I'm a sucker for battle couples. *smirks*

Klaus goes in through the front door, but I turn to the back. Walking through my old kitchen is odd. Gone are the wood burning stoves and outdated equipment of the early 1900s. Replaced now with stainless steel appliances and state of the art utensils, the room has become colder somehow. Impersonal.

I walk through it and find the entrance to the courtyard. The vampires on either side of my vantage point give me an imperceptible nod. I smile. I am not without friends here.

"Klaus," Marcel says in greeting as the man enters the courtyard.

"You've been avoiding my calls."

"Little pissed off lately."

"Apologies for my behavior can come later. You have something of mine. I want it back."

Marcel holds up the silver dagger that we told Josh to get information about. Josh has played his part well. Marcel shouldn't have brought him to Davina as she was already beginning to form loyalty to Elijah. "Sorry, but I can't do that," Marcel says as he turns the dagger over in his hands.

Rebekah enters the courtyard and takes the dagger from Marcel. Klaus makes a show of being surprised. "What is this?"

"Apologies for your behavior?" Rebekah scoffs. "You don't apologize, Nik. You just act. I've had enough. We have had enough."

"Look at you. Finally in possession of the one thing that can take you down. How does it feel?"

"Great," she says emphatically.

Marcel whistles loudly and a dozen and half vampires emerge from the woodwork.

Klaus laughs. "So this is it? The evil bastard Klaus has gone too far, must be punished. And by his own sibling, nonetheless. How positively biblical. And you, Marcel, is this your idea of a hit? I taught you better than this paltry excuse for a take-down. Do you think you can subdue me with this!?"

I look at the vampires still near me. Marcel does in fact, know better. But it won't matter.

"No. But I think I can with this." He whistles again and more emerge from their vantage points. Now seems to be as good a time as any for me to make an entrance.

I walk out with my head held high. The vampires part for me to walk fully into the room. Some surprised to see me, others not knowing me, and some feigning their surprise.

Klaus spreads his arms wide and smiles as I come to stand by his side, while I look at Marcel and Rebekah with hard eyes.

Marcel swallows thickly.

Rebekah is startled. "Julia?"

I don't respond as Klaus begins to speak. "Let's end this charade, shall we? Vampires of New Orleans! Do recall that I am an Original. A hybrid. I cannot be killed. Eternity is an awfully long time. How long, do you think, Marcel will stay in power? What if one of you lot were to release me, knowing I will be eternally in your debt? Oh, I would pity those of you who dared to cross me. I can assure you, your ends would be spectacular."

"To borrow a trick from an old friend," he says as he holds up a large gold coin. "Whoever picks up this coin gets to live."

He drops the coin to the ground and the sound echoes through the courtyard on the stone walls.

I look around the room. "For those of you who already stand with me," I smirk at Marcel as I speak and see the growing look of apprehension on his face. "You need not go for the coin. I know who you are. And I give you my assurance that Klaus does as well."

Klaus and I stare at them as Marcel shakes himself from his growing fear. "Anyone wants that coin, pledge allegiance to Klaus. Take it now. Go ahead. The choice is yours."

No one moves. But neither Klaus nor I are concerned. There's no way they win this fight.

"Take them," Marcel says lowly.

My sword comes out smoothly and wounds quickly, those who come at me. Klaus barely bats an eye at any of it either. In fact, by the look on his face, I would say he finds the first wave to be amusing.

The second is more challenging. He gets swarmed, while a handful of those who are loyal to me are quick to block me from any attack. They cover me as I make my way to the staircase. From that vantage point I have a bottleneck that my attackers are forced to enter, and it is easy to cut them down. But I needn't be too concerned about that. Most of Marcel's forces are concentrating on Klaus. The vampires that I have been whispering to for the last century stand aside, awaiting any signal from me. But I know I don't need to send one. Not when Klaus's eyes flash gold and and his smirk turns dangerous.

"Marcel! Come and finish this!" he roars.

One by one, two by two, vampires are dropped left and right. The chaos around me is kept clean as I continue to deter anyone from escaping to the second floor. Blood stains the cobblestones. Rebekah shakes as she grasps Marcel's arm and speaks to him until Marcel can't take it anymore.

"Enough!" Marcel shouts.

The room goes still.

Marcel kneels.

The coin leaves the ground and becomes clutched in his hand.

"Well, well, well. The great Marcel, self-proclaimed king of New Orleans, bowing before me."

I step up beside Klaus, wiping blood from my blade. I look down at my son, on his knees. "I did warn you, Marcellus."

"...I will stand by and watch happily when the true king comes back for his throne. And when it's all said and done, and he has stripped you of every title you've ever stolen, I will have you on your knees begging for my forgiveness. And then maybe. Just maybe. I'll grant it to you."

"I have nothing to apologize for," Marcel declares. He tosses the coin at Klaus's feet and looks up at him. "There. I hereby pledge my allegiance to you. You have the keys to my kingdom. It's yours."

Rebekah ends up staying at the Plantation while Klaus moves Hayley into the compound. Elijah joins him as well.

As for myself, I stay on for a few days. One of my first orders of business is freeing my friends in the Garden. Peter kisses my hand like the southern gentleman he was born to be around 80 years ago. Thierry is a tad sore toward Klaus and I for the part we had in his imprisonment, but in my last couple of visits I had assured him that his stint would not be long, and that he would be rewarded for his sacrifice for the betterment of the city.

Davina is moved into the compound as well, although she is not terribly pleased with this turn of events. As she is friends with Josh now, a fact that Elijah stumbled upon when he went to inquire about a seer sight cloaking spell for the Mikaelson baby, he is safe from coming to harm from either side of the vampire faction.

All in all, the transition of power happens much more smoothly than I would have expected. Even still, it wasn't part of the plan.

Klaus paces back and forth in front of the dead fire place while I sit with a book. It almost feels like old times.

"This wasn't part of the plan," he says in frustration.

"We can't help it if the pieces on the chessboard exercise their free will. There was always the possibility that we would have to adapt."

"The whole point of playing the long game though, was to keep you from getting exposed to Celeste too early. To keep our upper hand. Now we've played that card. And that is going to expose the wolves, which is also something that neither of us wanted. The vampires are going to need a peace offering."

I put the book down and look at him. "So we take me out of the equation. Manufacture an argument. I'll head into the woods and make sure all of the wolves are safe and taken care of. You do what you need to do."

"Set the vampires after them?"

"They won't be found unless they want to be found."

"Hayley won't like it."

"So communicate with her. If she knows what you're doing and why and that you have taken steps to ensure it won't bring any harm to anyone then there's not anything about that she can hate you for."

"Between her and Elijah there may be something they find to hate me for," he says with resentment.

"They do seem to be forming some sort of attachment."

His face reveals irritation.

"You disapprove?"

"I don't won't my child to grow up calling him father."

An old memory comes to mind. A time when Elijah and Marcel were once growing closer. That didn't end well for anyone, least of all Marcellus, who felt abandoned and tossed aside by an arrogant man. Meanwhile, Elijah suffered in the knowledge that while he loved Marcellus, he could not continue on for fear of angering Klaus. As such, he cut his ties to the boy.

"Do you remember when Elijah and Marcel were getting closer, and you got jealous and woke Kol who then went on a rampage?"

Klaus looks at me with exasperation. "I was not jealous."

I raise my eyebrow at him. "Even so, after you daggered Kol again, Elijah sacrificed his relationship with Marcel. Did you know that I had never seen him cry before that day? I held him all night while he sobbed because he couldn't understand why someone who showed love to him all of a sudden stopped." I pause for a moment to let that sink in. "Elijah isn't going to undermine your relationship with your daughter. He would sooner sacrifice his own happiness and die than do that. His relationship with Hayley will have nothing to do with his relationship with the little girl. He will love her, yes. But nothing will change the fact that she carries your blood and will call you father."

"So you see no harm in Elijah and Hayley forming an attachment?"

"Elijah is a grown man. He can make his own choices. And if it means Hayley will be kept happy and not feel the need to take your child and run to find happiness elsewhere? So be it. Unless, the issue is that you want to be with Hayley?"

Klaus smirks. "Now who's jealous."

I feel indignant at being called out. It was not my intention to let him have any idea at all that I still cared. Or that I still wanted him. "I am not jealous," I say. But I don't think either of us believes it.

We force ourselves to focus on the task at hand. To give the illusion of a divided house, that will appear to be a weak and easy target for Celeste to attack. For that to be effective however, the less people who know about it, the better.

"We could just weather it. Aren't you the one who always said that family is power?" he asks.

I shake my head. "It is power. But I'd rather force Celeste to tip her hand before we go charging in, guns blazing."

"I don't think I can handle Marcellus without you," he admits. I am surprised by this. "He's always been obstinate and stubborn. He's only gotten worse. You were always good at making him back down."

I sigh. "He's too independent these days. I've been trying for a century to get him to admit his mistakes and to stop being an idiot. It's not his mother he needs. He needs his father back."

"I was never really his father."

"Yes you were. Maybe he never called you that but can you blame him? In the end you were trying to treat him more like a friend then like a son. It's no wonder his ego inflated," I say as I roll my eyes.

"Oh so it's my fault he became a traitor and took this city in my absence?"

"No. It's both of our faults for not realizing that we had stopped being his parents. I've since learned it's not a job that you ever lose. Once a parent, always a parent. But right now he needs you. Not me. So do whatever it is you need to do. Just bond with him again. You need his support and that of the vampires still loyal to him if we're really going to pull this off," I begin to ramble. "Reign in the vampires. We'll bring in the wolves in due time. The witches will be harder. The humans won't be an easy task either. They have their deal with Marcel and they won't be pleased with a change in leadership."

"Let me worry about that. You just focus on the wolves. We'll call a dinner party. You can storm out, and we'll work everything out hopefully before Hayley gives birth."

That doesn't leave us with a very long time table.