Here we are again! Thanks again to my awesome beta, Idealskeptic for understand, translate and put on words my awful English (sooner or later you'll kill me lol).
Someone ask me what verbena is. Maybe someone knows it as vervain. It's a plant.
It has been associated to supernatural forces. It was called "tears of Isis" or "Juno's tears". Folk legend stated that was used to staunch Jesus' wounds after his removal from the cross. It is also called "Holy Herb" or "Devil's Bane".
Anyway, stop the cackle and read!
I hope you'll enjoy it :)
Chapter 3
Rosalie POV
I don't know where I am; it's dark and my body hurts. I feel ropes on my ankles and wrists.
Where is Emmett? Has Alice seen what happened? Will the others be on my trail? How could I be so stupid? Why did I lower my guard like this? Oh, yes, because I thought he was dead.
"Well, well, well. I hope you softened up in my absence." His voice make me sick and when his hands are on my face I start to panic. I remember when all this happened before and it takes all my power to not be overwhelmed by that memory.
"You're still the same hot girl I meet more than 70 years ago," he continues after he removes the blindfold. "It's a pity that I have to ruin your face and your body." Now I'm really panicked.
"Robert, Joseph, bring me the knife," he says to two vampires next to me.
"I think this stays here," he says pointing to the gag on my mouth.
"I don't want another bite from you." I don't know if he says it about the one I gave him when I thought I killed him or the one I gave him when he brought me here, after he tried to kiss me.
The two vampires return with a knife and a bottle filled with what seems to be water. He pours the liquid in a bowl and then he immerses the knife in it.
"This will hurt a little bit," he says and then he cuts me.
I shriek in pain and I try to free myself without success. This fucking thing hurts a lot and the more I try to move, the more it hurts.
"This is only the beginning. I have more plans for you," he says with a fucking grin on his face.
Jasper POV
I need a plan and I need it now.
After I came out from the bedroom I ran downstairs and outside, far from the house. I needed a moment to collect my thoughts and and let all the emotions I felt in the last hour was over me like a wave.
How did it possibly happen? We were happy and peaceful.
I have started to control my thirst better and I started to go to college. Alice is happy with her job in that stylist's office. Bella and Edward are finally happy and they let Nessie be with Jacob without a second thought. Emmett and Rosalie... Well, Emmett and Rosalie started to think about adoption.
My sweet, beautiful and caring sister has come to agreement with her past and she accepts the fact that a family is not only blood and DNA but respect, love and faith. I'm so proud of her.
I remember when everything started between us.
It was three years after I arrived with the Cullen. I already noticed that in a particular moment of the year Rosalie was more reticent, sad and avoided everyone but I thought it was always Edward's fault. He teased her, starting an argument and he pissed her off so much that she got angry and started fighting with him. Alice explained that it was like that from when Rosalie was changed but she didn't know the motivation and if I wanted know I had to ask to Rose.
After the latest fight she had run upstairs with Emmett on her heels. Carlisle and Esme reprimanded Edward for what he said to her and said he knows why she acts like that and he could try to be gentle. We didn't know what to do. I couldn't control all that rage and sadness and if they didn't stop I could do something wrong. Alice noticed it and led me out.
Edward left a little bit later and we went inside.
"Carlisle, she won't open the door." Emmett was frustrated.
"You know she's angry right now. Wait and try again later when she'll have calmed down." Carlisle answered calmly. It isn't the first time this conversation happened.
I don't know what pushed me, but the memory of Rosalie, defenceless and scared, told me that I had to do something. "Could I try? If she doesn't answer or if she tell me to go to hell, I will never try again." Carlisle, Esme and Emmett looked at me quizzically.
"Are you sure, Jasper? Rosalie can be mean when she wants." Carlisle explained.
"It's okay. I don't care if she says something mean to me."
"Okay, go. But if something happens don't say that we didn't warn you." Emmett shrugged and left.
I smiled and went upstairs.
I tried to knock several times without answer. After the tenth time, I opened the door but there wasn't a trace of Rosalie. I followed the scent and in a corner of the walk in closet there was a trapdoor for the attic.
I climbed the stairs and I found Rosalie sitting on a huge pile of boxes.
"Go away!" Rosalie hissed.
"No," I answered calmly.
"Go. Away," she hissed again.
"No," I replied.
"You want make fun of me like Edward? Save it for another moment. Right now I'm not in the mood."
"I know it, but I know you need someone to talk too."
"You can't help me."
"Try it."
She stared at me, and tried to tell why she's so sad three times, before she gave up.
"I can't," she sobbed.
"Okay. If you promise you won't bite me, I'll sit down with you so you can relax and try to tell me everything."
She nodded and I sat down with her.
"Now, close your eyes and relax. I can take care of the rest." I sent her waves of calm and confidence and she started.
She told me about her family; her father was a banker and her mother was a housewife. She had an younger brother who she loved. She told me about herself and when she walked in the street and how everybody looked at her. And then she mentioned Royce and even if I tried to send her the strongest waves of calm and confidence she couldn't go on. She started to sob, she clenched her fists and stood up.
"I can't, sorry. This is much too painful for me." She turned her back and went to the trapdoor.
"Wait! If you tell me what happened, I'll tell you my story." That was blackmail and I knew it, just like she did. In three years with the Cullens I never told my story to anyone. Alice knew a little bit of it and Edward saw less than her in my thoughts. Instead everybody knew about my power, or curse as I saw it, thanks to Alice.
"But I need your help." She couldn't avoid it.
"Of course." I pat the floor and she came back.
"It was a cold night in April and I just came back from visit my friend Vera and her baby boy when I saw them. They were in the street, drinking and chatting. Royce saw me and gestured me to approach. I made the biggest mistake in my entire life. I approached them and they started to mocking me, making fun of me and touching me. Royce violently took my arm and he brought me into the back alley.
"And it happened. They were on me in a second. They touched my body, they tried to undress me, and then, Royce did it..."
Even if she couldn't go on I knew what she meant say. She was raped. Those fucking bastards raped her without mercy.
She started to cry tearlessly. Her voice was shaking and she clutched at me with all her strength.
I didn't know what to do and I did the first thing that flashed in my mind. I comforted her. I place my hand on her head and stroked her hair. She hid her face in my arm and continued sobbing.
We stayed like that for awhile, then she stood up and thanked me.
"It's my turn. I'll tell you my story," I said when she smiled at me.
"We can wait if you want. I think your story isn't so different than mine."
"No, I want tell you. I promised you."
"Okay, but I won't hold you if you cry like a chick."
I smiled and nodded before I started "I was born in 1843 in Texas. When the Civil War broke out, I enlisted in the army and I told them I was 18 years old. I lied to them.
In a year I was the youngest Major in the Texas cavalry. But the night we evacuated Galveston I met them. Maria, Nettie and Lucy. Maria changed me and I became her first in command.
I worked on the newborns she and the other two turned and I had the duty to end their life when they reached their first year. I did the dirty work. The problem was that I felt everything they felt and it nearly killed me.
I couldn't feed, I couldn't do my job and sometimes I couldn't even get out of my room because of the headache that suppressed emotions caused me.
One day, my friend Peter and his mate, Charlotte, decided to run away; from the war, from their life, from Maria and from me.
Of course they asked me to go with them but I refused. I was blind. I thought that it was my life, but I was wrong.
Five years after their disappearance I went through my worst time. I didn't feed for three weeks and I was almost sick. Maria noticed that and instead of reassuring me, she punished me. Peter and Charlotte found me in the basement, chained to the wall with a little girl in the opposite corner. They found me and they saved me and the girl.
They tried to take care of me, but I was stubborn, and my gift, as always, didn't help me, I left them and I wandered from city to city until I found Alice."
I finished my story and I turned my gaze on Rosalie. She was sobbing again.
"You faced a lot of bad things in your life that I couldn't imagine" she said.
I watched her amused. She cared for me. I felt grief emanating from her. As if I was her real sibling.
"Let's make an agreement. If someone throws shit on us, we stay together, we protect each other and if one of us needs help call for the other. Do we have a deal?" she said confidently.
I thought about it for a little bit and then said, "Are you asking me to become your big brother, Hale?"
She nodded.
"Okay, so we have a deal."
She smiled. "From now on are we the Whitlock twins or the Hale twins?" I had to ask.
"Don't count on it. We are the Hale twins. I'm a married woman and I don't want take another man's last name that isn't Emmett's."
Here we were. The usual Rosalie had returned. "Okay. From now on we are the Hale twins." I smiled and I took her hand.
"It's time to face the others. We stayed away too long." We went down and when Emmett saw I brought Rosalie with me, he smiled happily and embraced her.
I stand up and I compose myself. They can't see me in this state. Then I walk back to the house and call Edward. "I need you do something. Call Peter and Charlotte and ask them if they can be here before tomorrow morning. I'll talk with Carlisle about the plan and then I'll update you."
I reach Alice and persuade her to look for a vision, any type of vision.
She sits on the couch and starts to search.
I enter into Emmett and Rosalie's dark bedroom. " Any sign of improvement?" I ask Carlisle.
"No. I'll call Eleazar for a consult. I hope he knows something more about this verbena poisoning. I understand you're going after Royce. Are you sure? For what I know, he was a wicked man. I don't want find out how he could become worse."
I nod. "I owe it to Emmett and, most of all, to Rose. So, yes. I'll go after Royce."
He sighs "Be careful. And bring my daughter back."
I go downstairs and meet Edward. "They're on their way. They'll be here before midnight. Do you have a plan?"
"I have a plan."
