Tolkein owns LOTR - Meyer owns Twilight and I own a ridiculous amount of Christmas Chocolates.
8 Renee.
Renee paced her kitchen, the phone call from the vampire had unnerved her, of course she had heard all about what had happened with Bella and Edward. She may not be in Bella's service any more, but her place as a protector didn't fade and she and Bella had shared everything. Bella had given her leave to marry Phil, she would never deny her a chosen and had sat with her when she told him everything. He'd taken it well considering he married a 3000 yr old elf. They had settled happily in Jacksonville, she'd often dreamt of having the gift of the peredhil, the half-elven, to give up her mortality for her chosen, but that was something that was lost to her. Still she would have a mortal lifetime with him and then, she return home to middle earth and sail to the undying lands.
The Cullen's left the hotel promptly at 9am and after renting suitable vehicles drove to Renee's small beach front house in Jacksonville beach. She took them by surprise, to the delight of Jasper as she opened the door as soon as they drove up and waited on them to approach.
"What are you doing here?" she asked non-too friendly.
"Mrs Dwyer, I don't know if you remember me, but I am Carlisle Cullen and this is my wife Esme and my children Edward and Alice..." Carlisle started, neglecting to mention the others who looked at him wondering when he removed them from the family.
"I know who you are, I'm just at a loss as to why you are here," Renee replied closing the door behind her, making it clear they wouldn't be going in.
"We were recently in Forks and were looking for Bella, but it seems she and Charlie have disappeared, we wondered if you knew where they were as we're quite concerned," Carlisle answered.
"Oh I'm sure you are, it took you a lot of concern to dump her in the forest, unaware of which direction home was, it also took a lot of concern to leave town without a bye your leave, so forgive me for being a little incredulous at this claim that you have now, after all, it's been over 4 months since you saw her last," Renee threw at them.
The Cullen patriarch stepped back as if hit, not remotely prepared to be received in such a hostile manner.
"I'm sorry if we made a bad impression, but at the time felt a clean break would've been best, after all young people tend to move on quite swiftly," Esme interjected.
"Indeed, it seems some adults do too Mrs Cullen, although I'm sure your other three 'children' would've loved to have been informed they were no longer part of the family, before your husband began the introductions. As for your 'Clean Break' surely that would've been better achieved if not kinder done at the front door of Bella's home, rather than the middle of a forest, miles away from home, with a the risk of wolf or bear attack, clean break indeed." Renee snarked.
Jasper, Emmett and Rose, tried desperately to hold back their grins, it seemed that Renee wasn't the push over that was expected.
They all heard Edward whisper at vampire pitch to Carlisle that he wasn't getting anything from Renee. It wasn't going down how they expected and Jasper thought it was great!
Renee cast a wary eye at the three outcasts, and using elven magic sent a message to their minds, "Come back to the house later, once you've ditched the Brady bunch, we'll talk then," she said.
Jasper, Emmett and Rose all nodded subtly and remained standing by their rental, the least they could do was get some enjoyment from this.
"Mrs Dwyer, could you tell us where Bella is, I really miss her and would like to get in touch," Alice tried, widening her eyes and tilting her head just so, she always tended to get her way with this look.
"You know...Alice, that trick stopped working on me when Bella was an awful lot younger, but I'll tell you where they are, they've gone home." She smirked.
"Home where? We know they're not in Forks," Edward demanded.
"Home, she's with her father and that is all that you need to know, now if you would kindly leave, I have somewhere that I need to be," Renee said turning back to her door a sign of dismissal.
Jasper, Emmett and Rose, climbed into their rental and waited for the Cullen's to leave, following behind them as they drove back to the hotel, Jasper could feel the dejected desperation from the other car and almost revelled in it. 'Serves them right' he thought to himself. On arrival at the hotel, the Cullen's went to their penthouse without word to the other three, Jasper had expected this, but Rose and Emmett were visibly hurt, first they'd been discounted as family in introductions, now they were literally left out in the cold.
"I always thought Carlisle was too good to be true, if he can treat you guys like this, there's no telling what else he would do," Jasper said grasping their shoulders and sending them calm and acceptance.
"Ya'll took your time, I've been sat in here scratching my ass for an age," a voice called from the sitting area of their hotel room.
"Peter? What are you doing here?" Jasper asked, moving to embrace his brother.
"A little bird told me to come," he said cryptically, "Said the weird and wacky Cullen's have thrown out the playbook and it's all going up shit creek."
Rose giggled, because looking from the outside, it really had gone slightly awry.
"You could say that," Jasper replied with a grin, "seems we three are persona non grata these days, took out memberships and id badges too!" Jasper laughed.
"Well, we have somewhere to be, I believe you got your invite, so lets leave the wacky ex-relatives to stew on it," Peter said, heading for the door.
"Speaking of wacky, where's Char?" Jasper asked.
"Oh, she flew the coop a while back, said she wanted to find herself or some crazy hippy dippy shit, will probably hook up with your ex-fam, while we're off saving the world." Peter replied non-plussed. "Here you'll want these," he said handing each a brown envelope.
"What's this?" Emmett asked.
"My knower has been going wackadoo for weeks, so I followed it through, liquidated all of the assets in your names, closed accounts, effectively killed you off, the Cullen's won't be getting shit from a chickens asshole, don't ask me why, I just know stuff, so you coming with?" he responded.
The three looked at each other, unsure of what on earth was going on, but they trusted Peter, so followed him down to the parking garage, where he'd left his truck. Climbing into the cab, they were pleased it had a rear seat, as it would've been quite a squeeze, "so where too?" Peter asked as he fired the engine, it grumbled and growled with a ferocity that Rose appreciated.
"Back to Renee's," Jasper replied sitting back in his seat and flicking his hand in the universal sign for get a move on.
The drive to Renee's was a lot less stressful than the one previously, Jasper was still concerned about the Cullen's, but right now he had bigger fish to fry, namely, how did Renee speak in their heads and what the hell was going on.
Renee was waiting somewhat impatiently as they parked on the curb outside her house, and yelled out to Peter to get a move on.
"You took your time Peter, did you forget the way?" she quipped.
Peter jumped from the truck and ran and gave her a fierce hug, before dropping her back on the ground, much to the surprise of the others who stared on with shocked faces.
"Me and Ren go way back, don't we little bird?!" Peter offered by way of explanation.
"Come on in, we have much to do and not much time to do it," Renee said cryptically leading them into the house.
The inside was light and airy and open planned so that you could see through to the beach side of the premises. Renee lead them through to a large sunken lounge and flopped into a huge couch, that almost swallowed her whole. A large square coffee table sat in front of it, with a set of small square boxes lined along the middle. A trunk, that looked like a treasure chest sat to the side of the couch.
"No questions till I've finished," Renee said lifting her hand.
The four vampires took seats around her and waited for her to fill them in.
"I feel like I can trust you, well Peter does, so I'll go with his gut. Bella, Charlie and I are not what you think, we don't come from here, we come from another realm called Middle-earth, we're Elves of the Woodland Realm, Bella was sent here 60 years ago by her father with Charlie and I as her protectors. Her father is King Thranduil of the Greenwood. Her twin brother, Legolas remained behind." Renee said watching as their jaws dropped.
"What?" Emmett asked.
"I know you're wondering whether to believe me or not Emmett, but it's the truth." Renee replied. "After the abandonment of Edward, Bella felt that there was nothing to keep her here, despite her fathers wishes, and so she returned home, to Middle-earth and Charlie went with her, she released me from service as I have married a mortal and wish to remain here, I can go back anytime that I wish, but I love my life here." Renee continued.
"Huh," Rose breathed out.
"The reason you're here, is firstly to prevent the Cullen's finding Bella, but also, I feel that you're going to be needed where she is and the only one who can send you to her…is me." Renee finished.
"Um...what?" Jasper said confused.
"I'm going to send you four to Middle-earth, Bella is going to need all the help she can find, there's a war coming. The war to end wars and should they lose, it'll bleed into this realm, the enemy would be too strong to contain," Renee answered matter of factly.
"And Bella knows we're coming?" Jasper asked.
"No, it'll be a surprise, but...a good one, I promise," Renee entreated.
"What about the Cullen's, we can't leave you to deal with them," Jasper asked.
"Oh don't worry about them, they have bigger problems than me coming for them." She offered with a smirk.
"How do we go about this?" Rose asked.
"First you'll need to change, those clothes will not do," Renee said moving to the trunk and pulling out leather leggings, boots, shirts and cloaks and handing them over. "Rose you can get changed in the bedroom through there, I'll just skip to the bathroom and leave the boys to it, call when you're done," She finished.
The four vampires shook their heads, what on earth is going on?
5 minutes later and they were all dressed like Ren fair rejects. Renee returned to the lounge area and clapped happily when she saw them. She returned to the trunk and removed a small arsenal of weapons, daggers, short swords and bows. They divided them up and attached them to belts and over their backs and looked at the woman for what was next.
"Right, to send you back, you'll need to stand in a circle and hold hands," she said as she handed Jasper a pouch of money and a rolled parchment. "Give this to Thranduil when you arrive, otherwise he may just have you killed, he can be a bit crotchety," she said with a glitter of mirth in her eyes.
The four held hands as Renee chanted a few words under her breath and clapped her hands together, a bright light filled their vision and then they could see nothing, it felt like they were falling, whilst being pulled in all directions. Moments later the bright light cleared and they were stood in a stone circle surrounded by archers and Charlie Swan.
Charlie shook his head as he saw the three Cullen's and the familiar vampire, before lowering his bow and approaching them.
"Charlie?" Jasper questioned the stoic looking former Police chief, dressed in a green tunic.
"Mr Hale, I would ask how you got here," he started, "But I recognise Renee's handy work, welcome to the Greenwood, here I go by Beren, come the king will want to see you," he said directing them to follow him and his troupe of elves through the trees.
"It's Whitlock, sir, I'm no longer a Cullen and Rose and Emmett are McCarty now. This is my other brother...Peter," Jasper offered.
"Oh I know Peter, we go way back, where's wackadoo?" Charlie asked.
"Off finding herself or some other crazy thing, I'm better off without her," Peter replied, "Good to see you Beren, been a while."
The vampires followed the Elves in silent awe, they could hardly believe where they were, yet they felt it under foot, and could smell all manner of scents, this was no waking dream.