Rating: K
Please note that the rating can change at any time over these chapters but I will warn you before what the rating is and if you don't want to read that chapter that is okay. I do not know how many chapters there will be, but I will write them so long as I feel the drive for them. Your comments and suggestions keep me going fasters so leave a little love note and I might get them to you faster :)
Enjoy!

'A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words'

This phrase was something Niklaus had heard numerous times over while on earth. Little did others understand just how much of a story some of his photos and paintings were worth. He stood at a distance as he allowed people to look over his art work in the street of New Orleans. It was a show open to the public now at the tail end of the busy summer season of tourism. The canvas' –some small some large- hung suspended from the second story balconies in the French Quarter. Unknown to the viewers of the art work, some of the smaller canvases were actually much older than the more cumbersome canvases. The age of the pieces ranged from his young adulthood a thousand years ago, to as new as just last winter.

The hybrid sat on a bench with a glass of bourbon in one hand looking at people and which works the most of them stopped at to look closer at. After a time of watching from a distance, Klaus decided to roam the crowd. He stood to his feet in his casual attire and blended perfectly into the masses. He glanced around and noticed a number of children had seemed to gather around a particularly old drawing.

Sipping his glass of bourbon, he wandered over to the older drawing and smirked. It was one of the oldest on display today. The scene was from the ground looking up to the trees with multiple colors of birds all sitting in the trees making it so the trees themselves appeared to be different colors. Klaus could remember laying on the floor of the woods like it was just yesterday.

~1000 years ago

"Niklaus, go fetch your little brothers and sister, won't you? Dinner is nearly ready," Esther requests as Elijah prepares the table. With their father, Mikael, and oldest brother, Finn, out of the village on a long hunt Elijah was head of the house and had to assist their mother.

Klaus nods without question and leaves the house to do as his mother requested. He quickly spots his younger brother Kol flirting with a young girl of the village and smirks. "Kol, mother says she needs you inside," he calls to him. Kol rolls his eyes and leaves the young girl only to bump shoulders with Klaus as he walks inside. Klaus chuckles lightly having ruined his little brothers flirting time and continues to look for his little sister and youngest brother. After a small amount of time, Klaus walks into the woods some behind their home and notices two people laying on the grass. Klaus approaches them slowly and comes to realize it is Rebekah and Henrik. "What are you two doing?" he asks curiously.

Henrik sits up and looks to his older brother, "We are watching the trees," he explains with a smile, "Care to join us?"

Klaus looks back to the house not too far in the distance and ponders the offer only to have his train of thought interrupted by Rebekah, "Just for a moment, Nik?" She asks looking up to him from her blonde halo of hair on the ground.

Klaus sighs, unable to ever really deny his sister and lays down with Henrik and Rebekah. All three of them lay with the tops of their heads against each other and looking up to the trees now once again filled with birds that have returned for the summer. It is not yet time for the summer festivities, but it is finally spring again after the cold winter. "So many birds," Klaus mutters looking around at the trees above them, "Hardly a branch untouched by them," he notices.

"It is as if they are the leaves of the trees," Rebekah says gently, "So beautiful," she whispers. Klaus then begins to see the trees in a new light. His mind turns the multiple colors of the birds into leaves on the trees with minds of their own. It was really a beautiful idea to have a tree born out of so many different colors. Klaus takes a mental picture of the scene above him and vows that he will remake this perfect picture for his darling sister.

The three of them lay in silence for a time and then Henrik rolls over on his side looking to Klaus, "Why did you come find us brother?" he asks curiously.

"Oh!" Klaus remember, "Dinner is ready. We had best be going," Klaus says sitting up. Henrik stands excitedly and races back to the house. Klaus looks over to Rebekah who has yet to move and arches his brow, "Something on your mind, Rebekah?" he asks.

Rebekah turns her head up to him and looks to him with her angelic blue eyes, "I don't want to leave here. If I do the birds will leave too. Do you think the birds will be here tomorrow?" She asks curiously.

Klaus smiles weakly, "Dear sister. Even at seventeen years of age you still ask such child-like things," he says sighing, "Birds come and go, but I promise I will make you a drawing as beautiful as the birds. This way you can have it with you always,"

"-and forever," she adds on with a smile. Klaus nods proudly and stands to his feet and offers a hand to her so she can stand as well. Once she is on her own feet, she keeps hold of his hand as they walk back towards home for dinner. It was these small moments alone with Rebekah that only reinvigorated in Klaus just how much he loved his little sister. Even if his love for her was twisted in a way that was not the love of a brother, but of a love it did not matter to him because her refusal to let go of his hand gave him that drop of hope he needed to keep going.

~Present Time

"Admiring old art?"

The voice was not lost to Klaus as he smirked upon hearing his sister beside him. Without any preamble, Rebekah slipped her hand around Klaus' bicep and he bends his arm at his elbow. "What brought you outside?" He asks sipping his glass of bourbon.

"I heard children talking of beautiful trees and I had to come see for myself," she notes and looks to her brother as his eyes meet her own. "It really is one of my favorites," she whispers to him with a soft smile.

"Would you like to tour the gallery with me?" he offers extending his free arm with his hand holding his glass.

"I suppose I do not see why not," Rebekah offers as they begin to walk down memory lane.