Jane and Renesmee were circling each other. Stepping over the bodies and body parts that lay sprawled on the ground, their eyes never left each other's fierce gaze.
"You should have finished me when you had the chance." Jane whispered, her plump lips lifting into a serene smile.
Renesmee said nothing, just kept circling.
Circling, and watching,
Watching Jane's thoughts.
Renesmee winced as she felt her arm burn. As though someone had just stuck it into one of the licking flames. She could feel her skin blistering.
A quick glance down with her eyes reassured her. Her arm was whole. The pain was not really there.
"I did say I would finish you..." Renesmee replied casually, and this time her mouth turned up when Jane's eyes widened and her jaw clamped shut against the pain.
Renesmee slackened her hold when the burning in her own arm cooled.
"What are you...?" Jane bit the words out, trying to regain control of her facial features, trying to smooth the contortions Renesmee's pain had caused in her face.
Renesmee let out a shaky breath as she felt something like shards of glass rake across her back. "I am..." she breathed, trying to fight against the pain, "...my father's daughter..."
Jane let out a piercing scream and Renesmee replied with a sighing breath when she shards recoiled.
She couldn't keep doing this forever.
She had caught Jane off guard the fist time, but now the Botticelli incarnate was fighting back. And seeming to enjoy the challenge.
"AAARRRGHHH!"
Renesmee let out a piercing scream of her own as something sliced across her forehead. It felt as though her skin was being pulled back...
She closed her eyes and sent similar jolts of blinding pain Jane's way, and was satisfied when the girl replied with a scream of her own.
And then she was laughing. Actually laughing! A low, serene chuckle.
"My brother is finishing off your dog as we speak..." Jane said, between giggles.
"No!" Renesmee winced at her words.
She couldn't see Jacob and Alec from where she and Jane circled. She couldn't concentrate on Jacob and keep her mind on Jane at the same time. She could only hope that Jacob was holding his own against Alec...
"Yes." Jane said, matter-of-factly. "And when my brother is finished with Fido, you will have the displeasure of feeling our combined force." Jane smiled, and Renesmee felt a twisting stab in her gut. She didn't know if it was Jane, or merely the effect of her words.
"I'll have him keep you conscious enough to feel everything, but powerless to stop it..." Jane sang the words.
"Alec won't do that to me." Renesmee spat out.
Jacob. She thought for a moment, surrendering to the pain in her gut to reach out to him.
"My brother's infatuation with you was nothing more than Chelsea's doing." Jane said these words with a little too much force.
Renesmee played on Jane's desperate conviction.
"Really? Your brother seemed to think differently..." Renesmee let the twisting in her gut continue as she showed Jane Alec's liquid gold eyes. As she replayed Alec's bitter words "I know you feel the same way" spoken just moments ago.
The pain that flashed across Jane's face in that moment was more satisfying than anything Renesmee could have imagined.
"NO!" the little girl screamed indignantly.
"Oh yes..." Renesmee tried a little chuckle herself, but only managed to exacerbate the pain in her gut. As though someone were twisting a metal sword around and round.
"No, no, no!" Jane continued to bellow, her eyes flaring black. "My brother loves me!" she screamed, and Renesmee collapsed to her knees with the pain.
Jacob! Help! she screamed silently.
Jane pulled on her hair, yanking her head back to look into her incredible eyes.
"Alec loves me!" she whispered low, exposing teeth.
I'm coming, Ness... hold on, I'm coming...
Suddenly Jane's eyes left Renesmee's face, lifting to see something.
No.
Jacob, she's... but Renesmee was too late.
All at once the pain in her stomach lifted and Jane was gone.
Renesmee whirled around and saw Jacob's wolf form collapsed in a writhe-ring heap on the ground, twisting and convulsing as Jane stood over him.
"NO! JACOB!" Renesmee screamed, rising to her feet.
She launched herself at Jane, who was too hell-bent on sending rocking spasms through Jacob's body to pay attention to her. The little girl's thoughts were consumed with the knowledge that her brother was dead.
Renesmee had her pinned to the ground, but Jane's eyes were still on Jacob where he lay a few feet away from them, still kicking with the pain.
She had been so tired a moment ago. Her mind had been sagging under Jane's malicious weight. Her abilities deflating with each bout of raw pain Jane inflicted on her and Renesmee likewise threw back.
But now, with Jacob convulsing from the pain... she felt strong again.
Suddenly Jane's body twisted underneath her, and Renesmee heard the comforting pant emitting from Jacob.
Renesmee locked her hands around Jane's head, and kept her eyes locked on the girls burning irises.
It didn't take much. She sent pulsing waves of pain through the girls body, and in between the racking spasms she merely said "Alec is dead".
Soon Jane was limp... either from the pain, or because she was giving up.
"Alec is dead!" Renesmee spit the words out.
Jacob suddenly appeared, he nudged her arm with his nose, but she kept her hands locked around Jane's head.
"He's dead!" Renesmee screamed down at Jane's slack face.
Jacob nudged her again, harder this time, but she was beyond noticing.
"Dead! Dead! Dead!" Renesmee screamed.
Suddenly she was knocked flat on her back, panting, the wind knocked out of her.
She lifted her head, and then lay it back down when she saw that Jacob was dragging Jane's rag-doll form toward a wall of fire.
Enough.
She heard the words, but didn't know who they belonged to.
We surrender.
Renesmee blinked, and felt cool hands lifting her up.
"Tell them, we surrender."
Marcus. His eyes were burning black as they looked into her face.
"Wh-what?" she whispered in a shaky breath.
"Renesmee, tell them to stop fighting." Marcus said, with a nod.
Renesmee blinked again, and then noticed Sulpicia standing beside Marcus. Her eyes were wide, and she was clinging to his arm.
She felt a burning heat, and realized that Jacob was by her side.
"Tell them..." Marcus said, his voice soft with pleading. "Please?"
Suddenly Marcus's cold hands were gone, replaced by an encompassing warm embrace. She hadn't even heard the ripping sound...
Jacob's arms were around her, her head tucked neatly under his chin.
"Tell them, Ness." he whispered.
She was so tired. Her body was as limp as Jane's had been at the last...
"End this, Ness..." he breathed, she felt his sigh underneath her cheek.
She closed her eyes.
She breathed.
She buried her face into Jacob's strong chest and she opened herself up...she reached out and held onto everything in the room. She sent the word out, and she hoped and hoped that they would listen.
Enough!
Enough!
And it was.
Renesmee held onto the thoughts for a few more minutes, repeating Marcus's words of surrender as he whispered them to her.
Every now and then she interjected with her own pleading. "Stop, please stop." though she didn't know if those words were meant for anyone in particular or for everyone...
It was enough.
Those left still standing, still fighting, stopped as her words pulsated...
And then she could do no more. She was so tired, she hoped that they had listened...
"No more..." she murmured into Jacob's chest, and she let herself collapse entirely into his arms.
Jacob bent down, putting one strong arm behind her knees and picking up her sunken body to cradle in his arms.
"You did good, Ness... you did good." he murmured into her hair while he rocked her.
She opened her eyes, her head still nestled against Jacob's chest. She took a hesitant look... and wished she had kept her eyes closed.
The fires burned low and the smell of searing flesh hung thick in the air with the billowing smoke...
Broken and torn bodies lay everywhere. Some were rock solid, others twitching in the final throes of...
She closed her eyes again but the smell reminded her of what was still there. She gagged and felt the burning bile rise up...
A low wail cleaved the air all around. It gashed and tore at her insides. The sound was awful, it was constant and intense and...
"I know, shhh honey, it's okay now."
Jacob rocked her, murmuring into her hair "I've got you, you're safe, it's okay..."
The wailing continued, pitched low and deep... it took Renesmee a moment to realize that the sound was coming from her.
"I've got you, it's okay..."
And he did. She clung to him, sunk her nails into his bare chest, felt the broad expanse of him slick with sweat and blood and now her tears... she couldn't stop, she gave herself up to the sound.
It shook her insides, clawed at her throat, but she gave herself up to it.
She felt him shake with it then too. Felt him collapse a little against her, and then she didn't know who was holding who and who was clinging...
"I love you, I love you, I love you..." she didn't know if her words made any sense through the broken sobs.
"I will speak with..." Marcus's voice sounded far away, she couldn't be sure, but she thought he said 'Edward'.
The thought lingered somewhere in the back of her mind.
Family.
My family.
But she couldn't let him go, she couldn't let Jacob go long enough to...
"For what has been lost here, I am sorry."
Marcus's voice, cool and sincere.
She bit her tongue against her cries, she listened to Marcus...
"You have suffered a great loss. I could never even begin to understand..."
She heard a snarl and knew it was her father.
Loss?
What was lost...?
And then she saw. She closed her eyes but it was there. He had seen everything and now she could see...
Rosalie. Her body eaten by the flames.
Esme. Ripped apart for her son.
Carlisle, following her into the darkness...
All gone. Her family was never to be whole again...
"I know." Marcus again, and the high hiss of a female responding to her father's growling...
"Surely you can see. You know we had no part..." Marcus was cut off by her father's voice.
"I see. I know. We are done here."
And then hands, cool hands pulling her up, pulling her from the warmth...
Jacob made a growling noise, but her father's voice was strong and close.
"Give her to me." not sinister, not angry, just... pleading.
Jacob's heat was gone and she fell into a cool embrace.
"My baby..." the velvet voice that had tucked her in so many nights of her young life...
"Daddy!" tumbling from her lips, the word was a balm in itself.
"Oh, my baby, my heart..."
More hands, cool and hard. Her mother's breath, a sweet tickle against her cheek, blistering the tears that had run down her flushed face.
Her mother couldn't say anything, instead she felt her arms wrap around her and her father, trying to fit them all in...