Original Vampires, Welcome to New Orleans (The Originals Seasons 1 and 2 Fanfic)

Chapter 12: A Not So Harmonious Dinner

Finn took the glass of wine from Elijah and sniffed it.

'What an aromatic Bordeaux,' he remarked.

'Well, it was a challenge to find a good pairing,' Klaus remarked saltily. 'What wine is meant to go with treachery?'

'Don't pout, brother. Tonight is meant to be a happy occasion,' Finn replied, sitting down at the table. The four of us sat, Klaus at the head of the table, myself next to Elijah on his left side and Finn on my right side.

'What, exactly, are we celebrating?' Elijah questioned.

'Well, my return, of course. Remember, I spent 900 years, right, laying daggered in a box. I'm rather enjoying this new body, strolling about your lovely city that you've made your home. Do tell me, what'd I miss? Regale me with your contributions to society - medicine, philosophy, art - or have you two merely cut a path of destruction across time?'

'The last time we met, you were helping our mother try to annihilate the lot of us,' Klaus replied drily.

'Oh, yes, how can I forget that murder plot?' I snarked, taking a sip of my drink.

'Are we expecting another guest?' Elijah asked.

'Mother will sit at the head, and as for the seat across from me, that's reserved for another of our clan. Care to wager an educated guess?' He leaned across the table, looking at Klaus. 'What about a paranoid one?'

'Well, there's no way Kol woud listen to anything other than his ego.'

'And yet, our mother has made such a compelling argument that even he, the wildest of us Mikaelsons, has seen the error of his ways and accepted his new form with vigour. Change, dear brothers - and Lilliana, is inevitable.'

'You would dare face us, a mortal? The only thing inevitable is your death.' Klaus threw a knife, but it missed Finn by mere inches, sinking into the chair next to him.

'I suppose the honour of carving should go to the oldest,' Finn replied, taking the knife out and looking at it. 'We have much to discuss.'

'I'm rather enjoying my evening,' Finn said, taking a sip of his wine.

'And I'd rather enjoy you getting to the point,' Klaus snapped.

'I had 900 years to learn to be patient, although I am curious why you kept me daggered in a box for so long.'

'You were kept in that box for being an ever-simpering sycophant. Did Mother bring you back from the dead to wash her knickers?'

'She raised me because I was treated unfairly, cheated out of all but the smallest portion of my life!' Finn exclaimed angrily. 'Elijah, I can always understand such cruelty coming from him, but I always thought of you as being the compassionate one. Isn't that why you raised her?' I scooted closer to Elijah at this remark, shrinking away from Finn's anger, and I felt Elijah's hand softly come to rest on my leg. The two of us looked at each other, an unspoken reassurance that said a thousand words. 'What did I do to deserve you turning your back on me? Were you afraid of Niklaus? Are you still, or perhaps jealous is why you kept me locked in a box? You coveted the duties of the eldest brother, in which case you had near on a millenium to fix the problems of this family and instead, you produced nine centuries of failure.'

'You might reside, somewhat parasitically, I might add - in another body,' Elijah replied, 'but let me assure you, in 900 years, your tedious sentiments remain quite the same. You see, Finn, like Father, you always despised our supernatural existence. Father, of course, slaughtered and consumed his own, whereas you, you became pretentious and dull, just like this meal. I will not ask you again. Where is Mother?'

'Oh, my darling son,' a voice said, and a young woman who couldn't have been more than 19 floated into the room. 'I've missed you, too.'

'Why don't you say what you came here to say so this wretched night can end?' Klaus asked the witch.

'It pains me that you and Elijah look at me with such disdain,' the witch replied softly.

'Can't say I blame them,' I replied, taking another sip of my wine.

'I only did the things I did to you so you wouldn't be alone, darling Lilliana,' the witch replied. I put my glass down, about to say something, but I felt Elijah's hand on my leg again, and I ceased. 'I wish you could see that my every action has been to protect you.'

'You actually believe that, don't you?' Klaus asked. 'I knew you were a liar, but now I see that you're utterly delusional.'

'If you can, forget the hatred that you cling to and remember all the times that I've mended and healed you. Elijah, do you recall the day Niklaus challenged your father to a duel? Did I leave him to die alone? What did I say when you came to me and asked me to help him?' The room went quiet.

'That you would rather die than to watch any of your children suffer,' Elijah replied softly.

'The necklace,' Klaus said. 'It wasn't a spell to protect me. It made me weak.'

'I sought to protect you from yourself,' the witch replied. 'If you would've killed your father in that duel or anyone else over the course of your life, you would have activated your curse.' He slammed his hands on the table.

'You ruined me,' Klaus snarled. 'You left me to suffer at the hands of a father who valued only strength.'

'I kept you from becoming a beast for as long as I possibly could,' she said, with tears in her eyes.

'No, you lied to me! To hide your own transgressions because of your own fear!' Klaus exclaimed. 'My whole life, I sought the approval that I was denied by the man I thought was my father. You turned me into the weakling he hated. Look at me! You rant, and you rave about the monster I've become, but you, Mother, you are the author of everything I am.' Just then, the girl that was Esther slumped in her chair, and Elijah grabbed her, sitting her upright, looking at Klaus and I.

'She's gone,' Elijah said. Just then, Finn threw Elijah into the table with his magic, snapping his neck, and did the same to me, and Klaus vamp sped to him.

'Where is she?!' he yelled, but using his magic, Finn knocked him unconscious as well.

In the witch shop in Algiers...

The spell was done. The hourglass had run out. Lenore pulled herself upright, slowly, gingerly.

'Are you okay?' Hayley asked.

'Yes.'

'You sure?'

'Just getting my bearings,' Lenore replied, raising her hand to her face, making Hayley back away suddenly, almost stumbling over her own feet in an attempt to get away from her.

'It's the mark. It's you, isn't it? Esther.' Lenore locked eyes with her, sending her a knowing smile.