Y/N has always survived Mystic Falls with Damon Salvatore at her side. Then Elijah Mikaelson enters the picture. What starts as constant arguments and reluctant teamwork quickly becomes something neither of them expected — until Elijah makes a choice that shatters Y/N’s trust completely. Now, with old enemies closing in and Y/N caught in the middle of a Mikaelson vendetta, Elijah must protect the one person who wants nothing to do with him. The problem? She isn’t being hunted because of what she knows. She’s being hunted because of what she means to him.
U had learned a long time ago that there were certain rules to surviving Mystic Falls. Never trust anything that seemed too good to be true. Never assume someone was actually dead until you had personally watched their body turn to ash. Never accept a drink from Damon without first asking what he wanted.And, perhaps most importantly, never become interesting to Klaus Mikaelson.Unfortunately, u had already broken that one.Noone was entirely sure how your friendship with the Hybrid had happened. Least of all u.it had started the first time Klaus threatened to kill u and u told him to get in line. Maybe it was the fact that u never treated him like a monster to be feared or a king to be obeyed. u argued with him, insulted him, drank with him, occasionally fought beside him and, on more than one occasion, threatened to stake him despite knowing perfectly well it wouldn’t work.Somehow, instead of killing u, Klaus decided he liked u.Years later, it had become one of Mystic Falls’ stranger realities. u were human.Yet u had somehow carved yourself a place amongst vampires, witches and Originals without ever becoming one yourself. u were close with Stefan. Damon was your best friend, something Klaus frequently described as a serious character flaw, and yet Klaus trusted u in a way he rarely trusted anyone outside his own family.There was only one condition.Whatever Klaus told u stayed with u. U could remain friends with the Salvatores. u could fight beside them. u could disagree with Klaus whenever u felt like it—which was often—but his secrets were not yours to give away.It was a surprisingly simple arrangement.Until Elijah Mikaelson returned to town.Elijah disliked u immediately.Not because u had betrayed his family.Not because u had threatened them.Not even because u spent an irritating amount of time exchanging insults with his younger brother.Elijah disliked u because u made absolutely no sense.Niklaus did not have human friends.Niklaus manipulated humans. Used them. Threatened them. Occasionally became fond of them, perhaps, but attachment was dangerous, and Klaus Mikaelson had spent a thousand years ensuring that very few people ever had the opportunity to become important enough to hurt him.Then there was u.Walking into the Mikaelson home without knocking.Stealing Klaus’ bourbon.Calling him a dramatic psychopath to his face.Sitting beside him like there wasn’t an immortal hybrid capable of ripping your heart out before u could blink.And somehow still breathing afterward.Elijah found it reckless.Suspicious.And incredibly irritating.He assumed u must want something from his brother.Power. Protection. Immortality. u assumed Elijah was an arrogant, judgemental arsehole with excellent suits and an unfortunate inability to mind his own business. Neither of u made much effort to hide your opinion. “If Niklaus wishes to entertain this friendship, that is his decision,” Elijah tells u after finding u in the Mikaelson kitchen one evening. “I simply fail to understand its purpose.” u stare at him over the rim of your glass.“Good thing nobody asked u, then.”From that moment forward, war is declared.Not the kind involving armies or daggers.Something significantly more petty.Every conversation becomes a competition.
Damon Salvatore left Mystic Falls convinced it was the right thing to do. He told himself that putting distance between himself and Y/N would keep her safe. That hurting her once was better than giving the universe another reason to take someone he cared about. He was wrong. In the year he was gone, everything changed. Someone close to Y/N was killed. She barely survived what came after, and when grief slowly separated her from the people she once considered family, it was Rebekah, Elijah and Freya Mikaelson who refused to let her face it alone. Even Klaus — despite Y/N still not entirely trusting him — became someone she could rely on when the danger didn’t end with the funeral. Stefan misses her. Bonnie misses her. Caroline does too. But guilt has a funny way of keeping people silent, and after enough unanswered days turned into months, Y/N stopped waiting for any of them to reach out. Then Damon comes home. Expecting the same girl he left behind, he instead finds someone quieter, guarded, and surrounded by people he never imagined would be the ones to pick up the pieces. Now, with old enemies resurfacing, buried grief threatening to pull Y/N under, and feelings neither of them ever managed to kill, Damon has to face the one truth he spent a year running from— Leaving was never what protected her. Staying might have.
