A/n: True Blood and all the characters thereof belong to Charlaine Harris and Alan Ball/HBO. I am grateful that they allow fanfiction at all.

This story takes place just before the end of season 3, before season 4. Alternate Universe. Will probably contain spoilers. There may be graphic depictions of violence, gore, vampirism, sex, etc.

This is a romance between a female OC and Eric Northman.

Legends and Dreams

1. Sheriff Northman

Rhiannon had been traveling for most of the night. She wasn't making the headway she had hoped to, though, because she needed to feed. The problem was that she was in the middle of nowhere. Even the gas stations had been empty and closed up.

She was getting to the point where she was ready to simply stop at a house—any house—and glamor a human and feed. She didn't prefer the method, but there were times it was her only option. It was starting to look like this was one of those nights.

She opened up her hearing somewhat and listened to the surrounding area. To her surprise, she heard music and the murmur of voices. It must be either a party, or a bar, she decided. If it was a bar, the possibility existed that she could find someone in the parking lot and glamor them. If it was a party, then she would check the scene and leave if she couldn't find someone alone.

Flitting toward the sound, she stopped short of the bar, called Merlotte's Bar and Grill. She searched the surrounding area with her hearing, but no heartbeat or footsteps met her ears. Sighing, she realized she would need to go inside. From Rhiannon's point of view, any interaction with humans was risky, and even more so at a bar.

Taking a deep breath, though, she walked up and pushed the door open. Stepping inside, she was greeted by a pretty blond, who picked up a menu and smiled. She was... perky... Rhiannon decided.

"Welcome to Merlotte's! Right this way, please!" the blond said.

Definitely perky, Rhiannon thought, suppressing a sigh. Interactions with humans were always taxing for her. Excitable humans were especially difficult.

"What'll it be?" she asked as Rhiannon laid the menu down.

"Tru Blood, please. Do not microwave it, if you would be so kind."

"Well... it's been in the fridge. It's pretty cold. We only have A-positive." Her ponytail flounced as she said it.

Everyone in the bar had turned to stare when Rhiannon asked for the Tru Blood. Rhiannon fought the instinct burned into her long ago to avoid crowds.

"A-positive is fine. Thank you. I will take it cold, if you please."

Rhiannon felt that microwaves further killed the already dead substance that was intended to succor vampires. Because it was not living blood, she would have to feed again as soon as most newborns. If she drank living blood, she could go for months.

Ill luck that she was traveling just as the hunger ignited in her again.

And her presence was having its usual effect upon the men in the bar. Even a few of the women were beginning to look at her with a sort of starry-eyed fascination.

She took the drink and smiled at the waitress. "How much?"

She pulled a couple of bills out and laid them on the table after the waitress answered. Then she stood up with the jug of synthetic blood.

"You won't be staying?" the perky blond asked. "I'm Sookie, by the way. I don't think I've seen you around here?"

"No," Rhiannon replied. "I won't be staying. Even if I had time, it seems that my presence is a trifle discomforting to your patrons."

"Oh them? They're just a bunch of dumb rednecks. No manners to speak of. Like puppies. Or assholes." The blond dimpled and Rhiannon wondered what the point was and why the girl seemed to want her to stay so badly.

"No doubt they are truly flattered to learn of the high esteem in which you hold them," Rhiannon told her. "Thank you for your hospitality. I must be on my way."

Rhiannon found making conversation to be as laborious and difficult as always. She considered glamoring the entire bar and fleeing, but that, too, was laborious. She doubted they knew enough to report her presence to the local Sheriff, anyway.

She stepped toward the door, and felt the presence of another vampire. Before she could flit out, the door snapped open. Immediately, she knew that this vampire was old, though nowhere near as old as she.

He stepped inside and began to walk toward the back of the bar. Rhiannon waited, holding her breath. He got only a few steps into the room before he suddenly turned to her, his fangs snapping out. Her heart sank. Of course, it would be her terrible luck to run straight into the oldest Sheriff in America.

"You are in my territory," he said. "You did not report to me."

She kept her fangs in. Even weak and tired and having not fed in days, she could overpower him as easily as if he were a child but she hadn't remained undetected for thousands of years by being a fool.

"No, Sir," she replied, keeping her fangs in and her eyes down. "I stopped to get food. My sincerest apologies. I have not eaten in so long that my hunger overtook my manners. Please forgive me."

"Go to Fangtasia and wait for me there. You may report to me when I return."

"I do not know where it is," she admitted, hesitating.

She did not know, and she did not want to go to his nest. There was far more danger for her there than here. To be noticed by a Sheriff was bad enough—to go to his nest was unthinkable.

Not unexpectedly, he grasped her by the throat. She didn't fight him as he lifted her off of the ground. "You entered my territory without knowing where my Seat was?"

She was in the danger zone now, and Rhiannon knew it. She had learned a couple of thousand years ago that she could glamor vampires much as she did humans. But this one was old. If she managed to do it, it would cost her dearly. She could not then glamor the entire room afterward. She had to do something to get him alone.

"I cannot explain here, Sir," she told him, giving the humans around them a significant glance. It was a gambit to get him outside. She could not explain the truth to him regardless—she hadn't ever intended to report to any Sheriff in any territory she flitted through on her way to Western Canada.

He looked around and then set her down. "Very well." He retracted his fangs. "Go outside and wait for me."

She picked up her Tru Blood and walked out. She drank it, feeling it restore a bit of her strength.

Moments passed while he conducted whatever business inside he had come for. She'd seen him go behind the counter and begin speaking with the cook, so she assumed it couldn't take long.

Soon, he walked out, looking at her steadily. She almost regretted what she was about to do to him. He didn't look or act quite as insane as other vampires. But she could not allow him to remember her.

Her fangs clicked out, and she leaped into the air. His fangs responded, and he met her with a clash of bodies that flipped them end over end in the air.

She slammed him down on the ground, holding him as easily as a human might hold a struggling kitten. Then she locked onto him. "What is your name?"

"Eric," he answered, slowly, mildly. His fangs retracted and he suddenly looked lost and uncertain.

"Eric, you will forget that you ever saw me here. You came here and concluded-"

"Eric?" It was the perky little blond.

Rhiannon looked up, breaking the glamor she'd begun on the blond vampire. "Fuck," she swore. It would be so much harder the second time.

The blond ran across the parking lot and started beating on her.

"Sookie, no!" Eric commanded. "Run!" His fangs snapped back out.

"Be still," Rhiannon snarled at him.

"Sookie," she commanded the blond. "Do not run. Everything will be fine."

"Like hell it will!" Sookie yelled. "What are you doing to Eric?"

Rhiannon was shocked. Her stomach twisted. "You cannot be glamored?"

"No. What are you doing to Eric?"

"Listen to me, Sookie," Rhiannon told her. "I have to make him forget me. That's all I'm doing. I'm not going to hurt him, if you'll just let me finish. I don't want him to ever know I've been here. I don't want any vampires to know about me." Rhiannon wracked her brain, trying to find a solution to the problem this human presented.

She had only killed a humans in nearly eighteen hundred years. She didn't want to do it now.

"No!"

Rhiannon sighed. "Let me help you understand, Sookie. Either I make him forget, and you swear to never speak a word to anyone about me... or I must kill you both. I have no other choice."

"Sookie," Eric said again, "run away! You have no idea how dangerous she is!"

"Vampires can't be glamored," Sookie argued, crossing her arms. "Why should I trust you, anyway?"

Rhiannon laughed. She looked down at Eric and told him, "Vampires are insane. Humans are all going insane. She's as helpless as a wingless fly, and she demands to know why she should trust me!" She looked back up at Sookie. "You know you can trust me because you are not yet dead. This vampire is a thousand years old. He is the oldest known vampire in America now that Russel is dead. I can snap him like a toothpick. Do you really think that you are any impediment to me at all?"

But Rhiannon's luck was not holding out. Another vampire arrived. Rhiannon had felt her long before she arrived. She let go of the male with one hand to grasp the newcomer female. The female had silver on her, but Rhiannon hadn't survived that long to let some nearly-newborn get the better of her. She snapped the female vampire's wrist, effectively ending her ability to use the silver chain.

"Drop it," she commanded.

The female refused, despite the broken wrist.

Rhiannon looked into her eyes. "You want to drop the silver."

"Yes," the female responded. She dropped it.

"Pam!" the Sheriff snapped, interrupting and breaking Rhiannon's control.

Resigned, Rhiannon snapped her fangs out. First, she would take care of the female-

"Wait!" Sookie cried. "Wait, you're not going to kill her, are you?"

"I no longer have a choice," Rhiannon told her.

"Sookie! Stay out of this!" Eric barked again.

"It's too late for that," Rhiannon told him.

"What's going on here?" the female vampire that Eric had identified as Pam, demanded.

"I am going to kill you all because this human could not make a deal to keep her mouth shut," Rhiannon informed her.

"It sounds really bad when you put it that way," Sookie objected.

"You think?" Pam said, her voice dripping sarcasm like a honey sandwich on a hot day.

"Wait!" Sookie cried again. "Wait, can't you glamor them one at a time or something?"

"I don't have the energy now. I've already wasted it. Unless you're offering your own blood?"

"No," Sookie said nervously, her hand automatically going to cover her neck. "But I have an idea! It's clear that you don't want to do this."

"Speak quickly," Rhiannon commanded her.

"Well, maybe you can hold onto one of them and send the other one to get someone to feed you. Pam is Eric's Progeny-"

"Sookie!" Eric snarled. "Be silent! You are not improving the situation!"

"Perhaps she is," Rhiannon said thoughtfully. "If I could feed, I could glamor you both." She looked at Sookie, her eyes narrowed, "Why should I trust you, though?"

"Because I don't want to die!" Sookie answered. "Eric is the fastest, strongest thing I know of. If you can kill him so easily, then I know I don't stand a chance."

Rhiannon released Pam, then Eric. They would not try to escape—both knew it was beyond futile, even if she couldn't glamor them. She looked at Pam. "You will go. Procure me someone who is willing and not someone I must glamor. If you return with more silver tricks, I will tear your maker apart right in front of you. If you do not return quickly, I will tear him apart right in front of her." She indicated Sookie.

Pam flitted away after Eric nodded at her to do as she was told. Her look at Rhiannon before she left was pure hatred.

"Sookie," Eric said, "go inside."

"No-"

"Go inside," Rhiannon told her. "I will come back inside and replace the Tru Blood I so carelessly dropped when it is complete." It was false, but a good enough reason to go back inside.

Sookie hesitated, but finally said, "Fine." She gave Eric a dirty look as she passed him, stomping back into the bar.

Rhiannon looked him over. "You protect her. A human. Why?"

"You did not kill her. Or me. Or Pam, who tried to burn you with silver. Why?"

"The AVL-" she began, but he interrupted.

"Yes... the AVL forbids it. You could have killed and hidden us all and none would have been the wiser. You could have fed on her and glamored us both and moved on. But you did none of those things. Why not?"

Rhiannon shrugged. "I don't enjoy killing. I'm old, I just want to be left alone."

"Who are you?"

"Idle curiosity, Mr. Northman? How very human of you."

"How did you come about the ability to glamor vampires?"

Rhiannon sighed. "I told you, Mr. Northman, I am old. It developed for me over time." She raked her hand through her hair. "Sometimes it almost seems worth my while to simply give up and let them catch me. I'm not always certain why I cling to life at all anymore."

He flitted over to stand directly in front of her, looking down at her. She was not afraid, but his proximity made her surprisingly anxious. "My Maker chose to meet the sun. Do you have Progeny?"

"No," she answered honestly. "By the time I knew how to make another vampire, I did not wish to do so."

"What of your Maker?"

"He died immediately after turning me... I do not think he even knew he had made me. I had bitten him in my terror when he first dragged me out of the house. He was still drinking from me when he heard riders coming. He dragged me with him, intending to feed on me at his lair. I killed him, not understanding what had happened." She turned away. "I do not wish to speak of it."

He guessed, though. "You were alone and confused."

"For somewhere around five hundred years, I think. I was wild."

A 'wild' vampire meant one who lost touch with the human self so completely that they lived like an animal. It was rare in the extreme for a wild vampire to survive for more than a few years. She knew of no other one who had survived for hundreds. Almost all were killed by other vampires, because they risked exposure.

Rhiannon answered the question on his face. "A human. He smelled like that one." She pointed at the bar, knowing he would know she meant Sookie. "The one you protect." She gave him a direct, penetrating look. "He stopped me from feeding on his cattle, but he didn't harm me. He gave me a bath, instead. For his efforts, I nearly killed him. It was then that I realized what I was. I was everything I most hated."

To her surprise, the Sheriff reached up and touched her face. "No Maker. No Progeny. You have never been in vampire society. Lonely life."

She looked away. "And long. Your Progeny returns."

Pam flitted up, putting a young man on his feet. "This is Andrew. He volunteered."

Rhiannon looked at Eric. "Glamor him and be sure he came of his own choice."

He did as she commanded, "Andrew, did you want to come here?"

"Yes..." Andrew answered, his voice dreamy, distant.

"Do you know that you will be fed on?"

"I do." Still dreamy, smiling.

Eric broke the contact and looked at Rhiannon. "Satisfactory?"

She stepped up to Andrew. He looked at her with the eagerness and apprehension of a child uncertain if he would be spanked or given a cookie. She looked at him for a long moment, letting him get the sense of her latent vampiric appeal.

After a long moment, he smiled, shy and uncertain. "You're beautiful," he told her. Then he closed his eyes and clenched his fist. "I'm sorry. I meant..."

"Shhhh," she ran a finger up his arm. "It's okay, Andrew." Her fangs clicked out and she nuzzled him, sliding close to him. He hugged her, burying his face in her shoulder; in doing so, bending down and coming within range of her fangs.

His heartbeat was the sweet roll of thunder, and the siren's call rose in her as it always did. Drink. Kill. Consume. He smelled sweet and his body was warm, alive, sensual. Curling a hand through his hair, she held his head still.

Then she plunged her fangs into soft, yielding flesh. Blood gushed into her mouth, a warm flood of sweet elixir. She drank deeply, until she heard the first tell-tale sign of blood loss. His heartbeat began to slow, and she licked his neck to seal it, pulling back by strength of will alone.

Power and life flooded her. Power that should have lasted her for months, but would likely last only a few short days when she was done glamoring the two vampires—maybe less.

"Thank you," she whispered in his ear, and stepped away.

"Give him your blood," she commanded Pam.

"He's already had it," she answered. "I don't think he really needs more."

"Very well." Rhiannon turned to Andrew and drew his attention to her. "You were attacked tonight, Andrew. A young vampire lost control and fed on you." He became distressed, and she soothed him. "It turned out okay, though. Pam felt your distress. She came to rescue you. You are appropriately grateful, but mostly glad it's over."

She turned to Pam. Drawing the vampire's attention, she told her, "You felt Andrew's fear tonight. You decided to investigate, against your better judgment. You found he had been bitten by a young vampire, but the newborn was gone before you got here. You never saw the vampire that bit him." Pam repeated her suggestion in a monotone. Rhiannon finished, "You should take him back to Fangtasia before he finds more trouble for himself and disturbs you again."

"Yes. I should take Andrew to Fangtasia," Pam said.

She picked him up and flitted away.

Rhiannon turned to Eric. "What did you come here for tonight?"

"I can't tell you," he answered.

"I can make you tell me," she told him. It was an observation, not a threat.

"I would prefer you not do that," he answered.

She laid her hand on his cheek, preparing to glamor him.

"You remind me of my Maker," Eric said. "He would have liked you." To her surprise, he leaned forward and touched her lips with his. "I would have liked to know you," he whispered.