Chapter 14

Killer Couple

Our journey continued, but Sookie wasn't herself. The person she thought she was, the life she thought she had lived, had all been a lie, and she was lost. I knew what was bothering her but there was nothing I could do. I began developing a theory out of sheer frustration. Vampires could form blood bonds with humans after three mutual exchanges of blood. Such a thing was entirely up to the vampire involved. With their blood, they could influence emotion, track location, and in some cases, exert full control over the human's will, though the human could sense and interpret and influence the vampire's emotions as well.

Perhaps the mating marks were similar? I found myself poking and prodding at the intuition that told me when Sookie was tired or hungry. All I could decipher were her needs, but I was getting better. I knew when to make pit stops, and, if faced with a choice, I knew what she wanted to eat. There was nothing I could do for her mood.

I couldn't exactly tell what she was feeling. I just knew it wasn't good and I couldn't comfort her. What was worse was the mark on my shoulder wasn't able to act as my guide. I tried to tell myself she needed time, however; knowing she was unhappy wasn't making me unhappy, it irritated me endlessly. It went a little something like this:

"Red light, brake; green light, go; left turn, Sookie needs something." On and on it went in an endless loop. "Have a blood, shower; change my clothes, get in the car; Sookie needs something,"

It was as if there was a fly swooping through my brain every few minutes; just when I thought it was gone, it simply came back again.

"What do you need, baby?" Sookie asked with a frown.

Deciding to test the extent of the bond, I was intentionally cryptic, "What do you think?"

"Can't figure it out…I think it's cause you don't know…" The latter half of her sentence was a guess.

She was right, I had no idea. "I want you to stop moping," I told her. "It's irritating me."

The familiar mirth danced in eyes. It wasn't to indicate she was going to smile, but she was thinking about it. "It's because the mark is making you feel you have to do something about it, but you don't know what," she replied.

I nodded. "So will you give it a rest now? You're ugly when you sulk." I teased.

She swatted my arm, but I did get a smile out of her. "No wonder you're single," she said.

"Who says I'm single?"

My voice was solemn, and I knew she was going to fall for the trick all over again. Sure enough, her featured turned to one of dismay, and she covered her face with her hands.

"Oh man…please don't tell me I'm a home wrecking hussy?" she begged. "That's the last thing I need."

I laughed and threw my arm around her. "No, the Old Bat is as close as I get to a steady girlfriend."

My response had been honest and evasive. There was no way I was going to tell Sookie the first woman I ever loved had ruined me for any other. I wasn't about to delve into the fact that said woman was a sociopathic, conniving, murderer who played me for a fool. Admittedly, Sookie and I had a similar sense of humor and some shared some character traits; but I wasn't going to get into my personal business with her. I wanted her to do me the same courtesy. We were just two people heading in the same direction. Fortunately, we were similar enough to share laughs along the way.

This time when Sookie smiled at me, it was bright and very much her own smile. "For the life of me, I can't imagine why."

I grinned, "Unbelievable, isn't it?"

Her fingers intertwined with mine where they lay draped over her shoulder and she leaned into me. For the first time since the visit from the Old Bat, she was relaxed. What she needed came to mind: a distraction. The future would come, and, when it did, we would face it no matter what it was. In this car, right now, there was nothing we could do. There were a few hours of moonlight left and thousands of miles to cover,so, I engaged her in a game of "Twenty Questions—The Unwillingly Bonded Mates Edition."

It was to distract her, but it helped me get a better read of the intuition that guided me to what she needed or preferred. Some things were easy. For instance, I knew her preference for chocolate over vanilla before I finished asking the question. Likewise, she knew I would take going to ground over a coffin. It wasn't a safety thing, it was a just a preference.

Once we reached Alpine, we decided to stay two days while I called any and every daemon I knew. None of them could do anything that wouldn't involve teleporting and Sookie couldn't, not while she was pregnant. Already I knew I would have to risk flying. Moving on my power would get us where we needed, but I would be racing the sun. It was looking like our only option. I would take off as close to shore as possible.

On our third night in Alpine, when were ready to depart, trouble came. I rose and noticed Sookie had traded her usual sweats for jeans and combat boots. There was a wide array of knives on the bed. Her weapon of choice was a bow and it was slung across her body. Somehow, it looked both beautiful and deadly. It was mercurial blue. Intricate designs were etched in silver along the handle. Both ends were in the shape of wings, sharper than any blade I'd ever seen. That bag of hers really could give provide her with anything.

"They're coming," she said, stashing daggers in her boot.

"You don't say?" I was already up and dressed. I was stashing enough weapons on my body to start a war. I supposed it was fitting.

Sookie rolled her eyes at me. She didn't look anxious as she concealed several knives on her person. If not for the mating mark, I wouldn't have known how terrified she was. She was going to fight Sin Eaters and she wasn't at full power.

"You're leaving," I told her.

We were already packed to go and we always traveled light. I didn't give her time to reply. I had her in my arms and was out the door. I wouldn't be able to fight with her this close and this scared. That was part of the reason; the other was me wanting to keep her far from harm.

"Don't stop moving until you hit Nevada. Go into the first brothel or casino you see. Ask for Felipe DeCastro. Tell him Eric sent you, and he is to personally escort you to the high court in Minnesota."

The Spaniard owed me. Ruthless as he was, being a king, I knew his word as an immortal meant more. He would get her where she needed to be. I tried to shut the door of the stolen car behind her, but she stopped me.

"I can't," she replied, sounding pained. She pulled her shirt off partly to show me her tattoo. The green roots that encircled the blue tree were pulsing. "Red is to protect us from each other. Green is so we know to protect each other from anything else. They're too close. It won't let me leave you."

I cursed violently. "Is there a reason why I'm just finding out about this now?" I hissed.

She shrugged. "It never came up," she said, righting her shirt. "Can I get a lift back to the room now?"

I didn't take us back to the room. Instead, I moved to the roof. Her backpack and mine were beside us. In the unlikely event we walked away from this fight, we could continue our journey with minimal delay.

There was no doubt that they had us beat in numbers. I pointed to the bow. "Can you use that thing?"

She huffed, "Nah, I carry it because it matches my shoes."

I supposed I'd walked right into that one. "I'll run decoy," I said, thinking of our best strategic options. "I'll watch your back."

She grinned. "That's just because you like the shape of my ass."

I laughed and made no attempt to deny it. We stood back to back, and out of morbid curiosity, I asked her a question that didn't matter.

"What is the blue for?" I wondered.

She reached for my hand and squeezed it. "It doesn't matter," she said, with a sad note in her voice. "I don't think we'll get that far."

"Blue means 'Lovers Eternal,'" a male voice called from the corner of the roof. "It only appears when the bond has been wholly formed and runs so deep not even death can undo it. It is rare."

While I appreciated that bit of information, I threw my dagger at the voice without waiting to see the face that went with it. All that registered was the sweet scent of fairy. It was all I needed to know. The only thing that saved him was Sookie. She knocked my arm aside to throw off my perfect aim. Instead of landing in the target's heart, it imbedded in a tree several yards behind him

"What is the matter with you?" she asked. "What about anything he said made you think, 'Kill me, I'm dangerous?'"

I shrugged. "Just about all of it," I replied unrepentantly.

I turned and found there wasn't just one intruder, there were two, and they were identical. Like most full-blooded fairies, these two had skin just a few shades darker than my own pale complexion and curly blonde hair. Both of them stood a head shorter than me. If their scent didn't give them away, their attire did; they were in boots, tights, and tunics. Only a fairy could make that look good in a setting so opposite to his apparel.

"Dermot, Fintan. There better be a good reason why I stopped him," she said.

Sookie's tone wasn't friendly so I kept twirling two daggers that had their names on them. They weren't wearing nametags, they were entirely identical from the length of their hair to the sound of their voices, and even their heartbeats were synchronized. I would just aim left and right then.

"We came to help," the twin to the left said.

Sookie's eyes turned to glass. "Help?" she hissed. "I know everything about what your help involves! Lying to me, making me believe I was part of your family, and making me think I was fighting to protect when I was just killing for you. That's what you call help?" she shook her head in disgust. "I don't want it, so you can go."

The twin to the right looked shamefaced. "We swore an oath in blood to be secret keepers."

Sookie waved her hand dismissively. "I'm not giving you another warning, Fintan, leave."

"You may know much, but not all." he replied.

"I'm a God Killer," she surmised. "Yes, I got that too, heaven in my right eye and hell in my left."

He nodded. "Yet you do not know that your blood is needed to claim the moon and the sun."

She let out a hysterical peel of laughter. "Fucking perfect!"

"No," the other twin said, shaking his head as if horrified. "It is bad, very bad."

I rolled my eyes. Sookie was apparently the only fairy that got the concept of sarcasm. "The moon will fully blot out the sun and the barriers between all the worlds with merge. With your blood, my father will keep the portal open to make himself Master of the Universe."

The other doomsday forecaster nodded. "You can destroy this world or you can save it," he added. "We want to help you save it."

"Why do you want to save it?" she asked, looking at the fairy on the right. She didn't want to believe them. She had no reason to trust them, but I knew she wanted to.

"You remember when you were little and you stumbled into my mind while I slept?" he replied.

Hesitantly, she nodded. "There was a little boy in your arms and you were telling him goodbye. You were crying in your sleep and in the dream."

He nodded. "That was my son. My father dealt him a death so merciless and so vile that his soul was too mangled and broken to find its way to the home of his fore bearers. To this day he roams this world and his spirit will never know peace."

There was no emotion in his face except for his eyes. They were haunted. It was a good thing that I knew fairies couldn't tell direct lies, otherwise I would have seen this as a ploy to gain trust through sympathy.

"What they did to his mother," tears filled his eyes. "What they did to her, I have not the heart to tell you. In loving her, I condemned her to die because she wasn't Fae. The fact that my son was half of me wasn't enough to spare him because his other half was human."

His brother took his hand and pulled his face into his chest. If not for the fact that they were fairies that would have been odd. Not only did they smell like all things delicious, that species couldn't keep their hands to themselves.

"We have taken from you," his twin replied. "It cannot be undone but we can save you, your mate, and your child from a similar fate. That and that alone is the only reason we have come."

Sookie looked at me. We needed the help, but I knew if I didn't agree she would turn them down. I shrugged. I would take the help, but it didn't mean I trusted them or would turn my back to them.

Sookie stiffened and I tilted my head east. "Party's here," I said, with a wicked smile. "Let's dance."

Sookie moved to join me as I leapt off the roof. I gave her a look so menacing she threw her hands up and returned to her perch. From the ledge, I saw the loose circle begin to tighten. There were nine in total. None of the faces were familiar except Preston's. Oh good! This was going to be fun! He looked up at me, and I grinned with fangs exposed in hello. He scowled and I knew he wanted to end me as much as wanted to end him. There was no talk this time. He was fast, almost too fast for me to keep up with, but not quite. I'd spent the past two hundred years fighting the worse fugitives the undead world had to offer.

He teleported and I knew he was going to appear behind me. It was a good call. I was waiting with my hand out and his neck literally appeared right in my grasp. His hands moved to break the hold, but it didn't matter. We were already taking the short way off the roof. I was kind enough to use his face to break our fall. I picked him and broke his back across my knee just because he'd made me listen to his anecdote. Then I threw his limp form at his friends. They watched as if confused.

"Don't be shy," I said, holding my arms out to the rest. "I don't bite." From the rooftop, I heard Sookie scoff and mutter something under her breath. I chuckled.

The others must have been waiting for Preston to make quick work of me. When that didn't happen, the blitz ensued. I threw two daggers with pinpoint precision. The first lodged in the side of a slim female. I threw so it cleared her ribs and punctured her lungs. It should have killed her, but it simply brought her to her knees. The other landed in the chest of the Sin Eater to her right. There was a crack of bone, again it should have been fatal, but it wasn't.

The one thing I learned in the heat of this battle was that vampires and the world in general were in deep shit. Sin Eaters were serious business. I couldn't remember ever fighting an opponent who had pushed me so close to the brink. I had suffered several deep gashes that were made with silver blades and the fight wasn't even close to being over. Dermot and Fintan finished off those I injured. I couldn't see them and neither could anyone else; I just saw the enemies I'd injured lose their heads.

"Ow," I hissed. "That hurt!"

I reached behind me and grabbed the fairy that had perched himself on my back. He had bitten me. Being a vampire, I wasn't beyond seeing the irony in that. I had him by the back of his neck, then I ran my knee into his face until I saw teeth and blood fly out of his mouth. For good measure, I crushed his sternum. I tossed him the air and by the time he bounced off the ground, there was an arrow in his chest that had him screaming in a way that my savage beating hadn't.

Preston was on his feet again and when he took in the bloodbath, he snarled and his fingers glowed. There was still a smile because I was the only one who saw the arrow that was inches from his back. The last thing he saw was my smile. Then he shuddered and dropped to the ground. He didn't scream as the others had, but it must have taken everything he had.

I moved toward the fairy to finish the kill, to put him out of his misery and mine.

"No," Sookie called. "Eric, please! Please don't!"

I really wanted to kill him. It wasn't that she didn't want him dead that angered me. It was the fact that despite his flagrant attempt to harm her and end me, she still loved him. With a frustrated growl, I kicked him into a wall. I got Sookie from the roof. She just couldn't leave without going to Preston. Again, I found my feelings divided in more directions than I cared to count.

"Remember," she said, caressing his face. "Remember what I said to you the day we went to visit my parents grave?"

He made a gurgling sound. "Hush…you're okay. You're okay."

"Not from where I'm standing," I commented smugly. That fact made me feel better.

"Try to remember Pres," she urged desperately. "If you do, you'll know this is as wrong as it feels. You'll know we were right."

She kissed his head and rose to her feet. She took me by the hand and began pulling me toward the parking lot so we could borrow another car. I knew she didn't trust me enough to leave him alone with me for a second. That was fair enough because I didn't trust myself. A minute later, we were leaving the hotel and gunning toward San Diego.