Everything seemed to be vacillating between slow motion and time passing far too quickly. The only thing Vivienne could truly register was the pain in her stomach, the feeling that something was wrong. The only time she had felt pain in the last thousand years had been when she expended her powers. But this was different. This was agony and spreading out from the area that the soulflesh knife had punctured.

Vivienne vaguely registered that her shirt had been torn open and nonsensically she appreciated that she'd worn a modest bra. The voices around her became easier to understand and beyond the roaring sound in her ears she could make out what was being said.

""-disappeared before I could properly see it – "

"–she can't be trusted – "

Vivienne tried to sit up upon hearing that but the pain in her core made her gasp and slump back down onto the soft surface she'd been laid across. When she opened her eyes she saw that Klaus and Elijah were standing by her side, eying her with suspicion.

Vivienne tried to open her mouth – they had to know. They had to know why she was here. She should have told them weeks ago about Henrik's request that she protect his family, but when she tried to speak she instead had to turn her head to the side to painfully cough up more of her blood.

Soulflesh weapons should not be on Earth. They were the weapons the Valkyries wielded, and for them to have been abandoned on this plane meant that at some point there had been an uprising that stretched to earth she was unaware of. There were three ways a Rusalka could die, and Vivienne had not even considered that a soulflesh blade could have been wielded by one of the witches in New Orleans.

Over the next twenty minutes or so Vivienne could feel hands trailing over her forehead and stomach. The immense pressure she felt on the wound she'd sustained made her cry out, but the hands pressing against her didn't relent.

With a soulflesh weapon having been the cause of her injury, there was a chance that she could die a permanent death. She would heal at the same rate, perhaps a bit quicker than a human. And from what she remembered, humans could very well die from a stab wound to the stomach, although it wasn't a guarantee. With her skin, there would be no possibility of stitching her back together. There was a possibility that Vivienne could be sent back to the Underworld – but not as a demon. She would be a soul just like those she'd spent a millennium guiding.

The conversation going on above her was not reassuring in the least. Elijah and Klaus continued to argue, and Klaus seemed to be advocating that they not save her or even attempt to do so. Elijah's hands must be the ones that were attempting to stem the bleeding.

Finally, Vivienne felt the trickle of blood cease from her wound. She would need some sort of medical glue, or fuck, even a hot glue gun to hold her skin together. However, at the moment she was more concerned with her surroundings.

Cracking open her eyes, Vivienne peered at the two immortals beside her.

A hand clamped on her throat, and she met the furious eyes of Klaus.

"How do you know about Henrik?"

Vivienne would have rolled her eyes if she didn't feel like she was on the brink of death – the hybrid couldn't further harm her at the moment, but she tried to remain even and calm when she answered.

"He was one of the souls I was assigned to guide. I stayed by his side for three hundred years."

It was quite clear that her answer had not sufficiently assuaged their concerns when neither man moved a muscle or even shifted their facial expressions. It was Klaus that once more snarled at her and spoke.

"I don't believe in coincidence, love."

The endearment was scathing, clearly a mockery of her affections that she now realized he must have been aware of. Vivienne, not entirely in control of her body at the moment, felt her talons extend and had to tightly clench her hands shut so as not to alert the Mikaelson brothers to this fact.

"Use your brain, love. It isn't a coincidence."

"Elijah's gaze moved from her to Klaus, and Vivienne noted that his expression had become assessing instead of the blank slate it had been.

"Niklaus, release her."

Vivienne gasped when Klaus's hand left her throat and she realized that her windpipe had been genuinely constricted. Being wounded by a soulflesh weapon had clearly left her more incapacitated than she had initially suspected.

Elijah now looked down at her and was quiet when he said, "Prove it. If you were with our brother for centuries he would have told you things you could not know otherwise."

Vivienne sifted through her memories, trying to decide exactly what she could say that would convince both Klaus and Elijah. It would have to be information that each brother was positive only they knew. Looking first to Elijah, she spoke as clearly as she could.

"When Henrik was ten years old he found a bird with a broken wing. He was scared that your father would force him to leave it to die, so you helped him keep it alive in secret."

Elijah's eyes widened, letting her know that he hadn't been even slightly convinced before of her honesty, but Vivienne knew she would have a harder time with Klaus.

"He came to you crying a few weeks before he was killed and told you he hated Tatia for putting you and Elijah at odds."

Klaus's expression became pinched, but before either man could speak Vivienne interrupted them, knowing that this might be her last chance to try to persuade them that she was speaking honestly.

"He is the one who requested I watch over your family. And he was… the only friend I had made in a millennium. It would have been impossible not to become his friend after being with a boy like Henrik for so long. When he found peace I requested that I be allowed a leave of absence to return to earth."

The two men began exchanging glances and Vivienne wanted to scream at them. She was telling the truth. She had done nothing to earn their mistrust, and she was still in an incredible amount of pain after being stabbed while fucking protecting them. Klaus looked away from Elijah, staring at her with a tense expression and clenched jaw before he spoke in a flat voice.

"Leave this city. And stay away from our family or I swear I will find a way to end you."

Vivienne stared at him, completely shocked. She hadn't – she hadn't considered that upon finding out that Henrik was the one that requested her protection she would be banished. Elijah was glancing back and forth between herself and Klaus and for a moment Vivienne hoped that he would contest the statement, but she saw his face instead become resigned.

Taking a breath to strengthen her resolve, Vivienne managed to pull herself into a sitting position, feeling her wound begin to bleed again at the movement. Unfortunately, she was unable to hold in her high pitched whine of pain, but after taking a few shallow breaths she felt a bit better.

In a pleading voice that she hated having to use Vivienne asked, "Before I leave can I request medical attention?"

"Get. Out."

Klaus stared at the dark bloodstained indent in his bed where Vivienne had just dematerialized from. He honestly could not assign a name to what he was feeling, all he knew was that the mention of Henrik had made him irrationally want to tear the demon apart. Henrik's memory was sacred, and the very possibility that this – this creature – had experienced more time with his youngest brother than all of the Mikaelsons combined was enraging.

After a few more seconds of contemplation, Elijah interrupted his stream of thought in a disappointed tone.

p style="font-family: Times; font-size: medium;""We may very well have sentenced her to die."

Klaus let out a snarl and tried to sound as firm as possible when he said in a scathing voice, "We can only hope."

Elijah let out a frustrated sound and when Klaus looked at his older brother he was surprised to see that he appeared stressed, perhaps even worried.

"There would be no ulterior motive to claiming she was with Henrik. There would be nothing she could gain from lying about that, and it makes sense."

Klaus remained silent, not answering his brother for fear that he would reveal too much by means of the emotion that would no doubt remain in his voice.

"She is Rebekah's closest friend. Will you be the one to tell her that Vivienne is gone and may be dead because we refused to give her medical help after she was wounded while fighting on our behalf?"

Without pausing to give him time to answer, Elijah continued in a more even tone.

"I would have thought your own affection for her would have granted her clemency."

Klaus finally broke, grabbing the lamp from the bedside table and throwing it across the room so that it shattered the mirror. Infuriated, he then whirled around to face his brother.

"She is nothing to me. Nothing."

Elijah looked at him with an expression that bordered on pity and said one final statement before he began to walk out of the room.

"I'm sure eventually you'll be able to convince yourself of that."