Chapter 10: You, The Living
Gravestones are monuments erected not so much for the deceased, as they are for the ones left behind to go on living.
Even still, Eric couldn't help but think Sookie would be pleased with hers, could she see it. In the old graveyard where generations of Stackhouses lay, her own stone kept vigil over them all, a black granite valkyrie standing tall and watchful. Though she leant upon a great sword, it was her expression that Eric found the most poignant - even in youthful features carved of rock, she seemed at peace.
He did not like the essential texts of the gravestone, however. They conveyed far too little - a name, two dates. A beginning, and an end. What of all the rest, the in between? No paltry dash could possibly contain it all, all she'd been and done and it was this thought that brought the vampire to his knees in the soft grass beside the grave.
All the love they'd shared. Who would he be now, without her? How long since he'd thought of himself, without Sookie somewhere nearby, just a sentence away in the story of his own life? A paragraph. A few miles. Rarely even a state line.
A price could not be named that the Viking would not pay, just to hold her one last time. Her fragile body filling his arms, warm breath of life against his neck. Laughter.
Full lips pressed to his.
Too many memories of joy to bear, and he clenched his fist upon the cool stone of her marker as he withstood them. He closed his eyes, seeking the infinite darkness within, only to find her face emblazoned upon his soul.
Eric would carry her with him for the rest of his days.
His memory transported him to the night of her attack upon Russell. The way he'd broken away from his guards, tricked them, killed them both and raced back to the antebellum mansion fast as he possibly could. Praying to Odin he would not be too late.
The Viking found them both lying upon the floor in a puddle of mingled blood.
Russell had met the true death, though how exactly remained a mystery.
Sookie herself still possessed a spark of life, though ever so faint. She would fight death, as she fought everything in life, stubborn to the end.
A decision lay before Eric, and the window quickly closing. She'd proved herself unafraid of death before, in the face of further embroilment in vampire affairs. Three choices remained for her: death, healing, or immortality.
A week later, Sookie awoke in a hospital bed, familiar Viking fingers clasped around hers. When a weak but genuine smile spread upon her lips, it finally seemed as though life might be possible again. A seemingly absurd thought, for a thousand year old vampire, but he'd never valued a life more.
"You didn't turn me," she sighed, pleased, thumb caressing the back of his hand.
He'd given her a mouthful of blood to stabilize her, and whisked her away to the hospital, throwing her to the hands of human medicine and human fate. They way she herself would have chosen, given a conscious vote.
Though she never could quite recall what happened in those last moments with Russell, in what exact way she'd triumphed over him, what last dhampir trick she'd pulled from her bag - she did remember her dreams, one in particular so lucid and vivid she could have sworn it occurred in reality and not the realm of the resting mind.
Upon returning home from the hospital, she'd told Eric of her dream while they spooned in her bed, aching muscles ordered to rest. She'd drifted afloat on a river of sighs, a blanket of glittering stars spread out above her, cool waters lapping at her body from all sides. In this way she floated upon her back for what could have been hours or days, until a heavy fog rolled in, obscuring all view.
She'd fancied she swam in a cloud, and translucent shapes brushed against her in the water, caressed her soothingly. This way they'd coaxed, and calmly she'd followed them through the mist, paddling slowly.
But some urge deep within her had caused her to look back; a pang in her soul, as lot's wife could not resist looking back over her shoulder to Sodom, secretly longing for the home she would abandon.
A shape formed in the mist, a fearsome head, a towering dragon, until a longship came fully into view, sails left limp in this windless still place. In a world of gray, Eric's blue eyes shone as a beacon, and without protest she gravitated to his arms, allowing her love to pull her from the water.
Don't go sighed the shapes around her, attempting to pull her back. But in Eric's arms, Sookie found her anchor, and she could not be swayed. The ship turned in its course, sailing back in the direction from whence it had come.
With a shudder after the first telling Eric had pulled her closer, humbled by how very close to true death they'd both come, the threshold of death's door waiting to receive the both of them.
But death had been forced to wait, nearly a century after that, the power of being dhampir and vampire's bonded holding it at bay.
Sookie cut her ties to the Federal government, as Eric gave up the position of sheriff. Suddenly it seemed too much remained to be lived for, to let precious minutes be eaten up by violence and politics.
Life marched on, fast and sweet for the happy pair. There were disagreements over the years, yes, but they'd been blessed with perspective, living so close to death. They knew what things in life merited true importance.
Eric and Sookie traveled the globe, several times over, but just as the world seemed unrecognizable in its feats of modern technology the old farmhouse on Hummingbird road always waited for them, a timeless constant and boon of their past in a world of dizzying change.
Several times, Eric begged of Sookie to accept the dark gift, to walk the night forever with him. Stubbornly, she refused to give in, choosing to retain her humanity, her fragility, her susceptibility. It was not that she did not love Eric enough; there were some nights when her heart caught in her throat at just the sight of him, the voracity of her love for the vampire startled her so. Then why turn his offer down?
She would shrug, give a mysterious if not apologetic smile in answer. Press his cheek, kiss his forehead, the tip of his nose, and distract him from the question with the delicious beauty of their present moment.
In time, Eric came to understand.
For all her love for him, Sookie also craved peace, when the time came. Rest, from all the pain inherent in living. For though it took strength and resolve to watch the centuries pass by, the way vampires clung to life also smacked of a certain cowardice to face what could lie beyond. Something other than this world; no one could know for certain what awaited after true death.
Could it be so simple as a river, drifting on and on, he wondered? A great body of water filled with peaceful souls, forever content to stare up at a starry sky? That too, he doubted.
He doubted often.
With Sookie, Eric found he doubted in ways he'd never dreamed possible; one balmy summer night in Barcelona, strolling the sycamore lined avenues, Sookie paused to watch a group of children kicking a futbol around the park, a small smile curling her lips. Though his exterior remained unaffected, a wave of panic accosted his heart, and he wondered if she would regret her choice of him.
"I don't want any," she assured him, pressing his hand, knowing as she always seemed to know the particulars of his inner workings, the cause of all his pangs.
"There is no regret in you?" he'd questioned, and he too felt an ache in Sookie. Yet, she shook her head no, and somehow he believed her.
"Jason will not procreate - you are the last of your family, Sookie. Perhaps you should have a child," he found himself suggesting, as though his voice were a separate entity from him.
She'd looked up to him with one blond eyebrow raised. "Find me a way to have your child, Eric Northman, then maybe. Otherwise, I'm not really interested."
He never did manage to find a way - and then Sookie aged past the point of childbearing. Still, the thought that she would be spoiled for him once past the blooming flower of her youth was a laughable thing. She and Eric loved and made love, long after she could still be considered young.
And then, in what seemed like a blink of the eye, time passed so quickly, filled with so much joy between them, Sookie was no longer young.
Next, she became old.
Still, he remained by her side. Because though her body weakened, the mind remained sharp. The Sookie Eric loved remained the same, even as the shell changed. What would he do without a night filled with her laughter, he began to fear? Her snarky wit, her loving whispers? She could see it in his eyes, but they did their best to remain strong, for the sake of each other.
One night, having left the farmhouse only to feed, a fluttering weakness overcame Eric mid-flight. Simply, he knew.
With a heavy sense of deja-vu, he raced back home to her, fighting for strength, hoping he would not be too late.
The scene that greeted him upon his arrival in their bedroom would remain emblazoned in his memory for the rest of his life: Sookie's body thin and frail, her long silver hair spilling to her waist, glowing in the moonlight. Ethereal, yet so very human. She leaned against her bureau, clutching her side, short of breath.
Upon feeling him near, she paid him a tragic smile. "I'm sorry, lover. I'm feeling a little weak tonight."
She would be 110 years old in two months, and though she did not quite look the part, it was still a long time for a mortal body to live.
But that night, Eric smelled death upon her, and she did not fight him as he scooped her up in his arms, carrying her to rest upon the bed. As she had so many nights before, she lay upon his broad chest, wrapped in the sanctuary of his arms. In and out she drifted, feeling her strength sap from her bones, her heart, her lungs. Long fingers slid soothingly through her silver hair, silent blood tears gathering in Eric's eyes, trailing down his cheeks.
She did not try to assure him, told no soothing pretty lies. They'd known this day would come, though neither could ever completely prepare for it.
Her voice came faintly in the dark, and only with the gift of vampire hearing could Eric make out her words. "In this long life I've lived, the only true regret I can think of was the decade I spent away from you. I'm sorry I was so headstrong."
Eric found it amusing, perhaps touching, that she would apologize to him now, for the first time, of all nights. They rarely spoke of those dark times; they seemed so very far away, in the face of all their other adventures.
"I too am sorry, for the mistakes I made with you," he finally said, finding his voice caught stubbornly in his throat. "But you have filled my life with far more love and joy than pain and suffering, Sookie Stackhouse. It is more than most can say to each other - and for that, I thank you."
Sookie smiled weakly as he kissed her fingertips, her palm, and softly, her lips. The moisture of tears also glittered in her eyes, and with a wistful sigh she settled back against his chest. "My silver-tongued Viking," she whispered. "How I have loved you."
"My beautiful lover, my stubborn warrior," he countered. What more could he say? Mere words could not embody the depth of his emotion for her. These feelings ran deeply within him, embedded as veins of gold within a timeless mountain. "You cannot know what you have meant to me."
These were the last words the dhampir and the Viking ever spoke to each other. Amidst the agony, Eric knew some relief, as he felt her pass, just an hour before dawn.
He'd feared that he would be forced to leave her alone, to take shelter from the coming sun. For so long she'd felt certain she would die with her boots on, in some bloody battle. What a sweet passing, to have instead known peace at the end, an old woman in her lover's arms?
As he held her close the vampire wept for the lover he'd lost, the companion, the brave woman with whom he'd known so many adventurous nights.
And still, by her grave in the grass, he cried. The nights ahead seemed impossibly heavy; in all his years, he'd never known such pain. Such weight in the prospect of facing life alone once more, moving on, finding something new. What more could there be for him, after knowing such bliss? He wondered if Sookie had ruined the rest of eternity for him; restlessly he would search for such happiness again, as he'd searched for the millennium leading up to the moment he met her.
The days following he would prowl the house restlessly, searching out traces of her, scents upon the bedclothes that would fade with time, only to be known in his memory. He would brood upon the couch where they'd made love so many times, the back still imprinted from the grip he'd once accosted it with, that first fateful night. He stared at the ceiling without the slightest inclination to move for hours on end.
On one of his darkest nights he found the envelope, left in plain view upon her bureau among bottles of perfume and her grandmother's jewelry, overlooked by him many times over. It was addressed on the outside simply, To You, The Living.
With a trembling hand, he opened the envelope to find a note in her hand.
Eric-
Words have always failed me, in their attempt to describe the way I love you. They are too small, too imprecise, too meager to begin. My hands and lips and eyes always served my heart better in this-yet I want you to know I could not have lived a better life, than the one spent by your side. Though you know this house is yours now, I want you to leave. It's time to begin a new adventure, my Viking. Mortality was my destiny - immortality is yours. Stop moping. Be brave. Think of me sometimes. I love you and wish you the best - Sookie.
Despite of himself, a small smile curled Eric's lips.
Sookie would give him orders, even from beyond the grave.
Folding the note carefully, Eric slid the paper into his pocket, casting a look around the bedroom they'd shared for so long. Longingly, he inhaled her scent, caressing the bedspread with long fingers, the pillow where her head had lain.
On long legs he slowly made his way through the house, shutting doors as he went, until locking the front door behind him. From the yard he turned to regard the old farmhouse, looking to what had been her window. What seemed like a lifetime ago, he'd tapped upon the glass, asked her to let him inside.
Little did he know the ride she would take him for.
"Goodbye, lover." His heart filled to bursting with the memory of her, his soul laden with the burden of loss, yet a wistful smile upon his lips, Eric took to the air.
FIN
A/N: Thank you, THANK YOU, everyone for the overwhelming response to this fic! It's been a pleasure and privilege to entertain you. :) If you enjoy my writing, I have EXCITING news about an original project! Check out my profile page for more details.