Chapter 11: Switzerland
The Island of Newfoundland wasn't Switzerland, but it was neutral. Or as neutral as we could get without being in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The location, admittedly was closer to their land, so an attack, if they were to advance with one, would be easier for them to accomplish. But we are better swimmers and have the benefit of being so close to the ocean, so it seemed fair.
We'd left in the three days that Aro had given us to prepare, and it took another two days to get to our destination. Our group was too large to travel together, so we ended up having to split up and then meet again before making our way to St. Johns.
Our contact site was in the middle of the Avalon Wilderness Reserve, two miles west of Laden Fields Pond. The meeting was to be held just after sunset. The shape shifters and their leader would meet with the guard and the Elders, with a neutral arbiter to negotiate and speak on behalf of both parties when need be.
After I went to Demitri's room and during our travel we had spent as much of every moment with one another as possible. In the last two and a half days we've done nothing but talk and gotten to know each other, I felt like I knew everything about him now, and likewise having told him everything about me that he didn't already know.
I was surprised at how easy it was to fall in to casual conversation with him. The first few hours we spent together felt like an interview, but after that it's been nothing but enjoyable. We have so much in common, I find myself wondering how I never realized any of this before. We should have been great friends after all these years, or possibly more considering everything I know now.
The most difficult part I found was explaining everything to Felix. He was speechless to say the least. I probably told him fifteen times that I wasn't crazy and that I hadn't been brainwashed or abducted by aliens. He's still having a hard time with it, giving me 'the look' every once in a while, but he's been getting better. I've included him in some of our conversations so that he would know for himself that I wasn't 'on anything', as if that was even possible.
We traveled on foot from St. Johns to Laden Fields Pond, loosely in formation. Demitri had taken up walking beside me after about thirty minutes of us being in the forest.
"Hey." I said to him once he reached my side, giving him a bright smile.
"Hey yourself."
"Are you picking up anything yet?" I asked.
"Yeah, Aro's friend is there, but I don't know about the shifters, having never met them I have nothing to track."
"How much farther?"
"A hundred miles or so, about an hour if we keep up this pace." He smiled at me again. "So, I was thinking..."
"Whoa! don't hurt yourself man." Felix cut in our conversation. He was walking with Afton, Chelsea Alec and myself, his position is to cover me if it's needed for defense once we reach the meeting site.
I chuckled at the jab, I couldn't help myself, but Demitri just rolled his eyes and kept on talking as if Felix has said nothing at all.
"...When we get ready to head back and if everything goes smoothly, maybe you and I could travel back together." He looked over at me with a hopeful expression.
"We're already going to be traveling back together Demitri, you're gonna have to be more specific." This time it was Chelsea including herself in our talk.
"Bella." He said to me, ignoring the group again.
"If it gets me away from these fools." I poked my thumb in their direction to indicate I was talking to all of them. "Then yes, I think that would be nice."
"Good." He smiled and nodded to me before taking my hand in his for a quick squeeze. He then returned to the front of the group to lead us the rest of the way.
After Demitri left, Felix 'snuck' up behind me and mocked me with air kisses in my ear, he didn't move away quick enough so I was able to elbow him in the side. "Knock it off you jerk." I said through a quiet laugh.
About forty-five minutes later we were close enough to the region that I signaled Demitri I would be raising my shield, he slowed our pace and put us in a tight formation.
I'm not very tall, but I doubt I would have been able to see much even if I had been, there we're anywhere from thirty to forty guard members forming a full circle around me, all I was really able to see were different shades of cloaks and hair.
I knew that we had reached them when the worst burning stench I had ever smelt sliced through my nose and assaulted my senses. Nothing and no one -human, vampire or animal had ever smelt so bad, I guessed it had to be the shape shifters.
I didn't know how many of them there would be, but by the smell I figured there numbers had to have closely matched our own. Once we stopped moving and the stench was at its strongest, I opted to quit breathing until we were through. It was really awful.
Aro, Marcus and Caius along with their immediate guards and the extras that had been assigned to them began to move forward to address the others.
"Carlisle, my dear friend, it's so good to see you again." He enthused, I had never heard the name before and by his address I guessed that this was the 'old friend' that had negotiated getting us here today.
"Aro." The man said "It's good to see you again as well, thank you for coming today."
"Of course! We want nothing more than this matter to be resolved." he continued "Are these our new friends? These wolves that appear before us?" He asked.
"Yes." Carlisle answered him. "They will be staying in wolf form for the duration of our meeting."
"And how are we to communicate with them?" Caius interjected.
"My son, Edward will translate." Carlisle informed Caius, pleasantly ignoring his short statement. "He has the ability to read thoughts, and will very easily be able to interpret."
"Edward, I feel as though we are old friends! I've heard so much about you. Aro chimed with excitement at Carlisle's introduction of his son. I thought it strange for a fleeting moment at Carlisle introducing Edward as his son, our kind generally don't apply family terms to their coven members, but then of course, I call Aro father when in private, so I quickly dismissed the idea.
"Aro, it's a pleasure." The voice that sounded like velvet which belonged to Edward said. As he spoke, his words were polite, but there was an edge to them, he didn't sound pleased to meet him at all.
"These must be the rest of your family?" Aro continued on in his friendly acknowledgment.
"Yes, this is my wife Esme, and Alice and Jasper." He answered him. "Rosalie and Emmett were unable to make the trip."
"It's such a pleasure. When this matter is resolved we would love for you to visit! All of you are more than welcome anytime." Aro professed.
There was a short pause before he began again.
"Now, Edward, would you be so kind as to introduce us to our guests?"
There was a thudding movement; paws as they passed over bracken ground, before anyone spoke.
"This is Sam Uley." Edward said introducing the leader of the shape shifters. "He is the leader who will be speaking on behalf of the packs."
After the introductions, Aro proceeded with first asking how they came to a decision to attack our race. Aro was not one for indirectness, especially when it involved something as essential as a threat against our people.
The leader explained that he was informed by a member of his pack of a plot in which we planned to take over the world. They believe and have appointed themselves as protectors of the human race and were convinced they were protecting them from us and world domination.
If the situation hadn't been so serious, if would have been laughable. Aro explained that the idea had never crossed our minds, and that in fact The Volturi had themselves protected the humans from such tyranny not so long ago.
"Our world depends on the secrecy and concealment from the humans. We have never, nor do we plan to expose ourselves in such a vulnerable way." He told them at one point.
The conversation continued with the shape shifters questioning Aro about reports and information that they had received that contradicted his statements of falsity. And after a very thorough account on Sam's side, Aro answered each accusation with more compelling evidence to support our claim of obscurity than those that had originally been posed.
The exchange progressed with back and forth accusations, questions, answers, reports and accounts for nearly two more hours. I had gotten bored and frustrated after the first thirty minutes of debate and couldn't fathom why it was still continuing, and by the impatient shifting of everyone around me, I figured they all had felt the same.
As much as I wish I could have though, I couldn't allow my mind to wonder. For one; I had a job to do, I was still shielding the whole of us, and couldn't for a moment allow myself to be caught off guard. For two; I was entranced by the translator; Edward. His voice was the weirdest mixture of comfort and familiarity that I had ever heard, but also an unexplained sadness I felt at the sound. I was intrigued by the voice and the emotions that accompanied it.
I could tell by the frequent pauses from both sides and the increase of silent conferences with Aro and the leaders that the session was coming to a close. At this point, nothing but a solid vow on both sides had been agreed on as far as a treaty. It was decided that since we would not be taking over the world to rule the human race, they had no need to engage us in a full-on war, and as long as that remained the case, the treaty would stay in effect.
The leaders were agreeing on this point when a loud feral snarl ripped through the silent weald, soon followed by the strangest sound I had ever heard; the ripple of flesh and fur as it contracted and reformed was absolutely bazaar. I didn't have time enough to really examine the sound or long enough time to wish to see if for myself because as soon as the pulsation happened it was followed by a death curdling scream that seethed of pain, horror and anger.
"NOOOO!" the newest reverberation wailed. "You can't do this! We should be killing these leeches not negotiating with them!"
"Jacob!" The translator snarled. "What are you doing!"
"You." the new voice bristled. "You did this! This is your fault!"
The turn of events had stiffened the guard, we were all now on alert at the change and commotion.
"Jacob." Carlisle said. "This isn't the time."
"It's the perfect time bloodsucker! We should have killed you a long time ago, instead of this!"
The same quivering sound followed a moment later; another wolf transforming into human form.
"Jacob, I told you to stand down!" The deep authoritative voice bellowed.
"No." Jacob's voice commanded.
The whole of us were intrigued by what was happening, letting the curiosity get the best of us, some of the guard remembers began to shift around and stand up straighter on their toes to try and get a better look.
"Gentlemen" Aro spoke up. "I believe that this is the point at which we will part and leave you. Having concluded our business here with you, and seeing as how this has nothing to do with us..."
"This has everything to do with you vampires!" Jacob cut off Aro before he could finish speaking. "You killed her! That's the ONLY reason we're here!" he roared.
"What..." The question that fell out of the translator's mouth was barely audible, laced and torn with tragic despair. "No. Your lying, that's not true." he continued with such anguish my heart ached for him. The sound of pain in his voice tore through me like a knife, my reaction to his sorrow was puzzling, but I wanted to run to him, comfort him in some way.
"She's dead because of what you did to her you filthy bloodsucker." He seethed to Edward. "And you killed her!"
Aro laughed loudly at the accusation "My dear boy, I am clueless as to who you speak of. I can assure you that I have never killed one of your kind before, believe me, I would have remembered."
"She wasn't a wolf, she was human! She went to you and you killed her!" Jacob continued.
"Alice?" Edward breathed.
"I don't know, I don't know anything! I haven't seen anything in ten years Edward, I don't know!" A tinkling voice pleaded.
"Jacob! Starting a war with them now after all of this won't bring her back!" The unidentified voice spoke again.
"I don't care." He responded deadpan.
"ENOUGH!" Caius interjected. "What is the meaning of this!"
"Jacob here believes that you killed a friend of ours." Carlisle answered him calmly.
"Don't speak for me and don't you ever speak of her, she meant NOTHING to you!"
"Jacob, you don't know what you're talking about." Carlisle continued to say to him, never once raising his voice or betraying any kind of emotion with his words. "Why do you believe that the Volturi killed her."
"She's dead."
"How do you know that?" The question was asked again.
"She would have never left me without another word if she weren't. She wouldn't have abandoned her friends or family; the people she loved. She's dead. There's no other explanation." There was accusation in the words as he finally answered the question. "And the letter. A letter was delivered with her things after five years of her being gone. It was on auto ship. She said she was going to them, and has never been heard from again." he finished saying. "She's dead."
"No." Edward hissed.
"Son, calm down."
"NO!" He barked. "Jasper! Don't!" he said before turning on Aro, just as the wolf Jacob had "Did you kill her?!"
"Edward, I am sorry, but I'm still unsure as to who the both of you are speaking of."
"BELLA!" He shouted at Aro. "Did you kill her!?"
Bella? I jolted.
"Oh my!" He laughed out loud again. "Is that what this is all about? The human girl who came to us so many years ago!" he continued to howl.
"Demitri." He said impassively then finished saying "Carlisle, Sam. Please tell me that we are not here under false guise of war, when really are here over a girl?"
While Aro was speaking with the leader of the shape shifts and Carlisle, Demitri had made his way back to me. He didn't say anything, instead just held out his hand in the direction of Aro, indicating that I should follow.
"Aro, this is all news to me, as it is to you." Carlisle assured Aro.
"No matter." Aro swiped his hand in the air upon my approach. "This could have been resolved long ago, without all the theatrics had we known what you were after to begin with." He said looking at the four that were standing the closest to him.
"My dear." He turned to me, raising his hands to brush against my checks before lowering my hood and saying "Will you please assure these people that you are not dead."
(1/21/11)