My eyes wearily fluttered open to find myself no longer in Edward's Volvo but now in a bed, still wearing the same clothes as earlier. Sitting up, I looked around panicked before realising that I was actually in the spare room at the Cullens' house, both of my suitcases sat beside each other in the corner. I leant over to the bedside table and picked up my phone, only to be met with a message from an unknown number.
I hope you had a pleasant plane journey. Enjoy your time in Forks dear. Aro.
I smiled, adding Aro's phone number to my very short list of contacts. It did seem funny to me that, despite being the leaders of the Volturi, they own mobile phones, and not only that but they text as well. I opened up the chat and hesitantly began typing.
The plane was so nice omg, thank you so so so much for letting me stay with you for the week xx
Was that suitable? Would he even know what 'OMG' means? Oh well, I guess he could figure it out eventually. Surely if they have mobile phones, they also have access to Google and the Urban Dictionary. After hovering my index finger over the screen for a few seconds, I pressed send and threw my phone onto the bed as if I was playing a game of hot potato by myself.
I lazily rolled out of bed and headed over to my original suitcase to change my clothes into at least something familiar. Once I unzipped it, I found all of my belongings exactly as they were, but the chocolate I'd brought over for Bella from the UK had melted into one giant lump of sugar. I took it out and placed it on my bed, planning on maybe placing it in the microwave and eating it melted with a spoon, and chose out a pair of jeans and a grey cropped t-shirt. Standing up to change, my phone vibrated, and I instantly dropped everything and leapt over to it.
You are welcome to stay with us at any time at all. However, would you care to explain what 'omg' means?
Well, I'd be lying if I said I didn't see that coming.
It stands for oh my god, haha
I stood up and only managed to change out of my hoodie and into my top before another message came through.
Caius is of the opinion that abbreviations are lazy and pathetic.
Again, I saw that coming.
Tell Caius that idc tbh and imma keep using text slang bc I can and you can't stop me lmao
Satisfied with how much I had confused them, this gave me time to finish getting dressed and brush my hair out to remove some of the knots left over from the past few hours. The screen of my phone flashed again, but this message was from another unknown number.
Eliana, I do not know what you think you are playing at, but it stops now. Please message formerly, these confusing abbreviations are simply rude. Caius.
Usually I'd be a little worried at this point as, while I was still in Volterra, I was always careful to stay on the kings' good side and refrain from angering them for fear of some kind of punishment, but through the phone pissing them off was just too much fun. Once I'd added him to my contacts, I quickly responded.
Look, 'idc' stands for I don't care, 'tbh' stands for to be honest, 'bc' stands for because, and 'lmao' stands for laugh my ass off, yw
'yw' stands for you're welcome
so yw
xx
Checking the time and seeing that it had just gone three, I sat down and thought about how I was going to tell the Cullens. I was so desperate to put it off, and I know that Marcus reassured me and all, but it didn't seem to help in that instance. After sitting there for a few minutes, I stood up and nervously walked along the landing with my phone in my back pocket, before Edward's cold hand grabbed my arm and pulled me into his room.
"Eliana, we need to talk"
He closed the door and sat beside me on his sofa. Funnily enough, he still had the same unreadable expression as earlier.
"What about?" I asked cautiously.
"You know what this is about: the Volturi"
It felt like my heart stopped. God, I'm stupid. Of course Edward knew, he has that whole freaky mind power telepathy thing, he must've read my thoughts earlier.
"Y-you know?" My hands were shaking as I turned around to him.
"Yes, and so does Alice" he replied. He didn't seem angry at all, which calmed me down slightly.
"Are you…" I paused, "are you angry at me?"
At that moment, Alice immediately appeared in the room and closed the door behind her, strolling over to sit on the other side of me.
"Eli, we would never be angry at you. If anything, we should congratulate you on finding your true mate, or should I say mates"
"Wait, how did you know? Is this what you were refusing to tell me a week ago?"
"I did tell you that I wasn't in the place to, but of course I knew. Otherwise, I would've left you in Forks without taking you with us"
"That's two less people I need to tell I guess" I humoured.
"So," Alice sat down on the floor in front of me excitedly with her legs crossed, her head rested on her hand, "what do you think of your mates then?"
"I mean-"
My sentence was cut off by my phone buzzing again in my pocket. I pulled it out to see another few unread messages, one from Caius.
Your attitude is really getting on my nerves now.
Oh well, he was always a little tightly strung. I accidentally let out an audible giggle, which caused Alice to move to lean over me to see my screen.
"Eli, I'd be careful if I were you. Never provoke the Volturi, even if they are your mates" she warned warily.
"Oh relax, you'll never believe me when I tell you that just yesterday I made brownies in their kitchen with Jane and Alec"
Edward and Alice both simply stared at me with a mixture of shock and bemusement. In fairness, most people did fear the twins, and for good reason; their powers are pretty damn torturous. While the two of them continued to process the fact that I was apparently friends with the monstrous guard, I read the other message which was from another unknown number.
Tesoro, Caius is close to crushing his phone in his fist. For the sake of me and Aro, please do message properly. Marcus.
Fine, I'll stop using abbreviations. For now in anyway. xx
"You are so incredibly lucky, El. To meet your true mates, in your human lifetime, is amazing" she added.
"I just…I know, after everything that happened last week, it sort of puts us and the Volturi in a weird position, and I-I don't want this to end badly"
"Eli, everything will turn out great" she assured.
"Do the others know yet?"
"No, I was tempted to tell them but we thought it would be better if you told them yourself," Edward replied, "are you going to tell them today?"
"That's the plan" I mumbled, glancing down at my hands in my lap.
Alice abruptly took my hand and led me out of the room and down the stairs, Edward following closely behind. She seemed genuinely bursting with excitement, so pretty much the complete opposite of me.
"Alice, wha-"
"No better time than the present" she called behind her, dragging me down into the front room where everyone was gathered already. Sat on the sofa, Emmett was attempting to balance a stack of pens on top of each other on his hand, Rose was watching on in bemusement, Jasper was stood on the edge of the sofa adding to the stack, and Bella was handing pens from the coffee table over to Jasper.
"Everyone, Eli has something important to announce" she squealed, causing the stack of pens, which had reached two or three feet tall, to tumble to the ground.
"That was my record!" Emmett yelled at the pens now scattered across the floor.
"What is it?" Bella turned to me, a little confused as to why this wasn't something I'd mentioned in the car.
"Um, it's probably something I should say to everyone at once, I really don't want to repeat it unnecessarily" I spoke sheepishly.
"I'll go and get Carlisle and Esme from his office" Edward offered, heading back out of the room.
"Can you at least give us a hint?" Jasper asked, now settled down beside Alice.
"Literally wait a few seconds, it's…interesting to say the least…" I trailed off.
I think the others could sense my anxiety, and they all seemed to gradually become more intrigued. Only a few seconds later, Edward reappeared with Carlisle and Esme, the whole family now gathered around me. I could feel my breathing becoming more frantic, my heartbeat accelerating.
"What is it Eli?" Carlisle looked at me sympathetically.
I took a sharp breath, all of the eyes in the room on me. "I-I-while I was in Italy, I found my…my true mates"
Alice bounced in her seat, lightly clapping her hands, and Edward smiled, while the others stared at me, their jaws dropped in shock.
"What's a 'true mate'?" Bella questioned.
"A true mate is an extremely rare phenomenon, something that can be easily compared to a 'soul mate' or a werewolf's imprint. Supposedly, every being has one, but the vast majority will never meet theirs. However, due to our immortality, there have been few cases of vampires discovering their true mates," Carlisle explained, before fixing his gaze back onto me, "are you certain?"
"I'm 100% convinced they are" I responded shyly.
"They?" Emmett asked.
"About that, what I told you is just the beginning. I-I-I…" I stumbled completely, my words refusing to spill out of my mouth. Edward placed a reassuring hand on my shoulder, and I took in another sharp breath before getting the sentence out of me as fast as possible.
"I'm mated to the Volturi" I blurted, before placing a hand over my mouth. It was the first time I had properly said it out loud to myself, and that sentence alone frightened me slightly.
"The Volturi?" Jasper's eyes practically popped out of their sockets.
"My true mates… a-are Aro, Caius, and Marcus Volturi" I explained, my chest feeling heavy.
Without me having a chance to explain anything further, Bella got to her feet, storming past Carlisle and Esme and up to Edward's room. Edward quickly patted me on the shoulder comfortingly before dashing upstairs to join her. This simply left me standing alone in the middle of the room with my arms crossed over my chest, the others still staring at me in shock. Esme was the first one to break the painful silence.
"Congratulations Eli, that is such fortunate news for you" she smiled, though her sincerity didn't come across very strongly.
"We are all very happy for you, Eli" Carlisle added, the shock still visible on his face.
I anxiously nodded my head and bit my bottom lip, before Alice wrapped her arms around my shoulders from behind me as a reassuring gesture.
"You'll be a pretty badass Volturi" Emmett grinned with an eyebrow raised, apparently the first one to get over the initial shock.
"Congratulations Eli" Jasper nodded, his eyebrows still raised.
"You're very lucky to have found your true mates so early on in your life, congrats" Rose said with a slightly dismissive tone, understandably a little uneasy considering these were the people who almost killed Edward and Bella.
"Thank you," I mumbled just as Edward came back into the room, "I think I should probably try talking to Bella"
After briefly hugging Alice, I bolted up the stairs and cautiously approached the door. So far, I'd gotten far more positive reactions from everyone than I'd ever expected, but I definitely wasn't expecting the worst reaction to come from Bella. I hesitantly tapped on the closed door and opened it, hoping I wouldn't anger her any more than I apparently already had.
"What do you want?" she snapped icily, not even turning around as she gazed out of the large window at the end of the far wall.
"Look, Bella, can we talk about this? Properly?" I took a careful step forward.
"The Volturi? Seriously?"
"…why is that an issue then?" I tilted my head.
"Eli, they wanted to kill me, and Edward, have you already forgotten?"
"I didn't choose them, Bella. I can't help any of this, any of it. You don't seem to understand, this bond, it's so much stronger than you could ever imagine" I explained, and it was. I mean, it's not exactly a common occurrence to passionately kiss the Volturi leaders after staying with them for a week.
"Not only that, but they're so much older than you, like, to the point where it's just creepy-"
"Woah-woah-woah, hold up, did you seriously call my relationship creepy? What the hell Bells? When you first started dating Edward, who can I just add is almost a hundred years older than you, did I go around calling you guys creepy? No, actually I ship your relationship so hard, you guys are honestly the cutest" I crossed my arms angrily.
"We have a one hundred year age difference, don't compare it to your ten thousand!" she snapped back.
"Firstly, it's actually three thousand, get your insults straight. Secondly, they're my true mates. What, do you want me to just break up with them? Is that what you want? Because, funnily enough, I happen to be eternally in love with them, and it cannot be helped! Besides, since when are you in a place to judge? You randomly fell head over heels for a vampire!"
"And apparently so did you, but at least Edward doesn't go around killing people and drinking human blood!"
Just before our fight had a chance to escalate, Edward and Emmett both dashed into the room after hearing us screaming in each other's faces, Edward with his arms around Bella to hold her back.
"Bella, let's go" he ushered her out of the room past me and Emmett, who had his arms around me to stop me from biting back. Bella gave me a cold and heart-breaking glare as she left, Emmett only releasing me from his hold once she had left the building.
As soon as he had finally let go of me, I ran past the others, who had gathered at the top of the stairs to see what had happened, and into the room I was staying in, slamming the door shut behind me. Warm tears I'd been holding in for the last day or two welled in my eyes, slowly running down my face and soaking my top as I leant back against the door. Not only was I currently on the other side of the world from my mates, but I'd also lost a best friend, two if you count my ex-boyfriend, and now I was stuck in Forks. I couldn't remember a time when I felt lonelier, completely isolated from everything and everyone I cared about.
As if right on cue, my phone began to buzz in my pocket, but instead of the usual notification buzz, I realised I was receiving a call from Aro. I quickly scurried over to the en suite bathroom and tried to steady my hiccupped breathing through my reflection before answering the phone.
"Hello?"
"Il mio amore, it is lovely to hear your voice again!" Aro's feather-soft voice echoed loudly.
"You too" I mumbled.
There was suddenly a loud rustling sound on the other end, accompanied by what sounded like a muffled disagreement between Aro and Caius.
"Eliana, I do not know when this attitude through your messages became acceptable, but it stops now! These abbreviations are nothing but disrespectful and cryptic!" Caius snapped.
"Yeah, sorry about that" I attempted to giggle but it came out as a sob.
"Oh, carissima, I was only teasing" he reassured, the guilt audible in his voice as he must've assumed I was crying because of him.
"No, no, no, it's not you, it's okay, it's fine, I'm fine…" I trailed off with a deep breath, all of my emotions beginning to catch up with me at once.
"Please do not lie to us, cara mia, whatever is the matter?" Aro asked, his voice echoing further due to them putting the phone on speaker.
"It's nothing, it's just…"
I never finished my sentence, but instead burst into uncontrollable tears, bawling my eyes out like a child. Every time I tried to stop, to pull myself together, it got worse, my emotions taking over every single action in my body. The three of them tried to soothe me through the phone, which did somewhat help.
"Please talk to us, il mio amore, what is wrong?" Marcus soft voice spoke.
"I-I just, I-I-it's everything, just everything, B-B-B-Bella's upset with me, and a-all of the" I hiccupped, "the C-Cullens are acting w-w-weird, and I m-miss you, a-and" I gulped back another sob, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand.
"What did the Cullens and that Bella girl do to you?" Caius growled.
"It's not their fault, I-I just got into an argument with Bella and I j-j-just want to go home" I cried, sniffling into a tissue.
"Maybe it would be best if we schedule a trip to Forks now" Aro suggested.
"I'd like to give the Cullens' pathetic human girl a piece of my mind-"
"No, no, absolutely not!" I insisted, "I just want to go back home, I don't want to stay in Forks for any longer"
"Are you certain that is what you would like?" Aro asked.
"Yes, I don't want to stay here" I sniffled, finally gaining some control over myself.
"In that case, we shall book you a ticket to England for tomorrow morning, that is, if you are absolutely certain"
"I am, I just want to be at home" I sighed, curling up onto my bed and holding the cushion I'd taken from Volterra close to me.
"Very well, we will email you the booking details and you will be home tomorrow"
"Thank you. If I could hug you all right now, I would" I managed to let out a half-hearted giggle.
"We all miss you very much, Aro and Caius have both become insufferable" Marcus remarked.
"You are quick to talk brother, you have been more distant than you have in centuries, and that says something!" Caius argued.
"You almost crushed your mobile phone, brother!"
"I fail to see how I am being roped into this" Aro added.
"Brother, you are no more innocent than Caius"
"How so?" he asked over-doing his voice of innocence.
"Tesoro, Aro has been pestering us to call you all day long, despite me insisting that you need some time to settle back" Marcus informed me.
"You were desperate to call our mate as well!" It was like I could hear Aro throwing his arms up in the air in exasperation.
This went on for some time, the sound of my laughter probably just encouraging it. I sat nestled in the pillows on the bed with the tub left over brownies in my lap, acting as Switzerland in this battle, which seemed to go off on a tangent very fast.
"How dare you accuse me of wasting space in our castle, our castle!" Aro seethed.
"Brother, thanks to you, there is now a room completely filled with houseplants. Do you truly believe that that is a suitable purpose for a room?" Caius snapped.
"Oh wait, I've seen that room as well," my muffled voice chipped in, my mouth still full of brownie, "Afton showed me, it's almost as weird as the party room"
"Eliana, who's side are you on?!" Aro sounded completely hopeless.
"The side of truth," I laughed, swallowing another mouthful, "why do you have a room full of houseplants?"
"What do you have against houseplants?"
"Nothing, but surely there are better uses for rooms than dedicated houseplant rooms"
"Thank you!" Caius sounded pleased that I agreed with him.
"Give me one better solution, just one" Aro snapped.
"Observatory, art studio, music room, fill it with insects to frighten Eliana" Marcus proposed.
"Don't even think about it" I grumbled, earning a chuckle from all three of them.
"Well then, watch your attitude through your messages then, that way we may not have to consider it as a possibility" Caius said slyly.
"What attitude?"
"The abbreviations!"
"This again…"
"Yes, this again. How can you expect others to understand your message if you refuse to type in full sentences?"
"It's not that hard, you can guess the vast majority of them!"
"Not that hard? Are you calling me stupid?!"
"What? No! Don't put words in my mouth!"
"Caius, Eliana promises to put an end to these message abbreviations, don't you?" Aro asked me calmly.
"Sure" I muttered disappointedly.
"That was not a yes, Eliana"
"Fine, yes"
"Do you see?" Aro was back to his smug self, "Simple problem-solving brother, that is all it takes"
Caius growled lowly, which caused me to chuckle. "…but I can't promise I'll never use them"
Author's note: This chapter got a little angsty haha, you're welcome. Please don't attack me for the subtle Cullen bashing, I did what I had to do. Also, oh my god why do I just absolutely love the idea of the Volturi owning mobile phones ahhh, I wish they would text me hahaha. Anyways, thanks so much for reading, please leave some feedback or whatever, stay safe, and ily!