enduringvoices | Oh, when darkness comes and pain is all around

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cain x elijah

Oh, when darkness comes and pain is all around

Cain probably shouldn't have challenged Klaus. He probably shouldn't have done a lot of things, especially where Klaus was concerned, but telling the volatile hybrid that his idea was a bad one to his face wasn't without consequences, and it resulted in his chest being punched out and his heart pulled beating from his chest. He saw it coming really, but he had to say it because it was a piss poor idea that would turn the vampires of the French Quarter against the hybrid, but of course Klaus would hear nothing of it.

And since Klaus couldn't bow nicely from an argument, he wrapped his hand around Cain's heart and Cain could feel it squeeze in his chest even through the radiating pain from getting his ribs broken and pushed aside. It was cold, more than the pain, it was a constricting coldness. He dropped like a ton of bricks onto the ground, collapsing in a fold of limbs splayed every which way.

A heart being pulled out wasn't the same as a stabbed heart, and it had happened often enough by now that Cain knew he was going to lose about half a day, at least. Probably wake up in the evening in the foyer alone and still need to clean up the damn bloody mess, literally, that his body made while he was dead. Why couldn't Klaus just snap his neck this time?

That was his last thought before.... complete blackness.

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It was his own curse. Ever since Elijah had taken Cain that one day he'd not been able to get the man out of his head. He often stalked him quietly through the day off and on, never once letting his presence be known, and he'd think. By the gods, he'd sit and ruminate over and over on what happened between them and what it meant, what it meant that he wanted it again and that he couldn't stop thinking about what Cain's skin felt like against his, what his musk smelled like when they'd finished having sex-- how his blankets and pillows smelled for the remainder of the week.

It was difficult to concentrate on Hayley and making sure her needs were set for the baby. It should never have bothered him that much. Making himself angry. Elijah forced himself to stay away from Cain next, falling back into the way of the family. He never touched,looked at or asked Cain for anything again.

Nothing until one day Elijah was walking through central foyer and he saw a body on the ground-- a bloody body. He was about to start yelling for Klaus to come and clean up his mess when he recognized it as Cain. His heart broke in half and dropped deep into a well. Elijah fell to his knees beside the mess of a body. It was covered in blood, especially where the shirt was ripped through and it looked like something had happened, but the vampire wasn't sure what. There was no hole in Cain's chest.

Lifting up the immortal's head, he placed it in his lap and took a deep breath. He grabbed one hand and folded it up at an angle over the body, and then brought the other up into his hand. It was so cold-- so different from how it felt that night, clasped in his as their bodies rutted in heat with one another. The thought choked and got stuck in the Original's throat.

"I wanted to talk to you. I wanted to talk to you so bad, and to know you better. I wished that we were equals and that you didn't belong to my brother as some stupid slave. You deserved better. I know you did. There's pride in your eyes that shows years of wisdom, something that doesn't come outside of life. I respect you, and I-- god... I-- I can't do this..." a tear fell down his face. "Why you. Why now. Why did you walk into my life, only to leave like this.."

Elijah brought Cain's hand to his lips and pressed it tight, holding it there close and then placed it against his cheek with his eyes closed, lamenting the passage of the man who could have been something-- but the vampire would never know now, because he'd been too stubborn and stupid to go for what he really wanted.

It was during Elijah's speech, when Cain's hand was still in the the vampire's hands, that the immortal's heart suddenly started beating again. It was a sound of labor, of a weak heart, newly regrown and struggling in soft flutters to pull what blood was left and in a body that had not had blood circulating in it for several hours already. Even in the quiet room it could barely be registered, adding a staccato of soft beats unnoticed in the background.

Consciousness was a strange thing. Waking from the dead was different every time, a sudden tight squeeze where he was dumped back into his awareness like a bucket of cold water to snap him awake, or a slow returning of individual senses that brought him back one step at a time. This time was the latter, of a corpse reversing the stages of mortem, his senses picking out things one at a time.

Someone was speaking to him, above him, his head laid on something. Warm. So warm like a furnace heat to his room temperature body.

Cold fingers against Elijah's lips curled slightly, too weak to truly move as the hand was manipulated against a cheek. This was moments before a sudden gasp of breath brought life fully back into the corpse to make it a living body again.

Cold, so cold. It must have been hours already, at least half the day passed, and... He was not alone.

That was the most amazing part of this ordeal, someone had been mourning him, holding his dead body like it was a thing of value, commemorating a companion who passed, making him a person worth remembering. But it wasn't the fear of discovery though that overtook Cain with this, but a sense of not being alone in this moment of cheating death yet again.

"Haven't... Haven't left," Cain whispered, his body still extremely weak from the ordeal. Blue eyes fluttered slowly open to look up into the vampire's rather shocked ones. He guess Klaus never told his family about his blood slave being immortal, although Cain had thought Elijah knew. How else could he have been with Klaus all these years? Any human would have been dead within a month, forget decades. Even if he was human, he would have to have been a kid to be with Klaus that long.

There were plenty of long-lived witches and other humans of power that managed to linger beyond their years. Elijah figured it was something different with Cain because of the way he healed those marks from feeding, but Elijah still had no idea exactly what the immortal was, or that he was actually, fully and truly immortal. The vampire figured that a cold dead body meant exactly that-- cold and dead. He hadn't had any experience that had taught him differently, beyond those that rose as vampires.

That was the first thought when the man in his lap gasped and clutched at Elijah's hand. Elijah closed his eyes, and got ready to do this the hard way. He couldn't let Cain become an undead thing like he was. He wouldn't condemn such a beautiful man so full of life to an eternity of being a monster. At least he'd no longer be a slave to his brother. "You're alive..." He said halfheartedly. A sad ache spreading through his limbs after that first spark of joy that was only tempered by what had to be cold reality.

"I can't believe what my brother did. Did he really need to feed and then turn you? I do hope that it wasn't your wish to be turned. It wasn't, right?" Elijah brushed his fingers along Cain's cheek softly as he spoke with reverence and respect, as one he'd cared for all this time-- and not as if they hadn't spoken since that day. "Klaus is so unbelievable, and he left you here too, for anyone to find. I swear, I'm going to take him down a peg or two next time I see him."

Cain didn't know what to think of Elijah's sudden lackluster tones that were so different from when he thought Cain was truly completely dead. It was as if he was disappointed to find Cain was alive, and that by waking up, Cain was no longer someone worth something.

It strangely hurt, a rejection that he wasn't even seeking recognition for, so quickly on the heels of that brief moment of companionship that didn't make this revival suck quite so bad.

Only to be confused by Elijah's gentle brush over his cheeks as Cain blinked, still trying to get his newly kick-started brain back to working order. People who get disoriented from being roused from slumber had nothing on coming back from the dead. He blinked, trying to get his brain back to working order while Elijah spoke.

"Wait, what?" Cain was still rested on Elijah's lap, making no effort to get up at the moment. Rather he was shivering, trying to get his body back to normal body temperature. His brain was still not functioning fully because he had no idea what Elijah just meant and felt like he should. But, it almost sounded like... Elijah thought Klaus turned him? "You think... Klaus?"

Perhaps his tones were lackluster, but his body and his touch were not. Those were things that Elijah couldn't help. He felt the coldness in Cain's body and began to run his hands up and down the overly large biceps and triceps, trying to ignore how much they ignighted the fuel within-- or how the thought of Cain actually being a vampire turned Elijah on. He wouldn't. He couldn't think those things. Not when it was taking a life, a personality, a human and making it a murderer.

"Damnit Klaus." Elijah squeezed Cain's arms tenderly, and nodded. "Yes, Klaus turned you. You were dead, Cain and now you are not. He must have put you in this state, and now you must make the choice to feed on human blood or not. To become one of us, or not. I know it's not an easy decision... I really wish you didn't have to make it. I cared for you how you were. I liked the human you."

Elijah realized that this upset him more than he should have let on, but he figured now there was no greater point in hiding it. Cain would move on after this no matter what happened to him. He'd no longer be their meager blood slave once he was either a vampire or dead. So, he would be lost to Elijah no matter what.

"I had wanted to get to know you before you left, but I imagine I don't or won't have time now. I'm sorry, everything was my fault. I should have said something that day... I don't know what, but something better than what was said. It- that meant something to me. You do, and I am still trying to learn why. So, now you know. Now that we'll go our separate ways." Elijah held himself still for a few seconds, waiting for Cain's response to any of it, all of it, feeling more vulnerable than he could remember feeling in a very long time.

He was getting a confession, Cain realized, and that Elijah thought he had no other chance to do it in the future. The idea was so incredulous and absurd that Cain for a moment didn't know how to react.

"Klaus didn't tell you?" he asked, his brain still fuzzy like it was behind a fog, one where he could barely see past the next street corner. It baffled him to think Elijah didn't know, until his mind caught up to the content of what Elijah was actually saying.

At that point it shocked him, and Cain tried to backtrack over what was said to him. Elijah, the elder Mikaelson... Liked him? He never even spoke to him, looked the other way even whenever Cain entered the room. The immortal thought the original was arrogant and looked down at the blood slave, believed their one brief afternoon together had been a mistake, like a stain of blood on his immaculate suits.

How did that turn into this?

"You're going to kill me," he muttered under his breath. Not that Elijah could, Klaus certainly had tried, but Cain could only imagine how the vampire would react if he discovered that the recipient to what Cain assumed was a secret confession, was neither a dead nor soon to be dead person.

"I've been stuck with your brat of a brother for 60 years, how old do you think I am?" Not a fair question perhaps, there was no way Elijah could get it right, but it might get him thinking. "I'm not going anywhere."

Looking at Cain's reaction and listening to him question about Klaus was Elijah's first tell that something was out of the ordinary. Maybe circumstances were not how Elijah thought that they were. Immediately, he began reviewing everything that he knew in his head. There were a few conclusions that could be reached and Elijah didn't feel that any of them were strong in his mind. His made more sense by far and yet it was still confusing. Why the questions and the puzzled looks.

One thing Elijah did know was that he was never planning on harming Cain. That was something that the vampire wouldn't do. It was Cain's choice, and Elijah would never further along things. It took a few days of not drinking blood, if that's what he chose for life to leave him again. However, that didn't seem like his choice either...

"I'm not going to kill you. I'd never hurt you in a way that was beyond what I've done already, and I'm sorry for that." Elijah shut up after he realized that he was only apologetic for the emotional pain and didn't really want to admit to it right now, not until he figured out what was going on.

"What - Really, what did my brother fail to tell me, and why do you call him brat, when he's ...." Elijah was struck silent when he pondered the last and final reason how all of this could work. He was rather brilliant, Elijah was and yet sometimes the fantastical was harder to believe even when it was right in front of his face. "No... you can't be him. I mean. You'd be... and then... but why would you even be here working for my brother? How could he treat you the way he does? It would explain the blood."

Elijah didn't know what to do with his hands now. He'd just confessed to liking the first child born to this world. Many would say that Cain was the first vampire, Elijah had heard that rumor so many times, and he'd laugh, talking about how his father's name was Mikael, not Cain, but here was Cain and they'd been intimate. Oh god, Elijah had been with Cain of the bible. He couldn't even wrap his mind around that, or anything else at the moment. It was a lot to take in.

There was a grimace that passed the ancient man's face when he saw Elijah had figured it out. He had told him, several times, who he was. Few believed him until there was evidence, although waking up after getting his heart pulled out was pretty damning evidence. Vampires, normal ones that don't have the Mikaelson name anyway, wouldn't have survived that either.

"Klaus treats everyone the way he does. Newsflash, I'm still human. Turns out not even the oldest one can resist compulsion." Klaus compelled him, that was the simple and straight forward explanation that ever Elijah should have seen coming. Cain came across Klaus and the hybrid saw an opportunity and advantage, so he took it in the same way he took everything. So now Cain was double cursed, to eternity and at the behest of Klaus. So he annoyed the hybrid in return, and Klaus kills him. It had been a cycle that went on for half a dozen decades.

They were not friends, but sometimes, Cain felt that even despite that, there was a feeling of companionship of sorts. At least Klaus was the first person he spent more than two decades with in a very long while. It assuaged his loneliness even while he hated the servitude at times.

It was probably Klaus' idea of a joke to not tell his siblings of this and had Elijah find out himself.

Seeing that the mystery was solved and Elijah was withdrawing, Cain started to sit up, groaning as his body tried to get rid of the rigor mortis that set in. Long deaths like that were painful in so many ways, and he almost missed the way Elijah had been massaging his limbs before. It had made the process a bit less torturous, and it was... nice. He tried not to think along those lines further, the vampire was likely changing his mind about everything that he said now that the truth was out.

It seemed like they were both splendid boxes full of mixed signals with neither of them able to look under the hood of the other to see exactly where the green and red wires ended up mixing up with the blue and yellow-- because all the colors were there and rushing by so quickly that at least Elijah was losing his grasp before he could finish all his thoughts on the subject.

As soon as Elijah's mind finally wrapped itself over and around the fact that this man was the Biblical Cain, the immortal was sitting up and pulling away from the original's hands and the way he'd been running those hands up and down the sides of Cain's arms to push circulation into Cain's body. Suddenly, Elijah's hands felt empty and he felt like he needed to sew his mouth shut about all he was saying. It'd felt so very good to finally be able to confess all his thoughts and some of his emotions about that night-- but now that he knew what his brother had been doing...

Now that Elijah knew that Klaus had been compelling Cain all along, and that it would likely continue how could the vampire look himself in the eyes. Hell, how could he look the immortal in the eyes again, those perfect sky blue eyes and meet them knowing that Cain knew exactly what was in the original's mind, and his heart -- that it was more than a passing phase, that Elijah wanted so much more.

He sighed, and reached out one hand and rubbed the back of Cain's neck after he groaned, working at a knot there. Elijah figured that he didn't have to be cruel. He would never use Cain again, not like a servant. He couldn't, not with how he felt, or with what he knew. There was far too much at stake.

"I will have a talk to my brother about how he treats you. I don't like that he keeps you as 'his' as it is. I will see what I can do, but Klaus and his wolf, are still more powerful than I am because of his bite." It was obvious that it annoyed Elijah, because Elijah was smarter and more powerful in the long run, but that werewolf bite could render him sick for a very long time. It was why they always reached so far in a fight and then stopped.

"Take it easy now and from here. You may use my suite of rooms to get away or shower or whatever you need for today. I don't want you to have to deal with my brother." There was no way Elijah could handle going through the experience of seeing or finding Cain dead again. That had been far more traumatizing than he thought it would be.

Cain thought that was it, he'll get up, Elijah will leave him and he himself will move when he recovers enough to have those dead muscles obey. Instead, he got up and Elijah was not pulling away, but moved his hands to help Cain massage away the pain in his neck and help break away the stiffness that had gathered there. It felt good, and warm, and Cain didn't know why the elder Mikaelson was still doing this after all his questions had been answered.

No, instead, he was talking about standing up to Klaus for Cain and that broke some of Cain's stoicism. A bit of derision, disbelief, with just a dash of confusion to muddy up the mix. "Not that I don't appreciate the effort, but Klaus isn't going to change just because you spoke with him. He saw I would be useful to have around, and he's right." Cain was useful. Not only was he a servant, but an inexhaustible food source, one who would stick around. Klaus too knew of Cain's desire to end his lonely existence and he took advantage of that too.

The offer of Elijah's private rooms brought Cain back to that one afternoon that he had challenged the elder vampire. It had ended up so different compared to his disagreements with Klaus.

"... He'll expect me to have cleaned this mess up first," he said with a soft sigh, not directly answering Elijah yet while he was still deciding what to do. He suggested to the vampire's they didn't repeat their afternoon again, yet Elijah... Cain still didn't know what he was getting from Elijah. "I also don't need your pity." He couldn't figure out what else this was. Surely the vampire didn't still like him.

There were parts of what Cain said that were true. Klaus wasn't going to change just because Elijah spoke with him, although there was a chance that if Elijah spoke somewhat, but not completely truthfully about how he felt about the immortal, Klaus might be willing to offer him more often into Elijah's care than not, especially if it would take the original's mind from Hayley, and the political air that was brewing. There were always negotiations that could be made with his brother, and Elijah was excellent at making them.

Elijah smiled with a mischievous grin. "No, he won't, but I have things that I can bargain with and I might be able to work a deal that will benefit you. He knows that your blood is sweet, but there are other things in life that he considers sweet as well." Elijah bowed slightly. It would allow Cain freedom, and yet still offer the immortal companionship as he sought it.

Elijah would have to be lying if he hadn't thought about Cain being in his rooms and their night together, but he'd also thought to be somewhere else, to give the man some privacy. It would be difficult, but he didn't want to think that on this day, the day he'd worked so hard to come back from the dead that the original would take such advantage of him.

"Don't worry about the mess. I pay a cleaner or two and they will clean it. You don't have to clean anything up but yourself, and this is far from my pity. I was merely thinking that it might be nice for you to stay away from Klaus who lives on the other side of the compound, and maybe you wanted some comfort for the night. I don't even have to be there. Not if you didn't want me around." Elijah had no idea what to do about what he'd said, and he didn't want Cain to think too much over his confession-- how embarrassing it was now that he knew Cain wasn't leaving or dying. What a fool he was.

The smile took the immortal by surprise and he stared, possibly longer than he should have until he realized he had been and turned away. No, that wasn't an expression of pity, wasn't even one of bitterness, but of brilliance and mischief, of a man who knew his own strengths and how to get what he wanted. On Cain's behalf, rather than from Cain, and it was startling to see.

He had often heard that Elijah was the noble brother, honorable even if such a thing was possible, and he was seeing it directed at him for the first time. It was... Unexpected to say the least, a kindness that was extended and so different from the brand of Mikaelson he was so used to.

There was no reason to turn it down, except Cain knew how cunning any one of these Originals were. So it wasn't that he was suspicious, but he had to ask. "Why?" Weary blue eyes sharpened now, and that bland expression intensified, not mistrusting, but analyzing, showing a mind that had been started up and was working on understanding.

"Don't tell me it's the right thing to do. You barely know me. We've had sex once and you don't strike me as the shallow type." Considering the honesty he got from the vampire before, whether Elijah had intended it or not, Cain thought he would offer a little bit of it in return.

"I thought you didn't even like me. I'm really not sure what to do with any of this, but I can't give you an answer right now. My head is pounding and I feel like I am still frozen... Let me recover a bit and we'll talk... If you still want to, that is." Cain wasn't sure he himself wanted to, but this would get too awkward if they didn't. He didn't need to be the cause of an extra layer of awkwardness around here.

A hot shower sounded really good right now though, maybe even a hot soak, so he might borrow Elijah's facilities for that. "Oh, you might want to warn the cleaner, or compel them, either way. But my heart is lying around here somewhere."

Elijah moved to open his mouth several times as Cain spoke, thoughts forming in his mind as the immortal went on and on about possible ulterior motives and how he thought Elijah didn't like him. The original was spinning in his own mind over it all. He thought that he'd already established the opposite by what he'd been saying and doing here. Didn't he even say that he liked the other? Or maybe that was a thought that didn't make it through his lips. It could have been.

There were so many things that Elijah wanted to say, but didn't know if they were worth the risk of finding his -- well, finding a piece of his heart broken. He hadn't even thought about it being that big of a deal until this minute, but utter and complete rejection would hurt deeper than the vampire was willing to admit. It wasn't love, but there was something there. Nothing with a name, yet.

Once Cain was finished speaking, Elijah wanted to reach out, to touch Cain but kept his hands to himself. He kept his head down for now and moved to sit on his hands where he knelt still. "The cleaners have been here for a while and know how to deal with things discreetly. I'll make sure they clean up your heart as well." Glancing up Elijah pressed his lips together and furrowed his brows.

"You can talk whenever you want or not. It's up to you. I - I wasn't about to tell you anything was the right thing to do. I thought you realized that I do. I like you. I didn't know how to go about it, and I didn't want to make it uncomfortable for you. You told me that we weren't to do it again and I respected your wish. I still respect your wish." Elijah too was rather exhausted emotionally, having gone through what he thought was the death of someone he cared about only to figure out that they were alive and the oldest living person on earth. Add to it sharing his feelings, or trying to figure out what he should say and what he shouldn't and his mind was astir with fatigue.

"Please, please go and take a warm bath in my chambers, warm up, relax. Take a nap or sleep as long as you need. I'll leave you to it, unless you need someone to help you wash, but I imagine you're fine alone. If you wish to speak with me, I'll be in the office down the hall."

Cain thought he could reply, but thinking it would be a bad idea to say more with his head pounding and his head not in the game, he only ended up shaking his head and almost instantly regretting the movement.

"Thanks. Give me an hour, I'll see you in the office then." A nap wasn't a bad idea but Cain didn't want to let this drag without sorting everything out. There was something, he felt it last time too when they were together for that short afternoon, and then there was what happened just now.

He got up, legs shaking slightly but he held out his hand to say he could handle it. Waiting until his circulation there was back enough for movement, he limped his way to Elijah's rooms. He needed to figure out what he was doing with the Mikaelsons too and he needed to do that in the hour.

It was a little under an hour that Cain knocked on the open door of Elijah's study, his hair wet and wearing only a t-shirt and jeans. He looked healthy and well, not at all like he had been dead for most of the day. Seeing that Elijah had a glass of something in hand, he nodded towards it. "Care to pour me one too?" Whichever direction their conversation will go, he felt like he'd need it.

Difficult. Everything about this situation seemed like it was about as easy as pulling a camel through the eye of a needle. In fact, Elijah probably would have rather threaded a camel than go through all of these undulating emotions that made him feel like he was on a roller coaster. One moment he knew what he was feeling and what he was saying and the next, Cain would turn his head and Elijah would be left speechless. The man had done more to frustrate the ever confident Elijah than any woman had in hundreds of years. He was even more daunting a task than Katherine.

Sitting in his office, Elijah did a lot of busywork. There was nothing important that he'd allow himself to touch because his mind wasn't in the game. He was distracted to a fault, wondering what Cain wanted to talk about after his shower. They could be merely extending their conversation, or it could be something else entirely. The original thought he did well by putting all his cards out there on the table-- at least he thought he had. Things were beginning to blur together currently as he waited for that fatal knock.

Turned from the door, Elijah had just poured himself a bourbon to help ease with cravings and nerves all the same, when he heard Cain at his back. He stopped breathing for a second and thanked whoever was listening for the fact that Cain was a regular human and wouldn't notice the uptick in his heart and the pause in his breathing, all little tells that he was nervous.

"Certainly." Elijah turned to his decanter and poured out another glass and offered it over to Cain. "Bourbon, enjoy." Given that he wasn't the one to request this meeting after everything, Elijah decided that he'd let Cain start, and placed his hands up on the desk, neatly folded in front of him.

A shower had done the immortal wonders, to help return the color to his bloodless features and get everything circulating again. It helped with the headache too and cleared the fog from his brain so he could focus a little better on the matters at hand. Which was a rather convoluted set of matters, of what he recalled from the moment of waking up in the vampire's arms.

Unaware of the original's dilemma, Cain accepted the offered glass and downed half of the measure in fast gulp. He didn't need liquid courage, but he was hoping it'll help dull the headache.

"So you don't dislike me," he reiterated what Elijah confirmed, setting the tone for the discussion they were about to have. "Which is good because given that I am sticking around you Mikaelsons for the next considerable while, I would prefer to not have more than one of you plotting ways to add to my misery if I upset them." Cain didn't need to elaborate on who or what he meant.

"Nothing changes with you finding out who I am, not on my part. Klaus knew, I figured it would have been a matter of time before you did when you appeared. Your sister knew." Who spent most of their meetings ignoring him and treating him as the family servant Klaus brought him in to be. That was how Cain expected Elijah to be too.

Yet something about that first meeting led to the bedroom encounter, and it had been bold and brash of how Cain had provoked Elijah that afternoon, but he had in part done it on purpose even if he didn't realize it at the time. Something transpired between them there, and it had sparked something dead within the immortal. Enough that immediately after, he knew he needed to stop it from happening again because it was dangerous for him.

But, Elijah was an immortal as well and he was not like Klaus or Rebecca. Now he knew the ignoring Elijah had done was a ruse, unlike Rebecca's. "You said you wanted to know me. Do you take those words back now that you do know who I am?"

At least his words weren't cold Elijah kept thinking. They could have been much worse. The vampire was certain that Cain was going to completely dispel Elijah of any notion that there could be anything going on between them beyond what Klaus compelled the immortal to do, and Elijah would have gone back to doing his best to stay away, but after what had happened this afternoon it would have done something to Elijah, taken some small piece and thrown it out with all the other dead corpses Klaus had already killed.

Sipping slowly at his drink, Elijah listened while Cain made his conclusions. He was surprised that his sister knew who Cain truly was. He didn't even know that his sister had met the man. He should have figured Rebekah being around Marcel so much lately would be around Klaus more as well. It only went to follow that she would have seen Cain more as well.

Looking now at the man who had been completely dead only this afternoon, Elijah wasn't surprised, but glad to find that he had back all his color and his energy. He looked like a new man, like the man that he'd taken and bedded that day weeks back. The one that had shaken him and made him realize that his garden grew beyond the simple flowers that he'd been looking so steadily at. Now that he was immortal as well, he became even more interesting. There was something about being with another person who would never die on him.

Finally, Cain finished on a question, and Elijah smiled for a second before turning serious. Still the immortal thought that Elijah might be changing his mind about the other man, like something he could do, or could have done would make the original feel any different. If anything, Elijah felt stronger now than ever. "No, I don't take back a single word I said. I want to know you." He felt like he was somehow meant to know Cain, but that sounded a lot crazier when he said it, so he kept his lips silent.

Cain gave the vampire a curious look, it didn't stay long on the immortal's face but it was there to show that he had half expected a different answer from the elder Mikaelson. Their family's track record hadn't been the best.

"Okay then," he concluded, accepting the announcement at face value until the vampire proved unreliable otherwise. Finishing the rest of his bourbon, Cain made to pour himself another glass, helping himself rather rudely with disregard to his 'masters'. He was a man who didn't consider himself beholden to anyone except himself, Klaus' compulsion or not, and Elijah's equal if not superior despite his position in the household.

Taking the new drink, Cain sat himself at the guest chair and turned so he was facing Elijah. "Klaus had plenty of questions when he found me and I suppose you do too. I'll answer what you have now if you will answer some of my own later." A fair exchange, without the need for compulsion, or at least that was what Cain was offering.

"I'll admit, I like you, Elijah, or the concept and image you give. But I don't make friends. I have brief acquaintances. I don't have enemies either; there is very little point when you know you'll outlive them. So I haven't quite decided where you and your siblings fall in."

"You like me?" Elijah repeated it almost immediately after Cain said it, letting the strangely foreign words play around in his head. He'd had no idea that the immortal had felt anything toward him at all-- unless it be disdain. Elijah was sure that Cain was rather stoic about the vampire family at best, especially the one that he'd taken to bed. He was a man that had no reason to be taken into slavery or owned, which is what his brother had done. It was a cruel thing, especially considering he'd taken a slave and made him a son. Now he'd taken the oldest son and made him a slave.

Elijah found the whole thing distasteful, and hated that he was pretty much bound by his brother's will for the time being. There might be more he could do one day, but for now. He was asked a question, and he didn't know what his answer was. What did he want to know about the other man. There were the stories from the bible, and all the other references, did Elijah even really care about all of that. It'd happened so long ago.

"So, you are immortal then. Cursed, is how the tale goes? I'm sorry, there are plenty of versions of your story out there, but I don't need you to really go through them, I'm more interested in you the person. You don't have friends or enemies because you're immortal, but here, there are other immortals, a whole city of them. I- I am just so angry that my brother has done this. Doesn't he understand who you are? It..." And with that, Elijah slammed his fist through the side table by accident, not meaning to break the furniture, but meaning to take out a light bit of frustration, his strength forever outweighing his emotions.

"I apologize. What questions have you for me."

Time passed differently to an immortal, and while seven decades of servitude seemed like impossibly long to a man who lived only a century at most, to someone who had eternity stretched before them, it really wasn't all that long. Nor did the concept of slavery seemed all that foreign to a person who had lived his life in all walks of life. He had been master and the mastered, the soldier and the oppressed alike. His immortality did not come with abilities that allowed him to escape either numbers or strength. And when one had no goals and no aspirations in life, to live day to day with little thought as to the next, his position mattered to Cain perhaps less than Elijah thought.

"You haven't done anything for me to dislike you," Cain clarified, as he nodded slightly to what Elijah spoke of about his story. It was the expressed interest in him, as the person and not the name, that raised his brows. It was soon replaced by a conflicted one at the mention of other immortals. "Vampires are not true immortals... They live longer but can just as easily be killed..."

The conflict on those features turned to a look of startled surprise, the first indication of something beyond the mild reactions the immortal shown in the study, when Elijah's anger destroyed part of his furniture. An anger expressed on Cain's behalf, a person who the Mikaelson had just discovered to exist a few weeks ago, and an identity recognized only an hour ago.

"He knows perfectly well who I am, someone who can help him further his causes, whatever that may be. I know where he stands. But why do you care so much?"

It wasn't as if Elijah hadn't spent his time indentured. His family had worked and lived under another family of royals for a while, hiding and pretending to be caretakers and keepers to that family in order to make their way across parts of Europe and the United Kingdom, hiding from their father, until one day when their father finally found them and they turned the tables-- taking over the lives of their benefactors so that they could prance about further with new names and new lives, ever hiding from the likes of Mikael the vampire killer.

He understood years under the moniker of slave, but wasn't there a way for Cain to escape? Didn't he want to? It didn't make a whole lot of sense to Elijah, but then again he didn't live the other man's life. Then to speak as if the original wasn't a true immortal. If anything Elijah and his family were the closest thing to true immortals that were out there, especially now that their parents were dead, and that the white oak stake had been destroyed for good.

"Maybe some vampires can be killed in various ways if they are not cautious, but many have lived long lives. My siblings and I however, cannot be killed. We are truly immortal. In our small circle there lies a lot of interesting things going on. People will try to find ways to come at us, ways to hurt us, but that's all they do. Hurt, not kill. Like gnats or mosquitos."

Elijah went through his rage on part of Cain and frustration at his brother and then calmed himself, bringing the facade back in place before he took on Cain's next question, wondering best how to handle the same question a second time. "You've asked this before. There's a strength and wisdom to you that I respect. You are intelligent and can do so much more than what you do. You never give up, even though it would be so easy, and ..." There was more, but elijah was finding it difficult to put it into words. Perhaps...

"May i show you? I can, if you allow me, show you what I think and feel about you from my perspective, through a memory of mine. You will be in and feel my memory, I will not enter your thoughts. That's only if you agree, and perhaps you might understand me better."

Cain knew enough about the Originals to know the truth of what Elijah said, that this family was the closest thing to immortals that he was ever going to find. How could Elijah understand the complicated feelings that raised in the immortal, the slight glimmer of hope when he first saw Klaus attacked and return from the dead. There was trepidation that his servitude to the hybrid was unending, but also the conflicting realization that this man was going to be the first person he spent this long time with... Ever.

So, while Cain knew, after seventy years he still didn't know how he felt about that news.

"I'm not that strong," Cain said with a shake of his head, once more telling Elijah he was wrong and not caring that he may be upsetting the vampire with that attitude. There was very little he feared, Elijah will find. "Giving up is not as easy as you think... It's the hardest thing to do."

Cain took a drink of what he held, a reasonable sip rather than a huge gulp this time, and looked evenly across at the vampire seated, once more composed at his desk. "Show me?" He wasn't sure what Elijah meant, and he had never heard of vampires having such a power. It sounded so hard to believe, and he looked dubious for a second before he shrugged and put down his bourbon. "Sure," he decided with nothing lose. "What do you want me to do?"

Sure, Cain wouldn't see himself as strong, because he saw the picture of a man who'd lived for fifteen thousand years, and had tried to kill himself over and over, wanting to die from the loneliness of a life lived without a single person by his side. He saw all the things that he'd gone through-- he didn't see the snapshot of the man that Elijah did. The picture of a man who had found a place with people who might just live a life as long as he did. Maybe the current eldest Mikaelson didn't understand Cain and that's why he saw all that he did, but would it do Cain so much harm to see himself from Elijah's eyes.

Eyes that saw the good in things, when maybe good wasn't what was to be found. Eyes that fought for hope, when Cain saw none in himself. Maybe the biggest thing that Cain didn't understand, was that Elijah saw Cain as an equal, a person that was neither above or below him-- which was one of the greatest compliments he could give to someone, because he was an Original and did owe a bit to his ego, but not with Cain. Cain was every bit a man and a name in his own right. There was no one that should think themselves above the other here.

"You may not see the strength that I see, but I see someone who lives beside my brother day after day, giving into the will of his wishes, and yes, I know that he compels you, but there are ways out of it and I would have thought that you would have sought them out by now. Sought the witches in town who offer the herbs? There is no shortage of them, and I know they come by the house at times. I see things, and you may not, but there's feelings and I can't help them"

Elijah could be wrong about the herbs, but he was standing and walking around the desk to where Cain was sitting. He moved behind the other, and placed his hands gently on the sides of his temples. "Just relax, that's all you have to do. Open your mind to me, allow me in..." Elijah began to drop back and pull a memory from both their minds, but he took it from his side, so that Cain could feel and experience everything from Elijah's perspective. First he'd notice that everything was far more enhanced, all his sense, his emotions. It was like someone had turned everything up by a thousand. "Shhh... I know, relax, take a few deep breaths, let yourself float, and your body will adjust" Elijah did his best to withdraw some of the strongest of the senses, and to dial back the emotions that didn't mean as much, allowing everything that he was feeling for Cain in the moment to fall forward.

There was an awe for the physical body initially, that mixed with appreciation for how the man carried himself, his intelligence, and it only seem to grow as they came together and talked culminating in their joining. Cain would feel every motion, every movement of Elijah, every jump of his heart along with the way his cock sung inside Cain's body. He'd find out how Elijah came to feel something for that man before, during and after their encounter, and in the following days as he followed the other man around. Every memory that was chosen, there was a new thing discovered in Elijah's mind about Cain, something that endeared him toward the other-- a gentle action toward an animal, a kindness to his brother when it wasn't even needed, and patience for all the work that was placed on him. Cain could skim, or skimp on his work, do part and say it was done, but he never did. He never placed the duty on anyone else, but did everything himself, working himself from morning through night without anyone telling him what to do most of the time. Elijah saw it all, and he couldn't help but fall for that, or have feelings for that man. After that, Elijah pulled himself out and closed his mind off. Taking a deep breath.

Walking back to his desk, he filled his drink and took all of it in a long gulp. It took a lot from him to go through memories like that, and to hand them over to a virtual stranger to use however he wanted. It was temptation for anyone to use as bribery, or other means of hurting the original.

"You finally understand?"

Cain was at first overwhelmed by the feelings of a vampire's mind, the intense emotional depth that made him feel everything so amplified, and such admiration and desires and passions he felt as he was given the brief glimpse of the same afternoon but from Elijah's point of view. It was so much more vibrant than his own version, even when it had already been an afternoon of intensity of the likes he hadn't experienced in years. With Elijah's memory though, it was almost ecstatic euphoria of such overwhelming levels.

But there was more. The admiration continued and Cain realized Elijah watched him, more than once, from afar or behind, always out of sight to the immortal but not to the vampire's prying eyes. He paid attention to Cain far more than the immortal had given the original credit for, and saw things in Cain's motions that Cain no longer realized from his daily habits, found points to admire that the ancient human didn't even realize were things to be noted. Tasks that Cain used to distract himself with, things he did to wile away his long hours of eternal days, Elijah saw as devotion and kindness. Perhaps there was some of that, although Cain couldn't be sure of that either.

When released, he fell back against the backing of his seat, stunned to silence by the experience that could be called an ordeal. It was nothing like anything he had experienced, but like the concentration of a year's worth of experiences concentrated into a day. It wasn't sure what he understood, except for the overwhelming feelings admiration he sensed from the memories of the vampire before him. A man who was intrigued by him, by everything that was him, the immortal first son... and not the first murderer as many cursed him as.

He reached out for his drink again, taking a gulp that mirrored the vampire's own as he tried to figure out what to do with all this.

Cain could not shake the feeling that Elijah would be incredibly disappointed if he found out the truth of the matter behind that man he admired. The strangest thing was, Cain did not want to be the source of that disappointment, that, he found himself caring in a very long time the way another person would see or judge him, when he normally cared so little for the eyes of another man or woman on him.

Elijah's earlier words had him thinking, and he realized, while yes, he knew of witches and those with magic who would aid him on principle of going against Klaus, Cain never sought them out or thought to use them. He had sided himself with the hybrid bastard regardless of how the man treated him, because subconsciously he knew all that Elijah pointed out, the Mikaelsons were as close to immortal companions as he'll ever find.

"You followed me... watched me... You never approached, why? Because I told you that we shouldn't repeat the afternoon? You're an Original." That was before Elijah even realized Cain was who he was. It was hard to imagine that this man who in his own way was no less arrogant than his hybrid brother, listened to the whims of a servant. "Would you have remained in the background continuously if today didn't happen?"

And, the most important question after the slew of them, "Do you plan on going back to the shadows now?"

It had only been a few memories and yet it felt like so much more had been given in that short time. Sure, it'd been a period of time, but that wasn't what took so much from the original. He could have shared his entire life with Cain if he'd wanted to and it wouldn't have taken that much longer. It was amazing the power that he held within his fingertips when it came to memories and wading through the stories of lives, importing and exporting dreams. Blood made that bond stronger. In fact, right now, Klaus probably had some of an idea that Elijah had imprinted in some form on his servant, because of how much of a blood bond they shared.

Klaus could make Cain do things by his will alone by now, whispering it into Cain's thoughts. Elijah would be the one making a stop at the herbal shop soon. Vervain in a ring, or a small bracelet, woven into the fabric perhaps so that Klaus wouldn't suspect it, could keep Klaus out of Cain's mind when it wasn't wanted. Elijah would have to figure that one out later, if the time came. Right now, he took his time in turning to face Cain again.

When he finally turned and sat, calming his mind. He nodded. "To know you and not be able to touch you was too difficult, did you not feel that. I am a lustful and needy creature. I wanted you, even as I admired you. I don't know how long I could have remained silent. I'm glad that I did not have to find out. I am also glad that you are still here." There was no greater truth that Elijah could tell right now. His face was far more stoic in telling than his words were-- or than he felt. The vampire did his best to mask everything that he was feeling, to have this discussion as one that didn't just share every heightened emotion of his with the man sitting across from him.

"I don't think I could manage to go back into the shadows, and I certainly hope you don't cast me there."

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Oh, when darkness comes and pain is all around

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