Chapter 31: Stone

Edward paced a worn trail into the dirt between the dilapidated huts of the abandoned homestead. His leather boots quietly layered footprints into the drying mud. His senses filled with the little sounds of natural life inhabiting a space free from human disturbance. Yet the space still felt haunted with memory and layers of meaning he couldn't quite translate. He wondered where the original inhabitants disappeared to, leaving the space free for problematic vampire occupation-the convenient dumping ground for an unemployed mind reader.

They left no soldiers to guard him and this, more than any of the General's transmissions during their journey here, made him feel uneasy. As the changing of the guard of the celestial bodies in the sky melted through his consciousness, his idleness warred with his worries and prevented his discovery of any profitable activities.

He decided to use the time to hunt. Once he decided on a purpose, he broke out at a sprint away from the isolated homestead. The feeling of the wind sweeping past him as he ran combined with the primal dominance of instinct over thought carried him farther than he originally meant to wander. As he knelt by a lake to cleanse himself of the remnants of his meal, the beauty of the diamond stars reflected in the water captured his attention. He lay on his back in the tall grasses, his arm pillowing his head, and he stared at the pinpricks of light as they crawled across the indigo sky above him. He listened to the wind sift through the long grasses like fragrant, earthy waves in the expansive savanna.

"It's about time. You are very difficult to get ahold of," a voice said behind him. He leapt to his feet and found his sister sitting on a rock. The immaculate white dress she wore gave her an ethereal glow in the night light. She quirked her head to the side and gave him an impassive stare. "You don't check your email. You don't have a phone. You live in a country that Jasper can't figure out how to hack. And you can't seem to hear my thoughts most of the time. I've been trying to get ahold of you for weeks." Her expression morphed into a scowl.

"Hi Alice," he said.

Her heels didn't make a sound as she leapt from her perch. She threw her arms around his neck and lay her head on his silent chest.

"So, have you been camping out in the wilderness waiting for me?" he asked with a smirk.

She grinned and punched his shoulder lightly.

"Ugh! I tried but that didn't get me anywhere so I convinced Jasper we needed to spend some time away. We left the family somewhere in Lithuania and spent the last month exploring the wonders of East Africa…otherwise known as fruitlessly chasing whatever visions of you popped up. We followed a couple of false leads before you finally turned up two nights ago and so I've been waiting here since."

Visions filed her mind of him sitting in this exact location, staring at the stars….and she quickly turned her thoughts to the periodic table of the elements in Hebrew.

"What are you hiding?" he asked.

She struggled to mask images that flickered across her mind. She bit her lip and wrestled internally with what to share.

"Tell me," he said. She met his eyes with an intense, earnest gaze that spoke simultaneously of hope and fear.

"I saw you in Volterra," she finally choked out in a whisper. "You and Bella. It was the same one I had before, well, you know."

Her mind filled with her old, displaced vision. In it, two gray-cloaked lovers huddled together by a fountain in the old fortress, passionately staring into each other's eyes.

"I don't understand….how?"

Alice shrugged, masking her thoughts again.

"You should come with me," she said. "Jasper would really love to see you. I've brought him as far as Masaka. Come back with me tonight and you can return to Wakanda tomorrow or the day after."

Edward considered her proposal and finally nodded. "I need to return tomorrow," he said.

"Whatever you say," she said with a victorious grin. He grimaced as her mind filled with plots on what she needed to say to get him to stay two days instead of one.

"Stop it, Alice. It won't work."

"Oh, it will. I just need to keep trying!" she said with a grin. She pulled him up from the ground and danced around him.

"Catch me!" she said and broke into a sprint, her laughter filling the quiet night.

He easily caught her, as she knew he would.

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Alice won. She always did. The two nights shared with his brother and sister proved a much needed change of scenery and he walked back towards Wakanda feeling refreshed. Alice's contagious joy and Jasper's soft, frank empathy wore through the tension he carried like a stack of bricks on his head.

He was ready to hear news from the others now. He could engage in the current affairs and micro-dramas of the small Cullen world and garner some interest in their well-being. He found himself still feeling like a chasm separated his current life from his past. He did not want to dwell on which side of his life would prove temporary and which would prove permanent. It was not time to return home, but he still basked in the easy comfort of silent communication only really shared with Jasper and Alice.

Alice kissed his cheek as she bid him farewell. She stood on her tiptoes as her lips brushed his cheek.

Edward, it was the only way. Remember that. Her mind mentally whispered to his.

He did not like the sound of that and, though he pressed, he could not drag any further elaborations from her. She simply sent him on his way.

He found no signs of disturbance or communication at his previous outpost and so he decided to go "home". He spent the remainder of the journey internally wondering when the simple lakeside settlement he haunted the most became his sense of home…and debating if it truly deserved the title. Maybe he would be better off leaving and returning to a more solitary, nomadic existence. Even as the thought crossed his mind, he knew he couldn't manage it. He would stay in Wakanda until Bella sent him away and even then he would only go as far as Uganda or Tanzania.

He drew near the forest fringing the lake and his pace slowed. He could still hear. He noticed strains of thoughts from the surrounding villages. It was unlike Bella to leave his gift unshielded. This meant she either had yet to return home or something was wrong. Either option worried him.

He picked up his pace again. He could hear the soldier's thoughts within. The soldier's thoughts were a bit muddled, but he was clearly worrying over his wife and this caused Edward's concern to grow even more.

His eyes swept the cleared land surrounding the huts for any signs of life. In the moonlight, he found Bella sitting alone and motionless besides the lake.

"Are you ok?" he asked as he ran towards her. She jumped and turned towards him, her eyes wide. She did not respond. She pulled her legs closer into her body as if she were a turtle withdrawing into the safety of her shell. Her eyes carried fresh grief like a new wound.

"Bella, what is it? You are upset."

"Of course."

"Why?"

"Don't you know?"

"No. What should I know?" he asked, attempting to speak gently but wincing as his words stumbled on his worry and came out sounding like petulance.

"Where have you been?" she asked. He could not tell if it were a question or an accusation.

"I went hunting and Alice found me and took me to see Jasper. What did I miss?"

Bella pointed towards her hut. He followed her gaze.

"What?" he asked, confused at what he should be noticing. Nothing appeared out-of-place.

"Bucky," she whispered, her face disintegrating into a look of such heartbreak that his thoughts momentarily fled from coherency.

He blinked and glanced towards the hut again. He could still hear the soldier within and so he remained befuddled.

"He's worrying about you," he said, cocking his head towards the mental sounds only he could hear. "Should he be worried about you? What happened to you?"

"What! You can hear him?" she nearly shouted.

"Yes," he said, his answer more a question than a statement. His words kindled a flame in her eyes and she grabbed both his hands in hers.

"You can hear him! You can hear him! Oh, Edward!" she said, jumping up and pulling Edward towards her hut. She pushed back the door with a shuttering bang and forced him inside.

Clear rays of light from the moon struggled to force shadows into the dark room. Edward's eyes flicked over the usual couch and stools. A large, dark object nearly blocked out the entirety of the curtain separating the sitting area from the bed.

Bella walked towards it and gently brushed her hands across it. Her dark eyes met his, speaking a question that she kept unvoiced.

"What is this?" Edward asked. The tall, uniformly grey form stood nearly as tall as Edward. The soft light reflected off of shining metal that flashed across the front of the motionless figure. He walked towards it and his mouth fell open as he recognized the frozen metal arm held aloft as if protecting the bearer from an enemy attack.

"There was an explosion near the border," Bella said. "We went to investigate…there was fire and people were hurt. He thought he saw something and wandered off and we didn't know until later…he didn't come back…W'Kabi found him…," Bella said, sinking to the ground and leaning her head against what he could now see were the legs of what appeared to be a statue made of stone, save for the metal arm.

Edward gave a soft whistle under his breath. He put his hands onto the statue's shoulders and winced as he felt cool, lifeless stone beneath his touch.

"I'm so sorry, Bella. Is there anything that can be done?"

"We don't know. Shuri has been running tests on the statue of the man-leopard for years now and we still haven't found a way to undo what has been done to him. She can tell he has some form of consciousness still in there, but she can't figure out how to bring life back into the physical form. I can't…I don't know what to do….I could have saved him if I had been there…if we hadn't been separated…and now…"

She covered her face with her arms and melted into the ground as tearless sobs wracked her body.

"I can hear him," Edward said as he closed his eyes. "His thoughts are a bit murky-almost like trying to see an object in the bottom of a pond that is full of mud and algae. I can still sense them, but they are not as clear as they would be normally."

"Please! What is he thinking?" she said, pulling on the cuff of his sleeve.

"He's, uh, trying to figure out what happened to him and where he is. He feels like he is in a dark room that he cannot escape from. He has memories of a frozen lake and nothing after that."

"Can he hear me when I speak?" she asked.

"Ummm, it doesn't sound like it. He, uh, he feels stuck and cut off from his senses and he doesn't know what's going on. He's worried about T'Challa, Wakanda, and you."

"Oh, Bucky!" Bella said. She threw herself around the statue and trailed kisses down his metal arm. "Baby, come back to me. Please come back!"

Edward shifted awkwardly on his feet and looked away, his heart in his throat. Bella composed herself again and turned to face him again.

"Thank you. Thank you!" she said and kissed his cheek.

Edward nodded and looked at the ground again. "Of course."

ooooooooooooo

The General arrived at the homestead at dawn. Without a word, she exchanged her spear for a hoe and she walked into Bucky's garden. The sweat trickled down her dark brow as she tended the cassava and tomatoes. She would be sure to send her lastborn nephew to come tend the cattle later in the day.

The zimwi sat against his hut and watched her from a distance. She frowned at him.

"You chose a convenient time to disappear," she said, ignoring his slight greeting.

"I didn't know," he said.

"Mmmmm," she said. "Somehow I doubt that."

He scowled.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"He will be heartbroken when he wakes if he finds his garden is dead," she said, cocking her head in the direction of Bucky's home. She threw even more force into the hard ground, reveling in the feel of her strength against its impervious shell. If she could only dig more, slash more, do more, maybe she could fix this, fix something.

She sighed and exchanged the hoe for her spear again. She wiped her forehead off with the back of her hand and searched the compound again, as if maybe she could find something she'd missed the last fifty times she searched.

Bella remained unmoved. Since they carried Bucky home from the border, Okoye had not seen her change positions. She lay on a banana fiber mat, stretched out across the feet of the statue. Her eyes stared at the wall across from her and she neither spoke nor moved. To an outsider, it looked as if two statues inhabited the small space instead of one.

"Zimwi, has she spoken?" Okoye asked, though she did not bother to hide her dislike of speaking with the creature.

"A bit. When I returned, she told me what happened but she's stayed quiet since then."

"Hmmph," Okoye said. She returned to the dark, cool shade of the hut. She knelt on the floor beside Bella, placed her spear onto the floor, and joined her in her silence. Anger, grief, and fear trickled down her face in tears she did not bother to hide for the moment. She closed her eyes and stroked Bella's hair.

At dusk, Okoye heard footsteps approach. Mama W'Kabi's voice asked "hodi?" before she removed her shoes and entered.

"You are still here?" Mama W'Kabi asked.

"Yes."

"I have brought food," she said and pulled a thermos and container from a basket. She placed them at the floor besides Okoye.

"Asante, mama," she said with a forced smile. Mama W'Kabi didn't bother to feign one in return. She knelt onto the floor and arranged her long skirt around her wrinkled ankles. She clasped her hands in her lap and joined in their silence.

"You should go," Mama W'Kabi said when the last light disappeared. She lit a small lamp and blew out the match. The flickers of light fell onto the walls and motionless figures. "I .will stay tonight. Ayo will come at dawn and Shuri will come at midday. W'Kabi will need his wife and T'Challa will need his General."

Okoye nodded and rose. Outside, the air felt thick with the promise of a thunder storm. In the far distance, she could see the purple rumblings of a storm.

"Zimwi," she said in a barely audible voice. "Come."

She heard a slight rustling and saw a body leap gracefully out of a tree. He walked towards her with his hands in his pocket, his collared shirt meticulously clean, and his eyes dour and his lips pursed. He nodded his head towards her to indicate his attention belonged to her.

"Did you know this would happen?"

His eyes grew momentarily wide, his impassivity exchanged for surprise.

"Of course not! If I had known, I would have done everything in my power to prevent it."

"Mmmmmm," she replied, raising both eyebrows. "It is too convenient. You just so happen to disappear when we are attacked."

"I didn't…I had no idea," he said. "I don't even know what happened except that it led to that." He motioned towards Bucky's home again. "How did this all come about?"

She stared at him again, as if she could will a confession from him purely through the force of her eyes. She saw him shuffle in discomfort, drop his eyes to the ground, and rub the back of his neck with his right hand.

She placed both hands on her spear and exhaled.

"There was an explosion on our northeast border with the DRC, some ways outside of Bunia. While not within Wakanda, it was too close to our borders to be an accident. One of our shields caught fire along with a guard tower. However, when our forces crossed the border to investigate the attack, it proved to be a ruse to entice us outside of the safety of our shields and leaving us vulnerable for the real attack. We lost three Dora Milaje to plain clothed armed men. We lost four border guards in an additional explosion. Sergeant Barnes is the only victim of the mchawi's black magic. We suspect she intentionally sought him out in retribution for our refusal to concede to her demands."

"It's my fault. I should have gone with the Volturi when they came for me."

"Maybe you should go to them now," the General said, raising one eyebrow pointedly. She felt slightly mollified from the look of abject guilt and misery that fell across his face.

"What can be done?" Edward said.

"The King is calling a council together tomorrow and midday. He has requested your presence. If you will agree, I will send a Dora Milaje to collect you in the morning."

Edward nodded. "What can be done for Bella?" he asked.

Okoye stared at him again, trying to decipher his motivations. "If you wish to help, you will attend the meeting tomorrow. Until then, see if she will eat."

"I'll try."

"Good. That is all that can be done. We will continue to stay with her. It is not good to grieve alone."

The zimwi watched her in silence as she turned to leave. She made a note to contact Secretary Norris and gather records from the zimwi's tracking device. While he may feign innocence, she still wished to see proof.

oooooooooooooooooooooo

Edward watched the General's proud, determined figure as she walked up the hill towards the road, spear in hand. He could hear her thoughts, her doubts, her strategies, her insinuations. He couldn't help but realize how much he preferred ignorance of her dislike of him.

He climbed back into his favorite tree and leaned against the trunk, one leg dangling off the highest branch that would bear his weight. He closed his eyes and listened. He could see Bella laying on the floor through the eyes of the old woman sitting beside her. The woman cared deeply for her and she busied herself in cleaning Bella's home as Bella sat motionless on the floor.

The soldier's worry had grown to near panic as his imprisonment lingered. Edward tried to tune out his muffled screams but the raw fear exuding proved hard to ignore entirely. Edward felt raw and uncertain the best course to take.

He thought back to his visit with his sister…and nearly fell off his branch as he sat upright in a flash of momentary clarity.

Edward, it was the only way. Remember that.

Alice's parting message to him.

It couldn't be…he didn't want to think it…but he couldn't help it.

Alice knew.

ooooooooooooooo

Translations:

Zimwi: vampire

Mchawi: practitioner of black magic (i.e. in this case, sorceress)

Hodi: can I come in?