A/N: Well, hellooooo my darlings! *puts on le pimp hat* I am super-beyond-excited to pimp out the new SVM contest that I'm co-hosting with nycsnowbird!!! Here's the spiel:

THE DEAD PAN CONTEST: It's an SVM contest with a twist. We're looking for your best parodies set in the SVM/TB universe that is Eric-centric, preferably with E/S as lead characters. Your parody can be culled from books, TV, films or even cartoons. How fun is that? You get to play the casting couch game, with your favorite Viking! Get more deets here:

http://www . fanfiction . net/~deadpancontest (take out the spaces for link to work)

And, don't forget to sign up for alerts for the story, Barmaid, there's a fly in my spoof, so you can get alerts for entries as they get published :)

ACT II
THE TASTE OF KNOWLEDGE IS UNDERSTANDING


He had warned her. Quietly, but loud enough for the curious human to hear.

"Don't use words you don't understand."

She all but ignored him. Her eyes widened and dilated, the hair rising in warning.

Run. Hide.

But she was a fighter, so she persisted. She tried to understand him, but it was in human terms.

Another warning. Don't push the immortal god through the sieve of mortality. You'll never make him fit.

But his warnings were delivered in something that started as a growl, yet ended up closer to a purr. Because he wasn't quite certain if he was pissed off or turned on, disgusted or intrigued.

She had not earned the privilege yet to understand him, and he resisted the urge to see her.

He did not want to understand her; he wanted to have her.

But then, just hours later, he was advancing toward her and the lover who was so desperate to hold onto her, knowing that he'd already lost her. Eric taunts both of them, telling her that one day maybe she would get to understand.

Because he does want her understanding. And because he would have her. It was only a matter of time, and he had plenty of that.

He laughed with his eyes, barely able to contain his amusement, knowing that Bill's house of cards would soon come crashing down on his head – and that he would have a front row seat to the show. He looked on as she begged her lover for answers that she was probably better off not knowing.

When she turned her blazing fury on the Viking, he loved it.

So, he teased her with the truth, all the while riling her up by dressing it up as a playful flirt. Hell, maybe it was both. But that was beside the point.

When he told her that she might someday find out just how strong the bond is between a child and his maker, he did it for the sheer pleasure of seeing Bill shake in his boots, knowing that Lorena, and the truth, were just around the corner.

Watching the show was highly entertaining. But, little did he know, the tables would soon be turned.

He rushes past the sniveling idiot, and speeds up the stairs.

The night is already receding.

Godric is staring into the sky, only acknowledging Eric with a slight shift in the muscles of his back.

Finally, Godric turns to his child, looking into his eyes for an eternal moment, and then turns right back around to face the starless sky.

He is beyond words.

Eric watches the determined line of his maker's shoulders. Waiting, even though time is running out.

At last, Godric's words pierce the silence with a quiet, irrevocable finality. "Two thousand years is enough."

Eric's anger and pain shoots through his body, his jaw flexing as he tries to contain it. His arms are stiff at his sides, held with such unnatural uneasiness. "I can't accept this," he growls through clenched teeth, his voice rising with anger. "It's insanity."

Godric keeps his gaze on the lightening sky. He makes room for his child's outburst, but answers with a deadly calm. "Our existence is insanity."

He finally allows himself to meet his child's gaze, the silence aching, but no more than the wound he must now deliver. He can no longer protect his child from the burden that has drowned him, "We don't belong here."

There is no room to disagree, but Eric is determined to make room. He'll tear it out if he has to.

So he rushes forward, kicking and screaming. "But we are here!"

"It's not right!" Godric snaps back, now turning to face him full on. "We're not right."

So quiet. So decided. So done.

Eric's voice now lowers, coming out small but desperate. He has to get Godric to see, to understand.

"You taught me there is no right and wrong," he whispers, pausing to give the words the space they demand, "Only survival." He pauses again, the length and weight of the silence excruciating and thick and raw. His mouth opens, almost taking an unnecessary breath, as his lips struggle to curl around the word that he cannot, does not want to face. Because if he does, it will be real.

At last, he squeezes it out. Though it costs him, shaking him to the core. "Or death."

"I told a lie," Godric looks away as he bites down on the bitter pill, but raises his gaze to meet his child's once again, "as it turns out."

How could he have been so wrong? How could it have all gone so wrong?

Eric's anger flares up. After an eternity of nights, suddenly, there is no time—not enough to convince his maker, anyway.

Eric cannot accept this. He won't. He advances, snarling out the words through clenched teeth. But his body, his conviction, is already bending. "I will keep you alive by force."

They stare at each other for a stolen beat, suspended in time even as it slides away.

Sadness seeps into Godric's eyes, his lips twitching into a matching line of sorrow.

It's another verse of the same song.

"Even if you could," he implores, "why would you be so cruel?"

Godric's beautiful, angelic lips spread into a heartbreaking un-smile—sad where it should be sweet; an apology wrapped in a plea.

He knows Eric could never be so cruel, and just what it'll cost him. He wishes that he could pay his child's way, but knows Eric must shoulder this burden on his own.

Eric's face crumples, his mouth twisting into a bitter smile that is the death of a world. His world. His eyes roll back in his head, and he looks to the heavens that don't hold one star, one light, one hope.

He chokes and stumbles.

"Godric," he sobs, as he sinks back to their old language. "Gör det inte!" His voice has warped into a high pitch that would grate on his nerves, if they hadn't all just been destroyed—numbed and crushed.

"Vi har haft århundraden av kärlek och tillit till varandra," Godric almostwhispers, staring into Eric's eyes.

Godric's eyes flutter with the finality of the words, as he tries to bury them deep, deep into Eric. Deep enough for safekeeping; deep enough thatthey will never be unearthed.

These truths they will both carry with them for their eternities.

Eric's face and body contort with silent sobs. He smiles a sad, terrified un-smile, his shoulders and jaw muscles clenching and heaving, shaking and crumbling, as the blood begins to spill.

"Snälla," he cries out, "snälla."

Ravaged and destroyed as the truth rips into him, as understanding pours out of him, he falls to the ground. The cement beneath him is cold and hard and real, the rough texture of it digging into his knees. He welcomes it.

He remains in the pose of supplication, but refuses to utter the prayer that will be discarded, or look up at the god who will not answer them.

His knees bleed as his body slumps. His body bends toward his maker and he tries to lay his head in his lap, even though Godric is standing upright. He is so close, but getting farther every second.

"Snälla, Godric!" he pleads, as his voice gives out.

The tears burn as they slide down his cheeks.

Godric stares into the distance somewhere above Eric's shoulder, not yet able to meet his eyes.

"Fader."

"Broder."

"Son."

The silence that punctuates each word rips through Eric anew, raising him up even as it tears him down.

Eric's sobs now pierce the silence, the coming day. Godric takes a deep, calming breath, and gazes down at his child's golden head and the wilting body beneath it. "Let me go."

Eric takes his own deep breath, and raises his head, meeting his maker's call as two blood trails stain his cheeks.

But he still can't look at Godric, as he tries to swallow it, tries to accept it. His body convulses with the taste of it. He opens his mouth, gulping in the air audibly. He makes his decision with a determined flexing of his jaw. "I won't let you die alone."

I will walk with you through the world, through the dark, just like I promised I would.

But not out of the world; not through the light.

Godric nods silently, consumed by the sadness, the pain he must inflict. "Yes, you will."

Eric bows his head again. His shoulders are quivering as the loud sobs rip through him.

I will be your companion. Your right. Your wrong. Your world.

Godric places his hand on that beautiful golden head—the one that's lit the infinite dark, dark nights of his immortality, and slides his fingers down to curl around the strong neck. His grasp consoles even as it commands. It is not cruel or compassionate, right or wrong. It is beyond all that. It takes without asking, gives without judging.

He waits for Eric to lift his head and meet his eyes again. They stare, in silence, an eternity between them.

What are you waiting for? Kill me.

"As your Maker," he says, a brave smile curling his lips as he swallows hard at the unspoken goodbyes. They are beyond the power of words. "I command you."

He nods an assurance, pouring his strength into Eric.

Eric gulps down the tears. He breaks, but only the traitorous muscles of his eyes give it away.

What's in it for me?

He rises to his full height, unwilling but with the grace that he and his maker—and this moment—deserve.

Godric lets go, but his hand pauses—hovering so close, but already beyond his grasp. He reaches for his world one last time, for one last touch.

What you love most – life.

Eric opens his mouth for a moment—but there are no words. And the force of his maker's words now pull him away. Eric's eyes sink for an excruciating moment, before he wrenches his head, and then his body, away.

He turns his back, defeated. He can't bear to watch Godric get farther away as his feet carry him off. This is where he'll keep him. Within arm's length, just almost close enough to hold onto.

Liv.

But his eyes betray him, and he steals one more look as he reaches the edge, the final drop.

Godric has already let go—he is looking toward the sun, a world away.

A warm hand grasps his own, pulling Eric back to the edge. He teeters, and she gives him the only treasure that she has to give. They both know it's gold. He nods, focusing on her, trying to hang onto and let go of all that's slipping from his strong, determined grasp.

She lets go.

But as she walks toward Godric, even as his feet propel him away, he can't help but take one final, greedy glance at what will never be his. Ever. And wonders if it ever really was.

He resists the pull of his maker's command for as long as he can, holding on for another splinter of a second, as his world falls away.

But momentum can only be deferred for so long. It must always be paid back. With interest.

The hard, unforgiving laws of physics smash and batter Eric, pulling him under into their brutal undertow, and he can only stare at his feet as they pull him down. Down the stairs. Down the hall. Farther and farther away.

He knows this, so he lets the force pull him back into the trajectory that he's resisted, wondering when the impact of his disobedience will hit.

The world doesn't divulge a clue that anything is not what it should be. The pulse is strong and steady as ever.

He once prized the speed with which the world moved, not stopping for anything or anyone. Now it destroys him.

His feet don't stop their uncontrollable movement until he is in the room, with the door shut behind him. He leans against it and slides down, crumpling to the floor.

He flattens his body against the door, wanting to get as near to Godric as possible. For the first time in a millennium, he isn't strong enough to take what he desires, and it burns him.

So he folds into himself, and shuts his eyes as the sorrow paints red trails down his cheeks and chest.

He reaches out for the familiar steady, quiet whisper that is his maker's calming presence through the bond—but it has twisted and changed. It is sadness and dread, magnified by an infinity.

But beneath it, there is a shining, humming, fearless fire; a tiny, mortal, hopeful mutter, gaining strength as it wraps itself more tightly around his ancient blood.

Sookie.

The overwhelming presence of his maker's blood now turns into a painful and discordant pitch of fear—and it makes Eric's stomach turn.

But her strength suddenly soars, overwhelming all of them.

And just as suddenly, the momentum shifts.

She stumbles, bravery first faltering, and then giving way to fear and pain.

The tears sear his skin, his cheeks, his eyes.

But the strong and sure wave of Godric's blood rushes at them, raising them up in its comforting calm.

Beautiful.

It pulses and radiates with happiness and contentment, expanding to fill him up just before it contracts and swiftly uncoils, unraveling itself from the chord of their ancient bond.

Eric sits, frozen; waiting for the burning of the dawn. But it never comes.

All that's there is receding circles of a pulsing, shining joy.

The spilled blood scabs over.

And all that remains is silence—emptier yet fuller than he has ever known.

Gör det inte: Don't do it.

Vi har haft århundraden av kärlek och tillit till varandra: There are centuries of faith and love between us.

Snälla: Please.

A/N: Okay, so … what'd ya think? Please press that li'l green button and let me know! And, don't fret—that dreamy kiss is coming … soon ;D *evil grin*

A/N: Big slobbery Nutella kissies to my amazing super-beta LanYap. A huge, Viking-sized thanks to Nyah as well, for combing through the final draft with her incredible skills. I love you ladies!

Also, thanks to KLloyd, for helping out with the Swedish :) Aaaaand … one last thanks, to my WC and tweeter h00rs – I swear I'd never get any writing done without you :)

Disclaimer: I do not claim any rights to the Sookie Stackhouse Series or the HBO series True Blood