After the body of their father was burned and disposed of for good, the corpse of the young woman Darla had befriended be taken care of (with the upmost respect and honour), and Kit was dropped off to the safety and comfort of his own home, the Mikaelson siblings all let out a sigh of relief.
Rebekah and Marcel were the first to retire, going back to Marcel's place on the border of the city. Then, shortly after, Hayley and Elijah followed in suit, mentioning something of the rather about wanting to see no more blood for a very long time. Freya had brought up something about needing a drink, and so Kol joined her — but for a different kind of drink, indeed. And with their departure, all that was left in the Mikaelson home was a weary father and his traumatised teen.
Darla hadn't spoken since the moment she reunited with her father, too deep in thought to even process the fact that other people were. She'd just killed a man. Her grandfather, to be exact. And although she knew and understood the fact that he was a horrible man — using the term loosely, of course — that didn't change the fact that she had blood on her hands.
So as she sat by the fireplace, watching the flickering flames, her father took it upon himself to watch the fire too. Well, more so the girl in front of it.
This — Darla having to experience a minor fraction of the hardships and gore that he had — was the last thing that Klaus wanted for her. In fact, that was the exact reason he sent her away in the first place. So that she could be brought up just as other children were. Without bloodshed, without being hunted, without being a target, and without having to kill original vampires with magical daggers. He wanted her to have a normal life. And for the most part, he succeeded.
She grew up in a small town and had friends her age. She played outside. She snuck behind her auntie Bex's back and brought boys into her room like a normal teenager did. She loved boy bands, and superhero films, and she slept a little too much but that was okay because she was normal. And the second that Klaus brings her home...
Shaking his head and getting rid of his intrusive thoughts, he found himself quietly walking over to the girl, crouching down beside her.
"How do you feel, love?" He asked worriedly, tucking a stray piece of hair behind her ear.
But Darla said nothing. Just watched as the hypnotic flickering of the flames engulfed the wood within the fireplace. In fact, Klaus wasn't even sure she'd heard him.
"Darling," He tried again, shifting in hopes of her seeing him better. "Are you okay?"
That question. That silly, stupid, irrelevant question that no one actually wanted the answer to was always the one to put a crack in the dam.
Darla tried to compose herself, but she couldn't stop the incessant wobbling of her chin or the tears that welled up in her pretty brown eyes. Noticing this, Klaus was instantly wrapped around her, cradling her like a child.
Because sometimes you just need to be held.
And as his one and only child wept into his chest, he found himself picking her up, and walking back to his room. He gently set her down on the bed — much to her protest — but cooed to her as he wiped her tears.
"I'll be but a minute, darling," He said soothingly, planting a warm kiss on her forehead. "I'll be right back. I promise. I just have to fetch something, okay?"
Darla swallowed hard and nodded slowly, not even bothering to wipe her tears. There was no use. She'd just make more anyways. She watched as her father, tall and proud, walked out of the room and flashed over to his art room, picking up the smaller canvases he treasured so much. Zooming back into the room where he'd left Darla, he joined her on the giant mattress.
Instantly, the young woman clinged to him, not wanting to be alone. That was the last thing she wanted at the moment, and the number one thing she wanted was her father. She wanted to feel safe, and there was no greater form of that than Klaus Mikaelson.
Klaus, on the other hand, simply just put the canvases down beside him and allowed his daughter to cuddle into his side, where she laid her head on his chest.
"When you were a baby," He began, shielding her from the evils of the world. "I used to lie awake at night, just listening to the sound of your heartbeat from the next room. I listened so intensely that I really couldn't hear anything else. You were the only thing that mattered to me. The apple of my eye, Darla Hope. And for some reason, I was scared that if I'd stop listening, your heart would no longer have a beat to listen to. How small it was then — how quiet. But it was the most beautiful song I'd ever heard, my darling. And oh, has it only gotten more so with age."
If there was one thing that never ceased to amaze Darla about her father, it was his eloquence. The way he strung words together was a skill that only a man of his years and his experience could have achieved, and oh, how she envied it. Everything he said was poetry, and it was one of the true cases of beauty in the world, to her.
"I painted these during your time here, with me," Klaus continued, gaining Darla's attention once again as he pulled the canvases into his lap. "You were too young to remember any of it, I'm sure, but I did a lot of painting when you were a baby. My favourite subject being you."
He held up the first canvas, which was her sleeping, infant form in an elegant wooden crib. Her wild hair had barely begun to grow more than an inch or two, and her little face was squished against the pillow.
Placing it to the side, Klaus and Darla examined the next one, and it was of her in the courtyard of their home, sitting on one of the cobblestones and pointing to something on the second floor.
The third one was her in a woman's arms (who Darla could only assume was Rebekah), sleeping on the bare shoulder of said woman.
They went through the whole stack of the paintings, Klaus offering a quick summary of the event that took place that was so precious that he had to paint it.
Needless to say that there were a lot of those little canvases.
"M-Most parents just t-t-take pic-ctures of their k-kids," Darla sputtered, sniffling as her tears subsided. "N-Not p-paint p-p-portraits of them."
Klaus rolled his eyes but smiled at his daughter's comment, happy that she was opening up once again. It might not have been much, but it was a start.
"Well, most parents aren't as talented as I when it comes to painting. Some of my works are hanging in the Louvre, young lady. You should be thankful that I took the time out of my busy day to paint you."
Darla, instead of giggling like Klaus thought she would, looked up at her father with curiosity.
"You're in the Louvre?"
"Don't sound too surprised there, darling. But yes, I am. I'm down the back, but who cares, still the Louvre. You know me and my low profile, love."
Darla couldn't help rolling her eyes at her father's last comment, but she smiled a small smile nonetheless.
"You're r-ridiculous." She sniffled.
"And you're exhausted." Klaus rebutted. "C'mere."
Cuddling closer into his side, she allowed him to reach for the blanket that sat at the foot of his bed, covering her slightly shaking frame with it. Darla, now content with her current situation, sighed and closed her eyes.
"Daddy?" She asked.
"Hmm?"
"Tell me a story?"
Klaus smirked a little bit as her flicker of youth came back, planting a kiss on her forehead and agreeing. Thinking on it for a second, he was suddenly struck with the memory of the bedtime story he'd tell her as a baby, bringing back other fond memories. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and began speaking:
"Once upon a time," Klaus began with a small smile, looking down at his baby girl. "There was a wolf king who fought a war for the most beautiful treasure in all of the kingdom ― his beautiful, little princess. But victory came at a price. Allies lost. New enemies made. And so the wolf king stood alone. Happily ever after it was not, but sometimes, even the worst endings are not really endings at all. And you should know, my littlest wolf, that even when all seems burnt to ash, in our story, there is always another chapter to be told."
Seeing that she was asleep and hearing her heartbeat slow to an even rhythm, Klaus sighed and pondered everything that had gone on over the past day. More specifically, Darla's origin. Well, the even darker side of it, that is.
He didn't know whether or not to tell her about her mother and Mikael, and it was eating him alive. On one hand, she had the right to know. It was her mother that was killed and it was her life that was traded away for an advantage over him like a pawn in some deadly game of chess. But, on the other hand, he didn't know if she was ready for that. She'd already had so much weight on her shoulders these past few days, and she didn't need anymore. And if he told her, it'd raise so many more questions. The one concerning him most being that of her birth father.
He knew his daughter. He was closer to her than he was to anyone else. He knew that she had an adventurous personality about her and that this mystery would not go unsolved. She would find him, one way or another, and that's when Klaus feared that things would go downhill for himself. He feared that their relationship as father and daughter would suffer because she found her birth father.
Her real father.
"Please don't abandon me, Darla," He whispered to himself, holding her as tightly as he could. "I can't take another heartbreak."