Hi! Finally, after so much time, I've gathered the motivation to re-write my stories. I was pretty far through this and my other, 'A Small Piece of Forever', when my pencil case was taken at school. I really love the pairing of Sulpicia and Aro, especially because they aren't referred to very much in the books. I only really learned any of their history from the illustrated guide. I tried to add as much truthful information about the characters and the city of Rome as possible. Please, please review. I would VERY much appreciate it.
~Eternal~ Prologue: Among the Ashes
Scorching fire had recently burned through the ancient city of Rome. The once ornate marble and stone buildings had transformed into large piles of stone and ash. Aro walked through the city that was once his home a few hundred years back. Beginning his coven, and becoming the head of it, the Volturi, Aro decided to relocate the guard to the nearby village of Volterra when conditions were beginning to worsen near and in Rome. Even though over the past years, the city began to repair its economic condition, the recent burning had set the city back even farther than it had been before the crash. It was only the fact that he had lived in the place as long as he had that compelled him to return. Kicking a chunk of stone out of his path, he noticed how very few people had survived. The population, as he remembered from his earlier times there, was just nearing over twenty-thousand. He only counted about seventy-four homeless residents rummaging through the piles of stone. Aro walked from charred house to house, attempting to remember what the place had looked like only weeks before. It was then that he began to think how truly despairing the city had become. He walked up to a house with only small bits of the wall left, the windows broken, and the roof only charred bits of rubble scattered along the ground. It was as he wandered the small house, that he heard a small, quiet voice ring out from behind a large piece of stone to his left. For a moment he believed the sound came from one of the piles of ashes that surrounded the home- and the city altogether. He thought better of it just as a small white head appeared out of the smoke from behind a pile of charred stone. Aro predicted the girl was about 5 or 6 years old. She had slate gray eyes, and her golden hair flowed in a natural wave down her back. "Ciao," the pretty girl quietly said, peeking out from behind the rock uncertainly. There was something about her that completely fascinated him, and he couldn't pinpoint why.
"Hello child," greeted, smiling down at her gently. The girl seemed to transform from the sad child he saw just a moment before, to a something much happier as she smiled a more hopeful smile. "Where may your family be?" Aro continued. She sat down on the stone wall, her small feet swinging in front of her. Aro went to sit next to her. The girl looked up at him with a mixture of heart-wrenching sadness, nervousness, and fear in her eyes. She seemed to him very complex for such a young child.
"They have left. All of them," the girl finally told him. Instead of replying, Aro nodded gravely, he didn't care very much about the girl's dead family members, but more about her well-being because of this. Here, in Rome, people had always been very friendly toward each other. He gently took her hand, and the child looked up at him sadly. He went into a sort of trance as he peered into her thoughts. This child had a rough beginning. Her family was once very wealthy, and then lost everything. Their small home died in the inferno, and her parents were able to get her out, but most likely passed away when going in for her elder siblings. He was silently glad that she had no idea of their fate, only that they had disappeared. It was only that he came to his senses as her voice rang out again.
"My name is Sulpicia," she said. How was it she seemed to trust him so instantaneously? She gave him her friendship, and he felt the need to protect her. Aro wondered how such a beautiful child such as Sulpicia could come from a background of such sorrow. He wondered why fate had chosen them to meet today amongst the ashes. Yes, he would protect her, bring her back with him. He hadn't an idea what the others would say about her, but at the moment, that wasn't on his mind.
"I am Aro," he told her, and stared up at the darkening night sky above them, thinking of what was to come of this girl.
Thank you so much for reading. Please review. I'd love to know what I'm able to change or fix. This is my second time re-writing this, and I'm using it more as a prologue to the story more than anything else. Hopefully more will come soon.
~Grace