Disclaimer: Charlaine Harris owns all.

Rated M for several reasons.

Chpt 59 Regicide

SPOV

I'm not sure I actively caught most of what happened next but I'm pretty sure Bon Temps will never forget it, or maybe they will . . . .

Jason opened his mouth to yell again and grabbed for my wrist, Vladimir grabbed his first and twisted it up behind his back, using it to propel Jason away from us and onto Mrs Fortenberry's table. The table didn't break, this isn't the movies, but it did tip over and face plant Jason on the floor, my last view of him was the soles of his workboots.

Mrs Fortenberry yelled, Jason yelled, Sam yelled, Arlene screeched, Alcide grabbed me and the four of them started hustling me for the door, forming a protective wall around me.

I don't think we made it that far though, I was just letting them guide me like a puppet, my whole focus was on the bond, and Eric.

I'd felt him wake up while I was talking to Sam, it had calmed me, reminded me why I was here, why I was doing the right thing, even in the face of Sam's reasons why I was doing all the wrong ones. But now it's like 'The Scream' my own horror reflected back from his, the ball between us crackling with negative energy and a lack of comprehension. Suffocating, like a downy pillow to the face . . . .

…..

Black figures in body armour are swarming all over the Merlotte's parking lot, like ants at a picnic. Restraining people, glamouring them, sending them back inside to watch the 'band' that's suddenly playing.

Some of the 'ants' are heading back to New Orleans with a distraught Vladimir in the truck. The rest of them, and their fleet of stupidly intimidating SUVs, are ferrying us to the airstrip outside Shreveport. Explanation has been minimal, not that that matters to me anymore, I may be totally focussed on our bond at the moment but my faithful 'disability' is recording it all for later. Full awareness comes with the miles the convoy covers, we are in trouble but at least they are bringing us together and not tearing us apart.

Small, sanity preserving, mercy.

They don't seem bothered about any conspiring so the four of us are sat in a section of seats facing each other across a table, seems more like a train than a plane but what would I know.

I've plundered every mind I can get into, which is all of them, and I know some of what's going on, but not all. The need to find out more is going to corrode a hole in me from the inside out. Gran used to say a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing and I can really buy into that right now. They've got it all so wrong that I want to leap to my feet and start shouting like a madwoman, flinging burning light out of my hands till they have no choice but to listen. But I can't tell them why I know that Eric didn't kill Philadelphia and Sophie Anne and I can't tell them how I know that's what he's been accused of. And I can't tell the others either.

So, using every ounce of self-control I've got, I have to sit here, one of a collection of four stone statues, and suck it up until I get the chance to do something about it.

We're to be witnesses cum hostages and possibly co-defendants at Eric's trial.

I feel so sick. My insides are burning and churning. The strain of stopping my left knee from bouncing frantically under the table is giving me cramp. But surprisingly I've no urge to cry. What I'd really like to do, so badly it's another physical pain to add to my current repertoire, is find the person responsible for this outrageous debacle and flash fry their heart in their chest. Or their eyeballs, or their balls if they have them. Whatever would be most painful really, I'm not sensing a preference.

Gran would be horrified. But I'm not. I might be her granddaughter, a Stackhouse, but I'm also a Brigant, and so help me god if I'm able I will make someone pay for putting me through this, and pay dearly.

Misplaced and unformed daydreams of little ole me being powerful enough to get everyone to see reason and put this situation to rights keep me vaguely sane, completely still, and puke free, until we land in Chicago.

By which time I'm such a mess that Thalia and Alcide have to discreetly help me off the plane and into the waiting limo.

…..

Scenery flashes past, recorded but not seen. Rightly or wrongly I'm focussed on the hope that Eric and I will somehow be slung into the same cell.

It doesn't happen. Thalia and Charles are ushered off into whatever quarters have been prepared for them for the day, and Alcide and I are shown into a bland, windowless room with a couch, a water cooler, and a generic meeting table with ass numbing chairs.

"What . . . ." He begins.

I shake my head and with a shake of his own he sinks onto one of the couches and drifts off to sleep.

Lucky, lucky, dog.

Seated in one of the utilitarian chairs and slumped over the cold table, I review, fruitlessly, what I've learned. I've managed to glean every bit of information I can about the layout, guards, bugs, alarms and weapons in this place. And I've absolutely got nothing to do with it.

…..

A couple of hours after sun up a were in the now familiar body armour, comes to ask if either of us need a 'human' moment.

We don't.

So instead his identikit friend brings us coffee and an array of salty snacks more suitable for a night in a bar than breakfast.

Funnily enough the lack of Eric in our bond helps me focus, not that it makes a blind bit of difference, the vampires here, and there are many, are all asleep and giving nothing away.

…..

The Longest Day.

Worry and a lack of information have worn me down to short nub.

A very short nub.

…..

Felipe de Castro is one of the last vampires to wake up.

The fucker.

How I'm not glowing I don't know.

He's got nothing on Eric so he's imprisoned Quinn's mother and sister and forced him to fabricate evidence against my King. Fucking glamoured him to make sure I don't hear any of it. He's so pleased with himself that if I could pop I'd be in the bathroom right behind him now, glaring at him in the mirror and raising the massive wooden stake in my hand.

Hate. I hate, hate, hate . . . .

Because I can see how the Council could find everything the pair of them are going to say totally plausible. After all, Eric and I can't tell the truth, can we?

…..

"Are you alright?" Alcide asks quietly as we're led out of our room.

"Not really." I answer tightly.

"Can I help?"

"Unlikely." I respond, squeezing his massive bicep. "Stay out of it."

He opens his mouth and I silence him with a look and the Eric eyebrow.

And for a moment the vampire himself is amused at my 'air of command'. But only a moment.

God how I wish this bond came with a walkie talkie. What do you know? What can I do? I love you, do you know that? Do you have any idea how much I regret being too chicken to tell you? Or you being too chicken to hear it?

We arrive in a huge amphitheatre, empty for now, curved rows of seats facing a raised dais with six thrones fronted by a high bench. A court room to any eyes. Very ornate, very symbolic, very vampire.

Alcide and I are gestured into the first row of seats behind the 'defendant's' table.

Vampires are feeding at the donor station outside, reading their emails, gossiping on their phones, anticipating some drama, the normality of it all nearly sends me careening over the edge.

A short while later Charles and Thalia are ushered into the seats next to us, their guards taking station with our around the outside wall.

My palms are itching. Itching in the worst possible way.

Thalia places her hand on my forearm, wrapping her tiny fingers gently round it, smiling forward at the 'bench' as six vampires file onto it.

Mississippi, Indiana, New York, Washington, Chicago and another, visibly ancient vampire, the others know as the Ancient Pythoness. A presence who usurped Quebec's place on the Council without any prior approval or subsequent argument from the others. Whose mind I cannot read. Not that I don't keep trying as various vampires, including De Castro, fill the rest of the chamber. Eventually she responds to my attempts to read her by giving me what I can only describe as a mental face slap. Terrified I withdraw into myself, appalled that I've thrown the game before it's even started. Only knowing she's amused by the half smirk on her lined face.

A vampire I don't know and instinctively don't like pings to his feet to call proceedings to order.

Serious allegations this, act of gross misconduct that, he drones on for an age. And it would all sound quite impressive if I couldn't see in the heads of the Monarch's on the bench that they'd pretty much all 'offed' a predecessor at one time or another, apparently it's perfectly acceptable if you don't get caught. How Eric's put up with this crap for over a thousand years I don't know.

I'm trying to stay angry and a little bit contemptuous but I can't, the fear is clawing its way through, making my throat dry and my heart stutter.

Eric isn't afraid. He's resigned and regretful. And that's a lot worse somehow.

Why isn't he here? Surely he gets to be at his own trial. I know I can feel him but this would be so much easier if I could see him. I think, hope . . . .

Doors open with a flourish and even though I already know it isn't Eric I twist in my seat, a ball of nervous energy.

A squat man enters, the lawyer, Desmond Cataliades, I've never seen him before but I recognise him from myriad thoughts. He's here to defend Eric. To a mixed reaction. The vampires that know Eric best, by contact or spying, are aware that he's rich enough to be able to afford him, the others are surprised and looking forward to exciting developments. Behind him, and towering over him, is his barely tolerated and arrogant human, known to some of the vampires present as Niall.

What the Caterpillar's Uncle?

I try to catch his eye but he is entirely focussed on the task of carrying Cataliades's copious paperwork and making eyes at the lady vampires present, which reminds me of Jason and abruptly makes me want to cry. Jesus I'm all over the place . . . .

When he takes a seat beside his 'master' at the table in front of us it's all I can do not to throw myself on his back and sob desperately onto his broad shoulders.

Thalia's fingers, tighten briefly on my arm, urging me to keep still and stay quiet.

'My child' Niall's soothing voice floats directly into my brain. 'We will try to do this without revealing our secrets, De Castro's evidence is circumstantial but there are many here who would want to see your vampire brought down and will choose to believe his hypothesis. Desmond and I cannot promise.'

I don't know how this works, can he hear me?

'I can hear you.' He assures me. 'Stay calm, allow things to take their course, but decide Great Granddaughter, how you want this to end if Desmond and I are unsuccessful.'

What does he mean how I want this to end? I want this to end with Eric and I whole and well. And together. What else could I possibly want? And how the hairy hell am I supposed to stay calm?

'If the vampires cannot be dissuaded from their petty course then intervention will be required.'

Does he mean a fight, what sort of fight, the kind where people get hurt? A war type fight, where lots of people get hurt?

'My child. If you wish to stay with your vampire it will have to be here, he cannot come to Faery, I am sorry. This will mean surrendering your anonymity and fully embracing who you are. You and he, you will be strong together, and powerful, but you will always be targets. You will have to fight, from time to time, for your right to just be.'

Around us the Master of Ceremonies is still droning on, procedures, evidence, witnesses, break times, rules for who and who not will be allowed access to the amphitheatre and when.

What's he trying to tell me, that we'll get no peace?

'It is not as bad as you might think.' Niall's mental voice is amused. 'Peace can be extremely overrated.'

What the hell is wrong with you?

'You are my blood Sookie Stackhouse Brigant and I have seen your soul, and his, since their inception. You can cope with a little strife in your life just as well as he. If you believe it is worth it.'

My thoughts snap back to the present when the 'Officiant' starts in on the potential outcomes of the trial. True Death. Pfft. Is there any other kind? Jeez, they're so pompous. And then my mind darts to Pam, does she know, is she okay, god she must be completely freaking out . . . .

'Sookie.' Niall's mental voice is insistent. 'My little ray, we are running out of time, if it comes to it be who you are, I will stand with you.'

Really? This isn't something you could have talked to me about sooner? Could you be any less cryptic about what I should do?

'Yes.'

I focus on the back of his neatly styled head. You know I've had a really bad day and if I had an ice pick in my pocket I'd stab you with it right now?

'Trust me.'

I snort and Thalia turns her head toward me.

'No one need die here tonight Sookie, but we may create a situation where that becomes inevitable in the future. Choices might have to be made and you might have to be the one that makes them.'

It's on the tip of my tongue to tell him I don't care who dies as long as Eric and the people I care about are okay, but years of being me keep me quiet, because I don't really believe that do I? But Eric, if anything happens to Eric, where the hell is he anyway? Shit . . . . You heard all that didn't you?

'My child.' His mental voice is soft now. 'There is not time for me to expand on the larger picture and the potential consequences of anything that is said and done here. But trust that I can make it should the need arise.'

I really don't know what he's talking about, how can I? And for a brief moment I close my eyes and indulge my fearful frustration in one final fantasy of kicking Gran's unfaithful, fairy humping, ass. And then I let it go, for good I hope, after all if she hadn't would I have any kind of hope for Eric in this situation?

Eric.

He's here.

The doors sweep open again, with a tad more drama this time, and a phalanx of body armoured vampires usher him inside.

Damn he looks good in a suit and tie.

Our eyes stay locked as he strides down the walkway, guards having to really hurry to keep up.

It would be quite funny, if it wasn't . . . .