#scandel

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“Did she meet you?” Hayley asked, handing the letter back.

“She did.”

“And? Then what? How did you get her to accept you again?”

Elijah smiled slightly and looked at the ground. If he was still human he was sure he’d be blushing. After a moment, however, his eyes met Hayley’s again as he said simply…

“I confessed.”

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“I wish to make this quick,” Hyacinth said as she appeared behind Elijah. The man turned around quickly, his hopes rising as he saw that she did indeed show up to meet him. “I wanted to return this,” she continued, holding out the letter Elijah had delivered back to him. “It would be better in your hands so no one saw it. I figured you’d want your secret kept.”

“Hyacinth I-” 

“Mr Mikaelson, I think I’ve allowed myself to become too comfortable with you,” she interrupted. “I apoligize for I should not have allowed myself to-” 

“You’re being ridiculous!” 

“I’m being ridiculous?” Hyacinth repeated with a scoff. “Sír, I’m not sure you understand exactly what it is I saw the other night. You and you brother had a… a harlot! Dead! In front of you both. Her blood dripping down your faces like she was an afternoon snack! Who is to say I’m not next. Or what other poor creature you’d pray upon next.”

“That’s would never happen, you don’t know-”

“That’s where you are sorelly mistaken, Mr. Mikaelson.” Elijah looked taken aback. He didn’t respond, he was curious as to what the young woman would say next. “I’ve read books, sir. I’ve read all about you and your kind. How you pray on the innocent to keep yourselves nourshed. How you use your mind tricks to subdue your victims into submisson. How you leave them with no memory of said interaction. So I would have no knowledge if this whole friendship between us has been faked.” 

“I wish that were the case,” Elijah scoffed. Before Hyacinth got the chance to take offense to his statement, he continued talking. “Do you know how much easier this would be if I had just compelled our relationship to one another. If everything here was simply fabricated, false emotions. If I didn’t have to risk not only your but my own reputation every time I see you across the room.”

The woman was quiet for a moment. She felt her anger and fear slowly evaporating as she began to lose her composure. “What do you mean?” she asked simply. 

“I take pride in my honor. I like to think myself a gentleman. But that honor, that duty, is hanging by a thread and gets thinner with every moment I am in your presence.” With every line, Elijah stepped closer and closer to the girl whom was stunned into silence. “Every glance, every laugh, every time you flip your hair over your shoulder or make one of your quick quips towards me, the thread is getting smaller and smaller; threatening to break with every interaction we have.”

“I do not understand what you mean.”

“Oh do not play that game with me. You cannot act the way you do towards me and claim to have no knowledge of these feelings I am describing.” 

“You seem to forget, sir, I am a married woman.” 

“A fact that has never halted your advances before. Nor stopped you from sneaking away from your said husband to promenade with my family and myself.”

When Hyacinth didn’t respond, Elijah took another step closer to her. The woman began to hold her breath to keep it from trembling with their close proximity. 

“Night and day, you occupy my thoughts,” Elijah continued. “Your face is all I can think about, your voice all I can hear, your perfume all I can smell. And every day, every moment I am in your presence I must kick myself to remind me that you are not mine for the taking. But how I wish I could have that honor. The honor your husband has to be able to hold you every night as you fall asleep. To kiss you whenever he feels. To be able to so much as graise your hand in a public setting without worrying about prying eyes around you. So excuse me, if I wish I could compel these feelings away. That with a snap of my fingers I could have you forget me and my family and return to your own life. That I didn’t have to risk my honor nor your own integrity whenever you did so much as smile. 

“From the day that I first met you, you infuriated me. I thought how dare there be a woman who could know more of the world than me. Who could be more skilled than me. More linguistic. And what gives her the right to be so damned tempting.” 

At the end of his speech, Hyacinth couldn’t take any more. She decided to take things into her own hands. Before Elijah could open his mouth to say anything more, she grabbed him by his jacket and pulled him to her, closing the already small gap between them as she drew his lips to her own. Living over a thousand years has let Elijah experience an array of different things. Every experience you could think of, every skill you could learn, every emotion you could feel. But he would be lying if he said he’d ever felt anything like this before. Every experienced a kiss like hers. They acted as if it could be their last, which it very well could be. But for this moment, this one perfect, secret moment shared between the two, everything was perfect. Nothing else mattered. Not that Hyacinth’s husband sat at home, non the wiser about any of this, nor that not a month prior she had seen the unthinkable in the Mikaelson home. It was just them two in this moment. Nothing else. 

Eventually, however, the two pulled away. 

“I should be screaming for the hills away from you,” Hyacinth said softly with a small sigh. Despite her words, she couldn’t help the small grin appearing on her lips.

“Or,” Elijah began. “I could rip that vervain from around your throat to compel you to spend the night with me.”

“Was it that obvious?” Hyacinth asked, glancing down at the new locket around her neck, filled with the only small herb she found was a weakness to his kind.

“If the smell wasn’t enough then surely the slight burning against my chest as you grabbed me may have given it away.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright, you were being cautious, it’s a smart move.”

“I will be requiring a full explanation about you and your family at some point in the very near future.” 

“But right now?” 

“Right now…” Hyacinth said with a small smirk, her voice softening slightly. “Right now I need you to kiss me again.” 

And that he did. 

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Hayley seemed in shock and awe at Elijah’s story. She couldn’t believe something like this was happening in that time era. In a time of scandal sheets and unlawful divorce. She couldn’t imagine what would have happened if they got caught. But at the same time, she couldn’t help but to root for the two. She was invested at this point. 

“She agreed to return here with me,” Elijah continued. “Niklaus and I explained everything to her. What she saw, what we were, our history. She sat in silence the whole time listening. We didn’t know how she would react when we finished. I half expected her to get up and leave, never to turn back again.”

“And did she?” 

“No,” he said with a smile. “Once we finished, she bean asking questions. Questions about our lives. She wanted to know what it was like to live lifetime after lifetime. Eventually, Klaus got bored with the small trip down memory lane, so he left to find his next meal. I offered to bring Mrs. Bennet home, but she refused.”

“Refused? But wouldn’t her husband-?”

“Believe me, I tried convincing her the same. But she wouldn’t budge. I’m not sure why I even tried to argue against her stubbornness. In the end, I asked her why. Why didn’t she want me to escort her home. I assumed she wanted to simply go herself to keep appearances, but no. She wanted to stay. She claimed I was breaking my word to her which confused me. When I asked what I had promised she said simply…”