Chapter Thirty

Authors Note: Here's the next two chapters! Hope you enjoy them and leave any kind of reviews good or bad!!

Q.P.O.V

Four weeks. That was how long it had been since I had spoke with Claire. I had seen her though, every night in wolf form watching her from outside her house ensuring that she was safe. Sam had argued with me at first, worried that I would be spotted, but he had no power over me now, he could only ask me, help me see sense as he called it. Jacob on the other hand, realised what I was going through, letting me have my way and watch over Claire nightly, I missed speaking with her so much, seeing her was becoming a small consolation. Each night I would go to her house and watch her from a distance, sometimes during the day but it was more difficult then with more chance of being spotted by a human. I had replayed my last day with Claire over and over again to the point where the rest of the pack choose not to be in wolf form when I was patrolling near Claire's; despite the ever present threat of the vampire that we had noticed a few weeks ago.

It was a single female, she had a gift of convincing people to do as she pleased with her voice from what we could tell. Colin had come across her one evening when he had been on his way back to La Push from a long run, he had smelled her before he had seen her, she was near a group of campers, whispering to a child that was playing out of sight of it's parents behind a camper van. The child a little boy of about seven, who had at first been afraid of the woman, had calmed as soon as she had told him to; before asking him to go and invite his sister on a walk with him and herself. The boy had immediately stood to go, without any need of persuasion walking towards the end of the van, but that was when the vampire had become aware of Colin's presence, and without any warning to the boy, had snatched him and began to run. The boy was not Quileute but it wasn't as though Colin could leave the boy to her, he chased after trying to lead her closer to La Push, into the hills where we had once fought against the army of newborns, along side the Cullens.

I had phased just as he was getting close to his destination, realising instantly what was happening Colin calling for someone to help him, afraid that he would not be able to fight her alone without somehow hurting the child. There was no time to ring any of the others for help, none of them being in their wolf form at the time, I ran as quickly as I could to the images that were appearing in Colin's mind. When I could see them, Colin was circling around the vampire who was holding the screaming child against her chest possessively, glancing hungrily toward him every few seconds, her eyes the shade of red which gave away her diet. I wasn't sure if she noticed my presence or not at first, but I didn't pause to think, glad of the distraction from the pain I had been suffering over the last number of weeks. The female dropped the child, or more accurately threw him away from her and Colin where he would be out of the way, but close enough to reclaim later, he wasn't hurt quickly scrambling towards a pile of rocks that were close by to hide behind.

Colin had all of her attention, or so I believed as I raced out from the forest, ready to pounce on her. In a movement that was so fast that I barely had time to realise what was happening, the female turned quickly on the spot kicking Colin directly in the chest, knocking him away from her as she turned and grabbed at me mid-pounce pulling at my foreleg in a painful movement, where my leg no longer felt connected to my body and throwing me across the clearing that we were standing in. The pain was unbearable, I was certain that she had pulled my leg out of it's socket, and that a few of my ribs had been broken from the impact off the ground when I had landed, considering the force that she had thrown me with. Forgetting my pain for a moment I looked up now to see Colin, glancing panicked between myself the female and the child who he had positioned himself in front of.

I watched as the female gave one last wistful glance towards where the child was hiding, before she sprinted out of the clearing. Colin chased after her, running until she had passed safely out of La Push territory, but she was too fast for Colin to keep up with. Besides her speed, he had wanted to get back to help me, and to bring the child home to it's parents. "Quil are you alright?…..how are you healing?" he had asked me as he ran. "I'm fine…just a few broken bones nothing that won't fix itself…." I answered truthfully, "Before you get back though I want you to phase back into a human….pretend as though you were out for a walk or something and that you had found the boy….take him home…and Colin…don't tell the parents about this…tell him that you found him on the highway or something….for all they know it was his imagination if he starts talking about the blood-sucker.." I growled the last part angry at the pain that she had caused me. Colin agreed, and I watched as he did as I had asked him to, running home for his truck. The boy had watched me from behind the rocks with a mixture of fear, pity and curiosity, never moving from his hiding spot. Colin when he arrived walked into the clearing looking as though he were simply out for a walk, his gait directionless but to me purposeful, if for any reason some innocent bystander had seen him they would never know that he knew where the child was.

Colin pretended to hear something near the rocks and leaned over by the pile feignin the sound of surprise seeing the boy, waving in a friendly non-threatening gesture not wanting to frighten him further. It was taking longer than I though was necessary, the pain was decreasing but I found my position uncomfortable and I knew that moving around would only frighten the child further. Finally the child after some coaxing from Colin, approached him and when he finally got here upon feeling the warmth radiating from Colin leapt at him wrapping his small arms around Colin's leg. "You're not cold like the lady.." he sobbed, gripping onto Colin's leg so tightly that his arms were whitening from the tension. Colin laughed slightly before picking the little boy up, "Nope not cold little man….quite warm from walking about as it happens…I don't see any lady though.." he trailed off, obviously testing to see what the child's reaction would be and what answer he would give in response. Instantly the little boy craned his neck in order to look around him, making sure that the woman was in fact no longer there or at least within earshot.

"No she ran away when the dogs came…….I didn't like her she said she wanted to play …but I didn't want to play with her and she made me…" the little boy's eyes were welling up with tears now, "I want my mam…." he declared, sniffing at the same time, evidently trying to hold back the tears that were threatening to overcome him. "Hey little man…don't worry about the lady alright your friend the dog made her go away right?…well I'm here now too and I won't let her pick on you again….so next stop will be back to your family and maybe we might get you some chocolate how does that sound?" he asked smiling broadly at the child, who was appearing increasingly relaxed in Colin's company. Chocolate seemed to be the magic word, the fear in his expression changing to one of excitement in a matter of moments; I guessed that it was as much for a distraction from the thought of the vampire as it was for the shock.

As soon as they were out of sight I tried to phase back, but I shouldn't have bothered, it hurt too much instead I decided to wait a while further until the pain had abated somewhat. It was growing late, the night growing progressively dark around me, not that it bothered me but I soon realised that it was growing close to the time when I would usually visit Claire. At the thought of Claire I began to panic, what if the vampire decided to track us in revenge for the loss of a meal, my scent was all around Claire's house it would be one of the first places that she would check if she could. Immediately I pulled myself up from the ground walking in the direction of Claire's house. I hoped that Colin in his rush home had thought to ring one of the other pack members to let them know about tonight's events, I couldn't hear any of the others thoughts, and my slow progress was panicking me further when I heard Embry. Telling him about everything that had just happened as quickly as I could, Embry went to inform the others and to go and patrol around Claire's house.

It took me a lot longer than I would have liked to get there, Embry had been growing impatient, there had been no sign of the female anywhere around the house. Before I could even see Embry he had left, he had been working all day and didn't want to wait around when he could be in bed. My usual stealth had to be abandoned, I knew she could see me, but I usually didn't let her see the direction that I came from, emerging instead from amongst the trees. I walked now alongside the tree line until I knew that she could see me, not being able to prevent the limp that had formed from my injuries. As I looked up at Claire's window I was worried that she might have decided to go to bed, since I was later than usual, but she was sitting as always in her chair watching out for me. When she saw me I saw the shock and worry that immediately formed on her face, before she began to stand, I howled in response, not wanting to frighten her but warning her to stay where she was. I wanted to be able to keep her safe and see her at once, her being in her room was safe enough, being outside in the middle of the night with an injured werewolf was not the greatest example of protection I had ever thought of.
I stayed there for the rest of the night, not daring to close my eyes for longer than a second. Claire had fallen asleep watching me, every time that she had made a move to leave, I had rather selfishly howled in response. I couldn't help myself it came before I even though about what I was doing. She was beautiful, in her sleep Claire would curl up, pulling her arms tightly around herself as though it was the only way of keeping herself together. I could have watched her sleep like that for hours to come, but I was interrupted by Jacob, calling to me having phased, telling me that it was about time that I went back to my house. Grudgingly I left, Jacob could order me to do as he pleased, but when it came to Claire he had no power, an imprint was always above the pack, a sour note to those among us who had yet to imprint. I didn't want to be there when Claire woke up, it was too easy to be spotted, night time was one thing but daylight was a completely different matter. Being spotted in wolf form would be a bad idea, Jane or any other of Claire's neighbours could see, I didn't need another object coming between my seeing Claire.

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"Quill think back what exactly did you do?" Suzette ordered down the phone, annoying me to no ends. "Don't you think if I knew that I would have tried to fix it myself by now?" I snapped back, most people would leave it be at this point, but not Suzette. "Don't you take that tone with me Artera you messed up with that girl and I'm trying to help you…fresh perspective and all that so take it easy it's not as though your figuring much out on your own….now think what was the last thing you said to her before she changed?" she replied, her tone demanding and thoroughly unapologetic, I had to fight the urge to slam the phone down, my hand shaking slightly. "Quill I'm waiting!" she called in a sing song voice, I groaned, "Give me a second will you I'm trying to think!".

I thought back upon that last day in the car for what felt like the millionth time, the other pack members had seen it and none of them had any ideas as to what had caused Claire to suddenly turn on me. I sighed in defeat, "Honestly Suze I have no idea…I mean I was talking about your plans for when you finished your degree and when I was done Claire was well…the way that she is now…I don't know if she's angry with me or….I mean what the hell else could she be?" I finished exasperatedly. Suzette paused for a moment or two before answering, "I'm not sure…I mean I doubt that she's angry with you that would be a little strange because from what you've said you didn't do anything…I mean it might have nothing to do with you maybe like you said she misses her own sister and you struck a nerve…" she trailed off, hardly giving me time to think about what she had said before she launched into another thought. "Are you sure that Claire knows I'm your sister?…if she did have some kind of interest in you...which I have heard she does I think that she might have got the wrong impression about you and I…" I didn't let her finish this train of though before I interrupted. "No way…no that is not it I told Claire about you before we were at the garage and I remember distinctly telling her that I had a sister too.." I finished, slightly disgusted at the thought of someone thinking that Suzette was somehow in relationship with me.

Suzette laughed for a second, "Quill…I'll take your disgust as a compliment I'm glad to know that you have no incestuous tendencies…but you said that you told Claire you had a sister what else did you tell her about me?" she insisted. I thought about it again, it had been about a week before Claire's driving test, she rarely spoke about her family and had been talking about what they were doing back in England, when I had mentioned I had a sister, before Sam had interrupted, needing to get to work soon after. Could Claire have forgotten my mentioning of a sister? I couldn't remember if I had said her name or not but I doubted that this could be the reason, it couldn't be that simple could it?. Suzette coughed impatiently on the phone, snapping me out of my reverie.

"I was telling her about you before…well just mentioning that I had a sister…we were just talking about family…but Sam interrupted us…so I know that she knows I have a sister but…." I stopped, if I didn't really think that this was the reason behind Claire's sudden aversion to me should I really placate Suzette; she could be a handul when she got an idea into her head. I decided that there was very little that she could do from New York before answering her honestly, "I don't think I said your name…or at least I was about to when Sam called…but Suzette even if that were the case and Claire somehow thinks that your something else.." I began feeling that familiar uncomfortable sensation at the thought of Claire possibly thinking that, "Why would she react like that to it?". I pleaded, hoping that she would have some kind of girls perspective on the matter. Suzette not for the first time laughed down the phone at me, "Quill honestly do you know anything about women?….alright look Claire is a sixteen year old girl she has moved here from a different country and she meets you her…well I guess her soul mate and she gets to know you and theirs this whole freaky wolf connection thing going on and not to mention covert attempts to get you to meet her, it's interesting exciting and from what Emily and some of the others have told me she seems to really like you….now if that was you and you didn't realise that she had for arguments sake a brother and she started talking about him wouldn't you feel rather deflated…disappointed...this person that you have this weird friendship with has a partner already…or at least you think they do…because that would explain why Claire is being like this I mean who wants to be around a person that they have feelings for when they think the other person has none.." she finished her voice rather sympathetic. I was stunned, that made far too much sense for my liking, I hated that Suzette could be right and Claire was upset about something that wasn't true.

"Alright well…I'm not saying that this is what's bothering her ….but even if it is…what do you think I should do about it?….she's not talking to me as far as I can tell…not coming to the garage like she used to…even Sam and Emily have a hard time getting her to come around…and even when she does it's out of the blue or with her mother and that lasts for pretty much no time at all…it's so frustrating!" I sighed. Suzette paused then, the only sign that she was still there was the sound of her breathing into the receiver, she evidently was just about as clueless as I was, it was all well and good to finally have some idea about what was going on in Claire's mind, but how was I supposed to meet her to change that. "Quill I think that one of your only options is to call by her place.." I cut Suzette off at this point, "NO! I can't do that if I do that and Jane is there she'll send her back to London without thinking twice about it and even if I did go over there how would I explain it?? Sure we're friends but it's not like she has my number or anything and I most definitely am not supposed to know where she lives…" I ranted, feeling more hopeless than ever. Suzette made a humming noise down the phone, something she always did when she was concentrating on something that she found particularly difficult.

"Quill all I can say to you is try….and even if you can't do what I've said….then use your imagination will you please?…I've watched you wait all these years almost my entire life and I want you to be happy so whatever you do don't give up now, not when your so close…please?" she pleaded, taking me aback for a moment. "Don't worry Suze…I won't…never would never could.."