hadn't daggered Klaus, thereby making his younger brother defenseless, Niklaus would still be alive and kicking.
He had saved his niece and … the woman he adored …
… and he had practically killed his brother himself.
His Klaus.
His baby brother.
He hadn't saved him from their father's cruelty while they were human, and now, he had handed their psychotic aunt the means to kill his brother's immortal body.
Bile rose up.
The wound on his chest, just next to the one done by Elijah himself, had colored the white silk of Niklaus dress shirt a most bloodcurdling shade of red. Veins of black trailed from his heart, sparkling with blue and white, and he knew even without magical training that it was Dahlia's magic keeping Klaus body intact.
For now.
For them.
A warning.
A mockery.
He came to a standstill next to the coffin, and carefully lifted his brother's cold hand. His own, just a bit bigger, like they had always been once they had finished growing, trembled. Elijah blinked. He was shaking.
No words escaped him.
He couldn't speak.
Couldn't think.
Having lost Henrik was horrible.
Losing Finn was painful.
Watching helplessly as Kol died – not once, but twice – was agonizing.
But Klaus? Niklaus?
Seeing Niklaus dead tore him apart. It opened the red door in his soul, the beast that lived within him, that wanted to feast on his aunt for taking his little brother, his most beloved brother – only to feel numb, paralyzed in his hate-riddled guilt.
It was as if he had taken the stake to his brother's chest.
This was his fault.
His.
And he could never ask for forgiveness.
In the end, he had proven Niklaus right. In the end, it had been his family, it had been Elijah, the brother Klaus had trusted the most, whose betrayal had killed him. And for the first time, he couldn't justify his actions, no matter how partially well it worked. Because not even for Hope, not even for Hailey, would Elijah have sacrificed his beloved brother permanently. Never before had he wanted to die so much.
He was the oldest. Freyja, their mother's firstborn, didn't count. Freyja, who was their oldest sister, who he had never even known but found just a few days ago, who had told them that daggering Klaus would be beneficial, that it would be temporary and save them all. Freyja, who would not know the pain of truly losing Klaus. Freyja, who he could not even think of without hot rage rearing its ugly head.
No, he was the oldest. His siblings were his responsibility, and he had failed.
He had failed Klaus.
'Always and forever, brother.'
It felt as if his heart was torn out of his chest … only so much more painfully.
Niklaus was gone.
Agony bloomed into impotent torment, into endless desperation as he heard the weak voice of his younger sister sound out behind him, filled with such raw uncomprehending pain that it smashed the last of Elijah's composure and drove home the finality of those dulled green eyes staring up at him.
" N-Nik?"
~ The End ~