The National Museum of Denmark rose against Copenhagen's evening sky, its classical architecture housing artifacts spanning millennia. Inside those walls, carefully preserved and extensively guarded, lay the remains of a Viking ship that had been blessed by Norse gods before the Mikaelson family took their first breath.
They needed to steal it.
"The plan is simple," Rebekah announced, spreading blueprints across the safe house's table. "I infiltrate as a wealthy donor during tonight's gala. Klaus compels the security chief. Elijah handles cameras. Kol neutralizes any supernatural countermeasures."
"And if something goes wrong?" Elijah asked.
"Then we improvise. We're Mikaelsons. Improvisation is what we do."
The preparation had taken a week—acquiring appropriate formal wear, establishing cover identities, mapping security patterns. Freya remained in New Orleans, protecting Hope alongside Hayley and Finn. This mission required stealth, and Freya's magic was too distinctive to hide.
Kol studied the blueprints, identifying potential problems. "The museum has supernatural security. Witch consultants who detect magical intrusion."
"You can handle them?"
"Probably. But it'll be tight timing. The moment I start neutralizing their sensors, they'll know someone's trying something. We need to be fast."
"Fast is my specialty." Klaus grinned with the anticipation of a predator scenting prey. "Let's steal some history."
---
The gala was everything Kol expected from European high culture—champagne, pretension, and enough wealth concentrated in one room to solve several global problems. Rebekah navigated it like she belonged, which she did. Centuries of attending similar events had made her fluent in the language of aristocratic small talk.
"The Countess of Brandenburg mentioned a private tour," she reported through their earpieces. "I'm positioning myself as a potential major donor. Security chief is Andersen—Klaus, he's the tall one by the east entrance."
"I see him." Klaus's voice carried amusement. "Elijah?"
"Camera control room accessed. I have feeds from the entire building. The vault is sublevel two, accessed via service elevator. Two guards on rotation."
"Kol?"
Kol stood in a maintenance corridor, Grimoire manifesting beside him. "Scanning for supernatural defenses. There's a ward network throughout the building—standard stuff, designed to detect magical intrusion. And something else. A witch, actively monitoring."
"Can you neutralize?"
"Give me three minutes."
He worked quickly, void energy reaching through the ward network to identify weak points. The system was good—professionally designed, recently updated—but it had gaps. Every magical defense did. The key was finding them before the monitoring witch noticed.
Two minutes.
He severed three key connections simultaneously, creating a blind spot in the detection grid. The witch would notice eventually, but they had a window.
"We're clear. Move now."
Klaus's compulsion work was elegant—a few words to the security chief, a subtle push that rewrote the man's priorities for the evening. Within minutes, he had full access credentials and a personal escort to the restricted areas.
Rebekah's distraction was more dramatic. She "accidentally" spilled champagne on a priceless painting, creating a minor crisis that drew half the security staff to the main gallery. In the chaos, Elijah slipped through service corridors toward the vault.
Kol moved through maintenance passages, tracking the monitoring witch's position. She was good—felt his earlier manipulation, was now actively searching for its source. He needed to reach her before she raised the alarm.
The museum's supernatural consultant was a woman in her fifties, dressed as catering staff, magical senses extended throughout the building. She spotted Kol the moment he entered her corridor.
"You're not supposed to be here."
"Neither are you, technically." Kol raised his hands, showing empty palms. "I'd rather not fight. You're not our target."
"The wards triggered. Someone's stealing something."
"A Viking ship fragment. No monetary value, just sentimental."
Her eyes narrowed. "You're not human."
"Neither are you."
The standoff lasted three heartbeats. Then the witch attacked.
She was skilled—trained in combat magic, experienced with supernatural threats. Her first spell would have paralyzed a human. Her second would have shattered Kol's barriers if he'd been a standard vampire.
He wasn't standard.
Void energy absorbed her attacks, channeling them into nothing. He closed the distance with supernatural speed, getting inside her casting range before she could adjust.
"Sleep," he commanded, pushing compulsion through the contact.
She crumpled. He caught her, lowering her gently to the floor. She'd wake in a few hours with no memory of the encounter, convinced she'd fallen asleep on a boring shift.
"Witch neutralized," he reported. "Elijah, status?"
"At the vault. Security measures are... extensive."
"Rebekah?"
"Still causing chaos. The painting may be permanently damaged. I'm not sorry."
"Klaus?"
"Having the time of my life." Gunfire echoed through the earpiece—non-lethal, from the sound. "Some guards don't respond well to compulsion. Finding alternate methods."
"Try not to kill anyone."
"Where's the fun in that?"
Kol reached the vault as Elijah finished bypassing the final lock. Inside, climate-controlled displays held artifacts spanning Viking history—weapons, jewelry, tools, and at the center, fragments of a ship that had sailed before Christianity reached Scandinavia.
"That's it." Kol pointed at the largest fragment—a piece of hull still bearing carved runes that radiated faint power. "Blessed by Odin himself, if the records are accurate."
"Can you extract it?"
"The display's warded. Give me a moment."
He worked carefully, dismantling magical protections that had been designed to preserve rather than protect. The Viking ash needed to remain intact for their purposes—damaged material wouldn't hold the blessing.
Thirty seconds. Sixty. Ninety.
Alarms began blaring throughout the building.
"Rebekah," Elijah said calmly, "I believe your distraction has concluded."
"Or someone noticed the unconscious witch." Kol finished the extraction, placing the fragment in a protected container. "We need to leave."
---
The escape was chaos.
Klaus had accumulated an unconscious security detail during his progress through the building—twelve guards, none permanently harmed, all requiring explanations nobody wanted to give. He emerged from a service entrance pursued by Copenhagen police who'd been summoned by silent alarm.
Elijah's camera manipulation bought them minutes, but not enough. Their exit routes were compromised, the building surrounded, escape looking increasingly unlikely.
"Kol," Klaus's voice was calm despite the circumstances, "can you get us out?"
"If I can reach everyone. Where's Rebekah?"
"Main gallery. Surrounded by very confused aristocrats."
"Elijah?"
"En route to your position."
Kol calculated distances, magical costs, risks. Void-stepping multiple people across significant distance would drain him badly, but they were out of options.
"Everyone converge on the east loading dock. I'll extract us together."
He reached the dock first, finding a delivery truck that would serve as cover. Elijah arrived seconds later, moving with supernatural grace. Klaus appeared moments after, having taken the scenic route through a window.
Rebekah was last, having paused to steal something.
"Is that a crown?" Elijah asked, staring at the ornate headpiece she'd tucked under her arm.
"It's pretty. I'm keeping it."
"We're fleeing a crime scene."
"And I'm bringing a souvenir. Are we leaving or critiquing my choices?"
Kol grabbed them all, void energy wrapping around four Originals simultaneously. The cost was brutal—forty percent of his reserves gone in a single expenditure—but they vanished from Copenhagen and reappeared in their safe house across the city.
Klaus laughed, the sound carrying genuine delight. "That was magnificent."
"That was insane," Elijah countered, though his composure had cracked enough to show amusement. "We left evidence everywhere."
"Evidence of what? Four extremely fast burglars who disappeared into thin air?" Rebekah examined her stolen crown with satisfaction. "They'll assume it was some kind of special forces operation. Or magic, which they won't believe anyway."
"The ash?" Kol asked, too tired to argue.
Klaus produced the container. "Secured. A bit dramatic in the acquisition, but secured."
They sat in the safe house, surrounded by their spoils and their chaos. Four siblings who'd spent centuries fighting each other, now committing crimes together like a family should.
"That could have gone smoother," Elijah observed.
"Where's the fun in smooth?" Klaus was still grinning, the expression making him look almost young. "We're Mikaelsons. We don't do smooth. We do spectacular."
Rebekah raised her stolen crown. "To spectacular failures that somehow work."
"To crimes that bring us closer together," Klaus added.
"To getting out alive," Elijah contributed.
They looked at Kol. He raised the ash container.
"To actually having stories worth telling."
---
The flight back was filled with increasingly absurd tales of past heists—centuries of Mikaelson theft from museums, private collections, and royal treasuries around the world.
"I stole Napoleon's sword from the Louvre in 1832," Klaus claimed.
"I stole the Pope's ceremonial hat," Rebekah countered. "Twice. Different popes."
"I convinced the British Museum to loan me the Rosetta Stone for a 'private exhibit,'" Elijah admitted. "They never got it back."
Kol listened, amused. He didn't have stories—not from this life, not really. His memories were Kol's, but the experiences felt secondhand. He'd never stolen a crown or conned a museum or embarrassed European royalty.
But he was making new stories now. Different ones. Better ones, maybe.
"You're quiet," Rebekah observed.
"Enjoying the show."
"You should have stories. Kol had stories—ridiculous ones, usually involving fire."
"I'm working on it." Kol looked at the container in his lap, the Viking ash that might help them kill an ancient witch. "This one's a start."
They landed in New Orleans at dawn. Freya met them at the compound, examining the ash with professional interest.
"Authentic," she confirmed. "Blessed by Odin's priests before my grandmother was born. This will work."
Klaus opened champagne—a celebration that felt earned despite the dangers ahead. The family gathered, united, preparing for war.
But Kol couldn't shake his unease.
They'd gathered both components without serious opposition. The corrupted church had been dangerous, yes, but ultimately navigable. The museum heist had gone sideways, but they'd escaped clean. Everything had worked.
That wasn't how Dahlia operated.
She'd had decades to prepare. She knew they'd need these specific components. She knew where the components were. And she'd let them succeed.
Which meant she had a counter. Something that made their weapon irrelevant. Something they hadn't anticipated.
"What's wrong?" Davina asked quietly, appearing at his side.
"This was too easy."
"Escaping a museum surrounded by police was too easy?"
"For us? Yes." Kol watched his siblings celebrate, genuine joy on faces that had seen too little of it. "Dahlia's been planning this for a millennium. She doesn't make mistakes. She doesn't leave openings."
"Maybe she's overconfident."
"Or maybe she's letting us feel confident before she springs the real trap."
The Grimoire pulsed against his chest, displaying text that reflected his concerns:
COMPONENT ACQUISITION: COMPLETE DAHLIA RESPONSE: MINIMAL PROBABILITY OF COUNTER-STRATEGY: 94.7% RECOMMENDATION: MAINTAIN VIGILANCE
Sound advice. But how do you prepare for an attack you can't predict?
Kol raised his glass with the others, celebrating their victory while waiting for the other shoe to drop.
It would come. He was certain of that.
The only question was when.
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