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Eric's POV

I can see the color litterally drain from Sookie's face after I tell her why getting Layla back is so important. I should probably be irritated to no end that this is her reaction. Did she think that after what she had done to us, after the way she treated me, I would pine forever for her and never be able to recover? Did she think that the week we spent together when I was cursed and the one night we had together before her attack were somehow so special that I would spend the rest of existence a lonely ghost of my former self, unable or unwilling to move on?

If not irritated, then I should be pleased at her reaction, pleased that it displeases her. After everything she said, I should be glad that a part of her is so affected by the fact that my life is, by all accounts, going far better than hers. But I'm neither irritated nor gloatingly pleased. I have never liked to see Sookie uncomfortable or unhappy, and it appears that old habits die hard. Still, I won't apologize for being happy, and I won't belittle what I have by pretending that what I had with her was somehow more. My wife needs me now, more than ever, and I will not betray her trust in me, not even a little, not even behind a closed office door.

"Your wife?" Sookie asks somewhat breathlessly. My only response is a nod. "I didn't know you'd remarried." I nod again. After the argument, or rather I should say the one-sided screaming fest in which Sookie tried to blame me for everything, including the rotation of the Earth on its axis, I returned the ceremonial knife that had pledged us to each other with Pam and Bill Compton as my witnesses.

"Twenty years ago, yes," Is my only reply. Sookie still looks pale, but she nods her head as though trying to process this new information and then asks another question.

"Do you think, then, that she was taken because of her activism or do you think she was taken because she is your wife?" If I were still a lowly sherriff it might be a good question, but the way things stand, it's a moot point.

"I am sure that she was not taken by an enemy of mine as no ransom demand has been made. As to whether they want to hurt her for her beliefs or to hurt me as well, I would say that both are probably true. When I was a sherriff, they might not have cared that much, but now, it's probably just two birds with the same stone." I swallow hard, my anger welling up in me again. Though I was able to break the pledge that Sookie and I had made, a blood bond is a permanent thing, only breakable at the death of one of the bonded pair. So, even though I have not seen Sookie in sixty-five years and even though I have happily married another woman, I have never been able to bond with her and therefore am unable to use such a bond to track her. It's the only reason that I was willing to swallow my pride and ask Sookie to help me. For that reason alone, if nothing else, she owes me.

"Eric, I'm a little confused. I really haven't been up on Supe politics in the last years. Has your position changed?" My anger recedes and caution replaces it. I have finally found peace and happiness after the things that happened between us, but it doesn't mean that there weren't dark years, years where my grief over the loss of my bonded was almost as strong as if she had been killed. These are things that I do not want her to know. Nor do I want her to know the circumstances around my 'promotion'. I promised that I would keep her safe even if we were not together and I always keep my promises, even when they put me at great personal risk. Still, the less she knows about the whole sordid affair the better.

"Yes, I am no longer Sherriff of Area 5. I am King of Louisiana and Arkansas." If Sookie paled at knowing that I was married, it appears that finding out that I am King is enough for her to almost fall out of her seat, because the only thing that keeps her upright after I close my mouth is a well placed hand on the edge of my desk.

"Wow, you've been busy in the last little while haven't you?" The note of bitterness in her voice is clearly detectable, but I have no intention of getting into an argument with her or indulging her self-pity. The Stackhouse temper and stubborn childishness are no longer my cross to bear.

"It has been an eventful half century." I say nonchalantly. She nods again.

"So, what's the plan?" She asks. I hold out a folder with surveillance photos and information on the Fellowship headquarters in New Orleans. How such a forward thinking, easy going place ever became the Louisiana headquarters of this bigotted reactionary movement I don't know, but there they are.

"There are only a few Fellowship centers large enough to be holding her. My wife is not without her own magic and means of self-defense and so I would think that, wherever they are holding her, she is not especially far. They would not want to take the risk of transporting her a long distance and have her be seen or regain her strength enough to fight. Therefore New Orleans is at the top of my priority list. Their compound there is big enough, and it's relatively close by. I would like you to do essentially the same thing you did in Dallas; go in and see if you can find out if she's there. Anyone who would have recognized you is dead or near dead now, as you've been laying low all these years, and no one would ever suspect you're even the same person since you have not changed in the least. I was hoping that we could leave tomorrow night and that you would be willing to take a look around here the next day."

Sookie gets a sour expression on her face when I mention her physical appearance but wipes it off very quickly. She takes the folder and looks through everything inside and then hands it back to me.

"Sounds good." She says.

"I'll have a car pick you up and bring you to the private air strip here in Shreveport tomorrow night." Sookie nods again and, seeing that our immediate business is done, she gets up and walks to the door. Just as she puts her hand on the handle she turns back to me a look of sadness in her eyes.

"Eric, did you know that I wouldn't age?" She asks, her voice very small. I feel the frown forming on my face. Despite everything that has happened in the last years, it seems there is still a place deep down in my soul that feels for this woman, and it hates the look on her face. Still I can be nothing but honest.

"I suspected, but there was no way of knowing for certain." I see the moment my words land. Sookie shudders as though she is feeling a deep internal pain.

"Why did you never say anything?" She asks, and I can hear in her voice that she is close to tears. I let out a deep sigh, tamping down the emotions that want to break free of the tiny cage I have trapped them in.

"I didn't think you would listen to me. You were never very good at accepting truths you did not wish to hear." I know it's a nasty comment, but it's also the truth. I'm astonished when she only nods her head and walks out. The old Sookie would have stayed to bite my head off, waited for it grow back, and then bit it off again.

Thoughts of the old Sookie lead, of course, to thoughts about that last night. I let out an exasperated sigh. I do not want to think about that night. I do not want to relive the anguish that still, so many decades later, overtakes me when I remember how thoroughly she broke us, broke me, but it doesn't matter. No matter what came afterward, no matter what happiness I have found, that night will always haunt me and, at moments like this when the emotions take me back over, I am powerless to stop the memory from flooding me...

"Lover, what are you doing sitting in the dark?" I ask as I enter her house. At first I had felt a moment of worry when I pulled up. I told Sookie that I would come that night, so when there were no lights on my senses immediately went on high alert. As I stepped out of the Corvette and heard the familiar sound of her heartbeat though, I began to think that perhaps she was just asleep.

She was not asleep though, and my instincts were right, worry was the called for emotion. Instead of laying in her bed she was sitting in the kitchen, a cold cup of untouched tea infront of her and the lights from her yard the only illumination in the room. She was dressed in what had become her ubiquitous uniform during her recovery, a soft flannel nightgown, and a thick terry cloth robe, the fact that it was almost high summer seeming to elude her.

"I've been thinking," She said in a flat tone. I walked over to her, not bothering with the lights. The darkness of the room had no effect on my ability to see and, if she wanted things this way, I would not disturb them. This was her home after all, and she had made perfectly clear on several occasions, both before and after the fairy attack, that she was not ready to share it with me.

"What have you been thinking about?" I ask gently. She has been so miserable, so filled with anger and fear since the attack that I often feel as though I am walking on egg shells with her. Any wrong move or word will send her either spiraling down into tears and sorrow, or spinning out into a rage that demands a target no matter what the cost. I have tried to bear it all patiently. She cannot know how well I understand what she is going through, and it is that empathy for her condition that has allowed me to withstand my new role as the primary target of both her sorrow and her anger.

Yet ,if I could I would like to have one night, just one night were we can really talk. It is more imperative now than ever before that we come to our arrangement. She is so stubborn, she does not see it, but to heal, to truly recover she needs her bonded now more than ever. And as her bonded, my blood as well as my heart cries for me to help my mate, to heal her. We are not each one being anymore, but two halves that make a whole and so, if she is injured, damaged, incomplete then I am as well.

"I can't do this anymore." I do not know what she is referring to specifically, but I try to help her by sending calm through our bond. Almost immediately she flinches, pushing her chair back and standing. "Stop it!" She yells at me. I try to keep my calm. My hope that tonight we might be able to work things through utterly abandoned.

"Lover, I'm only trying to help you." I say in my most soothing tone.

"No, you're only trying to control me. Stop it! Stop pushing emotions on me, stop trying to make me feel things I don't feel." She's pacing the room now, hands wildly gesticulating with every sentence.

"Please Sookie, don't get upset. I am not trying to control you." Sookie rounds on me now eyes blazing.

"Don't lie to me Eric, that's exactly what you're doing. That's what this whole bond is for, isn't it? For you to have control over me. I knew from the beginning that this would happen. If I had had any kind of choice I would never have done it." I feel my own temper rising now, but I try my hardest not to let her drag me into this particular argument.

"Sookie, lest you forget, you had a choice. You could have chosen to bond with Andre, but I don't think you would have liked the consequences of that very much at all. Just because you don't like your options doesn't mean there was no choice."

"Well considering he's dead, it seems like I made the wrong choice, doesn't it?" Her words are like a slap on the face. I have always known of course that she hated having to bond with me the way we did, but I have never given her any reason to say these things to me. I could very easily control her, I could bend her to my will or break her completely, but I would never do it. I love her too much to ever take away from her the mind that makes her who she is.

"None of us knew that he would end up dead. Lover, you cannot mean these things that you are saying. I know that you are still very unwell, but surely you can see that I only want to help you."

"I don't want your help. I told you, I can't do this anymore. I'm sick of all this supernatural bullshit. I'm tired of being a pawn in the games of more powerful creatures. If Niall had just stayed away from me, this," she says, gesturing to her stomach and legs, which still bare the scars of her ordeal, "would never have happened. If you hadn't coerced me into helping you find Bill this," she gestures to where I know the small circular stake wound to be, "would never have happened. If Callisto hadn't thought I'd be a wonderful message to you this," she points behind her to the barely visible claw marks that still run down her back, "wouldn't have happened."

I rise from my chair now,going over to her, attempting to give her some physical comfort if she will not allow me to help her through our bond. Sometimes something as little as a hug will transform her rage into tears, and from there I can calm her. But just as I am about to pull her into my arms she steps back, her hand held out against me as though warding off an attacker.

"Sookie, please," I implore her in a soft voice. But she will have none of it. Whatever has caused her to voice these particular complaints she is determined to finish.

"No, don't 'please Sookie' me. There's not much more Eric. There isn't much more of me to wound, to scratch, and scar and ruin. But whatever I have left, I'm not willing to put it out there anymore and wait for someone else to hurt it. I'm done. I want out of all of this. I don't want to be your telepath, I don't want to be your bonded, I refuse to accept that somehow I'm your wife. I am done. I want you and every other supernatural being out of my life. I want to be normal, to have a normal life with a husband I can sit and watch the sunset with, and children I can love and raise. I don't want to wait for the next supernatural with a grudge against you, or anyone else, to decide that my number is up!" Her words sting deeply, but this is not the first time in the last few weeks that she has said such things to me and so I try to find some way to calm her, knowing that she will apologize when it's all over.

She knows that I would never hurt her. She knows that the things I have done, bonding with her and pledging to her, were done to protect her from harm, not to hurt her further. She is just angry and vulnerable and needs someone to hurt so that she can hurt a little less. Though I hate it, I tell myself over and over again that, as she recovers, things will get better, and that, as her bonded, it is my duty to help her in any way I can, even if only to be a safe place for her to vent her hurt.

"You know that I do not see you as my telepath. We moved past that a long time ago Sookie. As for our bond and our pledge those things were done for your protection." Sookie laughs bitterly at that and again I see the anger in her eyes.

"Oh yes, my protection. And I remember how much you protected me when Lochlan and Naeve had me. Do you know how many times I called for you, how desperately I wished that you would come for me, and what happened in the end? Bill came. Bloody fucking Bill came. Bill who isn't good for anything, Bill who's never done anything since I've known him but hurt me. Bill came, while my thousand year old, Viking warrior bonded and husband was doing what? What were you doing Eric? What was more important than coming for me, that you sent the biggest loser at your disposal instead of coming yourself?" I feel my temper slipping. I have not yet had a chance to tell her about Victor or the ordeal that Pam and I had to go through just to get to her at Doctor Ludwig's. But for her to question me in this way, to insinuate that anything but the most dire circumstances would keep me away from her...it's beginning to erode my will power. I don't know how much more I can take in calm silence.

"Sookie, I have promised that I will explain what happened and why I could not come to you, but I will not do it now, not when you are so clearly determined not to listen and not to understand." Sookie laughs bitterly now.

"I understand perfectly, believe me. Eric, get out." She gestures towards the hall that leads to the front door.

"Sookie, I'm not leaving you like this." I say again attempting to step closer to her. She backs away again and this time she yells at the top of her lungs.

"I said get out. I'm done with you, I'm done with vampires and fairies and all the other crazies out there. I'm human and I want out."

"Sookie, you are my bonded, I cannot just leave you to suffer alone." Instead of calming her I am clearly making things worse, but I do not wish to leave her alone like this.

"I don't want to be your bonded Eric, or anything else anymore, don't you get it? I don't care if you did it for my protection, I don't care if you were the lesser of two evils, I should never have had to chose to begin with and, quite frankly, if I had the choice again, I would never ever bond with you under any circumstances. There is enough shit going on in my brain without you swimming around in there too. So leave. Get the hell out of my house and out of my life! So help me Eric, if you don't leave now I will rescind your invitation!"

There are no words to describe the pain I feel as her last words of anger rip through me. Yet our bond, this bond that she hates so much, tells me that she is being honest with me. She hates our bond, she hates this world that I must live in, and she blames me almost entirely for her misfortunes in it. I feel my anger reach a breaking point. I have endured insult after insult, tantrum after tantrum hoping that, with time, things would get better, hoping that we could find some kind of happiness again, as we did when I was cursed. But now I see that these were blind hopes; too much has happened since Hallow's curse was lifted for us to ever find that kind of innocent happiness again, and the wave of shame that comes over me as I think back to all of the abuse that I have allowed her to heap on me in these past weeks, without so much as raising my voice in return, makes me feel sick. Who is this stubborn, willful, stupid child to speak to me this way? How many times have I put myself in harm's way for her, only to receive this as thanks? I keep my voice as level as possible now as I look at her.

"If that is what you desire, Sookie, then I will not fight you any longer. I came tonight hoping that we could finally speak of our arrangement, but it appears that you have already given that a great deal of thought. You will never see me again, since you despise me so." With that, I turn and head out the door...

As I left her home that night, driving back to Shreveport as if in a daze, I felt my long dead heart harden the last little bit. I loved her so much. I had held on to every shred of hope that there was that, deep down, she might love me too, but now I knew the truth. She cared nothing for me or the sacrifices that I had made for her. She lumped me in with Compton and Niall and all the others who had hurt her without even a second thought. I would not come back for more of her abuse, I would not allow myself to be treated so. I was wrong to ever allow myself to feel such things for her.

A few days later Pam told me that Sookie had called. That she had wanted to apologize, but I was not stepping back into that game with her. Instead, I sent Bobby Burnham with a brief note; I would deaden our bond, return the knife to her and have nothing more to do with her. I promised her my protection always, as was my duty as her bonded, but I had felt the truth behind her words that night and now I too desired nothing more do with her.

Of course writing such things was easier than actually sticking to them, and many nights it was all I could do not to run to her, beg her for another chance, and tell her how much I still loved her. But each time I felt that way I replayed in my head the last words she spoke to me and they gave me the courage to do as I had promised.