Author's Initial Note: I might be developing or/and changing cannon just a little bit.
Chapter Dedication: This one goes to Lady [Gaga], as promised. Her reaction to last chapter gave me goose bumps.
Disclaimer: This will probably the last one. Truth hurts. I do not own The Twilight Saga--nor do I really wish to--or any of it's characters, settings, or plots. Everything belongs to Stephenie Meyer, and the greedy rightful owners.
Chapter 7
Healing of the Broken
The lack of sleep had her verging the thin edge of insanity. Chelsea had been the only one who kept her alive, bringing her both food and trivial information about the coven. Amelie barely listened. She hadn't muttered a word in a long time, but not because she hadn't been on the state to do so; she was restraining herself, instead, considering the risk of talking nonsense. Maybe it was more of a high possibility than a risk. She was careful to react even around Chelsea, who she had gotten used to.
"Heidi and Felix are on again." The light brunette told her on her fourth week of being part of the Volturi, searching for conversation, an oddity in her.
Heidi and Felix. It was really more of a vicious cycle. Amelie did not blame them, though; an eternity deprived of sex must be torture. She hadn't seen Felix in the last seventeen days since their encounter, and she doesn't thinks she wants to either. Chelsea, on another failed attempt on getting her to talk, told her Carlisle had been guarding her door lately. Afton must have told him what happened with Felix. Amelie had been bathing on her uncomfortable bathtub without complaints now; she knew that putting one foot outside her room was looking for death. And with her late profanation of unintelligible insanities, telling Chelsea more than what Aro needed to know, it was not likely that she could survive the transformation either.
Amelie just nodded weakly, burying her face on her pillow, the sleep acossing her.
Callum had finished his one thousand and third painting, thing he was not exactly proud of, an incomprehensible thing, Chelsea told her. Callum was an interesting being, Amelie had concluded. Chelsea had described him as handsome—as handsome she could describe someone without instantly comparing him to Afton—but close minded, trait he had gotten from his previous life. When his eyes had been green colored, he had been a Christian Greek who had been persecuted to death. A vampire nomad called Evangeline—that now belonged with the Volturi, like her mate—had found him, and they had fallen in love so monotonously, only them understood the reasons that had brought them together in the first place.
Evangeline had been on her previous life the daughter of a roman soldier, kept in secret, because soldiers couldn't marry, and because her mother had been Greek. The Coven of Romanian vampires found her, but she had been one of the many members who had betrayed them to side with the Volturi against them on their thirst for both power and blood.
In one of those brief and rare moments Chelsea acceded to talk about herself, she had announced she had finished twenty two chapters of her 14th novel since Amelie had arrived on the castle. She wrote fast. She had also promised to bring Amelie her last chapter, the one where she talked about her, in her last civil attempt to force her into voicing her numb thoughts. She just ignored her, and Chelsea gave up on her without seeming to care, always with the unbreakable façade.
It wasn't that Amelie was unable to talk; her feelings did not let her speak at all, an invisible lump on her throat more uncontrollable and powerful than herself. Ever since Carlisle had arrived at Volterra, she had seen things differently. She was dying. These vampires were changing her life—more like changing her—forever. They were giving her forever. A forever that was full of haunting memories, because Chelsea hadn't told her humans memories fade with the time. She felt cold, helpless, and the lack of sleep just completed it all. Without the hours that sleeping took, she had a chance to think—but not really coherently. So she just left speaking, but not listening.
Priscilla visited her once. Carlisle had entered with her, without really looking either both women. He took a seat far from her bed, where Priscilla had seated.
"I know you don't want to talk. I don't blame you." She shifted uncomfortably on the bed. Amelie's scent was distracting, and she felt out of place, even in the presence of a human. Specially in the presence of a human, where she could lose control so easily.
"This is not my place either, really. Everyone can tell, even I, who do not seem as smart as other vampires in comparison." There was a pause, but Priscilla spoke again. "I just wanted to tell you that words matter. Someone like Aro doesn't take it on consideration, because he's so confident on his power. I've never relied on my powers that much…"
Priscilla's naturally puffy eyes were suddenly narrowed, the glint of multiple memories passing through them. Amelie instantly knew she was hiding something---that something being a lot. She frowned; she had thought Chelsea more observant. Had Aro been as observant as her?
Priscilla looked fleetingly at Carlisle, who was looking straight ahead, his mind lost in thought, but Amelie was sure he had heard every word the blonde had said. When she looked at her again, she still had the same look.
"…because I'm more about words. They can get you anywhere if you combine them with actions."
Still nothing from Amelie.
"I'm leaving soon. Not yet, though. I want to make sure you are okay. You see, the Volturi are never wrong about who they choose when human. I'll see you somewhere in the between of our forever, sister."
Amelie, as much as she wanted to let the words being blown away by the sweet scent of both vampires, they clouded her mind, as usually, and she couldn't fall in the numbness full of reveries she had come to enjoy. Frowning, she closed her eyes harder.
Priscilla hadn't been so stupid after all. Lying had been her key all along, way out she was offering Amelie.
What had been her gift? With the time, Amelie would learn her trait had never been and never would seeing the future.
Carlisle, as quiet as he had entered, escorted her to the door, and both vampires left her room in one fluid motion. Amelie did not watch them; their gracefulness was starting to hurt her ego, and her injured leg did not help on the matter.
Amelie would also learn she would miss talking when she had the chance.
******
"Carlisle! My dear friend! It's so delightful to see you again!"
Aro seemed baffled by his friend actually coming, and extremely eager to 'catch up'. Carlisle decided to be laconic, because he knew better than to give Aro reasons to start talking, even though he was sure Aro talked to himself enough for both of them.
Living with a mind reader had become quite an exercise to be able to block thoughts, even from Aro, whose gift worked differently than his son's: he had to concentrate on one thing, that being the purpose of his visit, thing that wasn't exactly specified on the letter he received, though.
"Aro. Marcus. Caius." He said, nodding towards each.
"Sources tell me you have been in here long enough already. I'm almost offended by your lack of enthusiasm to greet us…" Aro made the comment to sound friendly, an ice breaker perhaps. But you can't break ice with a needle, with such weak statement. Aro's plans to reunite with Carlisle like nothing had happened crashed down when he sensed his sober mood, too tough to crack even for him.
"Your gloomy mood is quite intoxicating. Still pushy about our last encounter, I see." He sighed unnecessarily. "I will accept, we behaved quite rudely, but it was such a human mistake, we can not be judged by such! A friendship of so many years, and years to come, can't be destroyed for such a little insignificant incident. I'm sure you agree…"
"We used to agree on much things, didn't we, my dear friend?" Like Caius mind was synched with Aro's, he spoke, making an extension of his statement before Carlisle could respond, because he knew what his response would be.
"Except on your ridiculous way of living. Haven't you gotten tired yet?" Aro asked, with a genuinely puzzled face, his confused expression mixed with that of a child who had played a game too many times.
The edges of Carlisle's purpose were beginning to slowly fade; Aro had been looking for a way to distract him, searching his weakness besides his family. But that was pointless if you already knew; the mind reader knew how to crack Carlisle's determined mind, every weakness, every strength, and discussing humans was not his particularly favorite topic.
But Carlisle also knew Aro, maybe not like Aro knew him, but just enough to make himself remember to cut the chase. He still answered as laconic as he could.
"I prefer to keep my conscience intact. Human lives deserve more than to be cut short by us, who have no right upon them." He felt like he was betraying his own words as he thought of his lovely daughter Rosalie, and her other half Emmett, of his oldest son Edward… He had condemned them all by giving them the worst kind of salvation there was.
"Ah. That same philosophy?" Caius asked, his tone a little too bothered to be passed as bored.
"Some humans are just meant to die, Carlisle. In fact, in one way or another, they all are! You are interrupting God's plans for his little puppets." Aro said mockingly instead, like he was teaching Carlisle a lesson he had failed over and over again, the word God tasting bitter on his mouth.
"Which bring us to my visit. This young girl…"
"Ah! Yes! The little beauty Amelie Birmingham is! I'm sure you have seen her already. That girl must be as clumsy as your lovely latest daughter in law." He laughed dryly once, remembering hearing the vague details of her accident by gossip.
"How is Bella and your family, now that I remember?" He continued, "Are they good? Is her child drinking her milk? We don't want her to stop growing just yet." There was a double meaning to his words, both deadly, and Carlisle could barely contain the edge on his tone when he answered his query.
"Reneesmé is growing quite impressively. She will be attending high school this fall."
"Oh. That's great." Shameless disappointment. Carlisle could tell he was expecting otherwise. Of course he was. "We surely want to know more about that intriguing child. She's such a mystery to us. And to think we had the luck of her getting to be part of your family, such close acquaintances!" His excitement never aged, never faded.
The friendship the Volturi and Carlisle maintained had it's base on Carlisle's exploration of the new life he had been damned with on his first years as a newborn. But he had parted ways with them for their form of survival; Carlisle just wanted to live without the guilt of taking lives like the vampires who had taken his.
Even though he had not stayed on the Volturi's domains for long, he had forged a bond between the ancient creatures on the need for familiarity. When Carlisle was changed, there were no answers for the multiple questions he had about the creature he had become. Like a man lost in the desert, he was constantly surrounded by people he could potentially hurt, where no one could help him, because there was no such help for a monster like him. And he just couldn't take it…
He had found the Volturi shortly after and their civilized manners gave him hope that he could—maybe, just maybe—make an agreement with himself, accepting what he was without shame. The three graceful men, and the totality of the guard (who lacked the wicked twins and half the members it had on the present) got their survival by drinking human blood, though, and it was just unacceptable by Carlisle. It was their differences in the matter that just couldn't keep them in the same place any longer; the human life defender had parted ways with them on his search for self-forgiveness for the deaths he had caused, perhaps for research on the ways he could live without the eternal sorrow caused by the memory of his terrified first victims.
He arrived to America, and he just stopped eating alto together.
Because nothing done, no harm.
He thinks his abstinence made the monster inside of him even more furious for blood, that ecstasy in dense, liquid form. His struggle to control the desperate hunger that haunted him eventually got the best of the doctor, and he found an alternate way of surviving by feeding of animals. That was the first time he had fed and heard nobody scream. Maybe the farmer, but that was another story—something that involved the chupacabra…
Aro's sigh got him back from his memories. Carlisle found him with a face full of pity, his head resting on the back of his chair, his jet black hair falling gracefully on it.
"Oh…I hope our bonds haven't been that damaged to actually be able to maintain contact during the times." Aro said, seeming to be saddened by the mistake he had made, seeming being the key word.
"Don't trail off, Aro." The annoyance of Caius broke through his composed mood, finally tired of Aro circling the subject for the sake of relationships.
"But of course, how foolish of me to not formally discuss the reason of your visit!"
"There's no need to know her name, or the details of her face. She's as human as all of them are." Caius was exasperated, waiting for the final question to be asked and to the deal to be sealed. Marcus sensed, though, Caius wished Carlisle would refuse to change the girl, not because he bothered her, because he did not care about her in the minimum, but because his refusal would initiate speculations about searching reasons to start the imminent war sooner. Caius had always been too eager to be immortal.
"This is quite an intriguing child, though; so young, so…usable." The word sounded dirty on his mouth, and Aro couldn't hide his smile.
Suddenly, Carlisle asked what Aro had been eager for.
"Why couldn't you change her?"
Aro had thought about this. He knew Carlisle; he was not as stupid as Aro would've liked. He would claim to know the reason he had brought him to Volterra, away from everything he loved. Because he had time to plan and change the lies carefully, they came easier and more gracefully, each word carefully pronounced with a flawless ringing truth. Not even little Alice could have seen it.
That was the thing that made Carlisle suspect.
"She sings to me." His tone was neutral, with just a bit of conviction added to a tad of shame. "It won't be easy, as you may know, to control myself if her blood smells so…mouthwatering." Carlisle's wasn't sure of the cause of the shine in Aro's burgundy eyes.
If Marcus hadn't been part of them, he would have snorted. Aro continued.
"I don't trust any other vampire on this important task, but I choose you, my old friend. Think about it like a way to make sure things will eventually…heal between us." Carlisle's eyes were stony.
"Of course, Aro. I never wanted to things to fall apart like they did." And part of that statement would be true if Carlisle did not suspect about their attempt to still destroy him and his family. But maybe, just maybe, Aro would have more gratitude towards him and all of the Cullens for giving him a potential member, a potential enemy. Carlisle knew this; this matter had been discussed by him with his oldest son.
It was Caius' time for trailing off on his own remembered wrath. "Neither did we. But things unfold, irritating and incompetent people confuse us all…"
"Enough about the past! We have a promising future ahead of us. Why don't we enjoy it to it's fullest?" Aro cut him off with a smile that hinted his nature.
"Why not, right?" Carlisle could only respond with dry sarcasm.
"Exactly…"
"Will you do it?" Marcus spoke for the first and last time, like he usually did, with his usual bored tone. He was always the one that looked up for the job to be done, because that was the only purpose Aro had ordered Chelsea to work her gift on him.
The question hung heavily in the air, almost poisoning it. Carlisle took long for a vampire to think about the many aspects the offer involved. The choices were simple: to take his offer, and change the human or to refuse and disgrace the relationship between his family and the coven. There were too much lives involved.
Carlisle had been an active part of human society for more than three hundred years. Walking among people he could help had been his purpose all along, yet he was damned by accident, condemned by the rage his beliefs demanded as he persecuted a coven of the creature he was now. Yes, he was a vampire, but human blood had never been meant to him at all. He refused to kill his brothers, even if meant jeopardizing his own survival. It did not take long until he killed a human against his will, driven by the bloodlust, the part of him he had instantly hated. But Carlisle hadn't tasted human blood in so long, it worried him to taste it again, as much as he struggled to cope with the realization of it.
Besides, ever since Rosalie had accidentally—he still doesn't quite believes it, and he doesn't blames her—voiced her thoughts about how much she had once despised him for denying her choice upon her own life, he had taken a retrospective on the "little God game he played". It's useless to say only Jasper and Esme knew how much his beautiful first daughter had hurt him, and how hard it became for him to mask his pain, but neither of them said nothing. Silence was all he asked from his family; it was also all he got.
Truth was, he loved humanity as much as Rosalie wanted it, but his need was more subtle, his resignation more supreme; he knew what he was, and what he couldn't get t be again.
If he acceded to change her, though, he was going to give her choice, even if that meant putting himself on the line.
He did not even bother to consider the other option they were 'giving' him. Refusal had never been an option. But Carlisle knew that, either the choice, it was going to end on tragedy.
He has to be selfish for once. In fact, he wasn't being selfish for him at all. Saving his family was all that mattered, even if it meant welcoming to their world another beautiful woman, condemning her to face her own demons like all of them were and eternally would. Being one of those demons.
He just nodded grimly, self-disgusted by his own selfish decision just as he tried to convince himself he was doing the right thing and Aro couldn't be more happy; Carlisle had just agreed to his death, taking the first step that would lead him into the dark inside every vampire had.
"I propose a toast celebrating our agreement and our renewed friendship." Caius proposed, his joy not quite matching Aro's, even though the black haired wasn't as pushy.
"Let him be, Caius." Aro soothed Caius for the lack of enthusiasm Carlisle showed, stopping his complaints with a sadistic smile that matched the tone of what he was saying next.
"His nature will eventually call for him." Carlisle could only smile forcefully as he left to dive into the waters of his own purgatory for the wrong do he had just agreed to.
Was he worthy of the forgiveness of his family?
He evades his thoughts on the matter as he steps on her victim's room, meeting Chelsea briefly on the door.
*****
Three more hours felt like three more weeks for her body, but her mind could not tell the difference. Neither could Chelsea, who was determined on getting her out of her sick reverie. Amelie and Chelsea had forged a type of unspoken agreement, where it wasn't necessary to say that they were not friends or that they would stick together as such.
She had just entered with a tray of cold food to her room when Amelie's gaze lay on her, then to the food—moving uncomfortably, because she was hungry—dropping at her hands. Chelsea could just sigh unnecessarily loud.
"I don't even mind that you are not speaking , really, but how many times do I have to tell you that you can sleep? I'm not going to hurt you." She paused for a moment, where she glanced at the broken mirrors, and spoke carefully again.
"You look horrible and I mean it. Those bags under your eyes do not suit you."
The comment panged her already wounded ego even if she imagined she looked quite horrible, but that wasn't what made her finally speak.
She had just started trembling when she closed her eyes in a weak attempt of ignoring her, swallowing difficultly. Chelsea then compared her to a fresh newborn, incompetent and unwilling to control his thirst. Her mind was a scattered uniformity of streaming thoughts, all of them linking vaguely.
Curses for everything she had come to known in a ridiculously short amount of time almost invaded her mind in it's complete extent, if not for the fleeting coherent thoughts about the possible reasons the Volturi might have had for making her chase her own insanity. Because she was sure they were testing her will to make it to the coven by commonly rescheduling her death, and she was failing miserably. She knew it, but she was busy limiting her rage on her mind to think about it fully; paranoia is contagious.
Breathing heavily, her chest rising up and down at a disturbing pace, she continued with her struggle as Chelsea watched her without really seeming what to do, limiting herself to watch her with a composed face.
Not too long…Not too long…
Amelie could not quite convince herself, but her poor self soothing was all she had left.
She did not recognize what was real and what was product of her sick mind, the one that liked to be weak because it had already perceived too much. Because of this, she had not noticed she said her internal mumbling out loud, the words escaping her lips too jumbled to be understood by a human.
The honey-haired woman made no comment about her progress, but she was satisfied with her own efforts. Seeing her state, Chelsea decided to do her worst at soothing her. She could only do her worst; she had been tasting so much human blood, she doubted she could find such instincts in the monster she had become. The vampire doesn't really minds.
"Not long." Chelsea said carefully, yearning for eye contact. Amelie's stare, that was not quite full of sorrow, but of some indescribable feeling she had not experienced before and that intrigued her, was directed at the window.
"Can't somebody else do it? I want this to be over already!" Here cries were almost childish. Chelsea took pity on her, disappointed as she saw in her eyes bitter resentment molding perfectly with the necessity to feel alive. Amelie noticed this, and she hates pity, so she looked away, feeling crystalline tears numb her vision.
"I would have too, but the Master likes to watch suffering. Jane has been laughing her ass off about you all this time. Don't let her." Chelsea's voice turned stern, and Amelie asks herself when all of this became her fault, thought that enrages her already out of control mind.
"It's not like I can kill her! I will slap that dodgy bitch so hard when I get the chance, though…"
Chelsea took one long stride towards her bed, pushing her with only one hand without really wanting to hurt her, and her body was so weak, she falls.
"For now, you will have to hold on. Sleep."
"I won't, don't you understand!? You won't stay, and there's so much people that would gladly drink me dry for things I have done, that I don't really have fault of in the first place, like Jane, for just making it to Volterra, like that doctor, like Felix for my stupid ignorance…"
Chelsea then had to put her hand on Amelie's mouth to voice her thoughts and stop hers.
"What happened with Felix…?"
Hadn't Afton told her?
"I did not know you could burn. And he was being sleazy, reminding me so much of that bastard…and the cigarette's smoke must have gone to my head, who already is falling into madness…" Chelsea had to blink twice before drying the tears that were falling aimlessly of Amelie's dark eyes with her cool fingertips. Her tears made Chelsea felt, though, like she was failing to fulfill her task of keeping Amelie healthy.
"Shussh. Stop. They'll hear you. Nothing's private in here, so stop weeping like a child."
"I'm sorry. I'm so-"
"Stop it. Be a grown woman and take responsibilities for your actions."
Amelie then tried to control her sobs, which were embarrassingly loud. After a long moment of silence, her sobs stopped, and her mind wandered everywhere again, recalling past conversations she once had with Chelsea. Amelie whispers, because she knows she can hear her…
"You were right…this is purgatory…" Her voice seems dazed and lifeless, but Chelsea could not ignore the memories her changing brought.
"Transformation will be Hell."
"Are you trying to help? Because you are doing a fucking bad job…"Amelie's fit of rage made it's presence known, but it sounded odd in her weak voice.
"Truth soothes. Even if it destroys you first."
Then there was silence, because it was the only thing Chelsea could afford to give Amelie: privacy. After telling Amelie her food was getting even colder, and that it was the only thing she was allowed to give her on the day, she got up the bed shockingly gracefully and momentarily distracted she added, "Carlisle is coming."
"Is he…?"
"In fact, he's already here."
Amelie sighed once before Chelsea touched the doorknob.
Author's Note: Thanks to everyone who subscribed to my story. That's worth 10 reviews, and it makes me glow like a pregnant lady. A big massive thank you.
Thanks to Kopri, who beta-read this chapter, and who stands my psycho writing ways (and readers will understand this two chapters in the future, so don't tune out!).
Review me and get a preview? If anyone cares, anyway.
-Mia.
