Chapter Text
Jane’s POV - Wednesday, July 22nd & Thursday, July 23rd, 2009
I was trying to avoid Stan’s gaze, so I stepped out of the corner closer to the wildly proud human making his announcement. By the time I realized the motivation behind his feelings, it was too late. I didn’t remember the explosion. It was as if one second I was standing there completely fine, and the next second I was lying flat on my back, and everything hurt and seared.
Then Godric was next to me, and his face was glowing above mine. So beautiful and perfect. Just like in my dreams. He was the feeling. It was him. I felt blood slip out of my mouth, and I looked down to see that my stomach had been blown open; it was a huge red mess of blood. I was in shock. That was the only explanation.
Godric bit his wrist and held it to my mouth, but I didn’t think that would do any good. I knew how much blood it took to heal. And for the injury I had...I wasn’t going to make it.
“Tell Eric thank you,” I was able to gurgle out, letting go of his wrist.
“You must drink,” he said, wild-eyed.
“I loved our perfect fleeting moment. It was worth everything,” I told Godric, hoping he’d understand.
“You insane beautiful creature, you must drink,” he told me again, and he re-bit his wrist and held it to my mouth. Then Eric was there, looking furious and crazed.
“She’s dying,” he told Godric.
“I know,” Godric responded, forcing his blood down my throat.
“You need to ask her,” Eric said. “Jane,” he called out to me. He sounded so far away.
“Thank you,” I told him deliriously. “Thank you for helping me.”
“Jane,” Godric shouted, “I am going to...” But I couldn’t hear what he said. I was floating, and I was finally feeling what I had been searching for. That otherness, that timelessness, and decay. That twisted, perfect, agonizing, endless beauty. I let it envelop me, and I knew then that what I had been looking for was death. My last thought was that there wasn’t really any difference.
That Godric and death felt the same.
****
I blinked, and noticed I was surrounded by darkness. I was a bit disappointed but not surprised. I had always thought that there was probably nothing after death. I had hoped there would be some sort of afterlife, but it was disappointing to find myself just surrounded by blackness. I realized I still had a body. I was able to feel my limbs. I still had my senses - I could smell, I could smell everything. I smelled dirt and a disgusting sort of fluid smell that reminded me of a hospital. I moved my fingers and realized that I was surrounded by dirt. Wriggling around, I began to dig my way out, and just a few moments later, I broke the surface, gasping as I clawed my way forward.
There was so much to see and to hear. I could see everything - each individual blade of grass that surrounded me, each tiny dewdrop that beaded on the silken petals of roses. Magnificent. The world had never looked more beautiful to me... I could smell what seemed to be at least two hundred types of roses. It was so much, and I couldn’t process it all. Then I saw them. Godric was sitting still as a statue watching me with blood tears flowing down his face. Eric was standing behind him, his hand on Godric's shoulder. His expression was completely blank. I instinctively felt out for the bonds with them and was literally blown over by the feelings.
I shuddered and shook and felt like I was having a seizure. I was being blasted by wonder, by relief, and then by worry and fear. “Stop!” I screamed. “It’s too much,” I whimpered as I shook and shook, curling in on myself.
“It didn’t work,” I heard Eric’s voice say from far away. “She shouldn’t be reacting this way!”
“Enough,” Godric barked. “Calm yourself. She’s scared, she’s feeling both of us.”
Slowly focusing on the sound of Godric’s voice, I was able to pull back into myself and I saw them above me. “What happened?” I croaked, trying to understand what I was feeling.
“I turned you,” Godric replied, and I saw that he was covered in dirt. “I was not sure it would work.”
Turned me.
I was a vampire.
“Oh!” I said, suddenly understanding. I ached suddenly with thirst and need. “Oh.”
“We should get you inside,” Godric told me and he pulled me up to stand. When his hand touched mine, I quaked under the onslaught of feelings.
“Don’t touch me!” I said and removed myself from his grasp.
Eric and Godric exchanged a dark look but said nothing.
“Where...where are we going?”
“Back to the hotel. The nest was destroyed. Do you remember the bomb?” Eric asked me.
I tried. I couldn’t remember. I remembered a man walking in...and simple dark bliss. “I don’t know,” I told them.
“I should fly you back,” Godric told me. “In order to do so, I will need to touch you.”
I trembled. I nodded, and Godric scooped me up easily. Immediately I completely lost hold of myself, and all I felt was him, just him. All of Godric’s fear was pouring into me, his worry, a strange sense of pride and longing. I forgot who I was, and Jane didn’t exist anymore, only everything that was Godric.
“Jane,” I heard someone saying something. It sounded familiar. What did that word mean? “Jane!”
That was me! That was my name. I opened my eyes, and I was laying on the ground outside of a building. It was an alleyway. I stood. How did I get here?
“Where are we?”
“We’re at the hotel. Follow me,” Godric said and I was able to follow him. People gave us wide berth and strange looks. We went back to the hotel room.
“Get in the shower,” Godric told me, and I did what he asked without a thought. I went into the bathroom and stripped off my clothes before getting into the shower. I stood under the water watching the dirt swirl down the drain. The cold of the water didn’t bother me anymore. I could feel it was cold but it didn’t cause me to shiver. The warmth felt more normal so I made the water warm and I washed my skin and my hair. Once I had thoroughly cleaned myself of the blood and dirt, I got out and I heard Eric and Godric’s voices stop talking as soon as I turned the water off.
Walking out in my towel I felt their eyes following me. I went to my suitcase. I took out a bra and panties and a simple dress and then went back to the bathroom to dress. I realized with a start that I couldn’t feel anything. I was totally numb. I had pulled all of my feelings in too tightly. If I let them out at all… I would be lost again. I brushed the tangles out of my hair and went out into the living space.
“How do you feel?” Eric asked me.
“I don’t feel anything,” I told him. “I feel nothing.” He and Godric shared another dark look.
“Are you thirsty?” Godric asked. “We’ve ordered donor blood for you.”
I felt within myself to see if I was thirsty, but I couldn’t feel anything.
“No,” I told them. “I’m not thirsty.”
There was a long silence after that. I laid down on the bed and sank deeper into my numbness. I could handle this. Nothing was far better than everything. There was a knock at the door, and I didn’t even move. I heard a human outside, I could tell because I could hear their heartbeat. Eric came back with five bags of blood.
“Will you try some?” he asked me.
I shrugged, refusing to meet his eyes. I didn’t really care either way. Eric seemed to have taken that as an affirmative because he began to heat the bag up in the microwave.
“Sit up,” Godric ordered, and I did so instinctively.
Eric brought the bag over to me, a semi-hopeful expression on his face as he handed it to me. Tilting this way and that, I tried to figure out how drinking from a bag would work. I didn’t know what to do. Spotting the little tube part on the top of the bag, I twisted it open and sucked it in. It was fine. It seemed like water. I drank it through the little straw and they watched me and Eric’s face fell. I resisted the impulse to feel for him through the bond, and continued to keep a tight grip on my feelings.
“How do you feel now?” Godric asked.
“I’m fine,” I told him.
He looked away. There was another knock on the door. “Godric? Eric?” Isabel’s voice called out from behind the door. They opened the door and she came in. “How’s the new baby?” she asked looking over at me. “Did you just have your first blood?” she asked, putting her hand on her heart like it was a precious moment.
I stared at her. I felt nothing.
“Things are not…” Godric trailed off. “Things are not normal,” he said. I didn’t react. I didn’t care.
“We don’t know that yet,” Eric denied. “She’s still adjusting.”
“I brought you some clothes.” Isabel handed Godric a bag. She stood awkwardly, watching me. “We still have to meet with Nan. She’s requiring all of us to attend. She said you could bring your newborn.”
“Very well,” Godric said. “When?”
“In an hour,” Isabel replied and tilted her head at me curiously. “In the conference room.”
“We will be there,” Godric told her.
Isabel nodded and left.
“Jane,” Eric knelt before me. “We can feel you. In the bonds. They’re there but it’s like nothing is coming through.”
I nodded.
“Can you feel us?” Eric asked.
I paused. I didn’t want to try. Why didn’t I want to try again? I felt too much. That was why.
“I don’t want to know,” I told him.
“Why?” Godric asked.
“I… I was afraid. It was too much,” I told him.
“Are you afraid now?” he asked.
“No.”
“Reach out the bonds,” he urged. I did so and I collapsed against the bed under the onslaught of emotion, I shook and shivered as I tried to process it all. Fear, fear, fear. Worry. I was gone again. It wasn’t me anymore. I floated for a while, in a sea of apprehension, of grief and sorrow.
“Jane!” a voice was saying from far away. I blinked. Jane. That was me. I pulled into myself, recognizing my name again.
“Yes,” I said.
“You’re back, but you’re numb again,” Godric sighed. “The bonds are wrong.”
“Okay.” I didn’t really care. I felt nothing.
Eric and Godric started speaking in a language I didn’t understand, and after a few minutes it seemed to get heated. Then Godric said something that sounded like it was the final word as Eric clenched his jaw and went silent. Godric went to shower, and Eric went to the microwave and heated up another bag of blood. He handed it to me and I looked at him blankly.
“Drink it,” he said.
I sucked the blood up through the straw again and it was fine. Like water.
“Does it taste good?” Eric asked.
“It’s fine.”
He sighed. We stayed like that for some time and Godric came out, clean and dressed. They spoke in Swedish for a moment and then Eric started questioning me again.
“Do you think you can drop your fangs?” he asked me.
I looked at him. I didn’t know how.
“Think of something delicious,” he recommended. “Think of Godric’s blood.”
I tried. I tried to remember but I couldn’t.
“I don’t remember,” I told him.
“Do you remember my blood? From when you were human? You said I tasted like the North Sea.”
I remembered that. I thought of it, but there was no feeling behind it. Like trying to eat a photograph.
Eric turned and said something in the old-sounding language to Godric but Godric denied him.
“Drink the rest. Eric, make her another,” he said and I drank the rest of that bag and another one. I didn’t feel any different.
“Are you full?” Eric asked and he went to touch my stomach but I flinched away.
“Don’t touch me,” I told him. I didn’t want to feel all the emotions again.
He looked as if he would cry. I knew intellectually, that normally I would feel upset about making him feel that way, but I couldn’t feel anything.
“We need to go to the meeting,” Godric said despondently. “Come,” he ordered me, and I stood and followed them out. We went to a large conference room and Godric gestured to me to take a seat next to him. Eric sat on an ottoman far away from us. Isabel was already there, and she looked at me sadly. She asked Godric some questions in Spanish and he stood and pulled her aside.
Sookie and Bill came in, and before I even knew what was happening Sookie threw her arms around me. I felt all of her emotions - she was relieved that I was still here. She was curious about my change. She was worried about something too, something that she did. I threw her off of me.
“What did you do?” I asked her. I started to want something. I wanted to know.
“What? I don’t know what you’re—” she stumbled over her words.
“I could tell. You’re hiding something. Something you don’t want others to know,” I told her.
“Jane. Sit down,” Godric ordered, and I complied immediately and innately.
Then Nan Flanagan, the spokesperson for the American Vampire League, came in and I recognized her from TV. She sat down and started tearing into all of us.
“Do you have any fucking idea of the PR mess you’ve made? And who fucking has to clean that shit up? Me. Not you, me. I should drain every one of you bastards.”
“Stan went after the church on his own. None of us knew anything about it,” Eric told her.
Sookie was staring at him. Why was she staring at him?
“Oh really, because everyone who has met Stan in the last three hundred years knew he had a kink about slaughtering humans. But you, his nestmates, his Sheriff, had no clue?” Nan added sarcastically.
“And how were we supposed to know that this time he meant it?” Isabel chimed in.
“Not my problem. Yours,” she sneered as she directed her comment at Godric.
“Don’t talk to him that way,” Eric bristled.
“Don’t talk to me that way,” Nan responded. She turned to Godric. “Let’s get to the point. How did they manage to abduct you?”
“They would have taken one of us sooner or later. I offered myself,” I looked over at him. That did explain it.
“Why?” Nan asked.
“Why not?” Godric asked in return, and to me, it sounded reasonable. Nothing really mattered.
“They wanted you to meet the sun, and you were willing?” she asked him incredulously.
“What do you think?” Godric asked her instead of answering.
“I think you’re out of your mind. And then I hear about a traitor?” she asked.
“Irrelevant. Only a rumor, I’ll take full responsibility,” Godric said. I knew that to be a lie. I knew that Isabel’s man, Hugo, was the traitor.
“You bet you will,” Nan said to him.
“You cold bitch,” Eric said to her.
“Listen, this is a national vampire disaster and nobody at the top has any sympathy for any of you.” She turned to Godric. “Sheriff, you fucked up. You’re fired.”
“I agree, of course,” he said. “Isabel should take over. She had no part in my disgrace.”
Isabel’s gaze jerked over to Godric, “Godric, fight back,” she told him.
Eric looked over at us. “What are you saying? She’s a bureaucrat, you don’t have to take shit from her.”
“You wanna lose your area, Viking?” Nan threatened him.
“You don’t have that kind of power,” Eric replied.
“Hey, I’m on TV. Try me.”
“I’m to blame. I should have contained Stan the second Godric went missing,” Isabel said.
“Isabel,” Godric looked at her and she shut up. “I remove myself from all positions of authority,” he stated.
“Works for me,” Nan agreed.
Sookie wanted to say something, and Bill tried to stop her. “I owe him,” she told Bill. “Ms. Flangan, Godric rescued me from a really large rapist who probably would have killed me too.”
Suddenly, my mouth started speaking of its own accord,“That’s lucky for you. I ended up raped and dead.”
There was a moment of silence at my proclamation.
“Moving on,” Nan said, blowing past what I said.
“No, listen.” Sookie stood. “Then he rescued humans in that church plus a whole lot of vampires. You think it’s a PR mess now, it could have been a hundred, a million times worse. You should thank him,” she said.
“For getting kidnapped? For attracting a suicide bomber?” she snapped and suddenly gestured to me. “For creating this zombie? For piss poor judgment? I think not.”
Eric stood and growled, but Isabel grabbed him before he could do anything.
“Eric,” Godric said to him in a warning tone. There was a moment of tense silence. “It doesn’t matter.”
Eric sat back down and Nan proceeded. “Tell me about the bombing, please. Every single detail.”
“A boy walked into the lair. I thought he was someone’s human companion. He announced that he was from the Fellowship of the Sun and that he had a message from Reverend Steve Newlin. Then he detonated the bomb strapped to his chest. It killed three vampires and two human companions,” Godric explained.
“What happened after?” She asked.
Isabel jumped in. “We released the accomplices and did not harm any humans. We alerted the Hotel Carmilla so that we could seek shelter should the humans return.”
“What a fucking fiasco. You’re lucky I don’t send you all to the Magister. Godric, come to my suite to fill out the forms,” Nan ordered.
“Soon. Let me settle my new progeny,” he told her. The way he said settle made all the vampires shift uncomfortably but I didn’t know what it meant. “I also have something to say. I apologize for all the harm I’ve caused, for all of our lost ones, human and vampire.” He turned and directed the last part of this speech to me. “I will make amends, I swear it.”
“Take it easy, it’s just a few signatures,” Nan said, and she patted him on the shoulder, and then she left.
We all stood and Eric came to Godric and me.
“No,” Eric said resolutely.
“Look at her,” Godric replied. Eric’s eyes flicked to my face and then back to Godric.
“You have to listen to me,” Eric pleaded.
“There’s nothing left to say,” Godric responded.
“There is,” Eric claimed. But I had no idea what they were talking about, and I didn’t have any will to care either.
Godric looked at me and then back to Eric. “On the roof,” he said. He turned to me. “Follow me,” he ordered and I trailed after him.
We went to Nan’s room and Godric signed some forms. Isabel was there and signed them too.
“Godric,” Isabel said as we turned to leave. “It’s only her first night. You could give it some time.”
He looked at her blankly, but then turned and walked away and I followed after him. It felt late or early. I couldn’t decide. We went up to the roof.
Eric was already there. He was waiting for us.
“She is less than a night old,” Eric said as soon as we walked up.
Godric looked over the city. “One night is enough to know.”
“I can’t accept this, it’s insanity,” Eric told him.
“What we’ve done is insanity. We didn’t ask her, we knew it might not work,” Godric replied and gestured to me. “She doesn’t belong here.”
“But she is here!” Eric yelled at him.
“It’s not right. She’s not right,” Godric told him.
Eric tried a different tactic.“You taught me there is no right and wrong. Only survival or death.”
“I told a lie, as it turns out. I would not want mere survival for her.”
“I will keep you both alive by force,” Eric claimed.
“Even if you could, why would you be so cruel?” Godric asked him.
They switched languages and I couldn’t understand them anymore. It didn’t matter. I saw Sookie standing on the roof with us. Why was she here?
I had a feeling. My own feeling. Curiosity. I went over to her. She was watching Eric and Godric. Eric broke down. He fell to his knees and cried blood tears.
“Why are you here?” I asked Sookie.
She placed her hand on my shoulder as if to comfort me and I felt her emotions rush through me. Sadness, grief, guilt, and that niggling feeling from before. She was hiding something.
I grabbed her by the shoulders.
“What did you do? What do you not want me to know?” I shook her.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Eric and Godric watching me.
“TELL ME!” I demanded.
“I drank Eric’s blood!” she spat out and I released her.
I looked at Eric and he nodded. I took a breath and slowly felt out to his bond. He was stunned and worried, and suddenly I could feel again. I could care. I staggered over to him. The feelings were still so strong, I wondered if I could take them.
“Did you give her your blood to heal her?” I asked and he pulled me to him.
“No. The little leech stole it when I was knocked out from the blast of the bomb.”
I sighed. I felt relieved. I didn’t want him to want her, I realized. I was... jealous.
Godric was standing right next to me. “You can feel her?” he asked Eric.
“Yes, she… opened up,” he told Godric and his voice sounded amazed. He turned to me. “Open your bond to Godric.” I was immediately frightened. “It’s okay.” Eric held me.
“I’m too scared,” I told them. “When I opened up before… I was completely gone. I couldn’t feel myself anymore; it was only your emotions in the bonds. I didn’t exist anymore,” I explained.
“Then don’t,” Godric said. “We’ll wait.”
Suddenly I felt the rising sun on my skin and I gasped at the burn. “Oh! It hurts!” They quickly ushered me inside before we were burned too badly.
“Are you okay?” Sookie asked Eric, cupping his face and rubbing her thumb in his blood tear.
A sudden and fierce protectiveness rose in me, and I felt a pain in my upper teeth as I jerked towards her.
“Don’t you dare!” I hissed at Sookie. She immediately backed away from Eric and me, alarmed.
“She has fangs!” Eric said joyfully. I felt his surprise and happiness in the bond. He picked me up and twirled me. “They’re so cute. You have little baby fangs!” he rejoiced.
“Put your little sister down,” Godric ordered him and Eric did as he asked. I looked over at Godric and he looked inordinately pleased. “Thank you, Miss Stackhouse--your poor behavior has been the only thing that has been able to break through to her.”
Sookie didn’t know how to take that. “Thank you. I guess. I’ll be going now. I’m glad you’re alright,” she said and I narrowed my eyes at her, shoving down the urge to hiss at her again like a ruffled cat.
“Time for day rest,” Godric announced and he guided us back to our hotel room. Godric and Eric quickly stripped to their boxer briefs and I stood unsure what to do. Eric climbed in the middle of the bed and Godric got in on the right.
“Come to bed, little sister,” Eric said, patting the left side. I took off my dress and bra and pulled on the black tank top that Eric had just shed, then I crawled into bed and he wrapped his long arms around me and I felt the bond settle and hum, electrified with contentment, a thousand times stronger than what I felt as a human.
“Oh!” I moaned against him, hands curling into fists as I held onto the feeling and tried to not become overwhelmed by it. “It’s so much.”
He nuzzled me back. “All of your senses are heightened now. Including the bond.”
Then it occurred to me. What was wrong with me.
My ability to sense emotion… it was heightened too.
****
Godric’s POV - Friday, July 24th, 2009 (Night 2)
I woke before both of my progeny. I watched them at rest. I was utterly and completely awash in the crush of agonizing love I felt for them. I thought back to the night prior. I had nearly done something that would have killed us all.
The thought that Jane had turned wrong, that she was doomed to live her existence a feelingless being, with no wants or desires, had made me almost have her meet the true death. I had stood on the roof prepared to stay with her until our end. If not for the audacious behavior of Miss Stackhouse and Eric’s bond with Jane…
I shook my head and decided not to wander down that path. If I had thought that Jane was an unusual human, she was turning out to be an even stranger vampire. I was thankful that she had finally dropped her baby fangs last night. I wondered about her ability to feed, about her thirst. There was so much I didn’t understand about her.
How was she able to close me off from her? I was her maker, I was supposed to be able to close the bond, not her. Her bond with Eric was still strong, and I had never heard of a vampire having a blood bond to a vampire that was not their maker prior to their turning. I imagined that it would be permanent between them unless one of them decided to break it.
A permanent tie to a vampire that was not one’s maker. How did she feel about that? How would Eric feel about it? How did she even feel about being turned? I had asked both Nora and Eric if they wanted to be turned before I made them. Jane… Eric had said that she never had even considered it.
That she liked the way the light made shadows.
I didn’t know what any of it meant. I was thankful that I no longer had an area to run. We would go back to the safety of Eric’s nest, and I would try to get a better handle on Jane and how to help her. I got out of bed and went into the shower, still thinking. Only moments later I heard the thudding footsteps of Eric and the shower door slid open and he joined me.
“Thank you,” I heard his voice say.
I rinsed the shampoo from my hair and quirked a smile at him. He gave me the most devastatingly charming grin in his arsenal.
“A little sister!” he exclaimed. “A blood bonded sister. And the most unique human I ever met turned vampire,” he continued to exalt, his grin contagious.
“Eric,” I finally stopped him. “She will still have many challenges. I will need your support,” I told him seriously.
“Of course,” he replied. “Anything.”
Then suddenly, he nearly fell over in the shower and I heard something like a moan crossed with a yelp issue from Jane in the other room. I felt in my heart for her and I could not even sense that she had risen. My bond with her was clamped shut on her end - I could sense that she existed, but nothing else leaked through.
“What is it?” I asked him and quickly turned the water off.
“Arousal... and thirst, gods, she’s starving.” He was grabbing his chest where the center of the bond lay.
“Go to her. I will heat the blood,” I commanded him. He went to her, still naked, dripping water from the shower everywhere. I pulled on my boxer briefs and grabbed one of the O positive blood bags and heated it in the microwave. It turned slowly and I peeked my head into the bedroom. Eric had his face buried between her thighs and her moans were echoing loudly from out of the bedroom. The microwave went off and I squeezed the blood bag to disperse the warmth evenly and brought it in.
Jane seemed close to peaking. I was enraptured by the look of pained ecstasy on her beautiful face. She was a goddess. She was begging Eric for something. “Please, please, please,” she cried desperately, and then I saw him flick out his fangs and bite her thigh. She screamed and soaked his face in the pinkish clear fluid of her release. He groaned and I saw him pump his hips against the bed. Did she make him come too? Gods, they were glorious together.
Ignoring the ache of my own fangs I made my way over to the bed. “Feeling better, baby girl?” I asked her and sat down on the side of the bed. She looked at me with an extremely embarrassed expression on her beautiful face. How I wish I could feel that feeling from her through our bond! Then I could give her so much more than just my words at that moment... “None of that. Time to feed,” I told her and I gave her the warmed blood bag. Eric pulled himself out from between her legs and propped himself up on his elbow to watch. She wrapped the sheets around her modestly and then took a sip through the straw part like she did yesterday, only this time when the blood hit her tongue her fangs popped out.
“I’ve never seen cuter fangs,” Eric told her. “Even Pam’s weren’t that small.”
Jane was too absorbed in drinking the blood to notice his comment, however. This was what I had expected yesterday. She sucked it all down quickly. “Can I have another, please?” she asked sweetly, her little fangs still poking out.
“Of course. Eric, go make her another,” I ordered him and as he got up and folded back the sheets I saw the pink stain he left behind. So she did cause him to climax too.
Jane was smiling at me, looking nervous. “How do you feel?” I asked her.
“Everything feels extreme. Urgent,” she said and I nodded, that was more normal.
“Your emotions should be heightened right now,” I explained. “How does your bond with Eric feel?”
She closed her eyes and I saw that she must be reaching out to him. “Unbelievable.” I smiled.
“Can you feel your tether to me?” I asked her, wondering if she could even feel that. She nodded and looked away. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I'm still scared. Of what it will mean if I open both. Maybe I can close Eric’s off and open yours?” she asked, and Eric dropped the blood bag on his way back in at the mere suggestion of her closing herself off from him.
“No. I fear if you close yourself off from him, you’ll lose all connection as you did before,” I explained my concern to her and Eric picked up the bag and handed it to her. “We’ll go slowly.”
She nodded, but I saw her eyes glaze a little with bloodlust and she drank through the straw again. Eric was gazing at her with adoration. A little blood escaped the side of her mouth and he scooped it off her face with his finger and sucked it into his own mouth. She stopped to watch him suck his finger, and I saw her face transform with lust.
“Whoa,” Eric said and clearly he felt it. “What would you like, love?” Jane froze and looked between us and then scampered away, sheet and all, taking her blood bag with her and hiding in the bathroom.
I looked at Eric. “What just happened?” I had expected to watch him take her thoroughly, and hopefully, if she was able to feel like she could handle my touch, help her as well.
He flopped down on the bed.
“I don’t even know where to begin,” he said. “She’s been hurt.”
I felt like such a fool. Of course. What happened only two nights ago. “Ah... of course. I was silvered in, full solid bars,” I explained to him why I had not been able to escape and save her.
He shook his head. “Before then.”
I froze. “Explain.”
And so he did explain in a mishmash of Norse and Swedish. That she consented to her first sexual encounter to be horribly hurt, that she hadn’t known that such behavior was not only abnormal but deplorable. That her encounter with me was her first positive sexual experience. I had wondered why she had come from such a soft and simple touch. Eric explained that the bite I gave her at the moment of her peak was something that she now craved.
He hesitated, and then admitted that he still hadn’t had intercourse with her, but that she had been seemingly getting closer to being ready to do so. Until she was recently hurt again. While I had listened, unable to help.
“It’s not just the physicality. She doesn’t trust. She wanted to, but she wasn’t ready,” he ended.
This was going to make her transition a lot harder.
“I had a question about this actually,” Eric said, turning over on his stomach to look up at me. “Does the transition make all newborns more lustful, or does it just heighten what was already present in the human personality?”
“A good question. It heightens all emotions, but it also wants to feed the bond. In my opinion, it seeks out pleasurable feelings to heighten the connection between maker and progeny, even if those pleasurable activities are not with one another, they still feel each other through the bond and it helps cement the closeness,” I explained.
“So the stronger the bond, the stronger the urges?” he asked. I nodded. “Your blood is so ancient… her bond must be quite strong. She barely feels like a newborn.”
I felt around the thick tether of our bond. It felt like it could be quite strong. Jane slipped out of the bathroom, grabbed clothes, and then quickly went back into the bathroom as I heard the shower turn on.
“And she has a bond with me as well. She may be quite… needy. What will happen, if she doesn’t have her needs met if she keeps repressing them?” Eric asked.
“What happens if a newborn is not allowed to feed?” I asked in return.
He shook his head. “They will eventually crack, get bloodlusted, and gorge.”
“That applies to her other needs as well.”
“What does that mean?” he asked. “She will just strip and fuck the first person she sees?”
I shrugged. “Possibly. Or she will lock you in her room with her and have her way with you.”
“Now that I wouldn’t mind,” he purred with a smirk, and I chuckled softly at his comment.
The shower eventually turned off and we stopped talking. Jane came out dressed nicely and looking sweet.
“Eric, get showered and dressed, I am going get some things from the nest, and then we will return to your area,” I commanded him.
Eric nodded and got out of bed, swaggering past Jane on his way, and who had drunk enough blood that she brought a blush to her cheeks that spread down her chest. Shaking my head and letting a gentle smile cross my lips at their antics, I dressed and then sat down watching her.
She looked uncomfortable.
“I did not ask if you wanted this,” I told her.
She looked at me quizzically.
“To be made vampire,” I clarified.
Her eyes lit up and her mouth formed into a slight ‘O’ shape. She understood now.
“If you hadn’t I wouldn’t be here now,” she said, and I noticed her use of language. She didn’t say she would have died. She understood, she was dead. She had died. Very few newborns realized it. She was very aware.
“Some people would have preferred not to be turned,” I stated. “You had prepared to die. You gave us your last words as human, had you truly not considered this as a possibility?”
She looked away uncomfortably, and I wished that I knew what she was feeling.
“I never really thought about it. I guess it doesn’t matter now,” she said, and she confounded me.
Eric’s shower turned off and he came out in a flash. “You’re making her sad,” he told me, picking her up and cuddling her to him.
“Why does this conversation make you sad?” I asked her.
Jane shrugged and avoided my gaze. “I don’t know.”
“You did not wish to be turned,” I stated, sighing. This had been one of my fears. Forcing this life on her. She shrugged again. Eric held her more tightly and I knew that I must have made her even sadder.
I made her a creature of darkness against her will. By the gods, I was selfish. She had told me that I needed to give, yet all I did was take, her included. I sighed again. There was nothing to be done for it now.
“Are you packed?” I asked them and Eric zipped around quickly and put all their things away. Rising from the bed with a nod towards the door, “Let’s go,” I said, and Eric carried their luggage down.
We hired a car to take us to the nest. Nearly everything was destroyed in the main rooms, black scorch marks marred the walls. I noticed the spot where Jane had died, the dark stain of her blood coating the carpet. The very last of her human blood. She stared at it for a long time, and then glanced at Eric. He came and held her hand. I felt unreasonably jealous of their relationship. I turned away and we continued on through the house.
“Good thing I left all the important things in storage,” I told them as we picked our way through, much of the art I had displayed had been destroyed. I had told Isabel that we should have blood locked all the rooms, not just our personal quarters. She thought it would have been too difficult, too time-consuming, and who would dare to come to the main rooms of the nest? So foolish. Luckily my rooms were not too damaged, and I was able to gather clothing and my most important books. I slid the portrait Jane had done of me in the pages of a book and packed them into a duffle bag.
“You take this.” I dropped my bag at Eric’s feet. “I’ll take your luggage so that it’s easier for you to carry Jane.” After arranging that quickly, we were in the air on our way to Shreveport.
“Can we go to my house first?” Jane yelled into the wind.
“Too close to dawn,” I told her and she pouted. Such a little baby vamp.
We arrived at Eric’s nest, only an hour or so before dawn. Eric and I could stay up later if needed, but Jane would be out flat quite quickly after the sun rose. I was pleased to see that Eric had biometric panels installed. I had hated those coded locks he had before.
“I’ll have to get Ada out to add you both. I doubt Jane’s will work anymore since her transformation,” Eric said as he let us in. He called out, “Pam, I have a surprise for you.”
Pamela zipped into the room and Eric set Jane down. Pamela looked at her and processed what she saw.
“You said you weren’t going to turn her!” she snarled at Eric in Swedish.
“I didn’t, your grandmaker did,” he replied, smirking.
“What the fuck?” Pamela had switched back to English, and then turned to Jane. “You may be my Auntie by the blood, but you’re the baby around here, got it?”
“I’m glad to see you’re so pleased to add me to the family,” Jane replied sarcastically and I felt a burst of affection for her - I knew that Pam and Jane would eventually be as thick as thieves.
Pamela turned back to Eric and arched a brow as she crossed her arm stubbornly, “You better not stick her with me when you’re bored or busy. And I’m not doing any of the newborn baby lessons with her.”
“Pam. It takes a village,” Eric said. “I thought you’d be pleased. You seemed to enjoy dressing her up like a doll before…” he trailed off. “You’ll probably have to take her shopping,” he tempted her.
Pamela looked at Jane neutrally. “Fine,” she agreed, but I could tell she was pleased.
“Nice to see you Pamela!” I called out to her as she left.
“Lovely, as always, Grandmaker,” she replied over her shoulder.
“The baby is hungry and I could use a snack,” Eric told me and steered Jane into the kitchen. He opened the fridge. “What should she try next, she’s only had O pos right?”
“Give her A pos next, it’s the second most common in the States,” I replied. “What else do you have?”
“All out of AB neg, I was basically addicted to it for a while. AB pos or B neg?” he offered me.
“B neg.” I decided, and he took the AB pos for himself.
He heated them in the microwave together. We waited in silence as the bags spun for a bit.
“I can touch the fridge now,” Jane said suddenly. Ah, Eric must have glamoured her from doing so when she was human.
Eric nodded. “Yes, with permission you may now touch the fridge.”
The microwave beeped and he took the bags out and we went to the living space.
I drank my blood fully, trying to model an appropriate appetite for Jane, and watched her as she sipped hers. I was pleased that she didn’t seem to gorge. She also had an excellent appetite so far.
“When will she do her first live feed?” Eric asked me eagerly.
She looked grossed out by the idea, not elated, like most newborn vampires. Although the only human she had been around was Sookie, and her blood did not smell normal. Jane had been completely cut off from her feelings during most of their interactions as well.
“We can try tomorrow. We’ll find someone clean and suitable at your club,” I mused. I would have to get used to his club. I would need to build up a tolerance to humans and their scents again.
“Do I have to?” Jane asked, with a hint of that newborn whine.
“Jane, feeding is an imperative skill. You will learn to do it,” I told her sternly.
“You’ll like it, baby girl. Once you try it,” Eric said to her flirtatiously.
She still seemed skeptical.
“Time for day rest, you’ll be out in mere minutes anyway,” I told her, grabbed the empty blood bags and threw them in the biohazard bin. Eric let us into the basement and Jane knew right where his room was. I was surprised that he had let her down here, he must have glamoured her well, to let her be in his space of day rest.
As I anticipated, Jane passed out on the bed just minutes after the sun rose, and Eric shucked her clothes off, and changed her into one of his shirts so she would wake comfortably. He placed himself in the middle and I got on the other side of him.
I sighed. I looked over at her smooth young face, especially doll-like in her day rest. What would happen if she could never open her bond to me? It would be so difficult to be her maker and not know what she was feeling. Relying on Eric to tell me would hinder her development and our connection. We would never get to feel bonded as we should. Perhaps this was my punishment. It seemed like it was, this cruel twist of fate. But had I not changed her, she would be gone, and that was a thought I could barely stand. The idea that she would not be walking this earth...I shuddered at the thought.
Was this the best thing I had ever done or the worst?