It starts out as a very typical day.
When Elena wakes up in their king bed, the spot to her right side is empty – Elijah has likely been awake and about for hours already. In contrast, the spot on her left side is still quite occupied – Klaus is awake but almost eerily still, as he rarely is outside their rooms.
And he's just istaring/i at her, as if he still can't quite believe Elena is there. Even though it's been almost two years already.
"I'll call for breakfast," Klaus tells her, as he does nearly every morning – obsessed as he always is with what he calls her "human requirements." She knows that he won't listen to any objections that she's perfectly able to go downstairs and into the kitchen to feed herself; Elena doesn't even bother anymore. Instead, she allows herself to enjoy their alone time, leaning forward to ask for a kiss that Klaus quite happily grants her.
After she eats breakfast, delivered as always by one of Klaus's most trusted hybrids, they enjoy a shared shower. Klaus never misses the chance to see Elena slick and wet. (In any way.) After they dry off and get dressed, trading languid kisses all the while, he walks her to Elijah's study, where he leaves her while he goes off to do Klaus things that Elena probably doesn't want to know about.
"Good morning, lovely Elena," Elijah greets her with a kiss (and imaybe/i a bit more), and then Elena settles on the comfortable leather sofa to read, and write in her diary, and enjoy their companionable silence while Elijah works at his desk.
Just before lunch, Elena's daily routine is disturbed when Elijah gets called away to join Klaus in dealing with some scuffle among the ranks of vampires and hybrids that they rule. It's nothing iparticularly/i unusual, and Elena thinks nothing of it when Elijah leaves her in the dining room with Tyler, as he has many times before. They share a quick kiss good-bye, uncaring of their audience, and Elijah promises to return soon.
Elena and Tyler spend lunch chatting and catching up as other hybrids bring in the food and drinks, and then clear away their plates when they're done. Elena misses Tyler; as Klaus's first hybrid and one of his leading enforcers, he's often away dealing with "business." She doesn't get to see him enough. (She doesn't allow her mind to wander to the other people she misses.)
After lunch, Elijah and Klaus still aren't back, and Elena is tired of reading, so she heads outside. None of the hybrids in residence try to stop her, though she's sure there are at least one or two trailing behind her, silent bodyguards as she walks the grounds. The gardens are beautiful as always, and Elena is happy to be outside in the fresh air, but admiring the flowers isn't as fun alone. For lack of anything else to do, she enters the hedge maze, though she knows its pattern perfectly by now.
As Elena turns the corner into the center of the maze, someone grabs her from behind. Before Elena can make a noise, there is a hand over her mouth; she fights, trying to pull the hand away. A hybrid will be there in seconds, if only she can scream. (They know what will happen to them, if they fail to protect her.)
The man holding her is unmoved by her struggles. When Elena tries to stomp on his foot or kick him, he lifts her from her feet so she doesn't have any leverage. "Quiet, Elena," a familiar voice hisses in her ear.
Elena stops struggling immediately. Damon sets her down, and lets her turn around. After they make eye contact, he cautiously removes his hand from her mouth, even as he indicates that she should keep quiet. He grabs her arm, dragging her towards the exit of the maze, in the opposite direction from the way Elena came in.
"What are you doing here?" Elena hisses under her breath. She tries to drag her heels, to get Damon to istop/i, but her strength is no match to his.
"Saving you!" Damon whispers back. Rather than keep dragging her, he lifts her from her feet again, throwing her over his shoulder and temporarily knocking the breath from her lungs.
"I don't want to be saved!" Elena tells him, in her most chiding whisper, once she regains her breath. She turns her head so her nose doesn't bump into his back with each step. "Let me down and get out of here! If you get caught, you'll be executed."
A gust of air, and then Elena is away from Damon and carefully wrapped in a pair of familiar, protective arms. When she looks up, Damon is now the one lifted from his feet, with no chance of escape - struggling uselessly against strength far superior to his.
Klaus's grip on Damon's neck is tight, cutting off his air. Elena turns her head to gaze up at Elijah, hoping that he'll reason with Klaus – but by the look on his face, she shouldn't expect him to temper his younger brother in this.
"You're going to have a fate worse than execution," Klaus say; rage twists his handsome features into something monstrous.
"Klaus," Elena calls his name, trying to keep her tone calm. Appeasing. She wants to go to him; if only she could touch him, she knows she could soothe him. But Elijah's arms are a protective cage around her, preventing her from moving closer to Klaus – or Damon.
Damon's face is turning red. She thinks he might pass out, soon.
"I've been patient, love," Klaus tells her, shaking Damon like a rag doll. "But I won't have your Salvatores sniffing around any longer. Dearest Stefan picked a fight just to get my attention this morning. Now he and his brother have it."
"Niklaus," Elijah's voice is chiding. Elena feels a spark of hope, that Elijah might help her calm Klaus down, so nobody has to get hurt. Elijah continues: "The Salvatores' punishment should be public."
Elena swallows nervously, as Klaus responds: "You're right, brother." His smile is vicious as he snaps Damon's neck.
"You're safe now, lovely Elena," Elijah murmurs softly in her ear, rubbing her arms gently as if to soothe her fears. Neither he nor Klaus have ever quite understood that Elena's fears can't be soothed; instead, she just lives with them.
Kisses them.
Fucks them.
Loves them.
