A/N - No ownage of Twilight.

I jumped down the hole in the ground and allowed my knees to bend on contact with it. I looked around.

I had left this place with no intention of coming back not three days ago and here I was... again.

I had planned to destroy them and didn't follow through with it.

Jane jumped down, almost on top of me. I moved just in time. She looked disappointed. How could I have loved that? I pick out the worst prospect mates.

Jane moved on and I followed. No sense in not following. That would just get me in more trouble. I could sense the others close behind us.

We walked past the receptionist.

I had expected us to go on. To the chamber were the Three meet, but we went to the right into a dark tunnel.

It smelled of rotten blood.

Something dreadful had happened here. I could see a stain where a body had lain. There seemed to be shadows hovering around the walls.

Jane's friend was walking towards us.

"Alec!" Jane sounded sincerely worried and I was shocked. The boy vampire's veins were black. There seemed to be shadows hovering around him too.

"What happened?" Jane had rushed to him and was examining his wrists.

"Some maniac human with a freakish power," he said then winced with some unseen pain.

"Come, I'm supposed to show you the way." Alec turned around and walked, slowly, leading us.

The tunnel sloped down. The floor grew more wet. The tunnel split and we took a right. Then a left.

We arrived in a room. No, a chamber. A jail cell. As soon as I walked into the room I felt a sudden dread, stronger than anything.

They couldn't punish me. I was too strong for them to do anything that could shake me.

But I could punish myself. And they could get me to do it. All they had to do was-

Shit.

I smelled her before I saw her. Her scent was overwhelming. It smelled so- seductive.

I wanted to lose myself in that smell.

I wanted to bury my face in her neck and drink her veins dry.

Shit.

I shook my head and held my breath.

There was Caius, standing on one side of jail cell with the human girl's wrist held tightly in his hand.

This was turning out to be one of the worst days of my life.

"Good evening, Colin." He said 'evening' as a three-syllable word.

"Good evening, Caius," I replied. I tried breathing, testing my ability to resist her with my hunger.

It was possible, but torture. I stopped trying.

"Where was he?" Caius asked Jane.

"In the forest at Forks."

"Well, well," he smirked as though someone had told a rather amusing joke, "Two fish in one catch. How did the Cullens fair?" Jane looked down when she answered.

"They lost none. There were almost twenty newborns and they faired well, against all the odds."

You don't know of the werewolves do you? I didn't let the smile creep into my face. Caius would suspect something.

I looked at the girl. She was young. Much too young to be involved with the Volturi, but they had taken me on and she looked only a few years younger than I had been.

She also didn't look scared.

She was looking curiously around the room, at all the faces.

She looked at me.

I had a sudden chill down my spine. Her eyes were greener than jade and seemed to smile at me. I lost myself in those eyes. They had more depth than all the expanses of the ocean.

Her face was surrounded by long, thin lengths of fair hair. That hair looked as wispy as a cloud. I could picture it brushing across her face as a west wind pushed it, ever so slightly, out of place.

And into perfection.

"Marie," the girl looked up in shock when Cauis said her name, "What do you think of Colin." he said, gesturing to me.

She looked confused, opening and closing her mouth in an indecision to talk.

"Well," she said, looking back at me, "He looks nice," she looked harder, "I feel like I can trust him."

She was completely innocent. Naive of the danger surrounding her. Unaware that I was the most dangerous thing to trust.

I so wanted to prove myself wrong on that point, but how could I? I was a huger-driven animal and I knew it. I hadn't eaten in a month. My throat burned at that very thought.

I felt the black of my eyes widen into the white. I was too hungry. This was too much.

I closed my eyes, trying to concentrate on something else. Anything else.

"How are you Colin?" Caius whispered, but I could hear him, "How have you been?" I felt him step closer to me.

I tensed involuntarily. Um, Forks. Yeah, there were beautiful trees in Forks. There were interesting people there too.

"You look thirsty," Cauis whispered, "May I offer you a drink?"

Yes, interesting people. A coven, almost as big as the Volturi.

What was their name?

"She's a wonderful specimen," I sharply inhaled at the closeness of his voice and she did indeed smell wonderful.

No! Um, what was that girls name? I was panicking. I needed to concentrate.

Um. It started with a B, right? Yeah, a B.

Beatrice? No. Bethany? No. Becca? That's close. What was it?

"She's perfect. Her innocence will make her blood flow sweeter than anything you've ever tasted," his voice was right next to my ear.

"Try it. It's good."

"Bella!" I shouted the word, a look of triumph on my face.

"What?" Caius wasn't whispering anymore. I stopped breathing again.

"What did you just say?" I didn't respond.

"How do you know of Bella?" I said nothing.

Caius glared at my vacant face and unmoving mouth and growled, then hissed.

He quickly strode over to the girl, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her over to the table against the wall.

He placed her hand, palm up, on the table and drew a silver knife.

My eyes widened as he laid it upon her exposed wrist.

My venom flew with new fervor. I felt the black of my eyes grow to encompass almost all of my eye. I struggled.

A thing roared inside of me that wanted Caius to press the knife through her skin, giving the blood room to flow. It wanted her blood. It wanted it badly.

A weaker part frowned and said, very advently, no.

I sided with the weaker part, but the monster was hungry.

I need blood.

"Stop!" and everything did. For it was not I who had spoken. The little girl struggled with the hold Caius had on her wrist. She looked very angry.

She had not cried out in fear, but rage. Caius released her. In disbelief and we all stared at her.

She stood there, positively fuming at Caius.

If it had been any other moment, I would have fallen to the ground with laughter. A human child, looking as though she were about to scold a three-thousand-year-old vampire.

"I can't believe you," it took all of my self control to not fall to the ground with laughter. She was disciplining him!

"You told me that this was a royal family. Royal families don't treat noble-" she struggled to find a word, "people like this." She went on.

"Even not-noble people deserve to be ruled under the hammer of law!" I was failing not to smile now. She was so adorable!

"You are a bad man!" She said, pointing a stubby finger at him.

I snorted. I couldn't contain myself. I tried to take a calming breath and stopped in the middle of it, the monster re-surfacing.

Caius got his composure back in the second it took me to stop my breathing again. His mouth twisted into a crooked smile as he said,

"Felix, unlock the gate," Felix ran over and inserted a key into the keyhole of the cell door. The iron creaked as he swung it open.

Caius, in one quick motion, grabbed the girl's wrist and flung her through the doorway and against the stone wall inside the cell.

She yelped as her body made contact with the hard rock, then slumped to the floor and lay there. A heap of wounded spirit.

I rushed to the doorway, in a panic for her. A foot shoved into my back and pushed me on top of her. I stopped my body from crushing her by mere seconds. But it was our close proximity that almost killed her.

I scurried to the other side of the cell in one fluid movement.

"I give you a week, at most." Caius smiled maliciously as he looked at me, shying away from my desire for her blood.

Then he left. And so did the others. They locked an iron door on the way out.

I was suddenly exhausted. If only the sweet surrender of sleep were possible.

I leaned my head against the cold stone behind me and realized, I was as cold as that stone.

And as heartless.

Then I remembered the girl.

Keeping my lungs plugged against her scent, I went a safe distance closer to her.

Her form had righted itself and was curled up, against the rock.

She was shivering with the cold of the stone and, I realized, sobbing.

She leaned back her head and a weak wail escaped her throat, then she was back to sobbing into her knees.

Um.

"Are you alright?" I whispered.

She turned sharply around, fear in her eyes. When they landed on me, they softened and she smiled, ever so slightly.

She wiped her eyes on the back of her hand and nodded, then shook her head.

"I hurt."

It was put so simply, I didn't know how to respond.

I stared at her.

"Where does it hurt?" the words came out of my mouth unbidden, but I couldn't take them back.

"Here," she pointed at her chest and sobs wracked her body again.

"I feel so alone," she said, faced away from me, "My heart feels empty." She hiccuped.

I wanted to comfort her. Tell her everything would be alright.

But I couldn't.

Caius had been right. I wouldn't last the week with her. I couldn't resist her smell for much longer.

She had turned and was facing me, curiously. She had tear stains running down her cheeks, but she didn't look sad anymore. She was nothing but curious.

"What are you thinking about?" she asked.

I couldn't tell her the truth.

"Forks."

"You're lying." There was no conviction in her voice. She said it as though she were remarking on the weather.

I didn't know how to respond.

"Tell me what you're thinking about," she said, her head tilted to the side, "I promise I won't be mad or scared." She was completely sincere. Her green eyes looked innocently into mine.

I stared into those eyes.

She propped herself up onto her hands and knees and crawled over to me.

I stiffened, but didn't shy away.

She sat on her heals in front of me and took my hand from my lap and placed it in hers.

She traced all the lines across my palm, then turned my hand over and examined my fingers.

I watched in fascination as she studied every detail like it was a beautiful work of art.

Then, my hand still in hers, she looked up, back into my eyes.

"You don't have to keep your mind to yourself. You can share it, you know."

I stared at her and felt a sudden urge to tell her everything.

But I couldn't do that. It wasn't allowable.

I took my hand gently from hers and backed away, against the stone that was too much like myself.

She looked sad. As though I had done her some great disappointment.

But... I just didn't want to hurt her.

Right?

"I don't know why you won't tell me what's wrong," she said, looking down, "but I just want to help." She crawled over to the corner farthest from me. Shadow swallowed her.

I looked closer, trying to find her in the utter darkness, but I couldn't see her. She had disappeared.

"Are you still there?" I asked.

The shadows thinned, revealing her.

"Yes."

She was looking at me again. I avoided her gaze. That gaze was too pure for me to face.

She made me see all my wrongs. She made me realize I wasn't as good as I had convinced myself I was.

She made me feel uncomfortable with the way I was living.

Her eyes screamed, "Live!! You have so much to share. Lend your knowledge to people who need it! Let people in!!" but that was a very hard thing to do.

I had spent centuries in my mind and it was safe. I didn't want to leave that security.

But when I looked up... I had to.

I could trust her.

Marie.

A/N - This is the second time writing this.

The first time, Marie had some freakish power that made no sense, so I had to re-write it.

I'll start working on the next chapter as soon as I can, but finals are coming up. I'll write when I can!

(Just so you know: This story is seven full pages on Open Office. Twelve point... wow.)

Seven is my lucky number... chapter seven, seven pages... it fits.