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Chapter 2: Birthday and Dinner Party

June 22nd was a special day for Isabella Miranda Gilbert as she was in the Salvatore Boardinghouse getting ready for her party.

It was her eighteenth birthday and she was happy to be living for-already-eighteen years.

Stefan had come back but when she caught him with Caroline Forbes-both bloodsharing and being intimate, she refused to talk to Caroline.

A general rule of thumb is to never get involved in your best friend's exes but Caroline got involved with Matt and yes, Isabella was okay with it as Matt had shown he had a little crush on her.

However, with Stefan, he didn't truly break up with Isabella-he just left her behind without stating clearly that they were over.

It was times like this that she wished that Bonnie were here to help her with her Caroline problem especially since that Isabella didn't want a huge party and would have preferred to be at home or at the Grille with Elena celebrating as she trusted her sister more than the blonde baby vampire.

Elena was moaning as she was pressed into the soft pillow top bed as the silk sheets were fisted in her hands and her back arched as Elijah was pounding into her, suckling her carotid artery.

"Don't stop," she moaned and he grinned. "Please! Please!"

Alaric was at the party but he wasn't being a good parental/guardian figure as he caught Jeremy in the car with Matt smoking and found Isabella drinking scotch with some of the cheerleaders as Caroline was dancing with Stefan in a seductive way.

"So what are you going to do about baby Gilbert?" Damon asked as he looked at the teenagers who were in the Boardinghouse.

"What can I do?" Alaric sighed. "I could try to be an adult in his life but he'll rebuff me and go to Elena who will basically force him to stop."

"Where is she?" Damon couldn't help but wonder about the older doppelganger. Sure, he thought she was sexy and he was definitely going to taste her but to him she really wasn't girlfriend material. "Alone? In the house?"

"She's actually moved out and is living with her fiancé but I don't know who he is," Alaric snickered at Damon's shocked face. "She met him on her adventurous road trip and apparently he's popped the question and she seemed happy when mentioned about their upcoming nuptials."

The two didn't see Caroline and Stefan leave the party for a very long and loud after party.

Isabella went upstairs, intent on getting her jacket and leaving when she heard moaning coming from Stefan's room-the room she was headed into for her jacket. Stepping in, she left with the door open so everyone can see Stefan and Caroline having sex.

She ended up bumping into Alaric who had gone upstairs to check on Isabella and he had seen what had her so upset.

He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and led her to his car where he took her home and messaged Elena, saying that the 'blondes are at it'.

It was three days before school was to start and as Klaus was waiting for Elijah, Adeline, the Salvatores and Elena Gilbert (who requested to be there as it was her sister's future they were talking about as Isabella couldn't make it due to being in the hospital with Alaric) when he saw a shadow. He flashed towards it to reveal Marcel Gerard who smirked.

"Heard you were having a party and was hoping to join," he said as he hugged the hybrid who returned it. "Nice seeing you Klaus."

"You as well Marcellus," Klaus whispered as he smiled at his adopted son. "You as well though I thought you died."

"I'm made of tougher stuff," he told him. "Even the war didn't get to kill me." Klaus hated knowing that he was in the war and when he pulled him into a hug, he nearly squeezed him.

"Oh hello Marcellus," the two pulled back and saw the golden blonde locks of Adeline stroll into the room with her older brother behind her as well as Elena Gilbert who was in a knee length capped sleeved white dress with a black lace overlay on the skirt paired with a pair of black mary janes. "I'm surprised to see you here though Elena said you were."

Adeline herself was in the same dress style as Elena except it was a black dress with a white lace overlay.

"Hello again Marcellus," Elijah greeted him and Marcel waved. "You're looking good."

"Thanks," Marcel eyed the way Elena was angled towards him and he smirked, realizing that after tonight's festivities she would be discovered again. "You ladies look smokin' hot though." He added though internally felt sick when he thought of his adopted mom looking 'smokin' hot'.

Elena smirked as she kissed his cheek.

"Why aren't you a sweet one," she cooed and he grinned. "Klaus hasn't said anything nice about my dress but Elijah has." Marcel shivered, as he knew exactly what his uncle of sorts would have done.

"We also decided to invite Bonnie and Abby Bennett to this," Elijah told his brother. "Abby is after all Isabella's godmother and Bonnie is her only friend for the moment as they had a falling out with Caroline Forbes."

The knowledge that even Elena didn't have to use compulsion or subtle threats on the Salvatore boy and he leaving Isabella alone was good yet it was a double edged sword because it was bad for Isabella to have her once best friend betray her.

"It's for the best," she could hear herself say. "Nothing against Caroline but she was becoming a bit flaky and narrow sighted," Elena sighed as she looked up. "The birthday party was the last straw."

"It seems as though sweet Isabella walked in on a scene between the two blondes and they haven't spoken since," Elijah added. "So Elena is going to put her two cents about who sweet Isabella should be with."

Stefan and Damon had walked in at that moment when Elena had added, "as sad as I am that Stefan is a cad and would cheat on my sister I'm happy that she's detoxing from the love triangle now."

"Ouch," Damon said faking hurt. "You got me right here in the heart." He patted his chest and Elena rolled her eyes.

"Do you want to keep remaining as alive as you are boy?" Elijah asked in a low growl. Damon nodded. "Then shut up and sit down."

Since finding out that it was Elijah who Elena found and was engaged to, Damon had been trying to break them up and it was ticking Elijah off. Elena turned so that she could face her Original.

"Who gets to sample me at night?" She asked him, knowing that everyone could hear her. "You do. As sexy as it is when you're jealous…I'll be your dessert tonight."

Damon felt anger swell inside him at her words to the Original and he sneered at the brunette.

"Why don't we sit down?" it was Abby Bennett who spoke up as she just arrived with her daughter and both were in dresses-Abby's was a long spaghetti strapped light blue dress and Bonnie's was a thick strapped high-low dress in dark green.

The dinner was exquisite before it got time to discussing Isabella Gilbert's future.

"I think that she would pick me," Damon told Klaus. "That way, she will be safe."

"No," Abby, Bonnie and Elena said instantly with Elena adding, "you would want her and try to make her into the version of Katherine Pierce that will want you even through compulsion."

"No I wouldn't," Damon protested when Elena smirked cruelly. "I wouldn't."

"You could be right," she said as she decided to be brutally honest. "True, you could be right but you would try to change her into something she's not. You wouldn't care whether or not she was happy. You would want her at your beck and call, submitting to your whims even though she wouldn't want that."

"You would be the worst choice for Isabella," Elijah added. "She needs someone who wouldn't change her and would help her." He looked thoughtful. "I would suggest Mr. Donovan but their relationship went stagnate for a reason and then I would suggest Mr. Lockwood but he's a hybrid and she's a human."

"That's why Elijah and I propose that she finds her perfect match like I found him," Elena finished what Elijah said. "Even if it means she ends up with a vampire that vampire might be who she longs for."

"Give her a few years before she decides what she wants," Bonnie decided to say. "If you want her to have children and she has no match there is this thing called 'sperm donors'." Elena chuckled at the looks the Salvatores gave the young witch. "She could pick the best one and then after the months she feels ready she can turn."

"It's a suitable option dad," Marcel decided to add as he grinned at the hybrid. "She might not find her perfect match so that way, a new doppelganger in another five hundred years and she can be around to protect that one."

Klaus looked thoughtful and nodded.

"That was the best idea you few had," he said with praise to the young Bennett witch, his adopted son, brother and soon to be sister in law. "Much better than what the Salvatores brought to the table."

"So much better and then there's the fact that she might not want to be with a man," Abby said. "She might be trying to find out if she prefers a masculine touch or if the softer feminine one is much better suited for her."

"Abby's got a point brother," Adeline told him. "She might prefer one sex over the other or she might prefer both sexes. At this time and age, she's discovering herself."

"She prefers a masculine touch," Stefan rebuffed. "She liked mine."

"She could have been faking pleasure," Elena told him. "Honestly, she could have faked being with you."

"That was underhanded," Damon snarled at the female Siphoner. "You don't know that it could have been faked."

Elena pulled out her phone and dialed a familiar number. It took two rings and when Isabella's voice fluttered over the phone, Elena grinned.

"Hey Bella…" Elena began. "When you and Stefan were intimate did you fake it?"

Silence before… "I did actually. I thought I did something but he wasn't as good as I thought. Aren't vampires supposed to be the best lovers or something?"

"Most of the time they are," Elena told her. "Stefan just found out that he wasn't as good as he thought and prefers loose moral blondes named Caroline."

"We will talk to you soon enough Miss Isabella," Elijah told her as he hung up. "There you have it."

Klaus wanted to laugh at the look on Stefan's face but didn't though the others except for Elena, Elijah and Damon did.

"I remember a story you told me once," Klaus looked at Marcel who decided to stop laughing and diffuse the situation. "It was about a village girl named Tatia." The subtle wink at Elena went unnoticed by everyone but Elena, Elijah and Adeline. "Do you remember it?"

"Vaguely," Klaus admitted. "Elijah might know more." Elijah nodded. "He and I will tell the story."

"A young widowed appeared in the village," Elijah said. "She was pregnant and all the boys adored her while some of the girls disliked her but there was none who could truly steal her heart."

"I believe there was one," Klaus said as he thought back. "My brother and I went to blows over her but in the end we realized the sacred bond between brothers was stronger than that." He picked up his glass, as did the others. "Family, always and forever."

"Always and forever," Elijah, Adeline and Marcel echoed the statement and Elena cleared her throat. "Yes Lovely?" Elijah asked, already knowing what she was planning.

"I have a story I would like to tell," she looked at Klaus who nodded. "Thank you." She stood up and walked around to the fireplace with her wineglass. "A young Viking woman had been married at fifteen to a man her father didn't truly approve of. By sixteen she had a son and by eighteen she was pregnant again but to her father's horror and disgust her arms showed bruises. He had asked her about what had happened and when she spilled that he-in drunken rages would grab her arms roughly or try to hit her-he was incensed to the point that he sharpened the blade of his axe." She shivered as she could remember vividly how her father looked horrified and angry. "The father grew enraged and in an act that any father would do he told the village that the boy was a monster for hitting a woman-a pregnant one at that. He allowed the others to throw rocks and pebbles at him before he swung the axe, chopping his head off." She shook her head and closed her eyes. "The young woman was distressed and with the ability to steal magic from everyone and everything she felt as though she had shamed her family but they moved her to a new village where she met a family who helped her." She smiled as she opened her eyes. "One of the children grew to love her and she him but she did push him away, feeling as though maybe her hormones were the cause but some months after her daughter had been born, the young man was beside her and willing to play daddy to the children that weren't his." She looked at them once she opened her eyes. "They married four months later and one day a tragedy struck the family that caused the matriarch to use a forbidden spell on her children to protect them and to that day her actions had lasting consequences that even nature herself has adjusted to." She cleared her throat and grinned. "However something happened and when she remembered after something dastardly happened ninety six years ago to her, well-the phrase to make her family remember is 'belle fleur'."

At once, everyone watched as Klaus held his head and the thumps coming from upstairs made Abby pale and the Salvatores look horrified but then that horror grew tenfold as Elena moved from the fireplace and a redheaded vampire flew, her arm getting caught in the flames.

"Welcome back sister," no one noticed that Klaus had stood up and looked at Elena before he hugged her. "Now I know why you got Elijah first." He chuckled.

"Let me introduce you fools to my wife," Elijah grinned at their faces. "Elena Gilbert was a clever alias but her true name is Tatia Petrova Mikaelson, the Original Heretic and my loving wife of over a thousand years."