Hi! First of all, I'm sorry that it took me over a week to update again: too much work, a bachelotte party organized by me and one of my best friends' wedding (and all those extra things that she kept asking me to help her with), prevented me from updating sooner. But next chapter is almost done, and you won't wait too long for it, I swear. Anyway, Charhamblin's beta-skills and help were amazing and Charlaine Harris' characters are amazing too. And now, without further ado, here's chapter 44. I hope you'll enjoy reading it. Hugs from Portugal, Célia

Eric "Something For The Pain"

The previous two nights had been a fucking nightmare for me. An authentic fucking nightmare for me. And I had never felt so bad about myself. It all begun after I went to pick Nat up at the Continental Hotel, and from then on, it only got worse and worse.

That night, I had introduced Sookie and Nat, and, at the first glance,everything had developed in the right way. None of them had been aggressive towards the other, and for a few moments I actually thought that everything would be okay. But then, when I left at midnight, Sookie didn't let me kiss her. I obviously asked her what was wrong, but she only gave me her "we'll talk about it later" face and so I left to Fangtasia with Nat. And for a few hours after that, I actually had a nice night with Nat and a few more vampires. Besides, Mark Sottomayor, Felipe de Castro's emissary, hadn't given us any problem during his visit to one of my bars that night. So yeah, I'd say that until more or less 4 am, my night had been a somewhat regular night – not good, but not bad either. But, later as I drove Nat to her hotel, the shit hit the fan, and my night transformed into a fucking nightmare.

And why? Because when I went upstairs to Nat's room, so she could give me a few documents that Adelaide had asked her to deliver to me (yes, in retrospective, I know that I should never have gone upstairs), she then kissed me. And my body just reacted the way it was used to reacting and I kissed her back. But, I swear, in less than two minutes after I had started responding to Nat's advances on me, I got up and moved out of the bed.

And that was something that Natércia didn't understand nor appreciated. And then, when she asked why I wouldn't fuck her, I just decided that enough was enough, and I opened up and told her of how I felt towards Sookie. And she, well… she went berserk and just… attacked me. I let her hit me for a few minutes, but eventually, I punched her back. And we just… fought. But then all Nat's anger disappeared and turned into sadness when I told her that Sookie was my real companion, which was a word that we had always used between just the two of us.

And telling Nat that Sookie was my companion had the same effect that telling Ocella that I had spent my days with Sookie. And so, after those "bomb-phrases", they were both obliged to acknowledge Sookie and how much she meant to me. And as soon as I said it, Nat told me to leave. Which I did. Gladly.

I left the hotel, and I immediately drove home. As soon as I got inside, I just quickly checked Lizzie's room (I wanted to make sure that she was sleeping alright) and then I went to my room. I woke up Sookie and then I had the hardest conversation of my whole life. I told her about kissing Natércia and about fighting her because she had freaked when I hadn't had sex with her. And the way Sookie looked at me… It almost broke my heart. She was so sad and disappointed that I hadn't been up to her expectations… I told her how sorry I was, and that I wished that I had never done it. I talked about the huge guilt that I felt, and how I would do everything differently if I had the chance. I said that I loved her, and that if she still wanted me, I would stay with her for as long as I could. But, apparently, she didn't. And so she asked me to leave the room and sleep downstairs that day.

And when I went to sleep that dawn, I knew that I had never felt as alone as in that precise moment. However, on the next night, Sookie proved me wrong because as soon as I woke up, I felt even more alone. And why? Because both my wife and my daughter weren't there. And you know what else wasn't there? A fucking note saying that they'd arrive home later that night. And neither were a few of their clothes and personal objects. I felt like dying all over again.

But then, later that night, thank the Gods, Sookie came home again. And I felt immediately better, because even though she still didn't want to forgive me (or even see me for that matter), at least they were both at home. Close with me.

My loneliness lasted for another day and part of the next night. Because then, that second night after I had told Sookie everything about Natércia, she forgave me. Yes, Sookie, tender-hearted as she was, forgave me, even without saying the words. And then she allowed me to hug her. And later, I died for the day with her in my arms.

On the next night, I woke up alone and I felt lonely again. But I knew that Sookie would be with Liz at her brother's, and I was happy for that. They would be safe there because no vampire could enter that house, and that was the most important thing. I got up, I dressed, and then I grabbed my cell-phone and went to the living room. I had a crucial phone call to make.

I sat on the couch where not even 72 hours before Sookie, Nat and I had talked about Zephyrus, and I called Natércia. And… well, I wasn't sure if she would even answer her phone after what had happened. But luckily, she did. And I was glad for that. Nat and I really had to talk.

"Eric," Natércia acknowledge me as soon as the call began.

"Hello Natércia. How are you?" I asked. She had probably recovered in only a few hours after our fight two nights before, just as I had. When you get to be our age, we pull through our wounds much quicker than younger vampires.

"I'm okay. But you couldn't say the same about my bedroom though," she answered.

"Are you still in Shreveport?" I had wanted to call her earlier. But, at the same time, I hadn't. The whole situation was just a real cluster fuck.

"Yes, I'm still at the hotel. Though I had to move to another bedroom. And I'll pay a shit-ton of money because of the furniture we broke," she said with an almost normal voice; she only sounded slightly mad at me. It was as if the fight between us hadn't even happened. But that she was only vaguely annoyed with me for some lesser issue.

"I'm sorry about that," I said. I was talking about the destroyed furniture but meaning the fight as well.

"Yeah. I'm sorry too," she answered me. She was probably talking about both the furniture and the fight too. And then she added, "It was not the first time we broke a hotel's bed, though."

I remembered past, happier days between us and I almost smiled. But the operative word there was almost. Because I wouldn't be able to smile until we resolved all those problems between us and I was sure that no harm would come to either Sookie or Liz. "No, it was not our first broken bed," I answered.

"But it was the first time we did it fighting," she concluded immediately, "Listen Eric, we should meet. We have to talk," she added one second later.

"We should. That was actually why I was calling you," I said.

"Yes, I figured as much. Great minds think alike."

"They do."

"So, where and when do you want to meet?"

"Maybe I could pick you up? I can be there in half an hour or so?" I suggested.

"No. I want to have dinner first and… I need a couple of hours to think things through before I see you again. No, not yet. Let's meet at midnight, instead. And I don't want you to drive me anymore either. I don't think I'll ever want you to drive me anymore," she said.

For centuries, I had operated the horses. And since the first cars were commercialized, I had always been the one who drove whenever we were together. The fact that she didn't want me to pick her up spoke volumes. And it said that she was disappointed with me. So I could only answer her, an unintelligent "ohh".

"But I can meet you in one of your bars, if you want," she proposed.

"Come here. To my house. I don't want to talk to you in a bar. Will you come to my place, Nat?"

And then she said she would. We talked for a couple more minutes, both recognizing that we wanted to correct everything between us. I could tell by her voice that she was still kind of mad but she would gladly meet me at my place.

As soon as that conversation ended, I then called Pam and told her all about the previous night. I explained to her how Sookie and I had talked and how everything was alright again between us. And then I told Pam about my phone call with Nat, and that I would be meeting Natércia in a few hours. And then Pam kept insisting that she wanted to be there with me. But I knew how they both felt about each other, and I wouldn't want another stressful issue for Natércia that night. No. Pam would not be there with me. And instead, I told her to go to Sookie, at her brother's house. I was almost sure that Natércia wouldn't go there. But knowing Nat how I did, I didn't want to take the chance. Even though it would be a one in a thousand probability of Nat knowing where Sookie was, and going there, I didn't want to risk it. Sookie and Liz were my life, and I would feel much better knowing that Pam was with them. And eventually, my phone call with Pam ended too. But I stayed on the couch for a few more minutes, just pondering my life.

I really didn't want to fight Natércia. She was way too important to me (not to mention that I wasn't sure if I would win such a fight). I hadn't lied when I had told Sookie that Nat was my best and oldest friend. Ocella had been just a maker for almost four centuries before I had called him friend. Natércia though, had been my friend just three hours after we met.

I was living in Italy back then and I had a couple of highly glamoured delicious sisters that belonged to me living close by me. Nat drank dry both of them because "they smelled sweet". I realize now that the girls were probably part-fairy. But back then, when I wasn't 200 years old yet, they were just tasty meals.

Natércia had been living with her maker, Zephyrus, next to Athens for a while before he freed her as soon as they had moved to Italy. Back then, Greece was living the end of what the historians now call the Hellenistic period, and the establishment of Roman rule over Greek lands. During that time many Greeks migrated to Alexandria, Antioch, Seleucia and the many other new Hellenistic cities in Asia and Africa founded in Alexander's wake, but Nat's maker had insisted on staying in his own birthplace. But eventually, the subsequent mixture of Roman and Hellenic cultures took form in the establishment of the Byzantine Empire around Constantinople. Byzantium remained a major cultural and military power, until the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks later on. On the eve of the Ottoman conquest, much of the Greek intelligentsia migrated to Italy and other parts of Europe not under Ottoman rule, playing a significant role in the Renaissance through the transmission of ancient Greek works to Western Europe.

And, like many other Grecians, Zephyrus had moved to Italy too. And he had brought Nat along. But then, he suddenly freed her, and she was by herself for the first time ever. Nat also told me that she had been staying in Italy for three or four years. But she had hated the country and had decided she wanted to go to France, though back then we only knew it as Gaul.

And so, she was traveling to France when she smelled (and then killed) my two girls. And that made me angry. It was obvious that my scent was all over the girls – they belonged to a vampire. They belonged to me! But Natércia just didn't care. She had smelled them, and she had just drunk them dry because they had tasted sweet. When, on the following night, I got to the house where the girls lived, I just found their lifeless, bloodied bodies. I could smell that a vampire had been there, and the fang marks that where all over the bodies, left no room for misunderstandings. Another vampire had killed my property! And I would make him pay, so I started following the vampire's smell.

When I tracked the vampire two nights later, I saw Nat for the first time, and I thought that she was very beautiful. But she had killed my girls and I would not let her go unpunished. And so, we fought. And it was my longest one-on-one fight, up until then. And almost two hours later, I lost it. I had fucking lost the fight. I was absolutely sure that she was going to kill me, when the vampire spoke with a perfect voice, the mixture of Latin and Italian that was spoken there, at the time.

"If I let you go, will you still try to kill me? Or can you just forget that I killed the girls? I'm leaving to Gaul now, and then to Brittania, and I'd love to have a travelling companion. I'm absolutely sure, I just have this deep feeling, that we could be great together…" she said while I kept staring at her.

Except for her growling during the fight, it was the first time I had heard her voice and it sounded like an angel's. Especially with the musical cadence of the Italian language.

I didn't answer her but she got up from me, released my arms and let me go, nonetheless. That dawn we went to the ground together (for the first of thousands and thousands of nights) so we would both heal our multiple wounds. It would take us two more full days of rest to completely heal.

And so I started my friendship with Natércia. And I did go with her to Gaul, which was under a Roman administration back then. And we even managed to get our very first fake documents, because it was then that we gained Roman citizenship, because of the Constitutio Antoniniana, a law that extended citizenship to all free-born men in the Roman Empire.

A few years later, we moved to Brittania, which is now the UK. So, yes, you could say that we travelled a lot and we fed and fucked together a lot too. And that happened for a little more than a decade. And during those years, we were inseparable. But suddenly, we got fed up with each other. And we both decided that we needed some time apart. And so we separated for the first time. And it took us 30 or 40 years for us to get together again. However, during those decades that we were apart, we kept writing to each other. Back then, there was almost no postal service even though the Romans had tried to implement one, but whenever I moved, I made sure Nat knew where I was. And she did the same.

And when we met again, it was intense. It was Hiroshima and Nagasaki intense. Again, we stayed together for a few years, but then we went our separate ways. And so it had been for the last 800 years.

Yes, Nat was really my oldest and my best friend. And I really didn't want to fight or kill her. But I wouldn't let her kill me. We had fought once. And she had won once. But she wouldn't win twice. And so, I went out to Fangtasia, so I could have dinner properly before midnight. I grabbed a couple of frozen blood bags, I warmed the blood on the microwave, and I drank it.

I was back home by 11 pm with my hunger satisfied and ready to fight Natércia, if I had to, though I hoped that we wouldn't get to that. And then I spend the next hour, on the couch in the living room, thinking about our time together in South Africa in the 1920's.

The 1920s was the decade sometimes referred to as the Roaring Twenties or the Jazz Age, when speaking about the United States, Canada or the United Kingdom. In Europe the decade was sometimes referred to as the "Golden Twenties" because of the economic boom following World War I. And South Africa was no exception. The newly created "Union of South Africa", as it was called then, was a dominion of the British Empire, and completely Europeanized. The Natives' Land Act of 1913 had severely restricted the ownership of land by black people. So, adding the colonial powers to the economic prosperity, the 1920s was a great decade in South Africa if you were a white, rich land-owner. And Nat and I sure had used that status to have a great time.

I was still remembering our farm in KwaZulu-Natal, when, all of a sudden, I heard a car pull-up and then I smelled Natércia. She just walked in to my house without knocking and two seconds later I saw her by the door of the living room.

Nat was wearing some dark-blue jeans and a black scoop-neck t-shirt. And I felt that I would be more at ease if she had been wearing her usual formal-clothes attire. Why? Because jeans and a black t-shirt told me that she knew that there was a chance for a fight between us that night. The jeans would give her much more movement fluidity than a skirt, of course, and black was the best color to wear, if you wanted to avoid drawing attention to your bloodied clothes. And she had a ponytail. Nat never used to wear her hair up; but it really would be better for someone in a fight to keep the hair away from the face. But she was beautiful nonetheless.

"I can smell that your little blond blood bag isn't here," she said while she stood by the living room door.

"No, she is not," I answered, at least grateful that she hadn't even mentioned Liz.

And, well, you could never say that Nat ran away from stressful conversations. Because she immediately jumped into our main issue with her following words, "Have you changed your mind about her, Eric? Are you willing to leave her? I mean, if you'd kill her, I would prefer that, but are you at least willing to leave that human?"

"No. I am not, Nat."

"But can't you see that I'm forcing you to leave her for your own good? It's embarrassing to have you doing what a human tells you to do," she said walking towards me and the couch.

You could feel the huge tension in the room when she sat by me. It was as if she hated me. But I wanted my friend back and so put my hand on her knee, as I had always done. It was our position and it was completely natural, after thousands and thousands of nights. And I knew that she always calmed down whenever I touched her. If was as if… Well, I always thought of her knee as Nat's own personal Chakra point for calm and serenity, or something.

"I am the one who wants to keep her Natércia," I told her in a soothing voice tone, "I am the one who wants to be with her. I followed her when she left. I really like Sookie and her daughter,"

"The kid's a were Eric," she said with an almost desperate air about her. Natércia couldn't grasp why I was behaving that way and saying those things and she was… well, worried about the fact that I had changed that much, "Are you a were-lover now?" she asked.

"Elizabeth is half were, Nat. And you can barely tell it by her smell. She's much more Sookie than she is her father. And Sookie smells wonderfully. And I know that you won't deny it."

"Is that why you are with her? Her blood? Then please, just please dry her and move on."

Nat's eyes were begging me to drink Sookie and end all of that. She was really worried about me and I knew that she really thought that she was doing the right thing trying to make me leave Sookie. In her mind, she was being a good friend to me. And she was trying to get me free from Sookie. Besides, I also knew that she really was trying her best to understand me. But I knew that she would never understand my next sentence. Either way, I said it.

"I do not care about her blood. Yes, it's tasty and I love it. But I would still be with her if I couldn't drink from her. It is more than just a likeliness Nat," I paused for one second, and then I added, "I love her."

There. I had said it. I had told another vampire that I loved Sookie. And that was something that had taken me over two years to even say to Pam. Though my child had known about it, even before I had told her, obviously.

Now, just the concept of such an old vampire loving someone, was not that frequent. But a vampire, as old as I was, being blunt enough about it to actually say that he loved a human was not only rare, it was also scary and upsetting. Vampires didn't love. And they sure didn't love humans. But there I was, telling Nat that I loved Sookie.

She pondered over my confession for a minute or two, and then she asked me a question. "Would you choose her over yourself, Eric? Over me?"

"I will not let you harm her Nat," I answered full of conviction.

"Do you really love the human?"

"Yes, I do."

"Did you love me?"

"I think so. I… I think that I still do, Nat. You're my friend. I can't imagine my life without you in it. We've been through too much already," I answered.

"Yes, we have. And I think that I love you too, Eric," it was the first time, in 800 years, that we were talking about it. Love was a feeling. And the conventional idea was that vampires didn't feel. So we had always showed our importance to each other, but we had never uttered those words.

"I'm glad that you do," I told her. And I was.

"And the child?" she asked.

"Elizabeth is Sookie's daughter. When she left me almost 13 years ago, she later married a were-bear and they had Elizabeth. And when Sookie came back to Shreveport, she brought her child with her," I said.

"And her father?"

"Her father died almost a year ago. I am her father now. I love her as my own," I answered her truthfully.

"You really mean it, don't you?"

"Yes."

"Did you kill the biological father?" Natércia asked. And yes, it would have been expected that I would have killed him. After all, he had been with my woman.

"No. He died in a were dispute."

Nat looked appalled by my answer. "Why didn't you kill him?"

"Because Liz would have suffered. She still does. And the last thing I wanted was to bring pain to her."

"And the kid is the reason why you didn't kill the bear?"

"Yes. She was just a little girl, she still is, and she needed her father. And I would never kill her father."

"Even after he married your human."

It hadn't sounded like a question, but rather a statement. However, I answered her nonetheless, with a simple "yes."

"You are different Eric. You are not the man I knew. The old Eric wouldn't have let her leave in the first place if he didn't want her to leave. And he would never allow another man in her life. But you're not the vampire I knew. She belongs to you and you let her have her way. It's so strange," she concluded.

"Yes. I have changed. But I don't regret it. I am happy now. I am a better man and a better vampire. But I am sorry that you don't like the new me, Nat. I wished we could stay friends."

"I'm sorry too," she whispered. "And I wished it as well," she added a second later.

As before, she kept her silence for a couple of minutes. I knew she was making her decision. She was choosing if she would accept me with my love for a human, of it she wouldn't be able to live with that knowledge. Nat put her hand on top of the hand that I still had on her knee and looked me in the eyes. She whispered with the same perfect voice that she had always had, "I… I won't understand your new way Eric. I wish that I would, but I know that I won't."

"I'm sorry for that Nat. But this is who I am now."

"Are you sure of it? Are you sure you want this feeble life? Raising a half were kid with a human? Seeing them get older and older? Watching them get sick and eventually die?"

I almost shivered at Nat's words. She was hitting me where it hurt the most. The mere thought of eventually losing either Sookie or Liz to a disease or old age pained me to my core. But I would keep trying to convince Sookie to let me turn her, and, in a couple of decades I would try the same thing with Lizzie. And besides, even if I wouldn't be able to talk them into becoming vampires, I was still sure that I was willing to suffer with their death if that meant I could stay with them while they lived.

"I love them both Nat. I'll stay with them always," I answered, before I said, "no matter what." And I was sure of it. I wouldn't mind Sookie's age. I knew I'd love her forever, wrinkles and white hair, or not.

"And you're sure of it?"

"Absolutely."

"Then I'll… I'll stop. I won't insist that you must leave her. You'd… you'd keep thinking of her. And I… I don't recognize you and… You really sure of what you want?"

"Yes. I am."

Nat then did something un-Natércia like. She sighed. And then she said, "It's your choice, then." We then stood there, looking at each other for a few minutes. And after a second sigh, she added, "Our time together has been a great and long ride. And I've enjoyed it very much, Eric."

"So did I," I answered. And it was the absolute truth. Yes, we had argued over thousands of subjects, but I had always seen my time with Nat as some of the best moments of my whole life. Nat understood me like nobody else. She was the same as me. Or, I guess, she was the same as my old self. And so, we had always completely understood each other. And that had always meant a great time together.

She smiled back at me, and I remembered all over again why she was my friend and I had loved her for centuries. Nat's smile had always been incredible. And when she smiled like that at me, it was as if her eyes were smiling to. It would be hard to say goodbye to her. But that was what we were doing then.

"You were the best traveling through time companion ever," she told me.

"So were you. We've been to so many places together. We've met so many people. It was great, Nat."

"We were great," she answered accentuating the "we" word. She then continued talking, "We are great. We really are great together."

"Yes, you're right. We are great together," I told her. And it was true.

And for all accounts, Natércia really was my perfect companion. She was a vampire as old as I was; she understood my instincts, my thoughts, my worries and my purpose in life. She was sexy and gorgeous; and she would always be. She was sharp, intelligent, sarcastic and powerful. And I loved all that about her. We had spent a long time together and we had gone through so many things together. The world had truly changed since we had met, and we had helped each other during that whole time. So, yes, she was my perfect companion. There was only but one problem with Nat. I didn't love her as I loved Sookie. Natércia might be my perfect companion; but Sookie was my true mate, almost my soul-mate, if vampires did have a soul.

"And I will miss meeting you from time to time," she said.

Without waiting for my answer, Nat then moved across the couch in my direction and her lips brushed mine. I kissed her back for a couple of seconds, before she moved back to the other side of the couch again. It had been one chaste, innocent and last kiss.

"I'll miss you too, Natércia."

Nat then sat there, looking at me for a few minutes, while I glared her back. And then I saw red in her eyes. Nat wouldn't cry. It wasn't in her to cry. But the tears were there.

"I do have something else I need to tell you, Eric. And I fear that you'll be angry with me. But there's no more future for us anyway, so it's appropriate that I tell you the whole truth tonight because it will probably be the last time we'll talk this way," she finally whispered with a sad voice.

"What is it?"

"I've wanted to tell you this for centuries, but I didn't want to lose you. And that's why I didn't tell you before."

"What are you talking about?"

"I had already met you before Rome."

"You had? Where?" And how come I didn't remember Nat? She had always been pretty unforgettable to me. I was sure that I would have remembered her if I had seen her before. Perhaps she had confused me with someone else?

"I was only a couple of decades old, then. And that was why I couldn't yet really control myself," she said.

"What are you talking about?" I repeated. What was she talking about? I had never met her when she was that young.

"Zephyrus had wanted to meet the Ancient Pythoness. And he brought me with him to meet her once," she replied.

Her half-sentences and her jumps between different subjects were starting to get to me. I wondered where she wanted to go with all that talk. "What is it that you really want to tell me, Nat? This isn't you. You've always said everything without a second thought. So say it already," I urged her.

Nat took an unnecessary deep breath and then she added, "Back then, the Ancient Pythoness lived in the North of Europe. Close to Jämtland."

Jämtland? I never knew that she had lived there… Not since I was made a vampire, that is. Jämtland was next to the village where I lived when I was still… alive. What was Natércia saying? She had met me when I was alive? Was that the reason why I didn't remember that first time she said she saw me? Fuck! Had Nat drunk from me?

"Jämtland?" I whispered.

"Yes. And that was where I first saw you," she said before she added, "And Ocella probably saw you too because you had the unfortunate fate of living in a village that was somewhat close to the main road to Jämtland." And then she didn't add any other word. And we just sat there glaring at each other for a minute or so. But now I wanted to know the whole fucking story. So I took the dive and I asked:

"Was I alive when you saw me?"

"You were."

"Did you drink from me?"

"I did. And I…"

"What?" I whispered.

"I was young and I… I drank too much from you. And because I was afraid that Zephyrus would punish me if killed anyone else, I…"

"What?" I asked again. But I wasn't whispering then. I was almost yelling. Would Nat say what I thought that she was going to say? That she had somehow given me her blood? I… I… I didn't know what to think over that. I just knew that I had to know the fucking truth. "What?" I said a third time.

"I gave you my blood and then I glamoured you to forget everything," she finally said. Fuck! I had drunk from Natércia when I was still a human. I had fucking drunk from Natércia when I was a human. I didn't know what to tell her, and so I kept my mouth shut. And then Nat said, "I never thought I'd see you again. Italy was… It was a coincidence. And when we fought I was about to kill you when I smelled me in you. And that was when I recognized you."

"You…" I started to say, but then I shut up. I still didn't know what to tell her.

"I felt my blood in you and I didn't want to kill you. So I asked for you to come with me to France. And you did. And then we got along so well…"

"Why didn't you tell me?" I interrupted her.

"I had wanted to. But at first I only thought that I'd give us some time before dropping that bomb. And eventually, too much time had passed and I didn't know how to approach the subject."

"Do you… Can you influence me?"

"I…" she then stopped.

"Can you influence me, Natércia?" I almost screamed at her.

"I wouldn't say influence you. You only drunk once while you were human. But I know that the blood helped to keep us so close for so many years. But we were always more than the blood Eric. We had always been friends. And you know that," she said.

"I don't know anything about you. It's like… everything was a lie."

"No. No. The blood's just a detail. Everything was real. I only kept this from you. Everything else was the truth. I've only spoken the truth to you."

"Why did you decide to tell me about it now?"

"Because no matter what will happen tonight, we'll never stay the same as we were until a couple of nights ago. You are not the same. You are not the real-you anymore. And I don't like what you've become. However, I know that I will miss you, Eric. I will miss my friend."

"Natércia…" I started to say, but she immediately interrupted me.

"And my friend would deserve the truth. And that's why I'm telling you this. I just wished you were still my Eric," she said, moving again on the couch towards me. She brushed a lock of my ear to behind my ear and she kissed my cheek.

Natércia then moved back again on the couch, she smiled at me and she told me goodbye in the Italian language we had first used between us. And she spoke the same name that I used to be called back then. And it was fitting. Yes, it really was appropriate that the last sentence spoken between us, after 800 years and dozens of other languages, would be the same language that had allowed us to speak in the first place. "Arriverdeci Enrico Nortemani," Nat said.

And, as soon as she pronounced the last syllable of my former name, she attacked me with all her might. When you are as old as we both are, very few vamps fight you. And those who stupidly do it are easily overpowered. But I was now fighting another one-thousand-year-old vamp. And it was tough.

And Nat was a badass fighter. And I was sure that she was completely concentrated in winning over me. And there was absolutely no doubt of that in her eyes when I faced her. And suddenly I caught a glimpse of her moving stealthily but extremely quickly as well towards me, and I chose that moment to strike her as well. I feinted forward, and then I dropped into a crouch, while I swept one outstretched leg around me. And Nat was right here, punching my ribs. I swiftly moved, and my foot caught her ankle and I yanked Nat's feet from beneath her. And that was when I heard a deep growl from her that almost paralyzed me. Natércia had pitched backward with her arms flailing and she had smacked her head in the floor.

However, as the 1000-year-old vampire she was, she immediately got up and attacked me back. And all of a sudden, she had grabbed my arm, and she had twisted it while at the same time she had bitten my shoulder. And she even took a piece of my flesh. She had fucking bitten and taken a piece of my shoulder's flesh. My shoulder was like the fucking Apple logo with a piece missing. Arght! And right then and there, I realized that I hated Natércia with all my being. She had fucking lied to me for eight fucking centuries. Eight centuries! But, at the same time, I also hated myself.

After all that time that we had spent together, my mind still couldn't comprehend nor accept that everything had been based on a lie. And Nat and I had spent so much time together. She hadn't killed me that first time we fight, but other than that time; she had actually saved my life six other times. And I'm not even counting all those times when we both fought other vampires, or weres, or even humans when they had attacked us because they had somehow discovered and believed in our monstrous nature. Yes, I knew that I owed my existence to Nat, such as she owed her existence to me.

And all those conflicting thoughts were really messing with my head, and taking my concentration away. And that was when she pushed me towards the wall, and then I fell. Nat pounced onto me, and she rammed a fist into my chin and neck to insure that I was down for good. But I wasn't. Obviously. And Nat knew that. And that was why she didn't dare pause to savor her temporary victory; as soon as my fallen head rebounded from the floor a second time, she was moving again, this time kicking me.

But I quickly managed to get up, and soon it was Nat, who was under me, grabbing her stomach region because I had hit her there with at least half a dozen consecutive and very strong punches.

And just 15 minutes into the fight, I already had at least one, or maybe even two, broken ribs. But Nat was also hurt, I could tell. Every time she moved her right leg, it pained her, and I figured that she had probably a broken leg, or at least a twisted ankle. And her arm, next to her hand, was bleeding severally because I had bitted into her, and lacerated some of her skin and flesh just as she had done to my shoulder.

But she kept attacking me and I did the same.

Her eyes had hatred in them and I knew that she would kill Sookie and Liz if I lost this fight. But I didn't intend to lose it. I was now fighting for much more than my own life. I was fighting for my family's as well. And so, I concentrated on the fight and focused in my own strength.

Half an hour later, my house was pretty much destroyed and we were both a mass of broken limbs and bloodied wounds. Natércia's hate and great anger and the smell and taste of her blood in my mouth, from my last two bites fuelled my own bloodlust and I kept fighting her with all I had.

And so, I kept drawing my energy deep into my core. I thought about Nat's lie. I thought how she had drunk from me. How she had made me drink her blood. And how she had kept it all a fucking secret. And when she hit me again, and she actually managed to grip my upper back, I spun around, and I grabbed her waistline and I threw her up and over. Nat's back hit another wall and I was instantly next to her. And I kept punching her face and her stomach until I grabbed her again, and again I threw her into the air. Nat twisted in the air like a cat, and she landed on all four: her hands and feet were spayed wide and stable.

But just like I had recovered from her attacks, Nat too was up and ready to attack in just a couple of seconds. And despite her limping leg and her broken arm, Nat was still extremely strong. But I knew what to do. And so, I took a risk and I let one of her blows land. And fuck! The crack across my jaw and nose sounded like a gunshot and it actually made my vision cross.

But it was enough.

It was all I needed.

Because when Nat then moved to take advantage of her blow, like I had anticipated, I intercepted her movement. And then, my own blow was as solid and crushing as I could, and I knocked her head to one side, with a crack.

I had unsettled Nat's momentum, as she used to call it.

And as Nat stumbled, I helped her down with a kick to the thigh of her limp leg, and a second palm into her chest. Nat grunted in pain and she fell. I dropped with her. With all my considerable weight over her. I laid one forearm across her throat. And that was when I knelt across her hips, sinking my weight to prevent her from bucking me off or kicking up between my legs.

Natércia was extremely strong and fast. But so was I. And besides, I was taller and bigger – my arms had allowed me to easily wrap around her and give her the "boa's hug" breaking her ribs once; and her little arms had had a harder time trying to do the same.

But what ultimately decided the fight, was the fact that I was much more experienced than Nat. My fighting skills were better and I had been in many more personal fights than she had.

And I had anticipated her movements.

And that was why, a little over an hour after we started fighting, I found myself on top of her, with both my hands around Nat's neck. And I crushed it, right before I pulled her head from the rest of her body.

I immediately moved away of her body, and I stood there, watching Natércia. And that was when I saw both her head and body immediately kind of melting into two blood pounds in the floor.

If I could, if I was still a human, I would have thrown up right then and there.

However, the only thing I could do was fall to the floor, dropping to my knees.

Nat was dead. She had been killed. I had killed her. No. She had been murdered, not killed. And I had been the one. I had murdered Natércia.

Fuck.

Ocella's death had been a hard blown to me. He had left an emptiness as no other. But Ocella had also given me much pain in my first couple of centuries. And even thought I now saw vampirism as a gift, Ocella had been the one who had actually killed me and had taken me away from my parents, my brothers and sisters, my wife and my children. I had had as many good times with Ocella as bad times with him. He had given me much joy. But he had hurt me many times as well.

But not Natércia. With Natércia, all times had been good times. Yes, we had had to stay away from time to time, but whenever we were together it was always awesome. But those times were gone now. My friend, my companion. She was dead. Because of me. I knew I would never have with Sookie the same things that I had had with Nat. Nat and I had a history together. A huge history together. Natércia was my companion. She was like me. We were the same. I was myself with her. And I was desperate without her. Completely and fuckingly desperate without her.

Thirty minutes later, I was still kneeling on the floor, looking at Nat's remains and just feeling alone, desperate and empty inside. And it fucking hurt. It hurt. I had killed my best friend and my long time companion. And what had been the reason? The sorrow in me was immense and it was clouding my judgment. And I was starting to feel really angry as well.

Natércia had lied to me. She had fucking lied to me for eight centuries. She had pretended to love me, to be my friend when it was all a lie. Our life together had been a fucking lie. And I wouldn't let anyone else fucking lie to me. Fuck! I was extremely angry and I wanted to tear the world apart. I wanted to scream and to tear down everything so I would waste some of the anger in me. I was entirely too worked-up.

So I got up and I continued destroying the little furniture that had survived the fight. I was right into the middle of breaking the living room big couch into two parts, when Pam and Sookie entered the house.

I was so angry and desperate that I thought I could kill them both if I wasn't careful. They shouldn't be here. Why the hell were they here? They really shouldn't be here. I was still having aftershocks from the fight's bloodlust. And those, combined with my anger and despair, had made me into something really dangerous. Killing them would be easy and some instinctual, hurting, monster part inside of me was telling me to do it. Actually, that monster part inside me was screaming that if they wouldn't leave me alone, then I should just kill them. Instantly.

I had a moment of clarity and I managed to scream at them both, while I pointed towards the door. "Get the fuck out of my house!" And just one second after that, when I realized that they were still standing there, glaring at me, I yelled in my second instant of lucidity, trying to calm down that monster in me, "NOW!"

Pam felt me. She was my child, and she could feel my blood. She knew I had really meant it when I had told them to leave. Besides, I had given her an order, a maker's command. She immediately turned around and left the living-room and the house. I heard a car door opening and closing, but then no motor turned on. So Pam would wait in her parked car, on my driveway. I guessed she could do that. I had only told her to get out of the house. The driveway was out of the house, so to speak.

On the other hand, without the blood bond, Sookie couldn't feel me. She had heard me screaming at the two of them, but she hadn't felt my seriousness about it. And so, she walked a step in my direction. I quickly wondered why the hell, Sookie would never obey me. Nat had lied to me. And now Sookie was disobeying me. And I wasn't thinking straight. Fuck! She took another step towards me. I smelled William Compton in her. And I fucking hated it.

And the monster in me, repeated his previous mantra, "Kill her."

You know something? It was damn hard to write such a fight-scene. And I sure hope that it was realistic enough for you and that you've enjoyed reading this chapter. And do you want a small spoiler from next chapter? Sookie will not leave. She'll stay right where she is! :)

"Something For The Pain" is a song by Bon Jovi from their 1997 album "These Days". It charted at #39 on the top 40 mainstream charts and peaked at #8 on the UK Singles Chart. It was a regular song played on the "These Days" Tour but, like many songs on this album, has been played less since. However, recently this song surprisingly returned to the set lists and so far it has been a staple on The Circle Tour in 2010, usually in acoustic form. The music video for the song shows a teenager walking into a music store and heading to listen to some sample music. On the screen, it shows the band playing with other cast members singing the song in different scenarios. It ends with the teenager stealing a copy of the album "These Days".