CHAPTER 50: DANGEROUS LIAISONS

The Gilbert House

After Elena calling in a meeting between the Gilbert twins and Salvatore brothers, they ended up in the kitchen of the Gilbert house. The doppelganger got a visit from Rebekah after she left Natalie at the hospital with Alaric, and as you would think after she daggered the vampire, she wasn't very happy and it certainly wasn't a pleasant meeting. But then Elijah showed up and the two had a heart to heart about what had happened. 

This would have seemed like a good time for Natalie to mention seeing a very handsome original that she very much enjoyed looking at, but it felt like it would be so awkward to mention that to Stefan, because she had no idea how he felt about her but he must have felt something for her as he did call her when he was travelling with Klaus, he did kiss her back that night he left and he did seem very dependent on her as he was trying to keep himself from feeding on Elena (he eventually did, but Natalie jumped in the way so it was all cool in her perspective). But still, mentioning the fact that there was a new (or old, however you may see it) guy in the picture, although she wasn't really sure how it would all play out as she had no real idea about who he was and how he acted. Yet, somehow, she enjoyed that, learning about him, even though he was most likely another psycho original, but she'd grown fond of some of them, like Rebekah and Elijah and as much as she hated to say, Klaus was growing on her like drying paint, slowly and annoyingly. She hoped Kol would be the good one, though, but she was most likely wrong.

"It was their mother Esther who was sealed in that coffin." Elena informed the most elite part of the Mystic Falls gang that nobody seemed to be able to join unless you were, or were in love with, a Salvatore.

Natalie pouted as she heard this, hoping for something more exciting than a thousand year old witch, like, a green alien floating around on a spoon and throwing meteors at cows, but as crazy as Mystic Falls was, she doubted that would happen any time soon. "So just another crazy person that I once knew? Yay. That was a sarcastic yay, by the way," she informed them, only to let a giggle out as she listened to her own words. "That rhymed. I rhymed."

Damon shook his head at Natalie going off subject, but they loved that about her, she was Natalie, but they had to focus on the fact that a dangerous witch had been brought back to life so they had to continue with the habit of ignoring her. "What? How is she even alive? Thought her hybrid freak show of a son ripped her heart out a thousand years ago."

"I don't know. I'm guessing she has a couple connections in the witching community. Elijah said that she wants to live in peace with her family, including Klaus." Elena guessed, wanting to come up with the best answer she could to the question to get some peace of mind on the situation.

"She was supposed to be the weapon to help us kill Klaus." Stefan reminded her with a sharp glare as it was now obvious that their one and only hope to get to kill the hybrid just wooshed.

"Well, not anymore... at least not according to Elijah."

"That coffin was the only thing stopping Klaus from tearing us to shreds." the previously bunny-loving vampire groaned as Damon nodded in agreement, the two of them being the only ones that probably would get ripped to shreds because of the self-explanatory reasons behind Natalie's non-endangerment and Elena's freaky bloodbag thing.

"Not all of us," Natalie reminded them teasingly with a weirdly big smile on her face because she was in a really weird mood, but weird moods were her favorite moods. "Ha!"

" Look, Elijah promised me that his family wouldn't hurt any of us, and I believe him." Elena informed the three dark-haired people standing by her as the doorbell rang, causing them all to move out of the kitchen and rather into the hallway.

Elena opened the door, and there she found... nobody. There were two envelopes on the ground, but, otherwise, there was nothing. She picked the two thing up and looked closer at them to discover that each of them had a ornately-handwritten name on them. The first one she looked at had Elena Gilbert on it, whilst the other one had Natalie Saltzman.

"What is it?" Damon asked as she handed one of the envelopes over to Natalie, who narrowed her eyes at the fine writing and the fanciness that would most likely have something to do with it.

They grabbed a note out from the envelopes, and Elena started reading it out loud. "It's an invitation. Please join the Mikaelson Family, this evening at seven o'clock. For dancing, cocktails and celebration."

"Who the hell are the Mikaelsons?" Stefan spoke up, voicing the confusion that both him and his brother had.

"The originals. Duh. It's a patronym." Natalie answered them as if the answer was obvious, but, she was Natalie, she didn't really care about the annoyed looks she got, she always annoyed them and she loved it.

Damon quite simply shook his head at her before continuing with being Damon and handing out sarcastic remarks like they're gifts in Christmas. "It's not bad enough they're moving into town, now they want a housewarming gift?"

Elena rolled her eyes at him before flipping the card over and noticing cursive writing on the back. "Wait, there's a note on the back. Elena, I think it's time that we finally meet -Esther."

Natalie frowned as she glanced over at the message and flipped her own card around and noticed some writing on hers too; Save me a dance, darling, -Kol. She tried to suppress it, but a small smile made its way to her face, making Stefan eye her weirdly and confusedly.

"Is there anything on yours?" he questioned her, which made her look up quickly with wide eyes, like a deer caught in headlights as she shook her head rapidly. "Are you sure?"

Elena grabbed the note from Natalie's hand, and studied the writing and frowned for a moment before recovering and meeting Stefan's eyes. "There's nothing there." she lied smoothly, getting a grateful look from her twin. "You know, I'll never really get the Originals' obsession with you."

"Well, you know, I'm as smooth as peanut butter," Natalie responded with a smirk, only to see the doubtful looks on the three other people in the room's faces. "Chunky peanut butter."

Elena let out a laugh she was trying to hold in at her sister's remark (which was accompanied by a way too serious face for the situation. "But, anyway, if Esther wants to talk to me, maybe I should find out why."

"Well that's a dumb idea, she already tried to kill you once." Damon pointed out, an unusually serious look on his face.

"No, Elena is right. Bonnie was led to open that coffin for a reason. I think there is more to this than just some family reunion." Stefan disagreed, making Elena send him a small smile in approval for supporting her.

The elder Salvatore switched between glaring at his brother and Elena, wanting to keep her safe at all costs.  "Can we go back in time where the old Stefan cared if Elena lived or died?"

"What for? It's your job now."

"Awkward." Natalie huffed, ignoring the glares the Salvatores sent her.

Elena then decided to break into the conversation so that she could get her way and find out what the Original Witch wanted. "Stefan has a point, Damon. I should find out what she wants."

Damon quickly dismissed the idea with a shake of his head. "You can't protect yourself."

"But I can. So, I'll go because I'm already invited and I'll keep her safe. Badabim badaboom, everything's fine and I saved yet another day! Please stand in a line and you can give me your thank-yous." she smiled brightly at the three, who did not return them and definitely didn't stand in line.

"You're not going," Stefan said sternly, causing a weird look to come over Elena's face as he had no problem throwing her into danger but when it came to Natalie, he would stand up for her safety without a second thought. Maybe it was because she had nothing that she needed to do for all of them, maybe it was because of the small smile and faint pink tint to her cheeks as she looked at the back of the note, maybe he simply didn't want her in the way, Elena wasn't really sure what it was. "There is no reason for you to go, and we don't know how the other originals react to you as well as we need you too much to risk yourself at a stupid ball."

"Why would you need me if you won't give me the chance to do anything? And maybe I don't want to go there because I need to do something, maybe I want to do something and no matter how much you hate it, I don't need your permission." she spat in return with a bitter smirk.

"Okay fine," he agreed, although you could see that he wasn't very pleased with knowing that she was going. "Then I'll go."

"You've pissed off enough Originals to last a lifetime. I'll go." Damon shook his head, grabbing the invitation straight from Elena's hands. "End of story."

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The Mikaelson Mansion

You couldn't really say that Natalie was early. Or on time. Just, slightly late because she was there 30 minutes after the set time on the invite, mostly because she had nothing to wear so she had to head over to Bonnie's to borrow something (and she had nothing she wanted to wear for herself because she was unfortunately not invited) and then she got called by Caroline who ranted to her about Klaus inviting her to the ball (her "aw" could not be contained) and having nothing to wear until she finally agreed to wear the dress he got her.

Now Natalie realized how bad of an idea it was to come. Stefan was most likely going to be there, even though he said he wouldn't and then he'd see her with Kol which made her strangely uncomfortable to think about because even though Kol seemed very interesting, she couldn't quite shake Stefan and his hero hair off.

But she sucked it up and found herself walking through the large doors to the mansion and scouring her surroundings, noticing Stefan, Damon and Elena arguing not too far away, only for them to slowly come to the realization that she had arrived. Stefan's jaw dropped in just the slightest as Natalie twirled a strand of hair that had fallen out of her half-up-half-down hairstyle as Elena sent her a large smile as she noticed how beautiful her sister looked, Damon however shook his head in disappointment as he was really hoping that she would choose not to show up.

And then she met a pair of thousand year old brown eyes staring at her from across the room, he didn't take long to leave his conversation to walk up to the stunning brunette, who sent him a smile as she raised her eyebrows at him, only for him to smirk in response, something that she noticed that Stefan noticed.

"Fashionably late is still a thing, I see." his smooth and very British voice was heard as he walked up next to her.

"Very much so, but that's not the reason I was late. I was a bit... tied up." Natalie responded because of lack of better wording.

"Ah, you're into that kind of thing. Can't wait to see that for myself, darling." he smirked at her, making her eyes widen at how bad that sounded.

She bit her lip awkwardly as she made this weird awkward smile before taking a breath and going back to normal. "Don't flatter yourself. And I don't mean like that. It was just my best friend spending too much time ranting about your brother and how he has a taste for expensive gifts."

Kol let his smirk widen as he opened his mouth, clearly about to respond when she heard the familiar voice of Elijah Mikaelson. "Uh, if everyone could gather, please."

"Please forgive me, darling, but we have matters to attend to. Shall we?" he asked with a smirk (she suspected his face was stuck that way) as he reached his arm out for her to take, although she had no idea why.

"Shall we what?" she asked, frowning at him with this look on face as if she was reminding him that it was common to tell people what they were doing before saying they were going to do it.

"The family's gathering on the stairwell. You're apart of our family as well, Natalia." he reminded her with what was probably the most sincere face he could make (although she did notice the large and smug smirk that still didn't leave).

She smiled softly at him as she pulled her arm through his as he led her up to a high point on the stairs with Klaus, Elijah, Rebekah and another Mikaelson she honestly did not give a crap about at the moment beneath them. 

Her gaze went over the shocked looks she got from down there, mostly Stefan, Damon, Elena, Caroline and Matt though, the last one being Rebekah's date (she had conflicted feelings about that ship, but she currently enjoyed it). She was sure that Damon and Elena would interrogate her the moment she walked down and she didn't want that. She was lucky enough with the lack of questions they already asked her about the reincarnation thing and they knew less than Natalie (which didn't say a whole lot).

She was brought out of her mindset by Elijah as she realized that her arm was still linked with Kol and she pulled it out and walked down a step, she felt really awkward knowing that Stefan was watching from below. "Welcome, thank you for joining us. You know, whenever my mother brings our family together like this, it's tradition for us to commence the evening with a dance. Tonight's pick is a centuries-old waltz, so if all of you could please find yourselves a partner, please join us in the ballroom."

Everyone hurried to get a partner so they wouldn't be left alone. Klaus and Caroline paired up (Natalie loved that, even though Caroline was officially dating Tyler, but she was never a huge fan. He was just that guy that you don't really like but you don't want him to die), Damon and Elena paired up, much to Stefan's dismay, and then Kol asked her to dance, and after she tried to convince him that the only dance she could do was the running man, he somehow convinced her (but, don't worry, she was wearing her vervain bracelet, and she had been drinking a whole lot of vervain tea so she was content with that).

And then they ended up on the dance floor, Ed Sheeran's Give Me Love was blaring through the room as Natalie snuck a peek at her partner, who had his eyes on her the entire time. She looked down quickly as she felt her cheeks heat up, and she felt like this nervous twelve year old, and she hadn't felt like that since she was, you know, twelve, and she wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not.

"Although I am sure you are aware of the fact, but I do have to say that you look absolutely breathtaking this evening." he complimented her as Natalie tried to focus on her feet so she wouldn't step on him because that would probably be very awkward, but she did smile at him for a moment before trying to say thank you, but it was interrupted by her tripping over the hem of her dress. And he was very, very rude and let out a short laugh.

"Shut up." she groaned as she felt his hand take place on her waist as their faces were put closer together. "And thanks, you don't look awful."

But, then it was time to change partners, and the fate she was as non-existent just spat in her face as she was twirled into another's arms and her nose almost touching the one that belonged to Stefan Salvatore. 

Her eyes met his as they widened in surprise, he, however, seemed as if he knew it was coming. Like, he had placed himself there just so Natalie could end up in his arms. She was a little caught up with the surprise as she looked into her eyes before they fluttered down to his lips for a split second because of their closeness.

"When I told you that you deserved better, this is not what I meant." he then spoke up, ruining the silent moment as he referenced both her new whatever with Kol and his words the night they both got shot.

"I know," she said softly, trying to ignore the fact that Stefan's hands were on her waist and they were dancing pretty closely and that no matter how uncomfortable it made her, knowing who he had been lately, she also pretty freaking loved it. "But I wanted to thank you."

Stefan frowned in confusion, his eyes meeting hers once again with a questioning look. "For what? You haven't really had any reason to be thankful for anything that I've done lately."

"I know that you didn't want me to come tonight, but you didn't try to stop me which I appreciate." she responded with as much of a shrug as she managed with their swinging around.

He was even more confused by her actually thinking that he could do something like that to her, he wasn't Damon, but he wasn't quite Stefan either. "Of course I didn't. I've done and my fair share of bad stuff but I'm never going to take a choice away from you."

"Thank you, Stefan." she smiled softly and slightly in a way that she hadn't smiled at him for a long time, quite frankly, there were no words for how much she missed that. That feeling that made her want to run towards him but away from him at the same time, that feeling when she didn't know what they were other than happy and she never really thought of savoring it because she took him for granted and she regretted it. If she hadn't, she might not have felt his changing so strongly.

But then it was partner switch again, but at least this time it wasn't someone she have or may have feelings for. It was just her handsome blond friend that she always enjoys talking to. "Matt!"

"Natalie!" he mimicked her tone playfully, making her laugh. At least this was just a friendly and happy dance, she was glad to get away from that drama for a while. She loved that about Matt. Of course, the drama feeling surged back in as she saw Elena and Stefan leaving one another's arms and walking out of the room. What they were doing couldn't be good, and quite frankly, she didn't want to know.

▹▹▹

And after Kol and Rebekah having what Natalie guessed was a sibling bonding moment (she couldn't be more wrong, unless you count planning murder of a teenage quarterback bonding. Luckily, Rebekah was all against it in the end) the pair stood together as Kol kept questioning her about her new life.

"What do mean 'he killed you'?" he asked her after her explanation of Damon, involving that he was the most annoying person she ever met, he killed her and she loved him, he was her second best friend (Caroline barely beat him, killing her and turning her mom took it's toll).

"It's fine, we're cool." she waved it off as if it was no big deal. She wasn't a vampire, she didn't have the time to hold grudges. She then noticed a waiter coming around with red-tinted champagne and Kol gladly gave her one as he took one for himself, without drinking it as they knew it was probably a reason as to why everyone was getting a glass.

"You know, that reminds me a fair share of your relationship with Nik. You annoyed one another to death, and he killed you once." Kol smirked at her as she smiled in return, it was really helping her to understand Klaus' moodswings when it came to her when he compared it to Damon. She understood her relationship with Damon, so maybe she could understand hers with Klaus.

Kol had already compared her friendships with Caroline and Rebekah as she explained it. Two blondes who were overly competitive, ambitious and loving both loved her unconditionally without them ever having too many fights. He also compared Elena to Tatia (saying the original one was much prettier, reminding her of when Rebekah also commented on that).

Then, Esther Mikaelson walked to the top of the stairs, her own glass of champagne in hand. "Good Evening, Ladies and Gentleman. Waiters are coming around with champagne. I invite you all to join me in raising a glass. It provides me with no greater joy then to see my family back together as one. I'd like to thank you all for being part of this spectacular evening. Cheers!"

And, with that, everyone took a sip, not knowing that this simple toast could cost so many lives.

▹▹▹

It wasn't long after that Kol and Rebekah once again met up for some "bonding" and Natalie was left all alone. Stefan was nowhere to be seen, so she couldn't very well talk to him, Caroline was off somewhere with Klaus and Damon and Elena were in a heated argument. But when she heard commotion outside she ran out, it was most likely either Stefan or Damon doing something the insane Salvatore way.

She was correct as she ran out with the Mikaelsons (except Kol) and Stefan and Elena and they saw Damon standing over a Kol with neck snapped. He probably deserved it, that theory was proven as she seemed to be the only one who heard Matt's distant cries from a floor up, meaning that he most likely got hurt, and it Kol's fault. Why did she always fall for the psychos?

"Damon! Are you crazy?" Stefan exclaimed as if he could talk.

Damon's gaze then went to meet Elena, proving that their argument most likely did something that was not good. "Maybe a little. Far be it for me to cause a problem."

▹▹▹

The Gilbert House

Natalie and Elena decided that the latter would go with Matt to the hospital as Natalie could go home, just in case Damon was there, and since he was a little out of control, Elena wasn't the best choice to face him. What Elena didn't count on was Stefan offering to take Natalie home, and that's how they ended up in the hallway of the Gilbert house.

"What was with Damon going after... Kol?" Stefan asked her, saying the last name a little bitterly, although, he did try to hide it, but Natalie still noticed.

"He cares, Stefan. He was trying to protect Matt because he knows how much he means to everyone. We can't hold that against him." Natalie stated, knowing that he was internally pissed at him for ruining the night, even if he had nothing against seeing Kol with a snapped neck.

He nodded awkwardly in response, looking at her again to not seem to affected by the way she understood Damon better than he did, his own brother. "Anyway, uh, good night." he smiled slightly before walking out the door.

He didn't expect for Natalie to follow him so they stood right outside the door, but he didn't turn around to look at her until she uttered his name. "Stefan! How do you that? Act like you don't really care. Because I care, and it always shows and it's killing me."

"Natalie, stop."

She shook her head at him avoiding this conversation that had been put on hold for quite some time and she didn't really know why she just jumped into it, but she needed closure, even if he did end up back with Elena. "I don't want to stop. Fine, you may not care about me, but you care about something, even if you want to pretend you don't!"

Suddenly, it just became too much for him and he snapped at her thinking so low of him, like he wanted all this. "What? You think I want to be this person? I hurt you, Natalie. I bit you. I hate myself for what I did to you."

"Then show me," she said loudly, walking closer to him putting her hands on his shoulders so that he would look into her eyes and see the raw emotion she hid in them as she looked at him. "Because you're not very convincing without giving me those signs! You're not you anymore, because you're not yourself without emotions and letting them in and letting them out is the best thing you can do for yourself and for others. Please, Stefan, let it in!"

She saw for a split second a flash of emotion that she had so desperately hoped would be there, but as soon as it came, it was gone and he grabbed her wrists roughly as he looked at her with hard eyes. "If I let myself care, all I feel is pain."

And, with that, he left her all alone as she didn't even follow her own advice and pushed the tears back, she didn't want to let him have that effect on her anymore.

He couldn't.

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A/N: Slowly coming to the realization that your book is trash. Well, there's a reason it's called a trash can and not a trash cannot.

Anyway, I have not been updating, I feel like crap, but I really like the outcome of this chapter and I have been preparing for it so long. IT'S CHAPTER 50, AND MY FAVORITE EPISODE! I hope I did it justice. And, don't worry, there will be a whole lot of focus on the reincarnation thing in the next chapter.

Statalie or Katalie?

Votes and comments are greatly appreciated.