Christmas lights were not something Godric had expected to see at Eric's bar, and yet here they were, red and black bulbs tracing the doorframe of the main entrance.
Pam stood in front of them, one hand on her hip as she checked the identification cards of potential patrons with the other. Her tall frame was clothed in a sleeveless dress of black leather with matching heels. Long, fair hair was loosely pulled back from her face, where it tumbled down her back in waves. The ruby earrings Godric had sent her in celebration of her hundredth year as a vampire—chosen with Isabel's help—dangled from her earlobes, he was pleased to see.
One sharp eyebrow rose as he reached the front of the line of customers. "Please tell me our shopping trip is still on."
Eric had always enjoyed searching for clothing more than the ageless boy, Pam even more so than her Maker. Even though Godric had been able to find items that fit his small frame the way he wanted them to with increasing success in recent years, he had never developed the taste for clothes shopping that they had. But now Godric had finally agreed to allow her to adjust his wardrobe, on the condition that the changes to it not be too drastic. In truth, as much as he looked forward to the time with his progeny that this first visit to Fangtasia would bring, he also looked forward to removing some of the guilt that continued to pile on his shoulders every time he allowed the Viking's focus to be centered almost entirely on him instead of Pam.
"I am still at your mercy. I came empty-handed, did I not?" Dressed in a long-sleeved, gray shirt, with trousers and shoes of the same color, he carried no luggage. The ageless boy might not have been the only one present not swathed entirely in black, but he could already see he was among the few wearing the most clothing. A memory of his Maker, who had made his brief human life torture and the first few years of his undead one even worse, snickered in his ear, and he swallowed. "I have seen the human body in various states of undress for over two thousand years, yet now I find myself overcome with an extremely strong desire to leave this place as quickly as possible. Where is Eric?"
If Pam felt pity for him—a thought not quite as ridiculous as it sounded, given her human occupation—she did not show it. "Inside, on his throne."
Godric watched her face for several seconds to make certain she wasn't joking. "I can't say I'm surprised."
She merely smirked. "Eric said anything you order is on the house."
"Thank you." Even after centuries of having the Viking by his side, the ancient one was still not used to being treated with such reverence, and it took a moment for the words to slip past the lump in his throat.
The elderly child had barely stepped over the threshold when he was forced to smother a grimace, fighting to tune out the music playing inside the club. The mixture of percussion and electronic sounds wasn't necessarily unpleasant, but it was certainly much louder than he was used to.
He cast about him for a distraction, and discovered that the Christmas lights were merely a festive addition to a firmly two-toned color scheme: red walls, black stools at the heavily-stocked bar, red and black booths and tables situated throughout the room. It was difficult to tell whether the lighting was colored or white, given the hue of the walls, but its dimness was appreciated.
It looks like a checkerboard, Godric thought but did not say, as he was still easily within Pam's hearing range and he knew she had had the most say in designing the place, and he did not want to begin this vacation with his family on a sour note.
And then he saw that in the middle of that checkerboard arrangement of colors, on a high platform in the back of the room, stood a tall, ornately-carved chair draped in furs. In that chair sat a Viking prince that the immortal child knew very well. A charcoal-gray suit gave Eric's robust frame the sleekness of a lion; the black shirt underneath was partially unbuttoned, revealing his throat and the juncture of his defined pectorals. Hair the same tone as Pam's ran in one length from his progeny's temples to a few inches below the Viking's chin.
Their eyes met, and the shine in Eric's prompted a swooping sensation that was not at all unpleasant to be felt in the pit of Godric's stomach.
The ancient one smiled at his progeny before turning to find a seat, slipping through the sea of pale skin and black leather to a small booth in the corner.
A few moments passed, in which Godric tried not to watch Eric casually rise from his chair to have a word with the tattooed, Native American vampire serving drinks at the bar, and then the Viking was settling into the side of the booth opposite his own, a barely-suppressed grin on his face.
Godric pretended to blink in surprise, and spoke quietly, in Eric's native tongue. "I was not expecting a visit from the owner. I must apologize in advance for any disruptions my arrival may have caused."
"I wasn't aware that any had occurred." Eric leaned back, settling his arms on the back of the cushioned seat. "What do you think?" His hand moved in a lazy, circular motion to indicate their surroundings.
"I understand now what you meant when you said you were opening up a... tourist attraction. It seems as though you are trying to mock the ways our kind has been viewed by the human eye since the publication of that Stoker novel. Although I certainly wasn't expecting black Christmas lights."
"Pam found them online. I have a black Christmas tree in my office; we felt it was wiser to keep the more expensive ornaments away from the public—you know how some humans get when they're drunk."
Godric nodded. Just because he had begun to feel sympathy and pity for humans in the last century or so did not mean they were blameless. They certainly impeded the progress of the humans and vampires who wished to coexist peacefully. As quickly as the number of supporters for equal rights with each other's species was growing, there always seemed to be those who opposed the idea. As the months following the Great Revelation began to increase in number, Godric's hopes for peace had begun dwindling rapidly, more recently beginning to mutate into dark whispers of despair in his mind—whispers that he could not allow Eric to hear.
But the immortal child was among family now, and he was already finding the task of keeping his spirits well-elevated to be easier than he had previously thought. The close contact with his progeny, and the swooping lightness flooding their bond, was certainly helping.
All of a sudden, a crash was heard under the rhythmic thump of the music, followed by a series of earsplitting shrieks.
Eric sighed. "Clean it up," he said to a thin-faced woman just as scantily clad in black as many of the patrons; it was she who was screaming.
"I'm—I'm sorry, Eric, I'll try to do better!" The woman departed and soon returned with a dishrag, small broom and dustpan; she knelt on the floor and began clearing away the shattered bottle of Tru Blood.
Godric watched her shaking hands. "She's new?"
A brief nod. "Ginger came to us a few months ago. She does a bit of waitressing, busses tables, does the cleaning, those sorts of things. Pam and I have tried glamouring her to find out why she's so... excitable, but now we're beginning to think she'd been glamoured so much before we hired her that she doesn't remember what happened to her."
A stone settled on the ageless boy's chest. He remembered his own suffering under his Maker's will all too well, and he had always wondered whether not knowing exactly what had happened to him would be a blessing or a curse. Did Ginger feel the same?
For a moment he considered helping her clean, talking to her for a while, trying to calm this nervous woman in order to bring... chaotic serenity to his child's bar—
But he did not want to see the look on Eric's face if he did something so kind to a human, and so he selfishly remained seated.
In the moments that followed, the blaring music finally began to make the blood vessels in elderly youth's head pound. "Is there anywhere... quieter I can go for a little while?"
Eric swallowed as he searched his Maker's face; Godric saw one large hand lift a couple of inches from the back of his seat, as if to reach over and touch the boy, before settling back down again. "Of course." He rose with a swift human speed to his feet, easily winding through the crowd as he headed towards a black door at the back of the room.
Godric followed his progeny down a set of stairs in the noiseless dark—Eric had shut the door behind him—and into what must be the basement of the club: pipes crisscrossed the ceiling, and the back wall was lined with packs of Tru Blood and various alcoholic beverages, along with various other supplies.
There was a soft clicking sound, and when the ageless boy looked at the Viking he found that Eric's gaze was passing over his small frame hungrily, and that his child's fangs had snapped down into place among his human teeth.
To call Eric's implements of Death "baby teeth" would be viewed by the Viking as an insult, because Eric took pride in every aspect of his manhood. But those fangs had been with Eric when he had risen from the ground for the first time as a new vampire. They had never fallen out and been replaced by "adult fangs," had never been knocked out in a fight, had never been removed because someone deemed such a punishment "appropriate" to a crime he had committed. Except for the few moments that made up Godric's offer of eternal life to Eric, and before the transformation process had formed them in the Viking's mouth, those daggers of enamel had always been with his progeny—enduring physical proof of the bond they shared. The idea of releasing Eric had long been painful to both of them, and so, because the Viking could never "grow up" in the sense of true separation from his parent, to call Eric's implements of Death "baby teeth" would nevertheless be a fitting remark.
Godric could not hide his smile; the lust and dedication Eric was showing him now were aspects of his child that he was glad to see had not changed. "When I asked for a quiet place, I did not necessarily wish to go there with the intention of making love." He allowed Eric's desire to fill him as he took the Viking's hands in his, and his own fangs dropped when palms and fingers met. "I see now that my intentions have been changed for me."
Many things that a human might consider cold were warm to the frigid boy, and Eric's mouth was no exception. Godric's lips parted under the Viking's effortlessly, eagerly accepting Eric's tongue between them when it was offered. A soft moan caught in the boy's throat when their fangs brushed together.
Godric's chest began to rise and fall of its own accord as his progeny's mouth slid down the side of his throat. He searched beneath heavy eyelids for something soft on which he and Eric might have sex, and his eye lit upon a pair of ropes dangling from a pipe several feet to the left of the staircase. "What are those for?"
The Viking lifted his head and smiled when he followed his Maker's gaze. "I use them occasionally when I have sex with one of our dancers, or with a customer who has accepted my advances but doesn't want to leave the bar. He or she holds onto them..." Large hands squeezed his gently, guiding him closer to the sexual implements as Eric left the rest of the act to the boy's imagination, until boy and Viking were standing beside the cords. Blue eyes gleamed as the grin Eric had been holding back earlier now lit up his face. "Would you like to try it?"
Godric licked his lips, swallowed, wide eyes caught easily in the grip of Eric's excitement. "I think I would."
They undressed one-another slowly, garment by garment, pausing frequently to kiss and to touch each other's skin as torsos and limbs were freed from cloth.
The boy draped his arms around the Viking's neck, resting his forehead against Eric's, his eyes closing. "A tree's longing for the sun in the wintertime pales in comparison to how much I have missed you, my child."
Warm hands settled on his hips as the Viking once again captured his mouth. "And I..." Godric felt Eric's struggle for words as an ache deep in his throat. "Turn around. Please."
Godric did as requested, winding the ends of the rope around his wrists and gripping the lines tightly in his clenched hands. "Hold on to me."
He felt a gentle kiss on the back of his neck as Eric's hands secured his hips from behind. "Always."
The languid manner of their foreplay dissolved with the Viking's first thrust. Eric was still careful with the boy, as their lovemaking had always been, but the advancements were at a rate and strength resembling a state of their sex that was much nearer to climax than Godric would have expected so soon after the Viking's first entry inside him. Cries shuddered from his small body with each eager meeting of their skin.
"Is this all right, or do you need me to start out more gradually?"
It was already a struggle for the boy to keep his eyes open. Each thrust he received sent the heat of pleasure soaring through his veins. "No, this is... this is perfect..."
One hand slid around the boy's hip to his belly, Eric's palm gliding up his abdomen to his chest and back down to his hip again. Godric's head sank back against the Viking's pectorals as Eric's fingers traced the contours of his inner thigh. The Viking's mouth descended to kiss his neck, and a throbbing trail of pleasure was left in the wake of Eric's lips. Godric's cries increased slightly in volume when his progeny began to stroke him. Not since their parting, following the end of the second World War, had the boy felt so—so—
"Your Majesty, perhaps I can offer you a place to sit upstairs until Eric is finished...?"
Godric clenched a groan behind his teeth as Eric stopped at the sound of Pam's voice. The boy's head fell forward as he panted, closing his eyes as the clicking of two pairs of heels was heard descending the stairs. Despite the tingling sensation that had arisen in his belly at the prospect of being seen naked by someone other than his progeny, his lips twitched into the briefest of smiles: he had never before heard Pam speak with such sincere politeness.
"I don't see how you can—I'm already down here," a female voice that Godric could not identify replied to Pam's suggestion. And then, closer, "If I had known you were going to fuck another man tonight, Mr. Northman, I would have made an effort to arrive sooner. It would have been a treat to watch."
The Viking extricated himself from the boy gently and said without turning around, "And with any other partner, your Majesty, I would be pleased to display my prowess for you, but—"
"Right now, however," she continued as though Eric had not spoken, "you may introduce me to whoever you are hiding behind that bulky frame of yours, and then you and I have some private business to discuss."
Godric swallowed, sharing a glance with his progeny that was meant to be reassuring before releasing his bindings and donning his clothes so quickly that none of the other three vampires present would be able to detect the slightest individual movement. The still-nude Eric stepped aside so that they might approach the stranger together, revealing Pam and a woman with long red hair. She was wearing a blue dress and heels, with a fur stole draped about her shoulders.
"Your Majesty," said the Viking as Maker and child came up to her, "may I present Godric, Sheriff of Area Nine in Texas."
"Charmed," she replied, although Godric might have seen a hint of disappointment in her face as she said it. She proffered her hand for the boy to kiss, and he did so, pressing his lips to her fingers and releasing her hand again as quickly as it was possible to do so without seeming rude. She waved that same hand at him and Pam, gesturing up the stairs. "Off you go."
Godric followed his progeny's progeny back into the main room of the bar, shutting the door behind them. "I would have delayed my arrival had I known your queen was to be visiting. It was not courteous of me—"
"We weren't expecting her to drop in either," Pam interrupted him, and for once the boy was glad that she had not allowed him to continue on down the road of guilt, "but appearing somewhere unannounced is Sophie-Anne's specialty. I'd probably do the same, if I were queen, but seeing as the greater chance of being assassinated is not on my top ten list of desires in life I'll just have to be satisfied with being Eric's intern.
"By the way, I placed some calls to a couple of places in Chicago, and they'll be open late for us tomorrow night."
The eons-old boy resisted the urge to fidget; he had forgotten about Pam's plans for him in the enthusiasm of Eric's passion. "I wouldn't have expected Eric to agree to lording over his domain all by himself. It isn't like him to accept doing all the work so readily."
She smirked, as if entertaining the same image of their powerful Viking sweeping the floor that he was. "He won't be doing much of it: Ginger and Longshadow will still be here."
"Your bartender?" Godric was suddenly aware that making love with Eric had made him hungry.
Some hint at this thought must have shown on his face, because the question was answered by a quirk of one pale eyebrow. "I'll have Ginger bring you a blood. They all taste like crap, but AB negative tastes a tiny bit less like crap and a bit more like Eric than the rest of them."
Godric settled himself into his booth in the corner again, and in seconds the blonde who had broken the bottle of Tru Blood earlier had set a full, uncapped and whole bottle before him on a napkin, placing a straw inside it before rushing off again without saying a word.
The boy took a cautious sip of his drink, forcing himself to swirl the liquid on his tongue before swallowing in order to consider its flavor. Labeling its taste as resembling the Viking's blood was quite a stretch, but at least it was possible to see where Pam had gotten the comparison from.
His stomach began to knot a moment later, and he wondered if the blood was somehow tainted before he realized that he must be feeling some unpleasant emotion from his child. He looked up and caught Pam's gaze from where she was standing at the front door. Her face was well-composed, but there was a gleam of worry in her eyes.
A now-clothed Viking accompanied his queen back through the door a minute or two later.
"Thank you for your hospitality, Mr. Northman," smirked the lady. "I can show myself out."
Eric rejoined his Maker at his booth once she had gone.
Amid the scent of his and Eric's intimacy, Godric could still smell anxiety in the Viking's sweat. "Has one of us been threatened? Am I to return to my Area immediately at her behest?" The boy asked the questions that rose first in his mind.
"No and no." Eric's smile was tight. "I have not been permitted to discuss her request, even among family, unless it is absolutely necessary. But I'll find a way out of it anyway. I always do."
Godric nodded in acceptance of his child's answer. He would not go over the heads of royalty and command an answer from Eric with his power over him as Maker. Fracturing the loyalty and trust between the Viking and himself was also not something he was eager to do.
Then, incredibly, Eric's smile grew mischievous once more, and under the table his hand began to slide up the boy's thigh. "Have I shown you my office? I am told my desk is quite comfortable."
Godric smiled.
Author's Note: Queen Sophie-Anne ordered Eric to start selling vampire blood for her while they were alone in the basement just now, which I couldn't have Godric be present for because as far as I recall Bill and Pam were the only vampires who knew about Eric's arrangement with the queen before the Magister raided Fangtasia in Season Three. The wheel to which Lafayette was chained in the beginning of Season Two was not in the basement because I assumed that such a torture device would be something Godric couldn't ignore, and that was an argument I didn't want to get into over the course of a mostly happy Christmas story, so we'll say it's still being manufactured elsewhere. The ropes that Godric and Eric use when they have sex were, of course, a reference to the memorable scene in Season Three in which Sookie walks in on Eric having sex with the dancer Yvetta in the basement.
The cover of this story portrays the mouth and teeth of a young Welsh Corgi puppy.
I hope you enjoyed reading this, and may your winter holidays be merry!