Mysteriously, the day before the body of Bella Swan was scheduled to be cremated; it disappeared from its ceremonial holding building. The guards were found soundly unconscious that morning, lying where they had fallen, and their weapons useless. Upon questioning, it was found that they had no idea what had hit them.
Alice ran into Bella's house, where Edward had been staying, awaiting the funeral. She found him sitting at the low table in the kitchen, staring at a space in the wall that looked no different from any other space in the wall.
"Edward!" she exclaimed. He looked up at her from beneath his lashes. "Bella's body! It's gone!"
"Gone?" he asked, perfectly calm.
"Yes, gone! We can't find it anywhere and no one saw a single thing! It was like the thief was a shadow or something! Charlie's delirious and Renee is having an emotional breakdown!" Alice's topaz eyes shone with confusion, fear, excitement, and fury. "Who the hell would steal a corpse?"
Edward was silent for a moment. "Who indeed."
Alice stopped and stared at him, her brow furrowed. "Edward…what…? Are you not at all bothered by this? Does this mean nothing to you? Bella's body is gone! Someone stole Bella's body, Edward!" Alice panted after her outburst, obviously heavily disturbed by Edward's odd behaviour.
He stared back at her stoically and it was at that moment that Alice noticed his eyes. There was something in them that one did not usually see in the eyes of someone who was grieving, whose love, if not friend, had recently died. Alice knew that Edward had spent the better part of the last months of Bella's illness in her hospital room, never failing to be by her side, watching over her in case he was needed, somehow, some way. One would think that after all that, Alice would not be noticing what she was noticing in his eyes.
His gaze bore not the look of someone sad, not the look of someone whose companion had recently died. This was not the look of a man in mourning or the look of a man who was grieving. This was something else. This was the look of someone who had come to a grave decision, a decision to which they were resigned and ready.
Alice looked into Edward's eyes then and there and knew something was afoot, something more than she was privy to, something that she failed to foresee beforehand.
"Edward. What are you not telling us?"
He stared at her for a few more long moments before speaking. "I want you to call the family together. There's something I need to address."
"But, Ed—"
"Alice. Tell them to come here, to this house."
"All right."
Alice called everyone, which was not a difficult job, seeing as they were all in the vicinity of the cemetery, if not their house in the outskirts of Forks, to see Bella's body off in the funeral pyre ceremony. They wandered into Bella's house with various questions spilling from their lips.
"Did you find anything about the body?"
"Why did you call us, Alice?"
"Why are you staying in Bella's house, Edward?"
Edward raised a hand of silence, as everyone was taking seats around the table where he was kneeling. They watched him expectantly.
"I know," he said slowly, "where Bella's body is."
"Well, where in the world is it?" Carlisle.
"Hell, man, why didn't you tell us earlier?" Emmett.
"What?" Alice.
"I didn't tell you because I'm the one who took it."
A heavy, stifling blanket of quiet covered the whole room, before someone else spoke. It was Esme.
"Edward, if this is a joke, then it's not funny."
"It is no joke. I took her, and I hid her."
Emmett leapt up, but Esme and Jasper, sensing more to this than just what was being said, held him back. "Emmett!" Esme said sharply. "Let him finish!"
Edward stared at them all, calm like the eye in a hurricane. "I hid it somewhere that no one will be able to find it so that it will be safe and preserved until the time is right."
"Time is right? Edward, what the hell are you talking about? If you don't make some sense soon, I swear I will wring your neck and start making you, make some sense," Emmett growled darkly.
Edward turned his unnerving cold-topaz gaze to the equally unnerving amber eyes of his brother and blinked once, slowly. "I am going to bring her back."
"That's it. He's crazy and I'm going to do something about it." This time, it was Alice, her eyes dark with fury. Her hand rose above her head, ready to slap Edward, before Jasper stopped her.
Edward nodded at Jasper and continued. "I plan on going to the underworld and taking her soul back."
Jasper stared at him. "Edward, you know that that's only been done once, and even then it was just a legend."
Edward tilted his head in another complacent nod. "Yes."
Jasper peered at him for a few more beats. "You're doing it anyway, aren't you?"
Edward's gaze cut like diamonds.
"Yes."
Please leave feedback and answer my poll, the poll is crucial and there will be no update 'till both are done. Thanks. P.S. I can't find my story in the Twilight archive, reassure me that it's there or I might have to delete and repost A Fine Line again.