Keeping My Promise
Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or it's characters. Stephenie Meyer does.
Begins during New Moon while Bella is wandering through the woods, trying to follow Edward.
It was very dark now. I couldn't see my hand in front of my face, much less where I was going. But I kept walking. I had to keep walking; had to keep looking for him. Because if I stopped, it would mean that I was giving up. Giving in. It would mean that I had accepted what had happened, and that was impossible. Can you be resigned to the fact that your heart had been ripped out? I didn't know, and I didn't plan on finding out, either.
My train of thought was interrupted by a soft rustle of leaves to my right. It was a localized sound, not like the sound of the wind in the trees. My heart started to speed up. I spun to face the sound, almost falling over in my haste. My weak, human eyes searched the dark pointlessly. I saw nothing, but that didn't mean anything. I could feel someone watching me. The hair on my arms and the back of my neck stood on end. Adrenaline fizzed through me like a static charge, making my fingertips tingle.
"Who's there?" I whispered, still staring in the direction of the noise. "Edward?" I asked, without any real hope; Edward would not be hiding from me.
There was a high-pitched, girlish giggle, this time from behind me. I whirled around, not quite sure which way I was facing now. I sorted through the possibilities of whose laugh I had heard. The only person I knew with a voice that high was Alice.
"Alice?" I called out uncertainly. "Is that you?" If it was, I thought, then why was she scaring me like this. It was silent for a moment, then the same high voice said to my left now.
"No. But, by all means, guess again." I turned on the spot, searching for the speaker. It was not Alice's voice, but it was far too perfect, too beautiful, to be a humans'. And if there was a vampire other than one of the Cullens near me,well, the word "bad" did not even begin to describe the situation.
The voice continued, from behind me again, "After all, you know what they say." I stood completely still; my frantic breathing filling the silence like I was breathing into a microphone. How am I supposed to get out of this one?, I thought, There was no one here to protect me now.
Then there was a cold breeze on the right side of my neck as the next words were spoken directly into my ear. "Third time's a charm."
I screamed like a banshee and tried to throw myself away from the vampire, whoever it was. I was, of course, unsuccessful. An icy hand grabbed my upper arm and threw me, none too gently, up against something hard and wet. I couldn't see what it was in the darkness, but from the scrapes on my hands I figured it was a tree.
However, the issue of what I had been thrown against ceased to be important when a rock-hard hand came down over my windpipe, pinning me to the tree like I had once pinned bugs to a piece of cardboard for a seventh grade science project. Choking me. Killing me. And I forgot that any struggling would have been futile. I forgot the vast difference between the strength of a vampire and the strength of a human. Survival instinct took over, banishing all thoughts from my mind except one. Survive. Do anything you have to. Fight. My fingers clawed at the hand that had me around the neck, though it was like trying to claw through granite. And it was just as effective. My body started to run out of oxygen, my head started to swim, and I got tunnel vision. My mind wandered.
I wondered who it was that was killing me. I wondered why I cared. He or she was killing me, and that was all that mattered. And then it struck me. Why was I fighting? Did I even want to live if it meant living without Edward? No. So I stopped fighting. I embraced the knowledge of my imminent death. My vision went dark...And then the pressure eased enough that I could suck in a lung-full of air. And another. And another. Wracking coughs started to shake me, but I could breathe. I was breathing. The vampire hadn't killed me. Why? I thought dazedly. I gazed up at the shadowy face of the vampire who had let me live – for now- and blurted out the first thing that came into my mind.
"Who are you?" I rasped. The vampire laughed coldly, and as she -at least, I thought it was a she- laughed, a chink of moonlight fell on her face, glinting silver on her red hair. I could see her face now, and I wished fervently that it was still hidden. The sight of it stopped my heart and made my stomach drop.
It was Victoria.