Elijah, immaculate in a suit and immune to the heat, strode into Rousseau's and took a seat at the bar. He nodded to Cami, who was busy with another customer. In moments, she walked to him. "A little early in the day for you, isn't it? It's barely noon."
He merely looked at her.
"Right. Bourbon?"
"What else?"
She got a glass and poured. She hesitated, then asked, "How's it going? How's Klaus - Hayley?"
He was silent, and took a sip of his drink. "Not well. Haley is devastated. She barely gets up, barely eats. I have to force her to take my blood just so she doesn't start to desiccate."
"She's had a horrific loss," Cami began.
"We all have," Elijah snapped.
She looked at him with sympathy. "I'm sorry," he said.
"It's alright. Elijah - do you want me to talk to her? See if I can help her?"
"Thank you, but no. I've asked her, and - she's not interested."
"Okay. Well, if she changes her mind," she said.
"You'll be the one I call," he said.
She hesitated again, then asked, "And Klaus? How's he?" She picked up a rag and began to needlessly wipe the counter-top.
Elijah was silent - he heard the longing in her voice even though she tried to disguise it. He knew she was still hurting from Klaus' rejection of her friendship. "He's drunk most of the time."
"Oh. So - no change from his normal behavior then," Cami deadpanned.
Elijah chuckled. "Well, let's see - either he's drunk or raging at me - pretty normal, yes."
He keeps silent about the moonstones that draw on his brother's power - his ability to control whether he turns or not - every full moon to prevent the wearer from turning. Every full moon for the past four months his brother endured physical pain - the rings connecting to him, drawing on his power, draining his strength. I will not tell her, he thinks. Better to let her think that he is drunk and blinded by grief and rage than to let her know of the pain he endures each full moon. Those blasted rings...He curses himself once again for ever agreeing to that cockamamie scheme in the first place.
"And you?" Cami asked, interrupting his thoughts.
He looked up from his glass and into her eyes, surprised at the concern he saw.
"How are you doing?"
He set his glass down slowly. No one - not in four months - had asked him how he was doing, how he was feeling. "I'm f..."
"Don't," she said fiercely, placing her hand on his. "Don't tell me you're fine. She was your niece. She was a part of your family - she was the first Mikaelson born in a thousand years. She was just as important to you as she was to Hayley and Klaus."
He hesitated, slowly drew his hand away from hers, then started again. "I haven't had the time to think about it - how I'm feeling. I've been too concerned with Hayley, too busy keeping Niklaus from going on a rampage." He tried to stop, but found himself telling her more. "I'm angry. Frustrated. In a thousand years, whether human or vampire, I've never felt this helpless. All I can do to keep from succumbing to grief is to destroy those responsible."
"Will that help? Killing the ones who killed her - killed Hope?"
"Immensely."
She arched her eyebrow at him.
"Trust me - revenge can be extremely satisfying."
"If you say so," she said. "It's okay to grieve - to be angry," she continued.
"You're telling a thousand year old vampire to give in to anger," he said, amused.
"Anger can be healthy - and you have too much control to go on a rampage."
He smiled as he looked into her eyes. "You really have no idea what we're truly capable of, do you?"