Sookie 13 Dead Ever After by Charlaine Harris Page B

mysterious.”
    “You’re the one who kept a huge secret,” he pointed out. “You’re the one who had the fairy equivalent of a wishing well in your possession.”
    “Eric knew.”
    “What?” Bill was genuinely startled.
    “Eric knew I had it. Though I didn’t tell him.”
    “How did he know this?”
    “My great-grandfather,” I said. “Niall told him.”
    “Why would Niall do such a thing?” he said, after an appreciable pause.
    “Here’s Niall’s logic,” I said. “Niall thought that I needed to find out if Eric would pressure me to use the cluviel dor for Eric’s own benefit. Niall wanted it himself, but he didn’t take it because it was intended for me to use.” I shivered when I remembered how Niall’s impossibly blue eyes had blazed with desire for the enchanted object, how sharply he’d had to rein himself in.
    “So in Niall’s view, giving Eric this piece of knowledge was a test of Eric’s love for you.”
    I nodded.
    Bill contemplated the floor for a minute or two. “Far be it from me to speak in Eric’s defense,” he said at last, with a hint of a smile, “but in this instance, I will. I don’t know if Eric actually intended you to, say, wish Freyda had never been born or to wish that his maker had never met her . . . or some other wish that would have gotten him out of Freyda’s line of sight. Knowing the Viking, I’m certain he hoped you would be willing to use it on his behalf.”
    This was a conversation of significant pauses. I had to think over his words for a minute to be sure I understood what Bill was telling me. “So the cluviel dor was a test of Eric’s sincerity, in Niall’s eyes. And the cluviel dor was a test of my love for Eric, in Eric’s eyes,” I said. “And we both failed the test.”
    Bill nodded, one sharp jerk of his head.
    “He would rather I had let Sam die.”
    Bill let me see how startled he was. “Of course,” he said simply.
    “How could he think that?” I muttered, which was a stupidly obvious (and obviously stupid) question to ask myself. A much more pertinent question was, How could two people in love so misjudge each other?
    “How could Eric think that? Don’t ask me . It’s not my emotional reaction that matters,” Bill said.
    “I’d be glad to ask Eric, if he’d just sit down and talk to me,” I said. “But he turned me away from Fangtasia two nights ago.”
    Bill had known that, I could tell. “Has he gotten in touch with you since that happened?”
    “Oh, yes indeedy. He got Pam to text me to say he’d see me later.”
    Bill did a great impression of a blank wall.
    “What do you think I should do?” I asked out of sheer curiosity. “I can’t bear this halfway state. I need resolution.”
    Bill sat forward on the couch, his dark brows raised. “Ask yourself this,” he said. “Would you have used the cluviel dor if it had been—say, Terry or Calvin—who was mortally wounded?”
    I was stunned by the question. I groped for words.
    After a moment, Bill got up to leave. “I didn’t think so,” he said. I scrambled to my feet to follow him to the door.
    “It’s not that I think Terry’s life, anyone’s life, isn’t worth a sacrifice,” I said. “It’s that it might not ever have occurred to me.”
    “And I’m not saying you’re a bad woman for that hesitation, Sookie,” Bill told me, reading my face accurately. He put a cold hand to my cheek. “You’re one of the best women I’ve ever met. However, sometimes you don’t know yourself very well.”
    After he had drifted back into the woods and I had locked the house up tight, I sat in front of my computer. I had planned to check my e-mail, but instead I found myself trying to unravel Bill’s meaning. I couldn’t concentrate. Finally, without clicking on the e-mail icon, I gave up and went to bed.
    I guess it’s not too surprising that I didn’t sleep well. But I was up and out of bed by eight, utterly tired of hiding out in my house. I showered and