E N D U R I N G

        A particularly  e g r e g i o u s l y  wrong note spelled the end of her half-hearted attempt to draw from the keys a half-remembered melody. It was a tune her mother had sung growing up, which long ago she had plunked upon the keys of the old and severely out-of-tune piano that had stood neglected against the wall of their sitting room. Whatever skills she had once possessed, whatever ear she had had for remembering tunes, they had long since faded along with her sight. It was not that she couldn’t have continued to play, had she wanted to, but in the mess that had been the years following the fire, she had not possessed the heart. Besides, no piano sounded quite right.

            For all the momentary fleeting desire to slam her fingers down upon the keys, to let an intentional discordant clash cover the accidental one, Aline only folded her hands in her lap. A beat, then two, and though she could not have explained why, she turned her head uncertainly in his direction ( more or less ).    ❛ Would you play something? I realize I’ve never heard you play. ❜

mcnsterinme:

            ❛ Can you blame me? The perfectly respectable Elijah Mikaelson... caught off guard? How many can claim the honor of having witnessed that? ❜    Cami knew she exaggerated, knew she made a big deal out of that which was inconsequential, but it felt good to joke lightly, to dismiss more serious matters. But so long as he was content to play along, Cami would not break the moment. 

            His words, however, elicited an image far too absurd, and she could not resist laughing. When she regained control of herself, when she had quieted enough that she might speak, she managed,    ❛ I’m sorry... but you just made me think of you and your siblings playing pranks on each other... ❜    Across the centuries, doubtless keeping an increasingly long tally until it became so extended and convoluted that they lost track... 

mcnsterinme:

            ❛ Thirty four. In the U.S.. Alone. ❜    She repeated the words slowly, bemused despite knowing that she should not find such surprise in the information. Of course they did. Ten centuries spread across the world, inevitably forced to move onward sooner or later... how could they not? Still, the number seemed absurdly high, especially if she dared to consider those beyond the bounds of the only country she had ever known.    ❛ Do you... I don’t know... have someone to look after them? Pay property taxes? Make sure they don’t burn down or get vandalized or... ❜    The sheer maintenance of thirty four properties was inconceivable. 

            Cami knew she was distracting herself from more important matters, and for a moment, as they drew near the apartment that housed the O’Connell legacy, she found herself slowing, her steps dragging, wishing to prolong the moment as long as she could. She glanced with a strange trepidation toward the building’s front door, her mind already tracing the steps that would lead them to the empty apartment and back into the world of the real and the urgent. She hadn’t set foot in that apartment since what had happened, since she had died. The magic that kept vampires from passing over the threshold, she realized belatedly, would have evaporated. The deed had not passed to a new, living inhabitant. There was no one to sign it over to. All that remained to protect her family’s collection was the spells placed upon the inner door itself.    ❛ I need to get Vincent to check the warding, ❜    she said quietly, their former conversation all but forgotten in the wake of the realization.    ❛ Or to move it all someplace safer...  ❜

mcnsterinme:

            He did not seem to realize the trench he dug himself, the ever-greater temptation he laid at her feet.    ❛ If you mean to warn me off, Elijah, I would cease, now, before you have done precisely the opposite. Rare though our meetings have been, you know I only take warnings as a challenge, and idleness and boredom never play nicely with me. Do your precious city a favour and don’t tempt me. ❜

            She laughed in spite of herself.    ❛ One of these days I may find something that is beyond my ability, and until then, I’ll keep searching. Don’t make yourself my newest experiment. ❜    Her fingers closed upon the coin in the pocket of her coat, a steading reminder of her purpose. And tempting entertainment though the Mikaelsons made... now was surely not the time.    ❛ So I will make this simple for you and give you a way out. Trust me when I say that my business here has nothing to do with your family’s affairs, and walk away now. We can go another few hundred years before speaking again, and the city will endure, undamaged. What do you say? ❜

mcnsterinme:

            Cami knew that no matter how strongly she sought to deceive herself, nothing could convince her that he was wrong. No, nothing he might say would offer her peace. Nothing he might do could offer her peace, though some ( carefully ignored ) part of her wished she could step closer, step into his arms and hide her face against his chest and forget the world. Silently she chastised herself for the mere thought, fleeting though it was. 

            And though she did not wish to look at the flames burning unquenchable, so too could she not look away. How cut and dry, she thought, everything had seemed until this moment. The years of witnessing the chaos the Mikaelsons’ return to New Orleans inflamed, the subsequent years of finding her feet... rarely had she been forced to doubt the side on which she stood, to doubt the purpose toward which she worked. Now, however, there was no clear direction. She could not see all ends, could not know what would help and what would hinder.    ❛ I can’t do this. ❜    It was the only conclusion she could draw, awash in uncertainties and possibilities.

faesule:

            She was content to remain silent, a watchful presence, gaze narrowed,  e v a l u a t i n g. If he found the presence unsettling, so much the better. For all he served, in essence, as her commander, Maera ever afforded him little respect, and she was ever in search of opportunities to justify her behaviour.   ❛ Would it be answer enough if I said that I was curious? I’ve heard quite some rumors of late. I wanted to learn for myself: is it true? Was our great and powerful leader defeated by a mere, untrained girl? ❜

mcnsterinme:

            ❛ You are rather one to talk, ❜    she agreed, the faintest of wry smiles gaining purchase on her features. He had spent the years during which she had known him striving to do just that: control everything and everyone about him. Perhaps his flight from the city, the years away, had helped show him otherwise. She didn’t want to consider what made those years different, not when a thousand years had been unable to impress upon him the same lesson.

            But it was something that, all considered, she had not fully contemplated. She could go back to her previous intention, different though it must inevitably be. She needn’t forsake years of study, nor twist her experience to suit an endeavor that so little seemed to suit her skills. And thus, his words silenced her, drawing a frown not of displeasure but of thought. Cami could not have said why all had turned out as it had, why, with her life claimed, she had sought to forge an entirely new purpose for her life. No, she did know: she had felt it necessary to justify her continued existence. To provide the world one more therapist scarcely seemed sufficient. To right the disaster of this city, to help the helpless... Cliched though the endeavor was, surely it counted for more.

            ❛ Is this your gentle way of suggesting that I’m out of my depths and I should consider a career change? That I’m better suited for what I planned to do before? You wouldn’t be wrong... ❜    Yet she was grateful, despite, for his unflagging efforts to reassure. Grateful that, despite all that had happened, he seemed determined not to permit her faltering self-confidence to thoroughly give way. She shook her head, knowing even as she asked the question that the rest of his statement gave a clear answer: no, that was not what he had intended to say.    ❛ But... thank you, by the way. For somehow I can believing I can do this when all the evidence is stacked against me. ❜

faesule:

            ❛ ‘course I’m serious. What was I supposed to do? Turn the squirrel back out into the cold to fare for himself? I fed him, that’s what I did. Kept feeding him, and so he stayed. Sometimes I think that if I went back to that barn with food, he’d still come scampering down from the rafters. ❜    She knew better, of course. Too many years had passed, and likely the lifespan of the creature had run its course, but so long as she didn’t return, didn’t prove herself wrong, she could pretend. 

mcnsterinme:

            She knew indeed the limitations of his patience, the frustration that inevitably accompanied circumstances that did not go his way. Barring his erratic behaviour upon his initial return, he had shown significant restraint. Especially, she knew, in light of her own actions of late. How easy it had been to ignore, to settle the disquieting voices that sought to remind her that this was wrong, to justify her need for his help, for him. To this point, he had let her delude herself, ignore that which she would rather not see. Beyond his initial reminder that she herself had broken her own rules in coming to him that first day when she had asked for his help, they had all but ignored the reality of the situation. 

            Cami had been grateful for it, content to deceive herself, for all the hypocrisy of the situation. Now, she felt as if whatever tethered her had been severed or cast free, leaving her adrift, torn once more between what she knew to be right and what she desired, what she needed. Between keeping her distance, for his sake as much as hers, and not being alone in this struggle. But he deserved better than this, this constant game of push and pull, this selfish demand that he help her, regardless of his own feelings. In the past, Cami had told him off for less. 

            She did not know if his warning was meant to frighten her or simply to caution her, but it did not matter. For all she did not fear his temper herself, she knew what it would mean for others. It made her course singularly clear: this had to end, here and now. Whether or not she could do this by herself, she would. She must. 

            ❛ I’m sorry. ❜    She spoke scarcely above a whisper, knowing that the words fell short of everything she ought to say. Yet surely, she thought, surely they encompassed it all: sorry that things must be this way, that she could not drift back into that easy comfort they had enjoyed in each other’s company; sorry for all that she had done since, dragging him into her own efforts; sorry that she could not set things right. 

burnxyourxkingdom:

            Once more, she had said too much, given away more than she had intended. For all her insight, for all her ability to read those with whom she conversed, for all her adroitness in handling Klaus Mikaelson, the game she and Lucien played now was something wholly different. And, it seemed, far beyond her skillset. She wondered for a moment if she would be able to slip her phone from her pocket, to text Klaus. Cami knew that the chances of success, of accomplishing it without Lucien’s knowledge, were next to none. Besides, a voice of pride weighed in, refusing to call Klaus or any of his siblings in to the rescue. 

            Cami had assumed he knew that by day she masqueraded as a therapist      as Klaus’ therapist, she supposed she must specify, given her lack of other clients. Not that dealing with the Mikaelsons and the supernatural cohort of the city hadn’t proven a full-time job. Some of the damage might be done, but Cami was little inclined to give away more.    ❛ You’d be surprised, ❜    she replied lightly, striving to keep her irritation with this whole conversation out of her voice.    ❛ Never underestimate the demands of bartending until you’ve stood behind the bar yourself. But I’m afraid your out of luck when it comes to house calls. ❜    For a moment, she contemplated adding a snide remark, something along the lines of I don’t like you nearly enough, but it seemed the sort of thing that was likely to backfire, and so she refrained.

mcnsterinme:

            ❛ Some of us might enjoy discovering things in such a manner. But most people, I fear, are simply too foolish to believe anything save but what they themselves have witnessed. It does make things more interesting for such as you and I, those they dare to challenge, I suppose. ❜    That particular supposition rested upon the assumption that they could find entertainment in the idiocy of others, in the paltry challenges they posed. As if there were some dim amusement in watching fools break themselves against power and temper far beyond their reckoning. It was, she considered silently, perhaps too grand an assumption to make.    ❛ I suppose then that I ought to feel honoured to have seen Elijah’s rudeness and your pleasantness. Don’t worry: I won’t tell. ❜