A Thousand Years

by Mistletoe Contest

It's the year 1173. Bella has been waiting five years for Edward to finish his apprenticeship in Spain with a Jewish doctor, waiting to get married with him. What will happen when he gets back…with another woman?

Title: A Thousand Years

Summary: It's the year 1173. Bella has been waiting five years for Edward to finish his apprenticeship in Spain with a Jewish doctor, waiting to get married with him. What will happen when he gets back…with another woman?

Pairing: Bella and Edward

Rating: M

Word count: 4.716

Forkshire, England. 1168.

"I don't want you to go," I said, tears forming in my eyes.

"I don't want to go, either," he replied, cupping my cheeks in his hands and brushing with his thumbs the tears that I hadn't realized had fallen from my eyes.

"But I have to learn and then we can get married. It will only be four years."

I pressed my face against his chest and hugged him tightly to me while his arms moved around my waist, and I cried freely.

I had known Edward since we were kids. He was a couple of years older than me and had dazzled me with his great knowledge of the world…well, the knowledge that only a six year old can have…that, and his amazing green eyes that sparkled like the dew covered grass on a winter morning.

As the years progressed, we had fallen in love, and a few months before, when he turned sixteen, he asked Father for my hand. Father was the Sheriff of the King in the town of Forkshire and I was his only child. He was reluctant to marry me to a barber's son, thinking that he could find a better suitor for me, but he had promised my mother in her dying bed that he'd let me be happy. So he relented, but on the condition that Edward had a good job first.

Edward had always wanted to be a doctor, like his father, Carlisle, and he wanted to be an apprentice with the best. He had once dreamed of going to Persia, to study with the great Islamic doctors, but he had to settle with reading their books.

So he learn to read and write with the words of this great physicians —and I with him—, and then he wanted to study with a Jewish doctor, like his father did, because they were the best alongside the Islamic doctors.

And there we were, in our secret place in the woods. When we were little kids, we used to like to roam the woods and one day we found a small pond with warm waters. We used to go there once a week to swim and wash our bodies —Carlisle always insisted that if we clean regularly, we were less like to get ill. But we did so carefully, so nobody in town would notice and discover our special place.

He was just a few hours away of getting in a ship to France, where he'd start his journey to Spain. He was going to study with Benjamin Aaron, apparently the son of the doctor his father had studied with.

I lifted my face from his chest. "Promise me that you'll come back."

"Bella," he started, "I'm not only doing this for me. I do it for you, to be worthy of you."

We stood there for a moment, just looking at each other in silence until we heard the voice of his father calling out for him.

"I have to go," he said.

"I know."

"Wait for me," he said, with imploring eyes.

"I will," I said. And, with that, he leaned down his head to kiss me.

*.*

Forkshire, England. 1173.

I got up before sunrise. Like every day, I put on my clothes and went to the second floor to take a washcloth and the scented soap Father had bought me at the last big annual market of Forkshire, where merchants from another lands came to sell their goods; he had gotten the soap from a Venetian merchant and also bought me a warm cape for the winter from a Florentine merchant, but I left it home that day because the weather was getting warmer.

We weren't rich by any means, but the King had given Father a few lands with his Sheriff title and his pay was good; so we had a stone home with two floors —a kitchen and one room for each other— and a patio where we had the horses, and we could indulge from time to time.

I got to the pond, took off my clothes and submerged in the natural warm waters. That was the only place where I felt I could let my feelings run free, and the place where I felt more near to Edward. It had been five years now since he left and I hadn't received notice of him in all that time. Every day it got harder not to cry when I remembered him. But I couldn't do it that day, I had to go back home and prepare breakfast for Father, who had to go to Winchester to see the King.

I let the water wash my body and wash my sadness away. I used the soap and then the washcloth to dry myself before putting back on my clothes. I went back home and prepared eggs, sausages and porridge with milk and honey. We only had two eggs left, so I put them on Father's plate and took everything to the table, where a tankard of ale already waited —I put two mugs, strong for him and with water for me.

Father came back from the patio, where he had been washing his face, and sat at the table across from me.

"You don't eat eggs?" he asked after looking from his plate to mine a few times.

"We only had those two, and you have a long journey today," I said.

He grumbled and put one in my plate. "You have to eat, lass."

I smiled. "Lass? I'm a woman now, Father."

He grumbled some more, trying to hide his own smile, and we ate in silence.

I got up when he finished and took the plates to the patio to wash them. I looked up from my task when I heard Father coming out, he already had his belt in place with his sword. There was a dagger in his right hand, which he was looking pensively.

He looked down at me and gave me a tiny leather bag. "That's so you can go and buy whatever we need," he said. "And… here, take this," he added, handing me the dagger.

"But, Father…"

"I can't take you with me this time, Isabella, and I wouldn't like to leave you alone and unarmed," he said firmly.

I nodded and got up, then kissed his cheek. "Be safe," I told him.

"You too," he said before climbing on his horse and going out to the street.

*.*

I finished my chores at home and went to the small market. I had bought milk, bread and a few herbs, and was currently at William Brandson stand, talking to his daughter Alice while I put some of their eggs in my basket, but what I really wanted was to go back home. Everybody was looking at me quite strangely.

"Do you know what's happening today?" I asked Alice.

"You… you don't know?" she said, almost stammering.

"Know what?"

"He's here, Isabella," she whispered.

"Who's…?" I trailed off because there he was, standing by the Count's Tower's wooden ladder, presumably after having visited his brother, Emmett, who was one of the squires of the Count's son, James.

Edward.

He was more beautiful than ever —his jaw stronger and his body more build, and he had that wonderful smile of his in place. He was looking up and I followed his gaze. The egg I had in my hand fell to the ground when I saw it; it was only a flurry of blond hair at first, but then she turned her head to look at him and I saw a beautiful face with an equally beautiful smile. She was coming down the ladder and landed in his arms. He threw back his head and laughed while a lovely flush tinted her cheeks.

"Isabella?" I heard Alice ask as if she was at a great distance.

I came back to my senses slowly. "Who…who's that?" I finally asked her.

She looked at me shocked. "You don't really know? Everybody has been talking about it since they arrived just after sunrise. She's his betrothed, Isabella."

"His…betrothed?" I asked, but my voice was so low that I didn't know if she had heard me. I barely heard the words myself.

I was feeling dizzy, nauseous…I started hearing a low buzz, like I had bees in my ears. It got louder and louder.

I felt the basket slipping from my hand before everything went black and I fell to the floor.

*.*

Edward is betrothed. Edward is betrothed. Edward is betrothed.

It had been two months since that day, but it was the only thing I could think about. Edward was betrothed. It couldn't be —he was already betrothed, to me. But apparently that wasn't true anymore. He now was betrothed to a Spanish woman named Rosa, Rose in English —a name that suited her, because she was really beautiful as a rose, with her blond hair, blue eyes and red lips.

They were betrothed. They were getting married in only a few weeks. They would live together, sleep together, and they'd make beautiful babies like them.

My heart broke more each day as the date grew nearer. I was like a ghost. I was barely functioning, I was barely alive. I had spent many weeks without going out of home, going out of my room only to feed Father and going back there as soon as his plate was on the table. One day Father ordered me to go to the market to buy a few things that we needed —that he needed, because I didn't want anything those days.

I was at Harry Clearwater's stand, eying the meat he was selling that day, when I saw her going out of the house behind the stand with Sue Clearwater.

Our eyes made contact and she approached me with a smile. I didn't know what to do, so I stood in place like my feet had always been planted there like a tree. "Hello, I'm Rosa. And, you must be Isabella?" she spoke perfect English, even if she had a bit of an accent.

I opened my mouth, but nothing came. Her smile faltered a little, but she kept talking. "You must have heard that I'm to marry Edward Carlisleson," she said and I felt my legs debilitating. "His brother Emmett is going to be armed a knight and we are preparing a great feast for him. Edward said that you make the best cakes and thought that maybe you'd like to help us."

She was looking at me expectantly, but I really didn't know what to say. Was she serious? Was he serious? Why did they want to torture me like that? I knew I had to get out of there. The pity looks in Harry and Sue's faces didn't escape me.

"I…I…I can't. Sorry," I said and took off running until I was safely inside the walls of my home.

That had been more than a month ago, and had also been the last day I went outside. I didn't want to risk seeing her again, and I didn't want to risk seeing Edward either —I still hadn't talked to him since he had come back.

I replayed that moment again and again in my head while I prepared Father's supper, wondering why he wanted me there after what he had done to me. I left the plate on the table in front of Father with a mug of ale and went to the stairs to go to my room, but Father stopped me.

"Isabella, wait. Sit here with me, I want to talk to you."

I went and sat across from him at the table. My hands were crossed on the table and my gaze was fixed on them while I waited for him to speak.

"Isabella, look at me." I didn't move my eyes, I couldn't, I only wanted for him to say what he had to say so I could go and hide in my room. "Isabella, look at me, dammit!" he exclaimed with a firm slap to the table.

I startled and looked up at him. "You can't go on like this anymore. Edward is getting married. You have to accept it and move on."

My lower lip trembled. Why had he to be so harsh? I didn't want to move on. I didn't want to accept it. But he hadn't finished.

"I think the best way to move on is that you get married too."

That woke me up. "What? No," I said, but it was barely a whisper, a low whimper.

"You are a woman now and you know that I had only accepted Edward to make you happy, but I've always thought that there was someone out there more suitable for you."

"No, no," I was chanting while all my body trembled.

"Well, I have found that someone more suitable."

"No," I said, louder that time, but he kept talking like I hadn't said anything.

"Last week I was at the Count's Tower and his son, James, asked me for your hand with the Count's acceptance," he was saying animatedly. "Imagine this, my only daughter a countess someday!"

"NO!" I screamed, cutting him.

He looked at me astounded. I had even jumped from my chair with the force of the word.

"No! No! No! I'll never marry James or any other. Never!"

He jumped to his feet too. "You will. I am your father and you will do as I say. I promised your mother that I'd let you be happy and choose your husband.

"Well, you'll only be happy with Edward but you can't have him, so the promise is over. You'll marry James and that's it."

"NO!" I screamed again. "I'll never marry him. I'd kill myself before marrying him and I will if you force me to do it!"

I didn't register his hand moving and slapping me on the face until I felt the sting a few seconds later. It was the first time Father raised his hand at me. My eyes welled up and I almost fell to the floor.

His face was very near to mine and there was still fury in his eyes. "Listen to me," he said with a low tone. "You will marry James and, from now until the wedding, you'll be locked in this house and only will go out with me. I won't let you harm yourself. Now go to your room."

I spent that night crying, and the next one, and the next one. And, when I didn't have tears left, I thought…I thought of plans to avoid marrying James. I didn't have many choices, really; it was either killing myself or… or…

It came to me suddenly, the option I had been looking for. I'd have to be stealthy because it wasn't as drastic as taking my life away, but I was sure Father would lock me in my room if he knew what I was about to do. I only had to wait for the perfect moment to escape without being seen.

*.*

That perfect moment came two weeks after. Father had to go to Winchester again and I was being watched over by Sue Clearwater. I went with her to church on Sunday and, when the monks finished their chants, I told Sue that I needed to go to confess.

Only that I didn't go. I took advantage of the big crowd gathered at the church and went to where the nuns stood. I wasn't supposed to be there —nobody that wasn't a nun could be in that part of the church—, but it would only be a moment. I needed to talk to the Mother Superior.

She scolded me when she saw me, but I dismissed it. I was frantic; somebody could see me and tell Sue, and then I would have lost my opportunity forever.

She smiled when I told her that I had felt the call of God and that I wanted to spend the rest of my life serving Him. Immediately. She asked me if I had thought about it thoroughly, but didn't resist much because they were in constant need of more nuns to expand their small community in Forkshire and…well, because I had a heavy bag of gold coins with me.

She told me to go with her and led me to a door. I crossed it into the nunnery, and my future.

*.*

Six months after entering the nunnery I didn't felt happier, but I did felt more at peace. I still wasn't a nun, I only was a novice —I would take my vows after the New Year, during the Epiphany liturgy.

We were at the first week of Advent and, like I said, I didn't felt happier but we had a strict schedule even as novices so I had little time to think of Edward or what I had done to my father. So, again like I said, I felt somewhat at peace.

I was at the kitchen when Sister Angela came looking for me. She was only a few years older than me and had said from the first moment that I shouldn't be there; not because she hated me, but because she thought I could be happy outside with a man and a family. She knew my reason for entering, though, so she didn't usually voiced her thoughts in front of me.

"I need you to go to the hospice and help the doctor," she told me.

"Yes, Sister," I said, and went to the small hospice where we attended to the sick and poor.

I was wondering why she had sent me. We weren't an enclosed convent, so we sometimes interacted with men —usually the monks of the monastery or the ones that were at the hospice. But sometimes someone from outside visited us, and we the novices normally weren't allowed to talk to them as to avoid temptation.

Once was my father who had visited. He had been so mad when he came back from Winchester and heard the news that he had gone to the nunnery for me without accepting a no for an answer. A couple of the Count's squires that were near on the street had to take him out. He hadn't come back. I didn't know if I could ever have a relationship with my father again after the hurt I had caused him, but it had been the only thing I could do. He had not let me another option.

I shook my head to get rid of those thoughts when I reached the hospice. I spotted quickly a man crouched over someone on the ground and approached them.

"Sister Angela said you needed…" I trailed off, when he looked at me. Him.

"Hello, Bella," he said, and it was like music for my ears. Only he called me like that, and it had been a long time since the last time I heard it. More than five years.

"Edward," I said, paralyzed.

He got up and took my arm gently, leading me to the far wall where we could have a bit of intimacy to speak.

"What are you doing here, Bella?"

"I'm going to be a nun, I've felt God's call. What are you doing here?"

"I've come for you," he said, as if it was obvious.

"Yes? And what does your wife think of it?" I asked sarcastically.

"My wife? Don't you know? Nobody has told you?"

"Well, I don't seem to know a thing these days, not since you came back. So, enlighten me, Edward." I was mad, I was really mad. I hadn't known back then, when I learn that he had betrothed to other despite our own compromise, that I was furious. But I was, and I was letting it all out at that moment.

He looked at me softly, like he used to look at me back then. "You have every right to be angry at me, Bella, but please let me explain. Oh, Bella, I have missed you so much and I have so much to tell you.

"But first you have to know. I'm not married, Bella. Rosa is married to Emmett now, they're living in the lands the Count gave Emmett when armed him a knight and they're expecting their first child."

I wasn't expecting that, I wasn't prepared to hear it. She was married to Edward's brother? "But, why?"

"Because I neglected her, Bella. All I could think about when I came back was you, and I was miserable —I made everybody around me feel miserable. So she started spending time with Emmett and a week before our wedding said she loved him and so she couldn't marry me." There was such a deep sadness in his voice that I felt the need to hug him tight and comfort him, but I couldn't do that. I didn't know the entire story and if I touched him…well, I didn't know if I could separate from him if I did.

"And you just…accepted it? Just like that, you accepted that your betrothed got married to your brother?" I asked in disbelief.

"You have to understand something, Bella. I betrothed her only after reading that message you sent. I was grown up and needed a wife and…"

"Wait, what message?" I hadn't sent him any message, I didn't even know exactly where he was.

"The message where you said you had found a man and were going to marry him. And then I come back and hear that you aren't married, that you haven't even considered anyone of your suitors. Why did you do it? Were you tired of waiting, or it was some sacrificial act so I could be free? I don't know, Bella. My heart was broken and Rosa was there to take the pieces…"

I still couldn't believe it. Somebody had sent him a message telling him that I was going to marry? But, who? I could only think of my father, but I didn't believe him —I didn't want to believe him— capable of doing something like that.

I told him that and he swore that he'd find the person that had done it.

He cupped his hand on my cheek and rubbed gently his thumb over it while he looked me in the eyes. "We could have avoided all this. We could be married by now.

"But we can now," he added, his tone hopeful. "You can leave this place and come with me, and have the life we planned."

I was perplexed, I didn't know what to think. I had so much information swimming in my head…I needed time to think of everything.

I was still holding his gaze and hadn't realized that our faces were almost touching until the voice of Mother Superior exclaimed, "Isabella! Go back to the kitchen, now!"

I looked at her and said "yes, Mother" before looking back at Edward and stepping away. "I… I'm sorry. I have to think about it. Everything is so confusing, I…" I was at a good distance away from him when I told him I was sorry again and run to the kitchen.

*.*

I barely slept that night. I had a lot in my head and felt I wouldn't sleep again until I had it all figured out. And I had to do it soon, because Epiphany would be in less than a month and I was running out of time to make a decision.

It was silly, really, because my heart had known what I had to do the exact moment he told me he wasn't married, but I still spent the four weeks of Advent pondering my decision. I never had been a very religious person, I believed in God but I wasn't sure if he cared about us praying and giving money to the church or things like that. But I felt more at peace after talking to my confessor about it.

"You can serve God in many ways, Daughter. He made some of us to serve him inside His Church, but others were made to serve Him helping the poor, working the land or having a family," he said wisely while he looked at me with kind eyes.

"Thank you, Father."

"You may go at peace, Daughter."

That cemented my decision. So I went to see the Mother Superior and on Christmas Eve I climbed the ladder of the Count's Tower, where I knew that everybody where gathered for the feast that usually took place on that day.

*.*

Everybody was surprised to see me but the reaction I feared the most was my father's. I had thought he would yell at me or hit me again, or even do as if I wasn't there —his indifference would have hurt more than anything. But no. He just left the place where he was talking with a few men of the town and hugged me to him so tightly I couldn't breathe. There were tears in his eyes and in mine too, but we didn't care that others saw us cry.

Then there was James. Edward had found out that it had been him who had sent that message and I was terrified that he'd still want to marry me; but, when I entered the nunnery, his father had found him a noble bride and now was married.

So that left Edward. He only came to me and kissed me in front of everybody. He was laying his claim and after all those years and the last months of sadness, I had to break the kiss to let out a laugh of pure joy.

"I'm sure some people think I'm crazy," I told him later. Everybody was at their homes after the midnight liturgy, but we still didn't have or own home —his parents, Rose and Emmett were at his house, and my father was at mine with Sue. Harry Clearwater had died soon before I turned into a novice and Father had married Sue just last month. I surely didn't want to be in that house with a newlywed couple.

So we had gone to our place, to our pond.

"I don't think so. It's the magic of Christmas, nobody thinks badly of others on this day," he said.

"The magic of…?" I whispered. "Do you know they could burn you for talking about magic? For talking about magic referred to such a date?"

"There's nobody here and, besides, they can't burn me if I burn spontaneously first."

"What?" I asked him, laughing.

"I'm sure you can feel it," he whispered.

My breath hitched and I noticed at that moment. We had already been there a long time, kissing and touching. My hand was under his shirt, touching his naked chest and stomach, which at that moment were on fire. More so, I was on fire too. I just needed him after all that time.

I kissed him, long and deep, and when we broke it to breathe, he laid me on the ground, over my cape. His hand went under my skirts, between my legs while I held to him with my left arm around his neck and reached my right hand under his hoses.

We didn't went all the way that night —we were in the forest and it was too cold. And we weren't married yet. We just kissed and touched and kissed and touched some more, more than ever before. And when he had just release his seed and snow fell around us on that night our Savior was born, he finally asked me, "Will you be my wife?"

I felt tears in my eyes, tears of joy. "Yes," I whispered.

He smiled that beautiful smile of his, the one that made his green eyes sparkle even more. "You have waited a long time for me."

"Oh, Edward, I'd wait for you a thousand years if necessary."

He laughed softly. "That's a better gift than that set of medical instruments the Count gave me."

I smiled like a fool, like a fool in love. "Merry Christmas, Edward."

"Merry Christmas, Isabella," he said, before lowering his face to kiss me.

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