Author's Note:

Hello everyone! Thank you for the kind reaction to the last chapter-for your patience during this brief hiatus, for your speculations, and for your trust. It is very much appreciated. You are very much appreciated.

I'm earning the M rating in this one. It's very dark. This chapter contains some very adult, non-sexy things. I try not to be over the top in my writing, but I believe this chapter is graphic and requires me to tell you that. This is an important chapter to the plot, but I will warn you it may be a rough one. This is the one I warned you about before, extremely painful for our protagonists.

SO, I understand that some of you might have an urge to skip some of it, just from me telling you it will be rough. But, I'm going to ask you NOT to. If you can help it, resist the urge. There are two parts to it. The second portion of the chapter is not violent, but skipping the first part would cause you to miss ALOT that is important to the whole story. I REALLY encourage you not to skip. That being said, I get it, if that is what you choose to do. I've BOLDED the first sentence in part two for you so you know where it begins. Following the chapter in the end notes, I will also put a short review of the chapter in case you just can't help it. Otherwise, please keep in mind, this story IS a HEA-neither Bella nor Edward die, and it does get better.

Bear with me. Bear with the story.

Chapter 21 Playlist Song: Cold Water, by Damien Rice

Disclaimer: All characters from and references to Twilight and the Twilight Saga belong to Stephenie Meyer. No money is made from this writing, and no copyright infringement is intended. The plot for Entwined is mine.

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Chapter 21: Piece By Piece, Pieces of You

Slow and steady. Breath in, breath out. One moment, and then two. Like a wave, lulling over pebbles and sand and silt-wish, wash. Ebb, flow.

Deep. Cleansing. Breaths.

Only, breathing is not advised in instances such as these.

It only took a few moments for the excitement churning in the humans' bellies to turn from anticipation to fear. As time slipped away from them, their instincts began to kick in. We do that to them, cause humans' heart-rates to spike and their bodies to tingle. It is what anyone would feel if they were in the presence of someone who wished their existence to end.

They could feel it now, like hot, moist air around them, weighty on their chests. The voices in their heads turned from strange amusement at their predicament to stunningly accurate terror until they were mulling and bumping one another in an effort to find some way out.

But there was no way out. Only rest.

I clenched my eyes shut to try to block out the looks in their eyes, though that did nothing to hide the tenor of their thoughts.

I want out. Flee. Please, God, no. Get me out. Don't come near.

Their thoughts turned to loved ones, friends, broken promises and unfulfilled wishes. When I'd found the wreck that had ultimately brought Bella to me, these are the exact thoughts that I'd anticipated hearing from her and the semi-truck driver, but never did. These humans were aware of the danger that lay in this ancient room. Perhaps they didn't know exactly why, but they knew this could be their end.

The tour guide shook himself, his eyes widening as if he too suddenly realized they were not in a safe place-at least not the place he'd intended to take them. How had he allowed it to get to this? What had gone wrong? he wondered. It was fuzzy, somehow. He'd been ready to take these people on his assigned tour, end them in a quiet bistro, serve some of them too much good, heady wine, and make his profit another way. There was a few that would have worked today-not the elderly couple, but maybe the brunette with the rude husband, or the kid with his camera and his eyes always on the old ladies purse. But then she had appeared and then...

Heidi had charmed him, and she was only now just letting him go from her talent, the hazy, dream-like state that caused humans and vampires alike to fall at her feet. She was letting them all go, as the Volterra vampires slowly let the facade slip. Like a private dancer, taking off clothing piece by piece, they were revealing it all, inch by excruciating inch. The humans fear was growing more and more intolerable.

Everything in the room was palpable: The coursing fear, the desperate bloodlust, the anger and hate, and the trembling of the young woman in my arms.

I was grasping on to what was left of Bella's sanity. She was slipping from me.

My arms were wrapped around her, bear-hugging her to the point of my own pain. My fingernails dug into my own flesh, my corded muscles bunched and strained, but the pain I was causing myself was grounding me. It was all I could do to hold her, Bella was trembling so hard. I dug my feet into the marble on which we stood, cracking it so that I could find more purchase. It wouldn't help much, but it was something.

She'd not ever been this close to humans where she could simply rush over and take all that her body was begging her to. And she was strong, so much stronger than me. I'd never let her be in this position, where we could see just how much her body could handle, and it was something I now regretted. Perhaps, if I'd not been so careful with her, if I'd allowed her just a sniff when I'd had the support of our family around us. I'd never tested her to see what her limits were. I never made it possible for her to acquaint herself with the smell of a live human, pulsing and vibrating with life, and she'd only had a whiff from a distance, cloaked by the other, more-benign smells. She'd smelled the remnants of human on Carlisle's clothes, but it was tainted with ammonia and lemon-covered bleach. She'd smelled what my brothers and sisters smelled like after a day in the midst of teenagers, but only after they'd gone for long runs in the wet Washington wilderness. She'd smelled human in the air, washed out by rain and cool breeze and earth and sewer.

But she'd never smelled them up close, sweaty and desperate and afraid, reeking of useless survival.

Her hands were fisted at her side, her forehead creased with concentration, and she was pulsing to a steady rhythm as if she were chanting a mantra and dancing to it's beat. She was not breathing, not looking. But still, I knew that inside she was imagining the flavor of wet blood that rested just below their papery skin, and her throat burned and ripped like she was swallowing razor blades.

She'd only been a vampire for a little over a month, for Christ sakes!

I tried to steady her.

"Bella," I whispered. "Stay with me, love. Don't give in. Don't give up."

Her mind wanted to lean into me and listen to me and obey, but her body fought my embrace and the way I spoke the words on the shell of her ear, knowing that I was trying to stand in the way of it's food. Bella's heart was suffering and giving up, but her body was alive. It was taking advantage of her heart's weakness.

"Surprise!" Aro said, clapping his hands. The humans who were alert to their surroundings still and paying attention jumped at the sound of his voice and whimpered. Some of them were already comatose from their desperate fear. A small, brunette woman was clutching her husband close to her, grasping him so tightly it seemed that she was trying to crawl up him. A younger man with a camera had wet himself. Others were screaming, both through their throats and in their minds. A woman was begging, offering money and other unsavory propositions.

The guard encircled the small tour group, keeping their distance while still instilling ultimate fear. They were not trying to hide themselves now. There was no point. The vampires' eyes had turned black, and their faces had slipped from the guise that they wore outside the castle walls. Even a human could see that they were not. I knew as well as they did that there would be not witnesses leaving this room. There would be no one to tell the vampire secret to-no more reason to hide the truth.

I spun, turning Bella and pushing her against the far wall, holding her there with my body and keeping her as far from them as I could. She fought me, her hands trying to find purchase on me anywhere. She wrestled against me, levying her strength, and I knew I would not be able to hold her for very long. Her own blood from her change still gave her physical superiority, but I hoped I could appeal to the strength she possessed in her soul.

"Bella," I whispered desperately into her hair. She growled at me softly, but I saw her frantic eyes flash to mine with fear and recognition. "I'm right here. Listen to me. Don't breathe. Don't think. Focus on me, focus on the feeling of being in my arms. The sound of my voice, my hands, my arms, my hips. Don't breathe."

She snorted and tugged, but whimpered as if she were trying. She was trying! But this was even more than I could have imagined possible.

One. I'd thought, it was possible, that Aro would put one victim in front of Bella. He'd done it to Carlisle, surprising him with a bruised and bloodied victim on occasion, just to see if his resolve held. It had, of course. But that was not to convince him to join him, but rather to see the full extent of his control. Just out of curiosity.

I had not imagined that Aro would be so cruel, so calculating, as to do this to Bella. I could see it all now, in Aro's head. He would let her witness this sacrifice—force her hand to take part in it—and he knew she would see that there was no pleasure in animals blood, that the taste of it was nothing compared to the warm, wet flavor of human blood—that humans were made for this purpose, and she was made for the purpose of killing them.

I should have told her that I'd anticipated he'd try to lure her this way, but I didn't want her to burn with the thought of it, or fear it more than she already was fearing it. I didn't want her to anticipate what it would look and feel like to see a bleeding human in front of her.

But this? This I could have never anticipated. This I could never prepare her for. She struggled and whimpered and sunk to the floor.

She buried her head in her hands and cried. I continued to shield her from the sights in front of her, my body creating a cage around her little, trembling one.

And they hadn't even broke skin yet.

"Oh, Bella, dear!" Aro called from his throne. He was enjoying every moment of her suffering, hoping, very nearly praying for her to falter. "Come and join us! You are the guest of honor, and you are missing your treat!" His teeth clenched together at the end, and clearly he was not pleased that she was huddled behind me on the far wall.

The rest of the guard were amused by her reaction. And a bit annoyed. The humans were getting out of control-messy, dirty, like filthy animals-and it was ruining the experience for them.

Alec stepped forward.

"Master," he said. "Perhaps I can—"

"No!" Aro bellowed, interrupting Alec's offer to quiet the rabble with his gift. Aro did not want that. He did not want to offer them any solace. He did not want it to be quiet and easy, or anything like a buffet. He wanted blood to spatter, for them to fight, for their fear to seep from their pores. He was not only being cruel to the humans, but to Bella. He didn't want her to miss the raw savagery of the kill, the way the blood spurt so much more pleasantly-in quick, uneven jets-when it was not given freely. He didn't want their endings to be easy.

Aro wanted a bloodbath, and he wanted Bella to be the one to start it.

"Stop it!" I yelled at him over my shoulder, trying as hard as I could to still hold her. She was shaking even more violently now, little sounds coming from her throat that sounded like another language entirely. "Let her go! Can't you see what you are doing to her? This is no way to begin her life!"

Aro laughed, a low deep belly laugh that turned into a sinister growl.

"This is exactly the way to start her life! You've denied her! This is the way you should have allowed it in the first place. You think I am cruel for doing this to her? You are cruel for never allowing her to!"

He looked at me and smiled.

"Even you, Edward, have had the freedom to choose. So let her choose."

From across the room, I could see the depth of his insanity, the way his hate and power and thirst swirled in his eyes. There was not a thread of decency left in Aro at this moment. Once, Aro had been a human. There had been good in him. He'd been power-hungry, greedy, afraid, but there had still been good in him. He'd smiled once with real sincerity, and he'd loved-his family, his sister, his friends. Long ago, Aro had housed humanity.

Now, there wasn't a shred of it left, all of it burned away. And Bella was having a hell of a time holding on to hers. I would kill him for doing this to her.

She continued to back herself away from the humans, so much so that the wall behind her back began to lose tiny pieces of itself onto the floor. Her body wobbled and she kept chanting her strange, foreign mantra, her hands now fisted in her hair to the point that I was afraid she might begin to pull some of it out.

Aro looked at his guard, who were watching him, waiting expectantly. They were thirsty, not just for the blood, but for the vengeance. Only one word from him, and they would be on their victims' throats.

Let us get to it, already. Fuck the girl. Sweet, sweet fear. Burning. Mayhem. Mutilation.

Aro sighed, seeing the way that Bella was not moving toward her kill, he rolled his eyes and waved his hand dismissively into the air. Immediately, the other members of the Volturi descended on the tour group.

The room erupted with the essence of their lives. Ending.

"Edward," Bella choked, trembling in my arms. She shook with such force that my hands began to fail me-I couldn't really hold her. "."

She kept repeating it to me, over and over, through her choking sobs. I didn't know at first what she was begging for, whether it was to get her out of there or to let her go, or to end it all. There were no tears, that was not possible, but her heart was breaking in her chest, and I thought I might be able to hear it. Maybe that was mine, right along with hers.

I looked behind me at the carnage, blood coating the floor where yesterday we had stood before Aro. Arcs splattered the white walls where the vampires had been careless. The red liquid slid slowly toward the middle of the room, down each step, coating it in crimson copper until it began to drip, drapple, drip into the massive pit. It steadily trickled down the great cavern where it's sound bounced of the walls and meshed with the sound of their screams and gurgles and begging.

They were playing with them, keeping them alive but making them bleed as much as possible.

All for Bella's sake, I supposed.

Felix and Afton were guarding the main entrance to the turret, both of them watching me and Bella from their places. They were ignoring the massacre to their lefts, focusing all their attention on the two of us, even pushing down their own thirst. This was their given mission, to make sure that we would not try to leave. I thought about it for a moment, the idea of trying to drag Bella out. Of course, though her voice was still begging with me, her pleases starting to muddle together and become meaningless again, her body was still trying to fight me, trying to get through me to the blood. I was losing the battle.

I could take out Afton, no question. He was not one of the enforcers. But Felix? I wouldn't stand a chance, not with his immense strength, and a flailing Bella trying to fight at me to the bodies. I would never be able to get either of them. The two of us would be too slow, and the rest of the Volturi would be too quick.

The other exits were the same. The one behind the thrones was protected by Aro and Renata, and the other on the far wall that Heidi had come through was directly through the bloodbath. There was a chance that I could get to the hidden door closest to us, but in glancing at it, Felix seemed to notice. He indicated with his mind that that door was also guarded: from the other side. Behind it was another group of vampires. I could now hear them too, all of them milling and wishing they were amongst the chaos. Aro had commanded they stay, lest we try to leave, and they resented it, and us, and all the blood that was now dripping freely down the iron grate into the earth below, uselessly.

My own throat burned, my venom nearly dripping from my lips, but I ignored the usual feeling of need and want and hatred.

I looked down at Bella. Her eyes were black and shiny, so round that there was no more white in them. She looked possessed, which in fact she was. Her lips were wet with her own venom, venom like she'd never had before, greedy and wanting. No sound was coming out of her lips anymore, but she continued to mouth her pleading chant. She was looking up into my eyes with such sadness, such pain, and I saw her soul there.

Deep within her, where I didn't even think to look, was the piece of humanity that Bella still had. It was like it was buried in the recesses of where I'd never imagined it could be, this small piece of the good in us I thought didn't exist once we were changed. Bella had it, I'd known that all along—that it was in there somewhere. Of course Bella still had her soul. Me? Not so much, I thought.

I don't know how I saw it, this visible representation of Bella's soul—or if I actually even saw it at all—but I can't deny that I knew what this vision or hallucination or actual moment meant.

I was supposed to know that she was worth protecting. Unquestionably. Her soul existed in her vampire body, and I needed to make sure it stayed there.

Inside her, Bella could never want what Aro was offering. How many times had she said no to him? She would continue to say no to him, too. I knew that. If Aro kept asking, Bella would keep answering him the same way she had been.

But that was not the part of her that was in control now. That part of Bella was locked away at the moment. The demon that I'd put into her held the reins.

"Please," she hissed. Her voice sounded too far away, too unlike herself. It was another thing altogether.

Bella was not begging me to take her away from the blood.

Because in a moment, she would take it. She would take it all. Her body was the one that was taking control, and her mind had already relinquished. Anything to end it, this white hot carnal need that burned her throat and clouded her mind to the point of crazy.

She was begging me to give it to her. Allow her. She wanted my permission for this one transgression, this one sin. And if I didn't give it to her, she'd take it anyway.

I hesitated for a moment, and she took the opportunity to overthrow me.

I landed on the ground with a thud, my body nearly five meters from where I had been holding her captive. Bella stood, her body so much more in control than her mind could fathom. I got up immediately, running to her and blocking her path. She growled at me, the sound low in her throat. But then, her brow furrowed and her lips turned down in a frown. She looked like she was hiccuping from the guilt the growl had caused in her. I took the moment to lunge at her, but she sidestepped me. She was just out of my reach, floundering between the need in her body and the will of her heart. She was with me there for one second, my Bella, and then next, she was easily overpowered by the monster in her, the one I'd refused to believe had existed.

Back and forth, bob and weave, tit for tat and pull and tug. I didn't know which part of her would win. Because both were indeed part of her.

I had been so foolish in the last month and a half. To think that Bella didn't possess the same potential that we all had. Esme had slipped in her first few months, and Rose, and Emmett. I had killed out of desire just to defy my father-because I was tired of being something I didn't think I was. Jasper had spent a century killing. There was always the fight in us all, the desire to take what nature told us was rightfully ours-even now, I knew from all my family members' thoughts that it was something they had to try to control every day. Why had I expected Bella to be any different? Maybe in a different time, in another life, she could be like Carlisle. But in this one, the blood burned in her throat just as badly as the rest of us. Why had I expected her to possess so much more than any of us?

I knew the answer the moment the question formed: Because Bella was so much more than us. Because Bella wasn't supposed to be a monster.

I grasped her wrist, and her eyes flashed to my hand and then to my eyes. My Bella, the one that was wholly good, was still fighting in there. It was like looking at two persons in one body, her face morphing back and forth between the two. I pulled her and she pulled back.

"Please, Bella," I begged her, sinking to my knees. "Please come back to me."

The mass of victims around us electrified the room. By now, there were those that had died. I felt the way the air around us changed with each life ending. One man had succumbed to the pain, a woman had died of pure fright. The young man that had soiled himself was on the ground, his nothing eyes watching me, completely void and lifeless, but still wide open and staring as if he couldn't help but watch all of this. His brain was quiet, and I prayed for him. Me, the man that had never accepted my father's God.

I prayed.

I prayed for the rest of these humans, that they would die soon and their pain would end. I prayed that the Volturi would not win, and in the end, get my Bella. I prayed that Aro's schemes would not affect Bella, make her doubt who she was. I prayed that she would be safe and secure again, that we would see the meadow. And I prayed that she would not do what her body wanted her so badly to do. I prayed that I might be able to stop her.

Or do it for her.

I never considered my soul when I was human. I was too arrogant, too young, too unconcerned about anything that I couldn't see, to even think about the presence of my soul. Out of sight, out of mind. I'd heard the word in the church services my mother had made me attend as a boy, but I'd never thought about it. I thought I'd never die then. When I woke up to Carlisle's eyes and his thoughts and his prayers, I resented the fact that my soul was already gone. Something I'd never thought of, I now regretted. And I killed, and even though I felt the guilt, I knew it wasn't a mark on my soul. Obviously. I didn't have a soul. So I'd never had it. Not really. What was one more sin-one more death on my hands-when it meant saving my only salvation?

It was not what Carlisle would have ever wanted for me—for her. It was not what his God, or Esme, or my Bella would have wanted.

At that moment, the tour guide, who had managed to seemingly make it out alive so far came crawling away from the feast. His leg had been badly bloodied, to the point that he could no longer walk. But his fingernails tried to dig into the stone floor to pull him along, breaking and splintering and tearing at him as he pulled his full weight on the unyielding floor. The movement caught Bella's attention, and, like a bird of prey, her head shot to his figure crawling there pathetically. She cocked her head from side to side, and I knew then that my Bella was so far buried, clawing her way to the top of the monster inside her but gaining no footing. her movements were so inhuman it frightened me.

"Did you ever do anything to deserve this," I said to him, remembering the strange tone of his earlier thoughts. He looked up at me with beyond terrified eyes. There was no cohesive images or words, just pain and fear and madness. This had made him mad.

"Come on!" I yelled at him, holding and shaking him by his stained lapels. "Think!"

I wanted anything, anything that would lead me to believe that this man deserved this, what I was about to do. I needed the solace, not just for myself, but later, for Bella.

Why. What. Why. Pain. Hate. Die. End.

I was about to give up on him, but then, in a moment of clarity, he began begging. Not to me, but to a god of some kind, any of them that he thought might forgive him.

Ohpleaseohplease, ohplease. Just stop it make it end. I'm sorry that I led those people to that room. I'm sorry that I did it. I'llneverdoitagain. Pleaseohpleaseohplease. I didn't mean it I don't want to die I don't want to die. Just kill me now.

I saw the image of this in my mind, in his mind. He'd used his job—his job as a tour guide—to do another job, one where he sold unsuspecting tourists. Though he'd no real grasp as to how far the organization had gone, he'd willing played the part, oblivious to the full understanding of it, but he'd gotten to the point where the money had made it so he didn't really care. He'd led girls, boys, children, young women, even young men when he could gain the upper hand, all kinds all ages, to be taken and trafficked all over. And there had never been any kind of remorse-not really, anyway. He turned around and walked out the door, and blocked it out with booze and drugs. He'd happily lined his pockets, happy enough to push to the back of his mind that these were daughters, sisters, some-day wives, family, friends.

It was not much, but it was enough for me. He'd said his penance.

I would say mine later. Anything to save my Bella from what would certainly haunt her for the rest of eternity. What would break her. What would maybe never bring her back to me.

Before she could move at him, I took his head between my hands, clasping his ears so that he couldn't hear his last breath, and twisted, just enough that I didn't rip him apart. And then I dipped my head down, put my lips to his jugular, and ripped it like a paper lantern. His blood poured out of him, fresh, hot, powerful. It tasted of copper and life and desperation, and it coated his cooling skin and my hand and my chin and the front of my shirt.

I held him out to Bella. For a moment, she didn't take him. She stood there, her hair framing her face, watching with wild, wide eyes. There was a torch behind her, the glow all around her. She was otherworldly, radiant, menacing. The fire that burned in her throat seemed to radiate out of her like life itself. She looked like pure power. She stared at me for a moment, and I had the sense to almost be afraid of her. She was terrifying. She licked her lips and trembled.

But then, she stilled. She sank down to the ground, and her eyes softened and her lip quaked out of thirst and fear of this strange unknown. A piece of her gave up. But she knelt down and crawled on her hands and knees beside me anyway, lowered her body, and placed her lips at the man's wet throat. I held him for her.

The moment the blood hit her tongue, her eyes widened. She hummed and closed her eyes. Her lips were soft on the man's lifeless neck, sensual in a way I hadn't expected. She was almost gentle, and I knew at that moment that my Bella was back.

What had I done? What if I had only resisted a little while, would she have been able to fight it too?

She finished, slowly, almost serenely. She closed her eyes and used her tattered sleeve to wipe her mouth. The rest of the room was in chaos still, though the human's minds were faded to the point that I could not longer hear them. A few hearts still beat, hanging on to each precious palpitation, but their lives were void. Madness was the only thing that seemed to make sense anymore.

When she was done, I shifted back onto the heels of my hands, watching her. Surely, there was enough blood around to still tempt her. But instead of rushing around trying to find her next victim, she crawled over to me and climbed up into my lap.

Her body shook with sobs, her face buried in my shoulder. She audibly wept, her lips trembling and her voice hiccuping. I felt, rather than saw the desolation that wracked her body, because I was feeling in inside me too-in me, through me, out of me. I held her close, wishing I could absorb the pain right through her skin. She wrapped her fingers around my neck and curled into my body until there was no end to her and no beginning to me.

I had my own guilt, not only for the life that I'd taken, but for the fact that I'd allowed it in front of Bella. This was not about saving face, since I was bound to show her the monster that I was while I was here. I just wished I'd had another way, a way to save her from all of it. I didn't want any of this for her. Ever. I'd deluded myself into thinking I could keep her unchanged.

So to save her soul, to save her the guilt of taking a human life, I did it myself. Sure, she drank. But he was already dead, because of me.

Because if I hadn't, she would have. And then his blood would have been on her hands. Well, it was already, physically caked underneath her fingernails and drying down her arms. But that could be washed away.

I rose with her, carrying her easily she was like nothing in my arms, like a husk of who I expected her to be.

Aro was watching us. He had been the entire time, and I could tell from his thoughts and from the disapproving look on his face that this was not what he had envisioned. Certainly, Bella tasted human blood, but I knew already that this was not a victory for him. I didn't doubt that she would now crave it more than anything else—there was no comparison to the taste of warm blood, perfectly tempered to a healthy 98.6, or just a little hotter from fear. I didn't doubt that there would be moments where Bella craved it and obsessed over it and clawed at her own throat because she wanted to taste it again. But I also didn't doubt that she would never do it again.

I knew my Bella, and she would never put herself in the position she was currently in again. Monster or no.

Aro watched us as I carried her to the door leading out toward our "chamber." Felix and Afton stepped in front of me. Bella was still now, cradled against me like a little child. From Aro's thoughts I could see her eyes, wide, longing, empty.

"Let me through," I snarled at them. They did not move an inch. Afton ignored my request, choosing to focus instead on his mate who was now helping to dispose of the bodies down into the large pit. The heavy, grate was being moved and they were throwing cooling bodies down into the darkness. He was a coward.

Felix shook his head and sneered.

Behind me, his eyes sought out Aro's.

"Let me through!" I screamed at Aro. He heard me, of course, his eyes narrowed at me, angry and petulant because of what had happened. This is not what he wanted. He'd had hoped she would give into the carnal, raw nature and realize that this was the life she was meant to lead. He wanted it to make her powerful-not this, this shell of the creature he thought she was. He'd wanted her to see what he could offer her, show her that this is what their life was like, and she might realize that this was not at all what she'd been experiencing. He had wanted her to be the one to tear flesh and spill blood all over the ground. He'd expected it.

But that is not how it had played out. Aro knew that he could have ruined it all with this, even with the draw of human blood.

He also knew I couldn't take her far. Not like this.

She was nearly comatose in my arms, though she continued to sob softly. Deep inside her, she was spiraling out of control. I didn't need to read her mind to know it—I'd been there myself.

The blood tasted so good—rich and warm and savory. There was so much more in a human's blood that an animals didn't have, as if their very life essence was in it, their very soul. You could taste so much more: their hopes, their dreams, their fears. And you were it's master, taking it all into yourself and wielding it with a power unmatched on this earth. One life to another, a stronger being.

But there was also the insufferable grief. Deep and dark and haunting, the idea that you had caused another to die, to end without cause. Certainly it was delectable, but was it worth the pain and anguish, the endless, black vortex that threatened to consume you? There were two choices, only two: embrace the darkness with the belief that you were a supreme being, or reject the idea that there was anyone truly beneath you when you were the epitome of depravity. Carlisle had taught me that. And I had taught Bella.

Because there was another way where you didn't have to feel this guilt.

I had to get her out of there, away from the scent and the scene and the memories.

"God damn it, Aro!" I yelled again. "Let me out!"

He rolled his eyes, irritatedly with the fact that this phase of his plan had failed to bring the intended results, and waved his hand dismissively at the two grunts blocking our way. This was not over—he knew that and in his mind moved on to the next part of his plan—but he would let us go for now, while he contemplated his next move. In the meantime, he would make sure we were here to see it.

They stepped aside and I pushed through the doorway. I walked down the hall way to the prison that had held us the night before. Felix followed me, surprised at her reaction to the massacre-enthralled and disappointed. He'd never seen it before. She was daunting, both in the extreme control she'd managed to hold on to for so long and her reaction to the blood.

Instead of becoming ravenous and tearing the rest of the room apart in search for more, she broke down and collapsed upon herself.

Briefly, he wondered if this was her gift.

I kicked the door open with my foot, letting it swing back and slam shut, and carried her over to the bed, laying her down as tenderly as if she was a human infant. She immediately curled in on herself when she felt the blankets beneath her, her hands covering her head and her knees clenched up into her chest. A tiny gasping cry left her lips.

I didn't take my hands away from her. She needed the contact, as did I. I laid down next to her, my body alined with her and mirroring hers so that I could watch her and I placed my hands all over her body—in her hair, over her hip, up and down her arms, over her cheek. She trembled with the dry sobs that left her, so quiet now. They were more frightening than if she had been wailing, because I knew that the pain was buried deep in her, threatening to break her apart from the inside out.

Like ink in a shallow pool of water, it was spreading through her, dancing, reaching, trying to blacken everything, slowly. She was fighting it. I moved closer and wrapped my arms and legs around her, cocooning her. She fell into me, melting as if she were begging to crawl inside of me instead of being inside herself.

I knew that feeling all too well. The first time I'd killed, not out of revenge, but because I could not contain the beast, I'd wanted to crawl inside the empty body and stay there.

"Shhh," I whispered into her hair, murmuring words that likely held no meaning for her now. She was so small, I wondered if she'd not shrunk in physical size, collapsing like sinking sand. She was falling into herself now, and slipping through my fingers, each tiny grain of her.

It was hours. I could tell by the way the light through the windows shifted. I knew exactly how many minutes, seconds ticking by. I knew how many soft, needless breaths she took, how many times I said "shh" into her temple, or her hair, or her neck. I knew the exact number of times I pressed my lips to her-261-not knowing if she actually felt the pressure. I knew how many times she trembled and how many times I tightened my fingers around her, pulling her closer.

And I knew exactly how many times she'd blinked.

Not once.

Her eyes were glassed over, empty, hollow, unfocused. She shook and whimpered and sighed every so often, but her eyes did not move from somewhere far off in the distance, somewhere I could not follow her. Like a shell, she was not with me then, but somewhere deep in a cavernous portion of herself.

At seven twelve, when the sun was just beginning to dip in the Tuscan landscape, she seemed to come back to me. She blinked a few times, and looked at me, her eyes searching mine for something, although, I didn't understand what. She bit her lip and a single sob broke through her lips. She reached up and stroked her fingertips down the side of my face. I sat up, pulling her with me into my lap and held her close, almost rocking her.

"Please don't leave me," she said softly, her lips pressed against my neck. She climbed me, holding herself up with a strength that I didn't know she possessed.

"I'll never leave you," I whispered against the curve of her ear, relieved to have her simply speaking to me. She'd seemed to go on some kind of pilgrimage inside herself, and was only just surfacing.

"Please, please don't leave me," she begged again. It was as if she didn't hear me. Her tone was the same, and I wondered if she even knew I'd said it. "Please don't leave me again."

"I will never leave you," I promised.

"I'm sorry," Bella said softly. Her dry tears had not subsided completely, but she raised her head off my shoulder and placed her forehead on mine. Her voice caught in her throat, where it mixed with a breathy sob. "I'm so, so sorry."

I shifted her in my lap. There was nothing I could say to make this better for her. There was no taking away the pain or the regret or the images in her head. But perhaps I could clarify it for her in the way that she had for me.

I tilted her face up to meet me. Her eyes were no longer flooded black, but a deep crimson and liquid, as if the blood she'd just consumed was swirling in them. Had she had the ability to shed real tears, they would have overflowed down her cheeks.

My thumbs found their phantom path anyway, and I held her close and kissed her cheeks. She whimpered under my touch.

"Every decision, remember? There were many choices that brought us here. I made some for you, you made them for me too. I will never leave you. You will never leave me. You can't apologize for one moment that controlled you. Not that, anyway."

Bella leaned into me. She pushed me back on the bed, and curled into me, seeming to shrink again. There were no words exchanged between us, her little body offering enough warmth from the blood that was also offering her strength. But I knew from experience that she didn't feel strong. She felt weak and broken and used. She felt empty.

And even if she was not the same girl I'd loved before, I wouldn't stop until I found a way to put her back together, piece by lovely, broken piece.

.

.

.

End Notes:

*Peeks out of hiding.*

Um, hi guys…. I did promise you a HEA…remember? Try to remember that, even when it's really, really hard. You've got to fall before you can fly.

Recap: Aro arranges this "coming out party" for Bella, in which he tries to get her to drink human blood-more so, to have her be the one to end a life, so she can feel the power of it. Bella struggles for a long time, but in the end, she's up against too much, too soon. In an effort to take the guilt of ending a human life, Edward does the deed himself. Sadness ensues. =(

I am sure I am going to get questions about this, so I am just going to say it outright:

No, there was no other way. Yes, Edward had to do it. Why? Because Bella was going to do it anyway, and he didn't want her to live with the guilt of the act of murder…so he did it for her. Sometimes you do stuff like that for the people you love.

This chapter, this moment of regret and sin and giving-in and utter heartbreak was where this story was born. Seriously, the very thing that made me begin this story. I never understood WHY Bella had so much control right out the gate in the original, and then I wondered, "What if she didn't?" Because, I think that in a different world, maybe she wouldn't have had such control over something they all struggled with so badly. Well, knowing Edward, he would never let her take on the pain and suffering of being the opposite of the "good" he saw in her-cause' he's pigheaded and sweet like that. So he'd do it for her.

I know this was a difficult chapter to read. It was WORSE to write, trust. This is the lowest that Bella (and Edward, in turn) are going to get. Now is the aftermath, the growth that one has to have when they experience something so devastating. And yes, eventually, then the HEA.

It's all about the growth, people. Just trust. It's going to be lighthearted and good and sexy again, and yes, a happy-ever-after kind of thing.

So thank you for sticking by me in this. Thank you for supporting me and the characters, even at their lowest point. I look forward moving on from this with you.

I'll be posting chapter 22 TOMORROW. To happier times. Love to you all!