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Special thanks to Snarkymuch, Gredelina1, Arrr, Augustmoon. Verseseven and Mary-Alice-Brandon-Cullen for pre-reading this.

The was pre-read by jtmd24 and beta'd by Maxipoo1024 from Sparkly Red Pen. Thank you ladies.

Chapter Ten — Time and Patience

Jasper POV

I don't know how long I stood staring at the spot she disappeared from. After a while, the haze of shock subsided and anger replaced it.

I could hear the others talking inside. Carmen was trying to comfort Eleazar, and Tanya was demanding to know what Isabella said to him. I wanted to know that too.

I stalked back into the house, making no attempt to hide my anger.

"I am sorry, Jasper," Eleazar said. "I didn't expect her reaction to be so extreme."

"But you knew it wasn't going to be positive?" My voice was a low growl. "Did you not think I should have been warned? I could have allowed her more time, explained it to her sooner. I could have given her a choice dammit!"

"This wasn't my decision to make. I told them I would be honest if she asked, but she didn't."

"Told who?" Kate asked.

I already knew. Of course he would had gone along with it. Once a guard, always a guard. Even though he had left them long ago, they were still his masters.

"What did she say to you?" I asked, overriding Kate's question.

"You betrayed me. After all I have done for you, this is how you repay me," Edward said.

"Who betrayed you?" Alice asked, her brow furrowed in confusion.

"Not me. That is what she said to Eleazar." Edward explained, smoothing her hair affectionately.

I wondered what she had done for him, but I had a more pressing question to ask. "Is that where she has gone? Has she gone back to them?"

"I think so," Eleazar said sadly. "She will suspect their involvement, and she will be angry. I think she will go to them first, after that, I do not know.

"Volterra." Edward gasped. He must have heard it in our thoughts. I was making no attempt to keep him out of my mind, and I doubted Eleazar was either.

Esme clapped a hand to her mouth, horrified. Carlisle merely nodded. Apparently, he suspected it already. Though clearly he had not met Isabella before, he had spent time with the Volturi in the past.

"She is part of the Volturi?" Irina asked, her shock battling her anger for dominance. "Why didn't you tell us?"

Eleazar paced back and forth, his hands clenching into fists. "I didn't tell you because she asked me not to. She knows your history, and I imagine she feared this reaction. She always vowed she would tell you the truth if you asked, but none of you did."

Kate folded her arms over her chest. "You should have told us."

"Perhaps I should have, but you must understand the debt I owe to Isabella. Had it not been for her, I would still be in Volterra now."

Carmen caught his arm to stop his pacing and cupped his face in her hand. "I think it's time they all know. There are too many secrets; Jasper at least deserves to know these things."

He nodded sadly. "She will never forgive me for this, but if I am to lose her I should like to think I have thoroughly deserved it."

He sank into a chair and Carmen perched on the arm, placing her hand on his shoulder.

"I met Isabella shortly after my induction into the guard. She is, as you have all noticed, a unique character, but she was different then, darker. I don't think we exchanged more than a dozen words in my first decade there. The only people with whom she had any relationship were Aro, Marcus, and Caius. Most of all Marcus. It was not until she returned that we developed any sort of relationship."

"Returned?" Tanya questioned. "Where did she go?"

"She left Volterra for a time..." he looked to Carlisle "...that is why you never met her, my friend. She did not return for almost a decade after you left for America."

He looked at me cautiously, gauging my mood before continuing.

"When she came to Volterra, Marcus was still grieving his mate, Didyme. Isabella had a particularly difficult time as a newborn. I cannot explain further; it is her story to tell, but suffice to say she suffered. Marcus was the one to help her through that time. It was her need for him that pulled him from his depression. They developed a very close bond."

"I don't understand," Carlisle said. "When I was in Volterra Marcus was exceptionally morose. I understood it was because of Didyme."

"In part it was," Eleazar said. "Isabella had left, and it was her that had brought him from the depression the first time. But I believe it was her absence alone that did it. It was rumored that they had a fight before she left."

He broke off and looked thoughtful. He seemed to be deciding how much to divulge to us. His emotions switched from anxiety to determined resolve.

"When she returned she was different. She tasted the freedoms our lives could offer, and she found pleasure in life again. She discovered that she could survive on animal blood while she was gone, and that changed her. She began to feel the benefits of the diet we have all known: the ability to form closer bonds and the compassion it instills.

"I told you I owed Isabella a great debt, and I do. Shortly after her return to the city, I met Carmen. For a time she lived within the confines of the city, and I continued my role within the guard. Carmen was unhappy, though, and eventually I decided it was time for us to start a new life together. I knew Aro would not be happy to see me leave, my gift was very useful to him, but I never expected him to refuse me.

"I sought a private audience with him and explained my need to leave. He did not become angry but refused me at once. There was no question, he said, of my leaving. I left his presence, disappointed, but understanding. It seemed to me that it was a bad idea to leave after all. I had a duty to Aro. He brought me into the guard and gave me a life of power and respect; I would be a fool to leave all it behind. These feelings were not my own. You see while I had been talking with him, he had been planning."

Carmen took up the explanation for him.

"Felix and Demetri came for me," she said. "They told me that Eleazar had sent them. When I arrived, I did indeed see Eleazar first. He told me he spoke with Aro and realized the error he had made. We were brought before the rest of the guard, and I too saw how right he was. Aro was a great man, and I owed him for the life he had given Eleazar."

"Hold up," Emmett said. "What did this Aro guy do? It sounds like you were brainwashed."

Eleazar smiled ruefully. "Not brainwashed, but no less influenced.

Carlisle frowned. "Chelsea?"

"Indeed. While I had been speaking with Aro, Chelsea had been manipulating my bonds. She could not break my bond to Carmen, but she strengthened mine to Aro, and when Carmen arrived, he used Chelsea to influence her, too. We were both to be made slaves to her emotional influence."

"To us it seemed perfectly right," Carmen said. "It was a good life, and we were blessed to be offered a part of it. It wasn't until Isabella arrived that we realized anything was wrong."

"I have never seen her so enraged," Eleazar said. "She ordered everyone from the room but us, Aro, Marcus, and Caius. She screamed at him, told him he was playing god with people's lives. She threatened…well suffice to say it was a powerful threat. She called Chelsea back and ordered her to remove her influence. When we were back to our right minds, she apologized for what had happened and assured us we were free to leave and would not meet with Aro's manipulations again. She escorted us to the city limits and bade us farewell.

"I didn't see Isabella again for over a century, though I often thought of her. I was immensely grateful to her for what she had done. In the early 1900s, we received a surprise in the form of a letter from Isabella. She had used Demetri to find us. Her letter said that she was spending some time traveling and wished to visit with us."

He looked to Tanya. "She, of course, knew who you and your sisters were and sought my counsel before arriving. I advised her that you knew nothing of her existence and were unlikely to ask, so she was welcome to come here. I apologize for the underhandedness of it, but I was eager to see her again, and I couldn't refuse her after what she had done for me."

Tanya nodded. She was no longer upset at what he had done, but there was an undercurrent of sadness and sympathy directed towards me.

"You would remember her first visit as well as I do," Eleazar said, breaking into my thoughts.

Irina snorted. "She arrived on that old Triumph and asked why we had furniture. Yes, I remember perfectly."

Eleazar smiled fondly. "Yes, well when we were given a chance to speak alone, I expressed my gratitude and asked if there was ever something I could to do thank her for what she had done." He imitated Isabella's voice perfectly. "Your bizarre choice in living arrangements aside, I like it here. I should like to come back and visit."

I laughed. I could clearly imagine her saying it, the way she would consider each word carefully before speaking.

"And so Isabella came to be our friend," Tanya said. "I often wondered about her, you know. I couldn't understand how someone so...interesting could be without a coven. Now we know the truth."

"Does it upset you that she is Volturi?" Carmen asked. "Does it make her any different to the Isabella you have know all this time?"

It was Kate that answered. "No. She is still Isabella, just a little more intimidating."

"Intimidating," Carlisle said in a musing tone. "Something in your story has me curious, and I wonder if I could ask a question."

"Feel free," Eleazar said.

He already knew what was going to be asked. There was no hint of surprise in his thoughts as Carlisle spoke.

"She shouted at Aro, she ordered Chelsea to remove the artificial bonds. She is not an ordinary guard is she?"

Eleazar smiled knowingly. "No, my friend, she really isn't. Isabella is not a member of the guard, but a member of the coven. If forced to define it, I would say she is a ruler too, though she would disagree. To all others she remains deferential to the ancients, but to them she is an equal. She refuses the title though."

There was a stunned silence following his announcement as we all digested his words.

If I had thought it was a challenge to pursue her when I thought she was a guard, it was going to be impossible now.

"Not necessarily," Edward said, evidently following my train of thought.

"What do I do?" I asked the room at large. If ever I had need guidance it was now.

"What happened before she left?" Carmen asked. "Obviously she learned of the mating, but how did it happen?"

I thought back to the feeling I had when our hands had touched. It had felt like my entire being was reaching out to her, that we became one.

"Our hands met," I said carefully. "And something happened. I can't explain it very well, but it was like we were joined."

"That is mating," Alice said with satisfaction.

Each of the mated couples in the room nodded. Their emotions were full of love and happiness as they each remembered the moment it had happened for them.

"How do you feel about her now?" Esme asked, her smile too wide to conceal.

"I love her," I said simply. "It feels like half of me is missing. It is taking all my will to stop myself from running after her. My need for her is stronger that any thirst I have ever felt. It is not a desire―it is a demand."

"She will be feeling something similar," Eleazar said. He was torn between happiness that she would feel the pleasure of mating, but sadness that even now she would be suffering.

"I don't want her to be hurting," I said sadly.

"That is an understandable part of your bond," Eleazar said, "but unfortunately unavoidable. I know Isabella. If you go after her now, she will run. There is no match for her stubbornness. If you can allow her time to accept this, she will eventually come to you."

Esme's concern for me was overwhelming and touching. "How long will he have to wait? If she was gone from Volterra for decades because of an argument, will she be gone longer because of this?"

"I don't believe so," Eleazar said. "She will not want to suffer, and like Jasper, she will not want him to suffer. Just give her a little time."

Time. As a vampire I had infinite reserves of time, but I was not so blessed with patience.

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Simaril x