The Sookie Stackhouse Companion

injured child in a trash bin, where he was hidden by the custodian after she thought she had accidentally killed him. Returning to the bar, Sookie is suspicious of the new barmaid, Tanya Grissom, whom Sam has called in to cover for Holly.
    Sookie gets another visitor that night in the person of Calvin Norris, Crystal’s uncle and the leader of the Hotshot panthers. They discuss Calvin’s interest in Sookie, and he reluctantly acknowledges that they are not meant to be.
    FRIDAY, MARCH 18. Dressed and ready for her date with Quinn, Sookie is surprised when Eric arrives on her doorstep. He is not pleased to see her looking beautiful for another man, and they are arguing when Quinn arrives. He not only establishes his interest in Sookie but calmly informs Eric that the queen intends for Sookie to be in her retinue at the vampire summit. They leave a fuming Eric and head for the theater in Shreveport. Sookie and Quinn enjoy each other’s company, and Sookie is pleased that she can read only admiration from Quinn, who apparently has no fear of her gift. As they are leaving the theater after the show, two young half-changed werewolves attack them in the parking lot. Sookie is slightly injured as Quinn fights them off. The police arrive. They are questioned by the police, who are somewhat uneasy about the power that Quinn has displayed. After their questioning, Quinn takes Sookie to a werewolf bar, the Hair of the Dog, where he challenges the local pack over the attack on Sookie, who has been named a friend of the pack. As they return to the car, the attraction between them explodes, and Sookie decides that she needs to go more carefully with Quinn.
    SATURDAY, MARCH 19. Sookie doesn’t hear from Quinn the next day but does read in the newspaper that two juveniles were found strangled in the Shreveport holding cells—Sookie and Quinn’s attackers had been silenced. A lovely female vampire comes into Merlotte’s that night and introduces herself as Felicia, the new bartender at Fangtasia. She informs Sookie that Pam has told her to beg for her mercy, as Fangtasia bartenders don’t last long around Sookie.
    SUNDAY, MARCH 20. Sookie is suspicious and displeased when Tanya Grissom arrives at her house uninvited and makes obvious overtures of friendship. Sookie’s inhospitable attitude soon sends the shifter away, but her negative feelings are soothed when Quinn calls and they set up another date for the following night. Much to her surprise, Mr. Cataliades soon arrives, expecting her to be ready to accompany him back to New Orleans to settle her late cousin Hadley’s estate. He is equally surprised that his niece Gladiola did not deliver his message and sets out with his other niece, Diantha, to find Glad’s body, knowing that only death would have kept her from her task. Diantha locates Gladiola, cloven in two, at the edge of the woods, and Diantha and her uncle burn the body in Sookie’s driveway. Sookie goes to Sam’s trailer to arrange the time off and leaves the two supes to their solemn pyre. Remembering that Bill has asked if he can join her when she travels to New Orleans, Sookie calls him to let him know they will be leaving soon. As they travel, Sookie tells her companions about the Were attack in Shreveport and about the visit she and Quinn paid to Hair of the Dog. Bill is unhappy because it’s clear Quinn is becoming a part of Sookie’s life. When Sookie asks Mr. Cataliades’s opinion, he suggests that Quinn knows that the Shreveport pack may already be planning a challenge to the new packmaster.
    Arriving at Hadley’s apartment in New Orleans, Bill again offers to help. Exhausted, Sookie just wants to be left alone to rest.
    MONDAY, MARCH 21. The landlady and apartment owner, Amelia Broadway, who is also a practicing witch, startles Sookie awake. She assures Sookie that wards and a stasis spell (which has kept the place just as it was on the day Hadley died) have protected the apartment. After Amelia returns to her own apartment downstairs, Sookie begins to explore and is disturbed when she finds bloodstained towels in the bathroom hamper. She opens the hall closet and discovers a man’s body. Realizing the body must have been there since Hadley died, she goes in search of Amelia to tell her they have a problem. They have just decided that the stasis spell has kept the body from decomposing when Sookie notices the man’s fingers moving. She realizes they have a rising vampire to deal with. Amelia