Jane's Story

by Jennixst

Jane is one of the most stand-out óutside'characters from the Twilight saga. I hope you like my take on the little vampire. I wanted to give her a reason for being who she is.

In my tale Shadow Warriors I briefly touch on how messed up Jane is. I wrote this one shot in pretty much one go, it just came to me. I really hope you like my take on Jane. I always wondered if there was more too her and I wanted to give her a reason to be the way she is.

Thanks to content1 for her beta work and support. Your praise for this tale made me feel great!

Jennixst.

Jane POV

There are many in my world that me names. Witch, Bitch, Evil Twin, Satan's Daughter, Demon's Spawn. I have heard so many that they have gotten rather monotonous after so long. It is rare someone comes up with something creative enough to catch my attention.

Many of my kind fear and loathe me, but I do not care. Fear is power, not that I need it. After all, I have been a vampire for more then two hundred and fifty years, and a member of the elite Volturi Guard for almost as long. I was 'changed' around the year 1750. I do not remember the year exactly, just that it was a very, very long time ago.

A lot of my kind forget their human lives. I have not. How could I, when it holds the memories of my other half? The good piece of my soul. You see, once it was not just me and Alec…once we were three. I do not know how we ever survived. I remember my beloved nurse telling me, when I was probably around ten years of age, that we were born far too early. Our mother had not survived the birth. It was a great pity, she would have loved us…probably. I know little of human love. There was precious little of it in my life.

Our father was some kind of nobleman and therefore we lived a relatively comfortable existence…nothing like these modern times…simpler, uncomplicated. In many ways I miss those days. Our family owned a great deal of land and our father had many families under his care. I remember it was said he was a good man. That he was fair and reasonable, kind to those he employed, and did far more for his charges then other land owners around him.

For me and my siblings, he was not so kind. He was very religious, demanding, and strict. No misstep on our part was forgiven easily. After an appropriate period of mourning for our mother, he, in a political maneuver, remarried the widow of one of his peers. It was an arrangement, to take care of us. She was delighted of course, to keep her station, but she was not a nice woman.

My sister and I were identical twins. We were so alike it was said we were reflections of each other. Alec was younger than we were, by perhaps three hours. The whispers started even then. We were oddities…identical twins and another. As medical research reached its modern zenith, I'd found an explanation. My mother must have had two uteruses, to carry us as she did. One in fifty million the research said…even in modern times we would have caused a sensation. In the dark recesses of history, they had other names for our birth….

As infants, we'd only sleep if laid together in the large crib our father had custom made for us.

The first four years of our lives were happy ones…filled with cuddles, gentleness, and affection. Our nurse cared for us and doted on us like a mother would. It was not until we turned four that harsh reality crept into our lives. Our father decided then we needed to be taught to be good Christians, and our religious education begun in earnest. Until then we had merely said prayers before meals, before bed, and listened to child friendly tales of David and Goliath, and Daniel in the Lion's Den.

Imagine, if you can, being four years old and trying to stay still and quiet while listening to long, dull prayers. It was also at that time that we began learning our letters and numbers. Every week our father would visit to check our progress. Although we tried hard, he never seemed pleased, and nary did a word of praise fall from his lips. In my memory he never cuddled us, nor played with us. Perhaps we reminded him too much of our mother.

Nurse told us stories about our mother almost daily. She told us how kind, sweet, and beautiful she'd been, and how Father had adored her. She would tell us that our mother sung sweeter than any bird, and that there was always much laughter in the house during her time as mistress. How I wished we'd known her.

I can still remember two of the house maids gossiping about our birth while they cleaned our nursery. I had been hiding beneath our bed, playing hide and seek with Mary and Alec. They did not know that I was there. I listened as Sarah, a house maid who had been with us as long as I could remember, told Cecilia, the new maid in training, the sad tale.

"It was in the middle of the night when her labour started. Master was in a great panic. The babies were not due for nearly two more months or there about. The doctor had been called and her Ladyship was in great pain. Little Mary was born first, and everyone was amazed when she had cried. Master thrust her into my arms, in a right state he was. She was the teeniest thing I ever saw. I was nursing my little Henry then, and Master begged me to offer her some of my milk. I did it gladly too, I always had far too much."

"Then Jane arrived and the doctor was sure she was dead, but the old woman from the village, Agatha, who served as the midwife, would not give up so easily. Somehow she got Jane to breathe. Her Ladyship was exhausted but overjoyed. Little Alec did not come so quickly and she struggled greatly. Her cries and moans were awful to hear, and she was growing weak. After three long hours he was born, feet first, leaving her Ladyship exhausted and bleeding. She begged her husband to allow her to cuddle her children, and he always gave her just what she wanted. She had just enough strength to admire the babies and name each of them before she closed her eyes and never opened them again," Sarah intoned, dramatically confiding in Cecilia.

Cecilia was awed by the tale, triplets were extremely rare especially so long ago, and for all three of us to survive was far more unusual. Father hired a kind woman from the nearby village who cared for us, and two wet nurses who fed us. Sarah said he never set foot within the master suite again. As I lay there beneath the bed, silent tears falling for my dead mother, I heard the maids continue on with their gossip. There was still talk in the village that our mother had been a witch. Her herb and flower gardens had been incredible, and then there were the old suspicions around the births of multiples. Their gossip made me wonder…Mary and I could finish one another's sentences, and we always seemed to know what the other was thinking. We often spoke for Alec, who was painfully shy.

We were always together, even when we studied or did scripture lessons (of which we did a lot). We had a school room where we studied, off to one side of the nursery. It was a dull, drab room where we would have to sit for hours at a time on hard wooden seats. Our tutor was a bookish man who shared father's strong beliefs. Although our father was deeply religious he was also forward thinking, unusual for his generation, and insisted that we girls were educated the same as if we were boys. So when we were not involved in endless, tedious scripture lessons, we were studying Mathematics, English, Geography, Literature and Languages. If we did well our nurse would persuade our tutor to allow us to play outside, or do arts.

If I ever loved anyone aside from my brother and sister, it was Nurse. She was the one who secretly told us fairy tales and sang us to sleep. She would cuddle us when we cried and often bartered for treats and outings for us. Our stepmother was very cool towards us, unless father was around at which point she would pretend to be very loving. We quickly learned that she had another face, one she only showed us. Whenever we were left alone with her, she would find sly ways to hurt us…little pinches and slaps that did not leave marks, the removal of favoured toys or books, or her favourite punishment which was to eat delicious pastries in front of us without sharing. She grew worse as time passed, jealous of our very presence as year after year she failed to conceive a child of her own. We managed to stay away from her for the most part, spending the majority of our time either in our class room or nursery. Although cold and a hard taskmaster, our tutor never laid a hand on any of us so we figured we were safe there.

Things changed for us at the age of eleven, when our Father began travelling more and more. He developed interests in the New World, and would spend long stretches of time away from home. It was then our stepmother took over the running of the house. She told our father she wanted to help him. Around that time too she gave up her dreams of having a child of her own and became increasingly more vicious and bitter towards us. So it came about that he would leave on an extended trip and we would be at her mercy. Now, many years on, I wonder if he had found a mistress, someone warm and caring to fill the hole our mother left in his heart.

Nurse quickly learned not to interfere with her treatment of us, fearing being dismissed. It was to her we went when our stepmother was done. Nurse would rub salve or balm into our bruises and cuts, cuddle us, and tuck us into bed. Our tutor too kept us away from her as much as he could, although it meant more hours studying. Our stepmother liked that, the sight of us with our heads down working. She would walk about the room critiquing our penmanship, any mistakes she spotted were pounced upon with great glee on her part and she would spend hours tormenting us over them. A ruler was utilized to smack us if we were not sitting perfectly straight, or if our attention wandered. She delighted in withholding a fire in the classroom during the winter and insisted the windows were closed on the hottest days of summer. Our classroom, already bleak and boring quickly became either an inferno or an ice box.

Tutor, finally softening slightly to our plight, would stand beside the open window on hot days, ready to swiftly close it should we hear her heels on the hall floor. It would have been the same for our nursery except that Nurse insisted on heat and fresh air to prevent us from getting ill. So, instead, she took away our thick quilts and our soft feather pillows and allowed us only thin blankets. Our lovely toys were taken away, only to be returned to the nursery when Father was due home. We were no longer allowed to go out to play or to have picnics with Nurse under the trees. Instead we would be made to walk miles in stiff heavy shoes, carrying just a small canteen of water, and dry bread if we were lucky. She called these our "nature walks."

Our stepmother spent a lot of time reading her bible, at church she was seen as a fine lady, if not as kind nor as generous as her husband. In our father's absence she took pleasure in controlling everything. When she was not doing that she was either punishing us, looking for reasons to punish us or thinking up new punishments. It seemed her greatest pleasure in life was to torment us. Sometimes she embroidered, but mostly she made our lives a misery. Weeping in Nurse's comforting lap I asked her once, after being made stand in a broom closet for four hours for a small misdemeanour, why she hated us so. I will never forget Nurse's reply. "Some people let their own failings and bitterness colour their soul my Lovely. Your stepmother is a very ugly person on the inside. You should pity her." I didn't though. I hated her.

Soon after this, we replaced several of the house maids assuming their household chores. She never let on to Father that we were under staffed, instead pocketing the wages designated for the staff that did not exist and forcing us to scour floors and polish windows for hours. We'd spend hours cleaning silver or peeling vegetables, then have to go to our studies, our hands sore and bruised. Many nights we would have gone to bed hungry if it weren't for Nurse. She would sneak food to us whenever she could, always at the risk of her job. When our stepmother discovered this, she dismissed her, and we lost the only mother we ever knew. That was a bleak day indeed.

As Mary, Alec, and I approached our mid teens, we began to change. Mary and I simultaneously begun to develop more womanly curves and our days of comfortable smock dresses ended. Stepmother insisted we were fully dressed with tight corsets and layers of heavy petticoats everyday. Alec's attire didn't really change, but he was no longer allowed to sleep with us in the nursery. He was moved to a small room, three doors down the hallway and a thin whip of a man, Henry, was employed as his valet. Henry was our step-mother's brother and he was just as sadistic as she was in the things he would do to poor Alec. At the same time our beloved nurse was replaced by his wife, as our governess. She too was unpleasant and demanding. We had to keep our bedroom, which had once been our nursery, spotless. She could find the smallest thing to critic, and life quickly became unbearable. Mary and I would huddle together in our bed, so as to share our thin blankets, and we would dream of the day we would escape. We'd whisper together about Prince Charming rescuing us and living side by side in lovely homes somewhere beautiful.

Sometimes Alec would sneak in, and we would huddle together and plan. Our once warm and friendly nursery became our only sanctuary. Although now bare of our toys and books, and feather pillows and warm quilts whenever our father was away, it was our only retreat. It wasn't always safe, randomly our stepmother or our governess would wake us in the very early hours of the morning and force us to bathe in icy water, or march us down to the kitchen to help the staff prepare breakfast. What the house cook kept from them was that she would allow us to doze in turns in her cosy rocker by the fire. The house boy was Alec's only friend and he often kept watch, warning Cook if anyone was coming. Truly the house was divided. There was my stepmother, her brother, his wife, and perhaps three or four newer servants on one side, and we three and the rest of the staff, as well as our tutor on the other. Life was a tightrope of fear and punishments mixed with the kindness of the staff that remained loyal to the memory of our mother.

It was when Mary and I became women that we truly understood we were more different then we'd originally thought. One particularly cold night when I was fifteen, I was watching our governess who was embroidering by the fire, and I remember wishing she would prick her finger. To my delight she did, and I hoped it would happen again. When it did, and she had to stop sewing to blot her finger with her handkerchief, I wondered briefly whether it was my doing. So when she took up the hoop again I focused on her, and was delighted when she pricked her finger over and over again. I had to try hard not to giggle and delighted in sharing my secret with Mary and Alec. We were sitting far from the heat of the fire, with just one lantern, reading our bibles. As they watched, I focused again on our governess and they stifled their own smiles when she pricked her fingers yet again.

In frustration, she threw the embroidery into the flames, it had been spoilt with her blood anyway. Mary watched the flare of the flames as if mesmerized, before she frowned a little in concentration. As we watched, the fire simmered low then flared up, before dying down again. I stared at her in surprise and she giggled very softly. After that it was great fun to practice these tricks in the evening. The flames would leap up randomly at different intervals, so much so, our governess became quite distressed. She hurt herself often on minor things, thanks to me. Usually the events would end with her sending us to bed early, allowing us to skip the hour of prayer on our knees that we had done every day since we were six. Alone in the dark with Alec, who having tip-toed into our room, we'd whispered about the odd tricks we could do and wondered. I had long ago shared the housemaid's tales of our mother with my siblings and we pondered together if there had been any truth in them. We decided to continue to play with our new skills, to see where they would lead us.

Over the next year, as we entered our sixteenth year of life, we'd practiced whenever we could. Soon I could make people trip, cut themselves, or walk into things. I could also make them hurt themselves seemingly at random. It gave me great satisfaction to cause Henry, vile little man that he was, to trip over the rug in the front hall on a daily basis. It was a slow process, and sometimes it did not seem to work at all. I realized it did not work whenever I was slightly happy…like when Father was home, however briefly, and we were being treated like children of wealth and privilege. Mary discovered the same was true for her. Alec wondered if he had any gift at all until he discovered he was able to put our tutor and his valet into trances quite easily. This was especially a boon as his valet had progressed beyond nastiness, into a realm of abuse Mary and I were fortunate to escape. Poor Alec. He never shared with us what was happening to him, alone in his room with that vile man, but he became more and more withdrawn and he ate less and less. Mary and I knew something was very wrong, and it was only our pleading that made Alec eat what little he did.

So it began, us against our stepmother and her minions. For a while we felt that we were winning the war. Our stepmother seemed reluctant to hurt us, but soon her nature cured her of that. What little we could do was nothing compared to the pleasure she got from torturing us.

Then the whispers and the suspicions began. At first it was just whispers amongst her staff. Then it was open stares. We could see the fear in their eyes as we three walked through the house or the grounds together. For Mary and me it was not unusual to be stared at, after all we were two blonde haired beauties, on the cusp of womanhood. We were also completely identical and therefore fascinating to the males around us. On his last visit home Father had spoken of introducing us to society. Stepmother had been none too pleased, the hours of torment we endured upon his return to London had been testament to that.

It wasn't too long after this we heard the darker rumours that had spread through the village. We were being called unnatural and evil, the term Witch was being used far more often and, in time of witch hunts and burnings, this was not a good thing. Even those of the staff who had been kind to us before began to shy away from us more and more. Soon our stepmother began threatening to turn us over to the people of the village should we provoke her wrath in any way. Her cruelty knew no bounds. Along with beating us with her riding crop, icy baths, and being deprived of every human right whenever she saw fit, she began locking us in a narrow, windowless cupboard for hours. We would have to stand or crouch in the dark, there wasn't enough room to sit, even for us, and we were still very petite. (I suspect, because of our early birth, we would never have been very big anyway). This punishment, although physically kinder then many she dished out, was the hardest for us as we NEEDED to be close to one another, especially Mary and I. As our little tricks grew into full blown skills we learned to communicate more and more with one another without words. The bond was strongest with Mary and I, but Alec and I were a close second. For him, the time in the closet was the hardest, he said it gave him too much time to think.

Looking back, I remember my sister's gentleness. She was the light, where I was the dark. She smiled, and she used to draw beautifully and how she could sing! Sarah, the last of our original staff would say she was just like our Mama. She adored church on Sunday because she was allowed to sing, and be a part of the choir. I was too, but mostly for aesthetics. I could sing, but nothing like Mary. The choir mistress just liked to have our perfect, angelic faces in the front row. Alec was exempt from this as he couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. Instead he was an alter boy.

Whenever father was home he almost seemed proud of the three of us. Once I am convinced he almost smiled when he saw us waiting to leave in our pristine white Church robes. In church Mary would step forward and sing, and the old ladies in the congregation would wipe away tears. She dreamed she would be famous for her voice someday, but it was not too be. Our stepmother deduced Mary's joy in her singing, she could see it in her face and she often threatened to remove us from the choir. She took pleasure in the faint panic she could see in Mary's eyes whenever she threatened this.

Then came the dreaded Sunday when, before we left for church she gathered us in the parlour and announced we would sit with her in the family pew, rather than participate in the choir. It broke Mary's heart and she rashly waved her hand as our stepmother walked away. A swirl of flame leapt from the nearby fire and caught the train of her elegant Sunday dress. The lace began burning quickly, causing her to shriek and scream. The maids came running as her brother doused the burning material with the water from a vase of roses. The fire was out but the damage was done. They stared at Mary with suspicious, fearful eyes.

That afternoon we were taken to the village priest where we were locked in a small shed, awaiting our fate. Our stepmother told him a terrifying tale of evil and demonic possession. She embellished the little fire incident and declared I had caused far greater injuries then I was then capable of. She claimed Alec was possessed too, and was trying to possess others. Her brother and his wife backed up her wild tales and the gossip around the town did little to dissuade him.

Huddled together, there in the darkness, we could hear the crowd gathering outside talking and yelling. I heard our stepmother and her family amongst them, whipping things to frenzy. She was in her element. I can still hear her in my memories, weeping and wailing that the Devil had possessed 'her' beautiful children. I remember the rage I felt when she said this. We were not hers, our mother was long dead. We heard the voice of our old nurse, pleading and begging for our lives, and far worse, we heard our stepmother accuse her of terrible things. Witchcraft and devil worship, of 'poisoning' us with her satanic beliefs. Then, as we wept together and held onto one another in utter terror we heard them burn her.

Through a small chink in the wooden panels we saw them bind her and drag her out of sight. Our poor, kind old nurse, who'd never hurt anyone, loving us even to the very end, died a horrific death, burned alive for trying to save us. The screams and the smell were awful. I will never forget them. I will never forget Mary kneeling beside me and praying fervently for her soul, nor Alec staring sightlessly through the wood, trying to numb her pain. Perhaps it worked, I do not know, because she stopped screaming shortly after he began doing this. Perhaps she died quickly, or lost consciousness. I can only hope she didn't suffer too long.

All I felt was great rage, so intense it overpowered my fear. I heard them talking about collecting more wood, and discussing whether we should die together or one at a time. Rage boiled within me as they talked and I looked over at Mary. She was rocking back and forth, praying to be saved, praying for us to be saved. Alec focused on the wall, his head bowing under the strain. I heard footsteps and I grabbed my brother and sister's hands tightly. When one of the villagers peered in at us, I was momentarily saddened to recognize her face. She was the wife of one of Father's tenants. My sorrow was quickly smothered by rage and I narrowed my eyes at her. Crying out she leapt away from the door, a huge splinter embedded in her palm. I smiled. Her pain was music to my ears.

The door was slammed and a renewed mutter of Witch travelled through the crowd outside. In the gathering dusk they were building another pyre; I knew we had very little time left. I could hear my stepmother still, wailing and lamenting our fate. I hated her ferociously at that moment. She was enjoying this, her moment in the limelight, and the opportunity to rid herself of us, the constant reminder of the beautiful woman who had come before her. Alec sighed in the shadows and I looked at him.

"I was hoping that Father would ride up and save us."

I wanted to scoff, but instead I squeezed his hand gently. I knew Father could and would do nothing to save us, even if he wanted to. Once the priest said it was God's will, our fate would be sealed. The most he would do is turn away, and not watch us burn.

Outside darkness had fallen fully. I could hear the excitement in the voices of the villagers. Our time was almost up. Then I heard the sound of a carriage pulling into the cobbled square, a door opening and people dismounting. Hope flared within me, and then just as quickly it died. Why would anyone interfere on our behalf, risking the wrath of an entire village? I heard the nervous whiney of horses and people shifting about to get a better view of the newcomers. I looked to my siblings, travellers after dusk were unusual. Listening hard, we heard the priest address the strangers.

Eleazar POV

The town was like so many others, full of simple, hard working people. The only difference this time was they were in the middle of a witch burning. I sighed as I looked over at Aro and Caius. I knew Caius would want to watch, and Aro would want me to scan the humans for anyone of use. Marcus would not care whether we stopped or not. We'd eaten at the previous village and he was back in his apathetic state once more. I remembered the Marcus of old, before Didyme's untimely death, and I mourned for my lost friend. As we listened to the priest and some mad woman rant on about demon spawn and witches, I felt my interest piqued. They seemed to be talking about mere children, but with great fear. One of them, it was said, could control fire and the other girl always seemed to be present whenever someone was hurt. The girls, apparently, were un-natural, completely identical. The boy it was said was demonic, and his valet was claiming to have lost periods of time around the boy.

Aro touched the man briefly as if to pat his back, but drew his hand away in distaste. I knew that expression well. The man was evil, a parasite who found it pleasurable to fondle and hurt children. Aro had a particular distaste for his kind. I figured that he would end up being dinner for one of the guard who lingered outside the village. I hoped so. Most of our kind refrained from harming children and we were supposed to be soulless demons.

As the people talked, several big men disappeared into a small shack and came out with out three tiny figures. I was stunned at such a show of force for such small children. The two girls were lovely, perfect copies of one another. One, her hair in a long blonde braid, looked utterly terrified. Her twin had such a look of rage and defiance upon her face I almost smiled. Her courage in this awful moment was extraordinary. The man holding her tripped and struck his knee painfully on a large rock, but he did not release her. Instead he shook her hard. She glared back in defiance then turned her gaze to us.

Her eyes were a brilliant blue and I was instantly struck by the power of the gift within her. I could almost SEE it, it was so strong. Surprised I studied her siblings, and found that they too harboured powerful gifts within them. It was unusual in humans, for their gifts to be so obvious. I glanced at Aro. Too fast for any human to see I nodded my head and saw him smile, ever so slightly. We would be procuring some new talents before this night was out. I returned my gaze to the crowd, watching as they prepared to kill these children. I felt distaste roll about my icy stomach. I was glad my old friend Carlisle was not here, he would have found this particularly hard to stomach.

Caius looked anticipatory, almost happy. He truly did enjoy these types of spectacle, even if he wouldn't quite admit it out loud. Marcus hadn't even dismounted the carriage, sitting with his head back, as if asleep. Aro wove through the crowd, casually touching this person and that, garnering knowledge. He looked over at the still smouldering pyre behind the three new ones and grimaced slightly. Evidently whoever had died there hadn't deserved his or her fate. Then I saw him touch a finely dressed woman, who was dramatically sobbing into a lace handkerchief. It didn't take a vampire to know she was putting on a fine performance. Aro frowned slightly and carefully lifted his hand from her as if it had been sullied. He surveyed the crowd for a few more seconds before suggesting we move on.

The Inn Keeper made a half hearted attempt at luring us to stay, but he seemed more interested in watching the burning; as well as, a little fearful of us. "Smart man," I thought as we carefully climbed back into the carriage. It was such a nuisance, travelling with horses. We had to keep their human handler around, and they were still very skittish. As we rolled out of the square Aro carefully wiped his hands on his own linen handkerchief. I looked at him enquiringly while Caius glared. He had wanted to stay for the show.

"That woman had the vilest, most jealous mind I have ever had the misfortune of hearing," Aro stated. "She is perfectly delighted that those poor children will die. In fact she is ecstatic about it." He frowned. "In all my years I have never crossed a more twisted mind. She truly believes her religious posturing, but at the same time knows she is doing all this for her own end. I do not know how she plans to explain killing his children to her husband, but I am sure she will think of an incredible lie, if she lives that is." Aro looked over at me. "Well Eleazar? What say you of the children?"

Caius looked more interested at this, power and the acquisition of it meant a great deal to him. I opened my hands, palm up and stated, "All three have amazing gifts, I can feel how strong they are, even now as humans. The frightened one is a fire starter. A powerful one but she hasn't developed it anywhere near it's full range. Her twin is a power all to herself, a weapon. She causes pain, and is far more developed then her siblings. I think she sees herself as their protector. The boy, I am unsure, but I believe he induces nothingness." Aro and Caius looked positively greedy at the very idea of such power.

Aro filled us in on his discoveries. "The first fire was their old nurse. According to those who worked with her, she was the only person who ever loved the children or showed them any affection. The stepmother dismissed her only a few years ago. She tried to save them, the poor soul, begged for their lives even. All it garnered her was an awful death, accused of being the one who lead them to the Devil. The people in that town are all dependant on the generosity of the children's father, it seems the lands about here are all his. While he is away, his wife seems to have gained great control. They're uneducated, ignorant people ruled by fear."

He paused, his eyes focused out the window, "Interesting though, the gifts these children seem to possess. A fire starter! Imagine that! She will be a wonderful addition to the guard. Her twin causes pain, and her brother causes nothingness." He pondered this. "Apparently their nurse went quiet very quickly during her burning, as if she couldn't even feel the flames."

I nodded, momentarily thoughtful.

"They are triplets are they not?" I asked Aro.

"No… not quite. The two girls are twins obviously. The boy…there is no explanation… although he looks just like them. Their almost sixteen but they are very small… a side effect of being born early perhaps. In addition, that vile woman has spent most of their lives starving them whenever she could get away with it."

I nodded again. Aro tapped on the carriage back, behind the driver, and the carriage rolled to a halt around a mile outside the village. We all dismounted, taking care not to startle the horses too much. He looked up at the groom, who was studiously facing forward. "Your services are no longer needed sir, off you go," he said, majestically. Without question, the frightened man clicked to the horses and they were off into the night. Aro laughed. "He has no idea what we are, just that he wants to be well away from all of us." He chuckled.

The rest of the guard appeared at our side, silently, and Aro immediately began giving orders. "Seal off the village, no one in or out. Do not kill too many, we will need to be feeding newborns soon." He raised his hood again and smiled at myself and his brothers. "Now, we'd best get back, before we are too late."

Jane POV

The strangers had only just left when the priest, stumbling through some speech about demons signaled to one of our captors. As I watched, struggling against the far stronger man holding my arms, Mary was dragged forward. Her struggles were ineffectual against her much bigger captor, and they tied her to the first post. I saw my stepmother smile viciously at me through the darkness and I screamed as they walked towards Mary with the torch. "Put it out Mary, Put it out!" I shrieked but my sister was far past reason.

Her eyes rolled in terror and she closed them tightly, tears pouring down her cheeks. I could see she was still praying, begging God to save her. I tried to save her, I tried to focus on the men with the torches, but all I could see was Mary. One or two of them swore as hot embers landed on their hands but they would not stop. I screamed and pleaded, but they still kept going. As they lit the bonfire, Mary opened her terror filled eyes and our gazes locked. Not once in the next few agonizing minutes did our gazes shift. As we both screamed and cried, I stared into her eyes, and she stared back at me. Beside me Alec struggled ineffectually against his captor, he was almost mad with grief as he too stared at our sister.

Amazingly she smiled at him, mouthing "Thank you" before the flames leapt up, obscuring her from our view. I screamed, and somewhere within the fire ball I am sure I heard her scream my name, one last time. The world began to spin as I felt her voice slip away from me, darkness filling my head. All around me were sudden screams, flashes of movement, and noise, but all I could see was the encroaching darkness. My last conscious thought, as the hands holding me up abruptly let me go and I crumpled to the ground was "There is no God." As the darkness won, I realized my turn would not be soon enough. I didn't even care that it would hurt, I welcomed it because the pain would lead me back to Mary.

When I awoke we were back in my father's house. Momentarily I was terrified, and I looked around for my stepmother, but she was nowhere to be seen. I was not in our bare bedroom, but in one of the opulent guest bedrooms we were normally forbidden from entering. Just one man was in the room with Alec and me, and as soon as I sat up, closely followed by Alec, he ghosted out of the room. We looked at each other with wide, frightened eyes before wrapping our arms about each other to await our fate. We did have to not wait long. Four tall men entered the room, or perhaps they were angels, they were so beautiful. Three were dark haired, and one was so fair his hair looked white. They were shrouded in long dark travelling cloaks that looked too heavy for the season.

They moved gracefully, noiselessly, closer to us and we gasped together in shock and some fear. All four had blood red eyes! I focused hard on them, willing them to hurt themselves, or one another…just leave us alone. I knew that whatever our fate was, it was completely out of our control. The foremost man chuckled benevolently.

"If you are trying to hurt me, dear one, it merely tickles," he said dryly. I gasped and clutched my brother tighter still. "My name is Aro, these are my brothers Caius, and Marcus." He indicated to the men in turn, and I studied their faces. Marcus looked bored, and sad. Caius looked bored too, but in a far different way. "The man behind me is Eleazar. It is because of him that you are here. You see, he can 'see' things in people. It is a very useful gift…rather like your own."

I blinked. No one had ever called my extra ability a gift before. I considered Aro carefully.

He smiled, aiming for kind but missing it somewhat, and continued his speech. "We are from a very ancient family, one with an important tradition. I would like to extend an invitation to the two of you to join us."

He smiled happily at us, and I knew that it was not really an invitation. Before we could respond Aro and Caius were upon us, moving faster then my eye could track. Aro seized me as if I was nothing more then a kitten in its mother's jaws. I had time enough to squeeze my brother's hand before I felt his teeth slice into my neck and the most incredible pain took hold of me. Vaguely I was aware of him laying me back down on the bed and I dimly saw him extract Alec's limp body from Caius' embrace, before laying him beside me. With my last conscious, coherent thought I grabbed my brother's hand.

The pain was incredible, worse than being beaten, worse then any of my stepmother's punishments. It was like nothing I could describe. Fire, instead of blood, ran in my veins. Lying beside Alec I wondered, vaguely, if this is what Mary felt as she died. Together we writhed and screamed. I screamed, even though my throat was raw and little sound came out. As one we cried out for our long dead mother, for Mary, Alec cried out to God, and even once for our father, but I did not. Then as one we begged for death. Not once during the torture did we let go of one another. The pain flowed relentlessly through me, and through Alec. Our connected minds made the pain both more intense and more bearable. The room darkened and lightened perhaps three times as we burned together. Time meant little to me, the pain was everything, and it was everywhere. The only point of lesser pain was where my hand touched Alec's.

Towards what I now know was the end we were separated, spread a little apart, and it was no easy feat. As we had burned, we'd grown stronger. Separating us proved difficult. Somewhere in the dim recesses of my mind, I realized that at least five of them had to be called in to separate us. As the fire began to leave my extremities I felt it head towards my racing heart. I wondered if this was it, if I was finally going to die. Briefly I felt fear, for if this was a taste of hell I really hoped all my prayers weren't in vain. Then I remembered, with perfect clarity my sister being burned alive, and I knew there would be no Heaven for me. As the fire rose, my throat flickered to life with a whole different burn and my heart raced even faster. It beat so hard I thought it would explode. Then abruptly it simply stopped, and the pain vanished. I lay very still, my eyes closed, relishing the absence of pain, listening to a whole new level of noise around me.

Slowly I opened my eyes and cried out. The world was so very different. I could see so much more, hear so much more…and the smells. Oh the smells! Somewhere close by was something that smelled absolutely wonderful. There was another scent too…sweet and very familiar. I looked about the room, at the bed, and the luxurious covers that lay in tatters. Alec was on the far side of it, completely still. His was the sweet scent I knew so well. As I watched I heard his heart stop too, and I waited. Like me he lay still before he too opened his eyes. He looked about in awe before his gaze settled on me and he smiled. I gasped. His eyes were a brilliant shade of red. Gone was the familiar blue I was used too. Aside from that he looked amazing! My brother had always been handsome to me, but now he looked incredible. Like an angel. I looked about the room. Mary was not there.

The memory of her death hit me harder then anything I'd ever felt in my life. A surge of rage flooded through me and I was shocked when a fierce growl ripped from me. Alec blinked in surprise then he too scanned the room. Shock, then anger flew across his face, and suddenly without even trying we were back to back, snarls ripping through us as we surveyed the room. From a shadowy corner appeared Aro. He'd been sitting in one of father's finest chairs watching us. He smiled widely, even though his companions, scattered about the room, seemed far less relaxed.

"Welcome to your new lives my dears," he stated, unruffled by our growls. I stared at him and he smiled benevolently back at me. I know you must have many questions, but first, you need to feed." I frowned at him. "You're thirsty, are you not?" he asked simply. As soon as he said this I felt the intense burn in my throat again, and saw Alec's hand leap to his own throat.

Aro smiled and clapped his hands. To my surprise my stepmother and Alec's valet were brought into the room. "I thought this most appropriate," Aro intoned, waving his hand at them.

I glared as they writhed and shrieked in their captor's grasp. I smiled with delight and took a deep breath, readying to inflict pain, when the most delicious smell hit me and I found myself leaping forward. The guard holding my stepmother thrust her into my reaching arms and stepped back. Without a second thought, I sunk my teeth into her neck and began drinking greedily. I could feel her bones breaking beneath my grasp and I relished it. Her blood was the most delightful thing I had ever tasted, but I was still not satisfied when she was done. Growling in frustration, I dropped her lifeless, useless body and was rewarded with another warm one almost immediately. Again and again I fed and until finally I felt full. I dropped the second housemaid atop my stepmother and wiped my mouth on my hand. Part of me was horrified by what I had just done, but I was also just as thrilled by it. I looked around to see Alec, like me, had disposed of his former valet and at least two others, and was stumbling backwards, reeling with the same shock I felt.

Together we turned to focus on Aro, needing an explanation. He still sat regally in the chair, watching us, a huge smile on his face. I looked closely at him and was struck again by his beauty. He waved an imperious hand and we sat as one on the very edge of the bed.

He began grandly. "As you can probably tell, you are no longer mere humans. You are immortal now, each a newborn vampire. The same as myself, my brothers and our companions. My brothers and I are far older than the others, though." After moments of considering this, I accepted his announcement. Being a vampire was better than demon spawn I figured. "I know you are missing your sister and I am going to explain about that very soon. You have much to learn, young ones, about what you are capable of now, about your gifts, and about your new lives with us. We are called the Volturi. We protect the secret of our kind. We have some rules but the most important one is this, keep the secret. Too allow a human to discover your true nature is death, for both you. You have been chosen to join our elite guard, once your newborn year is over of course."

I nodded slowly, looking into the beautiful face before me.

"You are faster than any living thing, stronger, more intelligent. You are now at the very top of the food chain, a superior predator in every way," he concluded.

I couldn't help but smile at this. Then again, the press of wanting Mary hit me and I vividly remembered watching her burn, her pain and fear as they held us and made us watch. I remembered Alec's sobs as he tried again and again to numb her pain and the way her eyes, as she died, never left mine, and I spoke for the first time. My voice came out tinkling like bells and although I was momentarily startled. I forged ahead. "If you are so powerful, why did you not save my sister? She had a far more powerful gift then either Alec or I."

Aro smiled kindly at me and then his face became very serious. "My dears, we may be strong, and fast, and virtually indestructible but fire is one of our rare weaknesses. We returned to your town square as the flames took hold. I believe your sister may have, in her terror and pain, increased the blaze to end things faster for herself. Certainly she was beyond our help when we arrived. Instead we chose to save you and your brother. I am truly sorry we did not return sooner."

He spoke with such sincerity that I knew he meant it, although from a more altruistic point of view. Bowing my head I committed my memories of Mary to my mind, and heart. I carefully gathered her memory and shut it away inside the deep recesses of my mind before looking into Aro's blood red eyes.

"So what do we call you?" I asked.

"You can call us Master."

And so it began. We left the desecrated village that very day. Almost everyone was dead anyway, the only survivors those who had not been present at the bonfire. Aro's guard burned most of the town; I personally set fire to my own home. Alec and I left some special mementoes to Mary and our mother within our pockets, but without as much as a backwards glance. I am not ashamed to admit I did not care what little our father would find upon his return.

Our eternal lives began then, but I never let go of the rage. I use it daily to fuel my power. Every time I do my Master's bidding I feel like I am honouring Mary. In Castle Voltaire I am treated like royalty, even if the minions do fear me greatly. My memories of my sister are kept tightly under wraps, only brought out when I am weak, or I need my resolve strengthened. Instead I use the years of abuse at the hands of my stepmother to fuel my power If I were to see a psychologist they would probably say I am mentally ill. I'd probably eat them right after that. I do not think I have a disorder of any kind. For me it is far simpler. The good piece of my soul died with my twin, and I would never be whole again.