Klaus had an unreadable expression on his face. He stared at his father as he caught on fire, screaming.

Mikael was nothing but ash in a matter of moments.

Kind of anticlimactic.

"What did he show you?" He spun around.

"Klaus-"

"What did he show you?!" Klaus advanced on me.

He matched every step I took, until I hit one of the pillars.

"Don't be angry."

"Why would I? You've only taken a head dive into Mikael's mind." He caged me in.

"What will it take to prove I'm on your side?" I almost died just now.

"Tell me what he said to you."

I grasped his shirt. "It doesn't matter what he said. It wasn't true."

His guard was up, expression closed off. "Why the secrecy?"

"Check your paranoia."

"I wouldn't put it past you to work with my relatives against me. Why else would you have sought out Marcellus yesterday?"

"Really? You think I'm plotting against you? The man is dead. What plan could I possibly have conceived?"

"Then you wouldn't mind me checking for myself?" His hand came to rest against the side of my neck, thumb stroking my jaw.

A chill went down my spine. "Don't you dare. You promised not to."

"I did no such thing."

There wasn't a choice. I answer him or he does a head dive. "It was just a bunch of shit about how you're not worthy and how our kids don't deserve to live, alright?! There wasn't anything else, I swear."

Klaus leaned in close, humming, eyes searching my expression. "You're not lying."

"I'm not."

He pulled me into his chest, wrapping his arms around me.

Fucking whiplash.

Klaus set his chin on top of my head. "Thank you."

"He was wrong, you know. Nothing he said was true." I relaxed into the hug, wrapping my arms around him as well. "And I do actually love the name Henrik and I'm glad our son has his name."

Klaus didn't say anything.

Just breathed.

"Are the two of you alright?" That was Elijah.

Klaus was the first to let go. "You missed it, brother. Maverick almost staked Mikael." Was that a touch of pride I heard?

Elijah glanced around the room. There was no way he missed the pile of ash. "Sorry I did."

Rebekah and Kol weren't too far behind.

"Why does Nik always get to murder our traitorous parents." Rebekah put her hands on her hips.

"Where are the kids?"

"Finn and Freya have them."

Thank the gods. "So we're good right? All threats are down? We can just appreciate a moment to ourselves?"

"It's nice, isn't it?" Kol grinned.

"Wait, what about the prophecy?" It sounded pretty serious.

"A hoax to save their pathetic lives." Elijah rolled his eyes. "It wasn't hard to uncover the truth."

They probably spilled their guts at the threat of desiccation. "And everything's good on the factions front?"

"Well." He put his hands in his pockets. "Any rifts can be amended."

Good. That was good.

"Who's down for a greasy burger, because I am." It'd been a rough couple of weeks. "What? Okay, don't give me that look. We don't have to eat gourmet food all the time."

They all had disbelieving expressions.

"Unbelievable. You guys remember that I lived with two hunters, right? It's why I still sing Hey, Jude or play classic rock when the kids are upset." It was surprisingly effective. "You know what, we're doing it. I'm ordering it here and we're all going to sit at that table and eat it."

There were a few eye rolls, but they did relent.

Point Maverick.

"I'll alert Freya that the coast is clear." Elijah left out a long suffering sigh, but I knew he was secretly amused.

"Great." I pulled Klaus' jacket open and got his phone. "Dinner will be on the way momentarily."

He followed me into the dining room.

"Why must you do it from my phone. You have your own."

"It's more fun this way." I still had to check on that rift business. The last thing we needed was to deal with ghosts from any of our pasts.

But for now, I'd let things lie.

"What the bloody hell is that?" Rebekah stood in the courtyard, staring upward. "Looks like the stars are falling."

What?

I moved back, freezing at the sight. "Those aren't stars." Fucking hell. They'd done it. "They're angels."