Chapter 3

The Others

Veronique is Veronica now. The flapper long gone, she appears to all the world as an art school drop out, the embroidery of her cheap jeans unraveling, the faded ironic tourist shirt from Seacrest, the braids in her hair. But under the sparkling new lingo is the same Machiavellian mind, the same spider mind sitting at the center of the great web she has spun, touching the threads, feeling the world out, waiting, knowing. I have seen Veronique lay her traps, I have seen her feed.

Veronica sits crossed legged next to Willow, their eyes fixed on the computer screen. They don't know it, but their eyes scan in synchronicity, their brows twitch at the same information. Both do not like what they see.

I kind of hoped when they started problem solving together that a romance would bloom, after all, they were both equally twisted. I knew how Willow confused Buffy, how she would flirt. Rosenberg was insidious, oozing her way into our life, into the cracks, widening them. She and Veronica deserve each other.

But to my disappointment there was no sparks I could see, bar the friction of intellectual sparring. Willow, with all her sensuality and sugary words remained a thorn in my relationship with Buffy.

You want to talk about it? Edward says in my mind.

I said no. Don't be a butt head today Deadwood, I am not remotely in the mood.

They are reading about the New Orleans Coven.

The news is not good, I take it?

They were wiped out. All but for Jessica.

I thought Penelope would outlive us all. Damn. Who is Jessica? Have we met?

Fledgeling. Barely a year. She will be here soon enough. You really should talk to someone Alice, Esme could talk to Buf-

Edward, enough. Just leave it alone.

Willow looked up at me with a frown. I swear sometimes she can hear us. She draws in a breath to speak.

"So… New Orleans is like…"

"I know." I say, perhaps a little too sharply.

"Well, of course you do." Willow slips back defensively into that sickly, sarcastic drawl. I want to claw her smug face off and stomp on it. She grins, her orange-y, near golden eyes glinting mischievously and says "but do you know where Buffy is, right now? Who she is with?"

I spin on my heels and storm out.

Willow regrets saying that, she is embarrassed now. Edward thinks.

Yeah, well, I am sick of her emotional backflips too. I am going hunting. I want to kill something. A lot.

I didn't. I just walked. I needed to be away from them all. Edward, Willow and The broken remains of The Volturi Guard who now haunted my home. And I confess, Rosalie and Emmett. Because looking at them tore at my heart. I knew they would die soon, and how. And I could not bare to tell them.

I thought of Penelope of the New Orleans coven, morose and melancholic, alone, even in company. When I sheltered in her court during the second world war, I pitied her. But I understood her now. So she was dust, and perhaps I would soon be too.

"Alice?"

I turned to see Emily Young, the fledgling Makah girl, lying stretched out along a fallen tree trunk, her pale bronze flesh glowing against the dark moss. She wore denim shorts and a torn old grey t-shirt stained and flecked with fresh blood.

"Sorry, it is Alice, right? I suck at names, and there are just so many new faces to learn." She said, drawing herself up to her hands.

I nodded, and seeing no reason to wander away, sat down on a mossy rock across from her.

"You're, like, Buffy's girl, right?" She said, her vocal fry resonating in strange way to my ear. I realized then what her accent was. Forks born yes, but infused with Valley girl. Emily had spent time in California.

"How is hunting going?" I said, avoiding the question. I knew Buffy and Esme where at La Push. That she was going to visit her. The wolf girl who imprinted on her. I wasn't invited, and that burnt like the Ward of Saint Dymphna.

"Hunting? Oh. Easy as pie. It's not new to me. Besides, I have had, like, a whole lifetime of preparation for this."

"Ah yes. The crow." I said.

"You don't believe me either?" She said.

"Actually I totally get it. I am gifted too. I have visions of the future."

"Sucks, doesn't it?" She said with a chuckle. She stretches her limbs up gracefully, popping the joints with satisfaction. "That gothy one does too, doesn't she?"

"Drusilla." I said. I hadn't seen the woman in question for a while. She moved silently through the house, appearing suddenly and vanishing as you looked away. It wasn't teleportation, it was like she danced on the edge of your awareness.

"I wondered… and, like, totally say I am out of line here if I am… but she is like stone cold crazy, right?"

"Well, as you say, she is just like us. Only she can't separate visions from reality. To some that looks like madness. Right?"

"But you have your head screwed on right. I am not going to end up like her, am I?"

"Do you see any of us having a future to be mad in?" I said, and for that instant I felt like I was Pandora speaking.

Emily shrugged. "Hey, I just talk to spirits in my visions, Ally." She said. "I am the psychic equivalent of doctor Doolittle."

"Ally?"

"Not cool? I mean, you can call me Em, I don't mind."

"Okay, sure Em." I said. She smiled broadly, and nodded. "Can I ask, do you think an alliance between the wolfpack and Immortals is possible?"

"Possible? Yes. Easy?" She shrugs. "I love Sam, but he is stubborn as a log and quick to anger. And now there are more wolves than he can handle? It's probably good that Jacob broke off to form a second pack, but keeping those two from each other's throats? Gonna be work."

"And we are about to throw even more immortals into that powderkeg."

"Hey, I am not sure what it's worth, but I gave my life to make this happen. Like, literally. So if you need someone who believes, I'm your girl."

"Thank you." I said. Emily tilted her head to catch my gaze.

"You don't see how this is going to end, do you?"

"Not yet. My gifts rely on decisions. Right now too many decisions that affect the outcome are happening. I don't know who is coming to fight with us. I don't know where Diana is- she has a Slayer with her, so I cannot see past that."

"Then, not much you can do til it all settles." Emily said, picking at her bloody shirt. "Say, I saw a pool back down the way with this rad waterfall. How about a swim? They say, clean the body, clean the mind, right?"

"I… I'm not sure, I…"

"Come on Ally, let's enjoy the calm before the storm."

If I could tell you anything about Emily Young, it is this. Her smile can carry you off in strange directions.