✔ The Way We Burn || Kol Mikaelson (Complete)

Chapter 61

"Kol, this is madness!" Rebekah yelled as soon as Kol appeared in front of the patio door. One glance was enough to find Esther's broken body lying on the floor, looking like a wreck. Her arms weakened by vervain were barely strong enough to let her crawl and hoarse whimpers would leave her mouth every once in a while. She had screamed her voice raw earlier. "This is our mother! The woman who brought us to this world! No matter what she did, we ought to forgive her! Even if she tried to..."

She stopped herself, no doubt unwilling to state the ruth. However, Niklaus didn't have any such qualms and forced her to face reality by pointing out snidely, "To kill us, Rebekah. The woman you call mother tried to kill us."

"And you daggered me countless times yet I never left you! You even killed her once, Nik! We disappointed her and killing us was her only option!" Rebekah screamed in frustration. She pointed her forefinger at the window. "This isn't right! It's barbaric! Even worse than what our father would have done to you!"

Regrets briefly twisted her lips into a grimace. A moment later, Rebekah steeled herself and continued vehemently, "Elijah, surely you realize how utterly horrible this is?!"

Elijah hummed quietly, seemingly pondering on his eventual reply for a while. When he finally spoke up, his answer left Rebekah flabbergasted. "Frankly, I'm more curious about the state of her legs. How is it that they aren't growing back?"

As laughter bubbled up Kol's throat, Nora went to his side and pinched him discreetly even as her own lips kept twitching with the urge to laugh.

"This is because Nora-" Rebekah cut herself off, realizing who she was talking to. "It doesn't matter! Our own mother is treated like an animal!"

Nora frowned, looking utterly offended. Crossing her arms over her chest, she interrupted Kol's sister, "I would never do that to an animal!"

"I'm sure Rebekah knows that, darling." Kol smiled and patted her shoulder in a comforting manner. "She's just trying to fool herself into thinking our mother still loves us."

Truth was, Esther probably always loved herself more than she could ever care about them. Her mad rambling had certainly been quite illuminating and Kol regretted a little that Rebekah hadn't been there to hear it herself. For all her qualities, his sister often refused to see the truth unless it was right in front of her. And even then wasn't enough sometimes. Fooling herself simply worked better than coping with the harsh reality they were living in.

"I know that!" Rebekah screamed back angrily. "But she's still our mother! She isn't just an enemy but the woman who raised us! Surely killing her would have been more than enough."

Her words seemed to touch something in Elijah who hesitated for a moment. In the end, his expression returned to his blank state and Rebekah clenched her fists, refusing to admit defeat.

Kol felt it was quite humorous. If only she had shown just an ounce of this determination when Finn got daggered, the nine centuries that followed that event would have been very different.

"But I want her to suffer," he remarked casually with a shrug, his smile still firmly in place. "Bekah, do you really want to fight me over this?"

"This is not about fighting, Kol! This is about doing the right thing for once in our bloody life! If we can do this to our own mother, what the hell does it say about us?"

"Good thing you didn't do anything, then. But thanks for letting me know what you really think of Nora and me."

Rebekah pinched the bridge of her nose in exasperation. "You know very well this isn't what I meant," she said crossly. "I love the two of you but it doesn't mean I can accept everything."