Chapter 45

chapter forty-

five

Bill appeared in Salem Hospital suddenly as though he had been beamed into the ER. “Quick, he needs blood,” said Bill to a wide eyed nurse. She stared at Bill. Like a lot of Americans, she had never seen a vampire up close and Bill was fangy. “Move it god dammit, she is bled out, I only gave her enough to get here.” The nurse led him into the emergency bay and a doctor looked at her.

“Fuck!” swore the doctor. “What happened?”

“She is nearly bled out. She is O negative,” said Bill.

“How do you know?” he asked.

“I can smell her blood, hurry, she doesn’t have much time,” said Bill. He laid her on the gurney and stroked her red hair back. Sky began to convulse. “Sky hold on, hold on for Eric.” She shook and her jaws clamped together and she jerked.

“She’s stroking out,” said the doctor. “Move out of the way.” He pushed Bill away and the vampire stood there helplessly. The doctor was giving orders faster than Bill could track. Sky’s clothes were being cut away and IVs were being slid into her dehydrated veins.

“Her veins are blowing,” said the nurse.

“Bring a cut down tray and I will run a central line,” he said. “Vampires, you never learn do you. Ought to run a stake through the whole lot of you.” He did not look at Bill. He cut Sky on her collar bone and ran a guide wire into the main vein. He pulled the wire out, leaving the thin catheter in her and the nurse taped it in place. They hung bags of blood and some other liquid and they administered drugs to counter act what they suspected was the stroke she had had. Bill watched the nurses as they followed the doctor’s orders.  He felt helpless, he could do nothing for her. The nurse came to him.

“You need to step out,” said the nurse.

“I am responsible for her, I can’t leave her,” said Bill.

“The police want to talk to you,” she said.  Bill turned and there were two police officers waiting for him.

“How long before dawn?” he asked.

“A few hours,” she said. Bill walked out the emergency room and took his phone out. He called Pam. “Pam, this is Bill, I think I am being arrested. I don’t know if I will be allowed to go to ground or if they will give me day shelter.”

“Hold on Bill,” said Pam. “Endora will make a move on your behalf.”

Rachel looked down at Eric. He looked suddenly older than he ever had. His skin was creased as though he was wrinkled. “Don’t worry honey, a good sleep and a good feed or too, and Eric will be okay,” said Russell as he closed the coffin. Pam walked into the room. Endora and Russell and Rachel turned to her.

“Bill may be in trouble with the police, he needs someone to intervene on his behalf,” said Pam.

“I will go now,” said Endora. “I have some personal chips to call in, I can get him out of his situation.”

“And how do you know this woman?” asked the policeman.

“Sky Northman is the wife of my boss. She gave her blood to save her husband’s life after another vampire attacked him. I then gave her enough blood to get her to the hospital,” said Bill.

“Why didn’t you just heal her, I understand vampires can do that?” asked the policewoman sitting with them.

“Because Sky is blood bonded with her husband, if I gave her too much blood, then the bond would be broken and it would take a long time for her to be well enough to re-establish the bond, they depend on the bond between them as a married couple,” said Bill.

“Things were so much more simple when they weren’t allowed to marry,” said the man. “So you gave her just enough to get her here, how did you know it would be enough?”

“Vampires know, they can feel it,” said Bill. “I gave her just enough to get her here and get her transfused.”

“So she is still bonded with her  husband?” asked the policewoman.

“I don’t know, she may be, but he may have drank more of her than he should have or I may have given her too much blood in comparison,” said Bill.

“Where is her husband?” asked the policeman.

“He is the home of a local vampire in his day rest,” said Bill.

“But dawn is another six or seven hours away, why is he down now?” asked the policeman.

“Vampires heal better when they sleep,” said Bill.

“And where is this husband sleeping now?” asked the policeman.

“Look, he did nothing wrong, his wife gave her blood of her own free will,” said Bill.

“How do we know they are even married? She could have been a fangbanger and you and this Mr. Northman was doing what makes you you and you drained this poor woman and you gave her blood and rushed her here,” said the policeman.

“Look, my wife is Rachel Compton, she is with local vampires, and she will corroborate my story,” said Bill. “Is Sky alright?”

“Don’t you worry about that right now, let’s hear your story again,” began the police woman. Bill sat back and looked at the police. It was times like this he hated mainstreaming. “Now, where were you?”

“Don’t say anything more Mr. Compton,” said Endora Goode.

“Miss Goode,” said the policeman. “To what do we owe this honor?” The sarcasm was barely in check.

“Mr. Compton was expected back to my home after he’d sought medical treatment for his friend’s wife,” said Endora.

“And why does she need medical treatment?” asked the policewoman.

“She gave her husband blood when he was staked during a vampire proceeding. The laws state we vampires are free to police our own,” she said.

“You are, but when a vampire brings a half drained woman in the ER demanding a blood transfusion for her, it becomes a human police matter,” said the policeman. “Tell us more about this vampire proceeding.”

“You know I don’t have to disclose this to you,” said Endora. “Now, we are three hours from dawn, and his wife would very much like it if her husband would join her for the day so they can get some sleep.” Endora caught the gaze of the policeman.

“Sorry,” he said. The policewoman looked at him.

“Hey,” she said to her partner. “She’s glamouring you.”

“What?” he said, dreamily.

“Wake up, she’s glamouring you,” said the policewoman. He shook his head.

“Will you release Mr. Compton to my custody so he can go to his wife and go to his day sleep?” asked Endora.

“You will not leave Salem township, is that clear Mr. Compton?” said the policeman.

“Yes, officer,” he said. “I would like to check on Mr. Northman’s wife.”

“Come, Bill,” said Endora. They left the small consultation room and walked into the main lobby. The two vampires headed for the ER. They found Sky stretched out on a hospital bed. She was pale but her hair was alive. Bill could hear her heart beating steady and strong. He went over to her.

“Sky?” he said. Her eyes fluttered. She squinted at Bill.

“Bill? Is Eric…” she began.

“Eric is in his rest now,” said Endora. “He will be fine, Rachel and Russell and Pam are looking after him.”

“I can’t feel him,” she said. “I can’t feel the bond.”

“The bond may be depleted, but you can renew it, when you are well,” said Bill.

“Am I okay?” she asked.

“I am not sure, how do you feel?” he asked.

“Tired,” she said, feeling foggy. “My arm tingles.” There was a sound behind them and the two vampires turned to the noise.

“She is fine,” said the doctor.  “She has not had a stroke but some of her nerve endings are twitchy. It was a very close call. She should rest, get some sleep.”

“Can we see her tomorrow night?” asked Endora.

“Yeah,” said the doctor. “She needs to rest.”

Rachel practically flew at Bill when he walked into the house. He held her close. “It’s okay, Sky is okay, she is awake and talking.”

“Thank God, Bill,” she said.

“How is Eric?” asked Bill, nodding toward the coffin.

“He is sleeping,” said Rachel. “He looks…old.”

“How?” he asked.

“He doesn’t look like he is a thousand years old,” said Rachel. “Just like…he is tired.”

“That is normal,” said Bill. “When vampires suffer blood loss like Eric did, it makes them look older.” He pressed her to him. “It will be dawn soon.”

“Come with me, I will show you to a bedroom,” said Endora.

The old Salem Church had stood abandoned for some seventy years before Endora Goode bought it and made a residence of it. The stones had been hauled here by her father and her uncle using oxen to pull them. The village glaziers had made the windows and the floors had been cut and were ready to be installed. Who could know there would be such evil here.

After the witch trials and the executions, Endora went out and traveled for many years. For centuries she had walked in strange places, meeting others of her kind. Finally she came back and through human facilitators she bought the old church and had it renovated into a house. The roof was gone and the windows were gone but the stone walls still stood. It took two years for them to restore it and make the accommodations Bill and Rachel were being shown.  Endora sent a human get a change of clothes for Rachel. “Sorry I can’t accommodate you Bill, but if you will undress, my humans will clean your clothes.” Bill looked down at himself for the first time and saw the blood on his clothes.   

“I didn’t realize I was so bloody?” he said.

“It’s mostly Eric’s blood,” she said. Bill went into the bathroom and threw his clothes out the door. Rachel gathered them up and gave them to the human that was waiting for them. Another human handed her some clothes she could wear.

“Thank you,” said Rachel.

“You are welcome,” said Endora. “I imagine you are tired and hungry. I will send someone up with something to eat.”

“Thank you,” she said. The vampire left her and she laid the clothes on the bench at the end of the austere bed.  The floors were wide planks of old walnut and stained dark and there were braided rugs on the floor of unbleached wool, giving the room the only light color on the floor, looking like a beach on a black sea. The room was a little plain and a cold. She went to the fireplace. She could hear Bill showering. She lit the fire that was laid there and held her hands out to the growing flames. Bill came out, a towel around his waist.

“Go and get a shower sweetheart,” said Bill, kissing her on the forehead. She nodded and went into the steamy bathroom. Like the bedroom, it was plain but adequate. She undressed and started the shower and slid in.

Rachel finally came out of the bath. She was dead tired, no pun intended. The night had been long. Bill was stoking the fire. “Endora’s servants brought you something to eat,” said Bill.

Rachel looked at the tray. There were sandwiches and milk there. She sat down and began to eat it.  She tasted very little of the sliced chicken sandwich but she ate it all and drank the milk. She shivered. “I can sleep elsewhere if you are cold,” said Bill.

“No, I just had some milk and it always makes me cold,” she said. Bill stood up and pulled her from the chair. “I couldn’t sleep without you beside me anyway, not in a strange place.”

“Come, let’s get you into bed and under the covers then,” he said. He led her to the bed and pulled the blankets and sheets back. Everything had the feel of having been done in the old fashioned way, nothing modern save the electricity and plumbing. She slid in and he went to the cupboard and found another two blankets. He unfolded them and put them over her and then laid down and pulled the sheets and blanket over himself and her. “I think this will keep you warm.” He pulled her to him. His eyes looked heavy.

“Dawn is coming,” she said. He nodded. He laid his head on the pillow and pulled her closer.

“Sleep sweetheart,” he whispered and then he was asleep.

Rachel woke up, disorientated. Bill was gone. “Bill?” she said, raising up.

“I’m here Rachel,” he said, standing up at the fire. He was dressed.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“Just dark,” he said. “Dress, we will go to the hospital and see Sky.”

“Eric?” she asked.

“He is waiting for us there,” he said. “He would not wait.”

Sky felt something cool on her cheek and woke to Eric raising up from kissing her cheek. “Love,” she breathed.

“How are you wife?” he asked.

“I miss feeling you,” she said.

“I miss you too,” he said. “Are you well?”

“You tell me,” she said. Eric looked at her intently.

“Your heart sounds strong, and you smell funny, like you are wearing someone else’s scent, you are still too pale,” he said.

“You should talk about pale, you are whiter than white. Have you fed?” she asked.

“Not yet, I wanted to see you, I didn’t want to wait,” he said.

“De Castro? Baruch?” she asked.

“They have been given the true death, by Thalia,” said Eric. “And she has left already for Delphi.”

“Bill and Rachel, are they okay?” she asked.

“They are, they will be here in a little while to see you. I could not wait,” he said. “Thank you lover, for risking…”

“Shhhh, I knew Bill would not let me die,” she said.

“Thank you,” he said. “I love you Sky.”

“I love you too,” she said. She reached out and stroked his face. “You should feed so you can get                                       

us home as soon as possible.”

                “Don’t worry about me, lover, I am fine,” he said. He leaned forward and kissed her forehead. There was a noise behind him and he bared his fangs and turned around.

                “I am Dr. Sayer,” said the doctor. “Are you the husband?”

                “Yes,” he said, retracting his fangs.

                “Well, your wife had a close call,” said the doctor. “You should be more careful when you feed from her.”

                “I will,” he said. “When can I take her home?”

                “A couple of days, she needs to rest and have volume replaced and she needs to avoid vampire blood for a while, she nearly became one of you last night,” said the doctor.

                “We will be careful,” said Eric. He turned back to her. He cupped her face in his big hand and his hand wandered into her red hair. “Sleep Valkyrie. I am going to feed and when I come back, I will sit with you till I have to go to ground.”

                “You rest too Eric,” she said. She put her hand up to his hand and pulled it to her lips and kissed his palm. He stood there a while longer until he was sure she was asleep and then left in a blur.

                Endora Goode was sitting at the fireplace spinning wool on an old spinning wheel when Bill and Rachel finally made it back to the Old Salem Church. Rachel fought the impulse to look down at herself to make sure she was not dressed in a long frock and shawl. Endora looked over at the two and finished what she was doing and sat down. Bill excused himself to use his computer. “Tea, Rachel?” she asked.

                “That would be nice your majesty,” she said, sitting down in the chair opposite the vampire.

                “At home, I am just Endora,” she said. She called for her housekeeper and ordered tea and sandwiches. “Supper will be in a couple of hours, but a couple of tea sandwiches will hold your hunger.” The vampire was still busy, rolling her wool yarn on a ball. “You have to excuse me. As a human we were never allowed to simply sit, we had to be busy at something and though I have been a vampire for many centuries, I have never gotten out of the habit.”

                “Are you really a witch?” asked Rachel abruptly. The vampire laughed softly.

                “I am, does that surprise you? Have you met no witches in Louisiana?” asked Endora.

                “Yes, I have met witches, in fact I do business with a witch in New Orleans,” said Rachel.

                “Octavia Fant?” she asked. Rachel nodded. “I know Octavia, she is the great great grand niece of Marie Laveau, the third daughter, not The Marie Laveau, you understand.”

                “Were the people who were killed here, during the witch trials, were they witches?” asked Rachel.

                “No, not all of them. My mother, my human mother, was a midwife and she practiced a little craft mainly the spells to stop bleeding and curse burns, but I was a witch, even then, though I was nothing like the books say…signing my name in a black book, kissing the Christian Devil’s ass. No, I was a witch in the sense that I worked to help people. The trials were contrived to steal the flat arable land so the lazy Puritans would not have to work hard at having more farms,” said Endora.

                “And was your maker really Cotton Mather?” she asked.

                “Yes, he was one of the first vampires to come to the New World. He and a few other vampires chartered their own ship to come over, their own food aboard. Eric came over with him, though I did not ever know him till some time after the American Revolution,” said Endora.

                “Do you like being a vampire?” asked Rachel.

                “Being vampire is a real responsibility,” said Endora. “We have to both respect and feed from humans. Such was not always the case and as you have seen, not all vampires have respect for humans.”

                “Thalia killed De Castro and Baruch?” asked Rachel.

                “Yes, it was her right, the Ancient Pythoness was her kin and she had the right to kill them. Now she is the Pythoness. This situation with the human politicians is not over. We will have to deal with them in the future,” said the vampire.

                “I hope not,” said Rachel. The tea came and she poured a cup of tea and dressed it. “I want peace for me and Bill, I just want to live with him and do my work at the center. Just be…normal.”

                “Normal? My dear, you have married a vampire, your life will never be normal,” she said.

                “Peaceful then,” said Rachel.

                It was two days before Sky was released. By then, Bill and Rachel were back in Bon Temps, preparing for Eric and Sky’s return. Rachel was happy to be in her house. Bill went right back to work and they took up their routines. Rachel spoke to Sky every day while she and Eric recovered from their adventure.

The days were getting warmer and when Rachel was not at work at the center, she was at work in her garden. She planted flowers and put in her vegetable patch and herb garden and drew out plans for a swimming pool and patio with a small barbecue and an outdoor viewing area for night time movies outside. She was excited about the coming summer and the upcoming wedding of Sam and Jason and Danny. Danny had agreed to stay on as Bill’s day person and Bill promptly gave him a raise so he and Kennedy would soon be able to get their own home.

The day before Eric and Sky were to come home, Pam brought a couple of humans over to clean the house and dust and change the sheets and air out the house. It was warm now in Louisiana, though not as warm as it would be in a month or so. Rachel went back to work at the center and was happy to be home. She hoped there would be nothing much more to disturb their peace. She and Bill settled into a comfortable pattern of being together and working. Bill had plans for the double the lot where Rachel’s store once stood and his offices once were and he was deep in conversation with Alcide about it.

                Sky was happy when they landed finally in Shreveport. Eric carried her off the plane to the car and Pam and India took their bags in Pam’s car. “What will happen now?”

                “Well, I have to decide what to do with Nevada and Oklahoma. Red Rita is going to be installed as the queen of Arkansas. I have no idea what to do with the other kingdoms, who to give them to,” said Eric. “I may have to hold them for awhile.”

                “What about Heidi and Palomino. Perhaps they will take them off your hands,” said Sky.

                “I have thought about that, but I have also thought about making Salome the queen of Nevada. She has so much experience with the casino business,” said Eric.

                “True,” said Sky.

                “Don’t trouble yourself dearest,” said Eric. “Look, we are almost home.”

June 2011- November 2012