Alaric's Residence
Master Bedroom
They sat in what would normally have been called companionable silence, scrutinizing their opposite before Klaus sighed and pointed to the blood bag still held in his older brother's grasp.
"Perhaps you should finish that. You still look a little deadish to me. I must say I'm surprised that you let the Salvatore brothers get the better of you, or did they act as a diversion to let Alaric Saltzman get close to you with a white oak ash dagger?" Klaus asked curiously. Katherine hadn't fully filled him in on exactly how they had daggered his brother, just that he had and then given Klaus his location.
Elijah bristled ever so slightly at the thinly veiled order, but he needed the blood to repair whatever the Salvatore's most likely Damon had visited upon him while unwillingly in their care. Taking a sip, he relished in its taste as the nectar tickled his taste buds.
"That was their original plan. If you must know they foolishly removed the dagger. Their act nullified any agreement I had, and I went to collect the person I made the arrangement with. Would you believe that it was Elena Gilbert who daggered me after she made me swear to protect her family and friends after stabbing herself with a kitchen knife?"
Klaus feigned ignorance of who that particular person was, which, as he expected, elicited a growl of annoyance from his older brother. Even after a thousand years how he still could get a rise out of Elijah will wonders never cease, he thought humorously. He waited for his brother to finish feeding before answering Elijah's unspoken question. Still, he couldn't resist tweaking his stoic brother once more.
"Elena Gilbert? Now who could that be?"
"Still playing games, brother? You're possessing her teachers body so you'd know who exactly Elena Gilbert is?" Elijah answered coldly. His brother pursed his lips and shook his head slightly in a manner that confused him.
"Oh yes! Do you mean that she is the last Petrova Doppelgänger? How silly of me, not to mention that right at the start. As a matter of fact, I met her in my history class a little over two hours ago. I must say she is nothing like Katerina at all. She is more like the progenitor of their bloodline," Klaus couldn't help to add his last cryptic statement. Based on his brother's expression, it wasn't lost on him either. Good, I would hate to have to dagger him again.
"You're looking for her in a face that has haunted us both for a millennium. I made that mistake with Katerina, but I will not do the same with the lovely Elena."
Klaus knew his brother too well to know what he left unsaid, and he wondered if Elijah had seen a little of Tatia come through, but had ruthlessly suppressed those thoughts from coming to the surface. Katerina had hurt his brother in more ways than one, he realized, and that only made him want to punish her more. But that would have to wait.
"Speaking of Katerina, I assume the moment I was daggered she took off when my compulsion on her broke," Elijah added, trying to change the subject. His gums ached for another bag of blood, but he doubted his brother would give him one, not without extracting a heavy price for it.
"Actually Katerina is sitting on the couch in mister Saltzman's living room even as we speak." Klaus offered in a conciliatory gesture.
"Oh! Well, that explains the extra heartbeat I've been hearing nearby. It is too slow for a human, so I guessed it was another one of your minions. So I assume that you have the Moonstone as well?"
"You assume correctly, brother! After five hundred years, I'm personally not letting that stone out of my sight." Klaus beamed privately, amused that he surprised his older brother with the revelation he had both Katerina and the Moonstone after so many centuries searching for the pair of them.
"So do you have Elena Gilbert in a cage somewhere too and have you started collecting the spell items you need to break the curse mother placed on you?" Elijah sighed.
"She is safe at school for now, and I know she won't run. I had a little teacher/student counseling session. It was a rather revealing experience, I must say."
"She knows what you did to Katerina's family and the entire village, Niklaus. She isn't going to run; she values her friends and family lives more than her own. It's a pity the world is going to lose such a compassionate soul. This will be the second time it's happened in our lifetimes brother."
Klaus knew what he meant. When Tatia had died both he and Elijah discovered that as vampires they could temporarily turn off their emotions. It had been the only way they could have coped with their shared loss.
"Yes brother, I've started to collect the spell ingredients I have one of my warlocks out right, not arranging events to bring me hopefully two werewolves for the price of one. I have a vampire and if need be a certain annoying teenage girl, I wouldn't mind ridding the world of as a back up. Oh and I have my witches, of course don't leave home without one of those, right?"
"Your drool humor only amuses yourself, Niklaus. I must say I'm impressed at the speed you've gathered things here. I had only found a werewolf myself. I assume you're going to use Katerina as the vampire for the ritual?"
"Actually, no brother. I want her to suffer for at least half as long as she's been running from us. Death is too good for her. But I am curious about this werewolf you found. Tell me more," Klaus answered truthfully.
"I know how you like symmetry, so I hate to break it to you. The werewolf is a male, but I thought you'd like my reasoning for using him," Elijah stated, looking at his burnt clothing with some annoyance before returning his focus to his brother. "Yes, I actually stumbled over him quite by accident. He is one of the most despicable creatures I've encountered as of late. Not only is the man a werewolf, but he is a pedophile and physically abuses his own offspring as well."
Klaus's body tensed involuntarily after digesting his brother's words. Monster they both may be, but after what Mikael had done to him and much later the crimes inflicted on his deceased adoptive son Marcellus, they both had an unspoken rule that such people deserved death in the most painful manner possible.
"I think you found my first pick of which werewolf to use. The others I'll keep as backup and who knows they might even be the first of my hybrids." Klaus explained Elena's words coming back to him perhaps he could test it if he had the time.
"What are we doing this for, brother?" Elijah sighed, leaning back into the headboard. They both knew that they could easily shift from causal non-threatening behavior to lethal in a mere microsecond.
"What?!" Klaus asked, not bothering to hide his confusion and mild hurt.
"This! Did you just want to talk and find out what I knew before you re-daggered me and tossed me into the sea with our remaining family?!" Elijah growled and Klaus momentarily felt fear, which confused him. Why was his brother behaving like this? A drunken memory tickled the back of his mind and he looked at his brother as if with new eyes. He couldn't possibly still believe I did such a heinous act, did he? But his brother's next heated statement confirmed it.
"Ever since that faithful day you sent me that accursed letter telling me what you'd done, you didn't even have the nerve to tell it to my face! You're compelled vampire found me, gave me the letter, then promptly staked himself while I was reading it! You were already covering your tracks even then. Do you know how much I've invested in trying to find them! Do you have any idea how many people I've compelled to create technology to search the ocean floor in search of them? Seventy-one percent of the Earth's surface is covered by saltwater! I've found not a trace! I so badly wanted to kill you for what you did." Elijah roared, his temper breaking finally. Which scared Klaus, his brother, never lost his temper, at least so visibility. What have I done!?
"It doesn't matter now I guess, but I planned on what to do after I killed you. I was going to desiccate myself and have my body tossed into the deepest part of the ocean!" Elijah added. Klaus sat there, stunned.
"I… I didn't toss them in the ocean, brother! I'd never do such a thing!"
All it took was a microsecond, and Elijah had his brother pinned up against the brick wall. The force of their impact actually damaged some of the wall itself.
"Lies!" Elijah hissed. His fingers wrapped tightly around his brother's throat.
"Elijah… I swear… I did not do as I said in that accursed letter… I was hurt… feeling alone and in a drunken fit I wrote it and sent it to you." Klaus gasped.
Elijah, stunned by the revelation, backed away, releasing his brother. Who, despite being an original vampire, was currently occupying a very human body.
"If that is at all true, then why undagger me in the first place? What do you want from me?"
Klaus breathing heavily eyed his shocked brother, wondering if he could handle something he only just discovered. Perhaps a few innocuous questions first.
"Do you still have that Resurrection Elixir you had originally created for Katerina?"
"Yes, but what of it?" Elijah asked, not following where his brother was going with these new questions. He was still trying to piece together a reality that their family was still safe and accessible. He did feel some guilt growing, he'd made a promise to Elena Gilbert. Would he betray her now that he could be reunited with his family after so long?
"I said I had a rather interesting frank discussion with Miss Gilbert and she said some rather intriguing things to me or at least to her teacher."
"Niklaus?"
"One more question have you ever entered her dreams after your first encounter with her?"
Elijah looked at Klaus with annoyance. Didn't he know that she wore vervain making it impossible to do so? He had the means and the opportunity, he just never considered doing so, and that is what he eventually explained to his odd behaving brother.
"Pity. It just would have further collaborated my suspicions about our illustrious Doppelgänger."
"Niklaus, if you don't start making sense." Elijah threatened.
Klaus sighed and then started to explain in great detail his conversation with Elena after class. He took his time and when he finally finished, the stun look his brother had almost made him want to laugh, but now wasn't the time for that.
"Th… That's impossible! She never said anything to me about these dreams!"
"How could it be anything else, brother? She had details only Tatia would've known about our family or how Tatia had died. I found her body, remember?" Klaus declared. Finding her body like that still haunted him after all this time.
For the first time, his brother looked at him with wonder and hopefulness. Klaus knew that Tatia had been important to them both.
"Do you have a means yet of verifying if Elena is Tatia?"
"We will soon I have one of my better witches looking into it. Now do you see why I want the Elixir?"
"Yes brother! If this is true, then it changes everything!"
With that, they started to plan. They were still planning when Alaric's phone rang. Annoyed, he picked it up and saw that it was from Damon Salvatore. He was tempted to ignore it, but thought better of it.
"Damon, what do you want?"
"Ric! Where the hell are you?" Damon spat.
