Deadlocked

"I think we should let these rogues go," called an older man. "Blackball them from ever being a pack member anywhere. Put out the word."



Van closed his eyes. I couldn't tell if he was feeling relief or misery. Coco was crying; Laidlaw spat on the ground. Not smooth when people were deciding your life or death.



In the end, they were released. It was unceremonious. Roy untied them and said, "Git."



Eric looked away to hide his appalled reaction to such a lack of ritual. Laidlaw took off toward the east, running awkwardly because of his bandaged shoulder. Coco and Van went north. In a moment they were out of sight, and that was the end of the rogues, as far as the Long Tooth pack went.



Jannalynn remained. Responding to a gesture from Alcide, Roy untied her hands and she stood to her unimpressive height, rubbing her wrists and stretching.



Mustapha stood to face her on the sanded volleyball area.



"I will kill you," he said in his deep voice. He was not even wearing the dark glasses.



"Try, jungle bunny," Jannalynn said, and held out her hand. She got a sword, too, handed to her by Roy. I was a little surprised; execution seemed more in order than the right to fight. But nobody had asked me.



She was trying to make Mustapha angrier with her insult, but the epithet didn't have any effect on him whatsoever. Some of the pack looked disgusted. The rest looked ... like people waiting for a sporting event to begin. I looked up at Eric, who seemed interested, nothing more. Suddenly, I felt like punching him. This woman had talked a desperate stripper into drinking fairy blood and seducing a vampire, both dangerous processes with unknown outcomes. Kym might have been reckless enough to risk her own death, but that didn't make Jannalynn's scheming any less pernicious, or the pain I'd felt as a result any more bearable.



I thought she deserved to die for what she'd done to Sam alone. His face was rigid with the effort of holding in his feelings. My heart hurt for him.



The two combatants circled each other for a moment, and suddenly Jannalynn executed one of her flying leaps, hoping to come down on top of Mustapha. The lone wolf pivoted, and his sword blocked hers. She went spinning to the ground, but she was up in a second and back on the attack. Mustapha had told me he wasn't sure he could win a fight with Jannalynn, and for a few seconds she had the advantage. Not only did she hack away at him-this wasn't fencing, not like Robin Hood-but she shrieked, she screamed, she did everything she could to confuse and distract her opponent.



I noticed that she was working gradually closer to the edge of the sand. Closer to Alcide and Sam.



She might be a Were, but some intents were so strong I couldn't miss them.



"She's after you," I yelled in warning, and just as the words left my mouth Jannalynn leaped, spun, and came down on Alcide, who leaped aside at the last fraction of a second.



She got Sam.



He crumpled to the ground as his blood spurted. Jannalynn paused in shock at having cut her lover, and in that moment Mustapha grabbed her by the hair, threw her to the sand, and beheaded her. I'd seen beheadings before, but they're pretty spectacularly horrible. I didn't even remember Jannalynn's until much later, because I was launching myself across the intervening space to crouch by Sam, who was bleeding out into the grass by the patio. I heard someone screaming and knew it was me. Alcide crouched down by me and reached out to touch Sam, but I shoved him away. Sam's eyes were wide and desperate. He knew the severity of his wound.



I started to call for Eric, so he could give Sam his blood, but as I put my hand to Sam's neck, Sam's pulse stopped. His eyes closed.



And everything else in the world did, too.



In my universe, everything fell silent. I didn't hear the chaos around me. I didn't hear a voice calling my name. I shoved Alcide away for a second time. My course was perfectly clear. I reached in my right pocket, pulled out the cluviel dor, and put it on Sam's chest. The creamy green glowed. The band of gold radiated light.



Amelia had always told me that will and intent are everything in magic, and I had plenty of both.



"Sam. Live." I hardly recognized my own voice. I didn't have spells, but I had the will. I had to believe that. I pressed the cluviel dor to Sam's heart, and I put my left hand over the terrible wound in his neck. "Live," I said again, hearing only my own voice and the silence in Sam's body.



And the cluviel dor opened at its gold seam, revealing a hollow interior, and the concentrated magic inside it flew out and poured into Sam. It was clear and shining and otherworldly. It flowed through my fingers and into Sam's neck, and it vanished into the terrible wound. It filled Sam's body, which began to glow. The cluviel dor, now empty of magic, slipped from my right hand, which rested still on Sam's chest. I felt movement with my left hand, so I pulled it away from the gash and watched.



It was like watching a film run in reverse. The severed vessels and tendons inside Sam's neck began to knit. I held my breath, afraid even to blink or move. After a long moment, or several long moments, I could feel Sam's heart begin to beat under my fingers.



"Thanks, Fintan," I whispered. "Thanks, Gran."



After a small eternity, Sam's eyes opened. "I was dead," he said.



I nodded. I couldn't talk to save my soul.



"What ... how'd you do that?"



"Tell you later."



"You ... you can do that?" He was dazed.



"Not again," I warned him. "That's it. You got to stay alive from now on."



"Okay," he said weakly. "I promise."



Eric left while I was with Sam. He left without speaking to me.



When I got Sam to stand, we had to walk past Jannalynn's body. Sam looked at the corpse of the woman he'd dated for months, and his face was blank. He had a lot to process.



I didn't give a shit about the rest of the Were evening. I figured no one was going to challenge Alcide on the spot, and if they did, I wasn't going to stick around to watch another fight. I also figured if Mustapha wanted to join the pack, no one was going to vote against that, either. Not tonight. I didn't even worry about the effect of tonight's spectacle on the smaller teenage Weres. They had their own world to live in, and they had to learn its rules and ways pretty damn quick.



I drove, because I figured a guy who'd just died and come back probably should be left to think about the experience. Sam's truck wasn't hard to operate, but between driving an unfamiliar vehicle and remembering the way to get back to the county road to go home, I was pretty preoccupied.



"Where'd Eric go?" Sam asked.



"I don't know. He left in hurry. Without speaking." I shrugged.



"Kind of abrupt."



"Yeah," I said briefly. I figured his was the voice I'd heard yelling, before I'd focused on Sam. The silence hung around and got awkward.



"Okay," I said. "You heard about Freyda. I figure he's going to go with her."



"Oh?" It was clear Sam didn't know what reaction to give me.



"Oh," I said firmly. "So he knew I had this thing. This magic thing that I used on you. And I guess he thought it was kind of a test of my love."



"He expected you to use it to save him from this marriage," Sam said slowly.



"Yeah. Evidently." And I sighed. "And I kind of expected him to tell her to go to Hell. I guess I thought of it as a test of his love."



"What do you think he'll do?"



"He's proud," I said, and I just felt tired. "I can't worry about it right now. The most I can hope for is that Felipe and his crew leave for home and we get some peace."



"And Claude and Dermot are gone, to Faery."



"Yep, their own land."



"They'll come back?"



"Nope. That was the idea, anyway. I guess JB is out of a job, unless the new management of Hooligans wants him. I don't know what'll happen to the club now."



"So everything has changed in the past few days?"



I laughed, just a little. I thought of seeing JB strip, looking at the wet chair in Tara's shop, the faces of the babies. I'd talked to Mr. Cataliades. I'd seen Niall again. I'd bid good-bye to Dermot. I'd loathed King Felipe. I'd had sex with Eric. Donald Callaway had died. Warren had lived. Jannalynn had died. Sam had died. And lived. I'd worried and worried and worried about the cluviel dor-which, I realized, I didn't have to worry about, ever again.



I was relieved when Sam agreed to spend the night in the spare bedroom across the hall. He and I were both exhausted for different reasons. He was still pretty shaky, and I helped him into the house. When he sat on the bed, I knelt before him to take off his shoes.



I brought him a glass of water for the bedside table.



I moved toward the door, walking as quietly as I could.



"Sookie," Sam said. I turned and smiled at him, though he wasn't looking at me. His eyes were shut and his voice was already slow and thick with sleep. "You have to tell me what the cluviel dor is all about. How you made it work."



That was going to be a delicate conversation. "Sure, Sam," I said, very quietly. "Another day."