Gods & Monsters ✧ Elijah Mikaelson

XXXIX ✧ Blood

Chapter Thirty-Nine

They arrived home early in the morning, and went downstairs. When they got to the dining room, walking side by side, it would have been hard to miss the way that Kol, Klaus, and Rebekah all smirked at each other.

"You three are absolutely revolting," Freya grimaced at her siblings.

Klaus and Kol sat across from each other, while Aspin was sitting beside Freya and looked thoroughly confused while she took a drink. "What?"

"Elijah and Avarice enjoyed each other's company last night," Klaus hummed with a grin.

Both of them started to snicker, and Klaus went so far as to put a closed fist to his mouth to hide his smirk.

"Really, brother. I'm quite pleased that you finally got over your pining and made a move."

"Who says it wasn't me that made the move?" Avarice said with a grin. Of course, it wasn't. But she wanted to mess with them.

Both of them looked at each other with wide eyes, then gave her a wicked grin.

Rebekah was silent, but smiled rather happily while Freya looked horrified at her brothers' behaviour.

Aspin raised a brow at them all, still clearly not quite getting it. Freya grimaced yet again and leaned over to whisper in Aspin's ear, who then promptly choked on her orange juice.

Avarice took her seat at the head of the table with Elijah at her left side, and Pin at her right. "Where is Levi?" she asked Aspin.

"He decided to stay home and work a little more," she replied.

Avarice frowned. "I... I do hope that I haven't pushed too much onto the two of you."

"Oh, don't worry," she said with a grin. "Levi does most of the work because he loves it. He was born to be a leader, and that's what he is now, thanks to you." She frowned. "I think he'll miss it when you take over again."

Avarice's eyes darted over to Elijah, who was talking to Klaus and Kol. Briefly, she wondered if she really would be taking it all back. Perhaps it was time she take a break. Thousands of years of the same routine could be trying on a person.

She wondered what it would be like to live in the mortal world. She would have to find some way to ensure it, seeing how she was not able to stay in the mortal world long. It would hurt her; maybe even kill her if she were there long enough.

Maybe they really were doomed.

*

Avarice had researched more and more over those next weeks. She was in her study, going over different spells that she could use. She knew the basics of a spell that could help at least changing the poison in Kol and Elijah's systems, but there was nothing that could completely rid them of it.

Spells could be very complicated, especially those used in the world of the Reaper's. The magic used to make Lucien into the Beast was otherworldly. It was too strong and should not have ever been used in the mortal world, and yet it was. The ancestors had made it so.

Avarice, for once, had begun to feel conflicted. She cared deeply about the Mikaelson's, but she knew now that she loved Elijah. There was no denying it, she absolutely adored him.

It hurt her to think that he needed to go to back to the mortal world, and deep inside, she knew that it could never work between them. Even so, she was tempted to just be happy.

She never contemplated not curing Elijah and keeping him here, but she knew that lesser people would have thought selfishly. Unfortunately, she was not allowed to think selfishly. Not when there was an innocent child and an amazing mother involved.

There was an envelope she had found full of herbs, and she was going to use her letter opener on it, but she became lost in her thoughts. She was only brought out of them by Robert and Ajal bursting into the room.

"Avarice," Robert said as he rushed into the study, Ajal following after him.

Ajal looked out the doors of the study, then quickly closed them behind him and spun to face his husband and friend.

"There is an issue arising among the reapers. Nearly all of them," Robert informed her in a panicked voice.

"And what issue may that be?" Avarice asked, having been bored before and now intrigued in the darkest of ways.

"They want the Mikaelson's," Ajal said, in a slightly calmer voice.

"They want them dead," Robert continued.

"Why on earth would they want that?"

"Think about it, Avarice," Ajal said with a much more relaxed demeanour than Robert. "The reapers have never killed anyone, and you just brought in five supernatural creatures that likely have a combined death count higher than World War One."

"These people are a threat," Robert said, as if Avarice hadn't thought it before. "They want them gone, and the best way to do it is to let the mares loose."

Avarice's eyes widened a little. She knew now exactly what they were thinking. "That was how the mares got into the ball. They did not just break in, they were let in."

Both of them nodded slowly.

"Is Kaige involved?" she growled.

"Not that we know of, no." Ajal stated.

"What on earth are we supposed to do?" she asked after a moment of silence, her tone suddenly dying low with anxiety.

"We'll figure this out." Ajal's attempt to reassure her was nice, but at the same time, it was worrisome. She didn't want to have anything to be reassured about at all.

She wanted to hurt them. To kill whoever had let the mares in. She desired their deaths very badly, but she decided that it was best to leave it. Whether she had admitted it to the Mikaelson's or not, the Reapers were monstrous. They were selfish.

She glanced down at her wrist, knowing that that was where Marcel had bitten her. The bite was gone, of course, having fully healed right before the man's eyes.

None of it would have happened if he had never become the Beast. He would not have hurt the Mikaelson's, she wouldn't have needed to save them, and she would never have felt the fear for their lives that she did in that moment.

She could not protect them forever, and it was all because of him.

Her hand had clenched around the letter opener, and then she hissed in a mixture of surprise and frustration at the stinging pain that rushed through her hand.

She dropped the letter opener, and when it fell to the table, she saw her blood on the edge of the blade.

Marcel's venom would have gone into her blood. It would have gone straight to her heart, and yet, there she was. Still alive.

And that was when she knew.

Her blood was the cure.