Moonlight fractured through the forest canopy in pale, broken shards, casting silver veins across damp earth and twisted roots. The air smelled of sap, cold loam, and blood, old blood and new. Leaves trembled as bodies moved faster than mortal eyes could follow, shadows colliding with shadows in a violent ballet that made the night itself recoil.
Klaus Mikaelson snarled as a bladed whip snapped across his forearm, the crack like thunder wrapped in silk. He barely twisted aside in time, the weapon biting into bark instead of flesh, where vervain-laced metal hissed faintly as it embedded itself in the tree. The scent burned his nostrils sharply, green, and wrong.
"Vervain," he spat, yanking the whip free and flinging it aside. "Charming."
Amelia did not respond with words. She never wasted breath in combat. She pivoted on her heel, armor whispering, and the whip snapped back into her hand like a living thing. Her movements were precise, economical, every strike measured not to kill, but to weaken, distract, herd.
This was not a brawl.
This was a hunt.
Rebekah crashed through a thicket, snapping saplings like matchsticks as she drove her shoulder into one of the Death Dealers, sending him skidding across the forest floor. She was stronger; there was no denying that. An Original's strength was biblical in scale. But before she could follow through, steel flashed from her blind side.
Twin daggers kissed her ribs, shallow but deliberate. Vervain burned like acid beneath her skin.
Heidi danced back, her smile unbroken.
"Careful, darling," she said lightly. "You're exposing your flanks."
Rebekah hissed and spun, backhanding Heidi into a tree with enough force to crater the trunk. Bark exploded outward. For a heartbeat, silence, then Heidi stepped free of the splintered wood, brushing leaves from her shoulder as if mildly inconvenienced.
"Rude," she remarked, rolling her neck once. Her red eyes never left Rebekah's.
Elijah's fist closed around a Death Dealer's throat, lifting him from the ground. The vampire struggled, not in panic, but with grim, disciplined efficiency, driving a dagger upward. Elijah caught the blade between his fingers, the metal shrieking as it ground against bone.
"You are skilled," Elijah admitted calmly. "But this ends now."
The Death Dealer's lips curved into something like satisfaction.
From behind, a crossbow sang.
The bolt punched into Elijah's shoulder, detonating pain as vervain flooded his system. He staggered despite himself, teeth gritting as the world tilted.
Khan lowered the crossbow with surgical calm.
"Target impaired," he said, voice deep and steady. "Maintain pressure."
At once, the forest moved.
They came in coordinated waves, never more than two engaging directly, the others harrying, cutting off escape, forcing the Originals to turn again and again. Whips lashed low to entangle legs. Nets weighted with silver snapped tight around limbs. Daggers struck tendons, joints, places chosen not for lethality but control.
The Death Dealers did not shout. They did not roar. They communicated with glances, with timing, with absolute trust.
Klaus tore free of a net with a bellow, veins blackening as vervain fought his blood. He seized one attacker and hurled him bodily into another, bodies colliding with bone-breaking force.
"Enough!" Klaus roared. "You think tricks make you hunters?"
Amelia stepped into his charge without hesitation. Her whip coiled around his throat, yanking him short. Khan was there a heartbeat later, greatsword slamming into Klaus's side, not to cleave, but to drive him into the earth.
Klaus hit the ground hard, soil erupting around him. He snarled, grabbing the blade with both hands, strength roaring to life.
And then three more Death Dealers struck in perfect unison, one anchoring his legs, one driving a silver spike through his palm, the third pressing a vervain-soaked blade against his throat.
Not killing.
Breaking.
Rebekah screamed his name, fury tearing through her as she surged toward him, only for Heidi to intercept, daggers a blur, forcing her back step by step.
"You fight like a queen," Heidi said, admiration threading her voice even as she struck. "But queens bleed all the same."
Rebekah lunged, catching Heidi by the wrist and twisting hard. Bones cracked. Heidi grimaced, but did not cry out. Instead, she rolled with the pain, letting the momentum carry her into a low sweep that took Rebekah's legs out from under her.
Amelia's whip snapped around Rebekah's ankle mid-fall, yanking her flat onto her back.
Elijah forced himself upright, blood staining his coat. He took in the scene with sharp, calculating eyes.
This was not slaughter.
This was containment.
"They're not trying to kill us," he said aloud, voice strained but steady.
"No," Klaus growled from the ground. "They're humiliating us."
And then—
Footsteps.
Measured. Unhurried.
They cut through the chaos like a blade through silk.
Every Death Dealer froze.
Weapons lowered in perfect unison. Whips slackened. Pressure vanished as if a command had been issued directly into their bones.
From the shadows stepped a man clad in tailored black, moonlight sliding along the polished head of a cane.
Sébastien Valet.
The forest seemed to hold its breath.
His violet pupils burned softly, not flaring, not raging, simply present. Absolute. He looked at the battlefield the way a chess master surveys a board mid-game: not shocked, not impressed, merely assessing.
Klaus felt it then.
That pressure.
Not strength.
Will.
"Sébastien," Elijah breathed.
Sébastien's gaze lingered on him first. Then Rebekah. Then Klaus. His expression softened by a fraction, nostalgia threading through something colder.
"It's been a while," Sébastien said mildly.
He tapped the tip of his sword cane against the forest floor.
Once.
Like a bell tolling.
At once, every Death Dealer except Heidi, Amelia, and Khan melted into the trees, gone so completely it was as if they had never been there at all.
Sébastien turned away, already walking.
"You've come a long way," he said over his shoulder, a faint smile ghosting his lips. "Shall we?"
He did not wait for an answer.
Behind him, the Mikaelsons stood amidst broken earth and silvered leaves, breath heavy, pride bruised.
And for the first time in centuries…
they followed someone else.