A/N: This story is written from Renesmees' daughters point of view - Isabella Joslin. She is kidnapped from her bed in Forks in the middle of the night and is taken to meet her real parents to discover the amazing and terrifying world of mythical creatures. Please read and review, even if it is bad! I love any sort of feed back coz I love to know what your reactions to my work!
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I was trapped, like a pathetic lab rat locked in a cage waiting for the scientist's approach. The landscape outside the car windows was as dark as pitch. The face reflected back to me in the black glass wore an expression of pure terror; this was definitely not where I had been before I had fallen asleep. I hoped with all my might that this was a dream though I had just about ruled that one out; I had pinched myself so hard that I was sure I had, if not broken the skin, at least given myself a decent bruise.
I had no idea where I was or how I had gotten here. I was supposed to be at home in my safe, warm bed, not in the back of some strange car, tearing down the highway at two hundred kilometres an hour.
The guy driving the car – my kidnapper - was a stranger to me; I couldn't remember him from anywhere at present. My thoughts were in a scramble, wondering desperately what he would want with a normal, insignificant 16 year old girl. I hadn't done anything to him had I? I was innocent.
My stomach twisted, tying itself into knots and making me gag, last night's dinner threatening to make its way back up my throat. I wasn't sure if it was from fear or the speed. I wanted desperately to know why I was here, who he was and where he was taking me but I was too afraid to even breathe too loudly let alone speak. I wondered if he could hear my heart that was playing a drum role in my chest.
The drivers' massive hands were clenched into fists on the driving wheel, which looked in danger of snapping; he was huge, muscular in every way possible; his upper arms – which looked to be about the size of my neck, probably bigger – had hundreds of clearly defined muscles. His legs were the same. His hair, a dark brown or black, was cropped short on the sides but longer on top. The skin – stretched tight over his muscles – was very pale and looked strangely soft. In the green iridescent light of the clock on the dash board it seemed to glow. It made him look bizarre, somehow otherworldly. I looked into the rear view mirror to see his face and found him staring at me.
I looked away quickly, my breathing increasing to near hysteria and fought back another gag. I couldn't hear the drivers breathing and from the corner of my eye it didn't look as though he was breathing either – his chest wasn't rising and falling the way it should have been. His posture was rigid, back straight as a board and muscles tensed. I sneaked one more look into the rear view mirror. This time he was staring straight ahead. His face was beautiful with perfect features that temporarily had me mesmerised but that soon disappeared when I took in the expression etched into his skin. It was contorted into what looked like a mixture of darkest anger and deepest pain. I had never seen such an expression before and it sent a jolt of panic through my already stressed body.
I looked out of the windshield as a distraction from my way too active imagination. Up ahead there was a faint glow; city lights. I was just trying to figure out what town it could be when the driver spoke for the first time.
'Welcome to Phoenix, Arizona,' he said in strained yet somehow musical voice that didn't match his muscular appearance.
I was so stunned by his sudden spur of speech that the words didn't register for a moment, though when they did I surprised myself by making my own little outburst.
'What! How can we have travelled that far?' I spluttered and then fell silence, thinking about this rationally. I lived in Forks, WA and it was a four hour plane flight from there to here. Then I remembered the speed we had been travelling at all night and I didn't know how long I had been asleep for. I wondered erratically whether he was tired.
He kept quiet, slowing slightly, for the lights were nearing, getting brighter by the second. He still hadn't relaxed from his pose.
I decided that I would chance two more questions since he hadn't seemed too distressed by my little speech before.
'W-who a-are you and w-what do you w-w-want with me?' I had meant for it to a demand but my voice was shaking so it came out as more of a stuttered squeak of terror.
Again he was silent, slowing to an almost normal speed as we entered the city limits. The lights through the black tinted glass were blinding after so much darkness - I realized that he didn't have any head lights on. How could he have seen in the dark?
He finally answered my question.
'My name is Michael Hale and I am taking you to meet your parents.'
This derailed my train of thought. My parents lived in Forks, back the way we had come! I had no family here, well not that I was aware of anyway. They all lived in Italy, Scotland and Australia. My parents had come to America to live out their whacky dream.
'W-what? I-I'm sorry, but you have the wrong person. M-my parents live in Forks, Washington. They have done since before I was born.' He surprised me by smiling. This was even worse than his last expression for his smile revealed a straight row of brilliantly white teeth that had the same sort of glow as his skin in the lights.
'You are, as I presume, Isabella Joslin?'
I didn't answer. That was my name and there was no point in me trying to deny it – I was the worst of liars.
He seemed to take my silence as a conformation, for he nodded to himself and resumed his strained pose. I was sure that I could see the steering wheel bowing under his immense hands.
It was starting to get light on the unusual cloudy horizon and we still hadn't stopped. By now we had travelled through the city and out into the suburbs. The houses were bigger and more spread out, placed on large blocks of land with few trees.
We drove for about an hour through the country side that was mostly made up of grazing land where cows ranged around the small paddocks in search of the rare green stalks of grass. I was starting to get hungry and could really have used a bathroom but didn't feel capable of speaking again; the retching was becoming more frequent.
After what seemed like forever we turned left onto a dirt lane leading into one of the scare forest that called Phoenix home. The lane snaked through the under growth like a river twisting and turning, finding its way to the ocean. All was quiet except for my ragged breathing which had picked up again.
According to the clock it was 6:38am when we finally made it through the last of the trees. The clearing into which we entered was roughly the size of a football field with a beautiful house placed in the middle and a massive garden consisting of many tall shady trees, small shrubs and lots of brightly-coloured, flowering ground covers. The house was magnificent; it was three stories tall with walls and balconies poking out in peculiar places. The walls of the top and ground floor were white, rendered brick while the first floor looked to be made entirely out of honey coloured wood panels, well the parts of the walls that you could see; it had so many windows set into the walls, all of different sizes. Michael seemed to relax as soon as all of this came into view though his calm didn't last long.
On the front porch of the house was a welcoming crew consisting of five men and five women all but one bearing the same expression; loathing. One of the males in the front - the oldest – looked grave and disapproving but not angry. The entire group had pale skin, the shame shade and texture as Michaels and dark shadows set deep under their eyes. The one exception to this was a remarkably tall man, who looked to be around the age of twenty and was darkly tanned with black hair that reached down to just past his shoulders.
The man from the front of the group – the calm one who had wavy, blonde hair – descended the steps and seemed to glide rather than walk across the grass towards the car. Michael, not so sure of himself now, cut the engine and climbed out into the overcast morning.
As the blonde reached my kidnapper, Michael started spluttering at once. He seemed to be trying to explain but to me it was incoherent. The only word I caught was what I guessed to be the blondes' name – Carlisle.
Carlisle ceased his stutters by giving him an expression of grim betrayal. I didn't see or hear it happen but suddenly the group that had been on the porch were right behind Carlisle advancing slowly on the now cowering Michael. Only two lingered behind; the tall, tanned man and a woman around the age of eighteen with long bronze-coloured ringlets.
'What have you done? Didn't we clearly explain to you after you "over heard" our conversation that she was not yet ready to hear about her heritage?' inquired Carlisle strictly. Michael stuttered again and retreated to the back of the car. Carlisle paid him no mind and instead turned to address his party. 'Nessy, Jacob, Bella, Edward take our guest into the house and calm her down but do not explain anything to her until we are all gathered. I'll take Michael for a short walk; I need a few answers before we decide on anything. The rest of you please try and make yourselves useful and prepare something for Isabella to eat – she must be hungry.'
Everyone looked at me then, I tried to ignore them but was not completely successful. Instead I concentrated on how I had heard my name twice in Carlisles' instructions; the first time my nickname and the second my full name: I realized that one of the females must be named Bella. I also wondered how he had known my name. Like Michael I had never met him before.
The four that had been assigned to me came around to my side of the car. I did not scoot to the other side which was mainly because Carlisle and the others were still huddled there. The woman with the bronze ringlets bent down and smiled gently through the window at me. I did not move. I didn't feel as threatened as I had before but I was still uncomfortable with being around my 'family'. I wondered what sort of joke Michael was playing at bringing me here, taking me away from my real parents. I just wanted to go home.
The women straightened up and then slowly, very deliberately opened the door. This time I moved to the middle seat. She bent down again.
'Hi Isabella or do you prefer Bella?' I didn't answer though it was hard to be frightened of this person, what with her perfect appearance and her voice made of bells. 'I'm Renesmee and this is Bella,' she motioned to the other female with her; more a girl than a woman, around eighteen or nineteen with thick brown hair, 'Edward,' she motioned to a male nearer the back with untidy, bronze-coloured hair, 'and Jacob,' she finished with the man I had noticed before with the dark skin.
She touched my arm and I recoiled, shrinking further into the back seat; her touch had been much warmer than I had expected. She withdrew it and slid into the backseat with me, I slithered to the other side. She sighed.
'There is no need to be afraid of us. We won't hurt you. We just want you to be safe. Why don't you come inside and have something to eat?' I sat there for a minute expecting her to give up and walk away but I was wrong: she let me think and waited for an answer. I settled on walking to the porch and sitting there; there was a large comfy looking seat occupying a large amount of the porch.
'Fine but I'm sitting on the porch, not inside.' It surprised me that my voice was so strong - I was scared of these strangers and yet I was able to talk to them like I had known them for years.
She took this as an improvement and removed herself from the backseat so I was able to clamber out. My legs were like jelly after sitting down for so long and I fell into Renesmees' awaiting arms. I could feel my face and ears grow hot as she helped me to the house and up the stairs. She let go of me then for she could feel that I had had enough of her proximity. I lowered myself down onto the seat and the girl named Bella floated through the door and into the house. Like with all the others, I was blown away by her beauty: her brown hair was long reaching to the middle of her back, her heart-shaped face contained wide eyes with black irises, prominent cheek bones and lips where the top was a little too full to counteract the lower.
The man – Edward – sat down on the other end of the couch. He was lanky, less bulky than the others with black irises like Bella. He looked to be the youngest of the men. Renesmee sat down next to him and put her head on his shoulder and Edward patted her hair lightly.
By this time I was pretty desperate to use the bathroom and thinking about refreshments was not helping. Renesmee pointed me in the right direction though I didn't make it any further than the door step; I was too dazed by the beauty of the house.
The front door opened onto a large lounge room with honey coloured wooden floors, light gray green walls and a high ceiling holding an intricate, gold chandelier with crystals hanging from every stem of elaborately twisted metal. The room was filled with many large, soft looking lounge chairs, three of which were crowded around the biggest flat screen TV I'd ever seen. Spaced around the room were five large light-wooded doors. The door to the left of where I was standing was wide open and a lovely aroma of bacon was wafting through; this must be the kitchen. In the far right corner of the room was a lovely spiral staircase with a satin smooth rail the same colour as the floor boards. The walls pointing in the general directions of the sunrise and sunset were all glass giving a clear view of the yard outside which was now dark from the heavy clouds now drizzling rain and leaving small, muddy puddles in the grass.
I recovered from my trance and crossed the room to the third door from the right as instructed.
I returned to my post after visiting the ballroom sized bathroom and noticed an addition to the little group on the porch; Carlisle stood next to Edward conversing with him in whispers. I sat down as far away from them as possible.
I was just thinking about the bacon cooking in the kitchen when Bella emerged from the house accompanied by a short, thin, pixie like woman around nineteen with deep black hair cropped short and pointing in every direction and a tall, lean, muscular man with honey blonde hair. Bella boar a large plate holding bacon, scrambled eggs and toast which she handed to me along with a large glass of orange juice. She smiled and went to sit on the arm of the chair next to Edward who kissed her and moved her to his lap.
I ate my meal slowly, savouring the taste; my parents were vegetarian so I didn't get meat very often. As I finished the pixie like woman and the honey blonde man approached. I was about to cringe away from their advance when I suddenly felt strangely calm and forgot my intensions. I felt assured that these people weren't going to hurt me though that was the opposite of what I had been feeling a second ago.
The blonde sat down next to me and took my hand. His touch was cold as ice, like he had just taken his hand out of the freezer. I gasped but did not withdraw my hand. I felt sort of at ease from my problems with him here. I leaned my head against his chest - which felt like a rock - and he stroked my hair.
'It's going to be alright,' he soothed and in that moment I believed him.