KLAUS had set up a dinner table in the courtyard to celebrate his return to leadership over New Orleans and his repossession of the Abbatoir compound from Marcel. The vampire army, including Marcel and his closest friends, were seated around the table, and Klaus and Ingrid were seated at each end like King and Queen.

Klaus called for everyone's attention to give a speech by tapping his glass with his fork. "Let us begin with a toast to our shared gift: immortality. After a thousand years, one might expect life to be less keenly felt, for its beauties and its sorrows do diminish with time. But, as vampires, we feel more deeply than humans could possibly imagine." Klaus gestured toward a group of waiters and waitresses to have them join them at the table, one for each guest. "Insatiable need, exquisite pain..." The wait staff slit their wrists with knives, filling the cups with blood for the vampires, and Ingrid cringed slightly at the sight.

"Our victories, and our defeats." He continued on and raised his glass in a toast to the others "...To my city, my home again. May the blood never cease to flow..."

Marcel smiled and lifted his glass. "...and the party never end!" He toasted then looked over at Diego, hinting at him to continue on.

Diego nodded and raised his glass. "To New Orleans."

"To New Orleans!" Klaus repeated and everyone followed along, drinking from their glasses. All except Ingrid who frowned and smelled at her non-alcoholic cider. Klaus noticed this from across the table and chuckled, urging her to go on. She took a sip and wrinkled her nose causing him to smirk in amusement.

"I understand that some of you may have questions regarding the recent change in leadership, and I invited you here tonight to assure you that you are not defeated. No, my intentions moving forward are to celebrate what we have. What Marcel, in fact, took and built for this true community of vampires." Klaus explained to them, walking away from his chair and down to the end of the table where Ingrid sat. "As many of you know, my wife, Ingrid, is carrying my child. Consequently, I trust you will all pay her the appropriate respect." He remarked and placed a hand on her shoulder. "If not more respect than what I am owed. However, I understand that some of you are concerned by this vicious rumor that I intend to use the blood of our child to create hybrids. I assure you I do not."

They all turned to Ingrid, who raised an eyebrow and sat forward in her seat. "I understand the tension and the mistrust. However, I have no intention of siring hyrbids especially from the blood of my child. I am not a monster."

No one looked convinced and Klaus growled lowly, mildly frustrated. "It appears I will have to earn your trust. Very well. We'll eliminate the root of your anxiety. You see, how can we sire any hybrids if there are no more werewolves alive in the Bayou to turn?" Klaus questioned with a smirk and raised his glass. "So-- eat, drink, and be merry. And, tomorrow, I suggest you have yourselves a little wolf hunt. Go ahead, have fun. Kill them all!"

Ingrid was unpacking boxes in their new bedroom as Elijah paced the floor before her. "I implore you to talk Niklaus out of this deplorable wolf hunt."

"Elijah, I did not invite you here to speak on the wolf hunt. I invited you here because you told me you wanted to make amends." Ingrid reminded him while hanging up her clothing. "Do not make me regret this choice. But since you have brought up the topic of deplorable actions. Let's discuss yours. Tyler and Hayley blow through town and they pitch you the idea that Niklaus and I have intentions of creating a hybrid army at the expense of our daughter and not even a minute into the conversation, you decide to believe them over your own family. Your own brother."

"I know the concept may be too far out there to grasp but Niklaus actually does things with kindness and love. Believe it or not, he has feelings. He cares deeply for his family and for his siblings to betray him and accuse him of such a heinous act... it broke his heart, Elijah." She informed him with a sad look and he glanced down at the floor, guilty. "He will never admit it to anyone but I know it did... he has not stop calling himself a bastard since then. Because he has convinced himself that is how you both feel."

"You and Rebekah have him so convinced that he is the bastard brother and that there is no way in hell he could possibly be a good husband or father." She stated, her voice getting angrier by the minute. "Since the moment we arrived here Niklaus has done nothing but make sure that myself and our baby are healthy and cared for. He has fallen in line with everything that has been asked of him, which is commendable when you compare his past discretions."

"I made a mistake, Ingrid." Elijah replied, hoping to make things better between their family. "I lost sight of what was in front of me and I used my biased judgment to make a rash accusation. I'm sorry."

"I shouldn't be the one you're apologizing to." Ingrid remarked and walked passed him toward a set of boxes. When she went to pick it up, he waved her off and did it for her. "You need to say it him and your apology better be genuine. He should not need to worry about what his family thinks of him. If my opinion means anything to you, I say you deserved the punishment you had endured." She said then rolled her eyes and pointed at the bed, meaning for him to place it there. "As for the wolf hunt... I cannot do anything about it. My apologies."

He did as he was told and looked at her, hopeful. "He listens to me to an extent but he listens to you entirely." He then watched her pull out a stack of books and placed them on the shelves. "Ingrid, you need to talk him out of it."

"As I said, my apologies, Elijah, but his mind is made up. He is trying to earn their trust and their loyalty and right now because of Tyler's accusations, they don't believe that we won't make hybrids." She explained to him with a pointed look on her face. "I refuse to use my relationship with him to manipulate his decisions because you do not agree with them. If you're so set on stopping him, you do it. Besides, I am not too fond of the wolves so why should I help them?"

"Hayley--" He began but was interrupted by her while she gave a disgusted face.

"Oh, you have been spending time with Hayley." She drew out in a disapproving manner. "Spend one day with her and you run to her for every choice. Elijah, I expect you to keep better company. You could do so much better. Especially from the likes of Hayley. She paired up with Silas and set the whole plan in motion for Niklaus to murder his hybrids. She unsired his hybrids and no doubt she intends to unsire herself from me right now. My advice, don't get involved with people like her. They just use you."

He was about to respond when Klaus walked into the room. His face immediately fell upon seeing his brother standing there, especially in his bedroom. Ingrid knew he was about to make a snide remark and rolled her eyes. "Niklaus, I invited him here because he wished to speak to me. Please do not start."

"Yes and I was on my way out." Elijah remarked, clearing his throat and walking toward the door. He looked as though he had wanted to say something to his brother but decided against it and left the room.

"Oh, and I'm sure you were two were chatting away about me." Klaus said angrily and walked over to help her.

"In fact, we were." She answered honestly and handed him a box. "He wanted me to talk to out of the wolf hunt but I told him no." He looked over at her in shock but she continued on, ignoring his look. "He was also here to express his apologies for the accusations."

"He can say sorry to you but can't be bothered to say anything to me." Klaus mumbled in anger and scoffed to himself.

"I didn't accept his apology." She informed him in a casual tone and sat down on the bed. "Simply because he didn't do anything to me. He didn't hurt my feelings. What made me furious is what he said to you. I wasn't plotting against you if that's what you fear." She remarked then pulled out a bag of pretzels from her hidden stash in the bedside drawer.

"I would never think that of you. You are the only one it seems I can trust." He was touched by her loyalty to him but it was hard to keep her serious as she was slowly pulling out the bag in an attempt for him not to notice. "Alright, love. Where else do you have food hidden?"

She tried not to laugh but failed and placed a pretzel into her mouth as she thought of all the places she had hidden food around the compound. "If I tell you, they're not hidden anymore. There are so many more hiding places here!"

"Ingrid, we've been living here for a day." Klaus commented with a look of affection and disbelief.

He knew she would eventually get to stashing food but he didn't know it would be so soon. Back at the plantation, he was always finding random snack items hidden. His favorite was when he found peanut M&Ms hidden in one of his drawers. He wouldn't tell her that he would eat her snacks and replace them with full bags so she wouldn't notice.

"And?" She questioned in confusion, not seeing his point.

He simply laughed with a shake of his head and sped toward her, pushing her down on the bed and lying next to her. "Give me one." He requested, holding his hand out, and she gave him a pretzel.

Later on, Klaus had gone to a faction meeting and came home to join Marcel at a table in the bar room, a bottle of bourbon in hand. "I think it was far more gracious than they deserved." He said, defending himself as Marcel glared at him. Klaus began pouring them drinks and ignored his look. "You're disappointed by my lack of diplomacy. You out of all people should need no reminder of the human capacity for cruelty."

Marcel remained silent then turned his head to see Ingrid walking toward them with a confused expression on her face. "Niklaus?" She called out to him then noticed Marcel and smiled kindly. "Hello, Marcellus." She greeted  warmly and turned back to her husband in confusion. "Have you seen--?"

"One second, my love." Klaus' phone buzzed and he held up a finger to her, rising from his chair to answer it. "Hello?"

"Mr. Mikaelson. I just wanted to let you know that the faction's considered your terms. We've reached a decision." The sherif said calmly from the end of the call.

Klaus chuckled, amused at his attitude. "Have you?"

Suddenly, a loud explosion was heard from outside and large amounts of automatic gunfire pierced through the walls and windows of the compound, scattering broken glass all over the room. Some daywalkers were hurt by the gunfire and many of the nightwalkers went up in flames when they were hit by the sunlight. Terrified screams filled the air around them, paired with the sound of gunfire.

Both Klaus and Marcel sped toward Ingrid and they all fell to the floor.
Marcel was hit repeatedly by the machine gun shots and yelled loudly in pain as Klaus covered Ingrid with his own body, glaring furiously up at the room. Once the gunshots had stopped, Klaus hovered over Ingrid and glanced down at her in concern. "Are you alright, love?" He asked while pulling her up off the ground.

She looked up at him and nodded quickly. She then began to check him for bullet wounds. "Is everyone alright?" She asked then looked between the men in confusion. "What the hell happened?"

Marcel looked around at the disaster and grew furious. "Dammit, dammit, dammit!" He became so enraged that he flipped a table over before angrily pointing at Klaus. "This is on you! Now that you're in charge, these are your guys laying dead. Your guys. You're gonna run this city, that better mean something to you, otherwise no one worth a damn is gonna follow you. No one!" He yelled with a glare.

Instead of being angry at him, Klaus merely smiled as Marcel turned away from him. "I was beginning to worry about you. I don't think I could've taken any more of this differential nonsense. I mean, clearly I underestimated the faction. That won't happen again. But, tell me-- now that we've arrived to this point, now that they have come into our home, visited this upon our people... How would you counsel me to respond?" Klaus asked for his opinion, hoping to earn his trust by including him in the plan.

Marcel licked his lips and nodded his head, determined. "Let's go kill them all." He advised then turned on his heels and walked away from them.

Hayley stromed into the room and glared furiously at the Originals. "Those werewolves you ordered killed, that's my family."

"Hello, Hayley." Ingrid rolled her eyes and groaned in aggravation to herself. "You assume we should care."

"Not for long. I mean, this so-called family of yours, they haven't done you much good, have they?" Klaus questioned with a knowing smirk and Hayley avoided his gaze. "You said it yourself-- they abandoned you and left you on your own. Now it's simply your turn to do the same."

"Maybe they had their reasons." She remarked, defending the parents she hadn't even known.

"Yes, well, I have reason too and I don't need to explain myself to you." Klaus replied with stern expression then smirked wickedly. "Goodbye, Hayley."

She glared at him furiously before storming back out of the room. Klaus felt a presence behind him and stiffened slightly, staring coldly in front of him. "Haven't you had your fill of telling me all the ways I've disappointed you, Elijah?"

"Well, there is something important we neglected to discuss." Elijah said smoothly as he walked into the room to join them. "I accused you of having ulterior motives regarding the child. I was wrong. I'm sorry."

Klaus turned to face him with a bitter smile. "I imagine that must have been hard for you to say."

Elijah took a deep breath and smirked slightly. "You don't make it easy to love you, brother."

"And yet, you're obstinate in your desire to do so." Klaus replied then paused for a moment with tears in his eyes. "When you're ready, should you be so inclined, both you and Rebekah are welcome to join me here. It is, after all, our family home." Klaus smiled and walked out of the room, leaving Elijah and Ingrid behind.

Ingrid turned toward her brother-in-law with a wide smile. "I am proud of you." She remarked in genuineness.

He smiled slightly at her before taking a step forward with a serious expression. "Ingrid, there is something I need to discuss with you."

She examined his face and her smile dropped. Sighing in understanding, she nodded her head and motioned for him to follow her. They walked into one of the offices and she shut the doors behind him before taking a seat in one of the chairs. "Since you waited for Niklaus to leave, I am under the assumption that you don't want to talk to him about it."

"I need to run it through you first so I may have some insight." Elijah answered honestly and sat in one of the chairs next to her.

"Well, it is a good thing this is my office and Niklaus knows better than to barge in." She remarked with a grin then motioned for him to continue. "Proceed."

He nodded and reached inside his jacket pocket, pulling out a ring and handing it to her. "Do you recognize it?"

She studied it intently for a moment with furrowed her eyebrows. After a moment, realization crossed her face and she sneered. "Esther."

"The ring was in possession of one of the wolves." Elijah responded with a nod, signaling that she was correct. "So, naturally, I questioned him. He spoke of a legend. A legend wherein long ago, a chief of theirs had fathered a child to a very powerful witch. Their mythology further states that this child, a son, was later transformed into something this clan had never before seen. Something werewolf and vampire."

"Niklaus." Ingrid drew out with an unreadable expression on her face.

"We found remnants of his family. The bloodline of his true father. And we saved them from being slaughtered at the hands of the vampires he commands." Elijah began to speak in anger and she rolled her eyes with annoyance.

"Elijah--" She warned, about to make correct but he paused himself and shook his head.

"No, you're right." He remarked with a sigh then looked up at her with a serious expression. "Ingrid, your child is part of that family."

---
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