Chapter 27

Edward's POV:

It was like paradise passed through my lips. It was sex, violence, joy, romance, laughter, desire, arousal…everything you could name that made you want to stay alive…it was in her.

Like thick liquid heat it danced over my tongue and seeped into the microscopic ridges of my teeth…everything it touched seemed to glow and arise as if it were just born…it went down my throat and became a part of me…like no blood ever had before. It made me stronger, made me ecstatic…it made me whole. It was glorious and life changing. With this blood, a constant supply of it…I could be better than I ever had before. Maybe even perhaps, I could conquer the dark thing that lived inside of me. Could I really be free of it ? And even if I could, how would that feel ? He had been my soul mate for most of my existence…to be without it would be strange.

I could hear high pitched voices singing inside me as it filled my veins and drenched every cell within me. I never wanted to drink any other blood again. It would taste like piss water after this.

I laid back and let the euphoria consume me. It was unparalleled, this very victorious high I was experiencing. I felt as if I just crushed an army in a war all on my own.

I recall thanking my Mistress for giving me this unattainable gift, one I didn't deserve. I was too dizzy and high to even SEE Bella right now, let alone SPEAK to her. I would, in a moment, once I got a handle on my mind. Right now, it was shooting up into the cosmos like a rocket, leaving earth…leaving everything behind.

And then it began.

It was smart blood. Intelligent enough to let me taste it…and be fucking perfect in its flavor and following high that I wouldn't spit it right out at first taste. No. It waited until it was all deep inside of me and pumping through my ancient veins…THEN it began its purpose.

It started slowly…gently…like the kiss of a woman. Sweet and warm at first blush. Then, as I took my first breath with the nectar inside of me…it took hold. The rose wilted instantly and the thorns sharply came forth, cutting…stabbing me from the inside out. Every vein and cell that had been delirious a moment ago was now bleeding and being pierced by the tiny daggers. I could hear myself screaming and knew that Bella was there with me, hearing it too. She would be terrified at this unexpected turn of events but I couldn't even register that at the time. I was being murdered by a faceless thing within me.

The pain intensified and kept changing. Seconds later, I felt a burning inside me that felt like lava was melting my veins, my organs…my flesh. I could FEEL my face melting off my skull and was sure Bella was seeing that too. I don't know if I voiced it but I just wanted her to go home and leave me behind. I didn't want her remembering me this way.

She would take the blame, as it is her blood. For a split second, as I thought my teeth were turning into ash, I almost blamed her too. Love is what will destroy me. Those words kept ringing through my ears as I howled and internally begged for a second death. Let me go through the change from human to vampire again, I'll take that. I would even do my time in Hell, it had to be better than this fucking agony. But one thing held me back from going…Bella.

I didn't want her to feel as if this was her doing. I knew it wasn't. And if I died now, she would certainly be lost. How long would it be before she would take her own life ? I promised her I would help her do that if she still wanted it. Peacefully, quietly…with my hand holding hers. I could not let her go alone. I promised to protect her. I would honor that promise, even as a corpse.

The pain shifted again and gave me a new sensation now. The skin being torn from my body. Is this all internal or can Bella see it happening ? I wasn't sure but whenever I could focus on my surroundings, she was right there, crying…screaming right along with me. I hate that I'm doing this to her. She should be hanging out with her little friends, and Tank, preparing for school tomorrow. But no, she's here with me, watching me slap around like a fish out of water.

Then there was a fun little element to this nightmare I was sealed in – I got a little five minute break in between each bout of torture. It wasn't painless…I was freezing and then burning…and then numb…and then paralyzed…and then weaker than a newborn baby. And then a sensation that felt like a prickly tongue licking inside every little fiber of my muscles and bones. And then, just as I had situated myself to that particular state, the pain would begin again…a new one this time. It was an added terror – knowing and waiting for the next chapter of this nasty little book.

It was so quick that I hardly had time at all to talk to Bella during these little pauses. I was trying to recoil from what just occurred…and then prepare for what was to come…I couldn't have made much sense to her and I'm still not sure what I said to her in those moments.

My body felt wet and icy…then burning hot. Once I thought I had found release…I was drowning in a very deep, murky substance…and I couldn't breathe or talk or scream…and I was letting it pull me deeper…deeper…deeper into Hell. I swallowed and swallowed, letting it drown me…if it would end this…letting it take me down deeper into the vast ocean of ghosts and the damned. I would be just a speck in its monstrous web, nothing at all. I looked forward to that.

But then a bolt of lightning stabbed through the black waters and reminded me that my punishment was not even half over yet. I burned inside, again…and was not in my quiet river anymore. I was back in the hands of the thing that kept playing with me.

I could see all the faces of the women and men that I've hurt in my lifetime. Like half flashes they passed through me, hardly giving me time to register on any ONE of them. But they were all there….and seemed to relish in my too late payment for my crimes.

I understood that...I've hurt many people for much longer and for a lot less of a reason…I didn't argue the fact that I deserved it…I truly do.

It felt like years had passed and it was still toying with me, not even slightly bored with me yet.

But the whole time I did not hear the voice I always heard inside me every day. It was strangely absent, leaving me to deal with our deeds. It didn't surprise me. He was a fucking coward and I knew that long ago. He would, of course, leave me to face this alone. Prick.

My mind was so numb that I had forgotten Bella, almost forgotten what humans were and why I wanted to play with them so much. I can now remember seeing and hearing her, and that was something to hold onto…a reminder that I had something…someone to go back for. I couldn't die. She can't die.

I can recall opening my eyes and seeing her, or feeling her, wrapped around me. I didn't know who she was but I knew she was good. She was my angel, battling for my undead life. She looked so sad and tender that I thought she would never beat the feeling that had me in chains, whipping me mercilessly.

Then I would feel it pulling me back into its clutches again…wanting more. I wanted to stay in Bella's arms…not go down there again. I felt like Miss Fagan fighting with all my might not to return down into the hole again.

I would scream and kick, fighting it…clutching at Bella's arms and hands…giving it my best fight…but knowing all the time I would not win. It was too fucking strong, too fucking evil…even for ME. It seemed to enjoy my pain, I just felt that as I sobbed and begged for it to end.

Finally, I became too weak to even fight it anymore. I gave in to it. I invited it to kill me and get it over with already. But it kept fucking with me, now slowly…gradually…and that's I think the most frightening part of it. The hope that it was over…the silence…but I grew weaker and weaker by the second…I was dying but not dead yet…the in between was chilling. It was taking centuries. It was letting me think about it before it made its move. Letting me remember…consider…what I'd done in my 265 years. And it was Hell to watch it all unfold again. It was like reliving it over, helpless to change anything, or stop anything. Seeing it from the side of my victims this time, feeling every second of what they felt.

My birth mother was there, of course, the first demon I ever knew. I got the fun of reseeing my childhood, feeling it all as if I were back in that little boy's poor body. Then I saw James, the one who took my human life and made me into this fucking thing.

I wept as I relived the night he came back to the whorehouse to kill me. But first he tied me up and made me watch as he killed every one of the girls in the house, leaving Esme for last. I begged him for their lives but he just liked seeing and hearing that. I screamed and tried to struggle myself free all over again…but I didn't save them. He cut her throat right in front of me as I screamed and cried…she fell down on the floor right beside my face as I fell too, raging and sobbing as her blood soaked the rug I had purchased a week before…and it seeped underneath my face as I watched her eyes become glass…empty of life as she stared at me. I promised to protect her too…all of them…and I failed at that also.

James dragging me out of the house was no problem for him, he was a vampire. He burned the house down as I watched, captured in my ropes. Then he stood over me, his palm on the hilt of the dagger…and he let me think about it before he began to plunge the knife into me, over and over again…my face taking many of the stabs. He always told me he didn't like my face, it was too pretty. I hate that word.

I remember Bella said it to me once in my car, as a compliment, but I still loathed hearing it. By the time I bled to death, I didn't have a face anymore. Even eyes.

He could've let me die right then. But he didn't. That would be too peaceful and easy. His plan always was to make me into what he had become. He knew that was the everlasting curse that I could never escape. He drank all the blood I had left inside me…and then he bit his own wrist and fed me his blood until it's all I had in me. The pain I felt then…was less than what I was feeling now. A paper cut.

I had never felt a pain like it any time else. Is this James' blood somehow, in my veins now ? Is Bella with James ? No that can't be. Why would he come back to hurt me again ? And Bella would never…would she ?

She did fall in love with me pretty fast. No…no…that's not possible. She's not a part of this. Even my mind is turning into mush, even considering that of her.

I had never seen James again after that. He just left me there, a newborn vampire, easily busting the ropes that had been so tight only hours before. I could've gone and tried to save the girls I loved in the house, but he had set it on fire for a reason. I would not be able to change them, as I probably would have, just to save them in SOME way. They were ashes now.

There was no way for me to even ATTEMPT to save them, turn them. They were dust and I was afraid to go near the fire. That was my first sight as a vampire…my first smells…the frame of the house collapsing in flames, the flesh of my loved ones burning. No screams. Only the silence that meant death.

For a moment, I WANTED to walk into that tower of flames. I should have. Only one thing stopped me.

I had to walk away and find blood…any blood. Now. I didn't care about innocent or guilty anymore. It was just living and dead now. I don't even remember who I fed on first…or how many, if they were women or children or men…all I know is that I fed heavily those first few years. I didn't even LIVE as one of them. I just fed and laid in the forest, like a hollow log until I was thirsty again. I wanted to cry and mourn Esme and my girls...I had loved them all. They were lovers but also family. And they died because of me. Because I was weak.

I had tried to find James in my 265 years but never did. I thought maybe he died or was killed by another immortal somewhere. But I still keep my ears and eyes open…hoping I'll get another chance to meet him again. It's the one dream I had in my heart…until Bella.

Just as I began to feel my fingers loosening from the edge I was digging into, about to let go and fall into what was mine to face…just as I took my last gasp of breath…I could hear Bella saying "Don't you fucking move."

I liked the way it sounded. Like steel. I froze, not daring to disobey her. Then I could smell 313. A very cute African American girl I encountered over the summer break. She was doing summer school for failing gym in her last school. She wasn't a bad athlete, she just hated gym and never dressed for it. She does now.

In seconds, I felt her blood coming after the blood that was slowly killing me. It began to pull me out of my hole…not as flavorful as Bella's blood…but still it had life and strength…it began to color the black and white in me and repair a bit of the damage Bella's blood had done.

Then it was taken away…and I felt like I had been trapped underneath rubble for twenty years…only to see a beam of light…and then it was dark again. I screamed out and called…begging for more…begging to stay alive.

Please come back. Please don't leave me here ! I'm still alive !

And then it did. 146…one of my angels, Jade Martin. One of the few who withstands me no matter what I do. She's obedient and she's not afraid of me. She doesn't love me, but she likes me. She really enjoys the sex. And she's great at ice hockey.

I could smell her and hear her…I could read her mind. She felt sorry for me, laying there like a dead person. FUCK I LOOK dead ! I could see myself in her thoughts and wanted to wretch. I looked like I'd been dead for a week already !

She wasn't all heartbroken but she wanted to help me. I never had to hurt this one much, she was so up for any sex game I wanted to play. She liked the way my mouth closed and opened around her jugular vein, she thought it felt like being kissed, which I hardly did with her.

Then she was gone too. Someone is taking them away from me. Something is out there, trying to steal my rescuers from me. Is Bella safe ? Where'd she go ? I'll kill anyone who touches her, dead or not.

Next I caught the scent of the twins. Oh, the twins! I haven't seen them in months and months. I almost forgot about them. Two delicate Asian girls with 4.0 averages, sweet, submissive, love to please…and they don't mind at all playing with me together. Asia and Anika Lei. I almost wept with joy to see them. They smiled at me and let me feed from them next…one smiling at me while the other bled for me. I was finally able to move a little now…my arms coming back to life…the mixtures of the girls' blood were forming into a very good elixir for what ailed me. It was working. I was digging myself out of the murk I had been trapped in. I just needed a little more…and then there was 276, Ivy Greene. An expert baseball player and smart too. She wanted to be a journalist. She was afraid of me. But she endured me. She just prayed I wouldn't call on her often until she got out of this school. I didn't bother her much.

As I drank from her, everything seemed to stabilize inside me now. The horrible silence was gone…I could hear Ivy's heartbeat as I drank from her. She was praying for it to be over. Now. A couple more swallows, dear, and it will be. Things were waking up inside me again…my strength was flowing back through me once more…I could smell clearer…I could smell Bella again…closeby. I was relieved about that. I felt my hands cradling poor Natalie's face as she braced herself, closing her eyes, hiding, like always. I released her and she thanked God. She always thanked God.

I was so glad to be free that I felt myself leaping and flipping a couple of times, just to make sure I could. I looked at my hands and felt the power surging through them again. It was over. I had survived somehow. I was free.

Then images came hurling at me from the girls who came to help me. Bella calling them here, on my behalf, even threatening them if they didn't come. Bella pulling them in, one by one, forcing them to lay with me so I could drink their blood. Bella throwing them against the wall in case I needed them again.

My Bella. Forsaking five human lives and going against her own kind to help me. She didn't care about their lives at all, if it meant my salvation she would take them if necessary. I never felt closer to her than in that moment. Could she be as deadly a creature as I was, deep down ? I knew she had killed once before but that was in the heat of the moment, a girl who taunted her about her dead mother. I never held that against her. In fact, I was trying to bring her to a place where she could let it go and move on. But it seemed she had already done that on her own. I respected that, a 17 year old, having that strength. And here it was again. It seems there's nothing she wouldn't do for me. There was definitely another personality in there that was being held back, restrained. I wanted her to come out. I had seen a glimpse of that person when Bella was really hurting and when she was drunk…but I decided I wanted that girl in addition to my sweet Bella. I wanted all of her, not just half. I would find a way to release that other woman so she was free too. It would be very interesting to see them combined and Bella being ALL of herself, unashamed.

This would be my new project, in addition to finding out what was wrong with her blood. Well, not WRONG…but, blood that didn't like ME. It was correct to hate me, to protect her from me…but it was strange that it was able to do that. No blood I ever tasted or heard of had a mind of its own like that, and it's own powers to disable anything that would threaten Bella. Amazing.

I've heard lots of stories about poisoned blood. Then there was protected blood. Charlie would come during the Thanksgiving break, all the parents were invited. I would learn more from him then. Could Charlie know or be related to someone who could've said some words over Bella as a baby or a child that protected her blood from someone like me ? Perhaps. Poisoned blood - I didn't really believe it in this case. That Bella would poison her own blood to lure me into a trap and kill me was ridiculous. She stayed and cared for me the whole time I was being ass fucked by her blood, it made no sense.

Even if someone else had poisoned her blood, why would they ? Who knew I was a vampire other than the other girls here ? And they wouldn't dare.

Alice.

For hours I thought this over. A defiant little bitch, she fights me in every encounter. She finally does submit, but she does not hide her distaste for it…or me. She would certainly attempt it, if she had the chance and knowledge to do it. And she eats with Bella every single night. She hangs out with her in her room, has complete access to her bathroom.

And I was the one who put that little elf into Bella's life.

I would certainly be checking in with Miss Hale VERY soon.

I told myself to be careful. Bella considered her a best friend, her only friend here. I would have to be a certain judge in this case. And if she IS guilty…what then ? Bella would not stand by and let me destroy her little friend. I really hoped I was wrong here. But I would investigate this thoroughly.

Then James flashed across my mind. I would have to draw a picture of the fucker and maybe ask her if she'd ever met or seen him before. The last time I saw him was 265 years ago, I'm sure his look has changed since then. Shit.

It was a long shot but that made the most sense. Could James really be around here ? I haven't heard his mind or smelled his scent. He would be clever enough to hide that.

Why would he want to come back across my path again ? After all this time ? Maybe he wants to die. Well, come in, James. I'll accommodate you. He wouldn't need Bella to get me.

There are others who would want to kill me. But they're mostly humans and most of them are already dead.

Being a vampire, once I was healed, I went right back to my life, as if it never happened. I would remember the pain and torture, but I was already past it as Bella kept crying and shaking. I was patient with her, knowing how hard it must have been for her, in the dark, not knowing how to help me. If I were the one there watching her writhe and scream in pain, I'd be insane with horror too. I didn't laugh or hold it against her that she was still very shaken. I understood.

And then she began to panic about a new reality. Her blood hurts me. Had almost destroyed me. She was sorry as if it was her fault and I hated that. Then she revealed that she knew my attraction to her was all about her divine smelling blood and without that I would drop her like a bad habit.

It angered me because it was true. In the beginning, yes. I just wanted her blood and nothing else. I would take her body, too, of course, but the rest I didn't care much for. But that was before I knew her. Before I felt the pull she always had when I was close to her…before I owned her. I love being her Master and I would never toss her aside because of this. I hated to admit it, but I was also her prisoner. Gladly.

I meant what I said – I would give her a transfusion and replace all her blood with new if I had to. I would mourn losing that very intoxicating drink but I would not lose Bella. I was amazed that Bella meant more to me than her blood. It was something new for me.

I imagined myself being the thing I was before I met Bella. And if I knew then that her blood was painful to me, I would've turned a cold shoulder to her, telling her that she was no longer my slave and that she wasn't who I thought she would be. I would break her in half if I had to, to make her leave me alone. I'd tell her she was boring to me and sexually inept. I would even tell her to go back to Forks where she belonged.

But just thinking about it made my insides ache. In a whole new way other than her blood had brought me to my knees. I could pretend to be stern and strict and even mock her athletic skills but that was all in fun. I wanted this girl and I wanted her long term. That has not changed. I wanted her blood, too, free of the spell it was under. I knew I could find the way to untaint it. I would certainly give it my best effort. It pissed me off a bit to think Bella thought so little of me that when encountering a small challenge, I would throw my hands up and walk away. Was I not the one trying to teach her volleyball every single day ? I may fail but it will only be after I've tried a thousand different things first.

If I fail, and her blood cannot be changed, then I will have to consider Plan B. If I give her a transfusion, her blood will be ordinary. I will play with her and drink her blood but I will no longer require her long term. I can let her go on to college and she will be released from my service. She could have a life.

Maybe that's for the best. It would certainly be better for her. But it made me feel empty. That vision of her life here with me really seemed to delight me, the more I thought of it. Now it seemed to be slipping away, changing.

I was glad to comfort Bella and she stopped worrying, at least that's what she told me, when I took her home after it was all over. I took another sample of her blood to see if anything had changed since September. Maybe there was something going on in the school that affected her. It was worth a shot.

I looked forward to reading Charlie's mind at the end of the month. I was sure I would learn something there. Maybe that's how soon it would be over. I hoped so. I really didn't want to have to convince Bella every other day that everything would be alright. I really didn't know that for sure and I didn't want to tell her lies.

I began to read once I got home. There were books I had that were centuries old. I read about the rituals that would lift a protection spell from a human. Most of them involved a human sacrifice. Bella would not be alright with that. Would she ? Another way was to kill or destroy the person who placed the spell on her. Hmm. Doable. Once I find out who it is. Fuck. I hate witches. I had seen some over the decades now and then, most of them felt it was their duty to stop me and take me down. They failed of course, but they were irritating. Always with the spells, always trying to outsmart me. They think their magic is everything. They don't face you to fight. They intice you, they trap you…they whisper words and hide while you suffer in their voodoo curse.

It's partly because of them that I don't mix with most humans anymore. You just never know who you can trust. When I found this school, I knew it was the perfect lair. Only students and some adults are here, and always I know who's coming in and going out. It's like my own world, in a way.

I discovered the place in the worst way – after I fed on a woman and she was laying there, in a coma, because I didn't care how much blood I drained from her. I saw paperwork on her table about an all girls school, private and isolated. For troubled young girls. I sat at her table and used her laptop to look it up and send my very prestigious resume to them. The woman was the mother of a girl who was attending there. I had just put a stop to her life as she knew it…and now I was about to go work in the school where her daughter was. I didn't even blink as I left the twitching body behind.

Even worse, I did get to know that daughter of hers and she was one of the first "trainees" I accepted. I'm a sick fuck.

Her mother's death made her into a very sad little girl and I grew tired of her in weeks. I moved on to number 2, number 3, number 4…it was a cycle that repeated over and over again for decades. Whenever any human teachers or faculty grew suspicious of me, I'd either compel them to leave, moving on to another school, or I'd just compel them to forget what they knew about me. It was easy to control them.

I've been here since 1981 and every person on staff here were still under the impression that I only arrived her a few years ago, right out of college. I could be here forever and no one would suspect a thing. I kept them in the dark so easily. All except for Dr. Carlisle, who never liked me and was always trying to figure me out.

Dr. Carlisle. Another suspect in this little mystery. The more I thought of it, the more eager he was every day to speak to Bella, to reach Bella…more than the others. Why ? He would certainly have access to needles, drugs. He could even try to hypnotize Bella…but I would've seen that as soon as it happened.

I definitely have some questioning to do.

Other rituals to lift protection spells included cutting and mixing her blood with the blood of an animal. Creepy.

I really hoped I would not have to go this route with the kooky rituals but if all else failed it was a last resort. Science would be a better alternative, medicine. I preferred that way. I put the old books away and went to my medical journals.

I will find it. If I have to look under every fucking pebble on this planet and ten others, I will find it.

At about 2:13 am I peeked into Tank's mind and saw Bella in bed, asleep. Tank was laying around the back of her neck on the pillow as she slept very soundly. I was glad. She had not gotten sleep or food the whole time I was sick. I had made sure she got something to eat and I was glad no nightmares were keeping her awake. YET.

Goodnight, sweet Bella. I will never forget how caring and strong you were for me today. I will never again doubt your love for me after this. You have proven it. I just hope I can give you something in return.

END OF CHAPTER 27