Sookie

Chapter V

Weekends at Merlotte's were much more lucrative than weekdays. The tips were better because the bar had more activity. I knew it but now that I was sporting several different stains on my shirt and my head hurt I wanted to be taken off this rotation. It would be no hardship for my boss and good friend, Sam. It was a day that many of the other girls clamored for. With my glitch I didn't want it, but my bank account needed it.

Today I was having one of those days when I wished I had stayed home. My spring day had begun so beautifully, too. By the time I got home I wanted nothing to do with the outside world, not with one single soul. In fact I wanted nothing more than to be left alone for a great long while. At least for a little while I got exactly what I wanted. I changed into my pajamas and had a bowl of cereal for dinner. It wasn't exactly nutritious but it didn't require a lot of preparation or clean up, either.

There were two things that allowed me to wash away the troubles of my day. Watching 'Gone with the Wind' was one of them. I loved the old world feel and the turbulence of love that you knew was so true. No matter where Rhett went and how critical Scarlett was you never saw those two souls with anyone else. Then there was Scarlett's misplaced love for Ashley, talk about drama. It was all serving to pull me away from my own issues when a knock sounded on my door.

Walking backwards as not to miss the ending where Rhett walks away for what seems like the last time, I made my way to the door. I opened it thinking to find my brother or maybe Arlene who needed a last minute babysitter but I didn't see any of those people. The man on my porch took me from the Northern Louisiana to Middle Earth in one blink.

He looked so out of place that I stared openly no matter how much my upbringing despaired at the rudeness. I might have been able to ignore the shoulder length hair. It gave his unusual appearance a distinguished look. By unusual I meant that this man was dressed in tights, a tunic, and knee high boots. That was disturbing enough but he wore the look very well which was even weirder if you know what I mean.

As I assessed him, he stared at me. His eyes were blue to the point of being violet and they sparkled in the glow of my porch light. I dipped into his mind. I came back with nothing but fuzzy static. I recognized the signature and instead of taking a step back I remained where I was. This was the mind that I'd been hearing. Why wasn't I scared? I should be—I didn't know him at all. There was something about him I couldn't place. It was reassuring, familiar almost. It might be because he was old. While he was someone's grandfather he held raw appeal that was otherworldly.

Since they came out of the coffin, I'd often wondered how vampires would register on my radar. Living in small town USA I was yet to find out because in the two years that they had been walking about openly I hadn't met one. 'Course I could have come across one and not have known it. Being a telepath meant I wasn't blown away by the Great Reveal. It just meant I was categorizing the minds that I couldn't read. I was inclined to believe things other than human didn't translate well with telepathy. Sam didn't and he definitely wasn't human. This might be a vampire.

Being so far away from town ruled out the possibility that he might some lost unfortunate traveler. I hadn't heard a car announce his presence. Many ideas began running through my mind on the heels of that thought. Suddenly the fact that I lived alone in the middle of nowhere made me twitchy rather than comforted. There was nothing around but miles of woodland and a handy cemetery. Just the kind of thing horror movies were made of.

"Fear not," he said with a warm smile. His words were slightly accented and his speech formal. "I will do you no harm."

"Don't know that for sure because I don't know you," I told him firmly but politely. All the while I was thinking of the closest thing I could use as a weapon.

He offered me a deep nod of his head that had me fighting the urge to curtsey. "I am Niall Brigant," he told me. "Prince of the Sky Fairies and I am your great grandfather."

My eyes were on him as he vanished from my porch leaving nothing but an evanescent shimmer. I gasped and stumbled back a step and spun around almost losing my footing to find him in the house.

"I bring you good tidings."

~ooooooo~

When I left work this evening I thought my day had been bad. It only went to show that no matter how bad you thought things were they could always get worse, a whole hell of a lot worse. My visitor had gone but he had left me in a state of shock so complete that I didn't think I would ever overcome it. How he had ever categorized anything he told me as good tidings was beyond me. What he has told me was the end my of life as I knew it. It might even be the end of my brother's life—period.

I didn't want to think about that right now. I couldn't. From my place against the living room wall I was staring at all the photographs on the mantle above the fireplace. It followed the life and birth of every member of my family. I was looking at it with different eyes. Staring at the pictures of those that were dead wouldn't do anything to save those that were living. I didn't care what Niall had said. He was nothing to me and that was exactly what he was going to get.

I was smart enough to know that the only thing calling my local sheriff's department would get me was a padded room and straitjacket. Before leaving for Jason's I grabbed my shot gun. It wouldn't level the playing field but it made me feel better. Whether or not you were super human and could heal quickly, you still didn't want to suffer the pain that came from a gunshot wound. It was just a theory, one that I hoped I wouldn't have to test.

It wasn't until I was in front of my brother's house did I realize I had nothing else to do. It was the house where we spent the earlier part of our childhood. From what my father had said it was started out as a little cabin that he added to. It sat near a lake and was nestled off on the outskirts of town. Since my parents died I've never had an easy time of looking it. It was worse tonight because it was empty. Jason wasn't here.

Outside of his usual dives that were closed and the home of his best friend I didn't know where to begin searching. I'd woken Hoyt to ask the last time he'd seen my brother. It was the same day last week when he had been going on about the woman he met. I hated myself for putting off meeting her. If I'd sprung to do so right away like he wanted I would have been able to detect something was wrong with her. It might have been enough to keep Jason safe.

Nothing in my previous life experiences and upbringing had prepared me to fight monsters and magic. But I knew someone that might be able to help. With renewed determination I turned my car back towards Bon Temps. The sun was almost up as my ancient car graced Sam's lawn. By the time I was out of the car and half way up the steps he had his door open looking like death warmed over.

On a normal day seeing my employer in nothing but boxers would make me feel like I could die of embarrassment. Hell, I might have even stolen a few peeks to store in the male hunks mental archive. Sam had hair like a russet halo. Even with it mussed from sleep it looked good on him. His body was leanly muscled and his wholesome good looks would make a girl and her mama sit up straighter. I barged into his house pushing him to the side as I did so.

"Sure Sook," he said closing the door. "Come right on in, why don't cha."

"I need your help." I said without preamble.

He stopped mid-stretch and it might have finally dawned on him that if I was here at this time of night then it was an emergency. Smart man. "What's wrong?"

That question, the one that was meant for me to get to the point, cracked the composure that I'd managed to scrape together since that fairy darkened my doorstep with his presence. I rambled and cried and hiccupped my way through all that had happened in the past three hours.

By the look on Sam's face he didn't get any of it. That didn't made me slow down. When speaking was beyond me I just crumpled on his arm chair and cried in earnest. No one had to tell me life wasn't fair. I knew that. I'd witnessed in the minds of those around me who had it worse. But this, this was completely insane. I felt I had nothing to do with all this. It had happened long before I was a twinkle in my father's eye. It began with his father, his real father. Yet, Niall had somehow determined that it was I who needed to pay the piper.

Sam walked over and wrapped his arms around me. I'd always liked his slightly warmer body temperature. Tonight it brought me comfort. He rubbed my back and told me it would be okay. Having the benefit of touch I was able to read his mind. He was wondering why I was telling him this. He was curious as to why I thought he wouldn't think I was crazy.

"I know," I told him softly. "About you, that you're different."

I had to be real good at keeping secrets because many of them didn't belong to me. Knowing Sam wasn't all human was just one of them. I just kind of stumbled upon it. He was a werewolf or a weredog or whatever. I've known it since the first month after I took the job at the bar two years ago. I'd never been so confused when some stray Collie sidled up next to me for a scratch as it walked me to my car. It had the same mental signature as Sam. When I scratched behind his ear I read his thoughts.

For just a second his body tensed. "You're not scared," he wondered out loud. "You're not scared of me."

I shook my head where it rested over his shoulder. "Be like the pot calling the kettle black," I replied with a shrug. Since we were revealing secrets I might as well. I wanted him to help me and my honesty was a must. "Seeing I'm a telepath."

"Huh," he murmured letting me go. That was kind of anticlimactic. I mean I had a little more reaction when I found he turned into a dog. "That explains a lot." He sat on the floor across from me. "So what's this about Hoyt marrying Jason and some fairy wanting to kill him because he's in love with a vampire?"

I stopped short and for some reason—probably temporary insanity—I began laughing. When I'd finally slowed down Sam gave me a deprecating look. "What's funny?" he asked.

"I'm losing my mind," I replied succinctly.

This laughing fit was just a pit stop. Between the lack of sleep, shock, and worry I really felt like I was going crazy. It felt like I was burning the candle at both ends and due to crash. There was adrenaline in my system because I wanted to do be doing something. But there was nothing to do and the emotions just kept piling on.

Sam smiled. It was one of his finest qualities. He never let things get to him. Not the bar flooding or my recent revelation or current hysteria. He always had a smile to offer anyone in need of one. "Got all the crazy out?" he asked after a few moments.

I allowed myself several deep breaths before continuing "I'll start over," I told him once I found my composure. "My grandfather on my father's side, Mitchell, wasn't my biological grandfather."

Those words tasted like poison on my lips but I couldn't deny how true it felt. It explained so much about my life and my oddities. "He couldn't have children and my Gran really wanted them so she was with someone else. He was half Fae."

Everything that was done in darkness always came to light. My Gran had cheated on Grandpa Mitch. The affair had been ongoing and it was enough for her to conceive two children, my father and my aunt Linda. Both were long gone and so was Gran and I had no idea how I could reconcile the strong matriarch I idolized and loved with her indiscretion. To learn that she wasn't who I thought she was shook the very foundation of who I was. I felt betrayed though I knew I didn't have much right to be. To learn it from Niall, a stranger, had hurt all the more.

Gran had been a woman who had served as pillar of unwavering strength, unyielding devotion, and so much unconditional love. This was a woman who after losing her firstborn son hadn't let the grief allow her to not raise his children. Even after Aunt Linda died she had remained strong. She had been a great mother, even more so than my own. I'd spent my whole life bearing witness to her character. I just couldn't reconcile the truth of my origin with what I knew about my Gran.

"That explains a lot," Sam repeated "There's always been something about you, Cher," he whispered almost to himself. "Didn't know why but I've been drawn to you."

I shot him a glare that told him to at least try. He was from the other side of the curtain of reality. Apparently so was I, but I was a newly inducted unwilling member of this club. I hoped he knew something because this fairy hadn't been forthcoming. Sam scratched his chin as if he were deep in thought. There was stubble there and he managed to make it look sexy while on someone else it might have seemed unkempt.

"I think you're enough Fae to attract but not enough to be overly conspicuous," he said. "Where they tend to love flirting with disaster you prefer to be left alone and you don't have the vanity or love me, love me, thing most of their young ones have."

I made a face at that but decided I would come back for an in-depth fairy lesson later. "Tonight a fairy showed on my porch his name was…"

Sam lurched forward and clamped his hand over my mouth. I gasped but he didn't seem to care that he'd scared the hell out of me. His expression was as serious as the grave. "First rule with fairies, they're your basic supernatural being. From them come elves and brownies and angels and demons as well as water sprites, green men, all the natural spirits...all come from fairies."

My eyes were wide but I nodded because he still hadn't removed his hands from my mouth. "Don't say their name because if they are powerful enough they can tune into the conversation and they don't take kindly to hearsay."

I nodded again and he let me go. "This fairy," I began. "The one that came to my house tonight he's the patriarch of my father's bloodline. He is also the Prince of the Sky Fairies."

Sam's face scrunched up as if he was having a hard time believing what he was hearing. It took a lot to fight the temptation to enter his mind. I resisted because I'd always felt like he would tell me what I needed to know. "What did he say?" he prompted.

"He told me that I was beyond marrying age and that he has found me a husband."

"That was what he said verbatim?" he inquired leaning forward.

I nodded hesitantly. "Pretty much."

He shook his head. "Get specific, it'll tell me where we stand," he said. "Cuz with them it isn't what they say that should trouble you, it's what they don't."

"He said, 'You possess the essential spark.' Then he added the part about me being above marrying age." That had stung because any man should know not to go there.

Sam looked confused, worried, and shocked all at once. Strangely he looked like someone who was watching a horror movie and was at the edge of their seat. Needless to say it did nothing to make me feel better. And I hadn't even gotten to the most sordid part of this tale.

"He took Jason. He said that if this man that he presented me to chose me for his bride and I didn't agree, he would kill my brother."

The entire drive home from Sam's I was trying to tell myself that it would be alright. If for no other reason that it absolutely had to be, this would all work out. I was having a very hard time believing that though. Sam could do nothing to help me. The best that I could hope for was that this mystery husband didn't want me. After all I didn't fit the conventional model of beauty. I was a size seven and from some articles I'd read that was overweight even with my height of five seven. I've never been to college or even out of Louisiana. I wouldn't fit in his world. He wouldn't want me. He just couldn't. I went to bed that night with the feeling that I was fooling myself.