Renesmee & Jacob: Glowing Horizon

Chapter 19: Separate Ways

"Things were chaotic. And that's probably a big understatement." Alice said.

I bit my lip. "Alice…please, just tell me…who…"

She sighed. "I would love to tell you that your parents and Carlisle and Esme are alright, but the fact is that I'm not sure."

I gulped, unable to speak. Luckily, Jacob did for me.

"What do you mean, not sure?" He narrowed his eyes.

She sighed again. "Your mother was focusing completely on protecting everyone. Your father was focusing on trying to kill Demetri and protect your mother at the same time. Everyone was trying to protect her, but the Volturi knew she was the first one they had to get to. I was getting so many visions at one time that it was hard to focus. All I kept seeing were flickers, things were changing so quickly."

"Alice…who died?" I whispered so quietly that I wondered if anyone could hear it, but she did.

Alice looked down.

"Two wolves. I don't know who – they were in their wolf form when they..." she cleared her throat before continuing, "Kate. Zafrina. Peter, Charlotte. Probably more, but like I said, there was so much going on I could barely focus on anything in particular." She kept her eyes on the ground. It was obvious to me that she had been mourning them for the past year, but at the same time she was trying to forget.

I gasped. Zafrina was dead? We had met when I was little, and she had visited every couple years after that. She would have been due for a visit…

I had never known Peter, Charlotte, and Kate as well as Zafrina, but I knew that they were close friends of the family. And now they were gone, too.

Jacob's eyes were blank and staring – obviously wondering what two wolves Alice had witnessed, lying on the ground…gone…I loved the wolves as much as my own family, and losing two of them would be heartbreak. Especially if they had imprints…I thought of Emily, of Claire, of Kim.

I was on the verge of tears, but I held it in.

We were silent for another short moment.

"I saw a lot of wolves escaping, too, with Carlisle, Esme, Edward and Bella…"

I gulped.

"What about the Volturi?" Jacob asked.

"Demetri's dead. That's one good thing that came out of this." Emmett spoke up.

I felt a tiny bit of relief for that.

"Aro, Marcus and Caius ran off pretty quickly. They're not fighters." Rose said, staring ahead almost as if she was watching the battle like a movie in her head.

"Jane ran off too, along with a few guard members." Jasper said.

Alice continued to look down with a strange expression on her face.

"Alice?" I asked hesitantly. Somehow I knew what was coming next.

"Alec's gone, Renesmee." She whispered, pain in her eyes for my loss.

Suddenly I couldn't hold it in anymore. I burst into tears, my head falling into my hands. Even if he had betrayed us, I had still loved him for some reason, and I couldn't take that back now. He was behind my eyelids now, innocence touching his expression. Whether it was a sham or real, it still made me ache with sadness.

Jacob's warm arms wrapped around me, which made me remember that no matter how much I had loved Alec, it could never dream of touching what I had with Jake. That thought made me open my eyes and raise my head.

"So you saw them escape, right? My parents. Carlisle and Esme. Why don't you know where they are? Why can't you see them?" I asked, wondering if I wanted to know the answer or not.

"Well, I have a pretty good guess." She glared at Jacob.

"One of the wolves are with them." I stated.

She nodded, still frustrated.

I took a deep breath. It could have been a lot worse, I figured. I would mourn for Alec, and hopefully I would be able to move on. For now, it seemed, all that was left to do was wait. Not much had changed.

"So what now?" Jake asked, his arm still around me. It was probably what was holding my tears in.

"I think we need to split up." Alice said hesitantly.

I made a face as a flash of pain washed through me. Losing Alice, Jasper, Emmett and Rose had been hard enough. And now we had to be split up again? Even if our family wasn't whole, it felt more complete now than it had for the past year.

"But why, Alice?" I groaned.

She sighed. "I feel like the places they'd check first would be Forks, Alaska, and Brazil. We've been checking in every couple of months for them there, too, but we might have not hit them at the right time. So, if me and Jazz head up to Forks, Rose and Em will go to Brazil, and you guys can go to Alaska. Eventually, we'll run into them." There wasn't one bit of hesitation in her voice. She was telling herself that they were alive, too.

"Wait. Why Brazil?" I asked.

"Well, when you were little, and it almost turned into a battle with the Volturi, your parents told Jacob to take you down to Rio. Plus, some of our old friends are down there that they might run into."

I nodded. It made sense.

"Promise you'll call every day." I told Alice and Rose. They both nodded with a small smile.

"And if you need any fashion advice—" Alice started, but I gave her a glare that cut her off. Jake laughed.

And we went our separate ways, again.