"What can I get for you?" After a two hour meeting with Sam, Violet had decided to get a bite to eat before going home. She had drove here, dropped off the weekly produce and had a meeting about the next month. She didn't want to be home yet just in case Godric decided to show up, it was awkward now, and she would like to have as much time as possible to think. Not that she could do much of anything other then think of him, the bruises had faded but his bite mark was still very much on her skin.

"Can I have the garden salad and a glass of red wine, please?" She felt the marks every time she crossed her legs, even for just a moment, and then she had flashes of his body above hers. The redheaded waitress looked at her up and down, snorting in an unimpressed manor. "Can I see your ID?" No matter how many new cites she moved to or how many people she met, Violet never quite got used to people asking for that. She had learned to keep the smug smile from her face when she handed the small plastic card over.

Twenty-three. She hadn't been that age in decades, but it was easier then trying to explain to people that there are more then one sort-of-immortal creatures in the world and because she was one of them, you should serve her alcohol. The redheaded women looked it over, then fixed her eyes on her face and back down at the card again, then thrust it back at her and walked away.

She was wearing a dress that she'd had since 1944, the perfect time for dresses in her opinion. They where long and the skirts puffed out, it was sky blue with a black ribbon under the bust and holding the halter top in place. She had been in New York for most of the war, she went to all the dances for the troops, it called to her. The movement, the music, the men, she couldn't stay away. This was the dress she wore at the last dance she attended, where she met a sailor by the name of Thorton, Robert Thorton.

He was a strong man, barely old enough to fight but loved to twirl her around the dance floor as if he knew that he would never see the beautiful girl with long hair again. Even when the night wound down and they kissed like fevered lovers he made promises they both knew he couldn't keep. He couldn't come back from the war, perfectly unharmed, and marry her. He couldn't sweep her away to some white picketed fence surrounding a cookie cutter home and make a life for her. But he said he could, and she let him, just like she let him take her home and make love to her and then leave as the sun cascaded through the windows.

This dress had memories, which is how she liked her things, it had seen so much and yet been damaged so little. She didn't wear it nearly as much anymore, it didn't fit the style of today nor did she wish to remember everything that had happened in the dress. Almost like her white sundress that she wore when she and Godric came together, she didn't want to ware it or look at it or even touch it now. She had been with vampires before, of course she had, being around as long as she had and with her nymph blood she brought lust into places. Sometimes they did nothing, made no difference in the way people acted, but other times it overtook the room and the air became thick with desire.

None of the vampires she had been with where able to bite her no matter how hard they pressed their fangs to her neck, they simply could not break through. Her grandmother had told her that the Goddess' may have granted "the skin as tough as the bark of their trees" to the fae had they not they not decided that they where better then the nymphs. But they did, decided they had more power, that the power of the sun was better then the power of nature. Of life. That's what nymphs did, they brought things, plants, back to life.

But her blood? Nothing special, when she was a child they didn't know so much about their bodies, they couldn't tell you what their blood type was or anything of that sort, but other then her heratage their had been no mention of her blood. She hadn't known any other nymphs to be bitten by vampires, not even in the the oral history given to her by her grandmother.

When the waitress sat her food down she ate quitly, observing the people coming in for a bite and drink, mostly a drink. The men playing pool, talking loudly and laughing louder, where already well on their way to having to call someone to drive them home. The old men who sat gruffly drinking beer and whiskey watching the young men, so like they where in the past, in anger. Women who sat at tables and talking just loud enough to let their judgments known. All of the main characters that make up a small town where incorporated at this bar, in this moment.

"Are you old enough for that drink?" The young man with dirty blonde hair and cops uniform stood before her, smirking down at her in a way that nearly screamed 'this-smile-works-every-time'. She gave him a small once over, taking another sip from the glass and then turning away. He was off the clock and men like him, arrogant and used to getting their way, held no challenge for Violet.

He decided to sit down instead, turning the chair so the back was against the table and he had one leg on either side. "Now, I'm a police officer and you don't look old enough for that." She continued to ignore him, let his words whip past her ears and when her eyes looked near him she found her waitress.

"Excuse me, can I have the check please?" The redhead nodded and continued to work on what she was finishing before moving over to her table, the boy-cop continuing to watch her movements, the way her flowed over her shoulders.

She placed the bills down gently below the paper, grabbed her purse below and started moving to the door, the cop following a few steps behind her. She had her keys in her hand as she walked to her car, but he stepped in front of her, forcing her stop mid step.

"Look, officer? You're not my type and you're obviously off duty so even if I was underage you cannot arrest me." She moved around him, the look on his face told her that he had never, or at least not recently, been turned down by a women. He didn't move until she was pulling out of the dirt parking lot.


"Eric?" She was sitting by the tree, talking to it softly, feeling closer to what she had been attempting since seeing the property when she heard footsteps on the lawn. It was a calm night and she had gone nearly two weeks without seeing anyone, even Pam, and other then phone calls she had decided to focus on everything else.

"My maker and my child have been talking non-stop about your absence." The leaves on the tree shook like a terrified child as he spoke, he body stiff and his back perfectly straight. "Godric doesn't know how to tell you what happened, because he doesn't understand it, I was hoping maybe you could." She tilted her head, a smile playing softly on her lips as she let her hand fall from the tree.

She whispered to it, telling it to be calm, that everything would be okay as she stood, walking passed Eric she nodded to him to follow. Once inside her dress seemed out of place, the long pale pink goddess dress didn't seem to fit into a house, it was made to be worn outside. "Shall we speak in my study?"

The desk was covered in paper, words in black ink written in neat cursive scattered across the top with no order to them. The shelves where filled with books, all the books she and her grandmother had collected over both of their lives. "Godric told me that..." He sat in a chair in front of the desk while she moved to the other side and sat down "your blood made his heart beat." She nodded slowly, her mind racing. Everything she was ever told or taught about her heritage.

"Eric, would you feel more comfortable on this side of the desk?" She had stood and started running her hands along book covers, reading their titles to herself while he moved to her side of the desk and sat down. He did feel better over here, almost as if putting himself behind the desk he was in charge of the situation.

"We are the gaurdians of the foutain of youth." She began, she read as she walked to the chair infront of Eric. "We follow Artemis into battle. We bring love to the men. We are the creators of life." She sat, Eric watching her while she read from the ancient looking book that written by hand. "Nymph's bring life, without them the Earth would never bloom. Life sores through them like blood, their magic is in their skin."

"And what is that?"

"This is the book written by my ancestors and passed down through each generation. That's the first thing written in the book." Violet smiled, looking through the book, flipping through the words of her ancestors. The generations of Wood women where few, but quite long lived. They knew the secrets to surviving the ages, and they where all on the book.

"So, what you're saying is" Eric had his elbows on the desk, his long fingers pressed together like an evil genius listening to ideas to take over the world. His eyes peered at her, but she seemed oblivious to everything else other then the book that was laid on top of her lap. "His heart beat, for the first time in two thousand years, because your kind are the bringers of life?" He chuckled softly, as if that wasn't a good enough answer.

"My...kind?" She repeated his words slowly, closing the book and pronouncing every syllable almost painfully. "Tell me, Eric, does it bother you that you're maker and long long time friend is now something more then just a vampire, or the fact that his heart was able to beat and yours never will?" Her demeanor was different, no longer carefree, it was dark and threatening and Eric could almost her features getting darker.

The thing about nymphs, and part of the reason they didn't get along with the fae was how similar they where to each other. Even if nymphs could never allow themselves to actually cause harm to another living person, they where still able to defend themselves. Sometimes, this was done with words, they had a profound ability to say exactly what would cut the person in front of them the deepest. Sometimes this was feeding their power into nature, making the Earth as angry as they where until it stopped the problem for a moment. Enough time for the nymph to either get to the safety of their tree or to their satyr.

Eric was on Violet in an instant. One hand held her shoulder down the other on her neck. Her book was on the floor next to them, the pages closing as if the wind wanted to keep it's secrets. She stayed calm, didn't allow her breathing to become ragged and kept her heart beating steady, she had nothing to be afraid of, he couldn't actually hurt her.

His fangs clicked out as he leaned close to her, so close she could feel his cool breath on her ear. "I don't trust you. Your kind have stayed hidden even to vampires. There are no legends, no fairy tales of your blood in my community. You can make a dead man's heart beat as if it had always done so? That is something that would get around."

She smiled softly up at him but her eyes didn't return to normal, they where darker now, almost as if they where more hallow. She was still refusing to give into the pain he was inflicting. She would feel his hand on her neck, feel the brute strength in the viking, but she would not give him any sort of satisfaction.

"Eric Northman, I rescind your invitation." He as flown off of her and started the magical journey out of her house, he tried to slow himself down by grabbing a hold of things. A table. A shelf. A doorframe. But she stood almost as soon as he was ripped off of her and she walked in front of him.

"Tell me, before you're forcibly removed from my house," she stepped out of the way of her fallen belongings without looking down, "how exactly will Godric respond to his child attacking his nymph because she doesn't like you talking down to her as if she where somehow less then you?" He was on her porch, anger still in his eyes while she stood just out of reach in the doorway.

"My kind have less weaknesses then yours. We can't even bleed if you can't find the tree we're attached to. We're not a threat to anyone so no one would try and kill us on a daily," she giggled softy "I mean, nightly, bases if we came out of the woodwork. You on the other hand, well, even vampires have a time, don't they?"

She almost closed the door, but stopped when it was almost shut. "By the way," her voice was soft and so close to being the sweet sound it usually was, "I believe his heart beat because he makes my powers increase ten fold just by being near me."

She shut the door, locked it, and went about picking up the mess Eric had created on his way out.


AU: I was having such a hard time getting over this small bump while writing this chapter, I was only about 1,000 words in and I just kept staring at the computer as if it would just jump out at me. Then it sort of did, I guess, making this the longest chapter so far. Remember to review with any ideas, comments, or even if you just want to say hi.