Leah's story
CHAPTER ONE
So here I was again, mindlessly ready to sacrifice life and limb to protect one family of leaches from an invading force of blood suckers hell bent on destroying the "good vampires." As if there were such a thing. It made me sick to my stomach that I had no choice but to help these vermin, better off letting them kill each other until there was a manageable amount of parasites leftover for us to mop up in the aftermath.
An involuntary growl ripped from my throat at the thought of tearing off Bella Swan's face. It was all her fault in the first place. For years and years the treaty stood intact and our blood unchanged with the Cullen's right next door. For years and years our myths and legends about wear wolves and cold ones were proving to be just that, myths and legends. For years and years we were happy to pass the stories off as the rambling daydreams of our ancestors…until she moved here.
She is the reason for everything that went wrong in my life. If it wasn't for her coming here and attracting all kinds of new vermin to the area. If the bloodsucker Edward had never fallen in love with her and just let her be killed by the original three trespassing leaches two years ago, then maybe they would have just moved on and never came back, then maybe everything would be different now. And just maybe I would still be happy in Sam's arms. But no! Everything had to go all "cause and effect" in the world. Edward protected Bella and killed one of those ticks mate, she in turn started a grudge match in the middle of our territory which, if you follow the trail, was the direct reason for Sam's change in the first place. For years we stay human and happy, then she shows up and the next thing you know, there's a feral vampire problem in Forks and LaPush has a sudden wolf complex. SHE IS THE REASON THAT SAM…
"KEEP YOUR MIND ON THE TASK!" Sam's voice cut through me with all the force of an alpha male and I could feel my whole body shake with the compulsion. It was bad enough that I had to rejoin his stupid pack for this un-avoidable and entirely un-wanted fight, but did he have to use that voice on me every time he issued a command?
Once the shaking stopped and I could think straight again, I began to realize that the alpha command in Sam's blood seemed somehow weaker in comparisons to Jacobs. It was like, since I had defected to Jacobs pack, Sam's weaker blood only had a minimal hold on my free will. As if Sam were a step father trying to issue commands over a true blood father's….it just felt weak. I know that Jacob had never used his "big boy voice" on either me or my brother Seth, but I had no doubt that if he had…I would have no strength to resist what he commanded.
It was scary to me that while we ran together, Jacobs every suggestion seemed nearly as powerful as Sam's command. It took every ounce of my will power to deny him the slightest things, such as when he suggest that I go home for a shower during the weeks of running around the Cullen's, or when I'd dumped out the food that he had offered me by the river or like any number of other times I had denied him anything just for the sake of proving I could. It was never easy, but I feet that I had sufficiently made him work for everything he asked me to do. It was a little petty, but it kept me sane in a crazy world.
As always, as is the case now, thinking about Jacob automatically made me recall the day we had the first decent and civil conversation we had ever had since my first transformation. And, as always, it immediately brought the jealousy, rage and pain to pulse through my veins like liquid fire. We had bonded, in that one moment, through our pain and knowledge that we loved people who would NEVER LOVE US BACK. I could feel him look at things from my perspective for the first time and I felt, through our pack mind, his road stretching into an eternity of loneliness like mine. The embarrassment of rejection and the possibility of being a "genetic dead end," slammed into his gut just as hard as it did to me every time I had to look in Sam's stupid face. At that moment, I thought we made a connection. But, then I felt Jacob's rejection of the awful truth and an intense burning hatred for me right before he made a silent vow of imprinting just before he phased back to human form and out of our link.
I followed Jacob back to the leech's place and watched him go inside from the wood line. It wasn't long before I saw him peel out of the garage in an obscenely expensive car. The noise woke my brother Seth and he immediately phased to see what was going on. It only took him a second to register the entire episode I had with Jacob.
"Nice going sis! You always push people too far, you know that?! Were under enough stress as it is without you pushing your loneliness on other people!" He said it with an almost caring tone, only mildly trying to hurt me. I forgave him instantly like I always do. "Where do you think he's heading?"
"I don't know!" I replied with a little more force than I usually used on my little brother, "but follow him for a ways and make sure he doesn't do anything stupid. I'll run the entire circuit around the leech's…" A disapproving growl rumbled in Seth's chest. He was just as offended by the term "leech" or "bloodsucker" as the vermin were. "Sorry." I amended quickly "Vampire's house, just make sure you don't lose him!"
With all the gusto of youth, he took off after the car and, in the manner of all younger brothers who felt an unneeded responsibility to protect there older sisters, left me with some advice that I already knew about staying safe and warning the Cullen's about any danger… blah blah blah.
I had only had a chance to run two and a half complete circuits when Seth returned. I had already known through the link that Jacob was on his way to Seattle, so he didn't bother to report it a second time as he took his half of the roaming guard. We ran in silence for a couple of hours and it was quite a while before the guilt of driving Jacob away, no matter how briefly, after our near bonding moment began to sink into my stomach. Was it true? Was I such a retch, that I had to spread my misery on others just to feel close to them?
I was trying to work up an official apology for Jacob when I made a pass a little too close to the house. The screaming that was coming from inside sounded worse than any horror movie I had ever seen. It was as if somebody were tearing Bella in half. An odd sense of satisfaction wormed it's way into my belly at the horrible sound. At last Bella was experiencing the pain that she deserved. At last she was paying a little for what she had done to hurt Jacob and the rest of my family. Seth's concern for the vermin lover was instant and I could feel his need to come and investigate the scene. His concern and lapse in discipline reminded me to get back to work and I ordered him to do the same.
I was only just getting back to my route when we heard the car pull up and I could feel Seth's relief that Jacob had come back. Apprehension stirred in my belly at the coming apology that I would have to give him. Not because I really felt too bad about what I said, after all, the man should hear the truth without the sugarcoating if he's ever going to get over her. I only had to apologize because I had a feeling that he would order me back to Sam if I didn't, not just tell me to go, he would order it. I wasn't ready to go back and not without my brother anyways, so apologize I would.
I told Seth to take the circuit so I could phase back to human mode and apologize without him having to hear the mushy stuff. He quickly agreed and I was just about to go to the tree line and phase when I felt the oddest thing. Worry, horror and heart brokenness, But it wasn't coming from me or Seth… It was coming from Jacob. I could feel him pulling at the pack mind, sharing his emotions with us. It was like he was phased into wolf mode, but he was still a man. If I closed my eyes, I could see what he saw, smell what he smelled and feel what he felt.
The screams escalated in the house and I could see fountains of blood through Jacobs eyes and hear Bella's bones snapping like dry twigs. I felt Seth stop in horror at the gruesome scene. In the house I could here two distinct heart beats, one getting stronger and the other fading. I saw the blood sucker Edward bite down on something that looked like a ball of stone and pull a crying mass of blood out of it, then he placed it in my beloveds arms. I could feel nothing but over powering need to keep my Bella's heart pumping. To keep her alive.
Wait a minute! MY beloveds? MY Bella? This was getting way to out of hand! I shook my head to try and clear it of the confusing emotions running through all of our heads. I was not Jacob, I am Leah Clearwater and I am NOT in LOVE with Bella Swan! There, now that that was straight, I could register a dramatic change in our.. HIS!… mood. It was a deep and desperate hopelessness. She was dead, my Bella was dead and it was all that monstrosities fault. We couldn't seem to move faster than a slow motion as the bloodsucker, what's his name? Tried in vain to save Bella. It was hopeless and the only thing left to do was to destroy the monster that killed her.
I could feel Seth rebel weakly at Jacobs line of thought, but even though it wasn't a command and Jacob was definitely not in wolf form, Seth couldn't help but to draw up battle plans to kill the bloodsuckers that he called friends. Only Edward would be spared, only he would live with the pain of loss almost as great as ours. The rest were meant for the fire.
We reached the bottom of the stairs and all our concentration was fixed on destroying the demon spawn from hell. The blond bimbo lifted the doomed child above her head and we all tensed for the strike. We relished the thought of killing the little murderer. I had never felt closer to Jacob then at that exact moment when our twin hatred almost came together for the final strike….
Then the most un-thinkable, the most un-believable, The most vial thing that could have possibly happened, happened. HE IMPRINTED ON THE LITTLE MONSTER!
It felt like the end of everything to me. I was absolutely alone in my pain and misery. I would never have anyone to share it with now that my only ally in grief had imprinted. Hot knives of jealousy and betrayal stabbed through my stomach. How could he!? As all the implications of our alpha male imprinting on a half leech slammed into me, I felt my knees buckle, my human knees. I couldn't remember phasing. The link was broken and I was truly alone with my horror. The Cullen's were forever allies to the pack now, there would never be any retribution against them for how they split me and Sam apart. I ran naked and un-caring into the woods as fast as I could, trying to get away from everything. I had to find a way to leave both packs. I had to get away from LaPush.
