Disclaimer: I own nothing.
A/n: I know I have a few hanging fics out there … ::ducks thrown tomatoes:: but this is what I'm feeling at the moment. Digging around, I haven't found too many good Sookie/Alcide fics out there. (If you know any, please, recommend). They'd make a good match, really. ::ducks more tomatoes, rotten vegetables, chicken:: I hope you enjoy my imagination's wandering. :)
"And when that southern anthem sings, she will lay her burdens down…"
Iron and Wine
Prologue: When She Comes Home
She wasn't dead.
This was a belief Alcide held deep in his bones, about Sookie Stackhouse. She was too clever, too scrappy. Too good to have fallen to darkness just yet. He couldn't bring himself to think the worst, as the others were all too happy to do.
He felt as a medieval monk illuminating a text. Labor as meditation. With every stroke of the saw, every nail driven, he said a prayer to whoever might be listening to bring her home. Maybe even to her, herself. A plea set loose upon the wind.
Come home, Sookie. Come home.
Alcide was not the only one who still believed.
He'd been surprised, to say the least, when Eric Northman knocked upon the door of his new home in Shreveport, not so long ago. A sinking feeling overtook the werewolf at sight of the ancient vampire leaning against his door jam, a tower of black leather and smug self satisfaction. Not many men could look down upon Alcide, nor set him on edge in such a way.
Herveaux, welcome to our fair city.
A cold underlay the vampire's tone as a lake frozen over in winter, beneath the ice and snow waited waters frigid and threatening.
What do you want, Northman? He'd demanded immediately, disinterested in banter, false pleasantry. The vampire no longer held his father's gambling debt, thank god, and for once Alcide felt as though he may be able to face this trickster on an even footing.
Won't you invite me in?
No.
Alcide had crossed his arms over his powerful chest, waited.
Unperturbed, Eric shrugged. Very well, though that's no way to treat a future client. I have a business proposition for you.
I'm probably not interested, the werewolf immediately confessed.
I think you would be.
A pregnant pause passed between them. As an angler Eric waited patiently, dangling the bait, ready to set the hook at first sign of a nibble.
Alcide despised himself a little for caving. But as a businessman, he could lend an ear, right? In this economy a contractor couldn't turn down the chance to make a bid. Curiosity killed the cat; hopefully the wolf makes away clean.
Well? What is it then?
Pleased, Northman spread his hands wide. I have recently come into ownership of a very interesting piece of real estate. A certain farmhouse on Hummingbird Road that was ravaged by a maenad. I want you to restore it.
Puzzled, Alcide had raised one dark eyebrow. You mean Sookie's farmhouse?
The very one, answered Eric, all too pleased with himself.
And just how did you come by that? questionedthe werewolf, immediately suspicious. A thread of a growl entered Alcide's tone, even as mention of that little blond ray of sunshine invoked a certain ache within his heart.
Now, now, don't raise your hackles at me, scolded Northman, enjoying himself thoroughly. It was her rat brother who put it up for sale, up to his neck in hot water as ever. But I find myself believing Ms. Stackhouse will return to us someday. I think she'll be grateful to find someone didn't give up on her. One blond eyebrow arched suggestively, and the werewolf didn't want to think on the ways Northman would expect Sookie to express her gratitude.
What do you know, Northman? Alcide couldn't say he honestly expected Eric to divulge any information he may have happened upon about Sookie's whereabouts, and yet that thread of hope remained, a very real and true thing. He missed the telepath, even if it was not his place to, more than he would like to admit to anyone. Thoughts of her danced through his mind. Memories of her beauty. Questions. What if they'd met under different circumstances? In a world without Debbie, without Bill…they might have made a match.
And most of all, where had she gotten off to? Did she swear them all off, everyone who ever demanded something of her, thought unkind things of her without call, a whole state full of monsters who all seemed to crave a bite of that delectable little morsel in one way or another—maybe she drove off into the sunset, to a new life.
Or, the darker side of the coin: maybe she'd been taken.
No trace remained. Only hope. Perhaps the one thing he and the vampire standing across from him held in common.
Nothing to speak of. But I want to hire you, Herveaux, to bring that house back to livable condition. I trust you would charge me a fair price?
Eyes met across the threshold, Eric daring Alcide to refuse.
Surprisingly, Alcide found he didn't particularly want to refuse.
And so the project began. The werewolf assessed the damage personally, feeling a little strange as he made his way through Sookie's rooms, the spaces she'd filled with her body and her light. Despite the mess left behind by the bacchanalia, he could still pick up her scent everywhere. A comfort and a maddening thing, wrapped up in one.
Months later, the vampire visited his latest acquisition, to find Alcide himself on his knees in the kitchen, working late laying down a tile floor.
I didn't say you had to do the work yourself, sneered the vampire, crossing his arms as he peered down at the werewolf.
At first, Alcide had brought in crews to clean up the mess, contracting out across the full spectrum of his construction contacts. Everything in the old farmhouse needed work, from plumbing to electricals, carpentry and paint and all in between. And yet Alcide found that watching these hordes of strangers come and go from Sookie's home unsettled him. So many hands upon the things she'd touched; hands that did not know this fine girl, have any inkling of her story or her bravery.
In the end he sent them away, resolving to do the rest himself. A task he was perfectly capable of; Alcide knew the ropes, didn't mind getting his hands dirty. Northman hadn't given a time limit, and so bit by bit, the werewolf worked over the Stackhouse ancestral home, bringing it back to life project by project.
He could not help her, where ever she'd disappeared to. But this, this he could do, he told himself.
Saving you money, Northman. I didn't think you'd mind.
Money is no object, as you know.
Lucky you, sniped the wolf.
Is this the best you can do with your Saturday nights, Herveaux? Glancing the vampire's way, Alcide beheld a cruel smile curling Eric's lips. He understood all too well, knew the wolf had cared for Sookie. How touching. Here you are, pining for your little ray of southern sunshine, building her a home with your two bare hands.
It struck too close to home for Alcide to formulate a quick retort; his grip tightened upon the piece of tile he held, enough to cause the ceramic to creak, threatening to snap. A wave of sorrow overcame the wolf, Eric's words striking home as arrows set loose upon him. A longing that wrenched his gut ambushed Alcide, and there were no words. Only the madness with which he missed her, and the weakness her memory left behind.
Eric stood to leave, affecting disinterest, even while he himself battled his own wave of regret and longing. She's coming back, Eric told himself. She must. He'd found with a great surprise, that for all his years, all that he'd seen, all the losses endured, the thought of never beholding the sunny telepath's sweet face again was a thing he could not abide. And so he waited, and he believed.
She would be back.
The vampire turned on his way out the door, words thrown over his shoulder laden thick with disdain. Your puppy love is sweet, Herveaux, but WHEN she comes back…she belongs to me. Remember that.
Alcide glared at Eric's back as the vampire exited, hating the way that he walked, hating his words and the confidence with which he delivered them. Alcide hated the way Eric Northman treated the world and all its inhabitants, as though all he beheld belonged to him, awaited his word, his wish. Was it the mark of a creature passed a thousand years as a predator of the night, or had Northman always been that way?
Herveaux suspected the Viking had always been that way.
I think we'll let Sookie decide, the wolf had muttered under his breath. When she comes home.