A.N.: Our boys, making things worse by jumping in before looking what they're going to land in?! Never!
Resurgam
38
A Spat Between Friends
The whole school had been subdued all day.
News of Chrissy's death had been disseminated - but not the details of her murder.
However, two more bodies had turned up, and limited details of one of them had made it into the papers. It wasn't a stretch to link the murder with Chrissy's unexpected death, especially as no details were forthcoming about the circumstances.
There was a lot of confusion, and a lot of tears. He could smell the anxiety, the stunned disbelief, all day, seeping through the halls. With each class, but specifically Chrissy's third period English class, he had had to address her death, after a briefing from Mr Saltzman before classes began; to repeat that help was available, to anyone who wanted to talk - either the guidance counsellors or Elijah himself. Instead of taking his luncheon in the staff room with the others, he had opened his classroom door to anyone who wanted to stop by. He had put on some music through the SmartBoard and a handful of students had joined him, quiet, confused, tearful and jittery, but relieved to have a safe space.
He wished he could so easily be reassured.
The days were becoming blustery but still bright, foliage burning bright ochre and scarlet, warring with late wildflowers still basking in the sunshine; but the nights were coming earlier, and his students were showing up in light jackets and sweatshirts. Gyda had teased him so much about wearing Savile Row to his small-town high-school teaching post that he had tucked his tailored suits into their protective garment-bags, turning instead to dark-wash jeans, smart blazers, and, to make Gyda grin whenever she saw him in the halls, the blood-red Timberwolves hooded sweatshirt she had given him the night of the football game when Giulia had teased him about wearing a baseball cap.
Without the security of his suits, Elijah felt…free, but also untethered, as if one false step might set him adrift. If you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to… More than ever, he needed that certainty, the security that came from his 'armour', as Giulia called it. The way he hid his emotions behind immaculate suits with meticulous details to distract people from his own inner turmoil.
But he also could not fall back into old habits, use old crutches. Old coping mechanisms. He refused to spend the next millennium the same way he had endured the last, tucking everything out of sight, hiding away, putting himself last, always. The suits were his armour; but they were constricting. They protected him, but they prevented anyone from seeing beyond the Savile Row to the man beneath. They also stopped him from embracing all that he was - his interests, things that delighted him, his past, the expert boat-builder and carpenter he had been in his human life, a warrior in the shield-wall during spring raids, a farmer and a father, a husband… Spending time with Finn, he realised how much he had missed the simpler things from his human life. Sunshine warm on his face, watching things grow, sharing a meal with his family, or a game, relaxing around a fire, cuddling with his children as the evenings grew colder. Savouring the long nights with his wife.
Elijah had come to realise that vampirism had not stripped away his enjoyment of those things. Relentless psychological grooming had: Niklaus had systematically stripped away everything they had enjoyed, anything that did not have him as the centre of their attention…until everything Elijah indulged in, everything he had allowed himself to enjoy, even secretly, had in some way been approved by Niklaus because he allowed it.
Slowly, surely, over the centuries, Klaus had moulded them all to what he wanted them to be. To complement his lifestyle, his tastes, his desires, his fears.
It would not take nearly as long, Elijah hoped, to undo the damage Niklaus had inflicted on them…but Elijah recognised it. And that was the first step.
And he understood the motivations behind it: That was an even more important step in denying Niklaus any influence over him going forward.
Everything, throughout the centuries, it all came down to Ástríðr. Their mother. And Niklaus' all-consuming terror of being found out as her true murderer - and being held accountable by the people he had used for centuries as his own armour.
He was frightened of nothing but Mikael's wrath.
Now, Elijah understood it.
Mikael had never been upset that Niklaus was a bastard. He was not Ástríðr's first - Willem had been born in the New World while Ástríðr considered whether to divorce Mikael, so consumed by his rage and grief at Freyja's death at Dagmaer's hands that the man she had known, and loved, respected, had disappeared. It wasn't until years later, and Willem and Niklaus were both growing into strong, handsome boys, that Mikael had been capable of, and willing to reconcile with Ástríðr. And Rollo, Mikael's right-hand and Ástríðr's lover for all those years, father of Willem and Niklaus, had stepped aside, encouraging their reunion - he had married a Native woman, a fellow werewolf like himself, to help strengthen ties between their settlement and the Native tribe.
Rebekah had been born of their reunion, and then Henrik, years later. Ástríðr's last child: And the first taste Niklaus got for killing his own siblings. Every full moon, the Natives roamed the woods, in their wolf forms; their settlement barricaded themselves into the jarlshall, his father's house, for their protection. Desperate to tryst with a slave girl, Niklaus had flaunted their father's law, and snuck out: Henrik had followed, too young even to earn his armband, had followed Niklaus, intending to bring him back to the jarlshall, and safety.
Henrik had been torn apart, provoking a war with their friends and neighbours, the werewolves. Tatia, the slave girl Niklaus bedded, as much to enjoy her body as to taunt Finn for being too shy to approach her, despite his love for her, had ended up sacrificed to bind Niklaus' werewolf nature when he triggered his curse, and broke Tatia's body as she attempted to soothe the rabid beast Niklaus became.
Henrik, Tatia, then Ástríðr. She had bound Niklaus' werewolf nature; enraged such a truth had been kept from him, his own paternity, Niklaus had tracked down Rollo, and, Elijah had only learned recently, thanks to Giulia and some ancient, concealed cave-drawings… Niklaus had tracked down his biological father, and slaughtered him, as well as his wife and their children - his own half-siblings.
He had then ripped Ástríðr's heart from her chest.
And blamed Mikael.
His children were too wary of him not to believe it. And Niklaus had used that to his advantage, for centuries.
They should have known. Mikael had never shown any animosity toward Willem, only Niklaus. It was the boy he took exception to, not his father. Rollo had been Mikael's best-friend, his second, and Ástríðr's lover all those years Mikael had abandoned her in his grief and wrath.
It was Rollo, together with Mikael, who had committed human sacrifices at the shores of Kattegat, brutal and efficient and necessary, to protect Elijah's ships as they sailed to a new home.
The Threefold Death had been one of Mikael's signatures, committed at his wife's behest for power. She had channelled the power of sacrifice to protect them.
The last time Mikael had committed the Threefold Death was the night they were turned into vampires. In this very land, a thousand years ago.
Now bodies were being discovered bearing the very same tell-tale marks.
Strangled. Throats slashed. Skulls shattered.
Elijah sighed, and packed up his briefcase, tucking his shining new laptop into its protective sleeve. The school was quiet, dark; only the janitor was working away, and Elijah bid him good evening as he walked past. Outside, the parking-lot showed a few staff vehicles still parked, but not many; and he drove off, making a decision at a crossroads, literally. Instead of heading to the witch-house, he took a different turn, too agitated by the other bodies, too unnerved by the similarities in their murders to those historic sacrifices he remembered witnessing…back when human sacrifices were as much the norm as slaves and unthinking violence against neighbours for survival.
Content, Damon yawned widely as they strode through the vegetable gardens, tossing a pigskin between his hands. It was the second night this week he and Stefan had met up with Finn and Willem to play; he had missed just playing. Although Finn was resolute in preferring rugby to American football. Rose's windows were illuminated, a wide swathe of golden light picking up obscure details as she stood barefoot at the top of the external staircase, looking relaxed, a glass of rosé in her hand, tending to the potted plants at her bare feet. She raised her glass in acknowledgement, and Finn peeled away from them, to slowly scale the stairs, speaking Latin in a low voice that didn't carry on the air that had taken on a crisp tone the last few days. Rose tossed her gentle waves over her shoulder in as flirtatious a display of femininity as Damon had ever seen her make; she smiled, her eyes never leaving Finn's face, and gestured him inside.
"How long's that been going on?" Stefan asked, grimacing.
"A while. According to Rose, who's insisted on talking to me about this in horrifying detail, Finn is what the youths nowadays would call 'slow burn'."
"Huh. I guess he's patient."
"Dude's a saint. Rose is exquisite."
"And that's enough horrifying detail for me, thank you."
"For a Ripper on the mend, you sure are squeamish about the oddest things," Damon snickered. "You ever gonna shed that Victorian prude crutch? You know - I think that's the crux of all your issues, Stef."
"Oh, really?" Stefan asked glibly. "That's it, is it? Well, I guess we've identified the problem, everything's all good now, right?"
"Hardly, baby bro," Damon said. "But it does explain a lot about your suppressed appetite." He smirked, and Stefan shuddered, rolling his eyes. Damon's eyes twinkled with mirth as he teased Stefan; they let themselves into the barn, shedding their jackets.
Stefan's fell to the floor as he cried out in shock and pain, pinned to the wall by someone's vicelike grip, his chest exploding with pain, a hand clenched around his heart.
Not again, he thought, barely coherently, blinking in stunned disbelief at Elijah.
He had forgotten how scary the eldest Original brother was. Forgotten how strong and how vicious, in spite of the suits and the shining hair and appearance of benign manners. Perhaps he was all the more terrifying because this was not normal; Stefan had become so accustomed to Klaus' paranoid, vitriolic temper tantrums and incessant monologues, he was all but immune to their effects. But Elijah…was a gentleman, until he wasn't, and nobody could anticipate when he would snap. Elijah's dark eyes didn't need to flicker the way vampires' did under strong emotion for Stefan to be acutely aware just how enraged he was.
He gulped, and fought the urge to flee. Because Elijah had his hand wrapped around Stefan's heart, and one wrong word meant instant death for him.
Elijah turned pitiless dark eyes on Damon, poised to attack, impotent to make any move against Elijah as long as Stefan's heart remained in his grip.
"Why is it, Damon," Elijah said, his tone so gentle, casual, conversational, utterly at odds with the dire predicament he had placed Stefan in, "that when I examined the body of a brutally murdered teenager, and of all things, I scented you on her skin?"
Stefan met Damon's eye as his brother scowled, teetering closer.
Stefan yelled out as Elijah squeezed his hand slightly, his face betraying no effort whatsoever. He raised a questioning eyebrow at Damon instead. "Ugh…" Stefan groaned, panting, as he chanced a look down at his chest. Elijah's hand was embedded inside his chest, up to his wrist, where a shining silver band encircled his wrist, bright against his subtly tanned skin. It gave him insane déjà vu: The same thing had happened mere weeks ago, yet the first calm, polite vampire to do this had been blonde, not brunette. Blood stained Stefan's t-shirt, oozing down his stomach, starting to drip from his belt-buckle. He moaned, "You're getting blood on the carpet."
"Let him go," Damon said sternly.
"I shall not ask again, Damon," Elijah warned. "I would consider your response."
"You want me to admit I killed that girl - fine, I killed her!" Damon exclaimed, shrugging. "The other ones, too."
"No…no, you didn't kill them all, Damon," Elijah said quietly, and he sighed, as if disappointed - as if they were in class, and Stefan was watching Elijah mediate a discussion between his classmates on whether or not Daisy Buchanan was a romantic heroine or another villain in The Great Gatsby for her part in perpetuating the 'the-wealthy-use-and-discard-the-vulnerable' archetype. "You see, Giulia deducted from one victim's body and photographs of the others that we have two murderers on the loose, threatening peace in this town and our place in it. One who relishes the struggle," his eyes lingered for a moment on Stefan with faint distaste, "and another…who goes through the motions because he must. I wonder - how long until Giulia confronts you that it is you who have abused her trust in allowing you to return home?"
Damon froze, his eyes on Elijah. Eventually, he breathed, "She never said a word," condemning them by not denying it.
"I imagine she did not wish to go into the horrific details of a brutal murder in front of her child," Elijah murmured thoughtfully. His eyes narrowed on Damon. "You had the gall to coax Giulia into allowing you to take her daughter to dinner, alone, with your victim's blood still on your hands?"
"I took Zita for the afternoon to make sure she was safe," Damon protested. "So I could keep an eye on her!"
"Her mother is Giulia Salvatore, there are few places safer than with her." Damon's eyebrows flickered upward in surprise as the same emotion swept through Stefan: Elijah said it with such absolute faith, it was staggering. As if it was purely factual.
"You would think -" Damon said, and his lips parted as Stefan groaned, hissing, as Elijah squeezed gently. "Enough!"
"Now, darling, why would a vampire such as yourself start slaughtering innocents in a sacrifice ritual?" Elijah asked Damon gently. "You were never one to waste a meal. An answer, please." Damon hesitated, and Elijah sighed, gazing around the beautifully-decorated great-room. "All this dust in the air from those books, I would hate to sneeze while in such a compromising position. Alas, I have no handkerchief on my person." He sighed, as if truly upset about the fact. He gazed at Stefan, even smiled benevolently as if sharing a secret joke with him. "Shall we risk it?"
As he squeezed, and Stefan yelled, shuddering with the effort it took not to wrench himself away from Elijah's grip, Damon's eyes widened, but he was calm and stern and his voice took on a tragic heaviness when he said, "He'll kill them."
Elijah froze, still gazing at Stefan. It was…oddly intimate. "Who?"
"You know, Elijah," Damon said quietly. "You know."
Elijah stared at Stefan, and Stefan stared back, panting, as blood soaked his jeans, and dizziness started to set in from blood-loss.
"He said you'd - ah - recognise the Threefold Death," Stefan groaned. "It's the same way he sacrificed people for your mother - ungh!" He slumped to the floor as Elijah whipped his hand away, his fingertips unfurling from around his heart at the last second. With a dull thunk, he landed on the floor, shuddering with adrenaline. With a groan, he panted, and examined the gaping wound in his chest quickly healing. His shirt was ruined. First Rebekah, then Mikael, now Elijah… "Why does this keep happening to me?"
"Mikael," Elijah murmured, his hand shining ruby-red from Stefan's blood. He turned away from Stefan, holding Damon's eye. "How long has he been in town?"
"Long enough to royally piss me off," Damon muttered, his eyes widening as he realised they were not out of hot water just yet - Elijah's narrowed eyes were warning enough. "You know what, I really see where you get it from, now; the dude is scary." Damon peered around Elijah, checking on Stefan, who nodded that he was okay but rested his head back against the wall as he continued to heal, panting. At the unrelenting look on Elijah's face, Damon backtracked hastily. "I don't know! Look - he picked us off in the woods when we were out hunting for the vargulf. He knew it'd attacked Giulia, Rebekah and Caroline, seemed pissed it had, like that wasn't part of the plan."
Elijah's tone was grim when he said, "You knew about the witches' threat to Sheila Bennett and her great-granddaughters."
"Not until Giulia sent up the Bat Signal," Damon clarified. "But he - he wasn't upset we massacred the witches."
After a moment, Elijah murmured, "He wouldn't be. They were the beginning…the first sacrifice, and a powerful one." He sighed heavily, as if exhausted, and turned again to Damon. "Who else does he have?"
"Look, it's not like we're invited to his super-secret Bond villain lair to sit and chat about his plans for world domination okay; he shows up out of nowhere, we do what we're asked. He doesn't yank our hearts out, and he doesn't hurt the girls," Damon exclaimed. He caught Stefan's eye, and then added, "But - We think…he's got Jeremy Gilbert's girlfriend, you know, Ashlyn? I mean, she's the only other witch in town besides Sheila, and I doubt Sheila's up to whatever kinda mojo he's got planned."
"Who else?"
"Well, Mikael has exquisite taste. He only recruited the A-List," cooed a throaty, sultry voice, and Stefan grumbled to himself as Damon rolled his eyes so hard, he probably saw brain-matter. Under his breath, Damon swore to himself, and they all turned to stare at the doorway, where a slender girl with voluptuous curls posed in perfect lighting, highlighting the curve of her eyelashes, and of her breasts, displayed so temptingly by the plunging neckline of a tailored blazer with zip details that glinted with each movement, drawing all eyes to her breasts. She wore tight black jeans and leather boots that crept up her thighs.
Elijah sighed softly, his eyebrows drawing into a subtle frown. "Katerina."
"Hi," she smirked sweetly, with a sweep of her fluttery lashes. She glanced at Stefan on the floor, pulling a face. "Stefan, Giulia will kill you if you get blood on that carpet."
"Well, go and get me a towel, then!" Stefan groaned.
Katherine's eyebrows shot up, still smirking, asking sardonically, "Do I look like a maid to you?"
"GO!" Damon shouted at her, irritated. Katherine sauntered toward Damon's bedroom. "And stay out of my dresser drawers! You know, she only comes back because you keep having sex with her."
"I heard that," called Katherine, re-emerging with a fluffy towel. She eyed Stefan, "And don't flatter yourself."
"Wow," Stefan scoffed. "Just pile it on, Katherine."
"This boldness, Katerina…" Elijah said silkily, tracking her every movement as she tossed the towel at Stefan and perched on the arm of the sofa, tossing her long curls over her shoulder. "I presume it has something to you with your anticipation of my brother's imminent demise?"
"If you think I'm going to miss the opportunity to watch Klaus' total annihilation, you're dreaming," Katherine smiled richly. "Five hundred years I've been running from that sadist. And I've worn down too many amazing heels doing it. I'm owed a front-row seat to this danse macabre."
Elijah watched her for a moment without reacting. Stefan didn't breathe; Damon didn't move, his eyes dancing between the two.
Eventually, Elijah sat down in Damon's Brazilian armchair, groaning, "Pour me a drink," to the room in general.
"That's - that's my chair…" Damon muttered, but he let it go as Stefan wiped blood from his stomach, and the rich wood floor, careful to ensure no droplets of blood had fallen onto the decadent carpet.
As if to himself, Elijah muttered, "He has threatened to kill them."
"And we're being good little boys to make sure he doesn't," Damon clarified, as Katherine tinkered at the full bar hidden behind a sliding panel of the bookcase. Damon loved that bar.
"Has he asked you for information?" Elijah asked, as Katherine dutifully handed him a drink.
"Yeah. He wanted to know everything we know about where you're living, what you're doing," Damon shrugged. "He knows you're all un-daggered, and that even Willem is in town."
"Did you tell him we know the truth of our mother's death?"
"What truth?" Katherine asked, her curls shining healthily as she glanced between Stefan and Damon and Elijah, who sipped his dry gin martini thoughtfully.
"Klaus killed their mother. Not Mikael; but Klaus pinned it on him," Stefan muttered, speaking for him. "He's had them all running from Mikael for a thousand years, using them as a shield - because he murdered their mother."
"No wonder you two got along," Damon said, giving a tight smirk. "He killed their mother; you killed our father."
"Yeah, and Klaus blamed his brothers for abandoning him," Stefan said heavily, wincing, as he remembered their time at Gloria's, all the many nights wiled away with contraband booze, dancing with Rebekah, drinking his way through Klaus' many, prolonged monologues about how his family had failed him.
"Well, you were being a dick, Stefan, making meat-puzzles out of all our friends," Damon said reasonably; Stefan gave him a grim, half-guilty smile.
"It was a difficult time for me, Damon," he said softly.
"Your dysfunction is all kinds of gorgeous, Stefan," Katherine smirked, eyeing him up like a porterhouse steak.
"Can you compel her to leave me alone?" he asked Elijah.
"I could," Elijah said thoughtfully, looking superbly comfortable in Damon's armchair. "Or I could have Rebekah rip out her spine vertebra by vertebra."
"Ooh. I like the second one," Damon grinned.
"Poor Damon," Katherine purred. "What did I do to inspire such nastiness?"
"I know we're immortal, but even I don't have the time," Damon said drily. "Seriously. What are you doing here?"
"I can't spend time with my favourite boys?"
"No."
"It's a shame. All three of you in one room," Katherine purred, eyeing them all up, as if they were the appetiser, main meal and her favourite dessert. "I'm gonna sleep very well tonight."
"Alone. In your own bed. Far away from here," Stefan said, and Damon nodded his wholehearted agreement. "Goodbye."
Elijah frowned softly at her as she smirked playfully, ignoring Stefan's blatant dismissal. Gently swilling his martini around the chilled glass, he asked quietly, "What does my father have you doing for him, Katerina?"
Katherine shrugged decadently. "What I do best…keeping tabs on Klaus. It's rather dull, I admit, with him shackled to a rack, just hanging there and sort of whimpering, all pathetic, but, you know…when Kol and Isak start playing… I'm not going to deny I don't get a rush from watching him being gruesomely tortured. Isak is very creative. A little popcorn, some blood-infused Cristal, I had myself a little party last night."
"That's…really sad, Kat," Damon winced.
"What's the point of eternal life if you can't enjoy the simple things, Damon?" she sighed lustily, eyeing him up.
"You should be more careful. He gets one whiff of you and you're done once they get bored and release him," Stefan reminded her.
"You're assuming Daddy Dearest hasn't butchered him first."
"You're assuming Big Brother Elijah won't stop him," Damon said pointedly, eyeing Elijah, who sat back in the armchair, pinching his nose.
"Big Brother Elijah is trying to think, and would greatly appreciate an end to your almost-clever repartee," he muttered.
"You're crankier than usual," Damon observed.
"Yeah, well, his girlfriend got married, so…" Stefan shrugged, and Damon, Katherine and Elijah all turned to stare at him.
"Really, Stef?" Damon said, his eyes wide with warning. It was almost comical. "You wanna give him another chance to yank out your heart by provoking him?"
"Silence, both of you," Elijah sighed, and they shut up. Katherine handed him a fresh drink to replace the empty glass in his hand. "Thank you, Katerina…" He sipped ruminatively, frowning, and they waited, quiet, but rather impatient. Eventually, Elijah sighed, and advised, "Whatever my father has planned, he does not need the power of a dozen dead witches or sacrificial victims to kill Niklaus."
"You're saying Mikael has us jumping through hoops for the hell of it?" Damon scowled indignantly.
"Or he's not actually working with the Order," Stefan grumbled.
"Oh, you can be assured, he is working with the Order…rather, the Order is working for him," Elijah said sombrely. "But to what end… I do not know. We should all be wary."
He finished his drink, and stood, replacing the used glass by the sink to be washed and tidied away.
"What are you gonna do?" Damon asked quietly, watching Elijah neatly button his jacket.
Elijah glanced at him, raising an eyebrow in query. Then he realised what Damon meant, and answered after a moment, "Nothing."
"Nothing?" Damon's eyes popped; Katherine shot Stefan a quick glance.
"I protected Niklaus for a thousand years out of loyalty he manipulated from me," Elijah said quietly, but his voice was full of feeling. Still waters run deep, Stefan thought. "Giulia's life has been threatened to ensure my father has access to him, and make no mistake, I learned everything I know from Mikael: Give him no reason to make good his threats to harm Giulia or her child by getting in his way." The chill of his voice was more terrifying than any of Mikael's soft-spoken threats, and for a moment, Stefan briefly considered the thought that he was far more frightened of Elijah than his petulant little-brother. He sighed softly, and turned to Stefan, saying, very cordially, "Stefan - I apologise for my earlier violence against you this evening."
"What's a little heart-massage between friends?" Damon quipped, as Stefan gaped: He'd never had an apology for brutality before. Elijah nodded respectfully toward Damon, and frowned thoughtfully at Katherine before leaning in to kiss her shining curls, and saw himself out, disappearing into the night. Damon's jaw dropped, as Katherine sat perched on the arm of the sofa as if turned to stone, her lips parted, stunned. Damon blinked several times. "What just happened?"
Katherine recovered, shaking her head so her curls glistened in the lamplight. "Something I never thought I'd see… Elijah has abandoned him. Renounced his loyalty to Klaus," she said, smirking luxuriously, her eyes alight with interest, with enthusiasm and delight. "All while declaring his love for Giulia." She shook her head, then gave a soft little laugh. "Salvatores," she sighed, clicking her tongue, as she eyed each brother up with such an intense look, Stefan could feel it. "You'll be the death of us all."
Damon smiled warmly, approaching Katherine to cradle her face in his hands. And he sighed, lustily, "Here's hoping."
"You say the sweetest things, darling," she cooed, and Stefan rolled his eyes as she leaned in to give Damon a lingering but chaste kiss on the lips. She patted Stefan's chest as she sauntered past, following Elijah into the night.
"I feel like I need a drink," Damon groaned.
"Yeah," Stefan agreed, and Damon brought out the good stuff while Stefan changed out of his bloody, ruined clothes. Returning quickly, he asked, "You got it, right?"
"What, major déjà vu?" Damon said, and Stefan nodded.
He frowned, asking after a moment, troubled, "We're not like Father, are we?"
"I'm not," Damon clarified, pouring them both a couple fingers of bourbon.
"Dick."
"Nah, neither of us are like him, thank God, at least, not anymore," Damon said, and smirked luxuriously as he handed Stefan a drink. He added, mockingly, "The years have been kind."
Stefan sank onto the couch, eyeing the ledgers. One had been left open when they had abandoned their research to play around with the football. "Think they realised what we're looking for?"
"Have a feeling Elijah would've put a stop to it if he had," Damon said. "You heard him; even he warned us not to piss Mikael off. He'll kill them."
"Well, I want to kill him!" Stefan said petulantly.
"Not before I kill him first!" Damon protested.
"No! You can't!"
"Can so! I'm the eldest! We better hope Katherine didn't figure it out - she'll kill the both of us before Mikael ever gets the chance, if she thinks we're gonna get in the way of him tearing Klaus apart," Damon sighed, sipping his bourbon, fidgeting in his armchair to reclaim it.
"She wouldn't," Stefan said dismissively. They were the only loose ends Katherine could never bear to tie up.
"Yeah, you're probably right, she's too distracted by the idea of getting us all into bed to worry about us messing with Mikael's plan to kill the sadistic maniac she's been on the run from for five hundred years," Damon said.
"You're being sarcastic."
"Yes, I'm being sarcastic, Stefan!" Damon said, rolling his eyes. He pulled a grim face, "Although, she probably would prefer to torture us by chaining us up and stripping in front of us, instead of killing us outright like any kind of humanitarian. In that way, I think I'd prefer what Mikael has to offer."
Stefan rested his head back, gazing up at the panelled ceiling, and sighed heavily, observing, "This is messy."
"Yep. And it's only gonna get messier," Damon grumbled. "Better get everything stain-guarded."
"Oh, that reminds me… I need to work on the Porsche this weekend. I think Rebekah wrecked the alignment."
A.N.: Another treat for you. At this rate I'll have Resurgam finished in a few weeks! And then onto the next story!
