Eric was on his way to my place, and that made me nervous - especially because he had arranged for Amelia and James to be gone for the night, so he would be alone with Quinn and I. I knew exactly what that meant: he wanted to confront us again about getting back together. At the very least, he was looking for an argument, but in all likelihood, it was more than that; he probably wanted to punish us both somehow, and I knew vampire punishments usually involved violence.

For once, I wished he would just turn up unannounced, so I didn't get time to worry about what was going to happen when he got here. Of course, it wasn't as though he'd called and asked me if he could come over... or even called to tell me he was coming. As with so many things, I found out through his flunkys, and that annoyed me. Sure, he's not the kind of guy to call for a chat... but couldn't he manage some basic manners once in a while? Didn't I deserve any common courtesy at all?

I balled up all my anger and used it to help Amelia cast a sanctuary spell, to prevent him from doing anything violent in my home. I mostly held things and did what she told me, but there was one part of the spell that was simple to accomplish with fae magic and almost impossible with conventional magic, so I did it for her. I was glad to do something constructive about Eric's impending visit, instead of just sitting around worrying. I was also secretly pleased my fairy magic was getting so strong; where Amelia needed herbs and props and squishy gross ingredients to do anything magical, the most I usually needed was Niall's books and a few chanted words. I liked the simplicity of that.

As soon as we were done with the spell, Amelia got ready to leave, glad to be far away from angry Eric. I didn't blame her.

I knew he wouldn't let me go without a fight because I'm a valuable asset to his Area, and I wasn't sure what he'd do to end my relationship with Quinn. I also knew I wouldn't let him split us up, because I was happier than I'd been for years and Quinn was the cause of that. Even after Bill's confession that Eric didn't split up with me after all, I still didn't want to give up the man who makes me happy to go back to someone who infuriates me, endangers my life and makes me miserable so often. I still had strong feelings for Eric, but I suspected the bond caused most of them and I hated that. I didn't want to see him; I was happy as things were and I knew he'd change that if he could.

By the time I heard gravel crunching in my driveway, I was so tightly wound I practically jumped out of my seat.

Quinn squeezed my hand reassuringly. "We'll be OK," he whispered in my ear. "I love you."

I didn't get a chance to respond because there was suddenly a knock on my front door. Before I could get up to answer it, James already had the door open, and Quinn quickly moved away to another seat, putting some distance between us. Darn vampire speed, I thought.

Eric towered over James as they quietly discussed the trip to St. Louis in my doorway. He looked as splendid as ever, all lean muscle and long golden hair, but I was too nervous to appreciate the view. I knew things were bad when he didn't look at me once, and James didn't tease him at all. I'd noticed that Pam only stopped teasing Eric in the most dire of circumstances, and I assumed James did the same. As James and Amelia left, barely two minutes after Eric arrived, she said Good luck to me silently, hoping the wards held. I hoped so, too.

Eric strutted into my living room as though he owned the place, still not looking at me.

"Leave," he ordered Quinn, his voice icy.

"Sookie, would you like me to go?" Quinn asked, using his best Southern manners.

"No, I want you to stay," I insisted.

Quinn just shrugged and leaned back in the chair, making it clear he wasn't going anywhere.

Eric showed a hint of annoyance on his otherwise-expressionless face. "You are in my employ. I order you to leave."

"I'm in Sookie's home," Quinn rebutted, standing up casually to look down at him. "She's the law around here, Sheriff, not you."

"I can make you leave," Eric threatened, his tone making the hairs on my arms stand on end.

"If you make him leave your Area, I'll go too," I mumbled. I didn't want to go, but if he was going to make life hard for us here, perhaps I'd take that trip around Europe I could finally afford thanks to my inheritance, and hope he'd cooled off by the time I got back.

Eric looked ever-so-slightly stunned for a moment; he clearly hadn't expected me to say that. Heck, I hadn't expected me to say that.

Quinn turned to give me a little smile, delighted by what I said. I really hope it doesn't come to that, he told me silently, but I'm honored you'd even threaten to do that for me. As he smiled at me, the left side of his neck faced Eric for a split second. Even that was too long.

"A fairy has claimed you," Eric smirked, moving closer to Quinn to study his neck. "I did not notice this yesterday. You must know you can have no other, now you belong to a fairy. Leave, or I will tell your fairy that you court another." He looked pleased with himself.

Fuck, Quinn thought. I should've had the sense to cover it up. I wasn't thinking... sorry, babe.

When neither of us moved or said anything, Eric tried a different approach. "Sookie, he has married a fairy... do you still want him?"

I couldn't figure out what to say; I hadn't planned to tell Eric right away. Quinn had no more idea what to say than I did, so we just stood there mutely, exchanging nervous glances. I could tell we were making Eric suspicious, but I had no idea what to do.

"Whose mark is this?" Eric finally demanded. "Was it one of your relatives, Sookie? Did they do this to make him stay to protect you?"

"No," I answered honestly.

"Then who? If any other fairy has claimed him, he cannot be with you. He has to leave."

I couldn't work out whether I was relieved or offended that he didn't even consider me as the source of the mark on Quinn's neck; he clearly didn't think me capable of assuming my true form. I was sick of being treated like I was useless and helpless, so I decided to tell him.

"It was me," I admitted. "I did it."

Eric just laughed. "My bullshit detector reads that as false, Sookie," he chuckled, finally looking right at me.

I was so furious that he was laughing at me, I shifted accidentally. I was snarling at him as I did, so he got to see my teeth morph into sharp little points. His jaw literally dropped.

"Your bullshit detector is broken," I spat, then shifted back to human form smoothly.

"You marked him," Eric muttered, his shock turning to obvious dismay. "You claimed him."

I nodded. "I didn't mean for it to happen, but it did. My fairy instincts say I should be with him, that he's my mate."

"You cannot!" Eric roared, erupting in fury. "You are mine!"

In an instant I was out of my seat, standing next to them with one hand angled towards Eric so I could push him back telekinetically if I had to. Quinn's calm was holding, so I knew he posed no threat, but Eric... Eric was seething. This was not good.

"I thought we established you have no conjugal claim," Quinn sighed, crossing his arms over his chest.

The two of them faced off for a few long moments, assessing each other. Quinn was larger and more powerfully built, but Eric was a thousand-year-old vampire. If it came to a fight, I knew exactly who would win. I didn't want them fighting over me, though.

"Guys -" I started.

"I think you will find that I do," Eric cut me off, and I knew from his expression he was about to say something bad. "She pledged to me."

"Sure," Quinn laughed, not believing him, certain that was something I didn't want.

"It's true," I confirmed, my voice barely coming out.

For some reason, it was the worst thing I could possibly have said. I felt his heart break; literally felt it tear apart in his chest. I felt his whole world flip upside down, because the person he had made the center of that world - me - wasn't who he thought they were. I felt his sudden revulsion towards me; I dropped in his estimation from 'future angel' to 'pond slime' in an instant. Most of all, I felt his overwhelming need to get as far away from me as he could, because he couldn't stand by and watch this happen to me. I was dead to him now, just for that.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Eric's look of triumph, his face twisted to ugliness with cruelty and glee. I wondered how I ever loved him.

Then Quinn was gone, faster than I'd ever seen him move.

I knew it would be hard to find out your girlfriend's 'married' to someone else, but I had already told him about this. I had to go after him and remind him of that, to make sure he knew I wasn't keeping it secret from him. But when I went to move, Eric grabbed me instead.

"Let him go," he ordered, locking his arms around me so I couldn't go after Quinn. "You are mine."

There was no time to argue, so I simply teleported away, reappearing against Quinn's car door just as he reached to open it. He sprang back, as though touching me would burn him, and I could feel it hurt him too much to look at me.

"I'm sorry," I blurted out. "I told you I had this vampire marriage thing with Eric, I thought you-"

"Marriage?" he yelled, so shocked he actually looked at my face for a second to gauge if I was serious. "Marriage? How the hell is having a Maker like having a husband?" I 'heard' that he'd daydreamed of being the latter to me one day, and was upset he never could be, now.

I was so confused, I just stared at him for a second. "Huh?" I finally asked. "Wha-? Only vampires have Makers... I'm not gonna be a vampire."

That disgusted him even more. "You want to be a turned fairy," he spat out. "Have you ever met a turned fairy, Sookie?" He wanted to pick me up and shake some sense into me, but he couldn't bear to touch me at all.

I shook my head, not knowing what this had to do with anything. I hadn't even known fairies could be turned...

"That's what I thought," he growled. "So he just says you can still go out in the sun, you won't have a Maker controlling you, you'll get vampire magic and still keep your fairy magic... hell, you won't even have to drink blood, you can just drain people's life force directly... and you don't think to ask what the price for all that is?" His voice was turning hysterical. "That kind of power doesn't come cheap. You'll be a walking plague, wiping out whole towns in a matter of days, and you won't be soulless like a vampire, you'll feel every one of those deaths on your conscience forever, because you'll be properly immortal; nothing will be able to kill you. Nothing. But it's too late now, isn't it? You've said he can turn you, and you-"

"NO!" I screamed, shocked he'd even suggest that. "Eric won't turn me, he promised." I slumped back against his car door, dizzy and weak.

He laughed then; a cruel, bitter laugh I'd never heard him use before. "You think he won't hold you to your pledge?" He was sure Eric would.

"John, what does being pledged mean?" I asked, so scared of what he might say I could barely make my voice come out.

"Don't call me that," he snarled.

I just nodded; clearly there were only two people in the world on first-name terms with him again.

"Quinn, what does it mean?" I repeated.

He wasn't listening. He wanted to get away so badly, he was only thinking about how to make me move from his car door, without just removing me himself. Angry as he was, he still wouldn't lay a hand on a woman, not even one who disgusted him as much as I now did.

"Answer me and I'll move," I bargained. "Just tell me what being pledged means, and I'll get out of your way so you can go." I wanted to cry as I said it, but I bit my tongue and pulled myself together.

"You really don't know?" he asked, finally noticing my terror and confusion, and immediately softening when he did.

I shook my head. "He said it meant we were married according to vampire law, but I told him it's not a marriage I recognize."

"Sookie, how did this happen?" he inquired, his voice quieting as his anger abruptly gave way.

"He had his day man ask me to deliver a parcel to him, and I was so busy and stressed I just did it without asking why, and I didn't check what was in it because that would be rude. It was the knife from when we were bonded, and when I gave it to him, he said we were pledged."

"You didn't get on your knees and beg to serve him for all eternity, in front of a bunch of other vampires? You didn't tell him your life was his?"

"Heck, no!" I snapped. "What do you think I am, some stupid fang-banger?" No way would I do that.

"So all you did was hand him the parcel, and he said you were married," he repeated, making sure he had it all straight in his head.

I just nodded.

"Oh, babe," he cried, moving to hug me. "I'm so sorry. I should've been here to stop him, I should've protected you."

"Please, just tell me what it means," I whispered, shrinking away from him before he could touch me. "Please."

"The pledge means you've agreed to be his Childe," he said simply. "You've agreed for him to be your Maker, and he's agreed to turn you."

"No," I whimpered, tears coming to my eyes. "No, he promised... It was the only thing I asked of him, that he never turn me. He promised me."

My knees went weak as I realized what this meant. I was going to die. Eric was going to kill me. Eric, who I once loved. Eric, who I trusted as much as I could ever trust a vampire... He was going to turn me into something monstrous. He would condemn me to an eternity of massacring innocents, feeling every life on my conscience... For a moment, I couldn't believe he'd do that to me. But he was just inside my house, he'd surely heard this whole conversation, and he hadn't come out to tell me he'd keep his promise. I started slowly slipping down the side of Quinn's truck, my legs not holding me up any more.

Then I remembered something I had pushed from my mind, something I told myself couldn't possibly be relevant. He told me once, long ago, that Charles Twining pledged to Hot Rain, Long Shadow's Maker, and that made Hot Rain his Maker, too. Pledged... he had told me what it meant, but I had chosen not to make that connection, not to think about what this might really mean.

I tried to make my legs lock underneath me so I didn't fall over in a heap. I wanted to keep what little dignity I had; I couldn't face Eric with my knees scraped up like a child's from collapsing on my gravel. His gravel, I corrected; he paid for it, bought it for me because he found out I needed it and couldn't afford it myself. He could be so sweet, sometimes, but underneath it all... Vampires are all twisty and deceptive, I reminded myself, every one of them. I knew that; I'd had glimpses into his mind and he was among the coldest and twistiest of all of them. It was how he'd survived the last thousand years, so it wasn't like he was going to change; not for me, anyway. I knew that.

I was completely upright again a moment later, my arms each hooked over something to hold me up. I glanced down and Quinn had rearranged himself, leaning against the car with his weight resting on his hands, one tucked under each of my arms.

"I'm sorry I got so mad," he apologized, bending down to kiss me on the forehead. "I can't stand by and watch him kill you, but there's nothing either of us can do to stop him... do you understand?"

I just shook my head; none of this made any sense to me.

"Your pledge to him... if I interfere with it, the penalty will be my life," he explained, "and I'd still stop him, so long as you took care of Frannie when I was gone, but it wouldn't save you. If he dies, your pledge will be inherited by someone else... Pam, if you're lucky, or perhaps his Maker or Felipe, so you'll still end up dead... I don't know any way to get you out of this." He looked resigned to it, but he was thinking, I'm gonna find one, though. But that's our secret, we have to pretend we won't fight this, or we'll both wind up dead. I won't let him kill you, I promise.

I looked up into his eyes, and now his anger had cooled, I saw how much this hurt him. The thought of me dying, especially dying a needless and preventable death... it tore him up that he couldn't do anything to save me. He was a warrior; he would always fight for those he loved, so having to stand by and watch his mate die was torture to him. He knew exactly how he'd kill Eric - had decided that since Eric had done such a cowardly thing to me, it was OK to take him on in the daytime when he was weakened - but he also knew that wouldn't help me at all; he'd be doing it solely for his own vengeance, and it could make my situation so much worse...

We just stared at one another for a long moment, both trying to figure out what this meant for us. We had been so happy only an hour ago... I wondered if we could ever get that back again.

"You don't have much time left," he murmured. "No-one stays pledged for long... he'll turn you soon."

Tears welled in my eyes again, but I pressed my hand to the side of his face and pulled him down to me, so our foreheads were touching. I concentrated so I could talk to him silently.

Don't go? I begged. I'm not dead yet... l want to be with you for whatever time I have left. Please, don't leave me? I need you, please stay...

It took him a few moments to decide, and those moments dragged agonizingly for me. He loved me, he wanted to be with me, but he couldn't bear to see me die. He knew he would feel like a coward, walking away to leave me to my death when the time came... but he also knew his original logic for leaving was wrong: he knew it wouldn't hurt any less if he'd been away from me for a while before I died. He didn't love me any less for being tricked into this, and he couldn't give up the time we had left; he realized he'd regret it even more if he gave up on me.

He silently agreed to stay, heartbroken but happy I wanted to be with him to the end. I took his hand and led him back to my house.