I am waaay too much of a perfectionist, so decided to just post this chapter now instead of fine tuning it any longer. I've gone over it way too many times, but I hope you all like it!
ELEVEN
They were coming for her.
Her being Bella Swan, the ever present thorn in the pack's (well, mostly my) side.
Dammit, Jacob, why does that bitc-
I was cut short by Sam's warning growl. She matters to him, so she matters to us, too.
I simmered quietly while the rest of the pack argued about joining forces with the leeches or not.
We could use their help, Sam reasoned.
We need their expertise, Jacob swept his eyes over the pack. We were split almost evenly.
Even so… Sam trailed off.
I just can't stand those leeches, Paul's irritation flared, raising the tension in the air. My fur bristled under the flow of his anger, as did everyone else's.
We have to protect our people, Jared reminded them. No matter what.
Some nodded in agreement, while others still remained hesitant.
They just...stink, Embry made a face. Quil snorted at that.
How do we know they're really working with us? Paul interrupted.
Leeches aren't exactly known for their... friendliness, Quil added.
The Cullens wouldn't do that, Jacob snapped.
Well your opinion is biased, I directed my ire at Jacob.
Touché, Paul said, impressed at my boldness.
Might I remind you that the Cullens are the reason this pack exists in the first place? I continued. The only reason we have to interact with them is over the treaty line, that's supposed to be protecting us from them.
And now we're supposed to be playing buddy buddy with them? Paul scoffed.
So we should all just die, then, is that what you're saying? Jacob growled at us. Because that's exactly what's going to happen if we don't do this!
Dammit, Jacob, can't you see that she's the whole reason this is even happening? I retorted.
Leah has a point, Jake, Quil interjected. This is technically their problem, not ours.
Need I remind you that the leech leading them is the same one that was on our land not that long ago? The tension continued to climb as our argument got more heated. The swirl of warring emotions rolled heavily over us, making me nearly buckle under its intensity.
Enough, Sam's Alpha voice cut through our bickering. We need to do this. As hard as it is, we can't afford to put our people in danger when they're the ones we're supposed to be protecting.
These… newborns… are without law, without training. Embry's voice rang with a maturity that surprised me. They don't see people… they see food. He shuddered at that.
Deep in a place I refused to admit to, I knew he was right. I was being petty, at best. But my pride refused to let that show, and so I simmered in silence instead.
At least the Cullens have some twisted sense of honor, Jared nearly choked on the last word.
We have to do this, Sam said, his voice ringing with finality.
Our first meeting with the leeches came too soon.
As expected, the idiot girl was with them. I could smell her even as we approached, her scent distinctly human amongst the sickly sweetness of the leeches.
Watch it, Sam growled in warning, sensing the onslaught of insults I was ready to throw her way. I rolled my eyes in response.
The leeches were standing at the ready when we finally entered the clearing. Their bodies were frozen, eyes focused completely on us as we drew closer. I shuddered at the sight of how wrong they seemed here, startlingly unnatural in comparison to where they stood among nature in its truest form.
Seth gagged at the smell, letting out a low bark. I almost chuckled in response.
"Welcome," the blond man spoke, stepping forward in one smooth motion.
Sam bowed his large head in greeting. We could all sense the tension in his stance, and it settled over us like a fog, leaving every wolf alert.
Soon enough, the small, elf-like one and her mate took center stage, showing a series of techniques in a flurry of movement.
Seth's mind reeled as more information was revealed about the newborns' plan of attack. It's so…
Unnatural, Embry shuddered.
They were designed to kill. Pay attention, Sam's authoritative voice cut in.
So were we, Jared thought, his eyes following every movement with rapt attention.
I swept my eyes over the other leeches, pausing as the blonde female's eyes snapped to mine. She was stunning, in a cruel, inhuman way. Her body glowed with an ethereal beauty, juxtaposed against the glitter of her deadly teeth in the soft moonlight. Her eyes bored into mine and I stared back, defiant.
A rumbling boom from the center of the clearing interrupted our strange exchange, signaling the small vampire pinning her mate to the ground for the umpteenth time.
I watched the male vampire currently sparring with his mate warily as well, knowing that he could sense whatever feelings radiated off of me. While my thoughts were as carefully concealed as ever, I hoped that he passed off my subtle pangs of longing as directed towards Sam, and not towards Jacob.
I cursed the reason for why all of this was happening at all, directing glares towards the bitch and her mate.
While the pack ignored my grumbling, the bronze-haired vampire snapped his head up and looked towards me, his ochre eyes narrowing.
I wracked my brain for his name. Edward. Kindly screw off, Edward, I directed my thoughts at him, knowing he could hear them. I kept the rest of my thoughts carefully blank, lest the many other reasons for my ire slip out.
Just ignore her, Jacob thought in resignation.
I rolled my eyes internally, watching as Edward switched places with the pixie and began brawling with her mate.
The pixie made her way over to the-bitch-we-had-to-call-Bella perched and herself behind her, whispering quietly in her ear. The interaction made me shiver. How could one possibly get so close to one of those creatures? More than half the pack agreed with me, looking over the exchange with equal amounts of distrust and trepidation.
Beneath that, and the idle thoughts that passed through the pack members' minds as we watched the demonstrations, fear simmered within each and every one of us. Would we all truly survive the battle in four days' time? Who would we have to approach, explaining that their son was dead for no explainable reason?
Sam's fear was the biggest influence of them all, pulsing through our bodies, driving our determination to fight. To win.
We need to know their scents. We can't afford any mistakes, Sam broke the unspoken tension. Not on our side, and not on theirs, either.
Edward heard and translated for us. Sam was the first to move towards them, of course. Strong and determined, his poise radiating fearlessness even as we were thrown headfirst into this seemingly impossible situation. Still, he was guarded, distrustful at the idea of fighting alongside the one thing we were created to destroy.
Jacob trotted off towards Bella, our Beta seemingly unaffected by our leader's distrust. I watched him approach his whore, feigning irritation at seeing them together.
In reality, always in that part of me hidden deeply away, my gut twisted in ugly knots, and I felt my heart clenching. I wanted to will the pain away, but focusing too intently on anything Jake-related could spell disaster with the whore's leech and the entire pack in the clearing at once.
And so I obeyed Sam's orders instead, feeling dread echoed in every step I took.
"She's marrying him," Jacob breathed against my neck between kisses. "She's marrying him, and-"
"Shut up," I said firmly, flipping us so that I now straddled him on the bed. Shutupshutupshutup, I cried inside, wondering if Jacob could feel my desperation as I kissed away the tears on his face.
Probably not. He was quick to rid us of our clothing, and frenzied in his lovemaking this time, stopping only for short refractory periods until the early hours of the morning. All too soon, morning light began to spill into the room, signalling that mere hours were left before the battle with the newborns was due to begin.
"Stay with me," I breathed as he crossed to the window, uncaring if he could hear my desperation now.
The morning light illuminated his frame beautifully, and I longed to cross over and wrap my arms around him whispering reassurances until he would pull me back into bed once more.
He dressed quickly, saying nothing. before slipping out quietly without even a goodbye.
I wondered if he'd even heard.
It was late, and insects were gathered around Billy Black's porch light, their buzzing echoing loudly in my too-sensitive ears. My heart thumped loudly as I knocked tentatively on the door and listened to the creaking wheels of Billy's chair as he approached the door. He opened the door and looked up at me, pausing for a moment to take in my dishevelled appearance. Anger flashed in his eyes for a second before he simply rolled aside, resignedly leaving the door open for me.
The scent of the leech doctor lingered in the air, and I was certain he had been here not too long ago. It gained strength the closer I got to Jacob's door, which was firmly closed. I could hear his rasping breaths, and wondered if he was awake, hoping he wasn't.
I took a deep breath before pushing open the door carefully. A fresh onslaught of tears began pouring down my face as I saw Jacob's form on the bed.
Braces held up his rapidly healing body at awkward angles, somehow managing to swallow his large form. His eyes were closed, and his breath continued to come out in short, pained rasps.
I covered my mouth as I held back a sob, remembering the tragic events of earlier in the day. Jacob, turning to trot away from the carnage, thinking it was over. Me, following him from a distance like some pathetic puppy, trailing him quietly and drinking in the last sight of his wolf form I'd been certain I wouldn't see for quite some time. A low growl, as a newborn sprung suddenly from the trees, tearing towards Jacob. Me, rushing forth to tear it apart before it could tear him apart, masking my lovesick panic with false pretences of bravado. The newborn catching him and crushing him anyway, because I was too late, always too late. The pack's anger at my actions, blaming Jacob's injuries on my cockiness. I had let them, somehow relieved among my distress that they still don't know, still hadn't seen what I'd truly been thinking, how I'd really been feeling.
I reached over and took up his uninjured hand, clasping it in both of mine and kissing it softly as I cried.
"Leah, look at me," Jacob's croak broke the silence, and I closed my eyes for a few moments before looking up at him.
"Leah," he twisted his fingers between mine and I let go, letting him reach up to stroke my face gently.
"Leah," he said again. My heart thumped harder each time he said it, and I selfishly hoped that he was too distracted by the pain to notice.
"Jacob," I breathed softly, my eyes locked on his. "Jacob, I-"
"-I know, Leah." I could hear his agony in his voice, and it made me cry harder. "They don't know what I know, I'll tell them what I know. I promise. " he added.
How had he managed to pay attention to their admonishment of me while he had lain there, literally shattered? I reach my hand up and placed it over his where it rested on my face, gently stroking away my tears.
"Don't," I whispered. "They don't need to know anything, it's fine." It wasn't fine, and we both knew this, but he nodded anyway. They couldn't know about us - whatever we were, even despite the circumstances.
"Don't die," I added after a long silence. "I need you." He laughed at this, then winced at the fresh onslaught of pain it brought. Because if you die, I'll die too, I wanted to add.
"I won't," he promised. "I won't."
He almost did though, Sam thoughts blazed angrily at me as I ran that night, hoping none of the pack would have joined after the day's events. Don't you care?
I maintained my hard attitude, wary of what could slip out if I showed him even an ounce of my pain. I messed up. I admitted it. He's recovering. We have to move on, I thought instead, feeling another torrent of anger raise up from Sam at my words.
You're making it real damn hard to accept you right now, you know, Sam snapped. His mind was nearly consumed entirely by his sorrow at almost losing his beta, his pain and guilt at what he could have done weighing down my mind as I tried to escape from it.
Then don't, I snapped back, phasing.
He didn't come back to me after he healed. Instead, he took off, leaving me behind without a word.
I hadn't dared go back to his home after that night, fearing the judgment in Billy's eyes at seeing the woman who had supposedly almost caused his son's death. Once he had been up and running again, Jacob had resolved to full time pining. The bitch had finally severed the cord, breaking his heart for good. Having to fight for Jacob's pain was difficult, especially when I found myself fading further into the background.
We had been running on borrowed time, anyway, I tried to remind myself. Not just the time before the leech lover fully severed her ties with Jake, but the time before he found her. Even without Bella in his life, every moment he would spend with me could only spell more pain for the future, more pain for when he would inevitably run into his imprint.
Yes, it hurt now, but it was better this way, wasn't it? Better now than later, when a second man would be ripped away from me because of the cruel tactics of some higher power.
I had avoided phasing for weeks, and Sam had surprisingly allowed it. The rest of the pack was caught up in their own lives, and their own concerns for Jacob meant that they paid me barely any attention.
And so here I found myself, late one afternoon, sitting and dangling my feet precariously off of one of the tallest cliffs we had in La Push. I looked down at the water below, which was eerily calm today.
Oh, how easy it would be for a human to die from this height. I wasn't human, though, and the idea of the long, exhilarating jump intoxicated me.
This time, though, I wouldn't linger in the water. I would come back, and I would wait. For him, despite it all. Because no matter the consequences, I knew that a part of me was bigger than the pain I had experienced. And that part still wanted him back.
I hated myself for it.
Reviews mean the world to me - truly.