47. Kill Her, Kill Me

There was nothing more I could do for my Bella right now. Her heart pushed my venom through her body. Whatever the outcome, it would take days for the full change, and the werewolves were not intending to wait that long.

Her eyes stared sightlessly. I carefully closed the lids and paused to watch her as I had so many times before. She almost could have been sleeping, but for her racing heart. My lips brushed against her forehead.

"You're alright. You'll be alright," I murmured before turning away. My feet might have touched three of them as I hurtled down the stairs, shouting for my siblings along the way.

Alice and Jasper had returned to the porch, which was as close to all the blood in the house as he was willing to get. In the time I had spent trying to revive Bella, Rosalie had cleaned Renesmee and fed her a bottle. My daughter was safe with my sister. She would never allow anything to happen to her or her mother, and I was more grateful than ever for the family I was blessed with.

"Deal with it later, Jacob; I need you! Rose! Stay with Bella and the baby. Protect them."

Jacob had slumped to the floor in a daze. My shouts and sudden appearance had not roused him from his stupor, but I didn't have time to cater to his grief.

"Let's go," I snapped as I hastened past him. "Sam's pack is almost here to..."

I paused midstride. At the mention of the other pack, Jacob's whirlwind thoughts came to an abrupt focus. And at their center: Renesmee. An image of a girl very like Bella - but who was definitely not - was surrounded by a kaleidoscope of color. His complete and instant connection to her shocked me with its intensity, despite having seen evidence of it in his kind before.

He had loathed my daughter as the monster who had killed Bella only moments earlier. Had even told me to throw her out the window! And now he wished to protect her? Her, not Bella!

I turned to stare at him incredulously. "You did what?"

"Edward." Jacob's voice broke, and he swallowed spasmodically while he slowly rose to his feet. I didn't move, but he held his hands up and took a step back, and for good reason. The fury I felt was evident on my blood-stained face. Jasper crouched and snarled in reaction, though as yet, he could see nothing from which he needed to defend himself.

My hands shot out, and I hurled him across the room before I could consider the consequences of attacking the mutt within feet of my newborn daughter. Jacob made a satisfying crunch as he hit the wall hard and slid to the floor, where he stayed. He'd live, for now at least, but the wall was another story. Well, it was hardly the first I'd broken. Without bothering to explain myself to Rosalie - who wasn't sure whether to be angry or not, considering it had been Jacob I'd thrown - I stormed from the house.

"Protect them!" I shouted over my shoulder.

The nerve of that dog! How did he dare? Why did he always have to lay claim to that which was mine? Renesmee belonged to me! Me and Bella!

The mutt wasn't an immediate threat to my family. I'd deal with his gall later. For now, the pack of wolves prowling through the forest demanded my attention. I didn't need to tell Jasper where the threat was anymore. Their reflective eyes shone like lanterns in the gloom which surrounded our house.

"We're outnumbered." My brother wasn't bothering to hold his breath now. The scent of human blood only served to heighten his hunting instincts, including the need to defend his prey.

"By a lot," Alice added.

It would be neither the first nor the last time I would fight to protect those I loved. Although I would have preferred to fight alongside the wolves rather than against them, I didn't hesitate say, "I won't let them hurt my family."

Black on black in the moonless night, an immense wolf stepped deliberately into a square of light cast onto the lawn by our wide windows.

...covered in her blood. Flaunting it!

...knew his claims of love were false...

...forgetting how bad they stink, ugh!

...some twisted game to break up the years...

...can't trust a vampire!

... Bella's blood... man, that's sick.

We would not attack without just cause...

...and we have one! Bella!

The volume from their growls almost hurt my ears as, together, the pack surged from the shadows.

Alice had no need of her gift to know what her mate expected of her. She evaded multiple wolves to take to the trees while he met one head-on. He grabbed it by the ruff around its neck and heaved. It went flying, and he was dodging another's bite to kick it away before the first had landed. My brother was a trained soldier, a fighter whose equal I had yet to meet, and his wife and our family were being threatened. I doubted there was a creature alive who could best him today.

When Sam had been planning his attack days earlier, it had been his intention to take me on himself, and that hadn't changed with Jacob's defection. His strategy was easy to guess: one to harry the tiny girl whose prescience was negated by the pack, three to take out the soldier, and three - including the Alpha - to take down the telepath.

While Alice evaded and Jasper engaged, I waited patiently for the big, black wolf to come to me. Loud as their growls were, they didn't entirely drown out their thoughts, and there was nothing which they could do to prevent me from seeing.

My eyes never leaving his, I braced almost automatically for Sam, but he was not the one whom I was truly watching. I looked to be an easy and unsuspecting target as far as the others were concerned. One, Paul, circled to one side of me while one of the others, Embry, went around the other way. Their plan was for the two of them to remove my arms while Sam relieved me of my head.

I didn't intend to give them that chance.

The two leapt at me without a coordinating signal I detected, but the hint of movement I caught as they crouched to spring gave me plenty of time to shoot forward. Paul and Embry collided behind me. They were shaking their heads as I bounded over Sam's back, his teeth snapping inches from my feet. There was a wolf about to pounce on my brother, and I kicked a hind leg as I landed. He let out a yelp and stumbled away, but I didn't wait to see how badly I'd injured him. Sam and his two brothers were converging on me once again.

...shake it off, Quil...

...yeah, shake it, baby!

...sniff my furry butt, Embry-o...

...you two stop playing around!

The wolf Jasper had been fighting was left to wonder where his opponent had gone when a high pitched shriek cut through the constant rumble of snarls and growls. The instant Alice's scream had reached him, Jasper launched himself at the one who had her pinned. She had a grip on the fur and loose skin around his jowls as he snapped and slobbered. His claws were sinking into the skin of one arm, and given another minute he would have torn it off, leaving him free to use his teeth, but Jasper's foot launched him into the air.

Leaves and dirt flew up around his giant paws when he landed, scrambled for purchase, and skidded to a stop. He crouched low, his lips pulled away from his teeth, and all the hairs along his hackles stood up. He snarled and snorted in defiance at Jasper, but hesitated to engage him further. Jasper used his gift to increase the wolf's fear just slightly. Fear was a dangerous emotion in excess.

The holes his claws had made in Alice's skin healed before she was upright again. Neither of my siblings wasted time on thanks. A few of the pack were limping rather than stalking, but they were far from defeated as they circled the pair.

Slightly more cautious now, Sam and the two who were helping him converged on me. One of them remembered watching us train and the strategies they'd come up with for fighting a large group of newborns. I scoffed; those tactics wouldn't work on us! The other two tried once more to jump me, but instead of attempting another rush, they attacked one after the other.

Flinging myself to the ground so Paul launched himself over me, I sprang back up in plenty of time to hit Embry's side with the flat of my hand. He let out a squeal of pain and staggered away; I'd broken a few ribs. He wasn't out of the fight completely, but he had been slowed for the moment.

Fending off the other two had given Sam the time he needed. He butted me in the chest with the crown of his huge head. A grunt escaped me from the force of his impact. As big as he was, my arms couldn't encircle him. I grappled with him, but Alice had already discovered how useless gripping them by their fur and skin was. No matter how I pulled at him, there was more slack to be taken up. My feet made gouges in the ground as I was forced backward, and a noise like shredding metal assaulted my ears when his teeth tore into my shoulder.

I let out an involuntary snarl of pain, and my grip on his fur loosened. He shook me off, flung me onto the ground, and pounced on my chest.

Like Alice had been earlier, now I was pinned under the enormous paws of a werewolf. Unlike Alice, I wasn't acting to defend myself. My shoulder was only slightly damaged, and was healing already; I could have hit and kicked had I chosen, yet I did not.

Sam's mouth was wide, his growl fierce, and his instinct to take out the vampire strong, but the Quileute wolves were not the mindless werewolves of legend. Killing a man in cold blood - no matter how justified one might believe themselves to be - was not as easy as pictures made it seem. Though I would never allow him to harm Bella, I couldn't bring myself to truly damage him. Sam and I had never been friends, but I didn't consider him my enemy.

Not anymore.

I wasn't even sure now why I once had. He had only ever fought to defend and protect those he loved, and wasn't that what I had always done?

...isn't he fighting back?

He hesitated as we stared at each other.

I refrained from smiling with relief as I waited. The sound of my father's mental voice had never been more welcome than right now. Furious that a man whom he considered a friend was attacking his son, Carlisle rammed his shoulder into Sam's, knocking the surprised wolf away from me.

I was on my feet beside my father in an instant. His hand gripped my uninjured shoulder hard, but was gone before the wolves noticed the hasty embrace.

...can hear it beating, so she must have survived the birth...

"Yes," I said curtly.

Thank God for that.

There wasn't time for much else. Our numbers had swelled from three to six with the return of my family, but the danger wasn't over. With more vampires in the fray, the wolves' instincts kicked into high gear. Their victory not quite so assured, any hesitation to attack which the youngest may have had vanished. Colin and Brady called encouragements to each other and slunk toward Alice and Esme.

Emmett held a grudge against Paul, who was equally eager to tests himself against the strongest member of my family. My big bear of a brother's reach was greater than mine, and Paul not quite as large as his leader, but still his arms didn't go all the way around the wolf's torso. That didn't stop him from spinning like a shot putter and hefting Paul toward one of the massive oaks which lined our lawn.

Paul twisted like a cat in mid-air, planted his feet against the tree he'd been thrown toward, and launched himself back at my brother. Emmett took to the trees to escape Paul's retaliation; hands were more useful for clinging to branches than a dog's paws. Emmett landed a solid blow to Paul's head when the wolf leapt up, mouth wide and ready to bite. He was flinging himself toward another tree while Paul shook his head, slightly dazed from Emmett's punch.

Sam and I may have hesitated to strike killing blows, but it was in neither man's nature to hold back. They were in the trees, so I couldn't see them directly, but when Paul's yip followed another sound of stone impacting flesh, I found myself less worried for my brother than for his opponent; Emmett could be put back together again.

I couldn't interfere as I had my own fight to occupy me. With his lieutenant leaping at my brother, the two youngest eliciting screams from the two women, and Embry and Quil fending off Jasper, Sam was left with only Jared to face both me and my father.

Gentle he may have been, but our family was under attack, and Carlisle's low growls were made all the more frightening by their very lack of volume. He and I began backing away from them.

Can you see any way to end this without harming them?

I shook my head.

Does Jasper have any ideas?

I shook my head a second time.

Why do they attack now? Do they not hear Bella's heart beating?

"They are not after her. Not yet, anyway."

The child.

"Yes."

Sam had suspected some silent communication between us, and my spoken words confirmed it. The huge, black wolf decided he would never get another chance like this to get past me. In his mind, Renesmee was the biggest threat, and it was her life he was determined to end, no matter the cost. Though I knew it to be a feint, he growled and leapt at me, instructing Jared to do the same to Carlisle.

A grey blur streaked across the lawn and aimed itself directly at Sam's heart. Leah hit her former lover in mid-leap, and the two tumbled across the grass. She was on her feet and backing toward me as she licked her nose and growled. I could only stare at her in shock. Prowling to give us warning was one thing; placing herself directly between me and her ex was not something I would ever have expected, especially after all she had said to Bella.

Seth's defense of Carlisle was less aggressive, but Jared pulled up short of attacking the lanky wolf who had bounded over to stand in front of my father. Teeth bared, head low, and ears laid flat, Seth swished his tail back and forth slowly. His brother could no longer hear Seth's words, but I could.

Stop! Stop this now! C'mon, guys, this is stupid.

Esme and Alice retreated to join us in front of the porch while Jasper protected their backs. He left four wolves dazedly shaking their heads from the confusion of emotions he was bombarding them with and a few well-aimed strikes to places which he knew were most sensitive to a natural wolf. Unable to help myself, I started snickering as I finally understood Jasper's summer-long fascination with the Nature Channel.

I locked eyes with the one nearest to me, enjoying how creepy he found my appearance. The black of my eyes was ringed with a red which matched the blood that painted my chin and throat. My clothes stuck to my skin from all the blood Bella had thrown up. They may have heard her heartbeat, but to them, it was one of many and not proof enough to counter what their eyes saw.

Head to toe, I was covered in the evidence of Bella's murder.

Branches snapped, something large creaked and then let go with an explosive blast, sending ripples of destruction through the nearby forest. Emmett landed beside me seconds before Paul staggered from the tree line. The wolf seemed perfectly fine, aside from the fact that he was listing slightly to one side as he trotted up to stand by his Alpha's right shoulder.

Emmett chuckled and pretended to crack his neck. That was awesome...

Our numbers the greater now, Leah, Seth, and my family arranged ourselves in front of the house. The addition of Leah and Seth had done more than tip the numbers in our favor; Sam could no more order Leah's death than that of her little brother.

Seemingly united, the pack growled as they slowly paced closer to us, but an argument was waging between them. My family kept glancing at me as I listened, but they followed my lead and didn't move.

...another chance like this...

...treaty was law, and they've broken it!

...laws can change...

...not like jaywalkin'; we're talkin' lives here...

Yeah, our brothers'!

...Jacob Black made his choice.

So can I!

...cannot allow it to prey in our town! On our lands!

...just make 'em leave...

...so they can kill elsewhere? Nice, man, real nice.

...seen them kill anyone?

Use your eyes, Embry! He's covered in her blood...

...thought Jake was supposed to take care of it himself...

...'member when Claire was born?

...have to do with anything...

Bella was pregnant, right?

Duh! Ain't that the freakin' point?

...is Jacob, anyway?

...births are always gross.

...you be certain she's dead?

...can you think she ain't? Lookit 'im!

"Stop!" Jacob ran onto the porch, rotating his shoulder, which had healed from the damage I'd done. "It's over."

...the creature's dead!

Yes!

Way to go Jake!

Now for its father...

Sam took a few steps in my direction, but Jacob blocked him.

"If you kill her, you kill me."

Sam lunged toward Jacob, lowered his head like a bull, and tossed him into the air.

Before Jacob landed, he had already phased. The clothes which Emmett had given him fluttered to the ground in tattered shreds as the massive wolf shook his russet fur out. Until now, seeing them together, I hadn't realized Jacob had surpassed Sam's height and girth considerably. He roared his defiance and stalked toward the smaller black wolf.

Bella is already dead!

No, Bella is not dead!

Then he has broken the treaty, the law, and Bella will have to suffer the consequences for his betrayal.

She doesn't matter anymore.

Sam's eyes widened as he looked back and forth between Jacob's, as though searching for one to provide him with a different explanation than that which was evident in his mind.

Renesmee won't hurt anyone, but if you kill her, you'll kill me, and then where will your precious laws be?

As Sam took a step back, and then another, my family looked at me in confusion.

"Jacob imprinted."

WHAT?

I winced as the word was thrown at me from a dozen different minds.

"They can't touch her," I went on as I came to understand the repercussions of Jacob's attachment to my newborn daughter. The images in the mind of every wolf there made clear what would happen if Sam were to order the attack to continue, and why he and the rest of the pack began to slowly back away. "Whoever a wolf imprints on can't be harmed. It's their most absolute law."