Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from the books or True Blood. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Agnus Dei

Chapter 2

Sookie waited till sunset when the window blinds raised, and Bill sat up.

She complained, "Godric glamoured Sarah Newlin."

"To forget things?" Bill asked, while wondering how Sookie was anywhere to find that out. He had told her not to leave the room because he did not want a repeat of her foray to sample the free continental breakfast downstairs. The hotel now had more guests.

"No, he had her crawling on the floor and told her to kiss his feet."

"When did that happen?"

"Today, while you were sleeping."

"Where was Godric doing that? On television?"

"No, in his hotel room."

"What were you doing in his hotel room? Didn't you learn anything from Eric's trick last night?"

"I was takin' him some clothes."

"Godric called you and asked you to bring him clothes?" Bill asked in an angry tone.

"No, I called him."

"Why are you calling Godric?" he demanded.

"I'm gettin' to that. I was downstairs eating lunch, and read someone's thoughts and it was Sarah Newlin. She was lookin' for Godric so I found out what name his room's under and called him. It was still daylight, and his clothes from last night were a mess, so he asked me if I could do him a favor and pick up his clothes when I came up with Sarah. They got a conference room here at the hotel set up with spare clothes and things for whoever. I guess some of the vampires they know what they wear, so their stuff's put aside, so I didn't even have to pick clothes out for him. They were already bagged up. I mean he did ask me to do him the favor, and I said yes. It's no big deal."

"You should have notified security, rather than getting involved. You're now an accessory."

"An accessory to what?"

"A crime, Sookie. Don't you think? Godric is not going to quietly kill her and dump the body discretely. He's going to send a message to her husband."

"No!" Sookie denied. "Godric wouldn't do something like that. He glamoured Sarah and asked her a bunch of questions. She's crazy. No wonder why she … whatever with my brother. She wants to leave her husband."

"I'm not seeing the crazy about that, except that Steve Newlin might want her dead if it's not his decision she leave. Running to a vampire for help is the crazy part."

"She thinks she loves Godric."

Bill looked disgusted.

"Not like that. She's confused. Godric even came right out and asked her if she wanted blood or sex. Since the Revelation, that's all a lot of them are seen as."

"Lot of them?" Bill repeated.

"Well, you're a vampire too. And until I had sex with ya, I didn't know what all the big fuss was about, but I'm only interested in you, Bill. Not eyein' every vampire I see."

"So after Sarah Newlin said she was in love with Godric, he glamoured her to do degrading things?"

"He told her up front he was gonna glamour her to check if she was tellin' the truth. Then he just sat and thank, but when I started talkin' after waitin' so long, he told me to leave. So that's why I was waitin' for you."

"Other than the possibility that you may have been seen with Mrs. Newlin on a security camera leading her to her death, I don't see how this is any business of ours. We should go back home now. Pack," Bill ordered.

"I am not packing till I know everything's okay."

Bill glared at the phone when it started ringing. He picked it up, and said little, except words of agreement.

After he hung it up, he said, "It appears we did not leave fast enough. Later tonight, actually, early tomorrow morning, we're needed to attend a meeting regarding what's been taking place here."

"Why?"

Making a sour face, Bill said, "You are known to have aided in finding Godric at the Fellowship."

"So?"

"The more vampires that meet you, the more danger you are in."

"From what?"

"Did you forget Eric's trick last night?"

Sookie's cheeks heated as she replied, "Of course not, but not everyone's a big A-hole like Eric."

"You didn't approve of Godric moments ago either."

"You're the one who said he was going to murder someone."

"You forget he is still vampire. Do not go into their rooms at all, day or night. You are to stay away from them, unless you are with me."

"Are you going to do something about Sarah or not?"

"How long ago did you last see her alive?"

"'Bout two o'clock."

"She's already dead."

"I can't believe it," Sookie replied. "I did not just walk a woman to her death."

Sookie went to the door, with the intention of going back to Godric's room, but Bill got in the way.

"Move, Bill."

"Sookie, I forbid you-"

"Oh no you don't! I am not Jessica for you to order around. Wait … I haven't seen Jessica at all."

"I sent Jessica home."

"What? But I thought you had to bring her here because she could get into trouble on her own."

"It is too dangerous for her here."

"Around other vampires? I think Eric or any of them could stop or overpower her. But instead you sent her to Bon Temps where there are no vampires? Wait a minute, did you send Jessica home because she was getting in the way of you having two marvelous nights in this room with that woman?"

"No," Bill denied.

"Yeah," Sookie said, now convinced. "You didn't want her getting in the way of your passionate reunion with Lorena. I may not know how it gets between old lovers, but I can sure as hell can imagine it."

"I did not send Jessica home because of Lorena. The Fellowship is more aggressive than I imagined, and she was in danger. They could just as easily have used silver to catch her and expose her to the sun."

Sookie wanted to believe Bill, but then something clicked. "Wait, how did you know the Fellowship had Godric and were going to expose him to the sun before last night? If you didn't know that till I was rescued, we were with each other most of the night, and we didn't come back here because I borrowed that white dress from … you're lying to me."

"I would never lie to you, Sookie. It's Eric's blood that has you doubting me."

"How's that?" Sookie wanted to know. "Yeah, I had a hot and heavy dream, but he wasn't talkin' 'bout what a liar you were. If you were held captive in this room for two nights, as you said, then you couldn't have gotten a message to Jessica or Eric about the trouble you were in, while I was down in that basement. Did you tell Jessica to go home as soon as you saw Lorena or not?"

"I told her to go home last night, after I freed myself. I did strike Lorena with a flat screen television, but the hotel cleaned that up, but Lorena confirmed it for you herself."

"Oh, so you're saying Lorena is capable of telling the truth. So after you bashed her on the head, your first thought was to tell Jessica to go home."

"My first thought was of you, Sookie, but I was afraid for Jessica in the next room. Lorena would recover from that injury in minutes, and be unable to find me."

"Unable to find you? How did Godric know it was Eric, instead of you, breaking into the church? I thought it was because he is Eric's maker. He didn't raise his voice as he called to him to tell Eric he was downstairs, just closed his eyes, like he was concentratin'."

"You don't understand how it is between a vampire and his maker."

"I guess not, because the more I see it with others, I think there's things you're not tellin' me. The Fellowship, silver and getting exposed to the sun were just you making something up to keep her name out of the conversation."

"Sookie, most of us are not like Godric and Eric."

"You know, when Eric fell to his knees when he first got to Godric, you could 'ave knocked me over with a feather. You don't kneel to her or obey whatever she says, like Eric does?"

"No, she released me."

"Why? She seems to think the world of you."

"Her age and experiences have made her insane, Sookie. I cannot live with that. She believes she loves me, but she has no idea what love even means."

"So why does Eric still listen to Godric? He's a big boy, and old enough to make his own mistakes."

"Would you let someone like Eric free on the world? There is no one alive that knows him better than Godric. If Godric did not release him, there is a reason for it."

"Maybe, but I still think something stinks about this whole thing, Bill Compton. If Lorena is insanely in love with you, I cannot believe she'd let you go."

Bill silently cursed Eric in his mind. His blood had weakened Bill's hold on Sookie. She was not full of doubt yesterday when she challenged Lorena. He needed an excuse to get her to drink more of his blood. He could hire someone else to attack Sookie so he could save her again, proving his love. Perhaps tomorrow, here in Dallas. She had left the room at least twice, when he told her not to. There was definitely a lesson that needed teaching.

Since Bill wouldn't let her leave the room, Sookie picked up the phone, looked at the instructions to dial another room, and then entered room 712. There was no answer and it went to voice mail. Sookie paused, she didn't want to come out and say that she wanted to be sure Sarah was still alive since Bill said Godric was going to murder her, so said, "Hi Godric, it's Sookie Stackhouse. Bill told me there was gonna be a meetin' later, and I didn't know what I should do to prepare for it."

Bill glared darkly at her, and when she hung up the phone, informed her, "I will be with you, Sookie. You don't need to do anything other than only speak when spoken to. This is mainly among vampires. We are not getting involved with Dallas politics. All we want to do is go home."

"And get my money," Sookie reminded him. "Eric owes me."

Nodding, Bill suggested, "Why don't you order room service? We can then enjoy each other's company for a bit, and maybe you should take a nap so you're at your best later."

Since Sookie last saw Sarah, Sarah had what felt like a draining conversation with Godric, after he released her from his influence. He did let her know that she only remembered what he did because he felt it was right, and later, she may act on an impulse she would not remember because he left a complex suggestion with her to see if she was tampered with by another vampire. She didn't understand what he was saying about that, but Sarah started off embarrassed by how truthful she was, and that she had answered 'maybe' to sex.

Godric said that was not important. He was interested in knowing whether Sarah was there because he was vampire, and was looking for what other humans wanted – blood and/or sex. He confessed that he found it odd since the Revelation that so many humans took an interest in him, after meeting other vampires and finding out he was older and more powerful, despite his appearance. Unlike others, he had not relied on his looks to feed, and had not become an accomplished flirt.

"How did you eat?" Sarah asked.

"Quickly. Glamour, feed, heal the minor wound if it could be seen, and glamour them to forget, if I needed to."

"How often?"

"If I needed to pass for human, I needed to feed every evening. My appearance has not been of importance since the Revelation. I have fed sparingly since that, and usually to please someone else, who I was with out in public. Normally, I stay home and out of sight. I did not develop a reckless impulse to be among crowds to view spectacles. I would be drawn to battles when I was living out in the open, because there would be dying there. I could ease the ones who had terrible wounds that would lead to drawn-out suffering, yet I wasn't entirely altruistic, since I could also feed in abundance.

"Enough about that though. What do you want from me?"

Sarah almost wished Godric would glamour her again. However, she valued honesty and did not need some trick to make her tell the truth. "For a while, Steve's not been following the teachings of Jesus and the Bible. He's been reinterpreting them, or even ignoring them. Violence is not an answer to anything. Turning the other cheek's been part of Christianity from the beginning. At first, I was angry about vampires killing my sister, Amber, and that's why I met Steve, after going to listen to his father preach, but I feel like I changed so much to become what Steve wanted me to be. I was willing to be his partner, his helpmate to use an older term, but he was more partners with Gabe, and I was the pretty head next to him on the television."

Godric recalled that Sarah had spoke of her sister to him before. Their family lived in Dallas. Sarah had no idea of the names or descriptions of the vampires her sister was associated with, or traded sex to get vampire blood. Stan kept on top of that in his area, since he also believed, like him, that the blood was sacred, so his initial thought of who to ask was now dead.

"If you can share a photograph of your sister, I can look into that further," Godric said. "Why else are you here?"

"You … you … the way you handled that explosive situation at the Church last night … I think you're doing the right thing."

"Thank you."

"I want to assist you."

"Assist me? Last night is done. Both the incident in the church and your husband's retaliation. I am allowing the Dallas police, and whoever they feel is best handle the legal aspects of what happened at my home. You can talk to them with whatever information you have to assist. I believe they prefer that, rather than me passing along your information."

"I can do that, but that's not what I meant, Godric."

"I don't understand what you are offering, Mrs. Newlin."

"Call me Sarah. I got to … I don't know what I need to do about Steve and getting a divorce or whatever, but that doesn't involve you. What I'm trying to say is, I saw what you did last night and it was amazing. Vampires listened to you. And any human with a lick of sense could tell you were advising the right thing to do. At that point, they had to listen. Steve was telling them to keep fighting and become martyrs which wasn't right. He wants to see a parallel between the Christians and the lions, but unlike lions, vampires can think and make decisions."

"Those stories have gotten muddied," Godric said. "Christianity was illegal. When things went wrong, such as when part of Rome burnt, it was easy to blame the Christians since they were usually the poor or slaves, at the beginning, when St. Paul was spreading word of it. The punishment was not really throw them to the lions, but ad bestias, which mean 'to the beasts'. They could be killed by dogs, bears, panthers or boars, rather than lions. The more popular spectacles involved exotic animals like elephants, crocodiles, rhinos and hippos, but I don't think they were wasted on Christian slaves. The venator immunis, part of the Roman army was in charge of getting the animals, and bringing them to Rome."

Sarah said in amazement, "You were like there, weren't you?"

"I was in Rome at times, but only briefly. I did not go to the Colosseum. I had moved northwards in the Empire by the time of Christ."

"Even if you are shy, I bet there's a lot you saw and heard first-hand."

"I do speak Latin well," Godric admitted, before returning to their original subject. "You are overestimating me with regard to what you think I can do. The vampires last night all know me, and owe me their fealty. That is limited. I suspect some hurt humans as soon as they are not within sight of me. It is similar to the way people drive when there is a police car following them."

"I bet you could do a whole lot better than Nan Flanagan."

"I do not crave her position. It's political, both among humans and vampires. I am not ambitious in that way."

"We'll come up with something. Saints are not politicians."

"I am not a saint either."

"I didn't mean that. You can change things, and make things better, without being a politician or a saint."

Godric shook his head negatively, then said, "You don't know me. I do not like being photographed, so I will not want to do what Nan does on television, having public arguments."

"Start simple. Like how you corrected me about the lions."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to correct you.The story is more sensational with a martyr being devoured by lions, than ripped apart by dogs."

"That's where you're different. You can admit mistakes and apologize. It takes someone brave to do that."

"If Nan is instructed to apologize, she would," Godric admitted.

"By who?"

Once again, Godric shook his head. "I can't say. Vampires have their own sort of government. It doesn't appeal to all of us, yet I feel there is some fairness to not letting the oldest of us become the most influential at times. Things have been worse."

"Wasn't there unrest around the Revelation? I've read about some vampires wanting to tell more than was, but they were killed by other vampires."

"I had no involvement or direct knowledge of that. I did not mind the Revelation. For me, it simplified my life. However, some old feuds were reignited, besides new ones starting. Not all of the strife was over synthetic blood and acknowledging our existence."

"You mentioned you are not compelled to look human. Does that mean synthetic blood does not do it?"

"I do not like the taste of synthetic blood, Sarah."

She suddenly felt nervous. His blue eyes were looking directly into hers, and earlier, Godric admitted he glamoured those he fed from.

He continued, "So I now wait till I am actually hungry, rather than feeding for cosmetic appearances."

"Are you hungry?"

"No, I am not. Are you?"

"Uh … I don't think so. Thank you for asking."

"Do you need assistance?"

"Assistance?" Sarah asked, not sure what Godric meant.

"Other than coming to see me, and tell me of your plans, are you acting on them, or at least getting legal advice?"

"Not yet. I need to tell Steve."

"He seems violent to me. Perhaps when you tell him, not be alone with him?"

"But I'm human."

"He held a gun to the head of Miss Stackhouse yesterday, and used explosives in an area that had both humans and vampires. Also, if he finds out you gave alternate information to the police, your husband may consider you a significant risk."

"I haven't talked to the police yet."

"True. You should use a different legal representative than Rev. Newlin for that also. It may be a conflict of interest, if your information is not similar."

"I guess I'll need to find a lawyer. I needed to do that anyway."

Godric nodded.

Sarah then asked, "Is the one you use expensive?"

"Mine? I don't know if he's expensive or not. I think he could recommend another, if this is not something he does. Vampires don't marry so a dissolution of marriage may not be something he handles."

"Vermont's allowing it now."

"I have heard that," Godric replied, writing down a phone number from memory for Sarah. Isabel had been interested in marrying Hugo, and adopting a child. Godric knew she missed her real children. She had asked him about a child in his nest, and he thought it best that she not live with Stan and him, if she made that change. Too many vampires visited to risk having an innocent around as a temptation. "I don't have an informed opinion about vampire marriages. Vampires have formed long-term connections with other vampires, so we are capable of a commitment spanning decades. With all the recent changes in our lives, both vampire and human, I can see possibilities, yet knowing vampire tendencies, I cannot say I am a supporter."

"You're not?"

"No," Godric replied, shaking his head slowly. "I think those newly made vampires would find the arrangement most amenable."

"After listening to Nan Flanagan so much, I thought all vampires wanted to get married. That gives you the rights as their partner to make decisions, when there's an emergency. You can jointly share property, and make financial decisions."

Godric did not think he should reveal there were already legal ways to do much of that, without becoming married. "The VRA is more than that, however, I have lived so long without it, that I don't find most of the perks applicable to me. The equal treatment in all matters is beneficial though. I hope it leads to betterment for us all."

Sarah knew she was being foolish. From what she saw of Godric, he did not think of himself first, but others. She was married to Steve, and Godric had not expressed any of that sort of interest in her. In fact, he said he felt odd about people taking an interest in him due to his age and power.