A/N: Oh my god, guys. Wowee wow. I love you and am so happy to see you reviewing! I squealed when I came on here and realized how many comments I got. Love it, love it, love it~ Anyway, I'm publishin' this baby a bit late and I really want to go nappy nappy so I'm unfortunately skipping reviews this chapter. Please don't stop though. I will be answering them if you leave me a little heads up saying that you would like me to - that you like my quick fire wit and brilliant sense of humor. Kidding. Or am I? Yep. That's how you know it's past my bedtime. ON TO THE CHAPTER!


Chapter Seven: I Don't Wanna Know

I was a weird kid. I'd long since gotten to the age where it wasn't painful to admit that. In all honesty, growing up with Sookie eased some of that burden though. Not only did we cling to each other in a fragile kind of understanding but in other ways (more selfish ways) I was different from her. My abilities came when most were unaware. I captured dreams and she captured thoughts. Unlike her, I didn't parrot back everything anybody in my radius was feeling. I was silent. And like some children who grew up quiet, I learned to build up walls way before any of my classmates or siblings ever knew how to.

And not just in the "normal" sense.

"Stop it," I hissed at Sookie, grabbing her hand under the long tables of the school elementary painting room and squeezing. She was doing it again, trying to worm into my head. Every time, I felt it like someone was pulling on my hair. And back then, I couldn't kick her out. She could pluck out everything I was thinking like she was getting dandelions to wish on in our backyard.

My sister winced, her pigtails bobbing slightly as she tried not to cry out at how hard I was squeezing her hand. Back when we were little, I had wanted to hurt her. When we were in high school I realized that these instincts weren't normal. I realized that pain wasn't the only way to get someone to listen. It was odd how much it seemed to be my only option back. Hurt someone and they would stop.

"I can't help it," Sookie whispered back, tears gathering against her pale, snow white lashes. Disgruntled, I released her fingers, turning back to the paintings spread across our table. We were the weird siblings. Jason could away with it but Sookie and I were on our own. "They think what you're drawing is weird, Runa. You should stop."

My eyes flicked around to take in the hurried way that all the kids sitting at the tables around us turned back to their coloring pads and crayons. Our teachers brows were knit together as she stared across the room at us. I was sure that they were a striking pair: one with hair nearly as black as molten lava and skin tanned from years in the sun, the other with snowy strands and alabaster complexion to match. A white tiger next to a black panther.

"They always stare," I murmured back, turning my eyes back down to the paper beneath my chubby fingers.

Sookie gnawed at her lower lip, her lashes fluttering as she glanced around the room quickly and then down at the jagged lines on my paper. A girl sat in front of a large oak, it's roots crawling to scar the ground around her as the tall grass waved in the breeze. I shut my eyes, remembering the chill air and the scent of wild berries in the air, crushed and tart. Little red seeds like mistletoe berries clustered in the gnarled branches of the tree. It was so big, I remembered, my tongue going dry as the fresh, earthy taste of pine burst across it. I could have crawled in between those roots right under the very trunk of the tree. I had wanted to.

I shook myself, picking up another pencil and scribbling down a series of twitchy lines.

I was a weird kid. Not the normal kind of weird where I fed collared greens to the cat until she threw up. I had dreams. Not the ordinary ones that were barely lucid and out of my control. I could control myself. In the dreams, I had a will and sometimes I did do things. I ran in the long grasses all the way to the forest's edge, the trees circling around that one, strange tree, making all the others look like saplings in comparison. And sometimes I just sat there, the cool winds from the mountains in the distance rolling over me and sweeping my hair across my face.

It was my tree. I possessed it and it possessed me in the same, unsettlingly certain way.

Sometimes there would be others. They all looked the same. Or more correctly, they all had the same look in their cold, pale eyes. Women - maidens, that was the only word for them. Maidens with long, tangled hair and eyes as chill as mine, the edges so cold that they seemed milky. They would come into my meadow and smile, their long hair sweeping across tawny, slick skin, their waists small, their bodies lean from their narrowed noses to their lithe toes. They were beautiful, their breasts high and their lips full with lashes dense and fluttering like a grove of butterflies ready to fly on the next summer breeze.

So perfect that they should have been disconcerting. But their was something oddly familiar about them. So familiar that it gave me a headache. Slowly, their lips would curl back, their hands tightening on the long strands of their horse's manes. But it was hard to tell. Thier hair was always so long, the thick coils sliding across their naked breasts and arms until the horse's mane and the maiden's' hair tangled between their clenched fingers.

"Little girl," they would whisper, coming nearer and nearer but never seeming to be in any rush. Their voices were soft, lilting in the air with a slickness that colored the words of liars. Temptresses. I stared at them carefully, never moving from my position at the base of my tree. Never trust a girl with a pretty smile and oil words, I remembered my Gran saying.

"Little girl, you've wandered far away from where you should be."

Words choked in my throat and I moved closer to the roots until they scratched along my side, tearing at my thin dress. Avid, I stared at their approach. These horses weren't like the ones that I had seen on ranches and farms in Louisiana. They were wild, nearly frothing at the mouth as they shook their heads in agitation, stopping to paw at the ground until they had dug holes in my grassy meadow. The maidens smiled. It was always the same. No matter the woman, it never changed.

"What are you?" she would whisper, her eyes gleaming in the night. "Mare or man?"

"Girl," I choked out, shrinking farther from her as she threw her head back and gave a hearty laugh, her tangle of hair shivering like stars were falling from them, glittering in the night light.

"Girl. How cunning. Many names," she whispered, turning her gaze to the stars. In the moonlight,her teeth glinted dangerously. Sharp teeth like that of a sharks. Her eyes flicked to me briefly, her chin still tipped towards the sky. "But tell me, little girl do any of these titles ever feel right?"

I gulped down the clump of fear that gathered in my throat. Something in her words hit me, striking me to my very being.

"Men." The word was spat like a curse. "They give so many words to so many things that don't need them."

I blinked up at her, the light from the moon shivering along her skin.

"Man or mare, flower or tree, death or lust - they give names that they forget. Despise us, forget the gifts that we have given and repay us with curses." Her smile turned sickeningly sweet. "Yet they still let us into their beds. Fickle and foolish creatures. But their fears are absolutely delicious! Isn't that right, lovely, little Runa?"

A shock ran through me. She knew my name. They all knew my name. "Who are you? Why've you come to my tree?"

"Possessive," they would always sing, raising their brows at me. They seemed to almost hiss out their s', reminding me of a snake coiling. "We do not understand such curiosity. What a generous world you must live in to be able to question this and that at your will." Their eyes went considering. "We have no name. Do we need one? Why should we give ourselves airs when there is nothing more to us than our instincts - what we want and what we get? We are not the Fae. We do not need crowns or courts. We are not the Elves or the Witches who must seek companionship. Why would we want such useless things?"

Her eyes turned to meet mine, her lips thinning as her horse gave a wild whiny, rearing back as it's eyes rolled madly. Something clicked in the milky depths of their eyes.

"But you are not of the old world." Her lips thinned even more and through the taut skin of her mouth, I could see the jagged indentations of her teeth. "The first to accept us into their beds named us maras." Her teeth flashed in an ugly smile. "We killed three of their kings."

I shivered, swaying in the wind like a blade of grass. The mare circled me.

"Vikings," she hissed out, her long neck arching toward me. "We concurred them before they built their first boats and burned cities beneath their blades and torches. We were their goddesses. They worshiped our savagery. They prayed to our darkness and bathed in our promises. We gave them madness and kissed their enemies with nightmares."

She gave a derisive smile. "But everything must come to an end. We learned from them. We went with them, fought beside them. And sometimes we stayed. Most did not. We took their wooden horses and rode them across the seas to Asia and America where they gave us a deluge of ridiculous names - useless and ignorant. But one thing remained the same."

Her eyes stared through me, piercing me to my very bones.

"Your sisters only demand one thing in return for all that has been given to you through the blood of your mother and her sisters before her: never submit to the follies of men and other creatures." Her words snapped like wind across the sea, slicing through water and shaking the waves to rise. The mare calmed, both of them turning to stare at my shivering, small figure. "Tame a mare and you break it. Then and only then will we meet again, little girl."

The last night that I dreamt of them the whole of Bon Temp was seized in the thralls of feverish dreams. Seven people died from heart attacks.


"YOU THINK I'M A FUCKING GOBLIN?!" I would have thrown the phone which was still lit with the Wikipedia page that had popped up at Eric's head if it would not have meant that I would have needed to go and buy a new one. Slamming Bill's door shut, I stabbed a finger into the big vampire's chest, ignoring the raised brows and whistle from Pam. On the screen, it showed a little picture of a troll sitting on a girl's chest who looked like she was about to rip her see-through nightie off and dowse the creature in fire.

"It is a car not a rickshaw, for god's sake," I heard Bill grit out but I waved him off, snarling up at the man in front of me.

The blonde vampire took it in strides, his eyes shuttered in practiced consideration. Slowly, he plucked the phone from my fingers and scrolled over the page that I had pulled up. Sighing, his brows furrowed and raised in unimpressed disgust before he was handing it back to me.

"My people only had one word for you," Eric said, his voice low and gravely as he stared down at me with those blue, blue eyes. I was getting sucked into them. My fingers dug into the phone until a prickle of pain buzzed along my spine. "Mara. But I suppose others possessed your kind as well. Demon, goblin, temptress, cauchemar, merrie, zmora, incubus." His teeth flashed as my face went red at the last one, his eyes darkening as he leaned closer to me. "But we were the first."

My whole body shook down to my very bones. The first. My eyes went watery as I stared up at him, those two words roaring through my veins. I felt like a cello being tuned, the strings of my tendons vibrating through as the sickening smell of crushed berries and mountain air stung my nose. My back hit the car door, my fingers clutching desperately at the door for something to hold onto as my whole world shook. The dreams that I had kept locked up inside me suddenly being wrenched from the depths of my mind so violently that I felt like throwing up.

"Viking." The word torn from what felt like the depth of my heart, suddenly grabbing onto every detail of Eric's face. Sharp, narrow nose, cruel smile, broad shoulders, blonde, blue eyed like the arctic seas - not a spartan. Not even close to those land-limited, lawless bastards. A low hiss tore from me, my teeth flashing in a sneer as I crouched, my vision narrowing in. "Viking."

Something deep and dark was running through me, a carnal kind of hatred tearing my muscles into ribbons. Pam's teeth clicked down, her eyes going deadly. My fingers tingled.

"Back off, little girl," the blonde hissed, her blue eyes flashing as I saw Chow move to stand to her right. It wasn't like he would be especially willing to fight me but he was inclined to fight for his new bank account.

I couldn't control myself. Savage violence choking me. My fingers felt like I had stuck them in a live circuit breaker. I glanced down, shivering at the purple threads that spiked along my hands like pulsing veins, a sick kind of darkness that was inky and runny swirling through it.

"Runa," Bill was beside me, his eyes flashing in warning although he wasn't coming any closer than a good five feet. I knew that I should stop. I needed to - "Control yourself."

Another low hiss slithered from my lips, forcing itself into the air like a coil of snakes as I turned back to Eric. He was the problem. He was what I needed to neutralize. Amusement, curled the vampire's lips, his shoulders rolling. He wasn't scared. My lips curled from my teeth even more, the blackness around my fingers pulsing.

"You have no right to call upon our services." The words weren't mine, the voice low and lilting. Beside him, Pam and Chow stiffened, their eyes going a bit unfocused. Bill drew in a sharp breath. Eric didn't even move, his lips curling even more as his fangs clicked into place. Anger clouded my vision. "Vampire. Viking! Who do you think you are? Before the first man walked, we were the shadows in their dreams. We were the sisters who seduced their wishes into needs. Now you come before us-"

"You're boring me," he said, glancing around in disinterest. His eyes caught on Pam for a moment and I saw the first sliver of irritation flick through him. "But you do have an unsettling effect on my companions. I would advise you to stop. Now."

"YOU DARE-?!"

I was up against the car hood in a second, my skull banging across the steel as I hand curled around my throat, keeping me pinned there. A thick, hard body was pressed to every inch of mine, Eric's hips wedged between my thighs as he loomed over me. Desperately, I grappled with him, my fingers curling uselessly in the material of his shirt. Shock ran through me as the pulsing subsided into stillness and then dimmed. Fear. I blinked, swallowing convulsively. He should have been lost in delirium by now.

"Yes. I dare," he snarled like a rabid dog and I gritted my teeth as his lips curled away from his teeth, the light of the moon flashing off of the deadly tips of his fangs. The blue of his eyes rolled, stormy and dangerous. Awareness shivered through me at the hard roll of his muscles on mine, slicing through the anger.

"You have no rights-"

"I have all of them," he hissed and suddenly his eyes were wandering to the curve of my lips, his face dropping so close that I thought he might kiss me. My heart shook in my chest, a low ache starting inside of me. Shakily, I drew in a quick breath as I felt one of his hands slide along my shin. I shivered, my head fuzzing as he kept going up, up, up my leg until his hands were cupping the crook of my knee. "Your sisterhood has forgotten or tried to rewrite the way of things. Vampires were raised first and your people - well, they were not even in the game. Cattle and slaves for my people."

"No." My voice was back, the word guttural as Eric smirked, his eyes lighting up. Softly, his hand moved to my jaw, his thumb turning me so that I could only look at him. A shiver ran through me as I felt his hips grind even more into mine, a considerable bulge pressing through his jeans to my aching folds. Shit. I didn't even know that I was aroused.

"Either way it is irrelevant," he whispered, his breath blowing warm and wet on my ear as his fingers traced my inner thigh, playing along the frayed edges of my shorts and very close to some very compromising, very wet areas. I gulped, watching as his smile widened and he took a deep breath, his nostrils flaring. "I'll tell you what you're going to do for me tonight, pet. You're going to be a good girl and you're going to-"

"Beat the shit out of your undead ass when I get the chance, you-" I snarled out, trying desperately to wiggle free from him but only receiving more of his weight as he leveled into me.

He chuckled, the sound vibrating through him to me.

"Good to see you back." His head tipped to the side and I tried not to whimper when I felt his nose nudge into mine, his fingers squeezing my thigh in warning. "There are two very important people in that Tribunal and you, my pet are going to get their fears for me."

"Why not get my sister for this, you fucking-?" I spat.

"Because I wanted you," he said and I gritted back a retort as he leveled me a stare. His smile went lazy, his fingers playing down to my knee and then back up playfully. "And because Bill here tells me that your sister can't extract the same information - if any - from our kind."

My head snapped to the side, my eyes narrowing into deadly slits as I stared at the vampire. Groggily, Bill shook his head, his eyes fluttering in rapid bats.

"What the fuck was that?" Pam slurred and I saw her stumble into Chow as if both of them were waking from a dream.

A gentle squeeze from Eric's fingers around my throat brought my attention back to him. "You'll behave for me won't you, pet?"

My lips curled angrily away from my teeth, my fingers clenching even more in the material of his shirt. "How do you know so much about me? My kind?"

His head tipped to the side in consideration before he gave me a sly smile. "I once fucked one of your kind. When I was still human." Eric's eyes darkened as I drew in a sharp breath. "She was very vocal. About many things."

I growled. "My family's indebt to you, Mr. Northman. Whose fears do you want?"

"Good girl," he praised, his teeth nipping at my nose sharply as he rolled his hips into mine for the briefest moment, creating a deliciously slow friction. Damn him. "I will show you when we arrive at the Tribunal."

"Ah, isn't it a beautiful world?" Pam drawled as I straightened, seething as Eric moved away from me. Her eyes ran over me knowingly. Fuck her. Fuck all of these fuckers. I stormed, stomping away from all four of the vamps. I wanted to go home. I wanted to have Sookie. She would have made this a bit more bearable.

"Runa-" I slapped the hand from my arm, whirling on the civil war vampire to poke a finger into his chest.

"Why do you have to be such a little dipshit?" I hissed, shoving him. I glared venomously up at him. "If I ever hear you giving away my sister's secrets like bargaining tools again, I'll open your coffin and give you to the sun myself. Do you hear me?"

"Silver would help with that process," Pam offered, her eyes running over Bill's dejected form before giving him a fake smile.

"Eric is my Sheriff-" Bill whispered, his eyes flicking from their place on the ground.

I sneered. "Next time why don't you just let him put a sticker on your ass and buy you heels and a nice dress too? That way it'll be like an open warning that you're on call for the night."

Eric snorted. Pam let out a giggle of her own, her eyes lighting up. "Oh, how I do enjoy your new human."

"A bit mouthy," the big Asian vamp observed and I shot him a sneer.

Bill's eyes flashed. Oh, had I got him angry? My hackles raised, my teeth sharpening and aching in their gums. I wanted blood. My fingers tingled, going black and purple again as his fangs clicked down. I may not have been able to make the big brute of a man to standing just behind him pee himself in terror but I had done this before. A single touch would send anyone - undead or breathing - into a hallucination so vivid that they could easily go mad. Best case: scarred for life. Worst case: dead. It was maddening to think that Eric Northman was the one who could get away from me.

"Tempt me, Compton," I hissed out, my hands crackling. "Breyta eda andask."

I resisted the urge to flinch at the new language. My eyes flicked to Eric who was smirking, his head tipped back. A queasy kind of horror tipped through me. His language. I knew his language. I felt like someone had just hit play on some hidden button in the back of my skull. How many other things had changed?

"It was wrong of me," Bill whispered suddenly and my attention refocused on him. I would think about it later. Later when I could comprehend all the things that were changing so quickly. "I should not have done it. Not to Sookie."

Disgruntled, I grunted, turning to stomp away once more as my hands fluttered to a halt.

"Nice place you have here," I muttered dryly. I had thought since all the vamps I had met so far seemed to be born with a silver spoon up their asses, this Tribunal thing would be held in some rich, to do hotel. Or maybe an old plantation home. Hell, maybe they would even be able to find a castle in Louisiana. I was terribly wrong.

Eric stopped beside me as I stared up at the vans and wrecked vehicles that made up the cluttered junk yard. Cluttered in dust and dirt, the place had clearly been abandoned long ago, chains and old rigs left sitting in the heat to rust. It was nearly two in the morning by now and up ahead I could hear the quiet murmur of a mass of people. Vampires. It was an old place in the middle of the swamps, just east of the forests.

"I'm going to get my fucking shoes dirty," Pam griped, staring down at the my expensive heels. Her eyes flicked venomously to Eric as he turned a cool gaze to the heels.

"You could have stayed at home," he rumbled and I looked around, oddly at ease as one of his hands slipped to the small of my back. Piled high all around us, the junk nearly reached the skies. Like a big, ugly metal forest with muddy gravel dirt aisles zig zagging all over the place.

"Fuck you, you know that I couldn't have," the blonde sneered.

"A willing risk for my diligent progeny," Eric mused, flashing her a smile before nudging me to a slow walk.

"Cheap skate," I heard her snipe from beside me.

I didn't really pay attention to the turns that we took. We were in a jungle, filled with so many paths that I would never be able to get out. Besides, the only reason I would need to know is if I was running. And the only way I would be able to escape a horde of angry, vampires was - Well, even the thought was laughable. There was no way that I would be able to do that. My slick words would only get a minor number of vampires to be disoriented for a short bit of time and I only had two hands. They would tear me to shreds in a minute.

Soon the gravel narrowed out, Pam's whispered curses growing less and less frequent as she hurried along, still looking as elegant as ever even with the uneven gravel.

"Mouth shut, eyes down," Eric whispered to me suddenly, his hand tightening on my back. His eyes flicked to meet mine. "Do you understand, Runa?"

This was important. No matter how much I despised the thought of being at his mercy, I knew that he was going to be the only one on my side. My eyes flicked to Bill who gave me a worried stare before turning away. The only one able to protect me.

Instead of answering, I pressed my lips tightly together and turned my eyes to the ground, watching the stones pass below me. A low rumble of approval sounded beside me and I shivered at the roll of irritating pleasure that ran through me at the noise. A big hand spanned my hip, pulling me into Eric's side and I suddenly realized my role - what I would be to every other vampire here. Arm candy. Eric's quick fuck. I bit down on my tongue at the thought, quelling my response.

A low murmur shivered through the air as the ground evened into cement completely and I felt the press of a million eyes on us. I kept my eyes down, only glancing up once to get a quick look at the crowd of vampires - so many. More than I had ever seen in one location. The junkyard had opened up into an even bigger area - an old parking lot for cars that were no longer useful.

It looked like they were at a fucking music concert, some sitting on lawn chairs that they had clearly brought from home. Others were splattered across the area, standing high on cars. Right behind the main sitting area was a row of crates that seemed to be stacked together to make up little holding pens. Some had bars and shivering vampires behind them. Others held vamp clearly here to be entertained. It all circled around one car with an open bed on the back, a single chair with a pale, willowy man sitting in it, looking particularly bored as a vampire pleaded at his feet. A sinister cane was held loosely. He looked like some skeletal, comic book villian. Skeletor without the buff or a Victor Zsasz.

My eyes dropped quickly, turning to the feet passing me by as we made our way forward through the crowd to stand near the front, Bill hovering a bit away.

"I do not care," the man's voice cracked through the night, silencing the woman at his feet. His milky eyes flicked toward a vampire with short coppery hair in a leather jacket with gloves. "Luisa, is it something about my face? Something that makes these mutts think that I honestly appreciate the emotions - useless things that should have been left behind with their mortality - think that I would care about… What is the human emotion? The one that most of them say?"

"Love?" Luisa threw out helpfully, her fangs flashing as she smiled down at the quivering vampire.

The man sniffed. "That would be the one. Bind her in silver and throw her in the ground. When she's able to claw her way out, her punishment will be through-"

"PLEASE, MAGISTER! NO!" The vampire screamed and I flinched as the smell of fear permeated the air. This place was ripe with it. "NO-"

"Next!" the Magister snapped as two hulking vampires carted the screaming girl away and along one - male this time - was brought forward to kneel at his feet, silver already burrowing into his steaming flesh as he fell before the pale vampire.

My breath sawed between my teeth as I resisted the urge to jerk away from Eric, feeling a cool hand slip beneath the hem of my black beater to press against the skin of my hip directly. My eyes snapped to his, my jaw setting as he gave me an amused smirk and then tipped his head towards the Magister and Luisa. I blinked, the anger washing away as my mind sharpened. It was them. He wanted their nightmares. My lips thinned.

Vampires were a bit more complicated than humans. Sometimes if the instinct was ripe enough, I could pluck nightmares from the undead like peas from a jar. But that seemed to fade with age and these two seemed very old. Or at least… the Magister did. My eyes focused on the girl, inhaling sharply.

"Idiot," the Magister seethed, still somehow looking bored. I stiffened. Blood was gushing from the convicted vampire's mouth as he choked. They had ripped out one of his fangs. Against my side, Eric let out a low purr, his fangs makings a soft noise as they clicked into place. I glanced around, shrinking into Eric's side as I saw that all of their fangs were out. And that most of them were glancing at me like I was a steak and they hadn't eaten in weeks.

A squeak forced it's way up my throat as Eric's hand tightened on my hips, dragging me to stand in front of him so that he could nuzzle his hand under the other side of my tank. His hips pressed into my ass and against my back I could feel the strong roll of his chest. Damn. The viking bastard better have been thanking his stars that we were in a tribunal or I would have went off on him like a goddamn fucking banshee.

"You fed on a human that belonged to another," the Magister continued on slowly and I tried to focus in on the girl once more even as a certain vampire's thumbs started to move in circles along my skin.

The girl - Luisa - she was actually only as old as Bill, give or take ten to twenty years. I closed my eyes sucking in a breath as I dug a little further. Slaves - I could see them running, barefoot, wanting to scream but sealing their mouths tightly against the reaction as lights flickered like fireflies in the trees behind them. Luisa Prescott - part of the Underground Railroads. I could see her there - whispering to them and running ahead into the night to a small, farm house. There was a cellar door beneath the hay in the pig's pen.

I shivered, not even realizing that I had grasped Eric's wrist until I opened my eyes. She had ran a safe house when she was mortal. Unfortunately, she had brought a vampire there. Luisa had offered him food and water but - I stared at the girl, suddenly feeling sad. Back then she had been afraid of mortal men with whips and knives. She had seen public tortures for those who had harbored slaves.

Now - ironically - Luisa was scared of the thing that she had fought to bring about in her mortal life. She was scared of freedom and change. She was scared of what would happen when order could no longer be restored to her vampire hierarchy. I sniffed, glancing away as the crowd roared for Luisa to pull out the vampire's other tooth. But she also feared confinement. She feared the underground bunkers that she herself had created in 1800's. The vampire that had killed her left her out to bleed in a dirt grave. Funny in a very sad sort of way.

"This trial is concluded," the Magister was saying, flipping through a phone in his hand as if he were marking it off his to-do list. "Moving on~"

A short tug on my hair brought my attention to Eric and I shivered as I caught sight of his fangs, pressing against his top lip. A brow quirked and I tapped once against his wrist, tipping my head to Luisa as if I was leaning back to stare up as him. Smirking, he leaned down to give my ear a gentle nip. Damn. This man knew how to push all my buttons.

"Eric Northman, Sheriff of Area 5," the Magister called and Eric's head snapped up in attention, softly, moving me away from him.

"Magister," Eric said, bowing his head slightly but not taking his eyes from the Magister. I inhaled as the milky eyes of the man in the chair ran over me and then flicked away, his lips tipping down cynically. Obviously, he thought I wasn't a threat. Or even worth his time.

I was starting to think the exact opposite.

Eric was a viking born in the years before Christ himself was born - anno Domini, motherfucker. Something in my mind seemed to open up an hour ago and now it was like a library filled with untapped references. I wasn't all knowing. I wasn't even close. But I did know that Eric Northman was the oldest vampire here and he held more power than this Magister in his fake leather car seat.

If I was indebted to someone, at least it was him.

"Bring me your murderer," the Magister said, an odd twinkle in his eyes as he gave the command.

Eric glanced towards Bill as I focused down on the skeletal man in the chair, my eyes straying to a ring on his left hand. I could just make out a thin cross with a pin-like sword on it's right and some sort of plant growing on its left. My lips thinned. The Magister was at least 400 years older than Luisa. And much more volatile.

Sweat beaded across my forehead, slipping down my neck. Beside me, Pam snarled at a vampire that kept creeping closer and closer, his eyes hungry. I was the only fucking human here. Of course they would be drawn to me.

The Magister was so unlike Luisa that it was dizzying to have to switch gears so quickly. Incredibly dogmatic, he seemed to be more inclined to the natural order than even Luisa was with years of fear pounded away from her traumas as a human. The Magister laid down roots so quickly and with such fervor that it was almost laughable.

The ring - my eyes snapped to it once more just as the Magister laughed, his little, skeletal fingers clicking like game pieces on his armrest. I finally caught on the crown held afloat above the cross, foliage thick and elaborate circling it proudly.

The Spanish Inquisition. The words sighed over my brain like a dam finally breaking to flow. A monk, Jorge Alonso - blah, blah, blah, incredibly long Spanish name - he had risen from being from the poor to being one of the most feared inquisitors that the church had ever seen. I flinched, holding back bile as images flashed through my head. He was a sadistic motherfucker - so sick that even his fellow monks had reprimanded his treatment. Fifteen minutes was what each inquisitor was given and Jorge had exceeded that many times.

My head snapped to the side at the sound of a car backing up, my mouth going dry. In front of me, Eric's head tipped to the side as he cast a glance back at me. I gulped. That look was tell me that I wasn't going to say a word. What was-

I gagged, nearly throwing up my dinner as the trunk opened and the stench of decaying flesh and blood hit me. God. How could someone still be conscious with this much fear bloating them?

"You have no nest," the Magister declared, his cane splayed over his crossed legs as he fiddled with it in agitation. These things that he was ticking off seemed to disturb him greatly. "Prefer to consort with humans."

His eyes flicked to me in disgust and I resisted the urge to sneer, my lips curling as I dropped my gaze, feeling Eric's hot stare drilling into the side of my head. Yeah. Yeah, boss.

"Seems you have lost all sense of our priorities," the Magister murmured. I could still feel his eyes on me, deadly like the tip of a blade running along my flesh. Slowly, they moved away. "Bill Compton, you owe us a life."

The sound of the trunk opening pierced the air, followed by the scramble and sound of screams so hysterical that I couldn't keep my eyes on the ground anymore. I looked up, ignoring the hiss from Eric as horror spiked through me. A girl with red hair the color of carrots stumbled frantically around the circle, looking desperately for something familiar as she sobbed before Luisa threw her down in front of the Magister.

A small sound forced itself up my throat, my eyes burning as something ugly and desperate twisted inside me.

"Don't," Eric growled, one of his hands clasping my shoulder.

His words were distant. If it wasn't for the girl - sobbing and praying on the cement - I would have listened.

"Does your pet have something to add, Mr. Northman?" My eyes snapped up to meet his, my nails digging into the palms of my hands. The gutless worm. I hoped that every fear swimming around in his deluded, little brain would be fully recognized. I hoped Eric tied him in silvers and dragged his ass out to roast for a minute in the sun every hour.

"God, Marie and Joseph," the girl sobbed, turning her eyes to the sky. They had roughed her up before she had gotten here. Bruises marred her pale skin. "SAVE ME!"

The Magister was still staring at me, a brow quirked. Eric's hand tightened on my shoulder, his eyes ice bullets drilling into the side of my head. "No. She doesn't, Magister."

Jorge Alonso didn't even look at him, a smile quirking his lips. "Nothing?"

He was asking me if I wanted to save her. He was asking me if I wanted to take her place - this poor human who had only been out at a party without any alcohol wanting to finally get the attention of the boys who looked over her day after day after day. Tonight, she had thought that it would change. She wanted it to change. She had prayed for it the whole time she did up her hair. It was all gone now. It had fallen out from it's pretty, braided bun and she had fallen out with her dreams. The reality was bitter on my tongue.

Her name was Jessica Hamby and she was only 17.

"Please, miss." She was at my feet, big blue eyes staring wide and blurry as her hands shook, clasping at my legs. Tears tracked through the mud on her cheeks and I gritted against the oncoming wave of images that flood my overworked brain, my fingers curling through one of Eric's belt loops as I braced. "Pl-please - I didn't do - I didn't mean any harm - I just wanted -"

Sookie would have been better. Sookie could have helped her. She could have calmed her. She could have done so many things. So many things that I couldn't - wouldn't do. My finger shook.

"Nothing to save this little human girl?" The Magister questioned, his head cocking to the side as he gave an innocent simper.

My eyes narrowed, words biting across my throat. I knew why Eric hadn't torn Jorge a new one many years ago. Jorge Alonso had gotten into the butt kissing game far before Eric had. One Jorge Alonso was an irritation. A million was a nuclear bomb that would implode. And like spiders, people like him congregated around a dead body. If I offered myself - a mare, if that was what I was to be called - there would be no guarantee that I would rise vampire. An oddity among oddities that would put my family at risk. I couldn't let that happen.

"Sheriff Northman has already given you my answer, Magister." My fingers combed through Jessica's tangle of hair, forcing it away from her temple as she let out a hysterical sob. I couldn't save her but I could take away her fear. My teeth sharpened, the edges scraping along my gums and inner lip to draw blood as I sucked in a breath. Beneath my fingers, Jessica subsided. I looked back to the Magister, pleased to see annoyance evident on his face. I gave him a thin smile. "But thank you for your kind offer."

Jorge's tongue clicked, his finger twitching as Luisa hauled the girl to Bill's feet. Stricken eyes met mine. I looked away.

"Meet your Maker," the Magister called.

Eric pressed into my side, his hand moving to cradle my hip once more as he drew me closer to him. At least she wasn't crying anymore. It was a dull fear, barely there. I didn't look up from the gravel, choking back useless tears as I heard Bill's whispered apologies.

And then Jessica's fear blasted through me like a nuclear bomb going off, all of it convulsing from her body into mine. I stuttered out a breath, each draw of air painfully quick as I turned fully, pressing my face into Eric's chest. God. It hurt. I gasped, clawing at the material of his shirt as his arms curled slowly around me. Did he know? Did he know what I had done? I held back a screamed, my heart pumping unevenly as her body fought for survival. Arteries went off like slots in a pinball machines.

I took it all, my teeth sinking into the top layer of my tongue.

Tears trickled from my eyes. All she had to do was lose one fifth of her blood supply. One fifth and her mind dimmed to that of a flickering light bulb. I went limp, the last bit of life shivering out of her as I released my hold on her fear and slipped into blissful darkness.


Oh goodie. So, I usually wait to publish chapters until I get a lot of reviews and a lot of follows/favorites. I see the traffic graph and it drives me crazy! I know you're out there! I see you! See? I sound like a crazy, bag lady. Anyway...

Old Norse:

Breyta eda andask: Act and die.

Next Chapter: Runa researches her kind; Sookie has sex with Bill; Puppy Jason buries the sweetest vampire that I've ever seen.