These characters aren't mine.

Thanks to roswell1828 for looking this over.

VIII

I was burning, hours and hours after I had started the fire. I felt the flames coursing through my body, tasted the bitterness of them on my tongue. My hearing was the only sense free from the flames.

A voice reached me through the black flames, calm and constant like waves breaking on the shore. The words were muddled and beyond my comprehension; the voice sounded familiar but I couldn't place it. My memories were consumed in flames.

"I'm so sorry. I wish we had more time together before I changed you. I would have prepared you for this. I should never have left you alone. You almost didn't make it."

I wanted to comfort the voice but I couldn't move. The flames held me in place. The fire crept ever closer to my heart. It was almost over. I was surrendering to the fire.

"You don't know how brave you are, how strong you are. In all my years, I've never met someone like you. I'll never tell you goodbye."

There were more words but I couldn't hear them. My heart was beating too loudly, too swiftly, to discern the voice above my own body's din. I was ready to go. In one convulsive shudder my heart failed, forever stilled by flames I couldn't see.

Where there should have been silence, I heard a multitude of sounds. A rustle of fabric, the sound of fingers running through hair and wind. These noises should have been unnoticeable but were wildly amplified.

A hand touched mine. I recoiled from the intensity of the contact, eyes flying open to seek out who had touched me. The clarity of the room startled me. Sharp, clear and vibrant, my eyes took in every detail, even the smallest brush strokes on the generic painting hanging on the wall. Though I couldn't fully remember what it was like to see before, I knew somehow my sight was different now.

"Shh, don't be frightened. Everything's all right. Do you remember me?" The familiar voice called out from behind me. The tone suggested a whisper but to me it sounded much louder.

Turning my head, I caught sight of the speaker. I could pick out three distinct shades of blond in his hair even though he was on the opposite side of the room. His features reminded me of some classical statue, symmetrical and smooth, but there were lines of emotion and some blemishes rendering him just shy of perfection. And I loved him.

I loved him and I couldn't remember why. I closed my eyes, searching through fuzzy memories for his identity when a distinct odor enticed my nose. Green and fresh, I had smelled the scent before. Through the murky haze in my mind, some random flashes of my past emerged. A florist shop, warm and earthy scented, and a tiny woman whose eyes sparkled with mirth. A rose, white with red tinted edges resting against a field of reflected blue.

Opening my eyes, I saw my love holding a rose matching the one in my memory. I went to him, faster than my body remembered how to move. It was peculiar, doing things I felt I couldn't and succeeding nonetheless.

"Does this help?"

"Yes." Even the sound of my voice wasn't how I felt it should be but there it was, clear and tinkling like ice covered branches in a gentle breeze. Not strange but not familiar either.

"Your face, I knew you before. I love you but I can't remember why."

He looked sad. I disappointed him. "I've heard of this happening. Sometimes the transformation robs human memories from the mind." He twirled the rose absently between his fingers, indifferent to the large thorns remaining on the stem.

I watched his movements, mesmerized. The thorns didn't hurt him. The longer I stared at the stem, I noticed the thorns eventually broke away, disintegrating under his touch. They couldn't hurt him because only two things could hurt him physically: being torn apart or set on fire, and a third would injure him more than death itself. The loss of a mate.

More memories flooded my mind. Me curled up against his chest, listening as he talked. Pieces of paper burning. A kitchen counter and his cool lips against my heated collarbone. Dark eyes.

The more I concentrated, the more came back. They were dim, like watching a movie reflected in a window, but they were there. The stem of the rose stopped moving. He was watching me.

"What is it?"

"They're not gone."

"What?"

"My memories. They're still there, just not very clear but it's enough. The more I focus, the more I recall. You're Carlisle Cullen, age twenty-three or three hundred seventy-eight. You worked for the Volturi. There are only two things that will hurt you, another vampire or fire. One thing will make you wish for death and that is the death of a mate. I am your mate. And we are vampires." The words slipped effortlessly and swiftly from my mouth. He observed me quietly, staying rooted to the floor a few feet from me.

"What else can you recall?" He asked finally. "Do you remember the vampire who attacked you?"

"No. All I remember are red eyes and flames and fear. Everything else is black."

He smiled weakly. "Perhaps it's best you don't remember. To say that what you went through was traumatic would be an understatement. Let's leave it for some other time. I should have taken you with me. I'm sorry." The very memory of my last human moments troubled him. The stem had pulled apart in his hands, rips threatening the bloom. I put my hand on his, prying the rose from his hold. He winced and the rest of the stem broke away from the bloom. All that was left in my hand was a mass of woody green bits. The rest of the rose had fallen to the floor. I thought I was being gentle. The woody bits ground into a paste as I made a fist.

"It's all right. This is normal. It takes some time to re-learn how to touch things without breaking them." He brushed my cheek with the tips of his fingers. They weren't cool anymore. "How do you feel otherwise?"

"Like I don't fit inside of myself. I'm doing everything too fast, too hard and too much. It's not like me at all and yet it is, but I can't remember me very well. My mouth and throat are so unbelievably dry."

"Well, that I can help with. The rest will come in time and I'll be here to help you." He took my hand and led me out of the door.

We were staying in some kind of rental cabin. There were a few others, along with ours, clustered around a small gravel cul-de-sac, a snow frosted forest at their backs. They were vacant this time of year. Beyond that, I had no idea where exactly we were. Location didn't matter so much; as long as he was with me, anywhere was home.

A trail branched off of the gravel driveway leading away from the cabins. We followed it at a slow pace, a leisurely stroll for a human I assumed, for a while. We had come four hundred and thirty-two steps before we stopped; I had been keeping count without really being conscious of doing it.

Carlisle turned to me with a serious face. He was not my lover now. He was my teacher, my guide. He would do anything to help make this transition as easy as possible for me.

"We are predators and we have been gifted as such. That's why you can see and hear so clearly. But you also have a more perceptive sense of smell. Every creature has a different scent, including us."

He pulled me close to him and I breathed in deeply. At first, I noticed only the smells of soap and laundry detergent, but then his scent overpowered everything else. It was hard to describe but it was somehow him. I pressed my nose closer to the hollow of his neck, familiarizing myself with this new skill.

When I had gotten myself acquainted with his scent, he stepped away from me slightly but still kept hold of my upper arms. "That's how you'll find your prey as well. Humans will be the most appealing to you right now. I haven't known many newborns but the ones that I have, go mad at the smell of human blood. We'll have to stay away from people for awhile. Now that you know how to find me, let's go for a run. It will help you adjust to your new skin."

He took off running, not following the trail, heedless to the snow and the dense underbrush. I pursued and eventually overtook him. It was very odd, running so fast and never having to stop to catch my breath. Some part of my brain was completely in control of maneuvering me around obstacles while the rest of me was occupied by other thoughts. I stopped when I crested a ridge, waiting for him to find me. He was right; I did feel more settled in myself.

Soon after he caught up to me, he taught me how to approach my prey, in this case it was a small herd of deer. I tried to focus on his words but the unbearable dryness in my throat took over nearly every thought. I found myself wiping away something like saliva gathering at the corner of my mouth. He let go of my arm, signaling it was time for me to feed.

I gave myself over to instinct, feeding voraciously on several deer before I returned to his side. I felt full but the insatiable dryness still lingered in the back of my throat. I still craved, greedily wanting more. I still felt foreign in my new body yet I was growing to accept this new power I felt flowing through me.

There were no more animals around us. My frenzy scared the survivors miles away. There was one object of prey nearby. My gaze went to him. His eyes were dark. Another craving, another need, clawed at the back of my throat, seeking release. I surrendered to its will. And so did he.