Jacob has grown up on a lot of myths and stories from the Reservation. His dad has a fondness for them, stories about wolves and blood suckers, stories about growing up, but the stories about Soulmates are Billy's favorite to tell. Barely surpassing the ones about wolves. Billy will sit there and run his fingers over the writing on his arm, brown eyes far away from the world.
"The gods are both loving and cruel," he will say because he starts every story about Marks the same way, "they gift us with a hint about the one who will love us completely. But it is the last words they will say to us so that we will not take them for granted."
His father looks so sad as he talks about them now, the words on his arm are gray and scratched out, telling his son everything he knows. Maybe it's an effort to lessen the pain that will come. But Jacob isn't entirely sure why. Just like he doesn't understand why any of it matters. Surely Mates can't be all that great if you don't know who they are until you lose them. But it is because his father told him so many stories that he doesn't panic when his Soulmark comes in. A warning about the all encompassing, stabbing, burning, tearing pain that sears across his lower would have been loved but he is able to keep his head straight. The friends he was hanging out with at the time weren't able to, they all thought he was dying. He's laying on his stomach, his father rubbing numbing cream on the words later that night. He toys with the idea of not asking what the words are but curiosity makes him asks. The fact his father doesn't tell him right away worries him.
"He won't hurt me."
Those four words become the bane of his existence. He hears then almost everywhere, they follow him around like a storm cloud. He won't hurt me.
Those words echo in his mind when he finds out that Bella's boyfriend is a vampire. The girl his Wolf is sure is his, is dating his mortal enemy. The summer where Edward pisses off is the best summer of his life. Sure the night he grew into his heritage sucked. Burning fever on top of turning into a faint wolf? Not the best night in the world. But Bella was his. Then Edward came back. Because of course he would.
Jacob tries to keep his anger in check as Bella tells him that Alice the crazy Cullen is with Charlie and Edward at her house. That Edward is hurt, that he was worried that he'd hurt her but now he isn't. Those words don't comfort him at all.
"I need to go to him."
"He's a Vampire, Bella. And not only that he has hurt you. He left you! He left you in the woods alone."
Bella shakes her head, stubborn and passionate for the wrong person.
"He won't hurt me," she says leaving. Jacob's heart clenches.
"You don't know that!" He calls after her. He sees her flinch and continues to walk away from him.
He feels it later that night, sitting at the dinner table. The words start to burn. At first it's like an itch but it grows and it hurts. Then the phone rings. His father barely gets to it in time as Jacob bites back a whine.
"Billy…. B-billy help…. I-I…"
"Charlie? Charlie what's happening?"
"I… C-cut myself t-t-trying to make dinner… B-billy they… They t-took her…."
He hates his hearing as he hears Charlie fight to breathe through the phone.
"Just hold on Charlie. I'll send someone to help."
Charlie laughs and it's so weak. Then the burning becomes extreme and Jacob howls in pain.