Summary: The fight in Faerie goes drastically different from canon, and Sookie is forced to deal with the consequences with the threat of civil war hanging over her head. Eric/Sookie.
This idea came to me while I was re-watching season 4 for the new chapter of Bullshit Ban. I came across the scene where Bill is (shock, shock) a total pansy at killing Sophie-Ann, and it refused to die peacefully.
MAJORLY REVISITED.
Hands grasped her roughly, tight and bruising, unbreakable as they tried to hold her still.
"Let me go!" Sookie cried, fighting against their hold uselessly. She could feel her granddaddy fighting against the Fae, trying to free her, his shouts drowned out by the choas raging around them. Barry was shouting too, panic ringing in the air.
Terror turned her blood to ice in her veins, creeping into her heart. Her struggling grew more frenzied and desperate. Her fury flickered, roaring heat struggling to survive her fear. She felt sick with the erratic emotions, sickening pain and tart humiliation. She had run from Bill's awful betrayal, run to Gran, who had always said that family was all anyone could truly count on.
Then Claudine had appeared to her, offered her a hand, and lead her into a trap like a lamb to slaughter. These people were supposed to be her family, but they sure turned on her quick, just like Hadley. Twice, her cousins had sold her out to a red-headed Queen.
Steps slow and sure, Queen Mab approached, Light fruit glowing in her hand, malicious triumph in her eyes. Sookie's fury flared hot, cutting through her wild terror and aching betrayal. Narrowing her eyes, hatred and rage reaching a breaking point, she felt sparks exploding in her blood, a raw, shining power rolling through her.
The power exploded out of her with a wave of burning hot pain, knocking the group of Faeries in several different directions, cries of pain hitting the air. Sookie's arms ached with bruises, and her teeth felt ready to crack with the strong clench of her jaw.
The Faerie's beautiful illusion flickered and fell to the truth of a barren wasteland. Shouts and cries burst into the air, human horror overcoming Fae shock. The Light Fruit rotted like a child's dream, stale mush dripping to the floor. Someone - a woman - screamed.
It was a whole new world with an unhinged Queen and a small blonde girl in a modest blue dress. Through the years, through every astonishing and painful new realization, Sookie had never felt more like Alice in Wonderland.
Only she had never been less than Alice in Wonderland when she lunged forward. It was a pure baser instinct, driven almost primal with hatred and fear of never again seeing those she loved. Her blood burned, pressure coiled, and then exploded, bursting violently free from her body - and crashing straight into Queen Mab.
The Queen screamed in agony, a sharp piercing sound, and then she was flying backwards. With shared cries of shock, the humans and Faeries threw themselves out of the way. Mab landed with a sickening crack on the stone floor. Her head struck the ground, and blood splattered over the floor, dark red on sand, almost matching the light copper of her hair.
Time seemed to stop. The air thickened, seeming almost to flex, like an athelet preparing for a long run. Silence fell from the Faeries and the humans. It was impossible to ignore the sudden electrical charge in the atmosphere.
None of the Fae made a move to attack. But somehow the silence - the many stares - was worse. Even her grandfather was frozen silent. Her skin prickled, a shrill of panic slicing easily through her insides, and a strange taste in the back of her mouth, bitter like liquorice and sharp like a shock of electric, rattling her teeth in her mouth.
Queen Mab sucked in a pained breath, eyes wide, hands pushing herself up off the floor. Her gaze darted to the Fae, an ugly snarl twisting her face. Her eyes were filled with feverent madness and malice when they snapped to Sookie that she almost recoiled in fear, but something held her in place.
"No," Queen Mab hissed. "No. You have not bested me, little hybrid."
"Yes," Sookie heard herself say in a voice entirely unlike herself. It was flat and otherworldly, almost entranced. The words - consent, acceptance, acknowledge - poured easy from her lips. "I have."
"No!" Queen Mab cried in a different tone. The madness was gone, replaced by horror and despair.
The large crown of glimmering jewels rose up off Mab's head, hovering in the air, to the human's shock, and it began to glow. The jewels shrank in size, the gold slimmed until an elegant but grandiose crown had been replaced with a more subtle one, pale diamonds and soft opals glowing attractively.
Her big eyes locked on the tiara and tunnelled, utterly spellbound by the sight. Her mind seeped away as easy as any human under a glamour, numbed by a thousand year old enchantment. She stood on her feet, stance loose and unwound, utterly swept away. She heard nothing, felt nothing, saw nothing but the crown.
Dimly, she felt the electric coiling in her body fizzle violently before pulling taut, like a live wire ready to snap at the slightest action. The crown floated through the air, and the tension grew until it was almost painful, iron bands clamping around her ribcage with a squeeze.
"Back," she heard herself uttering, voice dreamy and dazed to words that she couldn't process. "Trust me."
The crown lowered further until it rested on her golden head, diamonds glimmering beautifully. An ardent flood of information gushed through her, flinging open sealed doors, sun shining in from the dusty windows. Cold rationality and hard facts briefly subdue the passionate emotions that usually ruled Sookie's mind.
For the first time since Bill's blood had passed her lips, her mind was clear.
And Sookie knew . . .
Once upon a time, there had been a Prince. Niall, a rational man with his heart under wraps until he ventured into the mortal world, and his eyes were laid upon a woman, Mary Stackhouse. She was tall and graceful, head held with pride, spine straight with iron. Within time, her son - Earl - would inherit her name. It would be a family shame, an unmarried woman with a son.
Niall grew to be King, a wise king with his heart filled by a proud woman. His wife had already birthed him a son, Dermot, who grew jealous of his father's love for the second son. Hatred festered. Mary Stackhouse died. Earl Stackhouse married Adele Hale, and a grandchild was born. Niall's wife died. Mab's ambitons grew, for was she not a beautiful muse worthy of the best, and ended in rejection.
War brewed.
Dermot chose a side. The family was split, an impasse was not reached, and Fae blood turned the ground red. Earl Stackhouse was approached by a beautiful woman with red hair, who spoke to him in his mind, and promised him answers for a few moments of his time. As seconds passed, days were wasted away. On Earth, time drained away.
A year later, in June, a car was swept away in the flood. Niall was ridden with despair, and Dermot struck. Though he could not bring himself to kill his father, his throne was taken to him, and Niall disappeared from Faerie.
Time passed. The land rotted.
Knowledge was power, and Mab was not truly Queen.
Royal blood was needed to bless the land. Mab and Dermot assumed his would be enough. The King and Queen must possess noble blood to balance the land after a rightful King was overthrown. Claude fought against his father, Claudine fought with him, and Claudette was among the many dead.
Once upon a time, a heart-sick girl, who was not Alice in Wonderland, ran from the ugly truth and into the arms of her family. As expected, things went wrong - and then they rightened.
The false Queen was struck down before her subjects, blood striking the land. Using the tentative connection to Faerie created by her coma-world visit, the crown feed into her little Fae blood, amplifying it. Sookie had drunk the kool-aid, and there were always consequences.
A new Queen was crowned.
Her Fae blood had been rebelling against the vampire blood in her body for months, driving her almost insane with conflict.
For the first time since Bill's blood had passed her lips, Sookie's head was clear.
Sinking back into her own body, Sookie swayed backwards, world bluring. Someone caught her, arms warm and worried, holding on tight as she slumped backwards, head lolling limply to the side, crown glinting on the top of her golden head.
"Oh," Sookie breathed.
Her heartbreak over Bill curled up and died. Her self-disgust and shame remained, sharper than ever. How childish she had been, how unlike herself, how stupid not to notice the change. But then, no one else had. Tara, Jason and Lafayette had chalked it up to the blushing naivety of first love.
She had given her virginity away, too blood-dazed to think straight. She had let Bill touch her, let him change her into somebody else, let him isolate her. She felt filthy and small, cheap and ruined, torn down by horrible shame and cold horror.
Eric, who knew only her worst self, who she'd acted so childishly, so utterly senseless, toward him, had set her free. A warm swell of affection battled against the horror-struck feeling overtaking her, a brief respite, almost settling her stomach. Her positive feelings for Eric had doubled in strength, cutting most of her negitive ones in half.
Subconsciously, she'd been picking up on Bill's hatred of the older vampire.
"What's happenin' to the garden?" a male voice cried, young enough to be a teenager.
"It's changing!"
"Pumpkin," her grandfather said gently, gripping her elbows slightly. "You're glowing."
"I should have stayed in Dallas!" Barry gasped, a livid terror in his voice. "This shit is crazy."
Moving her sluggishly head in his direction, Sookie peeled her eyelids open. "Crazier than a bunch of vamps?" she slurred.
"Yes!" he exclaimed, gesturng frantically around the garden which had been restored to its former beauty. Niall's blood was on the throne, within Sookie and Dermot, and the land was already growing healthier. "Vampires can't shoot weird beams of light of their hands! And what's with that crown?"
"Good question," a woman breathed, accent thick and southern. Kentucky.
There was a ripple in the air, a displacement of air on her left side, and her granddaddy's arms tightened protectively. "We have much work to do, My Queen," King Dermot stated, attracting her gaze.
His voice was quiet and held a slightly odd accent, like Claudine's. He looked like the Fae woman as well, dark-haired and blue-eyed of reasonable height. He took after his mother rather than his father, Niall. Dermot stared at her, ignoring his half-brother entirely.
Sookie felt strangely detached from the situation, still floating away in the crashing tides of her new knowledge, and simply looked back. Then there was a flash of silver, and automatically, her eyes snapped down. There was a silver knife in her uncle's hand, held unthreatening - offeringly - toward her.
The details of the blade slipped from her mind like butter, drowned out by the strong urge to reach out - to finish this in the way it must be done. Kings could win the throne by war but the spilling of blood was not a requirement, but Queens? Queens (most commonly not of royal blood) had to kill.
Even with her royal blood, a haze started creeping over Sookie again, fighting against her human impulses which screamed no, no, no.
"This is madness!" Mab shrieked. "Will you proud Fae beings prostate yourself to a weak-minded human, who one gives her Fae blood so easily to vampires?"
Sookie's head jerked towards the accusation, and her eyes fell upon Mab. The red haze submerged Sookie within the space of a single look, red but utterly cold, filled with what must be done. The sight of Mab activated the final step of Sookie's unwitting initiation to her throne.
When Sookie Stackhouse finally swam back into her body, confused and disorientated, the first sound to reach her ears were the high-pitched, senseless screams of horror. The first breath was one that turned her stomach, snapping her awake with horror and dread. There was blood in the air, thick and fresh.
Her eyes snapped open, and Mab was on the floor, and she was standing in a pool of blood. It was Mab's blood, splashed all over the floor, all over Sookie's shoes and her blue dress and Dermot's knife, slipping wetly from her fingers. The vivid red drop hit the floor. The sound echoed, and Sookie thought, did I do that?
And then her mind went strange, flitting in and out of consciousness, bruised by the sudden slam of knowledge and the altering of her basic biology -
A large group of beautiful Fae charged towards them, lead by the one called Claude (cousin, a strange knowledge said) and then there was a collision, holding the violence of a battle. It was horrible and foolish, and it was death to all. The humans were sent into a wild panic, not having expected to be dropped into a Lord of the Rings movie.
Sookie broke through the surface of herself harshly, seeing blood and death and oh god, what was going on? The masses moved around her, too terrified to so much as jolst her, and Dermot was laughing. He was watching his subjects bleed, and he was laughing. The noise alone made her want to curl up and hide until it went away - but they were hers too -
"Stop!" she ordered, a hard voice of authority slicing through the air and their minds, Fae and human. The battle came to a stumbling halt, dozens of heads turning to their Queen. "This is crazy!"
"We will not serve this King!" Claude called fiercely, drawing several shouts of agreement.
Sookie felt her mind sinking under the weight of knowledge once again. Words echoed through her head, and she raged desperately against it because she couldn't be a Queen - she was hopeless - and she had her family, her friends - golden hair and blue eyes and long, long legs; Eric - so she couldn't even try -
But if she didn't so many people would die.
The words forced their way from her mouth, "Then serve me."
There was a pause from the rebellion, heavy with thoughts.
"No!" Dermot exclaimed furiously. "It is not done!"
"But it can be done."
"I am King, and I refuse - "
"And I," she heard herself say, "Am Queen - "
"Why should I trust you?" Claude demanded on the near-battlefield. His blue eyes were wild and fierce, distrustful, and her world turned into static once more -
Until her mind crackled back, rising ever so briefly above who she must be.
There was calm. Claude was convinced, Dermot was furious, and Sookie wasn't herself. She couldn't remember opening her mouth to speak or even thinking of a retort. They were standing on the scene of a murder - her murder, oh Lord, please forgive her - and she couldn't . . .
"Oh, cousin," Claudine whispered at her, terror in her voice. But there was sadness in her eyes. "What have you done?"
"Restored balance," Claude snapped at his twin -
The images stopped abruptly, and the crown's control was shaken roughly loose.
Sookie Stackhouse returned. Her knees buckled, and she began to fall. Claude caught her before she struck the floor, and spilt her own blood. His arms were strong like the bars of a cage. Shaking her head furiously, Sookie pushed off his chest, stumbling away on legs as weak as a newborn doe's. They were in alone, away from all others in a woodsy area that she paid no mind to.
Her legs ached, blood was sticking to her skin, but she almost welcomed the horror, the revulsion, the guilt because finally, she was herself again.
The crown was heavy on her head but she knew what would happen if she ripped it off, like she dearly desired. The shock would kill her. Crush her brain like splat.
"I can't stay," Sookie told him, unable to gain proper control over her voice. Unable to scream and rage like she should.
"You must, cousin," Claude replied, not unkindly. There was guilt in his tone, clumped together with shame. The truth seemed to sadden him. It wasn't enough.
"This isn't me," she insisted, pulling herself together roughly. She swallowed, balling her fists tightly enough to hurt. It was a desperate attempt to keep herself grounded, to keep being Sookie in this topsy turvy Wonderland where she was a Queen, where she was a murderer. "That wasn't me."
Claude looked at her, hesitating. He was astonishingly beautiful, blue-eyed and dark-haired and pale-skinned like the rest of them. There was something in the cheekbones that they shared, and perhaps the compassion in his eyes matched hers - once. Not today.
"No," her cousin admitted. The word struck her like a blow, and an ugly nasty desperation clawed up her insides, burning like bile. Her legs felt weak but she couldn't fall this time - she was QUEEN.
"But it shall be," he said forcefully, reaching out to grasp her shoulders hard and grounding. "The crown is overwhelming, but only for a short amount of time. Yours has already passed."
Weeks and weeks of being controlled like a puppet burrowed around under her skin, uncomfortable and taunting.
"How do you know?" Sookie bit out sharply, temper short with repulsion and panic.
There was nothing short of soothing in the slow movement of Claude's hands as they rubbed at her arms but it itched at her in the wrong way. Perhaps sensing this, his hands dropped away.
"I can sense it." A smile dawned at the edge of his mouth, a tentative peace offering. "And I can hear it in your voice, cousin."
Sookie didn't soften. She felt her panic hitting deep at her bones, rattling her entire form. She couldn't believe this was happening. It was beyond surreal. It was fucking nuts.
"You don't understand. I can't stay here," she said frantically. "I have to get home. I have a whole life back there."
Claude looked at her without anger at the thought of her backing down on whatever she had promised him. He was calm. If not for the compassion, she would call him stoic. "You came here for a reason, cousin."
Sookie went still.
"I do not know why," he assured her. "But you needed an escape."
"Ruling over a rebellion ain't exactly my ideal vacation," she told him.
Claude's blue eyes locked on her brown pair, and cut clean through her. "Is it worse than what you are running from?"
Sookie couldn't reply to that. She remembered being beaten by the Rattarys, struck over and over again, the laughter when she tried to struggle to her feet, to fight, and then the punishment for trying, the shattering agony with every broken bone until her spine cracked. The last few weeks had been like that. Constant hits, and heart-breaking pain whenever she tried to manage things.
Her heart had been broken so many times, and her body had betrayed her, and everything felt broken, beaten down into nothing. Her feelings were a tangled mess. Even thinking about going over the last few months and trying to find out how she actually felt (suffering the sheer humilliation of what she had done) made her want to slip away into dizzy fractured oblivion again.
For Eric, her feelings had been strong enough to fight against the blood-daze of Bill's making. But she didn't know what those feelings were beyond lust and heart-tugging curls of affection. He had tried to set her free, and she would never forget that, but . . .
How could she even consider Claude's words? She couldn't leave Jason all by himself, and Tara had been violated in the worst way, so she needed her best friend, and she couldn't let Lafayette handle that by himself, and she had to talk to Eric . . .
"I have no idea how to be Queen," Sookie stated, shaking her head faintly, a furrow between her eyebrows.
"No one knows how to rule until they are forced to," Claude said simply, no threat in his voice. "I can teach you all you need to know, my Queen, including how to manipulate the Ways."
"The Ways?" she asked hesitantly, proving her point perfectly.
"A pathway to travel from Faerie to the mortal plane," Claude educated her. "You could remain here for years, and return to the mortal plane mere minutes after your departure."
"I don't want to be here for years," Sookie stated, voice firm but somehow impotent.
From whiny watress to Queen. She had blasted Russell Edgington, and dragged Eric away from the sun, bleeding near-life back into him, and her heart had been falsely shattered, and then Claudine had stabbed a knife in her back, leading to her stabbing a literal knife in a helpless woman. Not innocent but helpless.
The blood was drying on her skin. There wasn't a whole lot of fight left in Sookie. Maybe Bill or Eric or Russell had drained that frm her too. Or maybe weeks and weeks of insanity was finally catching up with her. In the end, her mind had been violated, and she had burned bridges so fast, and . . .
Weeks and weeks of blindly believing every single word to come out of Bill's fucking mouth made her feel sick with regret and horror and disbelief. But weeks and weeks of ignoring her friends, of not keeping her promises, begged her to make amends for it all.
To keep her promise, even if she hadn't really been the one to make it.
And how could she leave when she knew what would happen if she did? War, blood, death.
"You have nothing to lose," Claude reminded her, blue eyes bright. "I cannot force you to stay nor would I but I wish you would consider this. If this world is not to your tastes, no one will stop you from returning home."
He had her respect for not preaching to her as Claudine had, promising love and family and home.
Sookie was too battle-weary to be sharp and angry, but she felt a cold bitterness swelling in her chest, speading through her body. Her arms crossed, expression darkening with the proper cynicism of an oddity growing up in a backwards town like Bon Temps.
"I've heard that before," she stated lowly, not threatening but aggressive in a way.
Claude blinked, a small frown touching his lovely face. "Sookie," he began seriously, "You are my Queen."
And then, a click.
She had been so used to being the puppet, simply waiting for someone to grab her strings and make her dance. For so long, she had assumed it was Eric who played her, but no, it had been Bill on the orders of his Queen.
Only she was the Queen. She was the one with strings, new and untried ones admittedly. She had been stuck thinking like that Sookie, not like herself, the girl smart enough to survive the South in one piece.
There was a Queen who wanted to suck her blood.
Queens had power. Now she had power.
She could protect herself like this, and only like this. It wasn't going to be easy. People killed for this kind of power, and Sookie had already set herself up as an unpopular royal with Dermot's people. None of this was ideal or even wanted but . . . but maybe this was for the best.
Her mind flickered to Eric, who wore power with such frightening ease. She could never do that, she knew, but maybe she could survive this. But she needed to trust Claude. Not with her life, but she felt like she could trust him with the safety of his people.
Unable to believe what she was about to do, Sookie inhaled slowly, lifted her chin like Gran would have wanted, and met her cousin's bright blue eyes. With years of hiding her reaction to other's thoughts, she kept her expression as even as possible and nodded stiffly.
"I'll stay."
And Sookie prayed she wouldn't come to regret her choice.