A/N: Thank you so much to all of my reviewers: Erin1705, bwtawny, sydkiwi, Gina, TB-Chelyk, writergirl89, livesimple, sluggysmom, Ericsfae, VALady, aprilshowers021, nordiclover, whitestripes123, Jezebelnhell, KaiaRay, xxxbulletxxx, Spygrrl, SVMReaderCH, IkeaGoddess, StarKiss666, and ncmiss12.

Again, a big hug and huge platter of…hmm…I suppose I should ask her what her favorite dessert is – let's just go with an cheesecake assortment tray – to Rachael, the wonderful, amazing Beta who puts up with my half-brained schemes and helps me make them work.

I love and appreciate all your guesses for the next chapter – whether you guess them right or wrong, I love the fact that you tried to crawl in my brain. Best of luck with that to everyone; my brain is one hell of a scary place, let me tell you!

There isn't a song choice for the chapter, as I think the tone really can't be mistaken.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Chapter 6: The Living Dead

Sookie was the first to wake. She blinked, squinting against the dying sun, her long eyelashes brushing her cheeks. She was very, very warm and, as the fuzziness wore off, apparently very, very naked. As everything came into focus, she very quickly realized she wasn't alone. Her heart skipped a beat as she slowly let her eyes follow the limbs up to the face of their owner, who was none other than Eric Northman. She felt all the blood drain from her face. She had slept with Eric Northman? She had thought it was a dream, that maybe the reason she hadn't dreamt about him in a year was because she was in Faery and it somehow blocked the bond – he couldn't feel her presence, after all. His arms were anchored around her, and Sookie knew it would be futile to even try to get loose without him waking up, so she lay there. Logically, he'd already seen everything so it wasn't like things could get any worse.

'What did you do?' She asked, trying to contact the Faery counterpart that was usually submerged in her subconscious.

'I would think that's obvious.' She replied.

'How could you do this? Do you have any idea what you've done? I'm the one that has to deal with him on a daily basis, not you!"

'Darling, I would gladly deal with him on a daily basis if you wanted me to.'

'I cannot believe you just said that. He's possessive and violent and a fucking vampire! You hate vampires!'

'I do find them rather…annoying, sometimes, but I would happily suffer the company of Eric.'

'What did you do?'

'I saved our neck, that's what I did.'

'By having me sleep with him? You're just… un-fucking-believable!'

'Oh, stop whining. I did what I had to, to ensure our survival.'

'We would have been fine! We're in a tear in the Veil, in the middle of a forest, in the middle of Louisiana ! Out of all the places in the world, why would he look here? He doesn't even know where we're from!'

'We don't know that for certain, and I wasn't going to take any chances. We were vulnerable until he came along – and you're lucky it was him! I didn't care who it was, so long as we had someone. In hindsight, I couldn't have hoped for better.'

'What, exactly, did you do?'

'You're starting to sound like a parrot. Would you like a cracker?'

'Shut up. You're not telling me everything – I know you're not. We're the same person, remember?'

Silence.

'Hello? Hey! Come back here!'

She was gone; Sookie would get no more from her. She let out an exasperated huff and meditated on the pickle she was now in. She had, apparently, slept with Eric. Twice. The next time Sookie got a hold of her Faery subconscious, she was going to ring her neck – what the hell was with her, pulling her back into her body while Eric was…well, doing what he was doing. That was just plain mean. Eric was never going to let her live this down. Speaking of Eric, he and she had some talking to do. How dare he sleep with her! He had to have known it wasn't her, but he did it anyway! It wasn't like Faery could have tricked him into thinking it was her…could she? Eric knew her better than that, she thought. She hoped. Oh, now she was all confused.

It wasn't until Sookie turned her head to look up at Eric, little rays of sunlight lighting up his face, that she realized the implications of it. The sun had risen, and set, and yet Eric was alive. Fucking Faery! What else did she do? Sookie knew, of course, that it would be possible to grant a vampire the magick to walk in the sun, but she had not expected to be able to do it yet. She'd barely had enough training to control her powers, let alone use them, and since when did she have the metaphorical juice to even do something like that? She had her tricks, sure, but nothing that should have been strong enough to give him the power to walk in the sun.

It was as her head lay resting on his chest that she noticed what she had not before – his beating heart. All too quickly, Sookie could see the Faerys plan. She felt herself grow dizzy and nauseous. No, it simply wasn't possible. Eric was a vampire, she was human. It wasn't possible.

She gently removed his arm from her waist, and disentangled their legs. Upon making sure she was free, and he was still asleep, she picked up her sundress from where it lay pooled on the ground and folded it, stuffing it in her bag. She put her panties on first, being careful not to trip and stumble lest she fall among the cinders of the pyre from the night before, followed by her bra. She began to pull on her shirt, only to have it snatched out of her hands.

"Hey!" She reached to grab it from his grasp, only to have him tug it out of her reach. She lunged for it and had it in her finger tips when his arm, the arm she conveniently forgot about, slid under her thigh and hook it above his waist. Startled, she lost her balanced. Eric took advantage of the moment and let the shirt fall to the ground, using his free hand to hoist her other leg up around his waist. Sookie squeaked in discomfort, not liking where this was going at all.

"Eric," She began, ready to berate him, only to be stopped by being soundly kissed.

She leaned back as far as she could, despite her discomfort, and broke the kiss, glaring at him.

"Oh, Sookie," He sighed. "Must we start this already?"

"Eric, put me down."

He moved his head from side to side before stopping and to look her square in the eye and say, "No."

"Eric, we need to talk." Sookie was trying to reason with him; this was starting to go beyond uncomfortable.

"So, talk." He grinned at her, his fangs clicking. Sookie didn't jump when she saw them, but rather gave him a stern look. He rolled his eyes before letting his fangs retreat, wondering to himself how he ever got himself caught up with this girl.

"Please, let me down."

"What are you going to do when you get down?"

"Put some clothes on for starters," Sookie told him, thinking it would be obvious.

"Then absolutely unequivocally no." He grinned again.

Sookie was determined not to lose this battle and promptly unhooked her legs, not caring if she fell to the ground, but his hands were far too fast for her and all it took was one hand strategically placed on her ass to keep her where she was. Well, fine, if that's the way he wanted to play, so be it. Sookie let her hand rest on his chest before summoning her magick – in one, short burst of energy, Eric was sent flying backwards. Sookie fell to the ground, hard, but not nearly as hard as Eric had. He snarled at her from his position on the ground.

"Don't you take that tone of growl with me, Eric Northman! I asked you nicely and you refused," Sookie said, promptly standing with her hands on her hips. "Now, we can talk about this like adults, or I can drop you from the veil in the mortal world and you won't be able to see me let alone grope me again for another week." Wait, did she just offer to let him grope her, or…? The lines were a little blurred, on that one… Sookie decided to ignore it.

Abruptly, the growling stopped, and in its place was, at first, a chuckle. Eric tried to cough it down, and ignore it, but it didn't work; instead, it turned into full blown laughter. Sookie rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Are you finished yet?"

Eric was still smirking, though the laughter had ceased. "Did you just threaten me?"

"Eric, when I threaten you, there won't be a question about it." Sookie said in a no-nonsense tone.

"Right," He smothered another chuckled. "So, what is it you want to talk about?"

Oh, what she wouldn't give to just wipe that smirk off of his face. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, uneasy. "I need you to tell me what happened last night."

He paused, his smile waning. "Come again?"

Sookie gritted her teeth and repeated herself "I need you to tell me what happened last night, all of it."

"You don't remember?"

"I wasn't present." Faery Sookie kept her quite out of the loop, as a matter of fact – something they would have words about later, when she wasn't sulking.

"I don't understand; you live in the same body."

"Yes, but one of us usually has dominance over the other,"

"Yes," Eric interrupted. "She told me that. Does that mean that while one of you has dominance, the other is completely shut out?"

If he'd let me finish, he would know by now, she thought.

"Not always, no. Most of the time, even though only one of us controls the body, we share our mind. Last night, she decided it would be best for me not to have control of either." Bitch.

"Ah, I see," He circled around her too quickly for her eyes to process, and his hands were running up and down her side, too sensually for Sookie's taste. "How about I show you what we did last night, instead."

He wasn't asking. Sookie peeled his hands off of her and turned to face him. "You're not getting anywhere with me by being a pig, and for God's sake, may I please put some clothes on?"

The thought registered that she had just asked for his permission, and she felt bile rise in her throat. Why had she felt obligated to do that? Not waiting for a response, and intending to brush off the fact that she had just asked him to do something as simple as put some damn clothes on, she turned her back on him and began searching for the shirt she had dropped earlier. She could feel his gaze on her back but did not rise to the bait and turn around. She slipped her shirt on over her head and searched through the duffel until she found the pair of shorts she was looking for. She pulled them on quickly, not willing to give Eric any more ammo than he already had.

"Now then," She turned around. "What happened last night?"

"We made love until the sun rose."

That smirk was really starting to irritate her, but she decided to ignore it. "What else?

"Your Faery and I made a deal."

Uh-oh. That's what she'd been afraid of. "Which was?"

"Sookie, what happened in Faery?"

"We're not talking about that right now. I'm more concerned with what she got me in to."

"She asked for my help in keeping you safe during your Lunar Cycle."

She talked to him about that? That was personal! "We would have been fine."

"Not according to her. Why do you have to be so stubborn?" His tone of voice had deepened and now rumbled with an undercurrent of anger and desperation. "You couldn't just swallow your pride and tell me what was going on? No! You had to pick a fight with me and run away!"

"I didn't tell you because it wasn't any of your business!"

"Well," He paused, calming down, and looked at her with calculating eyes. "It's my business now."

"Why, because we slept together?" She knew he was going to hang that over her head.

"No, because you're mine and it's my job to know."

"Oh, we're not going to have this conversation again, are we? I am not yours!"

Eric snarled, a primal roar creeping its way out of his throat. He was on her in the next instant, too quickly for her to throw up her defenses, and his hand slid to the back of her neck. "Yes, you are!" Before she had a chance to get her land legs back, her mind and soul were overrun by emotions; anger, hurt, desperation, adoration. The sheer strength of each emotion was enough to knock the wind out of her, and she shuddered, at first from the tidal wave of feelings, and then from the realization that he was stroking her neck with the pad of his thumb. He was stroking the bite marks on her neck with the pad of his thumb.

"Why?" She asked in a whisper. "Why would she do this?" She stepped back out of his grasp, upset. Eric cocked his head to the side, angry with her for denying what they were, but wanting to make her feel better at the same time – how could he do that, when he was the one she was upset with?

"It is regrettable that you are upset, but this is for the best."

Sookie turned her head to look at him in disbelief. "For the best? What part of having no say in my life, is for the best? I was pulled back into my body after she, and you, got what you wanted from me."

"Don't say that!" Eric all but bellowed. "That is no where near the truth!"

"Truth is a matter of perception, Eric," Sookie was calm now, angry, but calm. "Thisis the unpleasant reality of what happened: You, and she, took advantage of situation in which I was vulnerable. What else?"

"I agreed to abide by Faery Laws as they applied to us."

"Faery laws?" Sookie asked, confused. "Why would it matter if you had to abide by…" She trailed off as her mind made a few intuitive leaps. Swaying on her feet, Sookie made her way to the mess of blankets, Eric's hand pressed reassuringly on her back.

"Sookie?"

She ignored him. "It's not possible… She couldn't have…" Though strictly speaking, Vampires weren't really dead. They were the living dead, which made more sense. Their change from human to supernatural occurred when their mortal lives were on the brink of death, but not dead yet. Combine that fact with a beating heart to get the blood circulating and waking things up…but no, surely not. Eric was over one thousand years old as the living dead – that had to count for something, right? A few minutes of blood circulation wouldn't be enough, would it? But, oh God, what if it was?

Sookie had always believed in God, always held firm in her faith, and had been forced to maintain that God worked in mysterious ways to improve the lives of his flock – she had to, in order to move past the death of her parents, and grandmother, and all of the bad things that had happened in her life. God sought to teach His children to earn their way into heaven, though they were going to be accepted anyway, to better their lives on Earth. Sometimes this was by rewarding them with something that they had earned by being good neighbors and Christians, and other times it was by punishing them, so they could do better in the future. For all of Sookie's musings on why God had done what He'd done with her life to make it better, it had never occurred to her that God would be fucking crazy enough to think that having the child of a murderous, violent Viking Vampire would do the trick!

Was this supposed to be a punishment or reward, anyway? Sookie couldn't tell. A child was always a miracle, but the Viking that came with the child… And then, there was that; her Faery counterpart had gone way overboard on ensuring their safety, if she succeeded. Faery Law was very cut and dry when it came to children and marriage – screw whoever you like, but if you get pregnant, you're getting married. Abiding by Faery law meant that Eric was one hundred percent responsible for the mental, physical, and financial welfare of both her and their child. It also meant that he could never love another, in the most puritanical, biblical sense. Having sex with any other woman aside from her, out of the confines of necessity on the grounds of procreation, would be grounds for punishment – maybe even death, depending on the severity of the offense.

Above all of that, worse than all of that, was that Sookie wasn't sure how she felt about all of this. In her year in Faery, she had spent weeks preparing what she was going to say to Bill and how she would react to his presence, but she hadn't thought about what to say to Eric. Of course, that's not to say she didn't think about him, but he was something of a second priority in comparison to Bill – Eric hadn't betrayed her. And then she came back, and it was Eric who was waiting for her return, not Bill. It was Eric who had bought her house and used his stupid vampire logic to assume that meant she was his. She was attracted to him, she could admit that, and she didn't find his personality unlikable, by any means. He had helped her, had paid her generously for services rendered… He had a kind of sweetness about him when no one was looking, and he felt something for her.

It was hard to remember that fact, when he did and said so many archaic things that make her sound dependent and weak, when he tried to control her life. It was hard to remember the desperation and adoration she felt when he kissed her for the first and, what he thought to be the last, time, when he prepared to meet Russell Edgington and the True Death. He was selfish, and violent, and diabolical, and terribly clever. He was kind, and generous, and loving, and protective, and smart; and he was hers, now, as much as she was his. She had spent so much time and energy being angry with him that, that particular thought hadn't occurred to her until now. He was hers. The gravity of the realization hit her hard and she barely had time to give him a heads up.

"I need some time to think," She whispered, moving away from him.

And she promptly dropped him from the Veil and left him in the mortal world. She just needed some time to think, without his constant presence to influence her. He would forgive her, eventually. He always did.

A/n: Poor Sookie…all confused and being completely circumvented by, well, herself. Poor Eric, who has to deal with the emotional mess that the likes of Bill Compton left behind. Poor Brion, for being picked on by you guys for being the 'villain' – which I never confirmed nor denied. I think the only one who's really getting amusement out of this is Faery Sookie.

So comments on… Faery Sookie/Brion not showing up in two hours/Sookie's emotional flip-flopping? I think y'all are going to get a kick out of next chapter… Reviews are like... some illicit, illegal drug to me. Feed the addict!