Chapter 7

2002

PPOV

Fucking fairies. I should've went back to Shreveport to help Eric finalize the plans for our new bar instead of going to the ground zero of inbreeding.

First, I got insulted by the detestable spawn of a whore and fae. Her pathetic attempt at staking me wasn't even worth mentioning, but the sheer fact that someone, anyone, had the audacity to raise a stake to me and then lived to tell the tale..

And when she started leaking and shouting hysterically about how she and her brother were abused by their mother as children, I broke. I was unfamiliar and, therefore, uncomfortable with the emotions. Unnecessary feelings, ones that made vampires weak and consequently got us killed, were one of the first parts of our humanity we lost when turned. For some it took decades, for others years. It wasn't a conscious decision, though I'd never spoken to anyone other than Corbett who admitted to trying to hold onto them, it was just one of the by products of being a vampire. Like accelerated healing. My maker, after a thousand years, lost all of his superfluous emotions. All he had left were ghosts of what he should feel, and whatever slithered through our bond from Corbett. It wasn't much and, logically, he should be a murdering psychopathic bastard. But Eric was nothing if not stubborn, and he refused to succumb to the madness that had taken so many others of his years. He lived by his own interpretation of a moral code. Something he retained from his life as a Viking. And among others on the short list, he vowed never to kill children and mothers. I think it had more to do with his human wife and children than his life as a marauder, but he never offered, and I never asked. That code was what made him save Sookie, and I was almost certain it was the reason for my turning Corbett as well.

Or maybe my maker was psychic. Because when Sookie had diarrhea of the mouth and began spouting things of her past, Corbett was attacked with a torrent of unpleasant feelings. Shame. Regret. Guilt. Grief. Sadness. Despair. Pain. And through our maker-child bond, I experienced each and every loathsome emotion as well.

Then, after rendering me speechless with her hospitality, Corbett's mother annoyed the absolute fuck out of me with her interruptions and demands. And I slipped. I said the one thing Corbett asked me not to say. Based on my experience with the fairy hybrids I was acquainted with over the years, and I've known plenty, Corbett was at least a quarter fae. It was reasonable to assume his mother knew about his supernatural heritage, and he decided not to bring it up out of concern and respect for her. I obviously didn't give a shit about her sensibilities, but it was the only request Corbett asked of me. But I slipped. After she vexed me. And I regretted it almost immediately. Sex with someone you were bonded with was fucking amazing. Everything gets amplified, and climaxes could last forever when sent back and forth through the bond. But even sex couldn't completely make up for how irksome it was to receive all of the annoyingly depressing emotions a young vampire experienced. And that's exactly what I was bombarded with when "momma" turned white as a vampire after I mentioned fairies.

So, someone was going to die. It was the only thing that would've salvaged my night, and I was all too glad it was the vile creature that preyed on children. Eric would be proud, I thought with a fangy grin.

I followed Corbett to the Stoner Hill neighborhood in Shreveport. I knew what he wanted. I felt the thirst for retribution running through our bond and into my veins. It was a siren's call, the call for death, a song that I was all too familiar with and all too happy to answer. Unfortunately, now that vampires revealed ourselves, the possibility of the death being pinned on a vampire was too great to just barge in without a plan. Forensic science was a bitch and Eric would have my head if I fucked this up. Normally, I'd let my child take the lead so I could observe the progression of his training, but he was too close to bloodlust, and there were one too many variables than I was comfortable with. So I sent him calm and caution, and waited for the red haze to lift from his end of the bond. There was resistance at first, but slowly, he regained his composure and the berserker state he was so close to treading almost became an afterthought.

When he was ready, Corbett, still in his crouched stance in the shadows of the foliage, raised his head and surveyed his surroundings.

"Houses too close together."

I nodded. It was still too early in the night, some of the humans were still awake. And judging by the sounds coming from two of the houses, we'd have an extra two humans added to the population of Shreveport in ten months. Just what we fucking needed, more breathers.

"All it'd take is one biddy peeping through her blinds.."

To start a witch hunt, he didn't say. He didn't need to. I was all too familiar with them. My first decade as a vampire caused Eric nothing but trouble. I always said that it was a good thing vampires couldn't grey, otherwise I'd have given him a head full of white hair along with his wheat blonde ones. I didn't have the patience and never fully understood the anticipation and enjoyment of the hunt until I was much older than Corbett.

"Come back at two, yeah?"

I checked my watch. That was over three hours away, but it gave us close to four hours with him until we had to dispose of his body before dawn. Plenty of time to play.

I smiled in anticipation of the hunt. Corbett mirrored my smile, and it wasn't a pretty sight.

I never cared much for breathers. It's a universally known fact. So when my maker felt how anxious I was about "meeting the parents", he became so amused that he spent the two nights Corbett and I had been back dropping glaringly obvious hints for an invitation to the reunion. Neither of us wanted to give Eric any more ammunition to use against us than he already had, so Corbett did what he always did around Eric, he played dumb. As in, mentally and socially retarded. And as it always did when employed, it worked like a charm. I also walked away with a new handbag and of course, a matching puppy, courtesy of my guilt ridden maker and his American Express.

What started as a joke thirteen years ago quickly turned into what Corbett coined Maker's Guilt, which I may or may not have been known to abuse every so often.

After being forced to sire a vampire I did not want, I ignored my maker for two years. I was too young, not even two centuries undead, and much too beautiful to be a maker. Training a newborn was dirty work. It entailed months of going to ground in the wilderness, hunting whatever humans unlucky enough to venture into the woods (which ironically, became more and more frequent as modern housing became more and more luxurious. I never understood the concept of camping. If humans wanted an authentic experience, why sleep in tents and eat prepared food out of tins? Their social behaviors baffled me, but that was nothing new), learning how to subsist on infrequent feedings, and generally just learning how to survive in the likely event of vampires becoming the hunted. With the Great Revelation being less than two decades away, learning how to survive in times of war was crucial. Humans were just too fickle to expect perpetual peace, even if their initial response towards vampires were positive. Jealousy and fear were powerful motivators for prejudice and violence. That said, I wasn't prepared to have to share my existence with another. I didn't want to be weighed down by the responsibility. And being a good sire was extremely time consuming - something that I had an abundance of, but wasn't willing to spare. Unfortunately, you couldn't just make a vampire and walk away. Not even the dregs of our society did that. The maker-child bond was that compelling. It had to be. Our race, as self-serving and self-aggrandizing as we were, would never have survived otherwise.

Corbett and I left Louisiana the night he rose as a vampire. Our laws, and common sense, made it impossible for a new vampire to reside in his home state for the first years of his new life. Risk of exposure was too great. Corbett didn't meet Eric, as busy as he was, until almost a year after our cold war was over. By then, I had already informed my child of everything that happened the night of his turning. Including my throwing his precious Sookie over the bridge, which he did not take very well, and Eric's quip about him rising as another Bubba ("I don't care if he becomes another Bubba, you are to treat him blah blah blah"), which he thought was absolutely hilarious after I explained who Bubba actually was. So when Eric finally had the time, and royal clearance, to visit us in Minnesota, Corbett took it upon himself to become the world's first redneck vampire, and official bane of my maker's existence.

He insisted on calling Eric "grand pappy", exaggerated his already atrocious accent, and had a stockpile of the most revolting southern colloquialisms on earth.

He's so full'a shit, his eyes are brown.

I wouldn't spit in his ass if his guts were on fire.

He'd eat the corn outta her shit if she asked him to.

He wouldn't say shit if his mouth was full.

Eric was in his own personal hell. And I loved every second of it. The only caveat? I got shat on constantly for fucking a moron, but it was worth it. He'd feel guilty immediately afterwards for dooming me to an eternity with said moron, and I'd walk away with something shiny and new. I doubted the joke would last much longer though. After all, it only lasted as long as it did due to the amount of time they actually got to interact. Which was once or twice per year. Now that Corbett and I were moving to Louisiana permanently, well, I'd have to milk Eric for as much Maker's Guilt as I could before the gig was up.

"He's as windy as a sack full'a farts."

Eric looked up from the papers he was going over on his desk. Fangtasia - The Bar With a Bite, was in its final stages of completion. It was a guaranteed moneymaker, not to mention the accessibility to an easy feed and fuck for the vampires in our area would also mean less work and cleanup for Eric in the long run.

Exasperation written all over his normally inscrutable face, he asked, "What the fuck does that even mean?"

"Means, he ain't 'lible." Corbett replied, distractedly. He was eyeing the bottle of True Blood in front of him suspiciously.

The frustration pouring from Eric into my side of our bond almost cracked me. I had to bite down hard on my cheeks to keep my amusement suppressed.

"Liable for what?" Eric asked while rubbing his temples. How Corbett was able to give a vampire a headache was anyone's guess, but Eric was close to losing it, so I sent caution to Corbett.

"'Lible a tellin' the truth! Nuts on a squirrel, why's it always so goddang hard talkin' wit cha? I got fucked harder than a hooker on Nickel Tuesdays. Errthang he told me, all 'em monthly reports and updates, they were all shiet. My wife dang near beat my baby girl to death and touched my boy in ways a mother never ought to. And that fucker, Burnham Sr., why he's 'bout as useful as tits on a duck and I betcha anything, he kept all the money he was 'sposed to be givin' my momma too. I got half a mind to hunt Michelle and Senior down tonight, but me and sweet cheeks here already got plans wit the grim reaper. Speakin'a which, I ought to get errthang ready. I sure would hate to stop in the middle'a guttin' the fucker 'cause I forgot to pack somethin'." Corbett stood, "Scuse me."

Eric waited for the door to close before raising an eyebrow at me.

I took a sip of the synthetic blood we were all expected to drink in public from now on. It was revolting. "Apparently his wife wasn't the only one in the family with inbreeding on her mind. We're taking care of dear old Uncle Bartlett in a bit. And who will you be doing tonight?" I added, changing the subject. The less he knew about Corbett's family, the better. I knew it was irrational, I mean it was Eric, but I'd had a fiercely powerful desire.. No, it was a need, an innate sense of need to keep my child safe since the moment he rose. And that included keeping his heritage, and what his precious little Sookie could do - unglamourable and a seer, from my own maker.

He shook his head. "Long Shadow wants to see the bar. Then I'll be dealing with five new check-ins. Thalia is also relocating to my area."

"Which state did she get kicked out of this time?" I asked, while examining my nails. I needed to invest in a better topcoat, my polish was already chipping after only two nights.

"Illinois. She was too... aggressive after the Great Revelation."

"After? It's only been two nights. Eric, you know I'd never question your edict but do you think it wise to have a rabid pitbull chained to your backyard?"

"When surrounded by snakes, what better pet to have chained than one who bites first?"

I looked up at that. "You anticipate trouble?"

"Always."

I nodded and resumed my appraisal of my nails. Maybe I should just get a manicure.

A/N: do you guys want Bartlett's death "onscreen", or can we just accept that he was tortured and murdered and dumped somewhere as gator food? If you want the death, I'll write a short chapter and include it within the next day or two. If not, we'll be jumping about a year into the future because there's just too much political shit going on 2 days post GR to weigh down the story.