A/N: Written because I wanted Sookie and Eric to actually sit down and talk about the bond. And though I like Quinn, in many ways, I still want Sookie to be with Eric. Sorry, Tiger, you can't have her.

I'd thought I wanted Quinn to stay, but after everything that had happened, I begged him to just leave me in my room on my own. I couldn't deal with another person right now – it was hard enough dealing with myself.

I tossed and turned after he'd gone, though, and eventually gave in to the inevitable. I flung on some clothes, pocketed my key, and headed to the elevators. I had a look at the wall plan, and spied a promising haven: roof garden. Up, up I went, and stepped gratefully out into the night air.

Surprisingly, for a hotel full of vampires, it was deserted. I wandered around aimlessly for a while, then sat miserably down on a bench. I could see city lights twinkling all around, but it did nothing to lift my mood. I sat and cried, and cried.

After a while, I felt calm descend, though I didn't raise my eyes from my knees for a good few minutes after that. It didn't entirely surprise me that, when I did, it was to see a big, blond Viking sitting on the ground in front of me. He was frowning.

"You were upset," he said, as if he was trying to explain to himself, as much as to me, why he was there.

I wiped my tears away with the backs of my hands. "All been too much," I replied tersely.

"I'm sorry. I tried," he said, and I knew he meant Andre.

"I know." I tried to pull myself together a bit more. "It wasn't your fault. And if it had to be anyone, I'd rather it was you than anyone else."

"Even Bill?" If there was any bitterness or jealousy there, he hid it well.

I thought about that, then shrugged. "He betrayed me. You can be a manipulative, ruthless, irritating bastard, but at least you've always been straight with me." I sighed. "I don't believe you'd ever deliberately hurt me, either," I added quietly.

"I wouldn't," he confirmed, wisely not commenting on my less-than-flattering character analysis. Or perhaps he agreed with it. "I would never have forced this on you."

"I know."

We sat in silence for a moment, until he asked, very gently, "May I sit beside you?"

"I can hardly stop you," I said resentfully.

"Sookie…" he hesitated. "This is not easy for me, either."

"No?"

"For fuck's sake, woman, I risked myself to stay with you while you were holding a bomb, and I even tried to take it from you," he snapped. He rubbed his hands over his eyes, and it seemed so human a gesture – of confusion, weariness, despair. "I couldn't leave you," he whispered.

Because it was just the two of us, and he was being open with me, I admitted, very softly, "I'm scared."

"Of the bond?"

"Of what it means. To both of us. Of what I did today. Of what's going to happen." Panic rose into my throat, but was immediately followed by a wave of calm. "That's you. Doing that. Isn't it?"

"Yes," he said. "I'm trying to… make you less afraid. Less upset." He sounded bewildered. "I don't know how else to help you."

I was going to hate myself in the morning for this. "Hold me?"

"It will help?" he asked uncertainly, as he got up from his seat on the ground.

"I kinda noticed that being around you is making me feel calmer. Guess that's the bond?" He nodded. "So it follows that, the closer we are, the calmer I'll be."

He sat beside me, very carefully, as if afraid I'd bolt as I had done earlier in Sophie-Anne's suite, then wrapped an arm around me. I took a few deep breaths, and if I was honest, I welcomed the feeling of peace and calm that radiated from him. I leant into him. "This is better?"

I just nodded. "Have you ever done this before?" I asked. "The blood bond, I mean?"

"No. The only bonds I have had are with my maker, my children, and you."

A sudden worry coursed through me. "You wouldn't… turn me?"

"Not against your will, no," he answered, and I relaxed fractionally. "Regardless of what anyone tells you, I would never force that on you if you were unwilling. Or anything else, for that matter."

"I know you didn't want this," I said.

He was silent for a long time. "It is fairer to say I would not have chosen it – certainly not for it to have happened this way."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"If you had wanted it – chosen it," he said, "I would have bound myself to you."

I tilted my head back so that I could look at him properly. "Why?" I asked, mystified.

"Why do we do anything that's asked of us?" he replied rhetorically. He stared out into the night. "Do you love the tiger?"

"I don't know," I said honestly. "I'd hoped to find out. I like him a lot, certainly."

There was a long pause. "Did you love me?"

I could have lied, but I figured he'd have known. "Yes. But I knew that you weren't… yourself," I said with some effort.

He gathered me closer, and, God help me, I snuggled into him. "Could you love me again?"

I thought about that. "I don't know. Maybe. Don't get your hopes up," I warned him.

He rested his chin on the top of my head. "I'll try not to," he said. "Though at this moment, it's very hard not to." His fingers played lightly through my hair. "I do care about you, Sookie."

"You want to have sex with me," I corrected him.

He was silent for a while. "That's true. I do. But that's… not the same thing." He added, and his voice was muffled, because suddenly he was speaking through my hair, "I find I like just holding you. Being with you. Comforting you."

And all of a sudden, it hit me what Eric was trying to tell me – had maybe been trying to tell me all along – but couldn't find the words to say.

Eric Northman was in love with me.

Oh. Well. Wow. I wasn't sure what to do with that piece of information, given that I had no clue how I really felt about him myself. Or did I? I'd admitted to myself earlier how often I thought about him. I'd always been attracted to him. For the most part, I'd liked him as a person, too.

Before I could formulate a response to that, though, he took off his jacket, wrapped it round me, and shifted us so that he was sprawled along the bench, with me tucked into his chest. "I have always loved the stars," he said dreamily, looking up. "Before I was turned, I learned to navigate by them."

"I've never known how," I said, wondering a little at the abrupt change in topic. "I've often wished I could pick out constellations."

He shifted us again, so that I was lying with my back to his chest, looking up at the sky, with his jacket draped over me. I snuggled gratefully into it. He pointed up to the sky. "There is the Big Dipper, or Plough." He traced the shape of it in the air. "Part of the Great Bear. If you trace the handle of the Plough, there is Polaris, the North Star," he said, his finger moving along the handle of the Plough to point at the star in question. "It's part of the Little Bear." His finger pointed to another part of the sky. "There is another easy constellation to find, Orion. You see those three stars, close together, in a line?" I nodded. "That is the Belt of Orion. Orion rises in the east and sets in the west, and Mintaka, the first star of Orion's Belt to rise and set, will always do so within one degree of true east or west, wherever you are in the world."

He pointed out other constellations and stars, and told me a few stories about the myths and legends behind them, until I was relaxed and comfortable. I gave a soft sigh, and turned to rest my head on his chest, stretching a hesitant arm around him, under his jacket, in a half-hug. "Feeling better?" he asked softly.

"I think so. But it's hard to know what's me and what's you," I said.

"I'm not pushing anything through the bond," he replied. "Things do sometimes... bleed across, but I'm trying to repress it as much as possible."

I absorbed that, grateful that he'd thought to try; whatever I was feeling now was all my own, and what I felt was peace and comfort, and a gentle pleasure at being with him and in his arms. "Would I have felt like this with Andre?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Unlikely. The bond will magnify something that's already there, and convey what's being pushed towards you. Your feelings about Andre are nervous at best, terrified at worst. Your feelings for me are altogether more… comfortable. And my own use of the bond has been to comfort, not control; I doubt Andre would have given you that consideration."

"Will you ever? Try to control me?" I asked anxiously. It was what made me the most fearful.

"No, lover," he murmured, tightening his arm around me ever so slightly, and it comforted me more than it should have done, to hear him call me that. "I'll never use it to control you."

"You told Andre I 'heeled nicely'," I said, with the barest hint of accusation.

"I lied." He gave a wry chuckle. "You don't heel at all. Never have, never will. But telling him that would probably have signed your death warrant." He pressed a kiss into my hair. "I doubt I could control you with the bond, even if I wanted to, given your immunity to the glamour and the call."

I let that information sink in, and realised that I was actually feeling better. I was glad I'd come up here to clear my mind; glad Eric had come to find me. Glad I'd sent Quinn on his way. Oh, hell - Quinn. "Quinn will be mad if he finds out I've been up here with you," I said worriedly.

"To hell with the tiger," he growled, and at that moment, I couldn't help but agree. "If he makes trouble for you over this, he will answer to me for it. You need to be comforted and reassured, not upbraided and scolded for something that was not your fault. And he does not have enough understanding of blood bonding to be able to do that for you."

I melted more than a little at that, and snuggled into his protective embrace.

"Pam is… otherwise occupied this evening," he said unexpectedly. "You could…"

"I'm not having sex with you," I snapped, feeling almost betrayed that he would suggest it, after all we'd talked about.

A flicker of hurt was quickly dismissed, and I realised it had come from him. "I wasn't suggesting that, Sookie," he said, his voice steady. I immediately felt ashamed of myself for assuming the wrong thing; I could tell that he was telling the truth, no doubt because I now had an insight into his feelings, thanks to the bond. "I only meant that, if you feel calmer close to me, you might sleep better if I were nearby. And with Pam not there, you will have some privacy."

I hesitated. "Promise me, no sex," I said, wavering. In all honesty, I wanted – needed – that comfort; I didn't want to go back to my hotel room, didn't want to face anyone else. I wanted to curl up in his arms and let him comfort me.

Cool lips brushed my forehead gently. "I promise. I will hold you, no more than that. You have my word."

I followed him to his room.