Thank mother f-ing goodness that I was able to get Word installed sooner rather than later! So sorry for the wait and I hope this makes up for it!
Disclaimer: I own nothing!
Omniscient POV
They arrived too late. The plane landed late in the afternoon and the additional journey to Volterra was extended due to streets clogged with tourists soaking up the lovely Italian countryside. Edward had leapt from the taxi after being trapped in the same spot for half an hour and rant the remaining distance to his desired city, Esme and Carlisle lagging behind.
Now they stood in the ruins of the Volturi's amphitheater where it was obvious that a fierce battle took place, a battle they prayed Bella did not lose. There were tufts of hair and clothing strewn about and the entire marble floor was massacred along with parts of the walls. Any previous features that identified the room as refined and classy were gone, leaving a bombed out shell in its wake.
Edward fell to his knees when he sniffed around; searching for any traces of his beloved, and found it barely clinging to a thin jelly bracelet she had been wearing. It was broken and had been buried beneath the surrounding rubble making it difficult to find unless one really looked closely. He snatched it up and pressed it to his nostrils, inhaling deeply and crying out when the scent faded even more.
"We'll find her son." Carlisle consoled him, coming from behind and clasping him around the shoulder. Edward closed his hand around the plastic and stood to face his father. When he spoke, his voice was low and menacing as well as threatening.
"Yes we will find her but first I am going to find the bastard who took her. Aro." he sneered the name and took off from the room at a crisp walk with Carlisle and Esme once again lagging behind, worried for their son's life but even more so for the man's whose he was going to take. They knew how frightening Edward's anger could be but were secretly gladdened that Aro would be receiving the short end of the stick.
A harried human woman sat at a desk and answered call after call, asking each to hold, and then dropping the phone entirely when Edward, looking murderous, came into the room. She attempted to stop him but his loud growl quieted her squawks. "Where is Aro?" he demanded, leaning over the counter but the woman was only listening to the sound of his voice, fascinated by the English accent but even more so by his beauty.
Edward was frustrated with her thoughts as they were solely focused on his attractiveness and had not revealed Aro's whereabouts. He asked her again, snapping her daze and this time her attention was on the words coming from his mouth. She stuttered and shook her head; she had been instructed not to tell a certain man with penny colored hair where her employer was.
"I don't know." Edward was frustrated with her deceit; he could detect it as if the very scent of her lie ran through her veins, teasing him with the evasion. He caught a peep of his brunette beauty in her mind, unconscious and being examined by Aro who appraised her scarcely clothed body with greed and lust in his vile ruby red eyes.
He grew angrier by the moment and contemplated killing the woman just to spite Aro but his hand was stayed at the thought of what his beloved would say. How she would admonish him with a kiss. However, he could not think of that now, not while she was still missing and her captor was still alive. Definitely not for long if, he had his way.
Instead, he followed the most recent scent that trailed from the amphitheater to a wooden door that had been blocked haphazardly with a plank of wood. Edward stalked up to it and tore the thick plank away and turned the handle, waving Carlisle and Esme to come after him and to keep quiet. They stepped through the threshold to find a stone staircase leading up to darkness, as there were no lights to illuminate the way.
"Aro has been up here recently, we're going the right way." Carlisle murmured as the bounded up the steps. No shit! Edward wanted to snap but kept his mouth shut since he knew he would immediately regret letting his anger get the best of him. Besides, being disrespectful to his father figure was something Edward had never done; the very idea horrified him.
They reached the peak of the staircase where a door lay bolted shut. "Something tells me Aro didn't want anyone to come through here." Edward thought to himself sarcastically as he raised his foot to kick the door in. The wood shattered into hundreds of splinters under the force of his kick in a thunderous boom and the pieces clattered noisily to the floor.
They ran through the jagged hole to a corridor that was dimly lit with torches held in iron sconces giving off an intimidating medieval vibe. The floor was covered with an ancient scarlet carpet that extended all the way down, disappearing around the curve of the wall, cutting off the vampires view. Identical doors were evenly spaced on either side of the corridor and all were closed except for one.
It was fifty feet ahead, and there was a heartbeat emanating from within along with the labored breathing of a woman. They turned the corner to find Rosalie Hale on a bed with her left hand cuffed to one of the metal bars on the headboard. There was a pool of vomit on the floor next to her and she was wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
Esme's gasp of horror made Rosalie's head snap up and her puffy bloodshot eyes filled with tears once she caught sight of her good friend Edward. He had her in his arms immediately, stroking her hair and soothing her as she shook with her sobs, grasping onto his shirt with all her might. After a while of solid crying the golden-haired girl pulled away and dried her eyes, sniffling and hiccupping.
"How did you find me? Do you know where Emmett is?" her voice was thick with her dry tongue and she grimaced after she spoke, touching her throat. Carlisle somehow came forward with a cool bottle of water and Rosalie took it eagerly, drinking with gusto. Edward looked at his father, wondering where he managed to find a chilled bottle of water where they were.
"We were looking for Bella and we stumbled upon you. We have no idea where Emmett is, I did not even expect to see you here. Have Alice and Jasper been taken as well?" Edward asked when she finished gulping her water and twisted the cap back on. Rosalie looked to be trying to remember something, clenching her eyes closed and her lips moved with unspoken words. Edward suspected it was either a prayer or a curse.
Finally her eyes opened again and her mouth was set in a saddened frown, "He had Alice and Emmett but they were unconscious the entire plane ride here. I was blindfolded after the plane landed so we would not know where we were. Jasper was awake and he held me the whole time and we both cried because Alice and Emmett would not wake up. After I was blindfolded, they drugged me with something from a needle and I slept for a long time. I just woke up and puked as you can see." she did not have to point to the sick on the floor.
"Poor dear." Esme whispered and came to sit behind Rosalie and started stroking her sweat-dampened hair and pulled a few strands away from her face. Carlisle waited until her eyes were closed as Esme began humming in her ear and then snapped the metal cuff off her wrist and then crushed it into an unrecognizable state and threw it on the floor, underneath the bed.
Edward rose from the bed to pace about the room and laced his fingers together behind his head as he growled quietly to himself with his eyes clenched shut much like Rosalie's had been. Carlisle watched him with apprehension, his eyes followed his every move, worried that Edward would lash out in either anger or misery but otherwise he sat motionless next to his wife.
"We have to do something!" it was Rosalie who spoke, startling those next to her as they expected Edward to verbalize whatever it was that had him so distressed. Edward stopped when he heard Rosalie and dropped to the floor and covered his face with both hands and pulled his legs underneath himself, Indian-style. Esme looked down at him with pity but she remained silent, clueless as to what to say to comfort him.
"Hello?" Rosalie demanded, growing irritated. "Our best friends are missing and you just sit down on the floor! What would Bella say if she saw you now Edward?" she asked in a whisper, wiping a tear from her eye and holding her protruding belly and caressing the spot where one of the twins had just kicked. Edward looked up and his eyes held anguish but also determination to get up and fight for his beloved.
"You're right." he murmured, rising and looking resolute, "I am being foolish. We must act but I don't you will be much help Rosalie, being pregnant and all." he added apologetically. She waved him off and got a calculating expression on her tired but elegant face as she pushed on the mattress and threw all her weight forward.
She managed to lift herself off the bed and onto her feet but a groan of pain, caused by stiff muscle and two heavy babies stretching her stomach, passed through her lips. Esme was at her side in an instant, supporting her by the arm, and stroking her back, trying to soothe her sore muscles to provide some relief to the poor girl. Rosalie thanked her and lifted the water bottle, uncapped it, then took a swig.
"First things first we need to find Aro, since he is the one responsible for all this shit." Rosalie said once she was steady on her feet, "Sorry about the language." she added ruefully but her apology was paid no heed since silly things like cursing were mere trifles in situations such as the one they were in.
They left the room with Rosalie hanging onto Carlisle's back like a rucksack, her arms locked tightly around his neck and her legs latched firmly around his waist. Her weight went unnoticed and Carlisle could move with sufficient ease but he had to take care not to jostle her too much or her grip would slack running the risk that she might fall. It was a risky endeavor to undertake but there was no other way to move with the human girl fast enough.
Rosalie actually seemed to enjoy herself once the vampires began running and was so enthralled at the speed that she did not even seem fazed at the blinding speed at which her surroundings passed. Suddenly they stopped once they reached the end of the corridor where yet another door lay shut but this one had grunts and shout along with the clanging of metal on metal and then the telltale sound of two vampires colliding; rock on rock.
Edward opened the door and began the descent down the stairs on the other side and the noise of whoever was down there continued with a shout of Again! Then more crashing. Another door was at the bottom of the stairway but Edward had that open as fast as he had the one before. All sounds ceased when the three immortals and one mortal came through the door and a collective gasp came from the newcomers.
Rosalie dropped off Carlisle's back and attempted to dash forward to her love but never got the chance because he as well as the blond-haired one had to be restrained by all of the four vampires in the room. "Stop breathing!" Carlisle shouted, his arms wrapped around the burly one's chest and fighting to hold him still. The two newborns cut off their air supply and stopped thrashing around.
They looked ashamed and the brown-haired one was hanging his head with self-loathing, unaware that the unguarded Rosalie was tiptoeing her way up to him. It was not until she was right in front of him that anyone noticed but by then it was too late and she already had her arms around his neck and was crying into his shirt. He exempted every single ounce of restraint in order not to tear Carlisle's arms from his body and suck the girl dry.
"I thought I lost you." She sobbed. It was then that something changed in the brown-haired one's head and all desire to kill this girl was robbed from his body. It was completely unheard of they would find out later and terribly cliché but the powerful love he felt for Rosalie was enough to make him not want her blood any longer. It was as some magical force flipped a switch inside of him and the thirst he previously felt was gone, at least for Rosalie.
"Let me go!" he cried to Carlisle who wearily complied after Edward searched his thoughts for devious plans to murder Rosalie and found none. As soon as his arms were freed, he had his children's mother in his embrace and laid kisses to any skin he could reach. After finally laying a deep kiss to her lips, he only whispered one word, Never, and then he kissed her again, long and hard while salty tears streamed from her eyes.
Sadly, all was not well with the blonde-haired person and he still very much wanted to tear the throat of the human before his eyes but Edward's cage-like arms kept him pinned. He knew this girl, had ever since they were children, yet the animalistic instincts he felt were screaming at him to feed. He just repeated in his head that he loved her, his best friends loved her, and that it was wrong to want to kill her. He kept it going like a mantra and Edward looked sadly at his friend.
He knew what it was like to have to tell himself not to do something and that the feel of it was degrading and no sane person should ever wish it upon themselves. "Jasper, just think of Alice, of what she would say." Edward told the blonde-haired man he held and Jasper nodded, grateful for the words. He pictured her with her spunky hair and bubbly personality and felt the ache in his jaw dim and was able to relax.
Edward finally released Jasper's arms and was amazed as well as pleased when he barely reacted to Rosalie's scent when she turned her head to gaze at him, which sent a fresh wave of her tropical smell. Edward knew it was a struggle for him to hold back and supposed that his suggestion of imagining Alice's reaction worked the same way he imagined Bella's voice working as his conscience.
"This is amazing!" Carlisle gasped as he saw how well controlled Jasper and the other newborn were around human blood. He also could have felt jealousy at their apparent good fortune but Carlisle was too compassionate to mind. "Emmett, what is it that is preventing you from attacking Rosalie right this moment?" he asked the brown-haired male.
Emmett smiled down at Rosalie who he still held in his arms before turning to Carlisle to answer his question. "She is carrying my children and killing her would mean I killed three instead of one. In addition, I know that if I lose control it will only mean seconds of joy and then I will forever be in torment for my selfish action. I love her far too much to even consider this." Carlisle nodded in rapture, astounded that Emmett's love was enough to save Rosalie's life.
"And you, Jasper, how have you restrained yourself?" he turned to the blonde-haired male with raised eyebrows and the inquiry of a scientist observing a lab specimen. Jasper was about to answer but suddenly in his mind he was able to feel something churning in his brain that all of a sudden allowed him to sense the emotions that those around him were feeling.
He clutched his head at the onslaught that made him feel duplicates of their emotions and was overloaded at the swift succession that they hit him with, like being shot with a machine gun. The others gasped and darted forward to try to find out what was wrong but Jasper waved them off, insisting he was fine; it was not painful, merely unexpected and shocking.
"I've been thinking of Alice." he said finally with a small smile. "Of what she would say if I was to harm one of her best friends. Just picturing her face is enough to stop me. As Emmett said, it is the power of love." Carlisle laughed in joy as well as incredulity that love could stop a natural instinct the two should not be able to defy.
"Not to be rude but my brother is, to put it plainly, planning your demise this moment," Marcus interrupted, previously silent and motionless. Edward had not even seen him when they first arrived, only acknowledging his presence when he helped restrain Emmett and Jasper when Rosalie made the wrong move.
"We must continue training!" Jasper replied in earnest. He and Emmett hoisted their abandoned swords off the floor and assumed the proper stance. Rosalie grew confused as the three began to duel. She carefully stepped to Edward's side as Emmett parried a blow Marcus sent his way, earning a rare smile from the ancient. She tapped him on the shoulder and he bent his ear down to her, even though he did not need to.
"What good will swords do against the Volturi if we must fight? I thought nothing could kill your kind except for another vampire? Or werewolf if I remember correctly?" she was puzzled and Edward opened his mouth to reply only to find that even he did not know the answer. He knew the steel of the blades would just slide right off the marble like skin of their enemies.
"Lord Marcus?" Edward called, addressing him by his proper title. Emmett and Jasper pulled back from their attack so Marcus could speak to Edward. Carlisle and Esme, who had found a seat on a nearby bench, watched from their spot as Marcus approached Edward, sliding his sword into the hilt on his belt and resting his hand on the pommel.
"What is it Edward?" he asked.
"Rosalie and I were wondering… how is it that swords will help if this ends in battle?" Edward was immediately thankful he had lived in a period where manners and proper speech were common. He would have felt like a fool if he spoke to Marcus, one of the oldest vampires still alive, like a modern teenager. Rosalie was thankful Edward had saved her the embarrassment of asking Marcus the question herself.
Marcus, surprisingly, chuckled at Edward's question, "Dear boy these are no regular swords. Aro liked to experiment. With vampires. The blades of these swords are made with the skin of the vampires on which he conducted his tests on, those that perished." he drew his sword and held it out to Edward for a closer examination.
Edward stared at the shiny surface of the blade and was almost disgusted to find that the hue of it matched the color of his own arm. "And it works? Can it actually kill a vampire?" asked Rosalie, wonder laced through her voice as she regarded the weapon with caution; if it could cut through diamonds she shuddered at what it could do to her.
"Precisely its purpose my dear." Marcus answered with a smile that reminded her of her own grandfather; the only relative of hers that did not completely annoy her. "Just ask Jasper over there how he nearly lost an arm!" Jasper raised his right arm and a long raised scar stood out against his otherwise flawless skin. Rosalie gaped at the wound, astonished that he had been harmed.
"We'll all need one then," said Edward, looking towards a cabinet where swords identical to Marcus's awaited in neat rows, "I anticipate a fight. Even if I have to start it myself."
Bella could feel her strength being restored to her thanks to the deer she had consumed and once she had returned to a semi-normal state, she noticed the painfully dark purple-almost like clouds in thunderstorm- shadows underneath Alice's eyes. "You must hunt Alice!" said Bella in earnest, hating that her dear friend was so obviously ravenous for blood.
"I know but I'm scared." the girl admitted sheepishly, staring intently at her torn nails that had soil encrusted deep behind the keratin. Bella placed her hand on Alice's arm, right above the crease in her elbow, and told her to look her in the eyes. She did so grudgingly, looking without blinking into the mismatched colors; one a warm butterscotch and the other teal.
"I will not have you weakened." Bella said to Alice slightly shaking her arm as she spoke, "I need you by my side this whole way. If you are distracted, more than necessary you might get hurt. Will it help if I come with you?" she asked and Alice nodded after considering Bella's offer. "Alright," she smiled warmly and stood from the floor bringing Alice up with her, grasping both of her hands in her own, "We must leave now. The moon is high and the sky is clear, perfect."
Night had crept up on them stealthily, Alice realized; she had not even realized that the sky was dark when she and Bella left the shack to locate a herd of deer that she could feed upon. Once they found a large collection of their prey Bella quietly relayed directions that would give Alice maximum results and minimum mess.
As soon as she was given the signal, Alice streaked towards the herd like a black and white bullet and quickly had three deer dead on the ground and the rest of the brown animals sprinting for cover. She fell on her kills and drained them, biting into the main and biggest vein, gulping down the warm liquid unique in its own way but rather familiar, like something that she had eaten as a child but had forgotten in her years of maturing. Although she was positive she had never drank deer blood ever before as a human.
"Well done." Alice had not sensed Bella's approach and realized that a mistake like that gain could one day cost her life if she ever came across a hostile vampire. "Not too messy except for that." she pointed to a smear of red on Alice's shirt with a delicate giggle that she covered daintily with a hand. Alice scowled but decided it would take practice in order to feed without spilling, like a baby.
They walked slowly through the long grass in a peaceful silence that lasted until Alice spoke, "Bella?" she hummed her acknowledgement, "Do we have to go back? To the Volturi's castle?" Bella did not answer her immediately; she just kept walking and stared out into the night, taking long deep breaths of the sweet, warm air through her nose.
Alice almost asked again but finally Bella responded her voice wistful and whispery; it was how she imagined the trees would sound if they could breathe. "We must. I have seen that they are all there." she did not need to say whom, "If we do not, they will be lost. We must fight the Volturi as well, I have seen this. I do not know the outcome however, but I do know that someone with great power will be destroyed." Alice said nothing, fearing greatly for that powerful person and prayed that it was not someone she loved.
They continued to walk and suddenly their clothes melted and white fabric tumbled to her feet, covering her toes. They were garbed in long white dresses that were one-shouldered, tied around the waist, and were loose around the bust, folding over the fine rope around the mid-section. Alice looked over to Bella in shock and found that her lips with graced with a small smile.
She said nothing to explain, only laced her fingers behind her back and tilted her head up and gazed up at the stars, which twinkled merrily, as if laughing at Alice's still amazed face. Bella looked like a Greek goddess with the dress and amazed Alice even further when thin gold vines began twisting through her hair and twisting around the crown of her head like a diadem.
"I have power Alice." Bella said unexpectedly. "Things like this bring absolutely no difficulty for me. I do not know how I got this gift since the powers we receive in this life are determined by traits we possessed as humans. I never had a knack for doing things that could have contributed to my abilities. I could not do anything when I was mortal; no special talents of any sort. I have questioned many times how I was so blessed and Marcus, the one you met at prom, has told me it must be divine intervention but not from God." she looked away from the sky to Alice.
"What about a goddess?" Alice asked, thinking back to her previous association of Bella with a powerful female deity. Bella looked thoughtful, like the idea never occurred to her. "If you were a priestess by birth your goddess would bless you some way." she went on, still walking at their leisurely pace. Bella shrugged her shoulders and did not speak.
Unexpectedly Bella halted and her eyes became glassy and her limbs locked into place by her sides, making her seem like a perfectly sculpted statue left in the middle of a field. Alice was not worried since she knew it was only Bella receiving a vision of the future; however hazy it might be. It was a few moments before her limbs unlocked and her mismatched eyes cleared and Bella sucked in a deep breath while shaking her head as if dazed.
"What did you see?" Alice murmured when Bella resumed walking, worry etched on her seraphic face; the one Alice had envied as any girl would when face to face with it. Her lips were pursed and her finely sculpted eyebrows were drawn together, bringing a slant above her wide eyes. Alice did not press the subject but her mind was running with all sorts of gruesome possibilities that could have fallen upon Jasper.
She knew it was selfish only to worry over her love but as Bella would wholly agree, living without her love would not be living at all. "I saw them in a white room with swords in their hands. Jasper and Emmett are immortal but Rosalie is not. It seems they did not want to change her for she is with child. Thank goodness or I would go to the castle this instant and tear Aro limb from limb." the pendant on Bella's neck- the one of two identical angel wings- glowed on her neck but wings did not spring from her back as Alice thought they would.
"Edward was there as well?" Alice asked, giddy that she saw Jasper as a vampire and Rosalie still carrying her precious cargo. At the mention of Edward, Bella glowed as if illuminated from the inside by the sun. figuratively of course.
"Yes," she replied, "as well as his parents, Carlisle and Esme." Alice had never met Dr. Cullen and his wife so no faces sprang to her mind when they were mentioned. She had only heard of their vast wealth and extreme kindness through the mouths of others that had met them. Alice had always been a healthy girl and rarely got hurt so she never had to visit Edward's father in the hospital and she heard Esme was a "stay at home mother".
"We will return soon." Bella added happily even though they would battle when they returned to the place Alice had barely escaped from with Bella in her arms. She doubted Bella knew what happened after Jasper, Emmett, and her woke from their change and followed a scent to a room where they smelled Bella- Alice had no clue how she knew it was her- and then busted down the door where Bella promptly fainted.
"Attack will come at dawn. After seeing them in the white room I saw the throne room with everyone including you and I and the sun was rising. We looked positively livid, Edward and I, and were shouting at our two main problems, Aro and Caius. Then the fighting started, just like that. That is what confused me" she looked grim at the mention of the fight.
"What was confusing? Didn't you hear what you were saying?" Alice asked. Bella stopped; they had just reached the crest of the hill that would lead down to the shelter they had found. She hesitated, her mouth opened but then shut and she clenched her jaw, her eyes going hard, like she was angry.
"I cannot hear sounds in my visions, very frustrating." she kicked at a tuft of grass with a bare foot, looking defeated that she could not give many answers. "It was confusing because one moment we were on the other side of the room and the next I had my hands around that stupid little Jane's neck. It was like I was watching a DVD and it was skipping." Alice did not respond, only looked at the dark sky, praying that the few hours they had left would pass slowly.
Holy smokers cough! That took WAY longer than it should have to finish! Hope you enjoyed!