Salvation of a Salvatore Sister

Peace and Bloodshed

In the morning, Klaus and I enter the courtyard to find Hayley in front of a table spread with breakfast foods. "So, which restaurant's missing a compelled chef?" Hayley asks, turning around and staring at Klaus as she eats a strawberry. I frown at her question, confused by the food.

"It's certainly a card I've played in the past, but I had no hand in this," Klaus tells her. Hayley looks at me. I shake my head.

"Not me either. Too much effort when I could just pop open a blood bag from the kitchen."

Hayley tips her head, acknowledging my point as she glances back at the spread of food. "Hmm. Well, then, I guess we have Elijah to thank."

"This wasn't my doing," Elijah speaks up, entering the compound.

Hayley frowns at the spread on the table. "Then, where did this all come from?" She asks, and her reply comes from a rattling of a silver lid on a platter dish. We all look to it in surprise before Klaus reaches out to pick up the lid. When he lifts it, two starlings fly out. Hayley gasps as we all watch them fly away before turning back to notice the note left behind on the platter dish. "What the hell was that?" Yet, none of us answer Hayley as Klaus picks the note up and reads it before passing it to me, a scowl twisting his face.

Dinner. Your home. 8pm. It reads.

I crumple the note in my fist as Elijah looks between Klaus and I. Meeting his gaze, Klaus reveals the essence of the note and this whole morning's charade. "An invitation from our mother."

...

Klaus paces our bedroom while Hayley watches him, sat upon the new chairs I picked out for the room as the old ones held too many negative memories. A rearrangement of the layout of our room was also necessary to aid us in starting fresh, which I told Klaus, who seemed uncompelled by my reasoning. Yet, he offered no objections and let me instruct him on where to move things as he offered a few inputs on some new decor elements I'm trying out.

"It is times like this I'm really glad I never knew my mother," Hayley comments, curled up in the chair. I let out a huff of a laugh.

"Thank your lucky stars. Mothers can be horrid," I tell her, frowning at the thought of mine.

Klaus sighs in frustration, pausing his pacing to look at Hayley and I. "We have enough enemies here. And now, the war for our home is to be fought against my own family."

"Your wretched mother and her disciples tried to put a carving knife through our baby's heart. I will happily add to the body count," Hayley replies. Klaus smirks at her anger, seeming to like her plan.

"You will do no such thing," Elijah remarks, entering the room. "Esther's a master in the art of possession. We know whose body she currently inhabits. We must decipher her intentions before she finds a new host."

"Well, her last invitation was an assassination attempt on all her children. I think we can assume her intentions are decidedly foul."

Pouring myself a glass of bourbon, I shake my head. "That may be, but I can't say that I didn't enjoy her last invitation. It was quite...entertaining," I say, taking a sip from my drink, giving Klaus a mischievous look. At Esther's last invitation to join her family together, she did so under the guise of a ball. The same ball that I reconnected with the Mikaelsons at.

Klaus shakes his head at my words, amusement lingering in his eyes for a moment, before we both return to the seriousness of the manner we're discussing. "Well, then. We have," Elijah glances down at his watch in the subtly dramatic fashion of his, "this afternoon to prepare for the worst."