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

Understanding

XII.

Zelda looked at me as if she was ever so slightly apprehensive and motioned me back toward Pythia's room. I entered to find her perched on her low dais. She turned and followed my movement.

Before she could even start in, I admitted "I lost my temper. I'm sorry. But I did not kill anyone. So at least there's that."

Pythia sat very still and did not speak for several minutes.

When you said I could not punish you, I now see you did not exaggerate.

I was completely drained and continued to speak out loud.

"I do not think you have really understood the depth of Eithne's concern. At least I can say that the months of work she spent on getting me to better control things have not been wasted, even if I still have too much temper."

She turned to me. "Too much temper?" she said out loud, incredulously. "He tried to kill you both, after I specifically ordered that you are under my protection. Not only has he threatened your welfare, he has crossed ME!" She screamed this last part. Pythia was definitely not used to being crossed.

"He was angry that the embezzlement was revealed in a public forum. Perhaps that was my mistake. It was compounded by the fact that I stopped him from killing the embezzler in front of a room packed with witnesses."

"I really do not care what the origin of his anger was. When I am done with him he will probably regret you did not kill him."

"It is not my affair. He did go against you. I can assure you, however, that I will be very hard to kill. Eithne has trained me well. It is just the thought of anyone trying to harm Eric in order to harm me that made it too much for me to take calmly." I was really feeling weak. "I need to eat and have some water. May I go?" I asked weakly.

"Zelda, give her water," she said in a rasping voice. "What exactly happened?"

I recounted the scene, as she nodded with her eyes closed.

"I assume the vampire who threw the stake will take at least several days to recover. Isaiah was likely only very frightened. And many people saw it. I left him in a state of disgrace," I finished.

"Good. Good! Let them all be very afraid. Being afraid of you is an extension of being afraid of me."

"Pythia, using this power drains too much of me for me to consider its use unless I am very sure why I am using it. I do not like to use it. There is an ugliness to it." I was now really feeling dangerously like fainting. Zelda brought me a bottle of Tŷ Nant water, but that wasn't going to cut it. I said firmly, "I'm going to my room to rest. We can talk more tomorrow if you wish."

I went toward my room next door and felt like I was just going to collapse in on myself. I was running on fumes. And now I was going to have to deal with Eric. The demon guards hung their heads, unable to meet me in the eye. I just couldn't deal with them right now.

I entered the room to find Eric putting down the phone. He turned to me and said "I ordered you the grilled cheese sandwich and more water. I didn't know what else you would want so I just got you the same thing I saw you eating yesterday."

I nodded and just collapsed onto the bed. I closed my eyes and tried to conserve my energy.

I awoke about 20 minutes later to a gentle nudging whisper, "Sookie… Sookie, you need to wake up, your food is here. You need to eat."

My eyes flew open and I moved swiftly to sitting up. I was now in bed, under the covers. I was in my pajamas. Eric gingerly lifted the table over to the bedside so that I wouldn't have to get completely out of bed to eat. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and looked at the food, hardly comprehending it. I had to force myself to eat, I thought. I had learned that the hours after one of these bursts of emotion-driven power were really a delicate period. The last time I'd had serious one, the jarring effect of Eric's actions had left me weakened for months. I was now at my most vulnerable and had to take care so I'd recover quickly enough for both our safety.

I started eating the sandwich and noticed vaguely that the cut on my left wrist was gone. I finished the sandwich and a bottle of water and crawled back into bed. Moments later, the lights were out in the room and I felt myself being shifted further into the center of the bed. Eric spooned against me and held my hand. My last fading thoughts were of the comforting feeling of his chin against my shoulder.


When I awoke more than 15 hours later, I was nestled in Eric's arms.

"It's just after 8 pm," he said softly to me.

"You're awake early. It's still twilight."

"We went to sleep early," he said softly.

I could feel a complex set of emotions from him and then suddenly, I realized that with my guard dropped from sheer exhaustion I was letting him feel me. I started to pull back from him, both emotionally and physically, but he held me firmly.

"No," he said in a firm low voice. "I want it back. You won't take it from me a second time."

"It's better that way," I said softly. "Really."

"There's nothing better about it." He hugged me to him. "You feel so… alone, Sookie. Utterly alone."

I caught my breath and felt tears forming in my eyes. I was utterly alone.

"I am not alone." Finally, I said, "I have Eithne. She understands. She's patient. It doesn't affect her. "

"You have me."

"I make your life more dangerous, Eric. My being apart from you might make your life safer and easier. And what channels through me is… terrible at times. It's a burden that should not be shared, even vicariously."

"You have made my life dangerous since I first met you, Sookie. That is nothing new. We'll protect each other. I cannot stand being apart from you again. It would not benefit either of us to even try. We will not be totally apart again. We just won't." There was much emotion in his voice. The way he held me I couldn't look into his eyes.

"You're not afraid of me, Eric?" Afraid of what I've become, of things you can't even see inside me yet, I thought.

"I am not afraid of you. I know you will not hurt me. To me, you have not changed in any fundamental way. I am bonded to you. I want to be with you. The only things I have ever feared with you are how much you made me feel and losing you. We are still together. We are." He said this last part as if it was a fact, something already written. His thoughts on the matter were already complete.

Where was I in my thoughts with him? A month ago, I'd thought we might never be together again, and here I was lying in his arms. I had to admit that my heart sang when I was near him. I remembered what he had said two nights ago, that he didn't need to feel me through the bond to know that I loved him. He was right. I did still love him, and I wasn't even sure anymore in my mind what it was I was trying to forgive him for. That night, that dark night. Wasn't I really in part trying to forgive myself for that night? For all my self-deception? I said I knew him. But had I truly accepted what I knew?

I realized he would never again be able to force me to do anything like what he had done that September night almost a year ago. Everyone who had talked to me about that night seemed to think that Eric had done exactly the right thing. I could still see Clancy's face in my memory and I shuddered. Would he really have sold me out? We had become guarded friends of sorts. But Eric had known him many years. Part of me knew that Eric suspected him and had kept him separate from the others on purpose. Clancy had known exactly what I was and told Eric he did. My scruples could have cost every one of the other vampires in that club their lives. I knew in my heart that Niall, Pythia and Eithne were right about that. I knew that Pam and Thalia would likely have defended me to their deaths just because I'd saved their lives. Even Felicia was attached to me. The others would have been compelled to do so if told to by Eric. He could never do what he did that night to me again, but really, he would never need to. I was now the power to be reckoned with. If Eric had indeed made the right choice that September night, perhaps that was the most important outcome. If all of it hadn't happened that way, perhaps I would not have ended up in Eithne's gentle care. Worse things might have come about. I had chosen to protect Thalia from harm. Perhaps choice creates fate or destiny as we move forward, I thought. Perhaps I had been missing Eithne's point all along. The two were inextricably intertwined.

I relaxed back into Eric's arms and sighed. I thought how ironic it was when I first told him that I was able to read vampire minds telepathically that he had commented that he could appreciate me for all that I could become. Neither of us had any idea then, had we? We had each been naïve, each in our own way, about the change that had begun in those weeks. Our path together was sealed. It had been from the first bond, which had been Eric's choice in spite of his fears of what I represented to him. There would be no turning back. I thought of the Lia Fáil and seeing his sapphire eyes. What is, is.

I realized that Eric was the only person, other than Eithne, around whom I was not wary. I envisioned him suddenly kneeling in front of me with my wedding ring and the chain in his hand, or undressing me and putting me into bed when I was too exhausted to even care. No one else could have even gotten that close to me when I was tired or weak. I trusted him, whether I wanted to admit it to myself or not, and even though he had hurt me. I remembered Eithne's words to me- 'the physical pain he rendered you is small in comparison to what it cost him to cause it.' I thought about how he took so long to get into the car with me that night. What had it cost him, I wondered, to literally break the bones of the woman he loved in order to save her from something even worse? And then I had left his side for ten months without so much as a word, and cut him off from feeling me. Rather than bond to someone else, or turn away from me, he just waited. It was so far from self-preservation it took my breath away. In the process of getting to where I was now, I realized that had been cruel to Eric. Yet he had forgiven me. I recalled how I had felt when our bond had been impaired by Niall's misguided magic for a few short weeks. Ten months. Ten months. I could not fathom how he bore it. 'You underestimate him' Pythia had said to me. Perhaps I had.