EN: ATS, Chapter 10

**A/N: As best I can figure and after much computation (ok, I looked it up online), it seems that Barbados (AST, no DST) is in the same time zone as EST (during DST which I think is a really, really, really stupid thing to still have going on when it’s no longer excusable and/or necessary), meaning that both are currently GMT-4, and that, finally, Barbados is therefore currently only one hour ahead of Texas (CDT, GMT-5). That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it. And yeah, all of that for around 231 words about Pam. The story of a writer…**

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Godric surveyed those gathered under the tent and rolled his eyes.

Fucking Fairies and the chaos they would bring…

He figured as much.

Niall, the pompous old goat, had decidedly lost control of his heirs, but at least there’d been no bloodshed, well, as far as he knew. After all, Eric had been, for lack of a better word, fairynapped by what appeared to be the original Sookie.

He had not yet decided if this was a good omen or not. The momentary flickering of their Maker/Child bond had been severely disconcerting, but other than feeling Eric’s shock and slight disorientation when reestablished, the bond related nothing but Eric’s pleasure and satisfaction…and increasing satisfaction… with that turn of events.

His tie with Richard was filled with a swirling array of emotions ranging from shock and awe to desire and disdain…and an annoyingly large dose of glee. Godric was positive that the desire was not for the dark haired faeboy; the disdain, however, most certainly was – he was sorely tempted to douse the dark-haired whelp with a bucket of ice water. His pride in his youngest was growing exponentially as Stan, well, Richard now, he guessed, was maintaining his surprisingly regal vampire dignity in the face of that Preston’s uncouth behavior.

He hadn’t even drawn his sword once.

Yet.

He smirked; Richard was also quite adroitly admiring the fair Gelsey, the bodyguard whose job performance was apparently questionable, with admirable stealth and poise.

The idiot relative of Niall’s was acting like an untrained puppy with a delicious bone.

His progeny: ++1
Niall’s progeny: –0

Ice water in ten if the faebrat can’t calm it down...even if it is somewhat amusing to watch Richard skillfully avoid the handsy pandering scum. Maybe this seemingly useless Gelsey would put the immature annoyance known as Preston in his place later on…

That, Godric decided, he would quite enjoy seeing.  He would even be willing to film it for his Youngest.  Niall really should have better-trained this one.

Finally he reluctantly admitted to himself that, rather more often than they should, his own eyes were drawn to the sweet little fairy miss peeking at him every so often from under her grand-whatever’s protective arm.

Fucking Fairies.

Godric sent a “enough already, let’s get out of here” nudge to Richard. If he had to deal with fae-based chaos, he’d far rather be inside…fewer witnesses to casualties that way. While he knew that Niall wasn’t likely to have requested this meeting for any nefarious purposes, well, nothing worse than average at any rate, still, it didn’t pay to play with the Fairies.

With a subtle nod to his Maker, Richard turned toward Niall.

“Let’s adjourn to more comfortable quarters, shall we?”

Godric remained behind to dismiss the guards, then decided it was a great time to retire to his office…his office that wasn’t contaminated with damned Fairies no matter how alluring they might be.

•~•0•~•

Despite the distance and the fact she was fangs-deep in the neck of a heavily-glamoured Barbie-wanna-be, Pam hissed as she felt the brief but extremely disconcerting loss of the bond with her Maker. Almost the instant she realized it was gone it returned, but it was extremely unnerving.

It was also a certified mood killer no matter how delicious the sun-warmed tourist whimpering in her arms was.

At the loss of the vampire’s fangs in her neck, Pam’s glamoured dinner – her favorite flavor: curvy, blonde, O+ female – whined in objection.

“Shut it, food.”

Luckily Barbados was especially tasty this time of year and she would have been Pam’s second course for the evening, but against the quickly re-glamoured blood bag’s abruptly silenced wishes, Pam swiftly shooed her out of the room, then in a blur she whipped out her phone and dialed Eric’s number.

He didn’t answer – there was, apparently, no signal.

Immediately afterward she rang her grandMaker and received no answer there, either, and she paced after leaving a strongly worded yet appropriately blasé message. Something was definitely going on.

Makers just did not blink out and in like that!

Godric not answering his phone was nothing unusual, but the convoluted mass of emotions vaguely bleeding through the bond with her Maker was both intriguing and annoyingly confusing.

Eric was never that…happy.

Something was definitely going on.

•~•0•~•

Eric grunted in displeasure when Sookie pulled away but was glad when she resettled herself on his lap with a little wiggle. She did have a fine shape to that ass.  And her kisses…

“…a while.”

“What?”

Fuck, what did she just say?

He was losing it! Sure, he would fall into downtime when bored, but he was as far removed from boredom just now as he could possibly imagine! Could all fairies interrupt the thinking process or was it just this one? He reminded himself to ask Godric later.

“Eric, were you even listening to me,” she asked with a low laugh. Sookie was rather proud of herself for putting that certain glazed look in her Eric’s beautiful blue eyes. He could be a bit stodgy sometimes, and there were times when he wore that “I am an unemotional vampire” cape a little too well, but she was certain she could loosen him up some.

Even though her encounters with the handsome male had unfortunately been of limited duration, she could sense that behind that vampire persona (Niall had told her and Claudine all about vampires’ superiority complexes) lived a person who needed to laugh more, who needed to enjoy what life had to offer even if they were limited to ingesting blood – a thing she could not fathom no matter how hard she tried – and even if he could only move about freely after the sun darkened for the night.

And so, once that silly television show business was over, Sookie had planned on finding Eric so that she could become actually and thoroughly acquainted with him, and now was her time. It wasn’t as though Niall would allow her to help with that nasty upcoming “civil unrest” as he called it (ugh, men), so she might as well have some premeditated fun and do what she wanted…with the person she wanted…

And she wanted Eric; that’s all there was to it.

The whys and hows…the ways and the means…they didn’t matter – she’d deal with them herself until they were a couple, and then together they’d deal with whatever came at them.

Problems had a way of sorting themselves out, and hell, she was a Fairy and Fairies had magic for a reason.

It wasn’t as though there was any sort of time limitation or bad accent or silly antiquated ideas she’d have to worry about, either (stupid show); the only “problem” she could think of was that annoying allergy vampires had to sunlight, but since she could make light with her hands and her magic, darkness would never be a problem.

The blood part, however, caused her a brief moue, but he’d been feeding himself for centuries so it wasn’t as though she’d have to have her servants pretend to cook for him or anything.

Claudine might have thought she was crazy at first, but Claudine wasn’t stupid and could plan and plot with the best of them. Sookie’s instincts had urged her to bring her cousin along and have her stay with her in this realm. She might need a good friend along for the visit, right? She hoped the dark-haired lady was having fun, and while he might be a wily old goat, Niall would certainly protect her if something went wrong, which she knew it wouldn’t. Niall might try to portray himself as a dodgy old coot, but he was still the most powerful Fairy alive, as far as she knew anyway, so it there was trou… Oops…

Sookie cringed – Gelsey was going to be so pissed…again.

“I was listening to your beautiful body, does that count?” Eric raised his brows and practiced his puppy dog look, and really hoped it worked. He might not admit it to another soul, but this Sookie already had him hook, line, balls, cock, and any other part of himself that mattered.

“Eric Northman, are you trying to play me?” Sookie could pretend a good outrage when she felt the need. The amused twinkle in her eyes betrayed her fake ire and sparked Eric’s more playful side.

“Me?” So could Eric. “Never.”

The reason for the soft plush carpeting became clear as the curvy blonde Fairy magically tumbled the tall blond Viking onto the floor of the tent and began to assault his well-muscled ribs with nimble fingers.

“So you’re…not…trying to…play me?” she asked between laughs. Judging by his expressions, the old Viking hadn’t expected a tickle war! That would show him…and he did need to loosen up some…

Once the shock wore off, Eric smoothly and quickly turned the tables, after kicking the literal table out of the way, and Sookie suddenly found herself flat on her back. She simply made herself comfy as the tall heavy vampire braced his weight on his forearms and nestled himself into the dip of her hips. When she eased her skirt up enough to raise her bare leg, he gave her a fangy grin that changed to a sightly more serious growl when she drifted her foot along the back of his thighs.

His hips gave an impatient thrust when she wrapped her free leg around him and pulled his hips closer into her heat. When she brought her other leg up and completed the bewitchment, Eric knew he was lost.

As his lips once again descended to hers, he felt her lift her hands and slowly comb her fingers though his hair, lightly massaging then scratching his scalp as she matched his kiss thrust for thrust, move for move. Her body seemed to melt into his, her thighs holding him tight while her hips moved in merry tempo with his.

Finally she firmly, if gently and with her eyes curiously closed, pushed him far enough away so that she could breathe.

After a few long moments had passed, Sookie exhaled gustily and opened her bright, shining eyes to gaze up at him with obvious humor and a darker simmering lust as he stared down at her waiting for her next move.

She was a whirlwind of surprise, passion, and humor who would undoubtedly keep him on his proverbial toes.

“Well, it seems we get along even better than I’d hoped we would, but Eric,” she paused to take another deep breath – kissing him had been far more addictive than even she could have imagined, “I still don’t really know much about you, and honestly, you don’t know much  about me, either. Let’s tone it down a notch or four and just start with the talking?”  With a wry cast to her smile she finally remembered to remove her fingers from his silky hair.

Eric, hale, hearty, and horny as fuck, knew a halt in the proceedings when he saw one, but said nothing as he lowered his head to kiss her lips once more before rolling over onto his back.

If his tempting little Fairy wanted to talk, then…fuck…they would talk.

•~•0•~•

At Godric’s nudge, Stan quickly resumed his kingly duties and, although he should have given the task to one of his stewards, chose to escort the Fairies to their quarters himself…even if his Maker had for whatever reason chosen to remain on the rooftop. Parading the Fairies around would have been The Royal Brother’s duty, but since he’d been… fairynapped…

Eric had been fucking fairynapped!

He couldn’t believe it. Hell, he couldn’t believe any of it! He’d finally encountered some real honest-to-goodness fairies, and while they were even more alluring than he’d been told – just look at Gelsey with her long blonde hair and her tall, toned body, and oh those long, long legs…

Stan shook his head…he was supposed to be thinking about something but…oh, yeah…

He indicated the double doors before The Visitors.  That’s what they were so that’s what he’d call them!

“For the duration of your stay, we have dubbed this The Fairy Wing of the Palace. A very powerful witch on my staff has warded this wing to allow no vampires beyond this point save my Maker, my Brother, and myself.   Even so, the only reason we would be allowed to encroach upon your territory is in the case of an emergency.”

Niall concealed his surprise well, but not from Richard who knew the layers of wards on the wing to be quite impressive. The old Prince of the Fae turned to more fully face the younger King of the Texas Vampires.

“I sense many wards in this place, and not only here.” Niall thought to himself that if he’d been blessed with spidey-senses, they’d be tingling right about then. Well, from the moment he’d stepped through the mobile Portal, really. Or maybe it was static cling? He could never tell.

“Of course,” Richard agreed. “I have a very powerful witch in charge of Ward Security and Design. Among other things she has ensured that your scents will remain contained within this wing, and we’ve also ensured that the ventilation systems funnel air from your wing out of the Palace via the highest point on our rooftop. Wards to protect vampires during their dayrest have been normal protocol since this place was originally built, but they’ve all been strongly fortified recently.”

While duly impressed with, ok, he amended to himself with brutal honesty, in absolute awe of, The Visitors, Stan knew that as King he would have to take into consideration the species’ sly, mischievous tendencies, and had immediately halted his discourse. Something about Niall pricked at the back of his mind, and he knew to take seriously any sort of intuition or “gut feeling” that came along. After all, for whatever reason his Brother had already been removed from the equation. The familial bond hinted that all was extremely well with the lucky bastard, but that still left them one old, powerful vampire down.

His intuition had never failed him in the past – that’s how he lucked out in having Godric as a Maker.

So with that in mind he had assured the Fairies of their safety and had warned them about the wards protecting their erstwhile enemies during the day, but chose to say no more regarding Palace security measures…alarms…guards…iron…

He turned to face the group.

“A well-stocked kitchen area has been installed in your wing, and we have Weres proficient in cooking techniques on staff for your convenience. You’ll find instructions for contacting them in there,” he stated with an elegant flick of his hand…a move which also served to distance said appendage from a certain appendage on a certain Fairy male with no apparent social skills and a personal-space problem. “You’ll also find a large area dedicated to entertainment purposes with a section providing information regarding local attractions. If you need anything, an escort for day trips,” he shrugged knowing that everything they could think of had already been provided given that they actually knew fuck-all about Fairies, “anything at all, do let us know.” He tried not to catch Gelsey’s eye too noticeably.

“After you’ve had a chance to refresh yourselves,” he addressed Niall again, “you are welcome to join us. Were guards will be stationed outside your main door at all times, and one will gladly show you to the meeting room.”

With a nod, he turned smartly on his heel and left the bemused group.

Gelsey was sorely tempted to dump a bucket of ice water over that idiot Preston.

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**A/N:  Ok, so, what did you think?  Your sweet words make my muse happy!  So does coffee, but yeah…**

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