Disclaimer: The Sookie Stackhouse Series is the creation of Charlaine Harris. Don't sue me Charlaine! I love your books.

Sookie's Revelation

II.

After listening to Amelia and Octavia speak, Eric quietly told me that since I had the next couple of days off, it might be nicer to go to his place, so that we could be "more comfortable". I could see his point. The walls were relatively thin and my vampire hidey hole had always been a tight fit for Eric. I didn't want to be apart from him right now, and I did have the time off. So, still filled with the mirth of Claudine's care, I agreed, packed a few changes of clothes and off we went, driving back to Shreveport.

I fell asleep at some point, but was roused by Eric's unbuckling my seat belt and a cool kiss on my lips.

"Lover, wake up!" he said, while nudging me gently.

I awoke and got out of the car and looked at a nicely appointed two story house that even in the dark looked quite stately and beautiful. I have to admit that I was very excited and curious to see how Eric lived. Sleepy as I was, I took all of it in eagerly as we entered. After the locks, and the alarm system and a small foyer, I focused on dark wood bookcases filled with books, cranberry leather couches and chairs, muted warm charcoal gray walls. We passed through the living room and toward the stairs. He guided me up the stairs, carrying my small bag, and opened a door.

"Your room, Miss Stackhouse," he said quietly.

At first I was just so puzzled by the whole thing I didn't really look into the room. I looked up at Eric and actually wondered if he was saying that we would still have to sleep in separate rooms even if we were together? After all, he'd slept in a regular bed in Rhodes. Then I looked into the room and gasped. The room was huge. The room was beautiful. And the room had very obviously been decorated with a female occupant in mind. Looking around, I half wondered if it was really Pam's room and she had been told to stay elsewhere. Then I remembered that I'd been to Pam's house last year, and so far as I knew, she was still living there. I was speechless. So of course I smiled.

"Sookie, I hope you like it?" Eric asked.

How could I not like it? It was gorgeous. And I told him so. "It's so beautiful, Eric!" He smiled warmly. I could feel the warmth and pride just spilling over into me.

After putting my bag on the dresser, he took my hand and led me back down the other end of the hall and showed me his room, which was windowless. Eric's room was dark, black and red, and the only room I'd seen thus far with anything personal on the walls. He had a large antique map of Scandinavia on the wall across from his bed. There was long broadsword hanging on another wall. I immediately made a mental note to ask him where he had lived as a human. Where his home had been? And the sword. How long had he had it? I realized that I really knew so little about him in some respects. I looked at the huge dark wood bed. It looked like ebony. The sheets and down comforter were dark red. I wondered if he always slept here, or if he also went to ground as Bill had called it. There was so much to learn about him.

He led me back up the hall to show me the bathroom, which also opened into my room. I thought it was a thoughtful touch since humans usually have much more use for the facilities than do vampires. The bathroom was huge, and so beautifully done. Eric smiled down on me.

And then, it all went south.

"…wonder how long before I can get her out of Bon Temps… to quit that damn job… get her away from that fucking shifter… "

I gave a small gasp, but Eric thought I was just delighted with the bathroom. I, on the other hand, was remembering a certain passionate kiss, in the midst of lovemaking. I was kissing Eric, and tasting his blood. I remember thinking at first that I had cut my tongue on his fangs, but having had Eric's blood four times now, I was really sure it was his blood and not mine. We'd kissed for a while. And now I was reading Eric's thoughts. I felt lightheaded. Eric picked up on that immediately, and swept me into his arms.

"You're tired, my Lover. You should rest for a while. With me." He smiled gently at me and carried me off to his room.

My clothes were off in a flash, as were his, and he held me close to him in bed. In spite of my brief panic only moments before, I just felt so good lying there in his arms. I felt so safe, so loved. I felt as if a tide of love and lust swept over me. We held each other for a time but resting did not last long.

Later, while lying in bed with Eric, I kept thinking to myself that it had to be random. I mean, I had read or heard his thoughts twice before. And after I'd had his blood the fourth time, in Rhodes, (I counted mentally- the maenad attack when I bit his finger, the bullet, the time in Jackson, the time in Rhodes) I had even heard Henrik, and flashed on Gervaise. Okay, so maybe it was random. But it was also true that I had heard Eric before I'd ever had his blood. I'd heard him after I'd had Bill's blood. Eric's blood was powerful stuff compared to Bill's. So now here I was, with a fifth dose of Eric's blood and I had heard him again. This was not good. But really, it just had to be random.

I reflected upon the fact that the whole reason I had started dating Vampire Bill, as they called him at Merlotte's, was precisely because I couldn't hear his thoughts. The peace and quiet around a nice vampire's mind was wondrous. I treasured it. It made dating feasible. I didn't want to hear what my boyfriend's thoughts. Because sometimes they thought hurtful things, or things that would make you mad or unsettled like your leaving your family home and quitting the steady job you've had for the past five years. Okay, I had to tone that one down. I couldn't say I'd be surprised that Eric thought these things, although I was none too fond of how he was referring to Sam. The point was, I really didn't want to hear this stuff.

Irrelevant, I thought to myself. The very least of my problems.

Beyond the whole issue of whether I preferred dating someone I couldn't hear there was the very practical issue that vampires don't want me to hear them. My hearing a vamp mind was a security leak to them. It was a risk to their elite world of often vicious plans and politics. It was… simply terrifying.

Okay, I thought. Random, totally random. A little bit of blood, and it was just a coincidence. Happened before, who cares if it's once in a while. It doesn't matter.

Two nights later, in the middle of making love, I again tasted Eric's blood in my mouth while kissing. I pulled up cold, in the middle of the best sex one could possibly be having, and said "Eric, I think you bit your tongue!" The reply chilled me.

"My Love, it's an easy way to give you a dose of my blood. It can keep you strong, and healthy. It will also slow down your aging, so that I can keep you with me as long as possible. It's just a small amount."

The issue of the aging problem was one that I had been trying as hard as possible to just ignore for now. Whenever I started thinking seriously about the whole relationship, even excluding the fact that I had heard Eric two days before, I was very worried about where this whole thing would go if we stayed together for a long time, since I'd obviously grow old. But it seemed Eric had that scoped out. I trembled remembering what Quinn had told me in Rhodes. That having had so much of Eric's blood made it easy for me to be turned. Between worrying about being telepathic with vampires and now worrying about being turned, I simply froze.

To Eric's credit, he stopped and asked me what was wrong.

"Lover" he whispered close to my ear, "I sense you feel afraid. Why?"

Grasping at the less objectionable of my two fears, I came halfway clean.

"Eric, I've had so much of your blood in the past two years. I just… I worry about it. I worry that…" I hesitated here. I truly trusted him, but part of me really did have an immense unspoken fear that at some point Eric would try to turn me. He loved me, and I was mortal and that meant guaranteed loss. At the same time, so few vampires stayed with their makers, that turning me would still seem to guarantee loss. As bad as it would be for me to die and lose Eric, the idea of somehow eventually losing Eric through having been turned, repellant as that already was to me, and being immortal without the man I loved at my side would be a thousand times worse.

Eric looked into my eyes intensely. "Tell me what you're afraid of," he said, insistently, but still gently.

I broke my eye contact with him and swallowed slowly, part of me savoring the residue of him in my mouth. Alright, I'll have to bite the bullet on this one I thought.

"I… I get afraid you'll try to turn me Eric. I just… I think about it and it frightens me."

Eric looked at me a moment, and rolled away from me, onto his back. He seemed almost to sigh. Then he rolled back onto his side and stared at me.

"To be honest, perfectly honest Sookie, I have thought of it. But I know you do not want to be vampire. I will never betray your trust. If you do not want to be turned, I will not do it." He sounded somewhat emotional saying it, speaking with a touch of an accent.

I was shamefaced. He was capable of being so much more honest than I was in that moment. Where was all the twisty treachery of vampire fame?

He felt my hesitation and added "I wouldn't let anyone else turn you either. I promise you."

And then the boom dropped.

"How did Sophie-Anne do it, I wonder? She kept them all. They loved each other. She and Andre truly loved each other. How did she do it? How could I ever risk turning her anyway if we could end up [feelings of revulsion] like Bill and Lorena?

I suppose another woman, with perhaps less experience with vampires, would have been focused on content. How could I ever risk turning her anyway? I, on the other hand, was focused on the more than slightly panicked telepathic end of the problem. I had just heard my love, Eric Northman, thinking in clear and complete sentences, as if he was speaking out loud, right at me.Complete with feelings accents, thanks to our lovely blood bond.

Completely hating myself, I sighed, imagined ice water in my veins, and put my head on my vampire's chest and said simply,

"I love you, Eric. I love you."