Part 5: What Must Shall Be
Our group suddenly seemed small since the departure of our two other Amazon friends. It seemed that although they were quite…unique, Senna and Zafrina had become a comfort to me in the last few weeks, their protection and guidance reassuring. When I awoke to find them gone that next day I realized just how much I was going to miss their presence.
"How long was I asleep?" I asked upon noticing Nahuel in the main house. His body curved over a large piece of wood, his fingers delicately carving groves here and there.
"Most of the day. You were tired." Nahuel said with a pleasant smile.
"Why is it that we sleep like humans? I am the only one in my family that actually needs a bed." I couldn't help but laugh to myself.
"I believe in that part of us the humanness wins." His wink brought a large smile to my face, but I didn't know why.
"Where is Huilen?" I asked. Her presence seemed quite to my ears as I listened to the sounds around me.
"She is gathering the necessary food for tonight's meal." He said with a smile as he worked tediously over his project.
"So Huilen cooks?"
"Yes, for me and for our guests. I think she quite enjoys the art of it, it reminds her of her old life."
"Well, I am grateful for it, I know Jacob will be. I don't think we can take anymore mangos or granola bars." I sat down in the empty chair across from him.
"You do not hunt?" He asked inquisitively.
"Back home I do, sometimes, as a child I found it quite exhilarating."
"And now?" His dark eyes caught mine.
"I don't know, I guess I seem to be more content with the not-killing side of my pallet these days."
"I understand. As a newborn I thirsted for human blood, I didn't know there was another way. Huilen and I fed whenever we grew hungry. We did not kill for sport we simply ate to survive. As I grew older, as I learned more about my parentage, I decided to leave that life behind."
"When was that?"
"A few years before I met you." He said with a smile. "Huilen has taken a few decades to come accustom to the lifestyle I wish for us."
"So what are you working on?" I asked changing the subject. The talk of blood made me feel it, making me suddenly want it. My eyes gazed down upon the large structure in front of us, hoping that focusing on it might take away the need.
"A new table for the main living area. The old one is in need of replacing."
"What do the markings mean?" I asked as I pointed towards the etchings along the legs and around the rim.
"They are the native language of my aunt and mother's tribe. Huilen taught me as a child. This reads, "Arise with the sun, and you too shall brighten the day."
"And this?" I leaned over and rain my hand across the marking along the side facing me.
"True love never grows old."
"That one is my favorite." Huilen spoke as she entered the doorway. Her baskets were filled to the brim with all sorts of plants and fruits, and game that I had not seen before. It seemed her trip had been successful.
"Here let me help you with that." I said as I stood to take a basket from her.
"No, you are our guest. Please sit. Dinner will be ready soon." Huilen smiled fully as she set the baskets down, sitting in the chair next to me.
"Are you sure? I don't mind." I turned to both of them hoping to somehow make myself useful. They both just nodded as if this was the way it was done and I should just let it go. "So why is that your favorite saying, Huilen?"
"My avó, grandmother used to say that to me. She always wanted me to find good man to be with the way she had." Huilen smiled, her dark eyes lightening up as she remembered. "She would grab my waist, here," Huilen pointed to the side of her stomach. "and say, no man will want you skinny." Huilen laughed. "I never wanted a man. I wanted to learn how to heal the sick, become a mid-wife. My sister, she was the one who always had the stars in her eyes." At the mention of his mother, Nauel's heartbeat sped up.
"My mother was in love with love." Nahuel turned the table as he spoke and began to work on the other side. "My father chose her for that reason."
"How do you know he didn't love her in some way?" I asked quickly but instantly regretted it. I knew it hadn't come out right. "I'm sorry, I didn't—"
"My father calls himself a scientist. He seeks to make a superior race. He believes himself to be a god!"
"Nahuel." Huilen's voice seemed to sooth his rising spirit.
"My parentage is unlike yours Renesmee. That was the first thing I noticed upon meeting your mother and father. I never knew…I never knew it could be like that."
"Do you see your father often?"
"No, he sends one of my sisters usually. In my one hundred and seventy years, I have only seen him twice. Once a few years after I reached maturity, he came looking for me. I rejected his offer to join his family. He gave me a hundred years to reconsider, but I again denied him."
"Because you think what he is doing is wrong."
"He does not love the ones he mates with, he simply uses them for his own purposes." Nahuel said severely as he flipped the table up right. "He cares for nothing but his work."
"How many more are like us out there?" I asked suddenly seeing the large check-list in my head of all the questions I wanted answered.
"You are the only one I know of outside my family. I have two new sisters and a brother since I saw you last."
"Your father has had three more children in the last sixteen years?"
"It has never increased in such a short time." Nahuel muttered to himself. "I myself have often wondered why he is creating them at a faster rate, but then again I believe he will slow down the rate, now that he has finally gotten what he always wanted."
"Which is what?" I asked as I leaned in towards him.
"A male to join him."
"For what purpose?" As I glanced over at Nahuel I could see even over his brown skin a dark shade of red. He was blushing. It took me a second to realize why. "Oh, right."
"He has yet to learn if we can reproduce." Nahuel tried to sound factual but his nervousness gave him away.
"Do you think we can?
Upon hearing my question Nahuel scratched the table forcefully with his tool causing a loud screech to fill the open room. Huilen deepened her smile upon seeing her nephew in such a state. I found a smile formed on my lips as well, it was nice to see the human side of him. He always had an air of formality about him, a stoic quietness. I couldn't help but smile at seeing him frazzled.
"It has never been explored." Nahuel stated shortly. He seemed un-willing to say anything further.
"What has never been explored?" Jacob breathed deeply, his chest rising and falling hard.
"Procreation of hybrids." Huilen mumbled as she picked up her basket and moved towards the other part of the house. It seemed she was about to prepare dinner.
The look on Jacob's face was priceless. It seemed he was half shocked, half curious as to what the verdict had been. He just ran a hand over his newly-shaven face, as if doing so would clear his thoughts. I don't know why but for that moment I wished I had my father's gift so that I could see into his mind and hear just what he was thinking.
"How was the run?" Nahuel asked turning his gaze from me back to his workmanship.
"Hot and humid. The perimeter seems quiet. I only saw monkeys and birds. A couple of great swimming spots though."
"We're safe here Jake, Nahuel said so himself." I nodded for him to join us and Jacob took a step inside the main house, finding a spot against one of the exterior walls.
"I am surprised by your method." Jake mumbled.
"My method?"
"You take your time."
"We have all the time in the world, there is no need to rush a masterpiece. Each object deserves to be created as perfectly as it can be. Don't you think?"
"I guess I understand now why this place seems so perfect." My eyes gazed over the detailed carving of the house. "It must have taken time to perfect it."
"Decades. Do you have a craft, Jacob?" Nahuel asked turning his attention from his work to hear what Jacob had to say.
"Not really, I mean unless you count hunting down bloodsuckers as a craft." Jacob chuckled to himself, but it seemed everyone in the room was silent and still for the first time in hours. "Sorry."
"Jacob is a mechanic." I quickly mentioned hoping to ease the sudden tension. "He fixes up old motorcycles and cars. He's really good at it. He taught me when I was younger."
"Renesmee never really had the right touch."
"Nope, I couldn't even change a tire properly."
"I've dabbled in a few things here and there, I guess. Carving smaller things, nothing like furniture though."
"Really, well I'll have to show you while you are here." Nahuel set the table right side up inspecting all the corners and groves to see if it fit his liking. "How is your tribe, Jacob?"
"My tribe?" Jacob looked at me with an expression that could only mean this guy was crazy. I just eyed him and nodded for him to continue. "Uh, yeah, only a few have phased in the last ten years. The original pack that phased around the time I did is now in transition."
"Transition?" Nahuel stopped what he was doing for the first time and looked up at Jacob.
"In times of peace, we can choose to stop phasing. Once we do that, we can age, grow, and eventually die." Jacob looked from Nahuel to me and I could tell his mind was somewhere else. "Some of my friends have decided to stop phasing, now they are beginning to age. Others are still phasing, but I believe in time they all will stop."
"You have the choice?"
"It's a part of the gig, I guess."
"And you said all of them will eventually choose to die?"
"I mean it's not that they want to like die or anything. I think they just figure its better that way."
"Why?"
"To live forever without being able to share it with the one you've imprinted with would be a sort of torture. I guess they have decided its better to live one long human life than years without them."
"I have never heard of such a thing, imprint?" Nahuel placed his tools down on the floor, his whole body turned towards Jacob as if enraptured with what he was saying.
I didn't have to look at him to know that Jacob was looking at me. This was a touchy subject and both of us knew it. I didn't say anything or move. I simply waited for his answer as well which gave Jacob the peace to continue.
"Imprinting is a sacred aspect of who we are, it's written into our very core. Imprinting is an in-voluntary way in which people of my…tribe…" Jacob eyed me with a smile as he repeated Nahuel's term "find their…soul-mate."
"You have no choice over who it is?" Nahuel questioned.
"It's said traditionally that the person who you imprint on is the one person who will make you stronger, better."
"What happens when someone imprints?"
"Normally, it occurs after your first phasing—"
"I never knew that." I chimed in.
"Yeah, most everyone from my phasing period imprinted between their first and second phase." Jacob shrugged his shoulders as if it was no big deal, yet I know what he wasn't saying. He was the only one who had to wait years before he imprinted. "It sort of happens when you see them for the first time, you look into their eyes and everything just changes."
"What do you mean everything changes. I do not understand."
"Imprintees can be anyone, Nahuel. A girl you never talked to who you have seen every day for ten years, your older sister's best friend, your best friend's girlfriend, a child. The possibilities are endless, so in one moment your whole world, it all changes. The world around you shifts, like gravity has pulled you to them, connected every atom in your body to that person, a million cords of steel that no one can severe. You would be anything and everything for them, a brother, a friend, a protector, a lover."
"And these humans themselves, imprintees, they themselves have that experience?"
"That's the kicker isn't it? It can't all be sunshine and daisies can it?"
I could tell that Nahuel didn't understand Jacob's sarcasm, his face looked inquisitive as if he was trying to understand the meaning behind his words. Nahuel looked at me as if I would somehow help him understand.
"No, Nahuel. Imprintees don't always feel that way." I spoke. I lifted my eyes to look at Nahuel but for some reason couldn't look at Jacob.
"No imprintee has ever fully-rejected the affections of one of my kind. I mean there have been times where they get freaked out and need time to figure things out, but eventually they come around. You see Nahuel, being adored, cherished, protected, loved is kind of hard gig for a girl to just pass up on." Jacob's tone was grating and it caused my heart to ache as the words echoed through the open rooms.
"What occurs if they are rejected?"
"Well, it's never really been seen, but hypothetically, out of their love for the one they have imprinted on they would learn to let them go. The thought of it is unimaginable though, the connection one of our kind have with the one they have imprinted on is so inter-connected that we believe eventually they would no longer be able to phase."
"What do you mean, Jake?" I asked baffled by what he was revealing.
"Phasing takes strength, Ness. The stronger you are the easier it becomes, the better, more powerful you are. Without the love and connection to the one they've imprinted on, we wouldn't be able to phase, a physical, emotional weakness would leave us paralyzed. Eventually leading us to age and pass on."
I had never realized that such a thing was possible. A part of me wanted to get up and run into the jungle, another part of me wanted Jacob to wrap his arms around me again like he had before. The sudden truth he had revealed left me feeling off-balanced.
"So have you imprinted, Jake?" Nahuel asked his black eyes searching Jacob's brown ones. A silence hung in the air as the two just looked at each other.
"Enough talk for one night, dinner is on the table." Huilen's voice carried from the other room.
Nahuel broke his gaze and stood, his eyes traveling across the open rooms to his aunt. Within moments he had departed to help her, leaving Jacob and I to follow. Before I stood, I let myself truly look into Jake's eyes for the first time. He looked like he had just dogged a bullet to the heart.