Author's note: Wow you guys, thanks for the reviews I've been getting these last few days - I love that so many of you "get" what this story is about, and how I'm trying to take a different road with the romance aspect than what most twilight fanfics tend to do.

Though I had no way of knowing for sure, the very air in the castle seemed changed after Nathaniel had escaped. The guards who came and went, occasionally stopped to look at me more closely – with a strange mix of curiosity and disgust. But other than that, no other new development had occurred.

That is, until three days later.

I awoke in the middle of the night with a start. I was still groggy with sleep as I sat up on the cold floor and looked around, searching for what it was that woke me up. Then I saw his familiar figure in the dark, on the other side of the bars.

Realizing who it was, I breathed out and laid down again – still watching him.

"Let me guess, you are not here to set me free are you?" I asked with a sigh. He was so still, but it was the way a predator gets ready to strike.

"I want to know how." he said slowly. It did not take a genius to understand what he was talking about. But the thing was, his threats were wearing thin.

"Why does that matter at all?" I asked instead and he shifted on his feet in the dark. It had been a long time since I had seen him nervous – or rather, unsettled.

"It matters a great deal. It factors in when they decide what to do with you." he said, not making any further explanation to who "they"were, but since Nathaniel filled me in on what I could expect from now on, it would seem that Aro's will and power over the Volturi only went so far. And I had gone too far.

"And I thought you were in charge of my fate, cruel as it is. "

His red eyes blazed in the dark, his figure very subtly shaking where he stood. His pale hands appeared through the bars, reaching out to me.

"By aiding his escape, you have jeopardized everything. I can no longer protect you. You have to decide, before it is too late. Become like us or die."

"And if I don't?"

"You defy me? You dare..."

I stood up quickly and moved up to the bars, and spit at the ground by his feet.

"I will always defy you. Haven't you learned that by now? There is nothing you can say or do that will ever make me-"

A moment's carelessness with a wild animal can cost you a finger, a drop of blood – or even a disfigured limb. And I had been careless. Before I could blink, Aro gripped my upper arms in a grip that was like a vice, and no matter how I moved I could not break free. He shook me violently, and one hand went up to clamp tightly around my throat. His hand squeezed, effectively choking me. I clawed desperately at his hand, trying in vain to get it off.

All the while he just stared at me, his eyes wild and flickering – as if he could not even see me. I was getting dizzy from the lack of oxygen. Yet he held on tight, refusing to let me go.

"I grow tired of this behavior. How can you say no to me? Why will you not have me? "he asked, his voice high and feverish, like he was speaking more to himself than to me. I began to see spots, and my hands slowed down, still covering his but no longer fighting it. How could I?

He blinked, and released me right before I felt myself losing consciousness. I collapsed to the floor and breathed like a fish on dry land, coughing several times until my breathing became regular again. He was still standing there, staring down at me. The roman empire loomed behind him, engulfed in flames. I could still see it.

"Why?" ha asked quietly. Why indeed. I shook my head at him slowly and coughed again. When I spoke, my voice was raw and tired. I didn't even look at him as I began to speak.

"Because you will never know what it is to love. You say that you love me, and yet you put me in a in here. My life is meaningless to you – if you really cared, then you would have turned me away in the first place. Let me continue on with my life without all these horrible memories of you. But no, you wanted to have me – no matter the cost, no matter the consequences. Just like before, just like always. " I said, sighing. It was quiet then for a moment.

I heard him step closer, his breathing now audible in the room – it sounded agitated and frantic. I dared to look up, and immediately wished I hadn't. He was terrifying when he wanted me, like this. It was impossible to tell by his expression whether he meant to kill me or not. An eerie sort of focus were in his eyes, as he watched me carefully as he spoke.

"You think I will let you go, after all this time? After nearly thousand years of your absence, of trying to remember the scent of your skin, the heat of your breath after it was long gone? I can remember everything else – I drink people and their thoughts like nectar and they stay with me forever. But not you – never you. I had only scraps and fragments – not even the sound of your voice or the memory of your smile. " He stopped suddenly and turned away from me, shoulders shaking and I realized that he was crying – but no tears would come. He gasped and looked back at me with the same intensity as before.

"Whenever I tried to remember you, I saw nothing, heard nothing. Hollow bones and dust. Do you know how happy I was, when I first saw you after all these years of nothing? A monster like me can rarely dream of such a miracle."

My vision was getting blurry and there was a terrible pain in my throat and chest that was not just because he tried to strangle me earlier.

"And do you know how frightened I was, how terrified when I found a charred corpse in the quarry, a married woman dead because of you? It was what I felt every day in your palace, every time I was anywhere near you. Afraid you might kill me at any moment, afraid you might hit me or ask me to torture someone for you. Your punishments, are they love too? Is that what a lover really does?"

We stared at each other then in silence for a long time. A flicker of uncertainty passed over his face, but it was gone as quickly as it had appeared. He drew back from the bars, his expression unreadable in the dark. His voice had gone back to normal, cold.

"An emperor is allowed to do so many things, because he is emperor. It does not matter if his people call him mad. All of it has purpose. Everything he does is for the good of his people. His gods watch over him. Now I am that god. "

"Then I guess I will have to denounce my faith. My word is still no, Nero. The world has learned, but you still have nothing. "

I could tell that my words had struck a chord. His eyes went wide and some unspeakable emotion flickered in his hellfire eyes. But that was it. He was once again calm, collected. Folded his hands gently in front of him and nodded.

"So be it."

By dawn the next morning, they finally came for me.

I could feel them coming, there was a new energy in the air that told me that something new was happening. Something different. The two guards from before were gone, and instead I was escorted out of my cell by two women, clad in dark robes and pale dresses underneath. They smiled coldly, led me by the arm out of the dungeon and up another floor.

I was led into a room there that seemed to be some sort of boudoir. There was a ladies dresser by one side of the room, a luxurious closet in the corner and a filled bathtub at its center. The women let me go and stepped back, standing in front of the closed door behind them.

"Bathe and make yourself presentable." one of them ordered, to which I could do nothing but happily obey. I couldn't even remember the last time I had showered, let alone took a bath. There was still caked blood on my skin and under my fingernails. My hair was a complete mess.

Not really giving a damn about modesty or being watched, I took off my clothes and got into the tub. There was some expensive looking soap next to the tub which I picked up and scrubbed myself with, the water soon turning muddy brown and then faintly red. I scrubbed until my skin was pink and raw.

While I was drying myself with a nearby towel, one of the women went over to the closet and picked out some clothes which I would wear. To my dismay, she chose a dress. And not just any dress – white embroidered silk with short flowing sleeves, with thread that looked to be made of real gold. It was the kind of dress that belonged in a church, a sacred place.

And I realized that I was being made up to play the part of the sacrifice – the lamb.

But I was no lamb.

And they did not seem to know that.