A/N: This is my first attempt at this...it's a lot more fun than I thought it would be! A few small things - this is a period piece, but I promise not to bore you senseless with battlefields and history lessons. All will be explained in good (hopefully short) time. That said, I have done as much as possible to adhere to the basics of both the period and the battle and the events surrounding it.

I don't own Twilight, its characters, its plot, or anything else about it. I wish I did. I wish I owned even one teeny tiny page. But it's Stephenie Meyer's world, I'm just living in it.

Edward

We've been walking forever.

It feels like forever anyway. I can't remember what it feels like to have one whole day when I'm not walking. Or fighting. We only stop walking to fight. Then we bury our brothers and our cousins and our friends and pick up our wounded and start walking again. Only way a man doesn't have to keep walking is if he's hurt bad or dead.

Sometimes I look out at those dead boys all scattered across the fields of Virginia or Maryland and I think I might just like to trade places with them. They just look so peaceful laying there where they fell. Even the mounds of freshly moved soil where makeshift graves mark the final resting place for so many look soft and inviting, though they won't for long once the scavengers get to them. And their occupants don't have to walk anymore.

Of course they aren't peaceful, they're empty shells that once were men, piled one atop the other in shallow, nameless graves. But I'm empty too, and I still have to keep on walking and fighting.

It seems like decades since I lit out from home with Emmett and Jasper. We couldn't hardly get out of Providence Forge fast enough; we practically ran all the way to Richmond full of excitement and fuss to whip us some Yankees and be home in time for Christmas. We joined up with General Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia ready to march off to glory.

Really we were just marching off to die.

That was two years ago now. It's June 30, 1863 and we've been walking and fighting since the summer of 1861. We've seen dead men in the fields at Manassas and Antietam and Fredericksburg. My once-fine butternut uniform is shoddy and threadbare; it doesn't keep out the cold in winter or the bugs in summer. My stovepipe hat leaks rain with the storms that come after every battle and I consider myself lucky just to have that much. Most of the boys still left in our regiment are without hats, and many are without boots as well. I myself have walked through two pairs of boots, and I've marched a fair mile in no boots at all 'til I can find a fitting pair on some poor fallen boy that won't need 'em anymore.

"Hey! Coppertop! You even listening to me?" Emmett's booming voice rang in my ears and pulled me out of my melancholy and back to the road ahead.

"What? Sorry Emmett, what was that?" I sighed.

My cousin Emmett McCarty had been my boyhood friend. We were as much brothers as cousins, since his folks and mine lived just a stone's throw apart in Providence Forge all our lives. And Coppertop is what he'd been calling me since we were young and Emmett saw a copper pot for the first time. He took one look at that kettle, one look at my own copper-colored hair flying about my head wild in the wind, and the name stuck. I used to fight it, but it's become part of me now.

"Shoot, boy. If I didn't know any better I'da thought you were yarnin' after some girl. You look about as sad as last year's cotton." Emmett clapped me on the back a little too hard.

"Aw hell, Em!" I said sorely. "Do you have to hit me so hard? My bones have hurt since Fredericksburg, and getting swatted by you don't do me any good!" I winced as I rubbed my shoulder.

Emmett had been a blacksmith in Providence Forge, just like his father and grandfather before him. The McCarty men were all the same: gentle and kind, but strong as oxen and loud as the sound of their hammers on hot metal. When the McCartys spoke, people listened.

Em joined up thinking he could be of use in the camps, knowing his way around a hammer and a forge. And gentle as he may have been with friends and neighbors, Emmett was never one to back down from a fight, no matter how big and no matter who started it, so when word came that Virginia needed volunteers, Emmett just figured he ought to go see this fight was about.

So no one was surprised to find he had a knack for fighting, but it did comes as a mite bit of a shock to find out he had something of a knack for leading men into battle. But like I said, when the McCartys talk, people listen, even when bullets are flying by their heads. So now he's Sergeant McCarty, but Jasper and I bring him down a peg any chance we get, because we still think of him as just Em.

"C'mon Emmett," Jasper drawled. "He's not pining over any girl. There's no joy in that boy's eyes. 'Sides, when's the last time you even saw a girl wasn't chasing us off her property or else cowering in fear behind the curtains while we march by? " Emmett smirked and shrugged.

The war had done one of two things to folks that lived near the battle lines: made 'em braver or made 'em afraid. We'd seen our share of both, but I preferred the brave ones. At least they had some fight left in 'em. The ones that hid were like a mirror into my own soul, tired of the fighting and the bleeding and the killing and the dying. They just watched us scuffle by from behind broken window panes, hanging on as tight as they could to whatever trifles and trinkets ain't already been stolen or sold, and silently prayed we'd just keep walking.

"My guess? His feet are tired." Jasper looked at me meaningfully, as if to say, "I know it ain't just your feet, Edward, it's your heart too."

Jasper's knack was for sensing what people were thinking. Sometimes it was plain scary how much that boy could tell just by looking at a person. Jasper Whitlock may as well have been a brother too. His folks were killed in a barn fire in Texas when he was a little boy and my mother's heart was always big enough for one more child, being a teacher and all. So when he came to stay with a distant relation in Providence Forge until other arrangements could be made, Mama took one look at little blond Jasper with his serious face and she took him in. We thought maybe his kin would have put up a fuss, but even as a lad Jasper could tell more about a person by looking at him than most adults could abide by.

Jasper was quiet and serious, a perfect complement to Emmett's thunderous voice and mischievous behavior. When Emmett announced his intentions to join up, Jasper had nodded almost knowingly to himself and said, "Well alright then. Lemme just get my bundle and we'll go."

Shoot, he probably had known what Em was planning to do all along. But when I asked him why he wanted to go, since this wasn't our fight, Jasper just said, "Well Edward, I been in Providence Forge nearly 15 years now. I don't remember Texas, or the trip here, or my mama or my daddy much either. I don't hardly remember anything but this town, and I think I might like to see a thing or two in this life. 'Sides, somebody's gotta keep you and Em in line." And he grinned at me and sauntered off to pack his belongings.

And just like that, I was going too. I meant what I said, about this not being my war. I know Virginia followed South Carolina out of the Union in favor of state's rights, but the right they were fighting for was the right to own another man, and I couldn't abide by that. Couldn't then, can't now. My folks and Emmett's were both from the North to begin with. Emmett's father moved to from New York to Virginia to be an apprentice to an old family friend. My own parents had ventured south from Pennsylvania when word came north that teachers were scarce in some of the smaller towns in Virginia and the Carolinas.

Neither of our families owned slaves, nor did we personally know anyone that did. All the big plantations out on the road to Richmond were worked by slaves of course, but Providence Forge was a little town, and our place in it was smaller still. Blacksmiths didn't have much call for slaves, and my daddy was the town schoolmaster, so neither did we, with no land to work. And Mama liked gardening and cooking so much, she wouldn't let a soul near the little ground we did plant on, nor the kitchen either.

So even though we weren't fighting the rich man's war to own another man, the three of us lit out to fight anyway, each for our own reason. Emmett for the fight, Jasper to see the world, and me, well, I just didn't know what else to do, so I was swept along with my friends. We three had been thick as thieves our whole lives, and we'd vowed to die together if need be, but none of us would ever be alone.

"Darn right my feet hurt." I looked gratefully at Jasper, silently thanking him for keeping my demons out of the open. "We've been walking for weeks and I haven't seen the inside of a barn for a good night's sleep in just as long. I'm plumb wore out." I sighed again.

Sometimes we'd find empty houses or barns, skeletons of someone's home that had been abandoned out of fear of a raid or a battle. Most times anything of any use was already stripped clean, food, blankets, clothing, anything that'd draw a price or a trade. But just to sleep under a roof, sometimes in a bed of old straw, was like heaven for us now.

"Well Cop," Emmett said to me as he gestured to a leaning old barn ahead of us on a little lane just off the main road out of Hagerstown that we'd been walking along for what seemed like ages. "You just might be in luck. Don't look like there's any livestock left in that barn judging by the grass growing around it. House looks pretty quiet too. Maybe the folks heard we were comin' and turned tail 'til the fighting's over."

I had to agree with Emmett after examining the property a bit. The grass around the barn was more than knee-high in the late June heat, a sure sign no animals were left. The house was quiet with no smoke from an evening meal coming from the lone chimney. The windows were closed, another sign that no one was inside. The summer heat was almost as heavy as it would have been back home, and the heat shimmered across the fields and the still grasses in the evening light. It almost seemed like the world moved slower in the wavy, shiny air.

The order to stop for the night had passed along the ranks while we talked, and Em set about making sure his direct charges were set up for the night. Jasper and I had both made Corporal after Antietam, but truth be told, most of the time it just seemed like they promoted us because we lived. We weren't in charge of much, so setting up camp wasn't much of a chore. By the time Emmett finished his duties and found us again, Jasper had water boiling over a fire for tea and I was fishing through my pack for some bacon and cornmeal to cook up for supper.

"Word is General Pickett's heading us towards Gettysburg," Emmett said as he strode over the fire and crouched down wearily. "'Bout 25 miles from here the way I hear it. The Old Man's called us all there to meet the Army of the Potomac. Should be a good fight comin'." Em was cheerful in this announcement. Battles always made Emmett cheerful, especially since he discovered he had some skill in a fight.

I didn't say anything as I fried up the bacon and then dumped the cornmeal into the leftover grease to make corn cakes. Battles didn't make me cheerful. Fact was, I'd lost my stomach for fighting months ago. I was tired and empty and sad. But I couldn't go home because I had no life to go home to, and because my brothers were here, so I was here.

Jasper and I ate in silence as we listened to Emmett go on about the plans for battle and where we would go tomorrow. We were near a little town called Chambersburg, he said, and we'd head due east to Gettysburg tomorrow to engage the enemy nearby. He went on a while longer while we cleaned up our skillet, then looked around at the other men settling in our camp.

"You boys want to go see about that barn?" He lowered his voice as he jerked his chin toward the structure we'd been eyeing earlier. "Seems to me if we're headed for a big fight, the least we could have is a good night's sleep first."

Jasper and I nodded in unison. Emmett got up and stretched, making a show of heading for his camp before striding casually away. He would get to the barn in a roundabout fashion after he checked the camp one last time. I looked at Jasper and stood, hoisting my bundle over my shoulder and walking slowly in the direction of the barn. Jasper stayed sitting by the fire. He always did, giving the embers a few moments to burn away and me a few minutes' head start. We'd been lucky so far, none of the men had caught on to our routine, but we tried to be careful enough that no one would. Could be the wrong man would take it as an attempt at desertion, an offense not looked upon too kindly in our thinning ranks.

I reached the barn first and quietly pushed the door open, then sighed in relief and weariness. It was empty, and had been for some time if the smell of dank, moldy hay was any indication. I looked around as I stepped inside. Small, even by small town standards, it wouldn't have held more than a few animals, but there was a hay loft above with some promising stalks poking out through the slats over my head.

I was testing the ladder to be sure the rungs wouldn't give way as I climbed up as Emmett stuck his head through the door.

"C'mon in, Em," I said. "Nothing's been in here but mice in months." I surveyed the loft as I reached the top rung. "We'll sleep like kings tonight though!" I grinned. "Hay up here's just like new, long as you don't mind a little damp."

"Sure am glad to hear I didn't sneak all over camp for nothing," came Jasper's drawl from below.

I stuck my head over the loft's ledge and gestured for them to climb up. Once the three of us were all crowded onto the loft, it seemed even smaller than it had been, but we were settled in no time. We never risked a lantern when we snuck away; if the light didn't catch someone's attention, there was the fear that we'd drift off and the lantern would tip and set fire to the barn. Jasper made us promise we'd never try to use a light. He never said as much, but I knew he was afraid we'd end up like his folks, and he'd have to go find another family again.

"Coppertop, you got that fiddle?" Emmett's voice echoed against the corner walls where he'd unrolled his blankets.

"Sure do, Sarge," I mock-saluted Emmett in the evening shadows. "Fancy a concert, do you?"

I loved music. Back home, my parents had saved and saved for months until they could afford a piano when I was a little boy. I'd been captivated by the amazing wooden box with the black and white ivory keys that sang when I touched them. Mama had figured out quickly that I had a knack for music and had engaged another teacher in town to teach me as much as he could, but I outgrew his lessons soon and began playing more and more on my own. Music became my sanctuary in a way I could never find anywhere else. Not with Em or Jasper or any of the girls in town that had looked my way. When I played it was just me and the song of the piano keys.

I'd learned to play the fiddle too, and when we'd left home, Mama had thrust my fiddle into my arms before she ran crying back into the house. "Your music will save you, Edward," she'd said. "And when you play this, know I'll be listening for you all the way back here."

So I'd carried the fiddle in its case across hills and streams and rivers of water and blood. I'd carefully wrapped it in my blankets each time we'd gone off to fight, and then pulled it out to play a hymn for the dead before we moved on.

"Play for us, Edward. Please?" Jasper's voice came quieter from the back wall of the loft. I smiled a little at his request. My playing put us all at ease, I knew that, but it eased me most of all. I felt clear, almost alive when I played. I hadn't felt alive in months, but I could almost feel life around me for a moment when I played.

I lifted the fiddle to my chin in response and started to play softly. The sound of the bow crossing the strings was almost eerie as it echoed and bounced off the big empty woodenness of the barn walls. I played a couple of tunes I'd picked up from other soldiers along the way, switching from a slow, mournful Oh Susannah to Neil Gow's Lament. Finally even I was tired, so I finished with one last song.

Home Sweet Home had been played at every battlefield I'd been to. I'd heard it on dozens of instruments and sung by thousands of voices on both sides. As the haunting melody flowed from my strings, I heard Emmett and Jasper both start to sing quietly, almost to themselves, so I kept playing, pretending I didn't hear.

Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble there's no place like home!
A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there,
Which, seek through the world, is ne'er met with
elsewhere:
Home! Home! sweet, sweet Home!
There's no place like Home!
There's no place like Home.

Finally I let the notes die away and I tucked the fiddle back in my pack and rolled over to face the wall of the barn. I could feel the hay pricking me through my blankets, but I didn't care. As I closed my eyes and listened to the silence outside, I was almost content. I had forgotten, even if only for a moment, that tomorrow I would get up and march off to kill or be killed. My eyes slipped closed, and I was at peace.

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A/N Part 2: Providence Forge is real. Home Sweet Home is both real, and was one of the most commonly sung songs on both sides of the war. The other songs were fairly common as well.

Thanks for reading...no more two-part A/Ns after this!