Huge hugs and thanks to Gredlina1 for beta'ing, cheerleading and supporting from the very beginning.

Chapter Fourteen ~ Come The Night

Bella

Edward had once told me vampires feel things on a different level to humans. I'd thought he had to be wrong, as I couldn't imagine feeling more love for him than I already did then, but I was wrong. My love for him changed as I did. It swelled and became absolute, as did my grief at his absence. I ached for him. It was a physical longing. I wished more than anything that I could see him again, just once, to seal his memory in my new, advanced mind with its perfect recall.

Two weeks after I woke to my new life, I got my wish. Though I was sure at the time I was losing my mind.

Jacob was sleeping, and I was lying on my back beside him, staring at the stars through the trees, feeling the closest thing to relaxed I had been in too long to think of, when it happened. I was thinking of Edward, wishing he was there, when I felt a dizzying sensation and I felt myself drift. That was the only word I could think of to describe it; I drifted away from myself.

Almost afraid of what I would see, I opened my eyes and looked around. I was still in the forest, but my perspective had changed. Instead of looking up at the stars from the ground, I was standing and looking at the trees. I turned reluctantly, and saw one of the strangest things I had ever seen in my life of the extraordinary: myself. It didn't look like me though. This was me with every blemish and imperfection smoothed away. It was me as a vampire.

I was laying on my back, beside the enormous russet brown wolf, with my hands folded on my stomach, looking peaceful. The stress I was feeling had not made its place on my features, because I wasn't truly there. That was a shell. I, the real me, was drifting, and I knew exactly where I wanted to go.

Edward

His name was a whisper in my mind, a soft breath of sound, but it was enough. I felt a distinct jerking sensation and then I was outside a grand house in the middle of a meadow surrounded by trees. It wasn't their Forks house. It was newer and lacking the period charm, but it was theirs. I just knew. I had all of a split second to notice the house before my attention was drawn to the porch and the person that sat there. It was my Edward.

He was sitting on a wooden bench, staring out at the trees but not seeming to see them. His face was a picture of misery, and I knew at once that he had heard the news of my 'death'. I wondered how he had heard, who had broken the news to him.

I had seen something close to this before, that last day in the meadow when he had apologized to me. It broke my heart to see it again, knowing that I was the cause. I would have given anything to erase those signs of pain from his face.

Unthinkingly, I moved closer. I came to a stop beside him, and reached out a hand to run my fingers through his hair. But my hand moved through him like smoke. I couldn't touch him because I wasn't really there. My heart shattered all over again.

Then something incredible happened. He smiled. It was like the sun creeping out from behind a cloud to dazzle my eyes. It was a thing of beauty.

Then I heard footsteps whispering towards us, and Jasper appeared. He looked almost afraid, as if fearing for Edward's safety. "You okay, Edward?" he asked.

Edward open his mouth, and I waited anxiously to hear what he had to say, but he closed it again and then said, "I'm fine. Just thinking."

I watched as Jasper laid a hand on his shoulder and then disappeared into the house again.

I crouched in front of Edward, placing my face in his line of sight, but he didn't seem to see me, and when I spoke his name, he didn't hear me.

"Please," I said, calling upon some higher power that I didn't truly believe in. "Help him see."

My prayer fell upon deaf ears. No one heard and no one helped. Edward remained deaf and blind to me, but I was sure he sensed something. It was in the look of peaceful anticipation. He knew I was there, even if he didn't know how.

A cruel, sensible part of my mind whispered that it was better if he didn't know. How would it help him move on if he felt me still? But I couldn't resist the urge to stay, to stare longingly at him and absorb the vision that was my love. There would be a time to leave, when he was doing better, but it was not yet. He was hurting. I would stay, just a little longer.

Edward

I never believed in ghosts before, I never had cause to, but that changed after Bella.

It was two weeks since we left the wolves in the forest, two weeks since we lost Bella, when I felt her come to me in the night. I was sitting on the porch of the house in Ithaca. I had chosen the place because it afforded me some privacy from my family, while still being close enough to know if anything changed in Alice's visions—she was searching almost constantly for a sign of Victoria. I was alone, and then suddenly I wasn't. There was another's presence with me. I looked around, expecting to see one of my family, but there was no one. I concentrated, and I heard each of them moving around in the house behind me. Rosalie and Emmett were in the lounge, searching news pages for any unusual deaths that might portend a sign of Victoria. Carlisle and Esme were together, speaking softly about Carlisle's meeting with the Chief of Surgery that he had been at that morning in which he'd announced he was leaving without notice. Alice was with Jasper in their bedroom, and he was sitting with her while she searched for Victoria.

But there was someone there.

It was like a breath in a high wind, a whisper in a crowded room, barely noticeable, but there nonetheless.

For a moment, I wondered if I was losing what was left of my shattered mind. Then, inexplicably, I felt the warmth of the presence and I knew who it was. I couldn't see her or hear her, but I knew, in my heart, that it was Bella. She had come back to me. I smiled slightly.

The gaping pit of agony that was my heart since that day in September when I left Forks suddenly didn't seem so deep anymore. It was as if her presence was soothing me somehow.

I heard Jasper's startled gasp and his thought, What was that? before his footsteps whispered down the stairs and outside to me. "You okay, Edward?" he asked gently.

I opened my mouth, ready to explain what I had felt and what I knew, but something, some instinct whispered against it. I was certain of what was happening, but I didn't want to share her yet. They might not believe me. It might worry them. They might think it was a facet of my grief or broken mind. They would be wrong. It wasn't me, it was Bella.

"I'm fine," I said. "Just thinking."

He rested a hand on my shoulder for a moment and then left me alone, wondering at the slight change in my emotions and deciding I must have been thinking of times with Bella before.

I was thinking of my Bella now. She was still with me.

But she didn't stay.

As dawn crept over the horizon, I felt her leave me. One moment she was there, warming me with her presence, the next she was gone, and the grief and anger came flooding back into me. I felt like I had lost her all over again, and a moan escaped me. I bowed over and covered my face with my hands. I heard footsteps and then Carlisle's hand settled on my shoulder. He didn't wonder what had triggered this new breakdown. He knew the nature of loss. He just wished there was something he could do to help.

With Carlisle's resignation handed in, there was no need for us to stay in Ithaca. With no new leads on Victoria, we set out for Alaska, to our Denali home. Even with our driving speeds, it took us a few days to make the trip. I traveled in Rosalie's, Carlisle's and Emmett's cars at different intervals. I had left the Volvo in Texas during my search for Victoria, and I had no desire to return to collect it. The only feature of the car I missed now was the fact it had once been steeped in Bella's scent, but that had faded long ago.

I would have bought another car for the journey, but I knew Esme preferred it when I was traveling with someone else—her thoughts were that it would keep my mind occupied a little. She was wrong. I spent all of the first day longing for Bella, and the first night worried she wouldn't be able to come to me again because we'd moved.

I was wrong though; she did return to me that night. We were at a gas station, filling up, when I felt her presence beside me. It was like having a ice-pack applied to a burn. The ragged edges of my nerves were soothed and I relaxed. She had come again.

When we arrived in Denali, Carlisle called Tanya to let her know we were in the area again. He gave no explanation of our return. I knew that they would have to be told eventually, they were no longer at risk now Bella was gone, but I didn't relish the idea of telling them. I didn't want to share Bella with them, too. Her memory belonged to me, to us, and they would have questions; they would want to know about the human that had stolen my heart.

The afternoon of our second day in Denali, Tanya, Eleazar and Carmen arrived. Having not been told the details of our return, they were immediately concerned when they saw us. My own grief was obvious, and that of my family's was clear to Tanya who knew us so well.

"What happened?" she asked immediately.

Carlisle looked at me. They need to be told. Do you want me to do it?

I nodded covertly and got to my feet. "I think I'll take a run through the park. I won't be long."

It was the first time that I had left them since they had found me in Rio. I waited for someone to protest, but no one did. They knew now that I would not leave them. Not until Victoria was dead and I had seen Bella again. For now, I had something to live for.

I found a small copse of hemlocks and leaned against the trunk of one, staring up at the sky. I remembered the last time I had been here, when I had fled from Forks and Bella. I had thought she was a demon then, a test sent by the fates, how wrong I was. She had been my blessing not my curse. She had given me the greatest gift of my life—her love. The six months I had with her were the only time in over a century of life in which I knew what it felt like to be truly alive.

I stood there, alone, for a long time, the sun was starting to sink below the horizon when I heard her coming. She made no attempt to conceal her thoughts or what she wanted to talk about, giving me the option to run. I didn't though; I stayed where I was waiting for her.

She came to a smooth halt beside me, and smiled slightly. "Edward."

I forced a smile that felt more like a grimace. "Tanya."

"Carlisle told us everything," she said. "I'm so sorry for your loss."

I bowed my head. "Thank you."

She took my hand and gave it a brief squeeze. "She was beautiful." I raised an eyebrow and she went on. "Esme showed me a picture of you together. You looked so happy. I've never seen you like that before."

"I never felt like that before her," I said, echoing a conversation I had with Esme what felt like a lifetime ago. "She changed me."

"I can see that." She frowned. "Edward, why didn't you change her when you found her?"

Unable to meet her eye, I stared out at the horizon. "Because I was stupid. I valued her humanity and soul more than our future. I wanted her to have human experiences—motherhood and human love—and that blinded me. I cared more for her soul than I did her life." I sighed. "I was a fool."

"If you could go back, would you do things different now?" she asked.

"In a heartbeat," I said immediately. "I don't even know if she would want to be a vampire. We never discussed it. If she wanted it, I would change her if I could. I thought too much about what she might lose that I didn't consider what she might gain."

"And what you might gain," Tanya said softly.

I nodded. If I had changed her, I wouldn't be feeling this pain now. I wouldn't have lost the other half of my heart. She would have been with me and I would have given her the world. I couldn't though. Bella had said there was no changing what happened. Even though we had the gift of time travel available to us, I would never be able to change her now. Whatever happened, happened.

My days fell into a rhythm. I would spend the days suffering, waiting for Bella to come, and the nights glorying in her presence. It was impossible for my family to not notice the difference in me, but they didn't say anything for a long time. A full month later, I returned from hunting to find Jasper waiting for me on the front porch. He was concealing his thoughts, so I didn't know for sure what he wanted to talk about, but I had a good idea from his concerned expression. I jogged forward and came to a stop beside him on the porch. He sat down and I copied him.

"We need to talk," he said.

"About what?" I asked innocently.

He locked eyes with me. "What's going on with you, Edward?" In response to my innocent look, he went on. "You've lost Bella, I get that, and you're hurting more than I've ever felt anyone hurting before. But there's something more. What's happening at night? What's changing and how do we make it last?"

I looked down at my hands clasped in my lap, wondering how much to tell him and how to even start. I knew the time had come for me to share what I knew about Bella, but I couldn't find the words.

"Talk to me, Edward, let me help."

"It's Bella."

"Yeah," he said slowly. "I figured that, but what's the deal with the nights? Are you just thinking of her, or is it something more?"

I was having this conversation with Jasper, but he wasn't the only one listening to my words. The whole family had fallen silent and they were anxiously awaiting my response. They wanted to know, too.

"Let's go inside," I said, getting to my feet and making for the door. "You all deserve an explanation."

I went into the lounge. Esme and Carlisle were already sitting on the loveseat, where they had been reading together. I sat down on the armchair and laid my palms flat on my legs. I had only a moment to wait before the rest of the family had joined us. They all took a seat and looked expectantly at me.

I tried to marshal my thoughts, to articulate what I wanted to say, but I couldn't seem to find the words. I wished Jasper had waited for night to ask me. Bella's presence would have made it easier for me to explain to them. Perhaps they would even have felt her, too, if I gave them the chance.

"What is it, Edward?" Carlisle asked gently.

"It's Bella," I said. "I… She's not gone."

The looks of sympathy and concern that fell on me were like darts against my skin. They were thinking in one vein—that I was losing my mind. They thought the grief of Bella's loss had stolen my wits.

"I'm not crazy," I said, my words a little harsher than I intended.

"You've suffered a terrible loss," Carlisle started. "And it's natural that you would want to deny what happened…"

"You don't understand," I snapped. "It's not denial. It's fact. Bella is still here."

"But I saw her die," Alice said in a small voice.

I got to my feet and paced the length of the room, every eye following me. My hands came up to my hair and I tugged on the strands. "I know what you saw, Alice, but she's here."

"You mean you're seeing her?" Emmett asked, concern thick in his low tone.

"Yes. No. I don't see her. I feel her—her presence. It started in Ithaca." I looked to Jasper. "That night. Do you remember?"

He nodded. "I felt something change."

"I felt her come to me. She was there. It hasn't stopped. Every night she comes. I can't hear her or see her, but she's there. And she's getting stronger. I feel it. She's becoming more present every time."

"You mean like a ghost?" Rosalie said. "You think Bella is a ghost now?"

I nodded eagerly. "Yes! That's it exactly!"

"Do ghosts even exist?" Emmett asked, looking at Carlisle.

"I don't know," Carlisle said carefully. "I have seen many incredible things in my life. I have heard of many more. I have felt the sensation of a soul leaving a body after death in the hospital, but it never lasted. It was fleeting, but…" He shook his head. His thoughts were clouded, so I didn't know what he was thinking, but his expression was one of despair.

"What?" I asked. "Don't you see? She's here still. She didn't leave me."

"I believe you," he said. "And I'm happy you feel some presence of her still. It's just…" He sighed.

"What, Carlisle?" Esme asked gently. "What are you thinking."

He braced his hands on his knees and looked up at me. "I cannot think of a more tragic fate for Bella to suffer." He bowed his head. "I miss her, and I wish more than anything that she was still here with us, but to be here like this… to be trapped… it's awful."

I rocked back on my heels. In my blindness, my selfishness, I hadn't once considered what this meant for Bella. I had been so exalted at her return that I didn't realize what this cost her. She had been denied the true peace of Heaven for an eternity living on the fringes of life. I wished for the relief of tears. My heart was breaking all over again, and I could not release the pain.

Esme got to her feet and came to stand beside me. She wrapped an arm around my waist and leaned her head on my shoulder. I accepted the comfort as it was offered and secretly wished for warmth and softness.

"What do we do?" Alice asked softly.

Carlisle scrubbed a hand over his face. "I don't truly know. If Edward is right, and Bella is still here, this may be it for her. There might not be a way to save her."

I was so used to Carlisle having all the answers that this caught me off guard. I had expected him to know what to do now, to have a way to save her from herself.

A sob built in my throat and escaped me in a noise of pain. I had stolen Bella's release from her, and my own. I had known my pain would not last forever, because I'd had a way out. I would kill Victoria, see Bella till there were no more summers to share, and then I would seek death. I could no longer have that. I couldn't find release knowing Bella had none. I was cursed to live now, waiting only for the night, burdened by the pain of what I had done to my Bella.

So… Plot twist, huh? No shieldy shield for Bella this time. She's got another cool—at least I think it is—talent.

Until next time…

Simaril x