The Fire of the Sun -- Chapter Three
Title: The Fire of the Sun
Author: audreyii_fic
Fandom: Twilight (Team Jacob)
Rating: T
Characters: Full cast (Jacob/Bella, Sam/Emily)
Genre: Romance/Angst/Wolfpack!Humor
Warnings: Language, violence, and references to adult behavior. See here for more details.
banner courtesy of untilwebleedoz
Summary:
Sequel to The Movement of the Earth. Bella finds the cost of joining the supernatural world may be higher than she can pay. ( Click here to start from the beginning.)
Chapter Three:
who'll be your lazarus / who'll be your lover?
Karine Polwart, "Resolution Road"
3. Riposte
It was three days -- three days of wondering and worrying and dreading -- before Jasper approached me at the beginning of Algebra. He towered over my desk, holding himself formally like an actor out of an old army movie. "Good afternoon, Bella."
I shrank in my seat and tried to take shallow breaths.
"Excuse me," Jessica said from next to me, raising her eyebrows pointedly at Jasper. "I think your seat is over there."
He answered her hostility with a warm smile. Jasper's vampiric perfection couldn't hold a candle to Edward's, but he was still beautiful, and his... aura projected nothing but friendliness. "My apologies, miss. I'll only be a moment."
Jessica wasn't immune. She flushed pink and looked down at her homework, redrawing the curve of her sine graph with quick fingers.
I made an effort to look steady as Jasper turned back to me. The yellow of his eyes was so bright it almost looked like fresh butter; he must have been keeping very well fed since the Cullens' return. Given that his loss of control was what had prompted them to leave in the first place, that probably wasn't a bad idea. "I believe that this will satisfy the parties in question," he said, handing me an envelope.
I took it. The paper was heavy and thick; I could feel the nuanced texture of the surface, even with the sense-dulled fingers of my left hand. Written on the front in impeccable cursive were the words For the Eyes of Sam Uley.
This was all very surreal. "Thank you," I said automatically.
"We would like a response as well," Jasper added. "Whenever most suits Mr. Uley, of course. There is no need for undue haste."
No need for undue haste. That didn't sound promising at all. I tucked the envelope into my backpack. "Thanks, I'll... let him know," I said, my head starting to spin. The shallow breathing was depriving my brain of oxygen; I fought it, but a second later my body overrode my mind and forced me to inhale deeply.
Perfume immediately saturated my lungs. For the briefest moment I felt that pleasure, that joy, and the accompanying thread of terror that ran beneath it all like an underground river--
--then the feelings vanished just as quickly. Both the terror and the joy. The pleasure remained, singing in my nerve endings, but it wasn't nearly as powerful as it had been a single breath earlier.
I blinked.
Jasper raised an eyebrow. "Better?"
"I..." My heart sped up as I realized what had just happened. "Don't do that," I hissed at him. My arms wrapped around my stomach protectively, like flesh and plaster would protect me from his abilities. Jasper Hale could manipulate the emotions of the people around him, and he'd just done it to me. "Don't ever do that."
"It was only counteractive." Jasper narrowed his eyes at me in an evaluative way I didn't like, as though I were a piece of some strange puzzle he was slowly putting together. "As much as possible, that is. I thought you'd prefer a mitigating effect."
"She'd prefer you be on your way," Jessica spoke up suddenly. His 'counteractive' measures must have hit her too, because all traces of blushing were gone from her face. Her expression had become dismissive. She made a little shoo-ing motion with her hand. "Begone now."
Jasper smiled -- a little wider this time, showing a few razor-sharp teeth -- but he nodded politely before turning around and taking his desk at the back of the room.
"He is so weird," Jessica muttered. "What was all that about?"
"Oh... um... I'm supposed to pass this note along to a teacher. Jasper... missed a test and needs to make it up."
I needed to become a better liar.
"Right," Jessica said, drawing out the word skeptically.
Luckily, any further questions were forestalled by the beginning of the lesson on parabolic equations.
***
At the end of the school day I dashed for the old payphone near the front office. I didn't have much time; Charlie would only wait a few minutes out front before he would begin to worry that something had happened to me at the hands of his other arch-enemies. His ban on the Quileute 'gang' was absolute, but his ban on the Cullen family could only extend to our house.
My father was probably the only person in the whole world who hated that I was attending school with Edward as much as Jacob did.
Life would be much easier if I could use my recently-replaced cell to contact people, but Charlie would see the number called when the bill came. In my haste to dig quarters out of my pack I jammed my hand against the metal teeth of the outer pocket. I swore and jerked back as my frayed nerve endings screamed in protest.
Ow.
I spared a few moments for a deep breath, then gingerly peeled off my leather glove and looked at the damage. The healing skin had split along my left index finger. Dark, crimson drops welled from the quarter-inch cut. I shoved the finger into my mouth quickly, sucking hard as I glanced around.
No Cullens to smell my blood.
Using the free fingers of my right hand instead, I finally fished out the correct change and dialed the phone number I'd long since memorized, holding the receiver to my ear with my shoulder. After two rings, a low voice answered. "Hello?"
"Hi, Billy."
The silence was deafening. "Bella," Billy responded finally, his tone frigid.
I swallowed, the taste of copper sticking in my throat and turning my stomach. I still hated everything about blood. "I just... could you tell Jake," I mumbled, trying to talk around my finger, "that I've got the response? Charlie's working really late, so he can come pick it up before nine. Whenever works best."
There was such a long pause that I wasn't sure whether my words had been comprehensible, but Billy eventually said, "I'll pass that along."
"Okay. Thanks." I hung up the phone without waiting for acknowledgment and got out of the building as fast as I could without tripping over my own feet.
Charlie looked impatient as I slid into the cruiser. "That took awhile, Bells, was there--" Then he frowned as he saw the blood oozing from my fingertip. "What happened?" he demanded, already reaching for the little first aid kit in the glove compartment.
"It's nothing," I said. I winced a little as he efficiently covered my finger in gauze and wrapped it in place with white tape. He'd gotten very good at bandaging in the last month. "Just scraped it, that's all."
"It might need antibiotics. I can call out of work--"
"No!" At Charlie's strange look, I faked a smile and tried to recover. "No, I can do it myself. I'm not an invalid, Dad. And you've already taken off about a million hours to take care of me."
"You're my daughter," he said, as though that explained everything.
"Yeah, I know. But I'll be all right." I looked down at my hand, wishing that I didn't have to lie all the time. "Thanks, though."
Charlie made a noncommittal noise in response as he put the cruiser into drive and pulled out of the parking lot.
***
After Charlie dropped me off at the house I found myself sitting in the living room, turning the envelope over and over in my hand.
The message was meant for Sam. For the Alpha. For the Pack.
I was dying to know what it said.
It would probably be wrong to hold the envelope up to the light. Or steam it open. I'd never tried steaming open a sealed envelope, but people did it on television all the time. You were supposed to use an iron or something, right?
And maybe it wouldn't be so wrong. Embry had said once that I counted as a member of the Pack now, so... maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal. And I was an imprint. I'd saved the lives of Pack members. Maybe I deserved to look.
My fingers toyed with the edges of the paper--
"Are you peeking?" a male voice asked suddenly.
I jumped, whirling around -- and promptly fell off the couch in an undignified heap.
"Oh, crap." Quil Ateara dashed over from the doorway, looking apologetic. He reached down to help me up. "Um... sorry."
"No problem. I do that a lot." I glanced at my left hand as I lifted it; the glove was off, thanks to the gauze, but there were no new cuts from my embarrassing fall. That was something. "Um, be careful, okay?"
"Well, yeah, I-- oh." Quil's eyes widened as he looked at the burns. He hesitated, then reached past my hand to grip my wrist instead. When he pulled me back to my feet I felt it in my shoulder even though he was clearly trying to be careful. "Uh, you okay?"
"Yeah." I tried to ignore the way Quil stared at my scars. "How did you get in here?"
"The front door," he said, nonplussed.
I winced. "Did anyone see you?"
"No, why?"
Wonderful. Apparently Jacob hadn't thought to inform Quil of the rules of the house. "Right. Where's Jake? Is he outside?"
"Nah, he's on patrol." Quil shrugged. He was even more enormous than the last time I'd seen him, shortly before he'd phased for the first time. He'd added at least another inch of height and maybe fifteen more pounds of solid muscle, all of which were visible in his bare chest and arms. "I got sent to pick you up. Ready to go?"
I blinked in surprise. "Go?"
"Yeah, to La Push." He raised his eyebrows. "To Emily's. Sam told me to bring you. Everyone's gonna be there, no one wants to miss this." He glanced with interest down at the envelope. "Did you open it? 'Cause I really want to--"
"All right, someone must have forgotten to pass along the message," I interrupted, exasperated, "but I'm not allowed to go to La Push. I'm basically under house arrest. Charlie doesn't let me out anywhere."
Quil looked confused. "Billy said your dad was gonna be gone all evening."
"Yeah, but--" I pointed at the telephone sitting on the side table. "He usually calls a couple of times to check in, make sure I'm okay."
"So tell him you fell asleep or something. C'mon, this is Grounding 101. Haven't you ever snuck out before?"
I frowned. "Well... no. But I promised my dad."
Quil's derisive snort told me he didn't think much of my teenage morals. "Oh, come on. It's only for an hour or two. Besides--" he glanced down at the envelope again "--don't you want to know what it says?"
I did. Badly. But that wasn't the point. "I still can't--"
"Jake'll be waiting for you."
That did it.
"Okay," I sighed. I handed Quil the envelope. "You win."
He grinned widely. "I figured that would do the trick. Embry was right -- you imprint people are weird."
"So I've heard," I grumbled. A thought occured to me. "And how are we getting there?" I held up my hands -- there was no way I'd be able to hang onto his fur. "I mean, I could ride you, but I don't think I... uh..."
...I felt my face heat up.
Quil blinked, then snickered like a twelve-year-old. "Sweet. I'm totally gonna tell Jake that you offered to ride me before you've ridden him."
Holy crow. "That's none of your business," I muttered, stalking past him to put on my shoes.
"Everything's everyone's business thanks to this stupid mind-meld thing. Trust me, I'd rather not see all Jake's fantasies of you riding--"
"Quil!"
"--I mean, it was bad enough listening to Bella this and Bella that back when you two were working on those bikes--"
I threw one of Charlie's boots at his head. Unfortunately I was throwing left-handed and he had superhuman reflexes; the boot sailed right by and crashed into the coffee table. "Shut up," I said through gritted teeth.
Quil didn't stop smirking, but he did hold up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Okay, okay. And no, you don't have to ride me, I brought my car like a normal person and everything. Besides, the treaty kind of says that we can't phase anywhere except our own lands." He rolled his eyes. "We got the rez and a promise they wouldn't bite humans; the bloodsuckers wound up with everything else."
"I think your ancestors needed better negotiating strategies."
"In more ways than one." Quil glanced again at the envelope in his hand. He sniffed, and a disgusted look came over his face. "It stinks like them."
"Who knows how long they've had it in their house." I couldn't smell anything, but wolf senses were much stronger than mine. "The paper looks pretty old." And expensive.
"Nasty," he remarked. "Let's go, the Pack's waiting on us. And I'm starving."
"You guys are always starving."
"Hey, we're teenage boys--
"Except for Leah."
"--except for Leah, and we're gigantic wolves. That takes a lot of junk food."
"Uh-huh."
Quil's car sat in the driveway, a rusted sedan that seemed to be held together with gum and baling wire. I glanced from side to side, but none of the neighbors were in their yards. "By the way," Quil said, looking down at me seriously, "I'm sorry about the stuff I said at the store."
"Huh? Oh. That." The last time I'd seen Quil he'd still been in the dark about the werewolf situation and... words had been exchanged. "It's fine. I probably would've said the same stuff if I'd been in your shoes." Except with less swearing, probably.
"So, friends again?"
I nodded as I tried to get into the car without needing a tetanus shot. "Yeah, friends again."
Quil looked relieved to be let off the hook. "Cool. Now let's just hope The Beast starts, she sounded a little hiccupy on the way here."
Great.
***
The ride to La Push didn't take long, in spite of the hiccuping; ugly as The Beast was, she seemed to function properly. She wasn't nearly as impressive as Jacob's Rabbit, though... which I didn't say out loud. Boys seemed to get really sensitive about their rides.
There weren't any other cars parked front of Emily's tiny one-and-a-half story house. No one else had needed to drive. As Quil cut the engine, a familiar figure swung open the faded blue door and darted out onto the rickety porch. "It's about time!" Embry Call shouted at us. "I'm going to eat your food, man!"
"Do it and I'll break your arm!" Quil shouted back. I suspected he wasn't kidding, but then, Embry probably wasn't either. All of the wolves had ridiculous appetites, but Embry's was especially appalling.
"Uh-huh. I know you, Ateara, you're all bark and no bite." As I got out of the car, Embry's face lit up. "Well, look who's finally sprung!" He ducked his head back into the house, and I heard him shout, "Hey, guys, Buffy's here!"
"Great," I heard someone yell back from inside. "Time to eat, then!"
Emily's first floor had a long couch and an overstuffed armchair tucked in the corner next to a fireplace; other than that it was all kitchen. A warm, home-y place that always smelled like baking bread, it functioned as the base of operations for Pack business. When I'd spent time here several weeks ago there had only been five wolves coming and going; now there were eight. There was barely room to move among the enormous bodies, and the din was deafening as they all talked amongst themselves.
As an introvert who only lived with her less-than-talkative father, I was accustomed to silent days and quiet nights. This was the exact opposite of that. I didn't hate it -- it was nice, actually -- but I felt a little overwhelmed nonetheless.
I didn't see Jacob anywhere.
Emily spotted me from near the stove and smiled; as always, only one half of her mouth moved as she did. The ruined right side of her face, with its deep scars and destroyed muscles, remained immobile. "Bella!" she called, motioning me over. I waved back, but there was absolutely no way for me to make it past the crush of people. My five-foot-four height didn't even come to the shoulders of anyone in this room.
Embry fixed the problem for me by shoving Jared, the nearest, playfully to the side. Jared crashed into Seth Clearwater, who yelped. "Move it, boys. Out of the way for the slayer chick."
Jared looked down from his ridiculous height. "Oh, hey, Bella!" he said -- or rather, mumbled. His mouth was full and he had a half-eaten blueberry muffin in his hand.
"Hi," I replied meekly. "Um, can I get through?"
Jared backed up, knocking into Seth again. I gaped at the fourteen-year-old as he glared and rubbed his shoulder; the last time I'd seen him he was a kid looking worshipfully at Jacob across a dinner table, hanging on his idol's every word. Now Seth was over six feet tall. The transformation was unsettling.
"Kim's been missing you," Jared said as I wiggled past. "Will you be hanging out more now?"
"No, it's a one time thing." I shrugged. "For now, anyway. Tell Kim I said hi, though."
"Will do."
With more of Embry's help I made my way to the kitchen counter. Emily brandished a spatula in his direction pointedly. "Help her up before you all squish her."
"Help me up?" I asked blankly.
"Okay, okay." Embry grinned down at me. "Don't tell Jake I did this," he said, grasping me firmly around the waist.
My eyebrows shot up. "What are you--" Then I gasped as Embry lifted me effortlessly off the floor, as though I weighed ten pounds instead of a hundred and ten. He quickly set me down on the counter; my shoulders bumped against the cabinets.
"There," Emily said, satisfied. "Now you won't get trampled."
"Thanks," I mumbled. Being suddenly grabbed by someone I didn't actually know that well was a little touchy-feely for me, but I'd figured out awhile ago that the wolves didn't have much concept of personal space.
"No problem." Then Embry turned back to Emily. "Are there any muffins left?"
Emily rolled her eyes. "You're all eating me out of house and home," she complained, pointing at the kitchen table. "I think you'll have to fight for the last few." When Embry lunged toward the nearly empty basket, she turned to me, shaking her head. "Do you have any idea how much flour I'm going through?"
"I can only imagine," I said honestly. I tried to only look at the left side of her face; not seeing her for over a month had dulled my memory of just how bad her scars were. I'd probably get used to them again soon.
Emily, meanwhile, was staring at my neck with a slight smile on the mobile half of her lips. "Don't worry," she said wryly. "He'll stop leaving them in a month or so."
"What?" I touched my throat... and scowled. Jessica had loaned me a tube of foundation, but by the end of the day it usually wore off, leaving the greenish cast of my hickey visible. "How obvious is it?" I'd need to reapply the makeup before I went home. How did girls in normal relationships do this?
"Not very unless you're close. I have some solid cover-up for when I go out, we'll put some on later."
"Thanks."
"You're welcome." Emily glanced down at the counter. Her smile fell. "May I see?" she asked, nodding toward my left hand. I blushed as I lifted my arm. She took my wrist in a loose grip, examining my skin; after a moment she looked back up. "Maybe we should start a club," she suggested, light teasing in her voice.
I giggled in response -- until I remembered something. "Uh, by the way... your hoodie. It needs some repairs."
"I figured as much. Just have Jacob send it along."
"By the way, where is--"
"Quiet," a commanding voice boomed.
Everyone instantly closed their mouths; the abrupt silence was disconcerting, like someone hitting the 'off' switch on a loud radio. Emily quirked her eyebrow and gave me the tiniest smug look. That was her wolf speaking, after all.
Sam Uley stepped through the doorway into the suddenly mute house. Jacob came in behind him, his eyes scanning the room; when he spotted me, he visibly relaxed and shot me a huge grin. A weight instantly lifted off my shoulders as he did, and I beamed back at him.
Unlike me, Sam didn't have any trouble making his way through the room; he was taller than everyone except Jacob, and more muscled even than him. He wasn't wearing a shirt, same as the others -- and as he approached the kitchen table I had to swallow a gasp.
Livid scar tissue sliced through Sam's left side. It ran from his shoulder to his hip, a handspan wide, a souvenir of his last encounter with a vampire. Though I'd seen and made an effort to dress the wound myself at the time, I hadn't realized how far it had stretched the limits of his supernatural healing capabilities. At least he'd lived, something that had been in doubt for several terrifying hours.
I glanced around the room and met Paul's eyes. He and I had been the ones who attempted to keep things together during that awful incident. I smiled hesitantly at him, but he snorted and looked away. Paul had never liked or trusted me, the new girl who'd run with vampires; apparently our shared experience hadn't changed that. I doubted he liked that I'd seen him throwing up in Emily's shrubbery.
The thick envelope seemed tiny in Sam's enormous hand. As he took a chair at the table, I noticed him look fleetingly at Emily. Her smirk widened ever-so-slightly, and Sam's answering quirk of his lips wouldn't have been noticeable to anyone who wasn't watching as closely as I was. Then his face was back to its customary hardness, and he ripped the envelope open without ceremony and unfolded a sheet of stiff white paper. I could see more of that elegant, flawless calligraphy flowing across the page.
Everyone leaned in -- including me -- as Sam read the contents quickly and silently. His only reaction was a slight narrowing of his eyes. After what felt like an hour but was probably a few minutes, he set the paper down on the table. I heard a strange sound; it took me a moment to realize it was grinding teeth.
I'd been right. This wasn't promising.
The silence continued -- all the wolves were still under Sam's directive. I looked toward the door and saw Jacob looking back at me, his whole body tense. I longed to go wrap my arms around him, but I felt as frozen in place as everyone else.
Another minute.
And another.
Finally Emily burst out, "For God's sake, Sam, tell them what it says." I was one of the few people in the room who recognized her words for what they were: an order from his imprint.
Sam began to read aloud in a carefully controlled voice.
To the Alpha of the Quileute Pack and Whomever Else it May Concern:
I must begin by offering my most sincere apologies. A series of errors and misunderstandings on my part are entirely accountable for the situation your family and mine now find ourselves in, and for that I take full responsibility.
I am sorry to say that in spite of being a primary oral signatory of the original treaty that continues to exist between my coven and your tribe, I was tragically ignorant of the full effect of our presence. The radius of our influence has proven far greater than either myself or your original representatives anticipated; as recent events have proven, our merely remaining absent from the ancestral land of the Quileute people has been insufficient to prevent mutations among your youth. The blame falls upon my shoulders and I bear it willingly. It is my genuine hope that the day will come wherein I am able to make amends for the grievous wrongs that have resulted from my carelessness. In the meantime all I am able to offer is assurances of my genuine remorse.
On the subject in question, it is the intent of my family to vacate this area within the next six weeks, pending the graduation of three members of our coven from the local school. That being said, I must state a contingency for our removal from this location.
The concern among certain members of my family for the welfare of one Isabella Marie Swan is very great. The internal negotiations of our coven have led to the following suggested compromise: the treaty between your tribe and my family must be amended to stipulate that Miss Swan remain a minimum of three hundred miles away from the Quileute reservation for the duration of her natural life.
Funds will be provided by myself for the relocation of Miss Swan and her family to any destination she so chooses, as well as any financial aid that may support her future endeavors, whatever those should be. Should Miss Swan opt not to relocate, or should her relocation be hampered in any way, our coven will remain present in the area to ensure her safety and protection from potential harm at the hands of your pack and/or other threats to her well-being. Previous treaty boundaries will be disregarded in this effort should it become necessary.
It is with a heavy heart that I present this condition to you, but my son has chosen not to live without Bella Swan, and therefore I too am left with no choice.
I am more than willing to discuss the matter in additional detail should you desire. Please respond at your earliest convienience.
Respectfully, Dr. Carlisle Cullen, MD
Another silence -- very different from the one before -- fell across the room as Sam finished reading and set the letter back down.
It was broken by an inhuman growl. I looked up in alarm just in time to see Jacob run out the front door, so fast I almost couldn't follow him with my naked eye. Through the window I saw a blur of red fur disappear into the forest.
"Jake," I whispered. I felt as though my stomach was full of stones. I wondered if he could feel it too; I certainly sensed his wrath slamming into me like waves. His pain, my pain. I tried to jump off the kitchen counter to go after him, but Emily grabbed my shoulder and held me in place; Jared was pulling off his shoes. A moment later another wolf followed Jacob's path through the trees.
The tension in the house was a tangible thing. At first I thought that was why I was light-headed, but then I realized it was because I'd stopped breathing again.
One breath, in and out. Two. Three.
...a minimum of three hundred miles away from the Quileute reservation for the duration of her natural life...
Sam sighed and rubbed his forehead, then said reluctantly, "Go ahead. Talk if you want."
The shouting was instantaneous and deafening.
"Who does the hell does that bloodsucker think he is--"
"--are we supposed to get a lawyer or something to look this crap over--"
"--he had better damn well be kidding--"
"--did he say mutations--"
"--high and mighty leeches--"
"--total bullshit--"
"--he can shove his 'sincere apologies' right up his--"
...our coven will remain present in the area to ensure her safety and protection from potential harm at the hands of your pack...
Four breaths. Five. Six.
"All right! All right!" Sam shouted over the din. "That's enough!" I noticed he'd lowered his hand down to his side, and Emily stepped forward automatically to take it. Their fingers laced together under the table.
Slowly the room quieted down, aside from a general indignant grumbling. Sam reached back into the envelope and pulled out another sheet of heavy, textured paper. This one was blank.
Quil gawked. "Jesus, did they send a self-addressed stamped envelope too? What the hell is wrong with these bastards?"
"Being dead's gotta do weird things to your brain." Embry said it off-handedly, but he too looked furious. "Like thinking you can tell us who we're allowed to have on our lands."
"Bella?" Sam didn't turn to look at me when he said my name. He continued to focus on the sheet in front of him, reading Carlisle's message again and again. "Do you have anything to say about this?"
"Oh, come on, Sam, you can't be--"
"It's not the girl's fault--"
"I'm only asking her opinion," he said, his voice hard and authoritative. "The letter is about her, after all."
Seven breaths. Eight. Nine.
"Bella?"
...the radius of our influence has proven far greater than either myself or your original representatives anticipated...
They were expecting a response.
"Bella."
"I don't want to go," I said. My voice shook uncontrollably in spite of my best efforts. "I don't want to leave. But... how many... will there be more phasings? If the Cullens stay?"
"Yes." Sam's tone was flat and matter of fact.
I swallowed hard.
More people like Embry and Quil. More kids like Seth. Their childhoods would be taken away, their sunniness drained out of them as they'd be forced to take part in a war that they hadn't even known existed... and it would be my fault. Because I was too selfish to leave. Because I'd put my own needs above the needs of countless others.
But... Jacob...
Paul was standing up from his kitchen chair. He reached forward and pulled the blank sheet of paper across the table, grabbing a pen out of a styrofoam cup.
"Wait a sec," Seth said anxiously, "I'm not sure you're supposed to--"
Too late. Paul had already scribbled out the Quileute Pack's official response to Carlisle Cullen's ultimatum. We all leaned forward to read it.
Fuck You.
"Subtle," Embry remarked dryly. "You're a real diplomat, Paul."
"No, that's right."
What?
I stared in shock at Sam, who had pulled the white paper back across the table and was adding a few lines beneath Paul's message. "It... it is?"
"They don't dictate terms to us," the Alpha said calmly. He was still holding Emily's hand, and she leaned slightly against his shoulder. "The coven will leave in six weeks regardless of where you are, or the Pack will make them leave -- one way or another."
Quil grinned widely. "Hell yeah."
"Sounds good to me," growled Paul.
Then a new voice spoke up. "Well, that's just fabulous. Let's all go to war and get ourselves killed over Bella Swan's scrawny ass. Great idea, O Wise Leader."
I shrank back against the cabinets.
A muscle in Sam's jaw ticked. "It isn't about Bella. We are not going to be blackmailed by bloodsuckers. Especially when they have no business being here in the first place."
"Besides," Quil said, "We can take 'em."
"Uh-huh." Leah Clearwater's six foot frame leaned against the stone fireplace, her well-defined arms crossed over her chest. She'd chopped off her beautiful long hair into a rough pixie cut; her stylish clothes had been replaced by cutoff shorts and a frayed tank top. The only feature that remained familiar to me was her feather duster eyelashes. "And you've killed how many leeches so far, Ateara? Zero. Hell, the whole pack's only gotten one; it was Buffy here who flamed the other." Unlike Embry, when Leah called me 'Buffy' it sounded like an epithet. "So forgive me if I doubt your mad epic skills. I want to know why we're about to face down an entire nest of vampires for Jacob Black's paleface girlfriend."
Paul glowered at Leah. "She's not Jacob's girlfriend, idiot, she's his imprint."
Leah's frigid gaze flicked first to Sam, then to Emily. Her lip curled into a snarl. "So? Jacob can leave too, if his imprint is so damn important to him."
Emily raised her chin and glared right back.
I'd already heard the story: Sam and Leah had been in love. Then, after Sam began phasing into a werewolf, he'd imprinted on Emily -- Leah's cousin and best friend. It wasn't his fault. It wasn't anyone's fault. Except there was no way Leah could have known that, and she'd spent more than a year with only the knowledge that Sam had dumped her and immediately gone running to Emily for no apparent reason. But now Leah was part of the werewolf pack and did know what had happened... and apparently that hadn't made things any better.
Embry leaned over to me and muttered, "She's fun, huh?" Leah shot him a dirty look; he rolled his eyes.
"This is what we're doing, Leah." Sam didn't look up from the paper where he was still writing, but his voice was carefully controlled. "Jacob isn't going to be chased off of our lands. And that's the end of it."
"That's the end of it? You're our Alpha, Sam Uley, not our father." Leah's bitter smile widened. "Right, Embry?"
I felt Embry jerk next to me, and an awkward silence fell.
Seth finally spoke up. "Leah... stop, okay?" His voice sounded pained... maybe at the word father.
Leah glanced at her little brother, then blew out a breath and looked away. "Fine. But if she's going to stay, can she at least make herself useful?"
"Of course," I said quickly. Maybe even a little eagerly. I wanted to be useful. Anything was better than pacing in Emily's kitchen. "What can I do to help?"
"Tell us about the bloodsuckers. How many are there? What can these bastards do?"
Wait.
"Good point." Paul's voice was almost as hard as Leah's. "You've got information on them."
"That's right, they told you all that stuff, didn't they."
"Is it true they have powers?"
"If they've got some weird tricks it would be good to know."
I pulled back, feeling attacked from all sides. "I... um... it's not that simple," I said lamely.
"Sure it is," Leah said. Her cold gaze was back on me. "If you're Jacob's imprint, then you should be one of us, right? So prove it. Tell us what you know."
I glanced at Emily, looking for help. None was forthcoming. Her face was studied and neutral; she agreed with the rest of them.
Too much too much too much.
I did know quite a bit about the vampiric world. I knew what the Cullens could do, what they were capable of. But these were things that had been told to me in confidence, back when I was going to be a member of their family. Even as upset as I was right now, even as frightened as I'd become, I'd loved them all once. They'd loved me. They'd trusted me with their secrets.
Now I would be handing those secrets to the people designed to destroy them.
And everyone was watching me.
But it... it was only fair, right? I tried to reason with myself, to make myself feel better about what I was going to have to do. The Cullens had started it; there wouldn't even be any werewolves in La Push if not for them. And it seemed like they already knew lots about what the Pack could do. Shouldn't the playing field be even? Shouldn't it be a fair fight?
Because there was no point in kidding myself. There was going to be a fight.
"There's seven of them," I whispered. "Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie, and Edward are the ones from the original treaty." I thought of Esme's sweet, motherly face as I spoke. Stabbing guilt made my eyes fill with tears. "Emmett, Jasper, and Alice joined later."
"Are there others?" Sam's voice was emotionless.
"None around here. The only others I've ever met were Laurent, James, and Victoria, and they're all dead." They'd all died trying to kill me. "There's a family in Alaska, though, that are like the Cullens. They only drink animal blood too."
Someone snorted derisively.
"That's what I was told, anyway. I don't know for sure. Laurent stayed with them for awhile. And, um..." I wracked my brain, trying to shake loose the details that I'd worked so hard to forget. "There's a group in Italy. The Volturi. They're like royalty, I guess, and you're not supposed to provoke them." The old wound in my chest -- the hole covered in scar tissue -- throbbed mercilessly against my ribs. "That's all. I don't know of any more."
"And powers?" Leah pressed. She seemed to be enjoying watching me squirm. "Jacob said your bloodsucker can read minds. What about the rest of them?"
I squeezed my eyes shut. This was it. The final betrayal. "Alice can see the future sometimes, but it doesn't always work exactly right." I heard murmurs fill the room. "Jasper can change the emotions of the people around him. Make them weaker, at least. I don't know if he can make them stronger. If the others have any special abilities, I've never seen them."
It was so hard to breathe.
After a long, contemplative moment, it was Seth who broke the silence. "Wow. That sucks."
I opened my eyes to see Emily mouthing Thank you. And the others were watching me with varying levels of gratitude. Even Leah's frosty glare had mellowed into a look of sullen appreciation.
It didn't help. I was a traitor.
I was saved from any further questioning or response by the sound of heavy footfalls; a moment later Jared clomped through the front door, shaking dirt out of his short hair. I glanced out the window and saw slumped shoulders and russet skin sitting on the porch steps. There must have been spare shorts in The Beast. Emily didn't try to stop me this time as I climbed down from the counter.
Sam raised an eyebrow at Jared and Jared nodded slightly in response. I heard him asking, "So, what'd I miss?" before I closed the door behind me with a click.
The afternoon haze had burned off a little; clouds still filled the sky, but the May air was warm. The coffee cans lining the porch railing spilled over with flowers. "Jared talked you down?" I asked.
"Yeah." Jacob's voice was quiet. "He has Kim, so... he kinda gets it."
"Right." He didn't look at me as I sat down next to him on the steps; he was still shaking slightly. I had no idea what to say -- there wasn't anything to say, really. So I tucked myself under his arm and buried my face in his heated side. His scent wasn't drugging or delicious; he just smelled like earth and sweat. Jacob smelled alive.
I listened to him breathe as his ribs rose and fell against my body. I felt his heart beat in my own veins.
"Don't go," he said simply.
I shook my head. "I won't. I promise."
He pressed his lips against my temple.
***
"Bella!"
I blinked as I raised my head from the couch. "Dad?" My voice was hoarse; my throat felt like it had been attacked with sandpaper. The living room light flicked on and I winced as my eyes tried to adjust.
Charlie stood over me, still in his uniform, his hands on his hips. His expression was not happy. "I called three times this afternoon."
"Sorry," I said tonelessly. "I took a nap." Which was true. After Jacob had brought me home and left again all-too-quickly I'd laid down and cried myself to sleep, too overwhelmed to remain conscious.
Charlie's stern expression faded as he looked at me; it changed into something that hurt my heart. "Bells, kiddo," he said unhappily, "can't you--"
"Let's watch some sports," I interrupted, staring forward at the blank television screen. "What's on?"
There was a long pause, then finally-- "The Mariners are playing New York. King Felix is pitching. We might actually win for once."
"Sounds good."
Charlie flicked on the game. As he sat down next to me I curled into a fetal position; he hesitated, then set his hand on my foot and squeezed it. "Bella... I know you don't want to talk to me, but if you called your mother, maybe she could..."
"Dad," I said, watching player in pinstripes swing a bat, "believe me, you're the one I would tell."
After a moment I heard Charlie swallow, then he squeezed my foot again and we watched the Mariners lose in spectacular fashion.
***
The next morning I waited in the school parking lot after my father dropped me off, pulling the envelope with the Pack's response out of my backpack and turning it over in my hand. I didn't have any great career aspirations at this point in time, but at least I was exhibiting some talent as a courier. Maybe I was meant to work for FedEx.
The rest of the students slowly filtered inside, chatting about homework and Friday night plans and whatever else teenagers with normal lives talked about. I waited through the first warning bell, then the second, alone in the misty air.
The silver Volvo finally pulled into the lot, ten minutes after first period had started. Alice was the driver and only passenger. As she climbed out, her delicate pixie face lighting up with delight at the sight of me, I was suddenly hit by a wave of emotion so strong it nearly bowled me over.
Fury.
Absolute, total, consuming fury.
This was my life.
Alice's lithe, graceful steps slowed as she approached, her eager expression changing to one of wariness. Everything I was feeling must have been obvious on my face. By the time she stood before me her entire being radiated disappointment. "Bella--"
"I want to talk to him."
"Bella, listen--"
"I want to talk to Edward. Where is he?"
"He's hunting today." Alice's tone was sorrowful, but for once it didn't touch my heart. I was too angry. "Please, Bella, understand... he's trying so hard, I swear. He's been trying to stay away from you, and he's been telling me to stay away too. He doesn't want to manipulate you; this is because you're not safe, that's all. He's not trying to make you unhappy."
"Well he is!" I exploded. I was happy that my voice sounded furious instead of petulant, because I was in serious danger of crying with frustration. "I'm not going anywhere and I don't want my friends to suffer because of it!"
Alice's large yellow eyes widened. "You're not going to leave?"
"No." I thrust the white envelope at her and she took it automatically, looking stunned. "I'm not."
"Bella, this is a bad idea--"
"When Edward gets back," I said, ignoring her bell-like words, "tell him I want to speak to him. At his earliest convenience."
"Bella!"
I stalked into the school, where first period Chemistry was waiting for me.
***
Chapter Four: Girls' Night
Sanity Update: While writing this I realized I'd made my first huge, unbelievable, UNFORGIVABLE canon mistake. In book!canon, Jasper graduated with Emmett and Rosalie. He's still at Forks High in movie!canon, but these fics aren't movie, they're book. There was much screaming when I realized this and then about an hour of swearing that that was it, I was giving up and not writing another word, I'd failed and had no choice but to change my name to Towanda and begin my new life in Uruguay. Eventually I calmed down, but I am SO sorry, guys. One simple goal: a canon-compliant alternative ending to the Twilight saga, and I cocked it up in the first chapter. *sob* (Side note: flow is vastly easier once you're through with all the stupid new-book-recap stuff.)
gypseian 's podfic of this chapter will be available here for listening and/or download.
Author: audreyii_fic
Fandom: Twilight (Team Jacob)
Rating: T
Characters: Full cast (Jacob/Bella, Sam/Emily)
Genre: Romance/Angst/Wolfpack!Humor
Warnings: Language, violence, and references to adult behavior. See here for more details.
banner courtesy of untilwebleedoz
Summary:
Sequel to The Movement of the Earth. Bella finds the cost of joining the supernatural world may be higher than she can pay. ( Click here to start from the beginning.)
Chapter Three:
who'll be your lazarus / who'll be your lover?
Karine Polwart, "Resolution Road"
3. Riposte
It was three days -- three days of wondering and worrying and dreading -- before Jasper approached me at the beginning of Algebra. He towered over my desk, holding himself formally like an actor out of an old army movie. "Good afternoon, Bella."
I shrank in my seat and tried to take shallow breaths.
"Excuse me," Jessica said from next to me, raising her eyebrows pointedly at Jasper. "I think your seat is over there."
He answered her hostility with a warm smile. Jasper's vampiric perfection couldn't hold a candle to Edward's, but he was still beautiful, and his... aura projected nothing but friendliness. "My apologies, miss. I'll only be a moment."
Jessica wasn't immune. She flushed pink and looked down at her homework, redrawing the curve of her sine graph with quick fingers.
I made an effort to look steady as Jasper turned back to me. The yellow of his eyes was so bright it almost looked like fresh butter; he must have been keeping very well fed since the Cullens' return. Given that his loss of control was what had prompted them to leave in the first place, that probably wasn't a bad idea. "I believe that this will satisfy the parties in question," he said, handing me an envelope.
I took it. The paper was heavy and thick; I could feel the nuanced texture of the surface, even with the sense-dulled fingers of my left hand. Written on the front in impeccable cursive were the words For the Eyes of Sam Uley.
This was all very surreal. "Thank you," I said automatically.
"We would like a response as well," Jasper added. "Whenever most suits Mr. Uley, of course. There is no need for undue haste."
No need for undue haste. That didn't sound promising at all. I tucked the envelope into my backpack. "Thanks, I'll... let him know," I said, my head starting to spin. The shallow breathing was depriving my brain of oxygen; I fought it, but a second later my body overrode my mind and forced me to inhale deeply.
Perfume immediately saturated my lungs. For the briefest moment I felt that pleasure, that joy, and the accompanying thread of terror that ran beneath it all like an underground river--
--then the feelings vanished just as quickly. Both the terror and the joy. The pleasure remained, singing in my nerve endings, but it wasn't nearly as powerful as it had been a single breath earlier.
I blinked.
Jasper raised an eyebrow. "Better?"
"I..." My heart sped up as I realized what had just happened. "Don't do that," I hissed at him. My arms wrapped around my stomach protectively, like flesh and plaster would protect me from his abilities. Jasper Hale could manipulate the emotions of the people around him, and he'd just done it to me. "Don't ever do that."
"It was only counteractive." Jasper narrowed his eyes at me in an evaluative way I didn't like, as though I were a piece of some strange puzzle he was slowly putting together. "As much as possible, that is. I thought you'd prefer a mitigating effect."
"She'd prefer you be on your way," Jessica spoke up suddenly. His 'counteractive' measures must have hit her too, because all traces of blushing were gone from her face. Her expression had become dismissive. She made a little shoo-ing motion with her hand. "Begone now."
Jasper smiled -- a little wider this time, showing a few razor-sharp teeth -- but he nodded politely before turning around and taking his desk at the back of the room.
"He is so weird," Jessica muttered. "What was all that about?"
"Oh... um... I'm supposed to pass this note along to a teacher. Jasper... missed a test and needs to make it up."
I needed to become a better liar.
"Right," Jessica said, drawing out the word skeptically.
Luckily, any further questions were forestalled by the beginning of the lesson on parabolic equations.
***
At the end of the school day I dashed for the old payphone near the front office. I didn't have much time; Charlie would only wait a few minutes out front before he would begin to worry that something had happened to me at the hands of his other arch-enemies. His ban on the Quileute 'gang' was absolute, but his ban on the Cullen family could only extend to our house.
My father was probably the only person in the whole world who hated that I was attending school with Edward as much as Jacob did.
Life would be much easier if I could use my recently-replaced cell to contact people, but Charlie would see the number called when the bill came. In my haste to dig quarters out of my pack I jammed my hand against the metal teeth of the outer pocket. I swore and jerked back as my frayed nerve endings screamed in protest.
Ow.
I spared a few moments for a deep breath, then gingerly peeled off my leather glove and looked at the damage. The healing skin had split along my left index finger. Dark, crimson drops welled from the quarter-inch cut. I shoved the finger into my mouth quickly, sucking hard as I glanced around.
No Cullens to smell my blood.
Using the free fingers of my right hand instead, I finally fished out the correct change and dialed the phone number I'd long since memorized, holding the receiver to my ear with my shoulder. After two rings, a low voice answered. "Hello?"
"Hi, Billy."
The silence was deafening. "Bella," Billy responded finally, his tone frigid.
I swallowed, the taste of copper sticking in my throat and turning my stomach. I still hated everything about blood. "I just... could you tell Jake," I mumbled, trying to talk around my finger, "that I've got the response? Charlie's working really late, so he can come pick it up before nine. Whenever works best."
There was such a long pause that I wasn't sure whether my words had been comprehensible, but Billy eventually said, "I'll pass that along."
"Okay. Thanks." I hung up the phone without waiting for acknowledgment and got out of the building as fast as I could without tripping over my own feet.
Charlie looked impatient as I slid into the cruiser. "That took awhile, Bells, was there--" Then he frowned as he saw the blood oozing from my fingertip. "What happened?" he demanded, already reaching for the little first aid kit in the glove compartment.
"It's nothing," I said. I winced a little as he efficiently covered my finger in gauze and wrapped it in place with white tape. He'd gotten very good at bandaging in the last month. "Just scraped it, that's all."
"It might need antibiotics. I can call out of work--"
"No!" At Charlie's strange look, I faked a smile and tried to recover. "No, I can do it myself. I'm not an invalid, Dad. And you've already taken off about a million hours to take care of me."
"You're my daughter," he said, as though that explained everything.
"Yeah, I know. But I'll be all right." I looked down at my hand, wishing that I didn't have to lie all the time. "Thanks, though."
Charlie made a noncommittal noise in response as he put the cruiser into drive and pulled out of the parking lot.
***
After Charlie dropped me off at the house I found myself sitting in the living room, turning the envelope over and over in my hand.
The message was meant for Sam. For the Alpha. For the Pack.
I was dying to know what it said.
It would probably be wrong to hold the envelope up to the light. Or steam it open. I'd never tried steaming open a sealed envelope, but people did it on television all the time. You were supposed to use an iron or something, right?
And maybe it wouldn't be so wrong. Embry had said once that I counted as a member of the Pack now, so... maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal. And I was an imprint. I'd saved the lives of Pack members. Maybe I deserved to look.
My fingers toyed with the edges of the paper--
"Are you peeking?" a male voice asked suddenly.
I jumped, whirling around -- and promptly fell off the couch in an undignified heap.
"Oh, crap." Quil Ateara dashed over from the doorway, looking apologetic. He reached down to help me up. "Um... sorry."
"No problem. I do that a lot." I glanced at my left hand as I lifted it; the glove was off, thanks to the gauze, but there were no new cuts from my embarrassing fall. That was something. "Um, be careful, okay?"
"Well, yeah, I-- oh." Quil's eyes widened as he looked at the burns. He hesitated, then reached past my hand to grip my wrist instead. When he pulled me back to my feet I felt it in my shoulder even though he was clearly trying to be careful. "Uh, you okay?"
"Yeah." I tried to ignore the way Quil stared at my scars. "How did you get in here?"
"The front door," he said, nonplussed.
I winced. "Did anyone see you?"
"No, why?"
Wonderful. Apparently Jacob hadn't thought to inform Quil of the rules of the house. "Right. Where's Jake? Is he outside?"
"Nah, he's on patrol." Quil shrugged. He was even more enormous than the last time I'd seen him, shortly before he'd phased for the first time. He'd added at least another inch of height and maybe fifteen more pounds of solid muscle, all of which were visible in his bare chest and arms. "I got sent to pick you up. Ready to go?"
I blinked in surprise. "Go?"
"Yeah, to La Push." He raised his eyebrows. "To Emily's. Sam told me to bring you. Everyone's gonna be there, no one wants to miss this." He glanced with interest down at the envelope. "Did you open it? 'Cause I really want to--"
"All right, someone must have forgotten to pass along the message," I interrupted, exasperated, "but I'm not allowed to go to La Push. I'm basically under house arrest. Charlie doesn't let me out anywhere."
Quil looked confused. "Billy said your dad was gonna be gone all evening."
"Yeah, but--" I pointed at the telephone sitting on the side table. "He usually calls a couple of times to check in, make sure I'm okay."
"So tell him you fell asleep or something. C'mon, this is Grounding 101. Haven't you ever snuck out before?"
I frowned. "Well... no. But I promised my dad."
Quil's derisive snort told me he didn't think much of my teenage morals. "Oh, come on. It's only for an hour or two. Besides--" he glanced down at the envelope again "--don't you want to know what it says?"
I did. Badly. But that wasn't the point. "I still can't--"
"Jake'll be waiting for you."
That did it.
"Okay," I sighed. I handed Quil the envelope. "You win."
He grinned widely. "I figured that would do the trick. Embry was right -- you imprint people are weird."
"So I've heard," I grumbled. A thought occured to me. "And how are we getting there?" I held up my hands -- there was no way I'd be able to hang onto his fur. "I mean, I could ride you, but I don't think I... uh..."
...I felt my face heat up.
Quil blinked, then snickered like a twelve-year-old. "Sweet. I'm totally gonna tell Jake that you offered to ride me before you've ridden him."
Holy crow. "That's none of your business," I muttered, stalking past him to put on my shoes.
"Everything's everyone's business thanks to this stupid mind-meld thing. Trust me, I'd rather not see all Jake's fantasies of you riding--"
"Quil!"
"--I mean, it was bad enough listening to Bella this and Bella that back when you two were working on those bikes--"
I threw one of Charlie's boots at his head. Unfortunately I was throwing left-handed and he had superhuman reflexes; the boot sailed right by and crashed into the coffee table. "Shut up," I said through gritted teeth.
Quil didn't stop smirking, but he did hold up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Okay, okay. And no, you don't have to ride me, I brought my car like a normal person and everything. Besides, the treaty kind of says that we can't phase anywhere except our own lands." He rolled his eyes. "We got the rez and a promise they wouldn't bite humans; the bloodsuckers wound up with everything else."
"I think your ancestors needed better negotiating strategies."
"In more ways than one." Quil glanced again at the envelope in his hand. He sniffed, and a disgusted look came over his face. "It stinks like them."
"Who knows how long they've had it in their house." I couldn't smell anything, but wolf senses were much stronger than mine. "The paper looks pretty old." And expensive.
"Nasty," he remarked. "Let's go, the Pack's waiting on us. And I'm starving."
"You guys are always starving."
"Hey, we're teenage boys--
"Except for Leah."
"--except for Leah, and we're gigantic wolves. That takes a lot of junk food."
"Uh-huh."
Quil's car sat in the driveway, a rusted sedan that seemed to be held together with gum and baling wire. I glanced from side to side, but none of the neighbors were in their yards. "By the way," Quil said, looking down at me seriously, "I'm sorry about the stuff I said at the store."
"Huh? Oh. That." The last time I'd seen Quil he'd still been in the dark about the werewolf situation and... words had been exchanged. "It's fine. I probably would've said the same stuff if I'd been in your shoes." Except with less swearing, probably.
"So, friends again?"
I nodded as I tried to get into the car without needing a tetanus shot. "Yeah, friends again."
Quil looked relieved to be let off the hook. "Cool. Now let's just hope The Beast starts, she sounded a little hiccupy on the way here."
Great.
***
The ride to La Push didn't take long, in spite of the hiccuping; ugly as The Beast was, she seemed to function properly. She wasn't nearly as impressive as Jacob's Rabbit, though... which I didn't say out loud. Boys seemed to get really sensitive about their rides.
There weren't any other cars parked front of Emily's tiny one-and-a-half story house. No one else had needed to drive. As Quil cut the engine, a familiar figure swung open the faded blue door and darted out onto the rickety porch. "It's about time!" Embry Call shouted at us. "I'm going to eat your food, man!"
"Do it and I'll break your arm!" Quil shouted back. I suspected he wasn't kidding, but then, Embry probably wasn't either. All of the wolves had ridiculous appetites, but Embry's was especially appalling.
"Uh-huh. I know you, Ateara, you're all bark and no bite." As I got out of the car, Embry's face lit up. "Well, look who's finally sprung!" He ducked his head back into the house, and I heard him shout, "Hey, guys, Buffy's here!"
"Great," I heard someone yell back from inside. "Time to eat, then!"
Emily's first floor had a long couch and an overstuffed armchair tucked in the corner next to a fireplace; other than that it was all kitchen. A warm, home-y place that always smelled like baking bread, it functioned as the base of operations for Pack business. When I'd spent time here several weeks ago there had only been five wolves coming and going; now there were eight. There was barely room to move among the enormous bodies, and the din was deafening as they all talked amongst themselves.
As an introvert who only lived with her less-than-talkative father, I was accustomed to silent days and quiet nights. This was the exact opposite of that. I didn't hate it -- it was nice, actually -- but I felt a little overwhelmed nonetheless.
I didn't see Jacob anywhere.
Emily spotted me from near the stove and smiled; as always, only one half of her mouth moved as she did. The ruined right side of her face, with its deep scars and destroyed muscles, remained immobile. "Bella!" she called, motioning me over. I waved back, but there was absolutely no way for me to make it past the crush of people. My five-foot-four height didn't even come to the shoulders of anyone in this room.
Embry fixed the problem for me by shoving Jared, the nearest, playfully to the side. Jared crashed into Seth Clearwater, who yelped. "Move it, boys. Out of the way for the slayer chick."
Jared looked down from his ridiculous height. "Oh, hey, Bella!" he said -- or rather, mumbled. His mouth was full and he had a half-eaten blueberry muffin in his hand.
"Hi," I replied meekly. "Um, can I get through?"
Jared backed up, knocking into Seth again. I gaped at the fourteen-year-old as he glared and rubbed his shoulder; the last time I'd seen him he was a kid looking worshipfully at Jacob across a dinner table, hanging on his idol's every word. Now Seth was over six feet tall. The transformation was unsettling.
"Kim's been missing you," Jared said as I wiggled past. "Will you be hanging out more now?"
"No, it's a one time thing." I shrugged. "For now, anyway. Tell Kim I said hi, though."
"Will do."
With more of Embry's help I made my way to the kitchen counter. Emily brandished a spatula in his direction pointedly. "Help her up before you all squish her."
"Help me up?" I asked blankly.
"Okay, okay." Embry grinned down at me. "Don't tell Jake I did this," he said, grasping me firmly around the waist.
My eyebrows shot up. "What are you--" Then I gasped as Embry lifted me effortlessly off the floor, as though I weighed ten pounds instead of a hundred and ten. He quickly set me down on the counter; my shoulders bumped against the cabinets.
"There," Emily said, satisfied. "Now you won't get trampled."
"Thanks," I mumbled. Being suddenly grabbed by someone I didn't actually know that well was a little touchy-feely for me, but I'd figured out awhile ago that the wolves didn't have much concept of personal space.
"No problem." Then Embry turned back to Emily. "Are there any muffins left?"
Emily rolled her eyes. "You're all eating me out of house and home," she complained, pointing at the kitchen table. "I think you'll have to fight for the last few." When Embry lunged toward the nearly empty basket, she turned to me, shaking her head. "Do you have any idea how much flour I'm going through?"
"I can only imagine," I said honestly. I tried to only look at the left side of her face; not seeing her for over a month had dulled my memory of just how bad her scars were. I'd probably get used to them again soon.
Emily, meanwhile, was staring at my neck with a slight smile on the mobile half of her lips. "Don't worry," she said wryly. "He'll stop leaving them in a month or so."
"What?" I touched my throat... and scowled. Jessica had loaned me a tube of foundation, but by the end of the day it usually wore off, leaving the greenish cast of my hickey visible. "How obvious is it?" I'd need to reapply the makeup before I went home. How did girls in normal relationships do this?
"Not very unless you're close. I have some solid cover-up for when I go out, we'll put some on later."
"Thanks."
"You're welcome." Emily glanced down at the counter. Her smile fell. "May I see?" she asked, nodding toward my left hand. I blushed as I lifted my arm. She took my wrist in a loose grip, examining my skin; after a moment she looked back up. "Maybe we should start a club," she suggested, light teasing in her voice.
I giggled in response -- until I remembered something. "Uh, by the way... your hoodie. It needs some repairs."
"I figured as much. Just have Jacob send it along."
"By the way, where is--"
"Quiet," a commanding voice boomed.
Everyone instantly closed their mouths; the abrupt silence was disconcerting, like someone hitting the 'off' switch on a loud radio. Emily quirked her eyebrow and gave me the tiniest smug look. That was her wolf speaking, after all.
Sam Uley stepped through the doorway into the suddenly mute house. Jacob came in behind him, his eyes scanning the room; when he spotted me, he visibly relaxed and shot me a huge grin. A weight instantly lifted off my shoulders as he did, and I beamed back at him.
Unlike me, Sam didn't have any trouble making his way through the room; he was taller than everyone except Jacob, and more muscled even than him. He wasn't wearing a shirt, same as the others -- and as he approached the kitchen table I had to swallow a gasp.
Livid scar tissue sliced through Sam's left side. It ran from his shoulder to his hip, a handspan wide, a souvenir of his last encounter with a vampire. Though I'd seen and made an effort to dress the wound myself at the time, I hadn't realized how far it had stretched the limits of his supernatural healing capabilities. At least he'd lived, something that had been in doubt for several terrifying hours.
I glanced around the room and met Paul's eyes. He and I had been the ones who attempted to keep things together during that awful incident. I smiled hesitantly at him, but he snorted and looked away. Paul had never liked or trusted me, the new girl who'd run with vampires; apparently our shared experience hadn't changed that. I doubted he liked that I'd seen him throwing up in Emily's shrubbery.
The thick envelope seemed tiny in Sam's enormous hand. As he took a chair at the table, I noticed him look fleetingly at Emily. Her smirk widened ever-so-slightly, and Sam's answering quirk of his lips wouldn't have been noticeable to anyone who wasn't watching as closely as I was. Then his face was back to its customary hardness, and he ripped the envelope open without ceremony and unfolded a sheet of stiff white paper. I could see more of that elegant, flawless calligraphy flowing across the page.
Everyone leaned in -- including me -- as Sam read the contents quickly and silently. His only reaction was a slight narrowing of his eyes. After what felt like an hour but was probably a few minutes, he set the paper down on the table. I heard a strange sound; it took me a moment to realize it was grinding teeth.
I'd been right. This wasn't promising.
The silence continued -- all the wolves were still under Sam's directive. I looked toward the door and saw Jacob looking back at me, his whole body tense. I longed to go wrap my arms around him, but I felt as frozen in place as everyone else.
Another minute.
And another.
Finally Emily burst out, "For God's sake, Sam, tell them what it says." I was one of the few people in the room who recognized her words for what they were: an order from his imprint.
Sam began to read aloud in a carefully controlled voice.
To the Alpha of the Quileute Pack and Whomever Else it May Concern:
I must begin by offering my most sincere apologies. A series of errors and misunderstandings on my part are entirely accountable for the situation your family and mine now find ourselves in, and for that I take full responsibility.
I am sorry to say that in spite of being a primary oral signatory of the original treaty that continues to exist between my coven and your tribe, I was tragically ignorant of the full effect of our presence. The radius of our influence has proven far greater than either myself or your original representatives anticipated; as recent events have proven, our merely remaining absent from the ancestral land of the Quileute people has been insufficient to prevent mutations among your youth. The blame falls upon my shoulders and I bear it willingly. It is my genuine hope that the day will come wherein I am able to make amends for the grievous wrongs that have resulted from my carelessness. In the meantime all I am able to offer is assurances of my genuine remorse.
On the subject in question, it is the intent of my family to vacate this area within the next six weeks, pending the graduation of three members of our coven from the local school. That being said, I must state a contingency for our removal from this location.
The concern among certain members of my family for the welfare of one Isabella Marie Swan is very great. The internal negotiations of our coven have led to the following suggested compromise: the treaty between your tribe and my family must be amended to stipulate that Miss Swan remain a minimum of three hundred miles away from the Quileute reservation for the duration of her natural life.
Funds will be provided by myself for the relocation of Miss Swan and her family to any destination she so chooses, as well as any financial aid that may support her future endeavors, whatever those should be. Should Miss Swan opt not to relocate, or should her relocation be hampered in any way, our coven will remain present in the area to ensure her safety and protection from potential harm at the hands of your pack and/or other threats to her well-being. Previous treaty boundaries will be disregarded in this effort should it become necessary.
It is with a heavy heart that I present this condition to you, but my son has chosen not to live without Bella Swan, and therefore I too am left with no choice.
I am more than willing to discuss the matter in additional detail should you desire. Please respond at your earliest convienience.
Respectfully, Dr. Carlisle Cullen, MD
Another silence -- very different from the one before -- fell across the room as Sam finished reading and set the letter back down.
It was broken by an inhuman growl. I looked up in alarm just in time to see Jacob run out the front door, so fast I almost couldn't follow him with my naked eye. Through the window I saw a blur of red fur disappear into the forest.
"Jake," I whispered. I felt as though my stomach was full of stones. I wondered if he could feel it too; I certainly sensed his wrath slamming into me like waves. His pain, my pain. I tried to jump off the kitchen counter to go after him, but Emily grabbed my shoulder and held me in place; Jared was pulling off his shoes. A moment later another wolf followed Jacob's path through the trees.
The tension in the house was a tangible thing. At first I thought that was why I was light-headed, but then I realized it was because I'd stopped breathing again.
One breath, in and out. Two. Three.
...a minimum of three hundred miles away from the Quileute reservation for the duration of her natural life...
Sam sighed and rubbed his forehead, then said reluctantly, "Go ahead. Talk if you want."
The shouting was instantaneous and deafening.
"Who does the hell does that bloodsucker think he is--"
"--are we supposed to get a lawyer or something to look this crap over--"
"--he had better damn well be kidding--"
"--did he say mutations--"
"--high and mighty leeches--"
"--total bullshit--"
"--he can shove his 'sincere apologies' right up his--"
...our coven will remain present in the area to ensure her safety and protection from potential harm at the hands of your pack...
Four breaths. Five. Six.
"All right! All right!" Sam shouted over the din. "That's enough!" I noticed he'd lowered his hand down to his side, and Emily stepped forward automatically to take it. Their fingers laced together under the table.
Slowly the room quieted down, aside from a general indignant grumbling. Sam reached back into the envelope and pulled out another sheet of heavy, textured paper. This one was blank.
Quil gawked. "Jesus, did they send a self-addressed stamped envelope too? What the hell is wrong with these bastards?"
"Being dead's gotta do weird things to your brain." Embry said it off-handedly, but he too looked furious. "Like thinking you can tell us who we're allowed to have on our lands."
"Bella?" Sam didn't turn to look at me when he said my name. He continued to focus on the sheet in front of him, reading Carlisle's message again and again. "Do you have anything to say about this?"
"Oh, come on, Sam, you can't be--"
"It's not the girl's fault--"
"I'm only asking her opinion," he said, his voice hard and authoritative. "The letter is about her, after all."
Seven breaths. Eight. Nine.
"Bella?"
...the radius of our influence has proven far greater than either myself or your original representatives anticipated...
They were expecting a response.
"Bella."
"I don't want to go," I said. My voice shook uncontrollably in spite of my best efforts. "I don't want to leave. But... how many... will there be more phasings? If the Cullens stay?"
"Yes." Sam's tone was flat and matter of fact.
I swallowed hard.
More people like Embry and Quil. More kids like Seth. Their childhoods would be taken away, their sunniness drained out of them as they'd be forced to take part in a war that they hadn't even known existed... and it would be my fault. Because I was too selfish to leave. Because I'd put my own needs above the needs of countless others.
But... Jacob...
Paul was standing up from his kitchen chair. He reached forward and pulled the blank sheet of paper across the table, grabbing a pen out of a styrofoam cup.
"Wait a sec," Seth said anxiously, "I'm not sure you're supposed to--"
Too late. Paul had already scribbled out the Quileute Pack's official response to Carlisle Cullen's ultimatum. We all leaned forward to read it.
Fuck You.
"Subtle," Embry remarked dryly. "You're a real diplomat, Paul."
"No, that's right."
What?
I stared in shock at Sam, who had pulled the white paper back across the table and was adding a few lines beneath Paul's message. "It... it is?"
"They don't dictate terms to us," the Alpha said calmly. He was still holding Emily's hand, and she leaned slightly against his shoulder. "The coven will leave in six weeks regardless of where you are, or the Pack will make them leave -- one way or another."
Quil grinned widely. "Hell yeah."
"Sounds good to me," growled Paul.
Then a new voice spoke up. "Well, that's just fabulous. Let's all go to war and get ourselves killed over Bella Swan's scrawny ass. Great idea, O Wise Leader."
I shrank back against the cabinets.
A muscle in Sam's jaw ticked. "It isn't about Bella. We are not going to be blackmailed by bloodsuckers. Especially when they have no business being here in the first place."
"Besides," Quil said, "We can take 'em."
"Uh-huh." Leah Clearwater's six foot frame leaned against the stone fireplace, her well-defined arms crossed over her chest. She'd chopped off her beautiful long hair into a rough pixie cut; her stylish clothes had been replaced by cutoff shorts and a frayed tank top. The only feature that remained familiar to me was her feather duster eyelashes. "And you've killed how many leeches so far, Ateara? Zero. Hell, the whole pack's only gotten one; it was Buffy here who flamed the other." Unlike Embry, when Leah called me 'Buffy' it sounded like an epithet. "So forgive me if I doubt your mad epic skills. I want to know why we're about to face down an entire nest of vampires for Jacob Black's paleface girlfriend."
Paul glowered at Leah. "She's not Jacob's girlfriend, idiot, she's his imprint."
Leah's frigid gaze flicked first to Sam, then to Emily. Her lip curled into a snarl. "So? Jacob can leave too, if his imprint is so damn important to him."
Emily raised her chin and glared right back.
I'd already heard the story: Sam and Leah had been in love. Then, after Sam began phasing into a werewolf, he'd imprinted on Emily -- Leah's cousin and best friend. It wasn't his fault. It wasn't anyone's fault. Except there was no way Leah could have known that, and she'd spent more than a year with only the knowledge that Sam had dumped her and immediately gone running to Emily for no apparent reason. But now Leah was part of the werewolf pack and did know what had happened... and apparently that hadn't made things any better.
Embry leaned over to me and muttered, "She's fun, huh?" Leah shot him a dirty look; he rolled his eyes.
"This is what we're doing, Leah." Sam didn't look up from the paper where he was still writing, but his voice was carefully controlled. "Jacob isn't going to be chased off of our lands. And that's the end of it."
"That's the end of it? You're our Alpha, Sam Uley, not our father." Leah's bitter smile widened. "Right, Embry?"
I felt Embry jerk next to me, and an awkward silence fell.
Seth finally spoke up. "Leah... stop, okay?" His voice sounded pained... maybe at the word father.
Leah glanced at her little brother, then blew out a breath and looked away. "Fine. But if she's going to stay, can she at least make herself useful?"
"Of course," I said quickly. Maybe even a little eagerly. I wanted to be useful. Anything was better than pacing in Emily's kitchen. "What can I do to help?"
"Tell us about the bloodsuckers. How many are there? What can these bastards do?"
Wait.
"Good point." Paul's voice was almost as hard as Leah's. "You've got information on them."
"That's right, they told you all that stuff, didn't they."
"Is it true they have powers?"
"If they've got some weird tricks it would be good to know."
I pulled back, feeling attacked from all sides. "I... um... it's not that simple," I said lamely.
"Sure it is," Leah said. Her cold gaze was back on me. "If you're Jacob's imprint, then you should be one of us, right? So prove it. Tell us what you know."
I glanced at Emily, looking for help. None was forthcoming. Her face was studied and neutral; she agreed with the rest of them.
Too much too much too much.
I did know quite a bit about the vampiric world. I knew what the Cullens could do, what they were capable of. But these were things that had been told to me in confidence, back when I was going to be a member of their family. Even as upset as I was right now, even as frightened as I'd become, I'd loved them all once. They'd loved me. They'd trusted me with their secrets.
Now I would be handing those secrets to the people designed to destroy them.
And everyone was watching me.
But it... it was only fair, right? I tried to reason with myself, to make myself feel better about what I was going to have to do. The Cullens had started it; there wouldn't even be any werewolves in La Push if not for them. And it seemed like they already knew lots about what the Pack could do. Shouldn't the playing field be even? Shouldn't it be a fair fight?
Because there was no point in kidding myself. There was going to be a fight.
"There's seven of them," I whispered. "Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie, and Edward are the ones from the original treaty." I thought of Esme's sweet, motherly face as I spoke. Stabbing guilt made my eyes fill with tears. "Emmett, Jasper, and Alice joined later."
"Are there others?" Sam's voice was emotionless.
"None around here. The only others I've ever met were Laurent, James, and Victoria, and they're all dead." They'd all died trying to kill me. "There's a family in Alaska, though, that are like the Cullens. They only drink animal blood too."
Someone snorted derisively.
"That's what I was told, anyway. I don't know for sure. Laurent stayed with them for awhile. And, um..." I wracked my brain, trying to shake loose the details that I'd worked so hard to forget. "There's a group in Italy. The Volturi. They're like royalty, I guess, and you're not supposed to provoke them." The old wound in my chest -- the hole covered in scar tissue -- throbbed mercilessly against my ribs. "That's all. I don't know of any more."
"And powers?" Leah pressed. She seemed to be enjoying watching me squirm. "Jacob said your bloodsucker can read minds. What about the rest of them?"
I squeezed my eyes shut. This was it. The final betrayal. "Alice can see the future sometimes, but it doesn't always work exactly right." I heard murmurs fill the room. "Jasper can change the emotions of the people around him. Make them weaker, at least. I don't know if he can make them stronger. If the others have any special abilities, I've never seen them."
It was so hard to breathe.
After a long, contemplative moment, it was Seth who broke the silence. "Wow. That sucks."
I opened my eyes to see Emily mouthing Thank you. And the others were watching me with varying levels of gratitude. Even Leah's frosty glare had mellowed into a look of sullen appreciation.
It didn't help. I was a traitor.
I was saved from any further questioning or response by the sound of heavy footfalls; a moment later Jared clomped through the front door, shaking dirt out of his short hair. I glanced out the window and saw slumped shoulders and russet skin sitting on the porch steps. There must have been spare shorts in The Beast. Emily didn't try to stop me this time as I climbed down from the counter.
Sam raised an eyebrow at Jared and Jared nodded slightly in response. I heard him asking, "So, what'd I miss?" before I closed the door behind me with a click.
The afternoon haze had burned off a little; clouds still filled the sky, but the May air was warm. The coffee cans lining the porch railing spilled over with flowers. "Jared talked you down?" I asked.
"Yeah." Jacob's voice was quiet. "He has Kim, so... he kinda gets it."
"Right." He didn't look at me as I sat down next to him on the steps; he was still shaking slightly. I had no idea what to say -- there wasn't anything to say, really. So I tucked myself under his arm and buried my face in his heated side. His scent wasn't drugging or delicious; he just smelled like earth and sweat. Jacob smelled alive.
I listened to him breathe as his ribs rose and fell against my body. I felt his heart beat in my own veins.
"Don't go," he said simply.
I shook my head. "I won't. I promise."
He pressed his lips against my temple.
***
"Bella!"
I blinked as I raised my head from the couch. "Dad?" My voice was hoarse; my throat felt like it had been attacked with sandpaper. The living room light flicked on and I winced as my eyes tried to adjust.
Charlie stood over me, still in his uniform, his hands on his hips. His expression was not happy. "I called three times this afternoon."
"Sorry," I said tonelessly. "I took a nap." Which was true. After Jacob had brought me home and left again all-too-quickly I'd laid down and cried myself to sleep, too overwhelmed to remain conscious.
Charlie's stern expression faded as he looked at me; it changed into something that hurt my heart. "Bells, kiddo," he said unhappily, "can't you--"
"Let's watch some sports," I interrupted, staring forward at the blank television screen. "What's on?"
There was a long pause, then finally-- "The Mariners are playing New York. King Felix is pitching. We might actually win for once."
"Sounds good."
Charlie flicked on the game. As he sat down next to me I curled into a fetal position; he hesitated, then set his hand on my foot and squeezed it. "Bella... I know you don't want to talk to me, but if you called your mother, maybe she could..."
"Dad," I said, watching player in pinstripes swing a bat, "believe me, you're the one I would tell."
After a moment I heard Charlie swallow, then he squeezed my foot again and we watched the Mariners lose in spectacular fashion.
***
The next morning I waited in the school parking lot after my father dropped me off, pulling the envelope with the Pack's response out of my backpack and turning it over in my hand. I didn't have any great career aspirations at this point in time, but at least I was exhibiting some talent as a courier. Maybe I was meant to work for FedEx.
The rest of the students slowly filtered inside, chatting about homework and Friday night plans and whatever else teenagers with normal lives talked about. I waited through the first warning bell, then the second, alone in the misty air.
The silver Volvo finally pulled into the lot, ten minutes after first period had started. Alice was the driver and only passenger. As she climbed out, her delicate pixie face lighting up with delight at the sight of me, I was suddenly hit by a wave of emotion so strong it nearly bowled me over.
Fury.
Absolute, total, consuming fury.
This was my life.
Alice's lithe, graceful steps slowed as she approached, her eager expression changing to one of wariness. Everything I was feeling must have been obvious on my face. By the time she stood before me her entire being radiated disappointment. "Bella--"
"I want to talk to him."
"Bella, listen--"
"I want to talk to Edward. Where is he?"
"He's hunting today." Alice's tone was sorrowful, but for once it didn't touch my heart. I was too angry. "Please, Bella, understand... he's trying so hard, I swear. He's been trying to stay away from you, and he's been telling me to stay away too. He doesn't want to manipulate you; this is because you're not safe, that's all. He's not trying to make you unhappy."
"Well he is!" I exploded. I was happy that my voice sounded furious instead of petulant, because I was in serious danger of crying with frustration. "I'm not going anywhere and I don't want my friends to suffer because of it!"
Alice's large yellow eyes widened. "You're not going to leave?"
"No." I thrust the white envelope at her and she took it automatically, looking stunned. "I'm not."
"Bella, this is a bad idea--"
"When Edward gets back," I said, ignoring her bell-like words, "tell him I want to speak to him. At his earliest convenience."
"Bella!"
I stalked into the school, where first period Chemistry was waiting for me.
***
Chapter Four: Girls' Night
Sanity Update: While writing this I realized I'd made my first huge, unbelievable, UNFORGIVABLE canon mistake. In book!canon, Jasper graduated with Emmett and Rosalie. He's still at Forks High in movie!canon, but these fics aren't movie, they're book. There was much screaming when I realized this and then about an hour of swearing that that was it, I was giving up and not writing another word, I'd failed and had no choice but to change my name to Towanda and begin my new life in Uruguay. Eventually I calmed down, but I am SO sorry, guys. One simple goal: a canon-compliant alternative ending to the Twilight saga, and I cocked it up in the first chapter. *sob* (Side note: flow is vastly easier once you're through with all the stupid new-book-recap stuff.)
gypseian 's podfic of this chapter will be available here for listening and/or download.