by Julie Plec
Sure enough, as they reached the front porch, the door banged open. “Sister,” Klaus greeted her broadly, extending his arms to indicate the entire quadrangle of land around them. His muscular frame filled the doorway, and his amused smile gave way to a dangerous gleam in his pale eyes. “You have returned to our happy home at last.” Klaus was still mad at her—weeks later—for their encounter in his hotel room, and now she had walked Eric straight into the lion’s jaws.
“Not now,” Rebekah hissed, pushing him aside and dragging Eric through the door, and Klaus followed gamely. With Klaus in this kind of mood, she’d need a cooler head to mediate.
Elijah was at the rough-hewn table, and he put down his set of papers when he saw her. She was relieved that there were no lingering traces of the terrible attack he had suffered. Then he saw Eric’s uniform and jumped up in surprise. “You have returned our cousin to us,” Elijah guessed, his brown eyes darting from Eric’s to Rebekah’s and back again. “We had heard her husband was killed in the woods, but—”
“He knows,” Rebekah interrupted, unwilling to cope with layers of lies. It had not been easy to explain the wagoner to Eric, but he understood that the price of immortality was blood. “He knows everything.”
Klaus and Elijah went completely still, staring at her as if she must be joking. “He knows what?” Elijah asked incredulously, and his serious face pleaded with her to go back to being the wagoner’s widow, or to show him that this was just some further deception.
“Perhaps I should give you a little time with your family,” Eric suggested, and beside his composure, her brothers looked to her like a pair of thugs. Rebekah nodded, and he gently disengaged her hand from his arm, passed Klaus without flinching, and returned to the solitude of the front porch. Rebekah steeled herself for what was next.
“My dear sister,” Klaus shifted his weight to block the doorway, “it seems you have been keeping things from us. Elijah, do you remember ‘Tell the good captain everything’ being part of her plan?”
“She didn’t mean everything,” Elijah insisted stubbornly, still trying to read Rebekah’s expression. “Explain yourself, Rebekah, because at the moment it sounds like you’ve betrayed our deepest secrets to the humans you were meant to recruit.”
Put that way, it sounded even worse. She decided in that moment that her brothers didn’t need to know about Eric’s brief involvement with Mikael. It was going to be hard enough to convince them not to kill him as it was. “It’s true that I have abandoned my mission,” she told them, keeping her chin resolutely high. “And I have also revealed our deepest secret, but only to one human, not all of them. He already knew of our kind, and desires—more than anything—to become a vampire. And I love him, and intend to do as he asks.”
Klaus made to follow Eric outside. Rebekah intercepted him, taking a hard blow to her stomach before Elijah pulled them apart. “He’s a liability now,” Klaus snarled, baring his fangs at Elijah in turn. “I’ll kill him and stake her. Get out of my way, brother, or I will be forced to question your loyalty along with hers.”
“Loyalty,” Rebekah scoffed. “To our family’s cause, or to you, Niklaus? How are things going with your little witch?”
“That’s over,” Klaus replied, his eyes darting away from her for the briefest moment. “You have no right to even speak of her, traitor.”
“Really, Klaus? And what have you done for us, except for meddle in the affairs of the witches and werewolves, and put us all at risk in the first place? And as you seemed determined on bringing everything down on our heads, I found something more. Something real.” She turned to Elijah, hating the tears that sprang to her eyes. “I love him,” she repeated. “And he loves me. He asked me to marry him before he knew what I was, and now he feels I’m the answer to his every prayer. I am going to turn him, and I am going to be with him. I’m sorry to tell you this way, but no matter how or when I say it, it will happen.”
Klaus lunged for her again, but Elijah held him back. “Rebekah, what you want is impossible,” he reminded her gently. “We have made significant progress with the local factions in your absence, but the fundamental rules of our presence here remain unchanged. If you make a new vampire, there will be hell to pay.”
“I know,” she whispered, and she saw Klaus stop struggling. He watched her intently, and although she spoke to both of her brothers, he was the one she wanted to reach. “There is no future for Eric and me here, and so we will have to leave.”
“Leave,” Klaus breathed, as if he thought he must have misheard. He shook off and straightened his collar, the motion practiced and automatic. “Leave? After everything we have done in the last few weeks—did you know how seriously Elijah was injured in the fight to stay here?”
“I found him and brought him home,” Rebekah reminded them, and Elijah’s jaw softened a bit. “I wish that I could always be there when you need me. Both of you,” she emphasized, laying a careful hand on Klaus’s sleeve. “I promised to be with you forever, but forever has still barely begun. I know we will meet again, but I can’t stay here with Eric. And you have built too much to leave now.”
“It’s just the way it is, then,” Klaus sneered. “Circumstances have gotten in the way of your vow—oh, well. When I fall in love, I’m a dangerous madman who needs to be brought to heel, but you’re just some starry-eyed romantic whose abandonment we’re supposed to accept.”
“You want other things, Klaus,” Rebekah reminded him. “You want power and admiration and notoriety in addition to love, and you will not be happy without all of them. My life is the only thing I have truly wanted since it was ripped from me. I have longed for the love I should have had for centuries, and finally, I have found it. Outside is a man who loves me, who never wants to be without me.”
Perhaps having heard her, or perhaps simply impatient with waiting, Eric reappeared, standing squarely in the doorway. He looked fearless, ready for any blow that might come.
“I am sorry to meet you under these circumstances,” Eric told the Mikaelson brothers. “I was under the impression that Rebekah had no living family when I proposed to her, or else I would have courted your approval first.”
“What an odd turn of phrase,” Klaus remarked, one eyebrow raised. “You said living...and you did not say ask.”
“I did not,” Eric admitted, ignoring Klaus’s ruse. “Your sister knows her own mind. She loves you dearly and would rather go with your blessing, but I will not demean our love by pretending that she can’t live without your permission.”
Klaus looked wrathful, but Elijah chuckled. It was a low, strange sound in the tense air of the house, and Rebekah wondered how many times she would get to hear it again. Because she knew, before Elijah stepped forward to clasp forearms with Eric like a brother, that they were going to let her go.
As if Elijah’s reserve had been the last thing shoring up his own anger, Klaus’s glower dissolved into a rueful smile. He nodded grudgingly toward Eric first and then Rebekah, who impulsively threw her arms around him and held him tightly. He kissed the top of her head the way he had when they were children, and she stretched onto her tiptoes to kiss his cheek in return.
“We should drink to your happiness,” Klaus said, smirking suggestively at Eric’s throat before stalking into the dining room to pour some whiskey into four glasses.
They drank and talked until the sun was low on the horizon, its red final rays drifting in through the homespun curtains. Once the tension between them was settled, Rebekah realized with a bittersweet pang that her brothers and Eric got along well. She could tell that Elijah liked him, and Klaus was considerate and well-behaved enough that she understood he was signaling his approval. If only they could have stayed here.
“This does not need to be forever,” Elijah reminded her when the green glass bottle on the table between them was empty. “We have a voice here now, and we
will use it. The witches’ prohibition against making new vampires cannot stand eternally. In time they will waver, and we will send for you.”
“We will return,” Rebekah promised, and Eric pressed her hands lovingly between his own.
“We will,” Eric agreed. “And if we find another place in our travels where vampires are welcome and safe from hunters, we will send for you.”
The words hung in the air for a long time before Rebekah realized that there was nothing else left to say. Her brothers would throw their glittering party to cement their place in New Orleans while she left it. There was nothing to keep her, now that she’d said good-bye to her brothers. She and Eric could sail that very night.
Looking at her brothers’ faces, she knew that if she stayed even one more day, the guilt of separating their family would break her heart.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
“MY LOVE,” KLAUS MURMURED, whisking Vivianne aside into an empty corridor. “Are you ready?”
She looked magnificent in a long silver gown that trailed away into unexpected shadows of lace. So far she had held up her end of their bargain, which required her to keep their secret while the Mikaelsons maneuvered for power. But the next steps would probably be harder.
“I have been ready since the morning after the full moon,” she replied. A peal of laughter filtered in from the main hall, and Vivianne’s head swiveled toward it for a moment. Beneath the powders, curls, and silk that made up her elegant armor, she was tense. “But they are all so happy tonight. I can’t imagine many of them will want to see my side, once I tell them.”
Klaus lovingly ran his thumb along the line of her jaw. “I am on your side, Vivianne,” he reminded her. “What the rest of the city does is of no concern to us as long as we are together.”
She swayed closer to him, her entire body seeking contact with his own. “I know you would rather fight your way out of a banquet hall full of enemies,” she teased, a smile playing on her lips. “But as you say, we are our own allies now. And so I will be your ambassador in this, and keep you safer than your own instincts would.”
“A bit,” he conceded with pretend reluctance. “I won’t give up all my fun, but it’s true that the Navarros have far more to answer for than your witches. If they are prepared to accept the new order, so much the better.”
He pulled her face up to his, kissing her in earnest this time. She responded eagerly for a minute, then set her hands on his chest and gently separated them. “Let’s wait,” she told him seriously. “Just until I have officially called off the wedding.”
“You want to be free of Armand, to tell him first,” Klaus interpreted.
“You understand, then,” she said, looking so relieved that he hesitated to tell her no. “Whatever else he is, he is technically my fiancé. It is only decent to tell him first, before making a spectacle of the news.”
A spectacle was just the sort of surprise that Klaus wished on Armand Navarro, but Viv looked resolute.
“Very well,” he agreed, “Tell him, then announce it to the rest, and we’ll deal with whatever comes. Things could get out of hand quickly if he has time to spread the news.”
“What’s the hurry?” she purred, wrapping her arms around his neck. “We still can have a few more minutes of peace.” Klaus folded her against him, inhaling the lilac fragrance of her hair.
“I knew you were a faithless whore, but to betray me with this thing?” Armand’s voice was thin and strangled. “How could you, Vivianne?” Vivianne gasped and spun around in Klaus’s arms.
While Klaus had kept half an eye on the door to the banquet, Armand must have approached stealthily from the other direction. He must have noticed that they were both absent and begun a calculated search. It was a dreadfully inconvenient time for him to have grown a mind of his own, and Vivianne looked absolutely stricken by the development.
“Armand,” she cried, straining forward while Klaus held her back. “I was going to tell you tonight. Within minutes. You should not have seen this.”
“Tonight?” Armand asked, his tone bitterly mocking. “And what about all the other nights you have spent ‘taking air’ in our garden, or sneaking out through your bedroom window? You never thought to tell me then?”
“You knew,” she breathed, shame flushing her cheeks to a deep red. “All this time, you knew.”
“I didn’t know it was him,” Armand spat. “I had nothing but gossip and rumors. No one knew you’ve been spreading your legs for a dead man.”
Before either of them could answer—although Klaus certainly had a few things to say about that—Armand ran in the other direction, making for the lights and music of the party. Vivianne squirmed out of Klaus’s grasp and hurried after him. Klaus saw a few heads turn their way even before they emerged from the relative privacy of the corridor. He was losing control, but he could not intervene without doing even more damage.
Vivianne caught Armand’s arm just inside the brilliant pool of candlelight, where everyone could see Armand shake it off and slap her across the face. Klaus could have slit his throat on the spot for that insult, but he had promised to try to avoid a war. Quite a few eyes had turned toward the supposedly happy couple already. It was unlikely the brutal murder Klaus had in mind could go unnoticed.
The music faltered, and Klaus saw Elijah gesturing furiously to the band. Elijah had arranged a spectacular party, Klaus noticed belatedly. The room glowed with thousands of chandeliers and candelabras, and every bit of space was packed with flowers and vines. The music was lively, the wine flowed freely, and up until this unfortunate interruption, everyone had seemed to be having a good time. The musicians resumed their cheerful reel, if a bit shakier than before. Klaus stepped between Vivianne and Armand, ready to defend her from another blow if he couldn’t avenge her for the first one, but Vivianne was only getting started.
“We were never in love, Armand,” she shouted recklessly. “You coveted me, and I was willing to do my duty. But once I understood what you demanded of me, what you let your family put me through...I never loved you, Armand, but after that I could not even bring myself to respect you.”
Armand laughed coldly. “You lost your respect for me? It’s mutual, Vivianne. You have been smitten with this abomination since the night we announced our engagement, so you’ll have to forgive me if I’m not too concerned with your opinion of me.”
“If he’s an abomination, what am I?” she asked, and Klaus could see real despair on her face. He had not thought about the next full moon, but he realized that it must be always on her mind. “What did you make me?”
“Nothing you weren’t before.” Armand shrugged. “Nothing like what your undead lover will change you into.”
Klaus saw the light glitter off Vivianne’s eyes as they flicked toward him. Armand had touched on the one topic that still divided them. Vivianne was tremendously powerful now, but she was still mortal. She would want to become a vampire eventually, he was sure of it...but she wasn’t.
“He has asked nothing of me,” Vivianne retorted, showing no further sign that Armand’s blow had hit home. “He loves me for what I am, not for how he can use me.”
Armand’s laugh was bitter. “And when he does? Will you change your mind again, and slink around behind his back, too? I’m sure you will. It hardly matters what else you call yourself, Viv: That is what you are.”
She slapped him in turn, and now any pretense of a private argument had ended. Guests stared openly, curiosity and suspicion mingled on their faces. Vivianne noticed them too late and froze, caught in the glare of the attention. The music stopped, and this time it did not resume.
“They might as well all know now, Vivianne,” Armand remarked, letting his voice carry, twisting the knife. “I think this farce has gone on long enough.”
He stalked away, and the crowd parted to let him th
rough. Vivianne and Klaus remained alone, exposed, with every eye on them. It was not the announcement he had hoped for, not by a long shot. If he had to fight his way out of the ball he would, and he would enjoy it thoroughly. But he cursed Armand for setting him up.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Vivianne began bravely, and though Klaus would have preferred to stand proudly beside her, he knew he had to separate himself, to look more like part of the audience than a player in this disaster. If they thought it was her choice, if they had missed some of Armand’s words or mistook their meaning, perhaps this still could be contained. “I want to thank you all for coming tonight, but I also owe you an apology. As you have perhaps guessed, Armand Navarro and I have ended our engagement tonight.”
Whispers became an angry buzz of conversation. Klaus deliberately avoided looking in his brother’s direction, as no good could come from seeing Elijah’s expression.
“Have you nothing to say, vampire?” Sol Navarro prodded, his voice deceptively mild.
Klaus had a great deal to say, but in a moment of inspiration he decided that Captain Moquet had already said it best that same morning. “She knows her own mind,” he said, wishing that Rebekah were here to hear him say it. “I am no part of this alliance—that is for you to sort out among yourselves.”
“No part of the alliance, but you cannot deny your part in ending it,” Sol countered, some heat creeping into his tone.
“I ended it,” Vivianne said, “although you have played your own part in that as well. I am done being a pawn in this conflict, and I will not sacrifice one more part of myself for it.”
Sol’s beady eyes narrowed, and beside him, Louis’s irises turned dangerously yellow. Vivianne stared them down, and then spread her hands wide to include the entire crowd. “Please continue to enjoy the party,” she announced in a loud, clear voice. “And I am sorry again for any damage my behavior may have caused.”