Damon was updating the list of items that he needed to purchase for Maya, he'd just finished walking her through how to set up the MacBook Pro he'd got her, and had realised that she would need a desk for her room. He could feel Stefan's eyes burning into his back along with the heavy waves of judgement coming from his direction, but was absolutely content to ignore it. He knew what Stefan was going to say, that he needed to take things slowly, let Maya adjust to having people who cared about her. He hadn't been able to help himself today, he'd wanted to buy her everything she could ever want, he'd had a welcome, if surprising, ally in Lexi, who had helped him run rings around Stefan and his attempts to rein them in.

"How long are you going to ignore me for, Damon?"

"I'm not ignoring you, Stefan; I just don't think it's necessary for you to repeat yourself any more than you already have today."

"Damon, I'm not saying don't get stuff for Maya, I know there's things she needs, I'm just saying take it slowly, a few bits at a time. You saw how she reacted today –"

"She barely ate anything."

Damon interrupted Stefan's latest repetition of the 'you need to go slow' speech that he'd been giving the whole day. He'd heard it, he'd understood, he'd followed Stefan's advice about getting the groceries after lunch and then coming home, hadn't he? He didn't need to hear the speech again, he needed to talk about the things he'd noticed today that were really bothering him.

"Did you notice? At breakfast she chose the smallest bagel slices with the least amount of toppings. She may have eaten two, but they barely even counted as a whole bagel put together, and at lunch, she may have tried a bit of everything we ordered but it was only a bite of each dish, even combined it wasn't a full portion."

"She's too small." Lexi said, entering the room, clearly having been listening in on their conversation.

"I know it can vary a lot with kids, but she is definitely too small for a twelve-year-old, all the clothes we picked out today were at the smallest end of eight-twelve range and some of those were still too big for her. She's underweight too, and it's not because she's a picky eater, she just doesn't seem to be able to eat as much as she should be."

"Clearly the abuse Narcissa Malfoy mentioned in her letter went beyond physical." Stefan said with a sigh, "Which is why you need to be careful about how you handle things with Maya. Did either of the letters have any details about it, other than what you've already shared with us?"

Damon shook his head, and ran a frustrated hand through his hair. They were right, they were both right in what they'd said, but Damon hadn't been able to help himself today. Maya's heartbreaking question at breakfast, when she might as well have asked; 'why would you waste your money on me', given that was what she'd really meant. When she'd said that all he'd wanted to do was give her the biggest hug he could, she was still so wary of him though, so he'd shown her that she was worth it the only way he could, by buying her everything she could ever want. Well, not everything, not yet, hence his latest list of things they still needed to get.

"You need to talk to Maggie; she'll be able to advise you better than us. Maya is definitely gonna need therapy, and getting advice from a doctor, or a nutritionist, or both, wouldn't hurt either."

Damon nodded, he'd already considered Lexi's suggestions, he wanted to hold off until he'd talked to Maggie, as a psychiatrist with almost sixty years' worth of experience, she would be able to advise him the best. Ragnuk had mentioned in his letter that part of the appointment he'd set up would include having a healer assess Maya and advise them on what they needed to do. Any healing and/or potions she might need to take to help her recover from the long-term affects of the Dursley's abuse and having a piece of someone else's soul in her head. That had been a magic, Damon would have much preferred never to learn about.

"They're due back in the morning, I left a message at their place, briefly explaining the situation and asking them to come over as soon as convenient tomorrow." Damon tilted his head and looked at the list he'd been writing, "She needs a desk. Do you think I should take her to pick one out, or just order one that matches the bed?"

"I think. You should go and get some sleep." Stefan replied.

"I'm a vampire, I don't need sleep."

"Uh, yes you do." Lexi scoffed. "When's the last time you slept? I'm guessing it was before Maya arrived? You might be able to go without sleep for longer than a human, but you do still need to rest."

"What if Maya needs me?"

"Maya's already gone to bed herself. Also, she's twelve, if she needs you, she's perfectly capable of waking you up."

Lexi's blunt, honest, reply got through to Damon, more than any amount of attempted persuasion would have. She was right, they both were, he might not need as much sleep as a human, but even vampires needed to rest, and he hadn't slept in close to forty-eight hours now. With a soft sigh, he left the list he'd been writing on the table and went to get some sleep.

Enzo and Maggie didn't turn up until shortly before they sat down for dinner, Damon figured his message might not have stressed enough the complexity or urgency of the situation. They kept it together pretty well though, much better than he had the first night, and a thousand times better than Stefan and Lexi, who had spent a lot of time arguing with him, right up until Maya showed up in the doorway of the living room and they'd realised she really did need his help.

Maggie and Enzo were also a lot better at drawing Maya out of her shell, asking her about Hogwarts, and her friends, and sharing a few stories about her grandparents had done wonders, giving Damon a few glimpses of the real Maya, hidden behind the mask she presented to the world. It was the easiest meal they'd shared so far, no tense conversations or awkward silences. Maya was even persuaded she didn't need to help with cleaning up when Enzo drew her into a conversation about Quidditch, after she mentioned that she'd made it on to her house team.

After they'd eaten desert Maya headed upstairs to her bedroom, partly because she was tired, and partly, Damon suspected, to get away from the five adults who weren't at all subtle about the way they all kept watching her. Damon included himself in that, he was usually much better at looking at someone without making it obvious, but it was very difficult to do this with Maya, her eyes just seemed to catch hold of him whenever he tried.

Thankfully for Damon's sanity, Maggie waited until they were all sitting in the lounge, and he'd shut the door to prevent any curious ears from overhearing them, to demand an explanation.

"What the hell Damon? Could you perhaps find it within yourself to give us a better explanation for what's going on here than that stupid message you left for us. When you said she was here, I thought you meant she was visiting with her family, not –"

Maggie threw her hands up in the air unable to complete the sentence, even though everyone in the room knew what she meant. Enzo pushed a drink into her hand and guided her into a chair, before grinning at Damon.

"India was lovely, thank you. Now, what sort of trouble have you gotten yourself into this time?"

"Maya turned up on my doorstep two nights ago, told me I was her godfather, that I'd been chosen by Lady Magic –"

Enzo snorted.

"Damon Salvatore, Fairy Godfather!"

Damon rolled his eyes at his friend, though he didn't deny the claim, fairy tales might get most of the actual details wrong, but that was essentially what he was.

"Anyway, she told me she needed a place to stay, and handed me a couple of letters. I couldn't turn my back on her, I mean… Well, you saw her!"

"She shows clear signs of an abusive childhood," Maggie said with a nod, "She's small, clearly malnourished, I didn't see any scars other than the one on her forehead but that doesn't mean there aren't any. She's cautious, wary of all of us, even if you put aside the fact that we're all complete strangers, she's clearly very guarded with people, she made sure she could see us at all times, she froze when anyone moved to fast, it was barely perceptible, but it was there. Physical abuse is a definite, malnourishment, most likely from food being withheld as a punishment, but I suspect that even when she was given food it was never as much as it should have been. There was probably emotional and mental abuse as well."

"You got all that from one conversation over dinner?"

"I've worked as a psychiatrist for almost sixty years, Stefan. I'm trained to see the signs that others might miss, the fact that I am a vampire merely aids me in that because it enables me to read micro expressions and see the tiniest of movements that a human might miss." She turned back to Damon. "I'll save my recommendations until you've finished your explanation. What did the letters say."

"The first one was from a woman named Narcissa Malfoy, she was a Black before she was married so she was probably related to Dorea –"

"And by extension Jasmine and Maya. That explains why she got involved, it doesn't explain why nothing's been done until now."

"Maya was sent to live with Luke's sister and her family, after Jasmine and Luke were killed. Last September she started at Hogwarts, where she became friends with Narcissa Malfoy's son and niece. According to what Narcissa wrote in her letter, she became concerned when Maya failed to respond to any of the letters sent by her friends and so she went to the Dursley's house to investigate. Whilst she was there, she discovered Maya being beaten by Vernon Dursley, she immediately got Maya away from the situation and took her to Gringotts bank."

"She took Maya to the bank! Why?" Enzo asked.

"According to what she wrote in her letter, she knew the goblins would be able to help her, and that they would also be able to preserve Maya's privacy, which she couldn't be certain of if she took her to the hospital. Because of what happened the night her parent's died, Maya is apparently quite famous and Narcissa didn't want what had happened to her, to be plastered all over the front page of the newspaper."

"So what? She's famous because her parent's died, and she didn't?"

"She's famous because she survived being hit by the killing curse, there's never been a record of anyone surviving it before." Lexi shrugged at Damon's startled look, "I have a few friends in the wixen community. You forget Damon, I was born and turned before the Statute of Secrecy was implemented."

"Yes, anyway, Maya is famous in the wixen world and Narcissa Malfoy wanted to ensure her privacy, so she took Maya to Gringotts, to the goblin healers. Narcissa wrote that the abuse was long-term, and likely started from the moment they were given custody of her. When her magical guardian found out about the abuse, he promised that Vernon Dursley would be sent to prison so that it would be safe for Maya to return to Petunia Dursley's care."

Damon paused for a second when Maggie squeezed the glass she was holding so hard that it splintered into hundreds of pieces. At his look she just shook her head and waved a hand for him to keep going whilst she cleaned up all the glass.

"That wasn't acceptable for Narcissa, the goblins, or for Maya, who is of the belief that she wouldn't survive if she was returned to that place. Narcissa stated that she was unable to challenge the decision herself though, and that it would be unwise for her to even attempt it. She mentioned that the political situation, Maya's history, and her future inheritance, all mean that Britain isn't suitable for her to stay in if she doesn't return to her former home. So, they decided the best option for her was to smuggle her out of the country, making it look like she ran away, and send her to me in the hopes that as her magically appointed godfather I would be willing to take her in and protect her."

"Who's they?" Enzo asked, once he'd digested everything Damon had said.

"Ragnuk, Fourth of his name, Head of Gringotts Bank, which actually means Chieftain of the entire Horde. He was the one who wrote me the second letter."

"Did he's letter have any more information in it than the one from Narcissa Malfoy."

"Yes." Damon sighed and rubbed a hand across his face. "When she was at the bank, they discovered that Maya had something called a Horcrux in the scar on her forehead."

Damon poured himself a glass full of bourbon, drained it all in a few gulps and then poured himself another before he started to explain.

"A Horcrux is a method of immortality. A wixen severs a piece of their soul and stores it inside an object, as long as the object remains undestroyed, the wixen will be tethered to our plane of existence, and thus, they can never die. According to what Ragnuk wrote, it's considered to be an especially vile magic, that violates the laws of three different cosmic entities, and the Horde take particular pleasure in destroying any they come across. Thankfully, because of that, they knew a ritual to remove the soul piece that was inside Maya and place it inside another object that could be destroyed instead."

"Who did it belong to?"

Stefan looked as horrified as Damon had felt the first time he'd read Ragnuk's letter, none of the others looked any better.

"It belonged to the man who took the name Lord Voldemort. It belonged to the man who was ultimately responsible for Charlus and Dorea's deaths and who personally killed Jasmine and Luke and attempted to murder Maya. He made more than one, he'd already made five by the time he attempted to kill Maya, Ragnuk believes that Voldemort's soul was so unstable because of this that when the curse rebounded off of Maya and hit him, it caused he's soul to fracture and split and a piece of it lodged inside Maya. The Horde is in the process of tracking down all of the soul pieces so that they may be destroyed, and then the remnants of Lord Voldemort can be banished from this plane forever. They expect to have completed this task by the end of summer."

"Well, that's one thing at least."

Damon nodded his head; he'd had the exact same thought as Lexi when he'd first found out.

"Does she know? Does Maya know?" Maggie asked.

"Yes. Ragnuk explained it to her before they performed the ritual to remove it."

Maggie nodded, the look in her eyes said she was updating her recommendation with every new bit of information Damon revealed. Enzo took his wife's hand and gave it a gentle squeeze, nodding at Damon to continue.

"Ragnuk made an appointment for Maya and me at the New York branch of Gringotts tomorrow. One of the goblin healers will check her over and give recommendations for how to help her recover from the long-term effects of the abuse, as well as from carrying around a piece of someone else's soul for the last ten years. There will also be documents for me to sign, to make my having custody of Maya legal in both worlds, and they will set up a new identity for Maya so that she's not easily traced by anyone looking for her."

"Good, because she's not going back."

Damon nodded at Maggie's words, as did everyone else, he'd been firm on that point as well, since the moment he'd first read the letters, if not before.

"The last really important piece of information he mentioned is that Luke wasn't Maya's biological father." Damon took a deep breath and dropped the final bombshell on his two best friends. "Maya's biological father is Niklaus Mikaelson, the Original."

If it hadn't been so serious, Damon would have burst into laughter at the looks on Maggie and Enzo's faces. He'd never seen either of them look so shocked before, Maggie had always had a cool calm exterior, never giving away a single thought unless she wanted you to know it, Enzo had always hidden everything behind a charming grin. Not now though, both of them were gaping at him, mouths open wide, absolutely gobsmacked.

"What are you going to do?" Enzo asked eventually.

Damon shrugged.

"Ragnuk is putting out feelers, trying to track him down, but the Originals have deliberately made themselves into nothing more than legend and myth over the past century. Anyone who does know where they are won't give that information up easily. Ragnuk thinks he'll be able to find someway of contacting him eventually, but it could take a few years. My focus has to be on Maya, on what she needs right now."

"Damon's right." Maggie and Enzo were almost as shocked about Lexi agreeing with Damon as they had been about Maya having an Original for a father.

"Maya needs someone who will put her needs first. If this Ragnuk does manage to locate the Mikaelson's then it should be up to Maya to decide if she wants to reach out."

"I agree." Maggie said, fixing her gaze on Damon. "Maya's needs come first."

"You have suggestions?"

"I do."

"Go ahead, I'm all ears."

"Firstly, she needs therapy. I can recommend some names, people who are connected to the supernatural in some way and can be trusted with the knowledge of Maya's particular background."

"Okay, what else?"

"Secondly, you need to be very clear with her about everything."

"How so?"

"Rules, and punishments for breaking them. It will take her a while to trust you completely, but you need to lay it all out for her to start with."

"Does she really need that? I don't want to make it seem like I'm the Dursley's all over again."

Maggie shook her head.

"Kids need rules Damon, and they need to know what the consequences of breaking them are, especially kids like Maya. Maya's not going to trust you, not straight away, that will come with time, and evidence that you're not going to hurt her the way the Dursley's did. By laying out the rules and what the punishments are for breaking them, you'll be able to demonstrate that she can trust you. If you don't lay out what your rules and expectations are, Maya is just going to get more and more anxious about what you expect from her, what you want her to do, what you'll do to her if she fails to meet your expectations, and she will crack under that pressure. So, rules and consequences, I can help you come up with appropriate consequences depending on the severity of the rule breaking, but none of them will cause Maya any harm."

"Okay, rules and consequences, I can do that."

"Good. Third thing, chores. Same as with the rules, make sure she understands what chores she's responsible for and what she doesn't need to do."

"What if I don't want her to do any chores?"

"They don't have to be onerous, Damon and they don't have to be a lot, but chores help kids learn responsibility. Things like keeping her bedroom tidy, setting the table for dinner, simple things, that's it."

"Okay."

"Fourth, she'll need to go to school in September, I would advise against sending her to a boarding school. She needs to know that you're always going to be there for her, and she has to get to know you and learn that she can trust you. Being away from months on end won't help accomplish any of that."

"Ragnuk suggested a school here in New York where she can learn magic, it takes day students as well as boarders. I've already asked for an appointment to speak with the Headmistress."

"I'd suggest taking Maya with you, so that she gets to have some say in her future. It's important for her to have that input, she needs to feel like she has some control over her life."

Damon nodded, he understood what Maggie meant, he knew from his own childhood, how awful it was to feel like you had no control over anything, least of all yourself.

"Finally, she needs structure, a routine, that will help her get settled quicker. It doesn't need to be strictly regimented, just something simple, like she needs to be up by a certain time, meals will be at certain times, curfew, and bedtime will be set at certain times. Talk with her, find out what she likes doing and incorporate it into her routine, make sure you spend time with her, but let her have her space when she needs it as well, don't make her feel crowded."

"Okay, I can do that, I can do all that."

"You're not in this alone Damon, Enzo and I will both be around to help you."

"I'll be here too, brother, as long as you need me."

"I'll be in and out." Lexi smiled, "but I'm only a phone call away if you need me, okay? For anything?"

Damon nodded, he'd been expecting Maggie's offer of unconditional support from her and Enzo. The three of them had had each other's backs through thick and thin, ever since Charlus and Dorea had rescued Enzo and him from Augustine, and then helped Enzo find Maggie, who he'd compelled to forget him and sent away so that she would be safe.

He'd been hopeful that Stefan would agree to help as well, things could still be tense and awkward between them, and he didn't think they'd ever be as close as they were before they were vampires, but they were both working on it. Lexi's offer surprised him though, she'd never really taken to him, she was Stefan's friend, and she would always put Stefan above Damon, that she was willing to extend a hand to Damon, meant a lot.

"If Maya is okay with it, I'd like to go with you to the bank tomorrow." Maggie added.

Damon raised an eyebrow, questioningly.

"I'd like to speak with the goblin healer who'll be examining her. I'm a trained doctor Damon, I want to know what her diagnosis is and what recovery regimen they'll be advising so that I can help monitor her and ensure she's on the right track. I won't go if Maya's not okay with it, but if she is, I think it would be helpful."

"I'll ask her in the morning. The appointment's at eleven, you're welcome to come over for breakfast."

Maggie exchanged a wordless conversation with Enzo, before nodding.

"That works for me, I'll come over for breakfast tomorrow and we can talk to Maya."

With that settled, their little group broke apart. Maggie and Enzo left for their own home, Lexi left to feed, and Stefan retired to the room across from Damon's that he'd stayed in last night. They'd need to talk about that, whether Stefan's offer extended to staying with Damon, or whether he'd want to stay at the apartment he owned in Brooklyn. Damon remained in the lounge thinking over all the advice Maggie had given him It would be hard, but he thought he could manage it.