A/N: Okay, so any of you who also follow "Mother Earth (Provides for Me)" will know this already, but I think that now that I'm actively writing two stories at the same time, updates will probably be coming closer to every other week.

In other news, I want it on the record that even though I'm the author, I genuinely have absolute no fucking control over how long these chapters are. I just write until I hit a stopping point man. Sometimes that's after 3,000 words. . . sometimes, like this week, it's after 8,000. What can you do?

Anywho, please enjoy chapter three, and-as always-I thank you for your lovely reviews.

Chapter 3: Secrets and Superpowers

Eric just wants to take care of his new problem childe.

If Eric was being honest, then his new childe's reaction to flight had been somewhat disappointing. She hadn't shrieked in shock or cried out to be put down or even marveled at the sight of the ground below. Olive had merely sworn once-loudly-before settling into his firm hold and peering out curiously through her mane of wild hair as it whipped in the wind. Eric would never admit that some of it had briefly flown into his mouth.

In some ways, however, her non-reaction had been flattering. Eric had sensed her struggle to trust him after she had first awoken, and he knew that her human life must not have been kind to her. Only years of mistrust and betrayal could have forged a will strong enough not to immediately bend to a newborn's instinct to trust her Maker. But that only meant that when Olive relaxed into his arms and promised to confide in him she was choosing to trust him. Choosing to believe that he would take care of her as he had promised, the way it was clear no one ever had before. The thought of her suffering brought Eric's temper to the forefront, but if a harsh life had led to the creation of the strong and impressive woman who was now Eric's youngest, then all he could do was thank the gods for granting him the opportunity to be her Maker, and vow to do better than those who had come before him. Olive had only been his progeny for about 24 hours, but already he was so achingly proud of her courage.

He worried about whatever this secret was that she had to tell him, though. Eric regretted snapping at her and frightening her when she had stumbled over agreeing to his terms, if only because he now realized that she hadn't been contemplating disobedience, but rather struggling to confide in him. The last thing he wanted to do was discourage her trust in him. But he wouldn't hesitate to scare her into compliance, especially if it meant that she understood how dangerous it could be to offend a vampire. He'd frighten her again, if he had to, though the idea left a bad taste in his mouth.

Was she involved in that V lab somehow? It didn't seem likely, but Olive hadn't been concerned or surprised by most of the changes she had gone through when she Turned. Not by her senses, or by the fact that they had obviously both spent the day underground, or even by her new bond with Eric. Combined with the knowledge she had deliriously admitted to the previous evening, Olive simply knew too much about vampires for a regular human. But even before Olive Turned, she hadn't smelled like a witch or a were or any other kind of supe Eric was familiar with. As a vampire she still smelled of sweet spring blossoms and stone, with a new hint of sea salt. A remnant of Eric's own scent, of his blood and magic flowing through her veins. Eternally, she would smell of his claim.

Still musing to himself over what Olive's secret might be, Eric touched down in the front yard of his nest, a large house with a modern exterior at the edge of the city. While he, Pam, and Longshadow kept coffins in the back of Fangtasia for emergencies, he hardly lived at the nightclub. It wasn't nearly secure enough for him to feel comfortable taking his day rest there on a regular basis, not to mention that although the club was designed to appeal to the fantasies human fangbangers and tourists alike had about vampires. . . it didn't really suit the tastes of a creature as old as Eric. He could appreciate leather and chains and dim lighting as much as the next man, but he hardly wanted to be surrounded by gaudy vampire paraphernalia 24/7.

Eric deposited Olive gently onto the ground, watching with a faint amount of amusement as she tried to find her footing. She shot him a mild glare, and he chuckled. It was impressive that Olive was able to sense such slight emotions from him this early in their relationship. Their bond was wide open, of course, since it wasn't safe to separate a newborn vampire from their Maker-emotionally or physically. Young vampires relied upon their Makers for support and security, and closing the bond between them even partially could prove disastrous for the childe's development if done too early. Eric had kept his bond with Pam completely open for around a decade before he sensed that she was ready for greater emotional independence. Pam wasn't a particularly emotional being, however. Generally, she was very secure in her relationship with Eric, and only needed the occasional reassurance of his unconditional love and support. Though she had seemed a bit unsure at the prospect of Eric Turning a new progeny, both at the bar and when she'd come to help bury Eric and Olive, so maybe he'd open up their bond a little wider than usual until Olive settled into their lives more comfortably. He didn't want Pam to think that he loved her any less, just because the dynamics of their bloodline were about to change.

That reminded him, he'd have to call Godric soon. As the progenitor of their bloodline and a truly ancient vampire, he had no doubt sensed the addition of a new member to their family and would likely desire an explanation. Eric couldn't wait to introduce his Maker to his newest childe. The way he had felt last night, knowing that she had fought off three vampires at once with nothing but her wits and a silver dagger. . . that must have been how Godric had felt, watching Eric fight the night they met.

"So," Olive said suddenly, interrupting his musings on the glory of battle. "Vampires can fly. Gotta admit, that's a new one, even for me." She crossed her arms lightly over her stomach, vibrant green eyes glancing around rapidly as she assessed her surroundings, seemingly out of habit. That was a good instinct to have, and it would serve her well as a vampire, but Eric had to fight back a bout of ire at the thought of how such an impulse might have developed. He didn't want Olive to think he was angry with her.

"Not all vampires," Eric qualified, shaking off the instinctive anger at the thought of a threat to his progeny. "It's more of a skill than an innate ability, and it manifests almost exclusively in vampires that are at least 100 years old. Some can fly, some can only hover, most can't even get their feet off the ground." Carefully, broadcasting him movements, he placed a hand at the small of Olive's back and guided her towards the front door. She was tiny next to him, at least a full foot shorter than his towering height, and very slim. Had she gotten enough to eat as a human? No matter, she would never go hungry again. "It is a more common talent in our bloodline than in many others, however, so I wouldn't be surprised if you eventually develop the ability."

"Huh," Olive released softly, observing as Eric fished a key out of his pocket and unlocked the massive oak front door. "Any other superpowers I should expect to crawl out of the woodwork?" An odd rush of emotion reached Eric from her side of the bond as she spoke- trepidation, pain, anticipation, and reluctant amusement-and he paused for a split second in confusion. "Besides the usual ones, I mean," Olive clarified at his look.

That hadn't been what he was puzzled over, actually. That was a very strange cocktail of emotions, and Eric truly had no idea what to make of it. He could only assume it had something to do with the question of vampiric "superpowers," and possibly whatever this big secret was. Eric was flying blind with his own progeny, and that simply wasn't acceptable. At the same time, however, 1000 years worth of experience and instinct urged him not to press too hard. Olive was going to tell him the truth, one way or another, but evidently they had wandered into a topic of conversation that was full of emotional landmines. If Eric wanted Olive to confide in him voluntarily, he'd have to tread carefully. "The usual ones?" he probed delicately. How much did she know about vampires?

Olive looked up at him. They were close enough to one another that she had to crane her neck back to see his face. Eric pulled back slightly so that she'd be able to examine more than the underside of his chin. "Yeah," she said eventually. "You know, super strength, super speed, super. . . everything. Plus the, uh, the hypnosis thing you-um, we can do." Olive shook her head, looking a bit dazed. "Damn," she muttered, laughing a little incredulously and grinning up at Eric helplessly. "I can hypnotize people now."

"Yes," Eric confirmed, delight at her wonder warring with concern about the fact that yet again she knew something she shouldn't. Olive's smile waned a little as she felt Eric's worry. "And I certainly hope that ability serves you well. Though I must ask how precisely you came by that knowledge. The glamour, along with the healing capabilities of our blood, are well-guarded secrets of the vampire community. Yet somehow, you knew about both of them already," he pointed out carefully.

Olive sighed, and though Eric could faintly discern the nerves bubbling in her stomach, she didn't seem too anxious about this line of questioning, so he figured it was a relatively safe topic. "Yeah, I guess you'd have to be pretty obtuse not to pick up on the fact that I know more than I should, huh?" she said wryly. Eric chuckled in agreement, relieved that it seemed she would answer his implied question. The idea of interrogating his new childe left a bitter taste in his mouth. "I've had my fair share of run-ins with vampires," Olive confessed, scrubbing a hand through her mop of curls and grimacing when clumps of dried dirt and blood rained down onto the porch below their feet. "Friendly or otherwise. Some stuff I learned just through experience, some stuff was explained to me. . ." she trailed off and bit her lip, before seeming to come to a decision. "I actually, um, knew about vampires before last year," Olive admitted, glancing up at Eric through her eyelashes, as if either seeking approval or dreading his reaction.

Eric's eyebrows shot up in shock, but he tried to broadcast his appreciation for her honesty through their bond. It was a very good sign that she'd parted with that information willingly. "Thank you for telling me that," he said lowly. "But I have to admit I'm surprised that any vampire you met prior to the Great Revelation didn't simply glamour you to forget the interaction. Before we revealed ourselves to the world, it was actually a grave offense for a vampire to allow a human to keep any knowledge of our species," Eric explained.

Olive swallowed, and Eric could sense her struggling with herself. "Some of them tried to glamour me," she quietly confessed after a moment. She exhaled sharply through her nose, steeling herself, then met his eyes squarely. "It didn't really work."

Eric's mind blanked briefly, even as his senses flared suddenly in an instinctive measure to make sure no one was listening. If he'd known this was where their conversation was heading, he would never have allowed it to continue in such a vulnerable location. "Let's go inside," he murmured, pushing open the door and urging Olive through it even as he struggled to put the pieces together.

She couldn't be glamoured even before she was a vampire, which was very rare. As far as Eric knew, the only humanoid species besides vampires that couldn't be glamoured were the fae and all variations thereupon-including demons. But they were meant to be largely extinct, and while Olive had smelled nice before she Turned, it had hardly been the unnaturally appealing scent faeries were said to possess. Nor, certainly, the nearly sulfuric smell of a demonic presence. What else could it be, though? Not a faerie, not a demon. . . there were some reported cases of mediums resisting glamouring, especially when they were possessed. Eric's stomach dropped as Olive's questions about "superpowers" took on a whole new set of implications.

"Eric?" Olive called hesitantly. Eric turned from where he'd been mindlessly locking the front door behind them to find her huddled in the entryway, limbs held tight to her body and eyes glittering nervously. "Is-are you mad?" she blurted, before immediately clamping her mouth shut. She didn't like that she cared about the answer, Eric could tell. She probably wasn't used to having people whose opinions mattered to her.

"No," he assured, reaching out to gently clasp her upper arms, cradling her shoulders between his hands. If her arms hadn't been pressed so closely to her sides, Eric got the feeling he would have been able to encircle her biceps completely. He brushed his thumbs over her collarbones softly, transmitting calm through their bond, and felt her relax automatically into his touch. "Can I. . . assume that this has something to do with whatever it was you wanted to tell me?" he asked quietly.

She exhaled a slightly shaky laugh. Eric could sense anxiety building in her gut, and carefully squashed it down with several firm waves of reassurance. He was Olive's Maker. No matter what this was about, he would deal with it. And Eric knew intrinsically that if he got through this conversation without any major blunders, he would manage to secure Olive's trust. "Yeah," Olive admitted. She bit her lip, quirking an eyebrow sardonically. "Nothing gets past you, huh?"

Cheeky. Eric approved. He smirked. "Not much, no," he agreed cheerfully, and Olive's tense features melted into a miniscule smile. A sudden pang of hunger echoed along their bond, and Eric realized with no small amount of surprise and pride that Olive had been repressing her need to feed all this time. That was very impressive, for a newborn. At any given moment, around 45% of a young vampire's consciousness was usually devoted to the urge to hunt. More, if they hadn't fed recently. Olive was brand new, fresh out of the grave. Not even a single drop of blood had touched her lips, she must have been starving. . . yet she was able to put her hunger out of mind to the point that Eric couldn't sense it through their bond. Pride surged throughout the Viking. His progeny was a natural. "Let's get you something to eat," he insisted, grinning broadly. Olive seemed perplexed by his sudden giddiness, but her eagerness at the thought of blood (and her confusion at that eagerness) stopped her from questioning it. "We can continue this conversation in the kitchen, once you have some blood in you." Her wellbeing was Eric's priority, even though his curiosity was growing by the minute.

Eric ushered Olive through his nest, toward the kitchen at the back of the house, watching with idle amusement and a surprising amount of fondness as she examined her surroundings. The house's exterior may have been modern and angular-even somewhat harsh-but inside was awash with deep, warm colors and rich, dark wood. Much of the furniture was hand carved by either Godric or Eric himself, and large furs and pelts were arranged tastefully, yet comfortably over plush leather couches and chairs. Pam's touch was most evident in other areas of the house, such as the sleek guest bedrooms upstairs and the luxurious bathrooms, but she could be felt clearly in the main living area as well, whether it be in the delicate drape of the expensive, embroidered curtains that concealed the front windows, the clean and sophisticated lines of the seldom-used stone fireplace, or-most obviously-the fashion magazines scattered across the heavy coffee table. The table, like all of the wooden furniture in the nest, had been carved out from a single tree, not pieced together from separate parts. Accordingly, it was far too thick and sturdy to be easily broken up for the purpose of making wooden weapons.

Olive slowed as they passed the cushy green armchair Pam liked to sit in when she read, hovering for a moment with a furrowed brow before inhaling deeply. She blinked, something unidentifiable passing behind her eyes. "Someone else lives here," she said with surety. "I can. . . smell them."

For some reason, Eric wasn't convinced that her sense of smell had been all that told Olive the nest had another inhabitant. Setting that aside however, Eric could tell the idea of a stranger living in her Maker's nest-a place her instincts would be telling Olive was hers, at least in part-made Olive a little nervous, so he didn't hesitate to put her mind to rest. "That would be my firstborn, Pamela," he explained. "Your sister," Eric elaborated when Olive didn't feel too reassured.

Eric felt Olive's heart leap with nervous hope and excitement. "Sister," she murmured, shooting Eric a wry smile. "I don't really understand that one either."

Eric barked out a laugh. "Oh, Pam doesn't either," he grinned. "That one, the two of you will have to learn about together." More genuinely, he added, "She's a little prickly, but I think she'll like you. . . once she lets herself, anyway."

Olive raised an eyebrow in confusion before her expression suddenly cleared. "Ah," she said understandingly. "Jealous of the new baby?"

Remembering how Pam had phrased it the exact same way the previous evening, Eric chortled again. "Yes, you'll get along just fine," he asserted. "And here we are," he said a moment later as they finally rounded the corner of the stairway and entered the kitchen. It was an immense, brightly lit space, fully stocked with kitchen tools in case any of Eric's guests ever brought human companions. Nearly a quarter of one wall was taken up by an enormous stainless steel refrigerator, which was packed to brim with Tru Blood (Eric never drank it, but Pam did sometimes, as well as the occasional visitor) and bagged donor blood. Eric got Olive settled on a barstool and moved to the fridge. "It's admirable that you were able to identify Pam's scent as that of another vampire, rather than just a part of the house. Her scent is rather ingrained, after all. How could you tell?" he asked, mostly to distract Olive from her hunger while he dug around in the refrigerator for a bag of every blood type that he could find.

"Um," Olive began hesitantly. Eric would have to break her of that habit. It wouldn't do for a vampire, let alone his childe to sound so uncertain. Luckily, he got the feeling that it was mostly the personal nature of their relationship that made her so uneasy. Based on what he'd seen of the aftermath of the fight last night, Eric expected that Olive never hesitated when it really mattered. "Yeah, her. . . scent is kind of everywhere, but it doesn't really seem like the kind of smell that should be coming from this house naturally, you know?" She paused, and Eric made an encouraging noise even as he groped for the lone bag of B-negative he knew was at the back of the refrigerator. Emboldened, Olive pressed on. "Her scent is kind of. . . sharp, I guess? Like citrus and. . . peppermint, maybe? But it's not chemically or artificial, so I knew it wasn't, like, a cleaning product or something." Eric knew exactly what Olive was describing. Pamela's scent was permanently embedded somewhere in his hindbrain, after all, alongside Godric's, and now Olive's. Pam also smelled faintly of pine, an aspect of his own scent that lingered in her blood, just as Olive now smelled lightly of sea salt and Eric's scent carried the same woody warmth of his own Maker's. These familiar scents passing from Maker to childe served to closer bind members of a bloodline together. If, for example, Olive were to meet Godric now, they would each be able to smell Eric on the other, and they would know that they were connected by blood. Eric supposed that Olive's nose wasn't yet skilled enough to differentiate between Pam's pine scent and Eric's, which was also suffused throughout the house. Still, it was very good for a newborn.

"Nicely done," he complimented sincerely, and felt Olive perk up unconsciously. Finally grasping the last bag of that he needed, Eric turned around with an armful of blood, shutting the refrigerator behind him. He settled beside Olive at the bar and began laying out each bag in front of her. Remarkably, she didn't lunge for the blood, though her eyes remained locked on the plastic bags as her hunger surged suddenly to the forefront of their bond. Her fangs dropped with an audible snick. "All right, we've got both positive and negative types of A and O, AB-positive, and a little bit of B-negative." As he spoke, Eric indicated which blood type was which, and where on the donor bag Olive could find information about the species, blood type, virginity, sex, and age of the donor, and any pre-existing medical conditions the donor might have (not that Eric's donors were every anything but squeaky clean). He reached across the bar and grabbed a stack of shot glasses, placing one in front of each bag of blood. "You should try some of each to see which ones you like most and least. I favor AB, Pam prefers A, and we both like O. On the other hand, neither of us are overly fond of B in any form, which is why we have so little of it. These things tend to follow the bloodline, so your tastes will probably be similar." A strange moment of understanding and something like satisfaction broke Olive out of her hunger briefly, and a small smirk spread across her lips. Hmm. Curious. Never before had Eric wished quite so much that he could read his progeny's mind. Eager to hurry things along, Eric opened the valve at the end of each bag and poured a little into their respective shot glasses, before gesturing for Olive to begin. The sooner she fed, the sooner they could clear the air.

Olive snatched the first shot glass-A-positive-and downed it, barely slowing before she moved on to the next. As Eric had predicted, she liked the O well enough, grimaced slightly when she reached the B-neg, and released a small moan of pleasure when the AB touched her lips. She finally came up for air, slowing down and running her tongue along the inside of the shot glass with a pleased hum, fangs clicking against the rim. Eric smirked as a faint thread of arousal reached him through their bond, Olive's scent sweetening with lust simultaneously. His own pants tightened slightly, but he didn't allow himself to react beyond that. Feeding and fucking were intrinsically linked for vampires, each a primal need in and of itself, and it was common, even encouraged, for a newborn vampire's first sexual experience post-Turning to be with their Maker, who would be able to help them understand and control their new urges and instincts. But for all that Olive professed to have experience with "Lovers," Eric knew that she didn't need him advancing on her in that way right now.

Later, however. . .

Eric nudged the bag of AB-positive closer to Olive and stood. "Finish that," he instructed, picking up and resealing the other bags to return them to the refrigerator. He left the O-positive behind as well, since that had seemed to be her next-favorite. "I'll heat you up some more. It's even better when it's hot." He winked over his shoulder at her, snagging two more bags of AB from the fridge and moving towards the electric stove to warm them in a pot of hot water. The microwave was fine for Tru Blood, since it was garbage anyway, but it stripped nutrients from donor blood just like it stripped them from human food. And as a newborn, Olive needed all the nutrients she could get. Eric turned away from the stove top after he got things set up, leaning against the counter and crossing his arms to watch Olive pick up the remaining AB blood eagerly. "Don't bite it," he ordered when it looked like she'd do just that. She shot him an irritated glare, but obeyed. Good. "Your fangs are harder to use then you'd think. Don't try to bite anything until I teach you. You can pour that into a glass or drink it from the tube," Eric advised, nodding towards the bag.

Impatiently, Olive brought the bag to her lips, sucking hard on the tube that would normally connect the blood bag to an IV. She gulped the blood down through it as if the tube were a straw, instinctively massaging the bag to get the blood flowing easier, expression blissful. Eric watched proudly as she fed. Quickly, Olive finished the first bag and moved on to the O-positive. She drank with slightly less gusto, but still enthusiastically, and by the time she reached the end of the second bag, she seemed much calmer. Her hunger receded back to a corner of her mind that Eric could only just sense. She wanted more, he could tell. But she could wait, if she had to.

"Your self-control is impressive," Eric said, fishing the warmed blood bags out of the water gingerly. He passed one to Olive, smiling at her surprise when the hot bag didn't burn her hands. Eric showed her how to twist the valve off the end by demonstrating with his own, then sat down beside her so they could feed together. Communal feeding was an important bonding experience for young vampires. It would be better with a live donor, but bagged blood would do for now. "We might be able to move on to feeding from the vein quicker than I thought."

Olive grimaced, eyes going distant for half a second. A peculiar sensation raced across their bond, one he'd noticed a couple of times earlier in the evening as well. It was like an echo of an emotion. The faintest impression of anger, lust, excitement rushed through Olive's mind. She wasn't feeling it actively, Eric didn't think, but the emotions were somehow there, just on the edge of her consciousness. "Maybe not," Olive grumbled. "I'd kill someone if I tried it now."

Hmm. Eric examined her. "That bothers you?" he asked.

Olive snorted. "No. I've killed people before." She glanced up at Eric, an odd spark of humor in her eye. "Killed someone last night," she pointed out. He dipped his head, conceding the point and smiling at how satisfied she was with herself. "I don't really have a problem with that. . . which is why I'd kill anyone I tried to feed from right now. If I didn't have a problem with killing people to ensure my own survival when I was human, I definitely wouldn't have a problem doing it now. And I've uh, got a feeling people are kind of just gonna look like food to me for a while, so if I tried to eat one I'd. . . well I'd probably eat a little too much. And I don't want to make trouble for you," she finished with a sheepish little shrug.

Oh, she was going to be glorious.

Eric smirked, pleased with her admission of bloodlust. Olive was going to make a fantastic vampire, he was sure of it. "It wouldn't be too much trouble," he insisted, bumping her shoulder. "But we can wait a couple days, if you're so sure. Though," he said warningly, "you will have to learn eventually."

Olive nodded agreeably, nursing her third blood bag. A long moment of quiet spread throughout the kitchen, broken only by the crinkle of plastic and the low, slight sounds of Olive and Eric drinking. Eric observed as his progeny lightly traced the swirls of white and gray in the black marble bartop, feeling the tension begin to build in her gut again as it became clear to them both that the moment for frank discussion was upon them.

Should he begin? It might help encourage her to speak up, but Eric didn't quite know what this conversation was going to be about. He could hazard a guess that it had something to do with why Olive couldn't be glamoured, but beyond that he only had inferences to guide him. Had she been a medium, and wanted to talk about whether or not she would still be able to commune with the spirits now that she was a vampire? Or was it something else entirely? How deeply embedded in the supernatural community had Olive been even before she Turned?

Olive interrupted his thoughts, speaking up to begin the conversation herself, though it was clear she wasn't fully prepared to do so. "I know that vampires are usually encouraged to let go of their human lives, to better embrace this whole idea of. . . rebirth, of a second chance. But I, um, I think mine was different enough that it's. . . probably still gonna be important." She swallowed, pressing her eyes closed briefly before she inhaled deeply, needlessly, bracingly. Her hands spasmed with anxiety, and she squeezed them into a tight fist. Carefully, Eric slid his own hand over the counter to cradle hers. He swept his thumb comfortingly over her knuckles, sensing that an interjection would not be welcome at this point. Olive turned her own hand over to grasp his tightly, and powered forward. "In fact, I know it's going to be important, because when I was human I was little bit psychic and now I think I'm a lotta bit psychic and keep having these weird mini-visions wherever I think about things too hard even though I never had those before and-"

"Whoa," Eric interrupted, putting up a hand. Okay, she had powered forward a little too quickly. He had gotten the gist of it, of course, but a lot of details were missing. What he had heard. . . well, it was already sounding like something Eric wasn't sure he quite knew how to deal with. Visions? What the hell? "Back up," he encouraged. "A little slower this time. Step by step."

Olive took another unnecessary breath. "Sorry," she muttered. "I've, uh, I've never told anyone about this before," she admitted.

Against his will, Eric's cold, undead heart warmed a little. "Well then, I'm glad I'm your first." He winked suggestively.

Olive rolled her eyes in a seemingly involuntary reaction, but Eric felt her relaxing minutely, just as he'd intended. "My mother was a psychic medium," she confessed after a scant second's hesitation. Ah, so he'd been on the right track, at least. Nice to know he hadn't lost his touch. "The genuine article," Olive assured him, as if afraid he had been about to speak up in protest at the very idea. "She could commune with spirits, speak to them, channel them. . ." Olive trailed off. "Though usually it felt more like she was being possessed than anything as benign as channeling," she said bitterly, rubbing at her wrists in an unconscious movement. Eric didn't love the implications of that, but Olive continued with her story before he could question her. "I didn't. . . I didn't inherit her abilities. Not really. But there was something. . . special about me, and I always knew that, even if I didn't want to admit it." She sighed gustily, extracting her hands from Eric's in order to rub them briskly over her own face.

"You were 'a little bit psychic?'" Eric prompted delicately, trying to project heartening emotions towards her.

Olive gave him a dry look, clearly feeling what he was up to. "I always hated that word," she said. "But yeah. I have this sort of. . . hyperactive, hyper accurate instinct. Almost like a sixth sense, but. . . more, I guess. That's why the glamour never worked, I think," Olive clarified. "I would hear what they said, I could feel them trying to influence me. . . but my instinct always told me that something was wrong. That I didn't actually want to do what they told me. That I shouldn't." She paused, clearly anticipating. . . something. Probably for him to react negatively, or disbelievingly, but Eric was too old to be so narrow-minded.

No, Eric was intrigued. This was far from the strangest thing he'd ever heard of, but it was still fairly unique. More importantly, however, it sounded like his progeny was still experiencing the effects of this sixth sense-to whatever degree-which meant he had to pay close attention. Abruptly, it became clear precisely why Olive had been asking whether or not vampires had any other special abilities; she wanted to know if hers would stick out.

Olive seemed to find something about Eric's reaction reassuring, because she continued quickly. "It, uh, it operated on a couple of different levels when I was human." Eric noted the qualifier, and recalled the connotations of her initial awkward ramble on the subject. Something was different now that Olive was a vampire. "It was like, on one level it was always active, and I would just get this really deep gut feeling whenever something was wrong. Like if a specific person was bad news, or if someone was watching me or following me," she listed. "I would have put it down to solid intuition, except it's never been wrong. Plus I always, always know when someone's lying to me."

Eric quirked an eyebrow. "Always?" he drawled jokingly. He didn't disbelieve her, but he was kind of interested to see this particular party trick.

Incredibly, Olive's nerves dwindled sharply at the friendly challenge. "Yeah," she said, putting on a veneer of false arrogance and jutting out her chin with a smirk. "Always." She narrowed her eyes playfully. "Two truths and a lie, lightning round!" She threw down the gauntlet. "Go!"

Grinning broadly at how comfortable she suddenly seemed, Eric complied. "When I lived, I was a Viking king, I personally saw to it that Elizabeth I was not in fact the Virgin Queen, and I have never been to the top of the Eiffel Tower."

"Ha! Easy," Olive proclaimed, leaning in to shoot him a falsely pitying smile. "You wish Elizabeth had put out, but she was too classy for the likes of you."

Eric laughed loudly in agreement, remembering how the formidable woman had turned him down cold. It was humbling to be refused every now and then. "You got me there," he chuckled.

Olive's grin diminished slightly as much of her humor left her, but Eric noted with satisfaction that her anxiety did not return. "Yeah, I did," she said quietly. She reached out and swiped a finger through some of the blood lingering on the rim of one of the shot glasses before idly sucking it clean. "Like I said, I always know." Olive sighed again, quieter this time, and pressed her palm to Eric's once more. Her hands were half the size of his. She glanced at him, biting her lip. "Is. . . this okay?" She sounded so very young.

Eric met Olive's eyes steadily. She really didn't know what any of the things Eric had promised her meant, he realized. She knew nothing about family, about the kind of love and loyalty Eric had vowed to show her. Olive had a lot to learn. But for now. . . "Whatever you need," he said, squeezing her fingers gently.

Her expression didn't chance, but he felt it when her heart lightened in relief. "Okay, so," Olive rushed to continue. "That's sort of the uh, the most basic level my. . . psychicness," she made a face, "operated on before I Turned. But sometimes it would also, like, tell me to do things? As in, apropos of nothing, it would suddenly make itself known and tell me to duck, or to turn right instead of left, or that I shouldn't stay at the motel where I was planning to stop. That kind of stuff. And then later I'd find out that if I'd turned left I would have encountered a massive riot, or that there was asbestos in the walls of the motel, or something. Or it would tell me to do something that then led to a positive outcome. Like a couple weeks ago," she said leadingly, a small smile turning up the corners of her lips. "When I got the sudden urge to start making my way south towards Shreveport. . ."

Stomach swooping, Eric remembered the feeling of the Maker's Call as it had tugged him insistently towards Olive the previous night, letting him know that nearby there was someone. . . perfect for him. And Olive had experienced that too, in a way, her trusted instinct pulling her towards Eric even as a sacred rite urged him closer to her.

Eric had left many of his beliefs behind as the world changed around him, but for a moment he couldn't help but feel as though the Norns themselves had surely carved their meeting into the branches of Yggdrasil, or written it in the stars and the sea. Eric would never be able to put words to this feeling, but he could still express his gratitude to Olive that somehow, through some miracle, she had chosen him as much as he had chosen her. Slowly, he lifted their joined hands and pressed a reverent kiss to their tangled fingers. "Thank you," he murmured.

Olive swallowed heavily, and nodded. She reached up to clasp her other hand around Eric's. "I think I'm getting a little more out of this than you are," she whispered.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that."

Olive was shaking her head before he even finished the sentence. "You would have been fine without me," she said with surety, eyes glazing over again as those same, strangely distant emotions reverberated throughout their bond. Eric assumed that was her having a . . . "mini-vision," and wondered a little uneasily what exactly she had just seen. "Not great, maybe, but fine. I'd. . ." She blinked. "Huh. Well, I guess I'd be dead."

Eric's own instincts roared with fury at the thought. "Unacceptable," he gritted out, and Olive jolted in surprise.

"Relax," she said, patting his hand in a clumsy attempt at reassurance. "I'm not any deader than you are," Olive joked. When Eric's glower failed to lift, she coughed a little awkwardly and moved on. "Right. Well, anyway there's uh, one more way my. . . sixth sense worked before, and I'd say it's the most. . . complicated." Olive pursed her lips thoughtfully, seeming to struggle to put the concept into words. "It's weird, cause it happened so internally that it's hard to describe. But I guess I'd say that if I had. . . a problem to deal with, or a decision to make, or anything along those lines, I could kind of. . . ask myself what I should do? Or, what would happen if I did this vs. that, or which option leads to a better outcome. And my instinct would answer." Olive shook her head slightly, drumming her fingers on the countertop. "Sometimes the answer would just an urge to pick one option over the other, but sometimes I'd get. . . little details. Stuff there's no way I should have known, you know?"

Eric didn't, but his interest in the question managed to drive away his anger at the thought of Olive's death in a way that her unpracticed reassurance had not. "Give me an example?" he prodded, fascinated.

Olive hummed in thought, brows furrowed, before her eyes suddenly lit up. "Okay so, last night, when those vampires were chasing me, I thought about ducking into this strip club across the street to get away from them. The one I told you about, remember?" she prompted. Eric did, of course, and he supposed he was about to get an answer to this particular question at last. "So I was sort of scoping out my options, and I asked my instinct what would happen if I went into the club," Olive explained. "And I just suddenly knew that if I went in, the vampires would follow me, and then there would be a big fight because some of the people who work there run a V business on the side, and they have silver weapons and wooden bullets. If I'd gone in there, it wouldn't have ended well for anybody," she said earnestly. "I didn't. . . see it exactly, and it's not like there's a little voice whispering this stuff to me inside my head, I just. . . knew. And that's just about the most amount of detail I ever got out of my intuition." Olive sighed, tipping her head back in frustration, and the sigh gradually transitioned into a low groan. "Before, anyway," she tacked on, complaining bitterly.

Eric cocked his head slowly, understanding dawning. "Because now you're 'a lotta bit psychic,'" he quoted. "Right?"

Olive blew out an unhappy breath. She sure did breathe a lot. Ah well, she was only new. Most vampires stopped habitually breathing by the time they turned 20. "Yeah," she griped. If Eric hadn't been able to sense the thread of genuine anxiety she felt at the thought, he would have believed her to be only mildly inconvenienced. But it must have been nerve-wracking to wake from a dramatic transformation, only to find a crucial tool you had relied upon for years altered in some unpredictable manner. Particularly at a moment in which one's instincts would be so important. "It's like Turning gave my instincts a shot of steroids or something," Olive elaborated, the pitch of her voice raising slightly in distress. "Not only do I have a new set of crazy vampire instincts growling at the back of my head all the time, but I'm getting all these. . . flashes of things. Images and sounds and even smells, every time I so much as even passively ask myself a question! Or think about something for a second too long!" Seemingly unconsciously, she started to jostle her leg rhythmically in agitation. Eric allowed it for a moment before reaching out to still her by placing a firm hand on her thigh. Obediently, she ceased, though her frown told him plainly she wasn't thrilled about it. Olive gripped the barstool between her splayed legs, leaning forward and curling her head toward her chest. "And a lot of it. . . it's not even immediate," she confessed, and this time she sounded truly scared. Eric didn't like it at all.

"What do you mean?" he questioned carefully.

Olive squeezed the stool hard enough that Eric worried the metal frame might warp beneath her slender fingers. "When I first woke up," she began, voice low, "I wanted to know if I could trust you. I felt like I should. . ." Olive said helplessly, as if afraid he'd be offended or hurt. But Eric remembered the confusion and distrust he'd felt when he awoke after Turning and found himself bound inextricably with Godric. He could hardly begrudge Olive her own worries. "But everything I've ever learned told me that trusting some guy I'd only just met would be the height of stupidity! And when I went to check whether I really could trust you. . ." Olive shook her head disbelievingly. "Christ, I can't believe I'm saying this," she muttered, "but first it was like there was this little voice telling me I could-which has never happened before-and then I. . . I saw all these things." She rubbed at her forehead, digging her fingers into her hair. "Things that had to have been. . . months from now, at least! I mean, your hair was so long! And some of it had nothing to do with what I was wondering about, and it was all so. . . so clear. Vivid. Like nothing that's ever happened before." Olive knotted her digits into her curls and yanked. Eric reached forward hurriedly, disentangling her fingers with his own.

"Don't do that," he said sternly. He examined Olive's face, lifting a thumb to rub away the stressed crinkles on her forehead. Really, he had no idea what to say, or how to reassure her. "Do you want to tell me about what you saw?"

Olive shook her head after only the briefest consideration. "Not right now," she said quietly. "I just. . ." She looked up at Eric, meeting his eyes desperately. Despite himself, Eric nearly smiled. His childe's distress was nothing to be happy about. . . but she was looking to him for help, the same expression on her face that Pam gave him when she wanted him to fix things. "I just feel like when I became a vampire everything got. . . amped up. If my instinct had three levels before, it's like everything bumped up by one step," Olive disclosed. "What used to be level one feels more like level two now, and level two is more like level three. Which means that level three. . ."

"Would be like nothing you've ever experienced before," Eric realized what had clearly been weighing on Olive's mind for a while. "If you're already having what sound essentially like small instances of clairvoyance-" Olive winced, and Eric shot her an apologetic glance, "-without even consciously seeking input from your sixth sense, then who knows what will happen when you. . . ask it for advice, as you put it earlier."

"Exactly," Olive said, voice small. "And I just. . . don't really know what to do. Are there. . . I mean, does stuff like this usually happen to vampires?"

Eric considered the question, wracking his brains for anything he'd learned in his thousand years of life that might help his progeny now. "It's not uncommon for particular human abilities to be enhanced to preternatural levels when humans become vampires," he mused. "But usually that manifests more along the lines of a very strong human becoming an unnaturally strong vampire," Eric admitted. "Most witches and psychics actually lose their abilities when they Turn. Although," he said, voice rich with dawning realization. In front of him, Olive perked up, a delicate tendril of hope taking root in her chest. "There is. . . one person I can think of."

As if on cue, Eric's phone took that moment to buzz with an incoming text message. He extracted it from his pocket, brushing some dirt off of it to better see the screen. "Speak of the devil," he said, shaking his head. "She always knows."

"Who?" Olive asked, voice urgent.

"The Ancient Pythoness," Eric said, mouth twisting wryly. "A most ancient and revered vampire, and the only one I can think of who maintained any psychic ability after becoming a vampire. Or perhaps I should say prophetic ability." Eric glanced up at Olive, smirking at her confused frown. "You might know her better as the Oracle of Delphi."

A/N: So the Ancient Pythoness is a canon character in the books, and she has an important role to play in this story. I hope you enjoyed this monstrous chapter, and all the relationship building I managed to squeeze in. I swear to God this story is gonna be about family even if I have to beat the plot into submission with my bare hands.

As ever, thanks for reading, and let me know what you think!