So Chapter 9 :) It feels so strange that this story soon will be over. There are just two more chapters that I have planned, if there becomes one extra I can´t answer right now. Only time can tell that.

So hopefully you will enjoy this chapter where the story id beginning to pick up a lot of speed and opens for the Volturis arrival in the next chapter.

Also I want to thank all of you that help me out by sending me stereotypes about Sweden. I will have my oral presentation on Wednesday so hopefully it will turn out good.

Chapter 9
Bella´s POV

A few hours; that was all the time we had left before the Volturi would arrive. The atmosphere which had been light and happy just one day earlier was now dull and dark. Or at least that was how it was for me and my sister. Everyone else were still optimistic that everything would turn out okay, that we all would survive and that we would be able to go back to our old lives. But I could feel in the depts of my very being that nothing would ever be the same after this day.

And that feeling scared me. It scared me more than anything else in the whole world because I had felt it one time before during my long existents and what had happened that time was such a painful memory that I couldn´t even bare myself to think about it.

I looked over at Edward and my daughter where they were sitting in the grass along with Zafrina and Jake. All of them were laughing and that Jake dared to be in his human form around all of these vampires warmed my heart. He would stay with my daughter; he would look after her and protect her with his life. It was out of fear I had attacked him that first day of my second life, fear that after imprinting on my daughter he would treat her like an adult. Like my father had done. Now I knew the thought had been stupid, I knew Jake and I trusted him. Inside the house I could hear Esme and Carlisle talking with the Denalis, all of them trying to catch up with the time that they had lost, and on the backside of the house…

"I have told you; DO NOT ATTACK HEAD ON!" My sister's angry voice echoed through the forest and I heard the usual ripping sound that always came afterwards. Sighing I ran to the backside of the house and saw Emmett and my sister standing in the middle of a circle made out of vampires and wolves watching them. Emmett was just about to reattach his right arm to his body while my sister was glaring at him from across the circle. I don´t think anyone ever could have imagined how Maria was going to train them, but ripping peoples limbs off and braking bones was probably not one of them.

I had been painfully aware of that fact though. When Mia and I had been newborns Nate had trained us in battle, but not the way my sister did. He had had an endless patience and in the end it had turned out the way he had planned; both me and my sister being able to beat him in battle when we really put our mind into it. Mia though who didn´t have her lost mates patience believed in a different approach.

"Was it not a little unnecessary to do that dear sister?" I asked and I all eyes turned to look at me. It hadn´t taken long for the others staying at the Cullens to learn that I was the only one who my sister listened to, and the other way around. They had also learned that I was the more… gentle one out of the two of us. Now Mia turned to me, an innocent smile on her face.

"Bella! Well I just thought he could learn something from it, like not attacking head on when I have told him not to." I looked at her with a very skeptical expression on my face and put my hand on Emmett´s shoulder since I now had reached him.

"Really? Then maybe I can remind you that Emmett is my brother just as much as you are my sister and remember the last time when you lost a limb?" I told Mia smirking towards her a little as she looked at me in disbelief.

"You wouldn´t." She whispered still staring at me.

"Try me." I challenged her and in a second I could see the decision forming in her eyes. With great power I threw Emmett backwards as Mia ran forward trying to get a hold of him. With a growl I tackled her into the side, both of us flying through the air. I landed on top of Mia just to be thrown of her with an enormous force. To everyone watching this, it looked like a real fight, but we were really just playing around. In the end though, I won and Mia theatrically fell to the ground, pretending to die before she angrily picked up her cloak and stomped into the forest muttering loudly to herself. Always the drama queen when she lost.

"Thanks Bells, I really didn´t feel for having my arm ripped off once again." Emmett had walked up behind me and his eyes were locked at the spot where my sister had disappeared. "She isn´t really angry is she?" His nervous tone made me laugh loudly. I saw that Emmett gave me a look that questioned my sanity.

"You all may have spent these two days training with Maria but you clearly don´t know her very well. She was never angry, she just becomes frustrated easily. And being beaten by your little sister can hurt the pride a little. Also she is very good at exaggerating." I could tell that everyone was listing intensely to what I was saying. It had become some kind of game the last days. Who knew most about the ancient vampires?

"Ohh…" Emmett simply said and looked a little sheepish.

"So what did you mean Bella?" Seth suddenly asked from the edge of the circle looking at me with an eager look in his eyes. I looked back at him confused.

"You have lost me." I told him.

"What did you mean when you told your sister to remember what happened last time she lost a limb?" He clarified rolling his eyes, obviously thinking that I was slow for not keeping up with him.

"Oh that! It was really nothing. A few years ago Maria and I accidently managed to bother a few vampires when we were in Kenya. We got into a fight and Mia wasn´t paying as much attention as she should have done. One of the men we were fighting ripped her left hand off and in rage I kind of ripped the remaining vampires in two pieces instead with one blow. The man who had ripped her hand of we ripped apart piece by piece, throwing them on the fire so he could feel himself burning up. The feeling must have been horrible." My voice was casual, but the ones surrounding me was starring wide eyed. For not the first time I was glad that I couldn´t read minds.

"But that was ages ago; only Aro could possibly bring such a reaction from either of us these days. Now Em, what do you say about giving this training another go?"

"Good! Very good even, a big improvement from yesterday!" I said from my spot where I was sitting on Emmett´s back, effectivelyholding him down on the ground. He had managed to hold me off for about one minute, even though I had used my speed which gave me a huge advantage. I got off from his back and Emmett rose from the ground and I could see that he was a little embarrassed for not being able to stand his ground a little longer. What he didn´t know was that he probably was the only one who could keep a stand against me and my sister, everyone else would have been dead after their first move.

"No one else who wants a last go?" I asked, not a single one of the vampires in the circle around me answering. Not even one of the wolves seemed to be up for another chance to train. Shrugging my shoulders I looked at the watch I was wearing. Just two hours left. I felt how panic spread in my chest, so little time, it wasn´t enough. I looked at my daughter and my husband standing at the edge of the circle along with the rest of my family, all of watching me with a worried expression. I managed to compose my face into a calm mask before I spoke.

"We all need to get going. The Volturi will soon arrive at the meadow that Alice saw in her vision and we don´t want them to come there without anyone welcoming them do we?" When no one moved I glared at them. "Have you grown roots into the ground? Move!"

My angry voice helped and everyone began to run towards our destination. Some walked up to me, giving me a hug, a thank you or a good luck before they followed the other vampires that were leaving. Soon it was only my family left, including Jacob, Leah and Seth who had all transformed into their human form. I looked into my daughter's sad brown eyes, my eyes, and crouched down to the ground opening my arms. The fastest she could my little miracle, MY Renesmee, ran over to me throwing her arms around my neck.

I held her as close to me I possibly could without hurting her in any way as I stroke her silky bronze looks. Then I felt how something wet and warm hit my shoulder. She was crying, my angel was crying!

"I don´t want… you to… leave mommy." She managed to say through the sobs which made her whole body shake. I felt a tremendous pressure over my chest and the stinging in my eyes as they filled with venom, venom which would never fall as tears. I couldn´t cry, but God did I wish I could. It felt as if my whole inside was breaking; as if the pressure and pain in my chest was going to rip it open.

"I have too baby, but just for a little while. We will see each other again, I will come back." My voice was thick as I looked over at the rest of my family, their faces twisted with a pain familiar to what I was feeling. Still they weren´t as old as I was, they could never truly understand. I saw that both Jacob and Seth had tears running in a steady stream down their cheeks and even Leah looked as if she wanted to cry.

"But no one wants you to leave mom." My daughter said into my hair.

"I know honey, I know." I whispered in her ear as I moved over to my family. For a moment I didn´t know what to do, but suddenly two slender arms wrapped around me and my daughter. Rosalie. She had accepted me after I choose to keep Nessie and we had grown close.

"I never hated you; I was afraid and so extremely stupid. I am so sorry." Rose chocked the words out and I leaned back a little looking into her glossy golden eyes.

"You have nothing to apologize for. I understand you and I understood you back then. You have always been like my older sister and I always loved you as one." I told her, allowing my voice to slowly return to its powerful tone to make her understand, taking her hand in mine.

"Sister. You will always be my sister as well." She told me with a sad smile and giving my hand a small squeeze. Nessie still clung to me when Emmett lifted me up in one of his famous bear hugs.

"You and your sister will have to keep on training me when we have kicked Volturis butt." He said trying to keep the mood up. He didn't succeed fully though.

Saying goodbye to Esme and Carlisle was extremely hard; both of them hugged me for a long time. Telling me I would always be their daughter and that they loved me to no end. I did feel safe with them and didn´t want to let them go. When I did I turned to Jacob and saw him looking at me, tears still running from his eyes.

"Oh Jake." I said before we both ignored the smell and hugged each other for a long time and just as in the old days, when Jake had been my sun, no words were needed. We understood the silent message passing between us and when I gave him a last pointing look he nodded as his eyes flew to Nessie in my arms.

Then lastly I turned to the only person who really mattered. Edward was standing looking at me with an agonized expression. I didn´t know what to say, no words could ever express what I was feeling nor what I wanted to say. I couldn't describe how much I loved him since it was stronger than anything that could ever be shown in any form. I took his hand in mine. The warmth of his hand both warmed me and caused me enormous pain. We had gotten so little time, so little time after all of those years in loneliness and longing. Longing for each other, to finally belong to the one we were made for. The one you could sacrifice your life for.

Edward lifted his hand and stroke my cheek, I closed my eyes at me sensation.

"I love you." Three simple words which meant so much, which could express more than thousands and thousands of words together, if the person saying them meant them. And there was no doubt that Edward did.

"I love you too." I said before I gave him a light kiss on his lips. It wasn´t afierce as the kisses we had shared on the mountain, still this one simple kiss meant so much more than any other we had shared. I looked up in his golden eyes and the pain and love I saw there had to be a match of my own. I knew it was time, I had to leave.

"Nessie, honey I need you to look at me." I carefully said and I felt how my daughter eased her grip around my neck. Soon I looked into her sad face and my whole inside twisted in pain.

"I have to go now darling." I began stroking her cheek and moving a few bronze locks out of her face. "And I need you go with dad and the others."

"Will I see you again mom?"

"Yes, I promise you will see me again. I could never leave you. I Love you more than my own life. All of you." I added the last part to everyone around me.

"I don't want you to go mom. Please stay with me, I love you so much." My Renesmee shouted in panic as I tried to give her to Edward. Then I did something that hurt more than anything else I had done in my entire existents. It hurt more than the time I lost Nate, more than when I lost Edward. I gave my daughter, my reason for living, to Edward as I forced her to let go of my neck. And once she was safe in her father's arms I turned away running in the opposite direction of the one the other vampires had taken.

"MOOMMY! MOMMY! COME BACK! PLEASE MOM DON´T LEAVE! I LOVE YOU! MOOMMM!" I nearly crumbled to the ground when I heard my daughter's screams from behind me, for a second I even heard light footsteps running after me and her breath which was heavy from the crying. Then someone must have got a hold of my angel because the sound stopped, as did I, falling to the ground sobbing as the world fell apart around me.

"You did the right thing." My sister's voice was soft. We were walking through the forest. Just forty minutes left. Forty minutes, it was nothing. No time left in a sandglass which cannot be turned.

"No I didn´t, I should be there with them." I told her, my voice hollow and empty. For the moment it felt as if I was drained from all energy, a shell.

"And you will be. When Aro arrives you will stand by their side, but you know he has sent out scouts. He cannot find out about your change before the last minute. Otherwise he will have time to think and if he has time to think…"

"He will figure it out." I whispered as I stared straight ahead.

"Exactly."

"It is strange" I began "We all live our lives thinking we have all the time in the world. Forgetting that sometimes you have to live for the day and see the beauty of the world around you and the love you feel towards your family and the ones around you. I have lived so long; never understanding the mystery of life. And now when time is running out I finally understand. It is about the people you love, your family and friends. It is about seeing the gift we have been given, the chance to live here and now, to actually have a life. It is to see and feel the joy around you, to spend as much time with those you care for as possible since you never know when life is going to end." I looked into the serious face of my sister as she nodded her head.

"Therefore I have decided to try buying some more time, by giving my family what already belongs to them." I ended.

"You have felt it too." Mia stated.

"Yes, it is the same feeling I had the day we lost Nate which means…"

"Only one or neither of us is going to survive." Mia finished as we both stopped. There were just a few hundred meters to the place where my family was, but before I could see them again there were promises which had made and pain which had to be felt.

Edward´s POV

We all saw her leave, my Bella and only love, to join her sister who had already left. The pain when I saw her disappear into the forest was even worse than it had been when I left her a year ago. Because this time I didn´t know if I would ever get her back and not knowing that, just knowing the danger she soon would be facing, made it feel as if the world was crumbling down.

In my arms Nessie was clinging hard to my shirt as if her life deepened on it as warm tears kept on falling from her eyes. My daughter. The daughter Bella gave me risking her own life in the process, just as she did now. Risking her and her sister's lives for the chance of giving everyone else the opportunity to live. I looked at my family standing around me and the wolves that stood on our side in this battle. We all wore the same broken expression and Esme was sobbing into Carlisle's chest as he held her close, trying to comfort her the best he could. In the reality though, he was just as close to breaking down as his wife.

Rose and Emmett were also holding onto each other both of them staring at the spot where Bella had disappeared into the forest. The only ones that were missing were Alice and Jasper. A sudden hate rushed through me. They had left, Alice must have seen this and she had turned her back on us, on Bella who had been her best friend. But the hate didn´t last, I knew Alice never would have done that. She must have seen a solution.

"We need to get going; mommy wanted us to join the others." My daughter suddenly said from her place in my arms and all of our heads snapped to her. She still looked sad, but now she had a collected look on her face and she had a presence which hadn´t been there before. Her voice had taken a more powerful and demanding tone and she sounded older than she had done just earlier this morning. Then I saw it. In the depts of her brown eyes, the eyes which ones belonged to my Bella, a fire had been lit. The same fire I had seen in Bella´s eyes before she left.

She really is Bella´s daughter I heard Carlisle think and I looked at him as we began walking, silently agreeing with him. Nessie had jumped down from my arms and now walked beside me, holding my hand in her right and Jacob´s in her left. Carlisle was right. She really was Bella´s daughter and she had the same core as her mother. She could be caring and loving, but at the same time powerful and deadly when it came to protect her family and the memory of what had happened the day before flooded into my mind.

Mia had been standing in the living room of our house with a sour expression before she closed her eyes and used both my daughter´s power and Zafrina´s to show us the battle where she and Bella had lost Nate. There had been a lot of begging and threats from Bella´s side before Maria had agreed showing us the battle. But before she had done it she had made Bella promise to give her something back hesitantly my love had agreed. No one had known what Mia meant, but Bella apparently did so we had not asked them about it.

Then we all had been dragged down into the memory of Maria and Bella and I had heard everyone's thoughts screaming that they wanted to return. They did not want to see what was before them. Maria had shown us an open field seen from a small hill. In the center of the field Maria was fighting an enormous force of newborns along with a dark haired male vampire. He had been a head taller than Maria and his body had been more muscular than Jasper´s, but not as extreme as Emmett´s. It was obvious that he had been considered beautiful, even to vampire. His long hair had been flowing around him like a black cloak, matching the hair of his mate. Nathaniel.

Then Maria had used Nessie´s power to add something similar to sound and smell. A constant ripping had appeared and in the air there had been a sweet sent from all the bodies which were being burned as they were ripped apart. Suddenly the perspective had changed and it had become a mix of Bella´s vision and her sister. Giving us a spectator's point of view. I saw how a young Bella, more a child than woman, stood on the hill before a powerful growl ripped through the air as a whip; causing the newborns to back away in fear and turn to look at my love. Maria and Nathaniel on the other hand had both smiled happily before they once again attacked the now distracted newborns from behind.

I saw how Bell joined the battle, slowly fighting her way towards Nathaniel and her sister. Countless of times she had been bit, but she always managed to survive the deadly grip of the newborns around her. After half an hour all the newborns were dead and Mia ran over to my Bella, hugging her hard until Nathaniel joined them in the hug. Bella gave him a concerned and loving look and for a second I was jealous before I registered the ruby color of her eyes. She had told us she had been hunting humans, but the crimson red color still looked so wrong and misplaced in her face. It made her less the woman I loved and more alike the vampire that she was.

Then I saw how Aro, Caius and Marcus suddenly appeared out of the thick purple smoke which came from the fires burning from the pieces of the vampires. The pure hatred in Aro´s and Marcus´ eyes was like nothing I had ever seen. Caius had just looked smug.

The six vampires had been standing watching each other for a long time before Aro said something which Mia didn´t share with us, but caused her to fly forward in her memory. Marcus jumped in front of Aro and as Nathaniel and Bella ran towards their mate and sister, Aro and Caius joined the battle.

Now I knew what Maria had meant with Bella being slow. The battle was powerful and enchanting at the same time. Then Marcus seemed to get the upper hand on Maria and bit down at her neck. A scream was heard and we all saw how Nate turned towards his mate, forgetting about Aro. Aro reached forward and got a hold of Nathaniel´s head, and before he had time to react, Aro had ripped it off; Nathaniel's body collapsing to the ground. The look and Maria´s face was heart breaking to look at, the pain so present that you could feel it through the memory, and somehow she managed to break free from Marcus grip ripping both of his arms off in the process.

But before she had time to attack Aro my Bella had run forward, grabbing her sister around the waist and dragging her away while Maria´s cries of pain and hatred had echoed over the fields.

Just a few minutes after we had arrived at the meadow the forest suddenly turned deadly quite. All the birds stopped singing and a cold feeling started to spread in the air. No one dared to say anything or move a muscle for a very long time. The only thing that was heard was the feather light beating of my daughter's heart and the more powerful heartbeats coming from the wolves. After what seemed like an eternity we heard footsteps emerging quickly from the forest to our right.

"MOMMY!" My daughter´s cry was heard before she ran the fastest she could towards my love that was walking towards us. She had a very tired expression on her face, but when she lifted our daughter from the ground holding her close to her chest it vanished, making it hard to believe it had ever been there at all. When everyone saw Bella scared whispers began to spread between all of our allies standing in the meadow and I saw how my family was staring at disbelief at Bella as well, she shouldn't have returned before the Volturi already was here. Taking them off guard had been a part of the plan.

"There have been a change of plans." She simply said as she walked over to me, as if she was reading my mind, before she took my hand in hers. I felt something hard being pressed between our hands before Bella let go, my hand encircling the object she had pressed into my palm.

"I couldn´t leave you. I love you too much." She whispered to me as I opened my hand and looked down at the object laying there. It looked like a red diamond, shinning with a soft but powerful shade of orange-red. I had only seen that type of object once before in my existences... With wide eyes I looked into Bella´s calm ones.

"You cannot give me your heart." I whispered to her.

"It already belongs to you and it always will. Keep it safe for me and no matter what happens today we will still have eternity." Before I had time to protest or ask her what she meant, Bella turned away, looking into the depths of the forest and her low voice was clearly hard in the silence that laid over the meadow.

"They are here."

So did you like it? I know this chapter isn´t very long but the next one will probably be one the longest in this story.

PleaseReview!

/Love Lysistrate