TODAY'S QUOTE:

With great power comes great electricity bills.

"Are you sure you're alright now?" Dad asked again.

"Yes. Dr Cullen bandaged me, and I'm okay to go to school and stuff as long as I don't take it off."

"It's true," Bella piped up from the kitchen.

"Good." Dad was quiet for a moment, and I rolled my eyes. I knew he wanted to say something. "So… What happened with Newton?"

There it was.

"He tried to ask me out, I said no, he threw a tantrum, I ignored it, he put his hand on my shoulder, and I flipped him around."

I could see the cop and the father in him were battling it out. "That's it?"

"Yes."

"No arson? No death-threats?"

"Not this time."

He was quiet again. "Okay. I believe you."

I was surprised. I was sure with my track record, he'd instantly assume I was in the wrong. That and he probably knew Newton better than he knew me.

"So, Morgana," Bella started, bringing out cooked salmon with salad and placing it on the table. "Angela, Jessica, Lauren and I are going dress shopping this weekend for the dance. Wanna come?"

"You're going to the dance?" Dad asked, a frown on his face. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Oh I'm not, but Morgana is."

He looked at me with a hurt expression, and I shrugged.

"I don't even know if I'll go anymore. I was planning to crash with the Cullens, but we had a, um, falling out."

I mean, what actually happened is I figured they were vampires, and I didn't need any of that shit in my life, but same thing.

"But will you come with us?" Bella asked again.

"Lauren and Jessica?"

"And Angela. And me, if that counts for something."

I pursued my lips. I hated Jessica and lauren - they were the exact definition of bitchy gossipers, but Angela was nice. And I did want to connect with Bella…

"Okay," I said finally. Bella squealed.

"I didn't know you liked shopping, Bells," Dad said.

"Oh I don't. But I am excited to go out."

I woke, for the second time since arriving in Forks, to the bright yellow light of a sunny day. I almost skipped to the window, stunned to see that there was hardly a cloud in the sky, and those there were just fleecy little white puffs that couldn't possibly be carrying any rain.

I opened the window, and sucked in the relatively dry air. It was nearly warm and hardly windy at all. My blood was electric in my veins.

Taking advantage of the cool yet sunny day, I dressed in a dress, a rare occurrence for me. It was tight around my chest, and flared out at the hips, little metal studs dotted along the seams. I had on my boots, (which were a little tight on my injured foot, but bearable), and a little belt. I was looking almost… preppy? Ew.

Dad was finishing breakfast when I came downstairs, and he picked up on my mood immediately. "Nice day out," he commented.

"Yes," I agreed with a small grin. He smiled back, his brown eyes crinkling around the edges. When Dad smiled, it was easier to see why he and my mother had jumped too quickly into an early marriage.

Most of the young romantic he'd been in those days had faded before I'd known him, as the curly brown hair — the same color, if not the same texture, as mine — had dwindled, slowly revealing more and more of the shiny skin of his forehead. But when he smiled I could see a little of the man who had run away with Renée when she was just three years older than I was now.

I ate breakfast cheerily, watching the dust moats stirring in the sunlight that streamed in the back window. Dad called out a goodbye, and I heard the cruiser pull away from the house. I hesitated on my way out the door, hand on my leather jacket. I wondered if it was too warm for it, but figured it'd at least be good on my bike with the harsh winds.

I was one of the first ones to school; I hadn't even checked the clock in my hurry to get outside, Bella having already left and me thinking it was much later than it was. I parked and headed toward the seldom-used picnic benches on the south side of the cafeteria.

The benches were still a little damp, so I sat on my jacket, glad to have a use for it. My homework was undone, but I really didn't care. I decided to put on my music, and started drawing absentmindedly.

I sketched inattentively along the margins of my textbook. After a few minutes, I suddenly realized I'd drawn five pairs of dark eyes staring out of the page at me. I scrubbed them out with the eraser.

"Morgana!" I heard someone call, and it sounded like Angela. I looked around to realize that the school had become populated while I'd been sitting there. Everyone was in t-shirts, some even in shorts though it was forecasted to grow colder today.

Angela was coming toward me in shorts and a striped shirt, waving.

I waved back, unable to be half hearted on a morning like this. She came to sit by me, her ebony streaks on hair singing in the light, her grin stretching across her face. She was so delighted to see me, I couldn't help but feel amused.

"Are you okay? You just disappeared yesterday after, well, - I was really worried!" she said, taking my gloved hands in hers and holding them tightly.

"That's… sweet," I said, inwardly rolling my eyes. But I couldn't be mad at Angela's worry and concern.

"I never noticed before — you always wear gloves," she commented, looking confused. She pulled them off before I could stop her, and I saw her breath catch when she saw my palms. "Morgana… what happened?"

My palms had little scorch marks, and scars from burns. The middle of my hand was worse, and looked like it had fresh burns. None of it hurt, but it wasn't pretty. Whenever I used fire (fire, not heat) the skin the fire came through singed, even if it didn't actually affect my health.

I decided she could handle the truth, well, some of it, and if she couldn't then I didn't want to be friends with her.

"I have a lot of issues, so I was sent to some… special schools. Institutions, actually. I have a thing with fire," I laughed morbidly. "I burnt a lot of them down."

She looked a little horrified, and she scooted back on the seet. "To be fair," I added. "They were more like really illegal asylums pretending to be schools."

"I don't know if that makes it better or worse, actually," she said. She gave me a soft smile, which I returned. "I'm, I'm sorry that happened."

"Me too."

The bell rang, and we went to class. I wasn't glad that she now knew, but I was glad she didn't hate me.

In Spanish, Jessica drove me crazy. She moved seats and came to sit right next to me, ignoring my books that were scattered across that desk. She was excited I was coming dress shopping, and that I was going to the dance. She didn't seem to understand that my eye rolling, harsh glares and snarky comments meant I didn't want to talk to her.

When we went to English, she found Bella and hounded her with questions till class finally ended, five minutes late, and we were on our way to lunch.

I sat at our at my table, patiently waiting for the others to arrive, listening to music on my phone. And then it hit me. They weren't here. I hadn't seen their flashy cars in the parking lot, I hadn't seen Alice in English, and Rosalie hadn't once talked to me about her newest car. They weren't here.

I felt ill, suddenly, the realisation of their absence hitting me hard. It was a sunny day. Emmett hadn't mentioned any family plans, and Jasper didn't appear at all sick yesterday. And again, it was a sunny day.

I already knew they were vampires, the news shouldn't surprise me, but it did, because some part of me still wanted to pretend I was just a silly little girl trying to play make-believe with the goblins and the faeries.

The rest of my day passed in daze. I went to drama, barely participated, making my teacher ask if I was okay, and then I went to PE, where Bella accidentally smacked a volleyball into Mike's face. I got a detention ten minutes later for hitting him where the sun don't shine, laughing and then admitting I did it on purpose.

Bella had fish marinating for dinner, with a salad and bread left over from the night before, so there was nothing to do there. I spent a focused half hour on sleeping, but then I was through with that, too energetic to fall asleep. I went for a run, going to my clearing and then back, took a shower, dyed my hair a dark aqua when I realised the blue was fading out, checked my email, and read a book.

It was sunny again in the morning. I awakened with renewed hope that I grimly tried to suppress. I dressed for the warmer weather in a mini skirt with a tight crop top — something I'd worn in the middle of Summer in England. I had planned my arrival at school so that I barely had time to make it to class. I parked and hurried to English, arriving breathless, but subdued, before the final bell. It was the same as yesterday — I just couldn't keep little sprouts of hope from budding in my mind, only to have them squashed painfully as I searched the lunchroom in vain and sat at my empty table.

The Port Angeles scheme was on tonight and made all the more attractive by the fact that Lauren had other obligations, according to Angela. I was anxious to get out of town so I could get it over with. That said, I was going to try to stop myself from ruining Angela's enjoyment in the dress hunting. Maybe I could do a little clothes shopping as well. I should get more gloves, and my boots were wearing out. I refused to think that I might be shopping alone in Seattle this weekend, no longer interested in the earlier arrangement. Surely he wouldn't cancel without at least telling me.

After school, Jessica followed me and Bella home in her old white Mercury so that she could ditch her books and truck, and my bike.

I pulled my hair up into a bun quickly when I was inside, feeling a lift of excitement as I contemplated getting out of Forks. I switched my scruffy wallet from my pocket to a messenger bag I rarely used, and ran out to join Jessica. We went to Angela's house next, and she was waiting for us. My excitement increased exponentially as we actually drove out of the town limits.

Jessica drove faster than Dad, so we made it to Port Angeles by four. It had been a while since I'd had a girls' night out, and the estrogen rush was invigorating, though last time I had girls night we went to a club and got hella drunk. We listened to whiny pop songs while Jessica jabbered on about the boys she hung out with. Jessica's dinner with Mike had gone very well, and she was hoping that by Saturday night they would have progressed to the first kiss stage. I rolled my eyes and tried to sut out her high-pitched voice.

Angela was passively happy to be going to the dance, but not really interested in Eric. Jessica tried to get her to confess who her type was, but Bella interrupted with a question about dresses after a bit, to spare her. Angela threw a grateful glance her way.

Port Angeles was a beautiful little tourist trap, much more polished and quaint than Forks. But Jessica and Angela knew it well, so they didn't plan to waste time on the picturesque boardwalk by the bay. Jessica drove straight to the one big department store in town, which was a few streets in from the bay area's visitor friendly face. The dance was billed as semi formal, and we weren't exactly sure what that meant. Both Jessica and Angela seemed surprised and almost disbelieving when Bella told them I'd never been to a dance in Phoenix.

"Didn't you ever go with a boyfriend or something?" Jessica asked dubiously as we walked through the front doors of the store.

"Really," she tried to convince her, not wanting to confess her dancing problems. "I've never had a boyfriend or anything close. I didn't go out much."

"Why not?" Jessica demanded.

"No one asked me," I answered honestly. She looked skeptical.

"People ask you out here," she reminded me, "and you tell them no."

We were in the juniors' section now, scanning the racks for dress-up clothes.

"Well, except for Tyler," Angela amended quietly.

"Excuse me?" Bella gasped. "What did you say?"

"Tyler told everyone he's taking you to prom," I said blandly, running my fingers along a nice little black dress with ruffled sleeves and blue highlights.

"He said what?" Bella sounded like she was choking.

"I told you it wasn't true," Angela murmured to Jessica. Bella was silent, still lost in shock that was quickly turning to irritation.

"That's why Lauren doesn't like you," Jessica giggled while the girls pawed through the clothes. I decided on the dress and started looking for my size.

"Do you think that if I ran him over with my truck he would stop feeling guilty about the accident? That he might give up on making amends and call it even?"

"Maybe," Jessica snickered. '"If that's why he's doing this."

The dress selection wasn't large, but both of them found a few things to try on. Bella sat on a low chair just inside the dressing room, by the three-way mirror, trying to control her fuming.

Jessica was torn between two — one a long, strapless, basic black number, the other a knee-length electric blue with spaghetti straps. Bella encouraged her to go with the blue; why not play up the eyes? Angela chose a pale pink dress that draped around her tall frame nicely and brought out honey tints in her light brown hair.

Bella complimented them both generously and helped by returning the rejects to their racks. I tried out mine, unabashedly tossing off my shirt and jeans with no thought, making Jessica sneer and Angela blush. It fit perfectly, and all three complimented me.

We headed over to shoes and accessories. While they tried things on, Bella merely watched and critiqued, not in the mood to shop for herself. I picked out a few pairs of gloves, and Angela passed me long, silk fingerless ones that I could wear on the dance night. I gladly took them, though I was worried about the fingerless part.

"Angela?" Bella began, hesitant, while Angela was trying on a pair of pink strappy heels — she was overjoyed to have a date tall enough that she could wear high heels at all. Jessica had drifted to the jewelry counter and we were alone.

"Yes?" She held her leg out, twisting her ankle to get a better view of the shoe.

"I like those."

"I think I'll get them — though they'll never match anything but the one dress," she mused.

"Oh, go ahead — they're on sale," Bella encouraged. Angela smiled, putting the lid back on a box that contained more practical-looking off-white shoes. Bella tried again.

"Um, Angela…" She looked up curiously. "Is it normal for the… Cullens" — Bella kept her eyes on the shoes — "to be out of school a lot?" She failed miserably in her attempt to sound nonchalant. I was annoyed yet pleased that she was maybe figuring it out.

"Yes, when the weather is good they go backpacking all the time — even the doctor. They're all real outdoorsy," she told Bella quietly, examining her shoes, too. She didn't ask one question, let alone the hundreds that Jessica would have unleashed. I was beginning to really like Angela, and so was Bella.

"Oh."

Bella let the subject drop as Jessica returned to show us the rhinestone jewelry she'd found to match her silver shoes. We planned to go to dinner at a little Italian restaurant on the boardwalk, but the dress shopping hadn't taken as long as we'd expected. Jessica and Angela were going to take their clothes back to the car and then walk down to the bay.

Bella told them she would meet them at the restaurant in an hour — she wanted to look for a bookstore. I decided I'd go with her. They were both willing to come with us, but we encouraged them to go have fun — they didn't know how preoccupied Bella could get when surrounded by books; it was something she preferred to do alone. And I wanted to have a look for elemental books.

They walked off to the car chattering happily, and we headed in the direction Jessica pointed out. Bella had no trouble finding the bookstore, but it wasn't what she was looking for.

The windows were full of crystals, dream-catchers, and books about spiritual healing.

"I'm going to go look for a different shop," Bella said. I frowned. This actually looked pretty good for what I wanted.

"I'm gonna stay," I said. "This looks pretty cool."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Okay," she said, giving me an awkward half hug and then running off to keep looking.

The door jingled when I walked in, and an old witchy type lady looked up from the counter. She had lots of beaded necklaces, and an old shawl, and her hair was cut just below her ankles, with little clips and ties tangled in it.

"Umm, hi," I said lamley. "I was helping you could maybe direct me to some elemen-"

She backed up, and pointed her bony finger at me. "You have the stench of the undead," she whispered, horrified, in a raspy voice. "It's like a poison, cutting off your life sources and leaving you blind to all important!"

"Right…" Clearly this woman was crazy, only she had mentioned 'undead', which was a word for vampires. "Can I have soem books on elements, please?"

I gave a sweet smile, but she didn't relax her frigid position. "You smell of fires and smoke and ashes and the undead."

"See," I said, smiling again as though nothing was wrong. "You have to help me get rid of the fire and ashes."

"No!" she shrieked. A glass ball popped with the high pitched sound, and I held my hand up to my ear where blood trickled down. "It is a blessing in a curse! A curse inside a blessing!"

"Okay…"

"It cannot be removed! It is a gift from all the gods! The gods have blessed you with a curse!"

"Okay," I said, backing up and trying to escape subtly. Unfortunately, the bell betrayed me by jingling again.

"No! You can't leave! You must wait for a sign! You are needed!"

"Well that seems pretty important, so I'm just gonna…" I nodded my head at the door, fully intent on running, but with amazing reflexes for such an old lady, she literally jumped over the counter, knocking books as she went, and snapped her hand around my wrist.

"You must wait for a sign."

'But I-"

"You must wait for a sign."

"Morgana!" Bella screamed from outside the shop. "Morgana help!"

'Ma'am, I really have to-"

She released my wrist immediately, and started picking up her books, muttering something about stars and the planets.

"Morgana!"

"Coming!" I yelled, calmly stepping outside. Bella was known to react dramatically, and if it was something bad, it'd be better to be calm than panicked.

"Oh thank god," Bella breathed, stopping in front of me and bending over to catch her breath. "We have to go. Now."

"Wait, Bella, I don't under-"

"Now, Morgana!"

A group of four men turned around the corner of the street, dressed too casually to be heading home from the office, but they were too grimy to be tourists. As they approached me, I realized they weren't too many years older than I was. They were whispering loudly among themsleves, and when they saw Bella, they started laughing drunkenly.

"There she is," one of the older men said, nearly falling over in is excitement.

"Bella, what happened?"

"Followed me," she wheased, a tear running down her face.

'C'mon baby, it's only a bit of fun," another laughed.

"Oi, fuck off!" I shouted, putting myself in front of Bella who was clearly frightened beyond belief.

"Ooh, she's got a bit of fire, doesn't she boys?"

"I like 'em fiery," laughed the older one.

"I'm warning you now, stay back, and nobody gets hurt," I said, slowly pulling off my gloves.

"Ooh, we're so scared!" jeered one of the younger ones, who was quite fit and looked like he wasn't as drunk as the others.

"You should be."

"Morgana, let's just run," Bella said, whispering into my ear.

"Isabella, listen to me." I twisted her head sharply so she was looking me in the eyes. "In a few seconds, it's going to get hot. Very hot. You need to run as fast as you can and get to the restaurant. I'll meet you there."

"No, please tell me you aren't going to-"

"Set them on fire and kill them?"

"I was going to say be reckless, but now I'm even more worried." She bit her lip, and I fought against the urge to smack her face.

"Go, Isabella."

She took a long look at me, and the at the men that were quickly approaching, stumbling and calling out rude remarks. She knew I could take care of myself though, so she listened to me and fled.

"I'm going to give you one more chance," I said in an emotionless voice, holding up my hands. "Fuck off, or I'll kill you."

The men just laughed. I waited until they were closer, before I pushed one hand on the leaders cheek and made my hand burn as fiery hot as I could.

"You bitch!" he roared, and I felt like it was deja-vu.

I used that fist to punch him in the stomach, burning through his shirt and scorching his chest.

I focused on directing my fire from my hands up and across, making it like a swirling ribbon of flames, whipping against each of the four, burning them beyond belief. I hadn't felt this much control over my power in ages, and it felt good.

"Morgana!" a velvety voice said, cutting through the haze of power. "Morgana, sweetheart, you have to stop."

Cool hands enclosed my own, and the person hissed when the heat touched their skin. They didn't release my hands though, so I elbowed them in the gut, although their skin was like hard diamond.

"Don't," I said, when the person tried to pull me away from the fight. I could make out through the smoke four figures lying on the ground, each one either groaning with pain or dead.

"Sweetheart, you need to stop."

I did stop then, though it wasn't of my own choice. My heart was thumping loudly, and I felt my hands shake. I was dizzy, and colours seemed to swirl together. The mysterious angel picked me up bridal style and held me close, and I barely had a moment to make out their face before I blacked out.

Who wants to take a wild guess at who the stranger was?

Thank you so much for the support, both with my exams/updating schedule, and just in the general direction this story has taken.

Again, do you want her to become a super cool vampire, or stay a super cool human?

Hands up, who thought this was a decent take on this chapter? I like it, but I'm not sure if it makes much sense on it's own... You'll just have to wait for the next update to find out what happened to Bella and Morgana.