A/N: While I'm working on the next chapter of 'Oaks', I thought I would write a few outtakes from the four months Alex is gone, and the adventures she gets up to during that time. This one takes place the morning after she and Godric declare their love for each other, and he wakes to find her gone.

As always, I do not own True Blood. Thank you to all those who read and/or review my stories. I hope you like this, as it went a bit darker than I was expecting. Fear not, for the next chapter of 'Oaks' is happier.

Scratch.

Mrrow.

Scratch.

Mrrrrrrrrr-row!

His eyes flashed opened as he was pulled abruptly from his day rest, his fangs snapping down to dimple his bottom lip. His senses immediately assured him that he was alone in his chambers, and that it was at least an hour before his normal time to rise.

He felt … odd. Like something precious was slipping away, moving further with every second and leaving behind a cold chill in its wake.

Something was wrong. Very, very wrong.

He could hear Mara scratching and yowling repeatedly outside his door, and could smell the faint hours-old residue of Alex's surprisingly sour scent.

Alarmed, he sat straight up in bed and took another deep breath. Her scent was … sorrowful? He took a second inhale and frowned. She smelled of pain and hurt but not, to his relief, of blood.

Godric turned his attention further outward, but the house and grounds were eerily silent.

Where was she?

Tension whispered across his shoulders and he felt the faint stirrings of heavy dread. Hastily, he pushed his senses until they stretched to their maximum distance twenty miles in all directions. Opening himself up like this in the industrial world was agony, but he needed to know.

He waited, straining with all the power at his command.

Nothing besides small animals, the sea, and the noisy sounds of the nearby town.

Scratch! Mrroooow!

Within an instant, he was dressed and through the door. The knot of feelings in his chest grew colder. He knew what he would find, but his heart still sank when he saw Mara guarding Alex's keepsake box, a single paw half-covering the faded and lopsided heart that surrounded their initials.

"Alex," he said through numb lips. The coldness began to spread, the sensation creeping stealthily through his body like a sickness.

He knew what this meant. What it had to mean.

Her words from last night rang over and over in his memory. He should have questioned her when she said that they did not need to worry about the marks of passion he had left on her neck … and now it all made horrific sense.

She had known she was leaving him. Leaving her nest. Had known … and had said nothing.

The ice spread further, leaching away all the warmth and happiness as a new feeling emerged.

Betrayal.

She held his heart and yet she did not tell him that she was leaving? Why would she do this, when she knew her nest would be held responsible for her actions? When she knew how he would worry?

When Mara shifted and batted at his ankle, he heard a faint crinkle. Quickly, he grabbed the edge of the paper and pulled it from under the irritated feline, only to see that it was addressed to him. For a wild, brief instant hope bloomed, and he wanted to pretend that if he did not read her words that he would find her snuggled safely in her bed.

Comprising, he grabbed the envelope and raced towards her room, bursting through the doors so fast the wood splintered into dust. The beautiful room he had remodeled for her was empty. Vacant. Sterile. It was as if the room itself mourned the loss of its owner, the vivacious energy that had filled it gone.

He ripped the letter from its envelope, his heart clenching at the familiar scrawl.

Godric-

I know I should have told you what I planned, but you would have talked me out of it. The thought of hurting you is painful, but I have to do this. I know you, and I know you'll blame yourself for my disappearance. Don't.

I love you. I've loved you since I was a little girl, and I've been in love with you for years. I know why you didn't say the words back, but I know you love me, too. I've adored you my entire life, and I will love you until I die the True Death, and if that happens I will continue to love you in whatever lies beyond.

I came back for you. I didn't tell you, but I remember almost dying after the car accident. It was your voice that drew me back and made me want to live. It hurt, but I would do it a thousand times as long as I knew you were waiting for me.

Screw Fate. You are mine and I'm yours and I would give up my 'soulmate' as long as I could walk through the centuries with you. Eternity by your side would not be enough. I may be young, but I know how I feel.

I kept your Bloodline's necklace and I promise I'll use it if I run into trouble. Please take care of Mara, and hold my box for me. There is a diary in there, and feel free to read it if you like. It talks about my hopes and dreams for us. Don't laugh at some of them, as I started it when I was a little girl.

Please don't be angry with me for leaving. Nothing can change how I feel about you. Not the old gods, not Fate, and not some pussy vampire who thinks he deserves me just because he's a suck-up, goody-two-shoes who probably serviced the gods in order to get a mate.

All my love,

Your Firefly

A strangled noise escaped his throat. "Oh, Alex …"

He closed his eyes, shoving all emotion away as he sped towards the front door. He needed to think clearly, to get to her before others realized that she was alone and unguarded.

He and his inner monster agreed on one thing. They would rip the world asunder and would drown the continents in oceans of blood if she were harmed. No place would be safe, and no one would be able to stand against his blood-fueled rage.

Not the Council, and not the other Ancients. There were reasons even his elders trembled at the possibility of his fury and he would gladly instruct the younger generations on why the name Death was still whispered in fear in the darkest corners of the world.

As he waited impatiently for the last rays of the sun to finally fade, he struggled to gain control over the cacophony of emotions within his breast. His bonds with his Children were as closed tight as he could make them, and he finally crushed his phone to stop his son's incessant calls. He had already left a curt message for Theron and he was not interested in speaking to anyone.

He realized he was growling, the sound low and continuous. He took a deep breath, forcing his shoulders to relax. For the sake of his adopted son, he had to keep control. He would not force Pierre to try and stand against him to protect his country. It would be a bloodbath and he would never forgive himself. No, he could not afford the violent lapses he had dealt with in his youth.

Finally, the sun fell beyond the horizon, and the sky darkened.

He laid the fingertips of one hand on the foot-thick wood and iron door and it exploded violently outwards with a boom. He strode through the falling debris, narrowing his senses until her scent filled his entire world. Until he could smell only her and see every step she took that bent even the smallest blade of grass.

There!

He followed her trail with the skill of one who had wandered the never-ending old forests of the earth when they were still new and green. His breathing quickened as his instincts twisted and howled, demanding freedom. To find that which it believed was theirs.

He snarled, his fangs dimpling his bottom lip and his eyes going completely black when her scent finally disappeared at a bus station. Several humans nearby screamed at his abrupt and wild appearance, and with an impatient glance, he caught the two men and the single woman in his glamour.

"Leave," he hissed darkly after determining they had not seen Alex and watched with predatory intent as they fled.

He felt others of his kind approaching, a harsh growl ripping from within his chest as he crouched. He was on the edge and it took him several seconds to recognize Theron and his progeny.

"Godric?" his old friend said cautiously from several hundred yards away. "May we approach?"

It took several minutes for him to regain some semblance of control, but he eventually managed to retract his fangs and give a brief nod.

The four vampires approached with human speed, their eyes on the enraged vampire.

"Where is my daughter?" Theron asked.

Godric handed over the letters, watching with hard eyes as his allies' visages turned sorrowful. His fangs ached, but he managed to keep them retracted. He could do nothing about his black eyes.

He didn't give a fuck if his eyes made humans and vampires alike piss or puke themselves in fear. His Alex was alone and her nest dared to feel sorry for themselves?

"Check her accounts," he snapped impatiently, his accent thick.

Gabriel swore and reached for his phone. After several tense minutes, he let loose a long string of profanity. "We taught her too well. She moved all of her funds, but before she did I got a ping on her phone and her debit card at the train station three towns over."

Godric was gone before the younger vampire had even finished speaking.

Hours later Theron stood in the doorway of the mansion, his shoulders slumped. "Did I do wrong in going along with the Ancient Pythoness?" he asked the Gaul. "In her letter, Alex spoke of her lack of trust, and that she doubts my Bloodline's love for her. That she wonders if I used her as a status symbol all these years and paraded her about the different Courts for my own political reasons. She believes her life is a lie."

Liquid red filled his eyes and he looked away. "None of that is true. She has been my daughter since I pulled her from the car wreckage. Since the very instant she lifted tear-stained eyes up to mine and demanded that I hold her. She would not sleep for weeks afterward unless she was within my arms. My Children had to feed me their blood to give me enough strength to defy the sun until we could switch her sleep patterns. She is my daughter."

He shook his head with a humorless smile. "I didn't think one of our kind could raise a human child, not really. But the Council asked and … I could not give her up. No matter what she saw in our world, she has never feared us … feared me."

Godric stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his face the same blank mask it had been since they had lost her trail at the train station. "In time she will understand," he offered distantly, his thoughts a million miles away.

Theron sighed. "Still, she has learned well the lessons we taught her. She had secret allies and by giving them her laundry there is no way we would ever be able to track her scent going in so many directions. She even took care of the camera footage. As angry as I am with her, as hurt as I am by her words … I have never been prouder of her actions. She is a strong young woman."

He looked over at the silent Gaul. "We will have to try and keep it quiet that she is gone, but I will not stop looking for her. Can you think of how many vampires would hunt her if they knew she was wandering about without protection? How many younglings would think they could force her mating? Their instincts would not allow harm, but I do not wish my daughter exposed to the darker parts of our world just yet. Not to mention the other species who would love to hurt someone sacred to our people."

Godric stood there, hands clasped behind his back. Silent and foreboding.

Theron shifted, an unusual act for a vampire. "Godric, when do you need to return to Dallas?"

Godric barely paid attention to his answer as his suppressed feelings grew stronger and stronger. Eventually, plans were made to check the nearest airports, stations, and docks and the Makhaira Nest returned to Barcelona.

He was alone.

Godric moved slowly through the house, his hands clasped behind his back.

Silence.

It was only then he realized that part of him had always been aware of her heartbeat, monitoring her health and well-being as they moved about their separate activities. A bolt of searing agony ripped through his chest, cutting through the cold. How often had he sat in his office listening to the beautiful thud-thud of her heart?

How had he not known how attuned he had become to her life? How much all aspects of himself, both man and vampire, had focused on her? It had started even before now, he realized with the dawning of sick despair. Slowly, over the last few years, his happiness had begun to revolve around their thrice-weekly talks, and their almost daily emails and text messages. Even a simple 'good evening' was enough to make his night less dreary, and he had been in a foul mood those days when their separate schedules had not allowed even that.

He started walking again, his slow steps moving aimlessly through the halls. Finally, he stood in the door of a little-used room near his office that she had taken for her own. The love-seat still held remnants of Alex's scent, the large coffee table haphazardly covered in photos, magazines, knick-knacks, paint brushes, and photography books.

According to him, she was hopelessly messy. According to her, it was 'cheerfully creative disorganization.'

His lips quirked when he remembered her response to his suggestion of how to keep from misplacing her belongings. She had shot him a look and huffily told him to 'stop being a stick-in-the-mud' as she searched for one of her shoes, before finally asking if he could 'sniff it out for her.'

The smile faded when he remembered that he would never again be able to hear her sassily tell him to 'stop being emo.' When she finally returned to the vampire world, he would not be able to see her. It would be too much. Too painful.

And, he now knew, too dangerous. No, he would need to leave her be to live out her mortal, and then later her vampiric, life. Perhaps, he thought grimly, in time he would be able to see her without wanting to claim her for his own.

His shoulders slumped. He doubted it, though. In two thousand years he had never fallen in love, and now that he had …

For all his years of perfect control, he knew that even in a thousand years he would still love her and would snap and kill her new mate. He would meet the sun before he hurt her in such a way, or damn his own Children to the True Death.

His sharp eyes saw something half-hidden under one of the couch cushions, and he pulled out a familiar, paint-splattered, cream tunic.

He closed his eyes and drew the cloth to his face, breathing in her beloved scent. She had a habit coming up with amusingly complicated reasons why she needed to borrow his shirts. It had become a game, not that he would ever deny her something of his.

He adored her in his clothes, swallowing a purr whenever he saw her small form swamped by one of his tunics. That should have been a clue to his feelings, he realized. How had he not noticed?

The single instance when one of the nest donors had gotten ahold of his laundry and dared to wear one of his tunics, the outcome had not been what she had expected. Isabel had come across the repulsive woman loudly bragging to the others about how 'she was Godric's human.' He had never touched her and had not been pleased at her audacity when an amused Stan had recounted the episode.

Isabel, it seemed, had been furious and had viciously humiliated the woman and made an example out of her to such a degree that no human since had tried to claim a vampire as 'theirs' without approval. In fact, Isabel often ran interference for him in such things … something he now realized she had only started after Chicago.

Had Isabel known all along how Alex felt? How he felt?

He growled, the low sound growing louder and louder as he finally understood just how truly fucked he was, and what his bleak future would entail. The startled jab from his bond with Eric was lost as he descended into a maelstrom of loss and rage.

Something snapped, and everything went dark.

"Maker! Gods damn it, Godric! It's me!"

He slowly became aware of the scent of dust in the air … and blood. Vampire blood.

The world came into abrupt focus and he shook his head.

"Maker?"

The hesitant voice brought the confused Gaul's attention to the hand he had wrapped around the male vampire's throat, but it took several long seconds more to realize that it was Pierre.

Horrified, he unclenched his fist, his fingers inches deep in his son's neck. He rose from his crouch, his lips sliding back over quickly retracted fangs.

He knew what had happened. Shamed, he avoided the stare from his son and looked around at the destroyed house. The only thing left of the beautiful mansion were half-standing walls and still-settling rubble.

It was gone.

Frankly, he could care less. What did the house matter? Let it burn to the ground.

He was strangely exhausted, and the only emotion left behind was soul-shattering grief.

"Maker?" Pierre had gotten slowly back to his feet, his wounds completely healed. His clothes were shredded and underneath his skin was stained red.

"My apologies," Godric said, but then a sudden thought made him jerk upright. He ignored how his son flinched, his attention caught by a faint sound.

"Mara!" He raced through the rubble, shoving his way to the center of the house. "Mara!"

To his surprise, the only standing walls were the ones around the entrance to his rooms. In that dubious safety was a rather pissed off and dusty cat guarding the box Alex had left in his care.

Mara glared and with a flip of her tail turned her back, settling down with a huff on top of the box as she started to put her fur back in order.

"I am sorry, Mara," he said and gently stroked soft ears. He suddenly laughed, the sound lacking amusement. "Apologizing to a cat," he said to himself. "Only Alex could drive me to such a thing."

He heard the soft steps behind him.

"Godric?"

He gently picked up the cat, tucking the box under his arm. "Why are you here?"

Pierre sighed. "Eric called, frantic because he could not get ahold of you, and said that something was wrong with your bond. He asked me to come check on you. When I got here you were—" he hesitated, trying to find the right words, "—wild."

Godric nodded, still struggling to control his emotions. "I am sorry that you had to see such a thing, and that I injured you."

Pierre shrugged. "I'm fine now, Father. What happened? Where is Alexan—?"

"Do not say her name."

Pierre barely managed not to leap back at the snapped command. "Sorry …"

Godric's voice was clipped. "I do not wish to speak of it." He shot a glance at his child as they walked from the ruin. "Do you require my blood?" The fact that he had harmed Pierre made him sick, and he would not leave him weakened.

He had almost killed his adopted progeny. One that he had fully taken into the Bloodline and raised as if he were his own chosen Child.

Despair and black depression descended as he listened to Pierre dial his cell phone. He was deeply jealous of Pierre and his chance of being Alex's mate, but he never thought he could harm one of his Line. So many centuries steeped in blood, and he thought he had evolved past that only to find that he was the same despicable beast.

The realization was crushing. He could not be trusted with even his own Bloodline's wellbeing. He came to an abrupt halt, barely listening to Pierre's conversation with Eric on the phone.

Eric.

What if his Eric were Alex's mate?

He felt sick. He would not be able to keep his distance from her if she were Mated to one of his sons. He remembered how Talbot had once mentioned that Russell's progeny had been able to feel echoes of their initial mating through the entire Line. Godric would be inundated with their joy, would be forced to feel their happiness as they consummated their new bond.

He had thought the fury-filled blackouts from his vampire youth were far behind him and only remembered by the oldest of his kind. There was a reason, backed by the blood of untold thousands of innocents, that he had taught all of his Children that vampires controlled their emotions. And now, because he was selfish and wanted something for himself and forgot for a moment that he was not worthy of such a beautiful feeling as love … he had doomed them all.

He closed his eyes and lowered his cheek to the purring cat in his arms as he locked away his pain and all other emotions behind walls of the strongest steel. He would not harm those of his blood, and he would be damned to hell before he hurt Al— … before he hurt her.

Even thinking her name filled him with anguish.

There was only one way to keep his Line safe, and only one way to keep her safe from his monstrous anger and insatiable need to claim.

He would return to Dallas immediately and begin to get his affairs in order while helping Theron to find her. There were still four months until her mating, so he had a little time to make things right. To make sure his Children would go into the future with strength and determination.

He opened his eyes, unaware of how Pierre's words stumbled to a halt as his power turned dark and heavy. He closed and locked the bonds with his Children until all he was aware of was that they still lived. They would be unable to feel him in return, but he could not find it within himself to care.

Over the next four months, he would make sure Alex would want for nothing in her new life. That his Line would be taken care of, and that his business and Sheriff duties were passed on to another.

Then, and only then, would he solidify their safety … and meet the sun.

In the distance, an old man watched the darkening aura around the Ancient vampire with worried eyes. "Hold on, warrior," he said so softly that not even the vampires could hear him.

He turned his attention to the North, watching as Alex and her Guardians began their trek towards Ireland. The ancient magic of that land would help hide her … for a time. Yet her enemies were circling ever closer, but this was her only chance to survive to her Mating.

He would give anything to intervene, but he had Seen what would happen if he did. So much depended on them, on her, to make all the correct choices so that the two would come together and bond stronger and deeper than any other Fated Pair in history.

Their mating would change the direction of the future, and they alone would keep that which must not happen from occurring. The Ancient Pythoness agreed and would keep her gaze on the girl. Her handmaidens were already in place, tracking her and keeping her safe. It was Her Grace who a hundred years ago had seen this one, faint chance at survival amongst all the possible threads of the future. She had awoken him from his eons-long sleep so that he who could orchestrate Alex's birth and meeting with the Gaul.

Sometimes he still wished he was asleep deep within the mountains of the gods. The world had changed much since his rule, but he had an obligation to protect that which he had helped create.

He turned to the South, watching the misled and enemy Guardians as they cast out their magic in search of one, human girl. Soon she would be Mated and her soul beyond them. Soon, the truth would emerge, and those who were enemies would need to become allies if any hope for a future could exist.

So much hope rested on the beating of a single, fragile human heart, and on the Ancient vampire who loved her.

He only hoped it would be enough.