Title: Blood on the Moon Part: 1
Series: Twilight Type: Alternate Universe (Eclipse)
Pairing: Jacob/Edward Rating: PG
Summary: While Sam's wolf-pack joins the Cullen coven in a fight against deadly new-born vampires, Edward and Seth battle Victoria to save Bella's life. During the fight, Seth falls... what if he wasn't faking..?
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Twilight characters or anything from the universe of Twilight. I am just taking the characters and playing with them a while – promising to restore them whole and unblemished! Thanks to Stephanie Meyer for creating these toys for me to enjoy. Please don't take any of my playing as having any bearing on the actual books. Enjoy.
JACOB BLACK
I hated funerals. I'd been to too many these past few days.
No one had realised the ferocity of the newborn vampires. Sam had been so confident that we could take them he hadn't stopped to think that there might be a cost.
Now I'd never get to tell him.
His ashes scattered through the air, leaving the scent of nothing but a wasted death and uncertain future. His mother, barely able to stand the torment, turned away as the elders reached for the second earn.
We prayed for Sam and we prayed for Emily. She had known the instant Sam had been killed. Some part of me thinks that she must have gasped as she felt half of her soul twist into nothingness. There was a note, of course... explaining how she simply couldn't survive without Sam. How there was nothing left to her and her future had died with him. All that she had left was left was to end the physical existence which seemed so pointless and painful.
I kind of got that.
A sob tore through the silence and my arm instinctively tightened on the girl beside me.
Leah blamed herself for Sams death. She had been taking on a small group of newborns when she suddenly convulsed and fell, leaving her wide-open to attack. Sam had intervened, turning his back and exposing his flank to the enemy.
We all knew why Leah had reacted, though it didn't hit the pack mind as quickly as his sisters...
The elders addressed the final causality, scattering Seths ashes to the four winds.
We had all been invited to speak, but only I was forced to. I was pack leader... I was the Alpha and it was my duty. All their eyes turned to me, expecting solace, expecting wisdom... Man, this sucked.
"We remember our brothers and sister," I began, my voice shaking, holding Leah as she bit her fist to remain silent. "We remember that they gave all of themselves, so that we might not loose this," I indicated to the gathered few, "Our family. Our homes. Our lives."
I squeezed Leeah closer, hoping to ease some of the suffering. "We understand their sacrifice. And we will never forget them. Every time we move, they will move with us. Every battle we face, they will stand at our sides. In our thoughts and in our hearts. Forever."
That was all I could bare to say. Even the last few words faltered as the rest of the pack dipped their heads in sorrow.
I wished this was the last time I would have to feel such loss... but it was only the beginning.
Two days later I stood outside Bella's house, pounding at the door.
"I know you're in there," I stated, trying to force an edge of amusement into my voice. I failed, of course, "I don't want to take this thing off the hinges, but I will."
After a moment, the door opened and Charlie looked out to me.
"Geez Charlie," I gasped, looking him over, "you look like hell."
"It's where I live, kid."
I couldn't argue with that.
"We don't have to do this... but you'll regret it if you aren't there."
Charlie shrugged. He was already half-dressed. He must have given up to turn back to a more fulfilling course of action... I eyed the half-drunk bottle of bourbon as the man reached for a black tie.
"Starting early again?" I asked, trying to keep it light.
"Started late," Charlie answered, looping the tie around itself with great difficulty, "Then time got early."
I headed over to him, batting his hands away and completing the knot. "Still not sleeping?"
Charlie eyed me, accusingly, "Are you?"
I barked a laugh, sobering as I acknowledged my words. "Sleep isn't the problem Charlie. It's waking and remembering."
He nodded, and then shook on his black jacket. "Suppose she's there already."
I nodded in answer, "Hasn't left the... Cullens," I spat the name, "in a few days."
Charlie huffed as I guided him out the door. "Where's Billy?" He asked, falling into my car.
"Had enough of funerals for one week. " I darkened, wishing I had the option to steer clear of this one.
"Kinda surprised you're so willing to go, under the circumstances," Charlie admitted, pulling a hip-flask from his pocket.
"It's for Bella."
That's all I needed to say.
The Cullen house was just as bright and rank as I remembered. The stink of leeches burned my nose and throat. Carlisle greeted us at the door, opening arms to Charlie, who shrugged him off and moved through to the kitchen, straight to the drinks laid out there.
"I am glad you are here," Carlisle said, "It is good to see you are healing."
The Doctor had been instrumental in healing me and the remains of my pack after the fight; there was no way I could be mad at him. I simply moved passed him, "Depends on your definition of healing, Doc'."
The coven hadn't sustained as many causalities as my pack, but they had lost the little one, Alice. She had suddenly collapsed in a vision, much the same as Leah... The newborns who had finished Sam converged on her and she fell...
Her mate, Jasper, had gone wild with fury, tearing out throats and dismembering opponents in a frenzy of grief and revenge.
When everything had stopped and the last of our enemies lay smouldering in the ashes of purifying flame, Jasper had left. He simply said there was no more for him with the Cullens and there was nothing to existing without Alice. He would head north and remain until there was nothing of him to continue.
I kinda got that thinking too.
The blonde one... Rose, or whatever, stood with her mate, Emmet, overlooking the gathering with a wrinkled nose. The weakened alliance with the pack and the coven meant her presence was expected and, clearly, not voluntary.
She did her best to avoid looking at me, not that I cared. I followed the track toward the conservatory. Closer to her...
"There she is!" Charlie announced as Renee appeared at the stairs.
"Charlie," she breathed, rushing down and into his arms so quickly I had to give an extra sniff to check she hadn't been turned in the last few days.
The mans face rose in colour... and, from the looks of him, I expected an explosion of cusses and hurling of names. But then he melted and folded to Renee in a sobbing mass of tears.
I turned away as Esme flowed toward the pair, opening her arms and covering them as if to shade them from the eyes of others.
My heart-beat increased as I reached the room; smelled the flowers, white lilies... and wished above all else, I wasn't going to have to go in and see what I knew I would.
Bella was there, waiting for me, dressed in cream silk, hair curled neatly about her face. She was pale and small against the memory I held of her.
He was there, of course. The leech had heard me enter and not turned or acknowledged my presence except to grip Bella's hand that slightest bit tighter.
Anger built before my eyes, like bricks of burning blood needing release. All I wanted was to see my best friend, the girl I loved... would he still try and deny me that right?
It didn't matter. He knew that she loved me as much as she loved him; the vampire and the werewolf at opposing ends of the scale… two different kinds of love for two different kinds of monster.
It changed nothing. She was still mine as much as she was his. As she would always be her own. How could either of us claim her?
I moved forward, tempted to brush the demon to one side. But I knew it would only end in the tearing of flesh and death to one of us, or both. Bella wouldn't want that.
I grudgingly took my place at her other side, where I always seemed to be.
He still didn't look at me.
Damned leech.
Knowing he could hear every word I thought, I concentrated on focusing my rage at the one who truly deserved it.
If Bella was with me none of this would have been necessary! No one would have died. Not my pack. Not his coven. And not the girl lying in the casket before us.
The vampire turned away from my sight, ashamed of his weakness and all the selfish deeds he was responsible for.
If he had left when he promised he would. If he had let her love and be happy in La Push she wouldn't be dead.
Edward cowered under the weight of truth he heard in my words. If he could have seen her future with me... our home and children protected by me and my pack...
"Are you saying I didn't protect her well enough?" Edward spat, turning sharply to me, eyes blackened with grief and fury.
"I'm saying you should have trusted her choices and not tried to keep her your little doll."
He went to move, but controlled the motion to stand; it would have done nothing, I still towered above him.
"She couldn't have survived in my world. I had to keep her safe."
"She was tougher than you ever gave her credit for."
"I knew her better than you."
"Sure, sure," I waved his words away, "That's why you insisted on her not seeing me... because you knew her so well."
"Sometimes Bella was a danger to herself."
"And that is your excuse for stalking her?"
"I needed to know she was safe."
"That's why you left for the better part of a year? To make sure she was safe. Good job."
A snarl ripped from his clenched teeth, "I left because it was the right thing to do."
"Then why couldn't you stay gone?"
"Because I loved her!" He raged, frame shaking.
"You just didn't trust her with me and that's what got her killed; your petty insecurities. Knowing she loved me and that was one thing you couldn't control her in. You stupid, self-centred leech! You killed her!"
The action was so fast, it blurred about the edges as he leapt over the coffin and locked his hands around my throat.
I stood, the wall against the wind, neither moving nor buckling against the attack.
My hands shivered from the onslaught, but ripping into my wolf-form and allowing the heat to claim me would expose me to too many guests... too many innocent humans that were gathering to grieve...
Guests who now had flocked around the door to watch the scene...
The vampire slid down my chest, leaning against me for support as his grip loosened. He raked air into his lungs, gulping against his grief, gasping as the seconds wore on without purpose... without her.
And I realised that this was precisely where I wanted him. I hadn't wanted to kill him. It was much better to see him like this; weakened from refusing to hunt, broken as his love lay dead through his own actions, at my feet and hopeless... almost as I had been.
I reached to his hands and pulled them away easily, letting him slip to the floor before Esme reached him, cradling the monster as if he were a child.
Walking past them, I reached the coffin and looked at the pale imitation of my best friend. The girl I loved had no rose to her cheeks, no spark that lingered. Her hand was ice as I lifted it in mine.
"Hey Bells," I mumbled. At her wrist was the bracelet I had made her, the wolf staring up at me as the diamond glinted the other side.
I shook my head against the tears stinging my eyes. "Be seeing you," was all I could manage before fleeing to the relative safety of the kitchen.
I had washed down two beers before I noticed that it had been Charlie handing me the open cans.
"He in there then?" Charlie asked, passing me a third can and nodding to the conservatory.
I nodded, mutely, gulping down the alcohol.
Charlie sniffed, pouring himself a fresh vodka. "Should have twisted his neck," he stated, finishing the glass in his hand.
