Part Two

He clung to her. She hadn't been in his presence for a decade, but time really doesn't have much of a meaning anymore. They both know they would eventually meet again, all that mattered was who would give in first. But, truthfully, that didn't even matter, neither would hold it against the other. It just so happens that she is the one to return to him.

It is the dead of night when she arrives in Volterra. She walks confidently in the warm summer air, the cobblestone road makes her laugh. She gains a bounce in her step and almost floats over them as she thinks that this was before her time, this city, this ancient city was constantly changing, the pace increasing every year, humans becoming more impatient, more inclined to want and need, more desperate for that vague ideal of perfection, and yet here remains this silly outdated uncomfortable road older than even her. Probably older than her father and definitely older than her mother. She wonders if Marcus was around when the original stone was laid.

She takes her time as she walks through the quiet city. She fruitlessly looks to the sky, imagining the stars that inspired so many legends so long ago. Now the whole city is covered with a faint smog, and aggressive lights. She knows once she's inside the safety of the castle the lights will fade enough to show only the brightest lights, but she longs to see them here. Italy still is the place that activates the imagination, tales of gods, lovers scorned, fate and eternal beauty. To see the reality, how common it is and how much it has become like every other city depresses her. She was looking for a little reassurance from the city that this is a place where romance blooms.

Soon enough she is in the labyrinth that is the catacombs. Carlisle gave her very precise directions and she makes sure to mind them. Her brown eyes, and lack of an invitation make her a target for all the low level guards looking for ways to elevate themselves in the brother's eyes. When she catches the smell of the first vampire she becomes nervous, cautiously she takes a few more steps ready for a confrontation, when she hears footsteps she freezes. It's him.

"Renesmee. " His voice is barely a whisper.

"You say my name as if you were expecting me." She hates that her voice shakes when she addresses him.

"I was. I am. " He moves forward. "I always am."

He walks until they are but a foot apart, close enough to reach out and touch but not close enough. His blood red eyes take her aback for a second. She knew of course, she remembered, she saw them in her memories, but having them look at her was slightly jarring. Brilliant beautiful rubies. Forbidden, evil, dark, everything about him contradicts itself. Savage but sophisticated, alone but constantly surrounded, beautiful and ugly.

Now that she is in his presence, that pull she constantly feels, that need to come to him, to finish whatever they started so long ago, deserts her. Now everything feels right. That constant need to move, to find something, has been satisfied and she rejoices in the moment by taking in a deep breath. "What happens now?" She asks.

She looks up at him, he who still has not moved and is just looking at her, devouring her with her eyes as if she might leave any second and she becomes giddy. This man, one third of the powerful Volturi brothers wants her, needs her. His want, his need makes her feel accomplished (wrong word) as a woman. It makes her feel valued, loved. As opposed to Jacob's need which had made her feel trapped. For a decade, she's been trying to come to terms with her role in his death. She has listened to her mother and father's questions, their confusion and even at times their resentment of her. She never really had an answer at first, just this feeling she wasn't able to convey of the world closing in on her. He loved her, he was a part of the family, everything in his life was focused on her, but she had never asked for it. She was never given a choice. He didn't even have a choice. Before he had imprinted on her he had a serious hard on for her mother, and then all of a sudden his whole life was her. Standing in front of a man she wants, that wants her, as a complete whole person on her own, she knows for certainty that the choice she made was the right one.

"That my dear, is up to you." He advances on her and she feels the once familiar flip flop in her stomach.

"I don't know," she states. She has no idea what happens next. She couldn't plan it. All that she knew was that she needed to come here. She was being driven insane slowly not being by him, not knowing what they had started a decade before. She needs answers, but how she is supposed to get these answers she has no idea.

"Oh really?" He laughs, cold but not cruel, "I think you do. I think you know exactly why you came." He is so close to her. She closes her eyes, and leans her head forward against his chest. It is all she can do.

"I just needed." His mouth is against her neck creating a delightfully frozen and hot feeling in her. "I wanted-" His hand softly, barely moves up and down her ribcage.

"What did you want? What could possibly drive a precious Cullen to the Volturi?" He asks, a mixture of laughter and pride in his voice, he knows the answer. He knows and she wants to turn the tables on him. She knows she can make him say that he needs her just as much. That he was walking through the lonely disgusting catacombs at night waiting for her, but that would take too much time. Right now she needs him more than her pride.

"You." She says and pulls his face down to hers, and when their mouths touch once again the world falls apart for a second. They seperated for a second. Their foreheads touch, their breathe mingles and Nessie feels something breaking inside her. Everything in this moment is perfect, almost achingly sweet. She wants to put it into words, but she is not talented enough to even convey how much he has meant to her even without being a physical part of her life so she shows him.

Her hand rest against her cheeks and she lets him see it all: her need, her want, the constant pull, his constant presence on her mind. Everything she has done these past ten years has been tainted by that one night. Has been defined by resisting him, the need to be near him.

He lowers his head to kiss her once again. It's you she says over and over again. Every time their lips meet, their tongues touch, every time she breathes it is him. Always him.

He pulls her closer, because it is never enough.

He spoils her.

Anything she wants she has, even if it is a passing thought or something he just thinks she wants he gives it to her. She hates it. She feels like it is too like Jacob. She likes being able to provide for herself, when she goes out and buys something for herself it just means more.

She tells him this.

"I want you to have the best. You deserve the best." He says, as his hand rests above her heart. He likes to feel it beating.

"I'm a big girl, I can take care of myself. I like taking care of myself." She says.

"You take care of me. Everyday you give me everything I want. You make me smile, make me laugh. Ness, you make me feel young again. Do you have any idea how much of an accomplishment that is? Everyday I spend in your arms. Everyday that you remain here with me is more than I ever thought I would have again after Didyme died."

She hates when he mentions his mate. She hates that she is not his one true love. If love is what you can call this. This is need, want, selfish desire, but something more has come out of it. She cares for him, she respects him. Her time in his presence has created a real admiration for him, the thoughts he has, the things he has seen, has lived through. He constantly surprises her and she cannot deny that the like she felt for him has deepened to love.

She drops the subject and he sits with her in the silence. He knows it hurts her when he brings Didyme's name up and tries to avoid it as much as possible but it is hard. Being around Ness always brings back thoughts of his wife. It is his reasoning that when one is happy one naturally thinks to the last time one was that way. He tries to make it up to her as best he can. He buys her everything she ever wants. He has bent the rules to allow her to hunt within the area, everyone now bows to her and treats her as if she were an equal to Sulpichia and Athendora. She thinks these simple tokens are too much, but he knows what being with him is costing her. Not once has she received word from her family. Not once has she made contact with them, and though he ignores it and she thinks he doesn't notice he can't help but hear them in her head every once in a while. While they are lying together and she runs her hands through his hair, he hears past conversations, he sees her memories that she dwells on.

No nothing is too much for her. He would do anything to keep her here. She tried once, a few months after she first arrived to leave him. She wanted to go back home, she said she made promises to her family but then she made the mistake of touching him and he saw how torn she was. At some point they bound themselves to each other entirely. Neither would ever be able to have another again. They had months of constant need and want and desire, fueling them to never break; they never tired, never slept, it was constant sensory overload so different than both the mating experience he has and her previous attachment with Jacob. This was indescribable, like breathing, like suffocating, like life.

Denying whatever this is is impossible.

Denying her was impossible.

She is careful not to touch him when she is hurt, he hates that. She is turned away from him watching the television he had installed just for her. She really hated it when he got that. She nearly threw it out the window claiming that he was changing too much. That he was altering his entire personality to accommodate her, that soon she would hate him. He hushed her down. Which wasn't the smartest thing in the world to do because that only made her lash out more. However he isn't a stupid man and he has learned from his mistakes. He needs to listen to her fears and take them seriously. It's a change in the right direction that he has now at least acknowledged

No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change:
Thy pyramids built up with newer might
To me are nothing novel, nothing strange;
They are but dressings of a former sight.

He moves closer and kisses her shoulder. She pulls back slightly but when he moves forward and kisses it again she leans into his touch. He runs his nose along the curve of her neck breathing in the sweet simple, erotic smell of her. He bites the lobe of her ear and pulls down, he hears the moan she tries to suppress and is now confident of his victory. His hands ghost the side of her ribs. Delighting in every shiver, every hiss, every time she leans into his touch. He continues to whisper in her ear.

"Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire
What thou dost foist upon us that is old,
And rather make them born to our desire
Than think that we before have heard them told."

She moves her hand above his, but she does not still him, they run their hands together over the lines of her body.

"Using the bard to seduce a girl, don't you think that's a little cliche?" She asks him as she turns over, her hips now straddling his.

"The ends justify the means, no? I'd say this ended the way I intended" He thrusts his hips up, but she scoots up on him so that she is now straddling his stomach and the motion leaves him unsatisfied.

"And what exactly were the means you had in mind?" She asks as she lowers her body so that her breasts brush against his chest for a moment while she whispers in his ear. Teasing him, taunting him. There are a million different Renesmee's he has seen, but playful Ness might be his favorite. Happy, mischievous and a little bit of a sadist all wrapped up in his beautiful girl. Keep her, a voice whispers in the back of his mind, the same voice he hears countless times every day. Keep her, is his constant mantra, he needs her here and if spouting ancient poetry will aid in this he will gladly make a fool of himself.

"Thy registers and thee I both defy,
Not wondering at the present nor the past,
For thy records and what we see doth lie,
Made more or less by thy continual haste.""

His voice slows, and though this has become silly and lighthearted, it's original intent was to make sure she knew how much he needed her. That despite not being mated he was devoted to her in every single way a man can be to a woman. Just looking now at their hands entwined, fingers laced he can see the golden threads that have formed between them. He looks straight into those gorgeous, impossible brown eyes and repeats the last line, to make sure she knows. To make sure she can never forget or doubt, how entirely he belongs to her.

"This I do vow and this shall ever be;
I will be true, despite thy scythe and thee"

Her mouth is on his. Fast, insistent, her eyes are closed but he saw the tears in her eyes. He heard the sharp intake of breath. "I love you Ness. Always." He whispers between kisses.

"Why are you still talking?" She asks and pulls her shirt over her head.

"I have no idea." He answers, flips her over and helps her discard the rest of her clothes.

It is when she reaches for another kiss, that she touches him that he sees every thought in her head is him. Always him.

He has succeeded in keeping her for another day.

Days seem to bleed into one another. Without sleep, without the rigid time schedule of humans she forgets slowly. As she goes deeper into their world she finds herself thinking less of her family. She indulges herself. It started off slowly. She gave in and let him buy her whatever she desired. She spent days locked in his room making love. When they did make it out of the bedroom she found herself interacting more with the guard. Heidi brought her shopping, she became accostomed to having her hair done and the daily gossip sessions. Life in Volterra was a slow seduction, the process so deceptive that she hardly noticed that she had become unfazed to the blood red eyes, to watching the members of the guard feed. Sometimes when she was bored she would even lead the tours and bring the humans to their death.

She was in the process of doing that right now. The two were leading the tour and in between directing the tourists attention to this painting they laid plans for the rest of the day. Heidi was going to go to the forest outside of the city limits with Ness while she hunted and then the two were going to go on a brief shopping spree before attending to some Volturi buisiness in Paris.

"You'renot going to kill anyone right?" Ness asks too fast for the humans to hear.

"No. Aro would send Felix or Demitri." She laughs. "I am to be a representative on behalf of the brothers for a banquet for some artist that Aro has taken a special liking too."

"Oh."

"It will be terribly dull, but we could have some fun with the humans. Make ourselves look utterly delectable." A wicked smile forms on her face and Ness can't help but match it.

Out in the tour group there is a girl not more than seven years old. She couldn't care less about the paintings or the ancient building. Everything inside the walls dulled to the park her family had visited this morning. She had swung the highest on the swings higher than the mean Tommy who was a whole two years older than her and called her names. The only thing that could possibly compare to being outside and out of the dark smelly castle were the two princesses in front of her. One of them even had violet eyes. The prettiest one had long reddish hair like her with brown eyes. She smiled so pretty. Lilly, for that was this young girls name, imagined being like her when she grew up. She saw the balls, and princes, because princes unlike boys were not icky at all, and dancing and jewelry.

Soon the tour stops in front of two very large doors. Lilly holds her breath, she thinks she is going to see the ballroom that her fantasies have been building for the past hour. The reality is much more perfect, she sees a black and white checkered floor and giant candle lit chandeliers like her fairy tale books. It seems like almost everyone is holding their collective breath as they walk into the massive room. She looks to the two princesses waiting for them to say something about this room but now that she is finally interested in the history they stop talking. She leaves her parents side, making her way forward to them, dying to ask them a question. It is while she pushes and shoves her way past the forest of legs and that she hears it, a blood curdling scream that makes her sprint to safety, to the princess with the long red hair. Once the princess is in her sight she makes the mistake of looking back, she sees men and women sinking their teeth in every ones neck. She watches the blood flow freely down their bodies, creating tiny little rivers that saturate their clothes. It looks like a page from her nightmares and if she believed in such things she would call these people vampires, but vampires aren't real right?

Finally she reaches the princess, and promptly locks her arms around and buries her head in the princess' stomach. "What is going on?" She asks, as tears cascade down her cheeks ruining the expensive material of Ness' dress. "Why are they hurting everyone?"

Ness bends down so she is eye level to this young girl, she can't help but wonder what would cause anyone in their right mind to run to her in such a situation. She touches the girls cheek, images of safety and beauty fill the little girls mind until she calms down. Ness takes her by the hand and leads her out of the room until the two are under the safety of sunlight. No one can come and bother them here. Her mind races as she tries to figure out what to do with this little girl. Her family is probably drained by now, they were tourist here for vacation meaning there is no one in the area to take her in and an orphanage just doesn't seem right.

"Whats your name, little girl?" Ness speaks in her softest voice, petting down the girls unruly curls.

"Lilly."

"Lilly was your whole family in there?"

"Yes. It was me, mama, daddy, Michael and the baby in mama's tummy." She says. "Are they okay?"

"No sweetie. I'm afraid not." Ness says as her heart breaks for this young girl. Pregnant. There were other children too, Caius favored them, something about the sweetness of the blood. Ness wishes she can vomit. Everything that her father and family had said about this place, everything they hated about it, everything that she thought was pure basic prejudice on their part came back to her. It was true. It was all true. Somehow she had become blind to all Volterra's faults, she lost sight of who she was and now here she is not sure which way is up or down with this little girl. Both orphans in the world, both of their worlds just crashed down around them. She holds Lilly as she cries, wishing there is a way to turn back time to right everything she has so thoroughly screwed up.

When Ness approached Marcus with Lilly he thought she was finally making the change he had longed for in her diet. When he realized she intended to keep her he forbid it. When she stated she was not asking his permission he was furious. He thought she would back down and see the insanity of her ways. Surely she knew what had occurred with her own mother, that no human could know of their existence without being changed or dying at some point. A vampire could not raise a human, and the Volturi were the least qualified of all. Every vampire in the castle but one lived off their blood, what would happen is she were to fall?

Ness told him she would not kill this child, that she would protect this child with everything inside of her. And like always Marcus gave in, he could not deny her after all.

Now they sit together in the darkness. Where once there was light and joy there is now a weight holding them down. He has sought every way to keep her here, he has even tried bonding with Lilly who lives in a villa outside the castle with a nanny that the Volturi support. The fights with Aro to secure the childs safety were long and tedious, but he fought until Aro became bored and soon Lilly was a fixture in their lives. The little girl celebrates her thirteenth birthday tomorrow and Ness is meticulously double checking every detail, she swears this is an important day in every females life. Funny, he thinks, he thought the thirteenth birthday was only significant to little Jewish boys, but he doesn't voice this. He also doesn't comment on the faces she makes when he goes to feed or the fact that she completely cut off her relationship with Heidi. No, he is now mute always accepting every thing she does, constantly making excuses for her and allowing her free reign as he always has.

"Do you think fireworks are too much?" Ness asks him without really waiting for his reply. He reaches for her, their two bodies barely touch before she pulls away again. He tries again and pulls harder. Her body tenses, but he does not release her. He presses kisses against her skin, nipping, biting, but she does not melt to his touch. She sighs impatiently pushing him away, he does not release her. He yanks her closer so her softness is molds against his hardness touching the magic spots he knows she cannot deny. The low guttural moan that she releases leads to a small victory dance in his head.

"Stay with me tonight." He whispers. His hands dance along her body, playing her like an instrument.

"I can't Lilly." She leans her head back, resting it against his chest.

"Just one night." Reduced to a begging man he thinks bitterly.

"One night." She says and before he can change her mind he turns her around. Their mouths meet. Not soft, but harsh. She doesn't touch his face anymore. He makes up for it by grabbing her by the hair, keeping them close, her hands pull and tug at his clothes. He pushes her against the bed. He attempts to undress her slowly, to gain control of the situation; gain control of her. He places kisses between each button, pinning her with his weight, taking his time to enjoy her but more importantly to have the opportunity to make her feel, make her remember, increase his influence over her. Her hips bucks against him and he buries a smug smile into her stomach. Slowly he kisses back up as he pushes aways the shirt he just unbuttoned until his hands push her hands above her head. Before she can understand what is happening her arms are secured above her head.

"Marcus. What?" He cuts her off with a kiss. He continues to kiss, to touch, and bite until her body is his again. He knows he can get her back, he can make her his and fix whatever broke. They started with one night, one night when her better senses warned her against him and they could start again the same way.

"Let me in Ness." He says as he begins to remove her jeans, once again, slowly and deliberately. With each hum of approval, each thrust she makes, every squirm he can feel her becoming his again. He pulls back and finishes undressing himself. Her eyes watch him. They are focused, deliberate, intense. On him. Not on the human girl, not on plans and shopping and charity and anything else that has occupied her mind in the past six years; she is focused on him again. She will be focused on him all night, he tells himself as he hovers above her, and when he enters her he makes sure of it.

The next morning he relinquishes his hold on her, letting her go to Lilly. He watches her as she gets dressed, her movements are fast and hurried as if what was once a pleasure has become a chore at some point. He wishes she touched his face last night just so he can have some idea as to what is going through her mind.

"Ness." She doesn't look at him. "Renesmee" He shouts and she pauses.

"What? You had your night." Her voice is laced with venom, as she plays with that annoying piece of metal.

"My night." He repeats, astonished. "Do you not see a problem with me having a night?"

She ignores him. He takes the annoying piece of metal out of her hands and smashes it.

"What are you going to do Marcus? Tie me to the bed every time I don't obey you. This is who I am. I care about people. I take care of people. I don't even know the girl you have been with all these years." He holds her, his hand grips her arms so tightly that he is half surprised they haven't been ground to dust beneath her. In those few words she just took apart everything he thought he could count on.

"Why did you choose me that first night? Why set your sights on me? Why not leave me alone. I was happy Marcus." She continues. He recalls that first night easily. The memory of it has been playing through his mind more often lately, he chose her because she was perfect, because she was so fully loved and adored by everyone, because she was a crystal doll and he wanted to shatter her. He wanted to corrupt her and own that innocence and that love. How fitting that he got everything he wished for only to realize he didn't want it, the poets would call it justice, he isn't so sure he disagrees. But there is one point in which she is clearly mistaken.

"You were not happy, dear child. You were suffocating in your golden cage. You chose me that night just as much as I chose you. I showed you the way to freedom but you took it. You cam back here to me, ten years later to continue down that road." They stand face to face, perfectly still like the statues he always had a fear of turning into. Before Ness came into his life he often wondered if some of the ancient statues were not just vampires who became bored with living, but now the point is moot.

"Do you really think I had a choice?" She asks him, looking like a child and for the first time the millennial difference in age between them finally seems like a significant trial to overcome.

"I think we always have a choice." He answers as he lets her arms go. Choice. Staying with him needs to in the end be her choice. He can persuade her, want her, trap her, but she needs to want it too.

"I never had a choice. I was stuck in a spiders web from that first night. You paralyzed me. I wanted you, I couldn't not want you. Because you were beautiful. Because you fought me. Because you surrendered to me. Because you loved me back, despite yourself. Because you were the first thing to make me feel in decades. I wanted you, but I never chose you. I never had a choice." She raises her hand, and he holds an unnecessary breathe. Maybe today, finally after all this time, but she stops in mid-air as if realizing what she was about to do and her hand is by her side again. "I hated you."

"I know." He says, his thumb traces the curve of her cheek."

"I still kind of hate you." She says with laughter, leaning against him.

"I know." He answers and smiles. She is saying goodbye to him, she is saying she loves him and he is letting her. He knows that she will be back again. She needs to grow, to age, to do whatever she needs to do. He can't hold her back, and he cannot leave, his fate was decided long ago. He pulls her closer. Her shoulders shake against his chest, and the two stand there in silence, not ready to let go.

Ness walks into their, correction, his room. He must be with Aro, she thinks but it is probably for the better. She did swear that she wouldn't come back for anything. Her family is more than able to provide for her and Lilly when she joins them. Yet, she can't bring herself leave without the locket. It is the only gift she asked him for during their first trip outside of the castle together. The gold is so delicate it looks almost like it is hand spun thread woven into the most beautiful design of a hazelnut plant entwined with honeysuckle. When he placed it around her neck, he asked her if she knew the old tale of Tristan and his Isolde. When she said she had not they spent the rest of the afternoon walking through the city as her told her the story of the lovers epic love. When he reached the part where Tristan fashioned the wand from the branch of the hazelnut tree and carved Isolde's name, he looked her in they eye and repeated the line she was sure even if she didn't have the advantage of vampiric memory she would never forget, "we are bound together like the honeysuckle entwined with the hazelnut. If the two plants are separated, they die, just as lovers if separated, cannot survive." It was that moment, that the lust, attachment, need and want of him finally gave way to the free falling sensation that is love.

As her fingers grasp at the lock and the locket settles against her chest she whispers into the darkness. "I don't really hate you. I wish I could but I cant. If I could hate you I would hate you for making me leave my family. For Jacob. For all those people. For making me into this. For making me love you. But I guess I really didn't have a choice either did I? I can't hate you and you and I both know this isn't goodbye. True lovers can't say goodbye right?"

The question hangs there in the darkness. She already knows the answer. She can never stay away the same way she can never truly stay; the same way she can't choose who she is. She is a Cullen. She has a family, she has people, people who love her, people who she needs. Lilly, she thinks with a smile, she can't wait to introduce her family to Lilly. She glances around the room once more before she hears her fathers parting words in her mind. "Come back to us," he told her. "Go to him, but come back to us." And so she does.

The End

Quick A/N here. Specail thanks to Dolphin4442 and Its929 for pre-reading this for me and putting up with me when I dove back into this world. I hope you enjoy re-visiting Marcus and Nessie as much as I enjoyed writing them.