Thanks so much for all your wonderful thoughts!
Most characters belong to S. Meyer. The rest belong to me. All mistakes are mine.
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Chapter 17 – The Things We Do For Love
Somewhere in the wilds of the Colony and Dominion of Virginia – October 17, 1692:
He hath picked flowers for her.
He gathers them as they be sat together in the meadow. The night is moonless, the sky bespeckled with stars. Their gilded luminescence dapples the windblown canopy of trees in the distance, lending the world below an azure tint. 'Tis this tint which makes the lush grass resemble dark, rippling ocean waves, like the ones I have observed in Salem Town.
The blooms themselves grow in shades of bright blues and deep violets. Their vivid peculiarity, a contrast to the surrounding muted tones, attract her attention. Otherwise, rarely does her gaze stray from her crimson-eyed lover. She mentions to he the blooms' oddity, the lack of their ebullient existence near Andover or its environs. He, in turn, posits that 'tis the warmer climes which allow for the hues. For, aye, 'tis milder in these parts to which he escorts her nightly. Although bundled as she be in warm animal furs, and further, wrapped in her lover's embrace, she would not feel cold even were snow to blanket the land.
'Tis after this floral rhapsodizing that he brushes his lips across her temple and gently eases her head off his lap. He then deftly unfurls to his impressive height. His movements be fluid, performed with a grace I imagine lithe and agile beasts must possess when roaming the land in search of prey. She watches him with similar thoughts as if he be some form of god, wandering the ebony world while all humans sleep – all humans except she.
And I.
The starlight casts a luminous sheen over his silken hair, then highlights his strong features, his bare, unyielding chest, his powerful thighs, and the round curve of his buttocks. And I feel her admiration for his physical form. I feel it in her thoughts and in the tightening of her core. I cannot fault her lust, for he be male beauty made flesh. Indeed, comparing he to any of the boys in Andover, including Emmett, whom I once believed the handsomest of men, be a laughable endeavor.
Indeed, she does laugh the next moment, though her amusement ceases abruptly, and her gaze narrows, confused by what prompted the action.
Meanwhile, he returns and offers her the blooms he hath plucked from the earth for her joy and pleasure.
"What be so humorous?" asks he with a grin as she inhales the flowers' wild scent, noting the smell of fresh rain over an herbal pasture. She smiles, though I feel her brow crease.
"I…I do not know why I laughed. But I thank you for these. They are lovely. I wish I could take them to brighten Mother and Father's hearth."
"Then they shall remain here." His voice is deep. Husky. His lips stroke hers with featherlike tenderness. "In our home. Awaiting our nightly return."
She thanks him again beneath the stars and under the animal furs, spreading her legs, then cradling his hips betwixt them as his flesh penetrates and stretches her. Like nocturnal, untamed creatures, they fornicate atop the meadow, he grunting and grinding his hips against hers, she groaning and arching her chest against his. She writhes as he suckles her mouth, her neck, her breasts. When he sits and folds his legs beneath him, lifting her over his thighs, then sinking her atop his rigid girth, she cries out to the obscure heavens. The unbridled sound holds neither fear nor care for who hears.
Later, within the canvassed tent, a fire blazes in the hearth. He licks the beads of sweat that have gathered upon her stomach and trickled further below her navel, the tip of his cold tongue languidly skimming further downward. Smoke rings rise in the air, and her pleasure-filled moans chase them through the opening above as, with one hand, she fists the animal skins that have grown damp beside her. With the other hand, she fists the head buried betwixt her legs. When he stands and carries her, his arms flex as he guides her to and fro along his length.
With each powerful thrust, his nostrils flare. His jaw clenches. The musculature in his defined chest contracts. Low, guttural growls rumble deep in his throat as he watches himself move in and out of her. Without breaking their joining, he lowers them, so that 'tis his back against the animal furs.
She takes up a savage ride atop his hips as if she be the native warrior and he the beast she commands, his broad, strong shoulders her reins. Her feral pace makes he, the true-born warrior, writhe on the ground. He grips her hair and hips, hisses roughly in his native tongue. Then, licking his lips, he gazes at her as if she be more than a simple, human woman.
As if she be a queen. His queen. As if the sun rises and sets in her eyes. As if she be his very god when 'tis he who be godlike.
When he bucks and holds her prone, hipbone to hipbone, he captures her mouth, swallowing her open-mouthed cries as pure rapture crests and rips through her core. He responds with a long, hoarse growl. It sends the nocturnal creatures outside of the tent into a screeching flurry.
All the while, she shudders and rides out her ebbing ecstasy until, spent, her frame falls slack atop his, and he embraces her. All the while, he breathes vows of eternal love, of unquenchable lust. Of unending devotion.
And, in my bed, my heart pounds as I touch my own flesh and press my lips together through my release. 'Tis merely a shadow, an echo of what I felt her feel. For feeling through her be not the same as feeling…as feeling him.
Afterward, they talk. She waxes poetic on the entirety of the world and its state, as she has always been wont to do. He listens raptly as if she be the first to ever express such thoughts. She then sleeps. He never sleeps.
Instead, he holds her back against his chest and brushes his mouth against her shoulders…her nape…whispering never-ending endearments in her ear.
"My love…"
"My life…"
She is not awake and cannot reply, and so…in my bed and into the silence of my room, I reply for she.
"Edward…Soaring Eagle…I burn for ye."
He cannot hear me.
For all this, I abhor my former friend.
I loathe her with every fiber of my being. The fool. The clever harlot. The fortunate whore, for had he seen me before he saw her, had it been I stupidly led into those woods by Emmett, rather than she, the ruby-eyed god would have been mine. 'Twould have been I in that meadow, receiving those flowers from he. 'Twould have been I receiving his words of devotion. 'Twould have been I receiving him inside me.
For I have always been the golden-haired beautiful one to her dark-haired clever one.
But now I shall be the beautiful, the clever, and the fortunate one, for the dark-haired clever one has removed Grandmother's rings.
OOOOO
Massachusetts Bay Colony - Andover Village, October 31, 1692
"Foolish girl, I know what ye plan! I can see it! Ye play with a power ye can neither control nor comprehend!"
When I attempt to walk past Grandmother, she clasps her fingers 'round my wrist.
"Hear me, granddaughter! Enter not that church to fill it with thy lies, for 'twill not end well for thee! The magic ye cast be pure evil and malevolence!"
I shove her, and ancient and frail, she falls to the floor with a grunt of pain. Momentary remorse shoots through me, years of being forced to respect our elders regardless of how stupid they be. But remorse hardens into resolve, for although I be her granddaughter, 'twas to her my own grandmother gave her rings of protection. Rings that should have been mine.
That, I shall never forgive.
Regardless, there be nothing weak about Grandmother when she glares up at me.
"The Reverend needed merely an excuse," I spit out. "Regardless of what I now say, all the villagers want to see her hang for a witch! And when her lover returns to save her body…'twill be my mind in her stead."
"You fool! Thy envy has doomed an entire village! For, aye, ye shall shift fate, but ye shall not alter it! She be his fate!"
"Were she his true fate, she would never have stupidly removed the rings ye gave her! Name me evil and malevolent all ye wish, but ye be old and shriveled," I accuse, "and ye have forgotten how it be to be young and beautiful and possessed of power! Ye cannot recall how it feels to burn with such heat, with a burn buried so deep…so deep no other man but one may slake it. No man in this village would ever attempt to, for they only care for their own pleasure! While he-"
"He shall not want ye!"
Her brutal, plainspoken words annihilate any shame I may have felt in taunting her, in wounding her as she wounds me.
"Tell me, Grandmother, was his father like he? Virile and eager to please his woman? Be that why ye spent thy entire life yearning for he?"
"Speak not thy filth against Carlisle."
I laugh at her. "Ye have forgotten the old ways, Grandmother, the true power of we Volva witches. We were meant for more than this Puritan existence. And we possess more than the ancient Siedr sight." I scoff at her deprecatingly. "With the gifts ye possess, ye spent thy life yearning for what ye lost, yet ye ceased seeking out thy Captain. Why?"
"'Twas not my fate to find him."
"I spit in the face of fate," seethe I. "I shall not spend an eternity yearning for what could have been mine!"
For a long moment, she scrutinizes me through milky, opaque eyes that have always seen more than what be before them. They seem to peer through me.
"Ye do not possess the Seidr sight, do ye? The darker gifts, aye," she nods, "but not the sight. Otherwise, ye would see this path leads to madness."
I visibly bristle and raise my chin. "I have no use for a useless sight when I shall make my own fate."
Her gaze pans away, half-blind eyes rounding, then narrowing as she blinks away what stupidity she has seen. With a nod, her eyes sweep back to me.
"Aye. Aye, ye shall make thy own fate and 'twill not be to spend an eternity yearning."
Her impassionate words are spoken placidly, her tone indubitable yet serene. 'Tis as if the truth of them be so irrefutable that any sort of agitation be superfluous. Fate be fate, regardless. And, for a moment, her words send a trickle of cold blood seeping through my heated veins.
But then…a recollection flits through my mind…of his crimson gaze focused in love and lust. And aye, I long for the intensity of those crimson eyes focused on me and not through her. And if the only manner to achieve that is by eliminating her…
Then, I must do as needs.
"Thy twisted words shall not deter me."
"Then thy fate be truly sealed."
OOOOO
"BURN ME, OR I SHALL RETURN AND DRAG YE ALL TO HELL WITH ME!"
In the blink of an eye, I have gone from total victor, from the buoyant knowledge that I shall soon lay in the immortal demi-god's arms, and he none the wiser, to a loss that sends shivers racing up my spine. The shrewd harlot, the clever whore has used Andover Village's fears against them.
As she be dragged out of the church, a bout of nausea rises and threatens to close off my throat. For, by the time he returns, she shall be mere ashes. And aye, he shall seek vengeance. He adores her. He worships her. She be his queen, his god, and there shall be no time to show him she was a mere nothing and that he may have more.
Still, as she be led from the church in shackles and with the mob in hysterics, cursing and beating her as she passes, I stand still and force myself to think! To gather my wits, for I be clever as well! I must formulate a manner in which I may yet emerge victorious.
And so, perhaps…perhaps, if I can convince he to listen to me for just a moment, I can show him that she be no queen, no god. For the love of all, she shall burn! What more proof be needed that she be nothing more than a simple woman?
Perhaps, once he beholds my superior beauty, it may pause his thirst for vengeance long enough to show him that I can also be superior in other forms as well. I can be clever and wax poetic. And I can satisfy his baser needs. After all, I have seen what he enjoys and how he enjoys it.
Aye. Aye, perhaps…perhaps I can yet convince Edward, the Soaring Eagle to love me.
In this place, in this village where hope rarely blooms, where its multi-hued petals be as rare as those of the wildflowers in that faraway meadow, hope emerges with a vengeance. It grows quick and sturdy, heartened by the assurances of the reverend and the elders as they look to me. From the beginning, I have controlled this narrative, and I shall still determine its outcome.
The resurgence of hope burning brighter than ever loosens the knot that had tightened itself painfully round my chest. It pushes back against the walls closing in on my mind, just as I once enclosed walls around her mind. With she now secured to the stake, Reverend Newton and the elders cast their eyes to me.
For men – reverends, elders, lovers…all are predictable. Offer them a smile, a tearful expression, a sultry glance, and they shall do your bidding. And so it shall be with the crimson-eyed being. For underneath his veil of glory…he be a man as well.
As the mob hurls curses and damnations in her direction, she yells and curses me, calls me liar, scowls hatefully at me. She pleads with Emmett to retract his accusation. But it shall not work, for though she was always the clever one…in the end, I was cleverer.
Grandmother be mistaken. She…the dark-haired one be not his fate. She be aught more than a simple woman, while I be the witch who shall alter fate.
Before the pyre be lit, while the crowd shouts and waves fists high into the obsidian sky, I lean into her ear and murmur her name for the last time, for I vow to forget her existence for eternity.
"Isabella…was he worth the burn?"
She glares at me as I pull away, putting up a brave front heartened by her hatred, but I see the fear lurking…overpowering her dark gaze.
Reverend Newton steps forward. "Isabella Swan, I send the demon that possesses ye back to the hell from which it came! And I pray that the Lord, in his eternal wisdom, grant mercy to thy corrupted soul!"
As the reverend puts a torch to the pyre, she continues to fight her fate, struggling against her restraints. And…and aye, I do feel a modicum of her horror, a whisper of fear for my immortal soul. But what is one act of cruelty in the face of such forthcoming joy, moreover, when one's soul shall soon be immortal?
"Nay! Nay, do not do this! I be no witch!" Her arms, bound above her head, flail, rope slicing into her wrists. "Nay! Nay!"
'Tis then that I note the rings.
Grandmother's rings.
They be back on her hand. My eyes grow round, and in the second that follows, I try to convince myself that as they are no longer of any use, neither do they hold any power. They shall burn along with her, their metal melting into silver puddles and seeping into the earth to be forgotten.
"He loved me as none of ye shall ever know love!"
I ignore her shrieks of madness, of delirium as mine own flames of fear once again lick at my mind. Yet surely, the rings mean nothing any longer.
"And HE SHALL AVENGE ME!"
Nay. Nay, I shall win him over. And those rings…they mean nothing. Yet, regardless of how much I repeat the affirmation in my head, the flames of doubt burn brighter…hotter…
And abruptly, through the blue flames, the red blaze, and the black smoke enveloping her, her eyes meet mine. The grin she bestows on me stokes the embers of panic smoldering within me.
"Aye. Aye, 'twas worth the burn. For he was the burn. And no matter how long it takes, he shall end ye."
Heart pounding, my eyes flash up to her rings. Nay. Nay, they no longer hold any power. She cannot-
I know not how much time has passed.
Vaguely do I believe, do I think – nay; nay, not think for such heat torments me that I cannot truly think – that something has gone wretchedly wrong. The pyre. Its fire must have spread like the flames rushing through a forest. It consumes the entire village, sending such screams to fill my ears, cries whose fiery anguish be only dulled by my own tribulation. For terror hangs thick as smoke in the air.
For an immeasurable moment, the blinding, numbing pain and terror continue.
Then…I hear it…I hear him.
I thought I knew fear. I thought I'd learned its true measure in the past…minute…hour…days in which I've burned.
But his rage…his rage be an entity. It prowls in every crevice within and without. I feel its wrath in my melting bones and in the bile at my throat when he calls for me. For, although she must be dead by now, it seems she somehow managed to name me before her end. And so, as he calls my name, he also calls me by his native term for demon.
My bowels release.
The stench of my fear mixes and melds with the stench of charred flesh and decay surrounding me. Such terror courses through me that it overpowers even the burn that somehow, bewilderingly continues, that grows in its torturous intensity. Yet, even more hair-raising than the burn is his voice.
His voice…his deep, hoarse voice…a voice I have dreamed of calling my name, does so now while infused with the pure, unmitigated vow of death.
It raises every hair not singed on my body. It curdles my innards. It manages what even the heat's torture could not.
It forces me into action, for I know, without a shadow of doubt, that should he find me, death shall be something I pray for. As for hope…there be no hope left, no chance that any beauty I possess or may have once possessed could ever tempt he.
Though every limb and muscle movement be excruciating, I lift myself on all fours then sob silently as I crawl through the dead and dying corpses his wrath hath left behind – the broken bodies of Goodman and Goody Crawley; Goodman Weber and Angela staring at nothing with equal gazes of horror. Jane's mouth hangs agape in a silent plea. Michael lies face down, distinguishable only by his frame. The severed head of Reverend Newton with one eye bulging. Emmett. Dear Lord, Emmett's heart ripped from his chest, and his limbs at unnatural bends!
I swallow back my screams as I crawl, but 'tis a useless endeavor, for aye, he be a godlike creature. And, as we in Andover have been taught, ye cannot hide thy sins from god.
"Ahh. There. Crawling like the serpent she be."
Even before he be done hissing, I be plucked from the ground, lifted by my hair, much as he plucked the flowers from the earth for her.
He holds my limp form at his eye level, and my innards coil tighter, lungs cramping and forfeiting every breath. As I meet his gaze, the hatred reflected in his blood-red eyes be beyond any I have ever imagined. Truly, did I believe I could make him love me? For what I behold be beyond human acrimony, such stark fury greater than the soul's ability toward rage. His ferocity…his hunger for vengeance be as animalistic as the rest of he, and it be directed at I.
I cannot even scream as he grins, and blood as crimson as his frenzied gaze drips from his mouth. It stains the blunt ends of his teeth. How I once wanted to lay with this being be something I cannot fathom. How I wanted to convince him to keep me over her, be equally as incomprehensible.
For aye, he be a demon from hell come not to ravish, but to ravage.
And aye, I pray inwardly for death. For madness, at the very least. And mad, I must be, for I think I hear a child's wails. A newborn's cries. Yet, he laughs, and the dark sound is that of a malevolent spirit's howling rancor; guttural. Gruff. I retch over mineself.
"Thy end shall be neither quick nor painless."
He bares his teeth all the more, and I shut mine eyes.
The next thing I know, I again burn. Nay, not burn.
This be beyond mere burning. The burn earlier was merely a fever. A singe as when one touches a scalding pot. The quick lash of a buckle for a minor misdeed.
This…this be blistering, rage beyond comprehension. I feel my flesh melt off, mine bones like a fatty, tallow candle, the stench even more repugnant. M blood boils like water simmered in a hearth. My bones blister to ash.
And as I lie on the ground, the inferno torment continues for ages. For a lifetime.
"Stupid, filthy witch," hisses a woman at some interval. "Thy spells have gone awry. But someday, we shall kill ye, and as my nephew vowed, when thy end finally arrives, it shall be neither quick nor painless."
OOOOO
Forks, Washington: Present Day:
With a sharp gasp, I wake, uncomfortably splayed on the wooden floor of my bedroom…of Edward's and mine.
"Edward," I breathe. "I've had the worst…the most horrendous nightmare."
Bits and pieces of my dreams flash through my mind, confusing images I can't…I don't want to make sense of. In the recesses, they mix with Edward's words from…from when? Was it earlier? Yesterday? Where did he say he was going? To…work? Out with friends? To the basement?
Then, I recall the bewildering phone call with Alice, a call where she hissed at me with pure rancor and hatred in her voice. But I can't seem to place the time when that occurred, either.
Alarm bells sound within me. Again, I call for my husband. Again, I'm met with the relative silence of nothing but a TV blaring from some other room.
"Coming up on the five o'clock news, escaped convict and convicted murderer, James Hunter is still on the loose after a strange escape where fellow prisoners claim a dark shadow appeared in the penitentiary's halls before Hunter went missing. We're also following a breaking story from Port Angeles, where the driver of the car that went over a cliff a few days ago was identified as forty-two-year-old Marcus Volturi, who served fifteen years in prison for-"
My heart races.
"Edward?"
'…when her lover returns to save her body, 'twill be my mind in her stead.'
'She be his fate!'
"Were she his true fate, she would never have stupidly removed the rings ye gave her!'
I look down at my fingers, bare of all rings. "Rings…where are my…where's my wedding ring?" I breathe to myself. With growing panic, I yell, "Edward!"
'…mine love…'
'I be no witch!'
'Fate can be shifted but never altered!'
Getting to my feet, I make my way to the bedroom door. All air expels itself from my lungs as I catch a glimpse of my hair in the oval dresser mirror. Whimpering, I double over.
"No," I choke. "No. It was a dream. A nightmare."
Breathing purposely and methodically, I draw in lungfuls of air. Unfortunately, the action serves to awaken my stomach muscles. Hunger strikes like a whip.
'…he suckled on her lips…'
"Edward, where are you?" I plead.
When there's still no answer, avoiding the mirror, I sprint from the room.
'I was in the basement…best time to take care of vermin is when they're groggy...'
My breath hitches, vision blurring. I take the stairs down slowly, steps unsteady, all the while calling,
"Edward? Edward, are you in the basement? Something's wrong, Edward. I'm having…I'm having bad cramps. I- Oh!" My gut gnarls, and I wrap both arms around my midsection. The pain is so excruciating that I lose my balance and reach desperately for the handrail. For a second, my fingertips make purchase with a long, wooden baluster…
…the reverend puts a torch to the pyre…
My breath hitches, and my hand slips. As I topple downward, my head meets each step with a thud as I topple downward. Crying, I lay prone on the bottom landing, more dazed than in pain.
"Edward?"
…I crawl through the dead and dying corpses his wrath hath left behind…
"Edward!"
'…I shall forgive thee, Emmett, if ye assist me…'
Flinching, I squeeze my eyes shut. My teeth rattle as I vigorously shake my head, attempting to loosen and purge away all the bewildering thoughts…the memories-
Nay! No! No! They're dreams!
"Just dreams," I breathe through a series of broken sobs. "They're just dreams, and soon, Edward will be here, and…"
'…what would ye give me…Reverend…what freedoms would I earn if I helped ye…?'
That never happened! It was a dream! It never happened!
Drawing a deep breath, I expel it heavily and reach my feet. On leaden legs, I reach the basement door, pulling it open with a quivering hand. I peek my head into the dark space.
"Edward? Are you down there?"
'He's not coming for you. Someday, we'll figure out how to get you out of there. For now, enjoy your once-a-year nightmare…'
"No," I cry. "No. Edward loves me. He loves me! I'm his wife! The other one…she was just a dream! A nightmare! Edward!"
Slowly, I take the steps down to the basement, the floorboards creaking loudly under my bare feet.
'…what ye felt, I felt…when ye were there, I was there as well…'
'…thou art the witch, not I…!'
'…I be no witch!"
'…was he worth the burn…?'
'Aye. Aye, 'twas worth the burn. For he was the burn. And no matter how long it takes, he shall end ye…'
As I reach the bottom step, an eerie silence fills my ears. It's like being underwater, adding to the sensation that, somehow, I'm drowning. Reaching blindly overhead, I locate the wiry string and pull, the lone lightbulb's filaments flashing like lightning and momentarily blinding me. The cavernous basement alights. Empty. Unfinished. I find myself wondering…trying to recall why we've never finished this basement.
I try, and I try, standing stiffly and racking my brain for a single, solitary conversation regarding it, regarding any mundane, household topic.
Instead, in my mind's eye, I see Edward gathering flowers in a darkened meadow. Except…except his hair is long, and he's dressed in nothing more than a piece of leather around his waist.
Again, I shut my eyes and shake the image out of my head. When I reopen them, they land on the padlocked door to Edward's tool closet.
'…vermin…best time to subdue vermin…'
'…stay out of the basement…'
With my heart pounding in my throat, my stomach churning, and equal parts hunger and nausea making me dizzy, I shuffle forward. Reaching out, I wrap a hand around the thick padlock and give what seems like a negligible tug. Yet it's enough to break the padlock.
For a long moment, I merely stand there.
The dreams.
The unfulfilled hunger pangs.
The fall that left me with no injuries.
The superhuman strength.
I give the stout, solid metal door a push, and I walk in.
I'm almost…almost not bewildered by the reinforced cage built into the opposite wall. It's in the shape of a box, made of layers of some sort of glass and silvery gray metal. The cage is compartmentalized – on the left lay a handful of bodies in a piled heap. On the right, face down, lays just one body…one blond-haired female dressed in rags.
A whimper escapes me. I swallow thickly and squeeze my eyes shut, blood pounding viciously in my veins. I'm unsure how long I stand there, staring uncomprehendingly before I feel…I feel him behind me.
His speech erupts abruptly into the silence, his tone cold and sterile, almost conversational in its insouciance. But by the time he ends, a sharp, bitter edge has crept into every word.
"It's a combination of titanium and polycarbonate acrylic, two of the strongest materials known to mankind. Shatterproof. Bulletproof. Soundproof. You name it, though we don't worry too much about the left side of the cage. The animals in there, they're frail. Weak. Scum of the earth to boot. No, it's the one on the right we mainly watch out for. She's the one this entire setup was built for. By necessity."
In turn, my breaths erupt in a series of long, heavy gasps, panting that grows louder as he draws nearer. His footfalls remain even and steady.
"Of course, even the strongest materials known to mankind might as well be an aluminum foil in our hands. Delicate porcelain," he scoffs, "as evidenced by that padlock you just broke so easily."
"Who…? Who is-"
"Although, most of the time, she's subdued sufficiently by a combination of elements we've developed over the years…the decades…the centuries, where we need not concern ourselves too much. Nonetheless," he sighs, "we're always on alert. We have to be. All because she wanted a life, an existence that belonged to someone else." The words are spat in accusation. "Because she was a witch who thought herself more. Because she accused-"
I spin around and reach out for him simultaneously.
Because he's my husband.
My Edward.
And despite my fear and bewilderment, I love him.
His features contort into an expression of pure revulsion mingled with loathing. Before I can touch him, he swats away my hands, and I reel back more in shock than pain. His chest heaves, his nostrils flaring wildly before he hisses one word.
"Witch."
"Edward, no," I cry. "I don't understand."
His ensuing laughter is fringed by bitter ice. "That's your own fault. Faulty fucking witch at that."
"Edward, I've been having horrible…frightening dreams. And I'm hungry! So hungry!"
He snarls hatefully, shuffling forward, and despite how badly I wanted him moments ago, the gleam of contempt in his gaze makes me shuffle backward, stumbling over my feet in my haste.
"I'd fucking let you starve if it wasn't her body you're inhabiting. I'd let you feast on your usual meal of poisoned rats." He juts his chin, and my eyes follow the direction to a corner within the right compartment of the cage, where a mass of dead rats piles the corner like black bile. I cover my mouth and dry heave.
"What's happening?" I shout. "What's going on?"
His slow approach continues. Again, I reach out. Instinct. Unrequited love. Again, he smacks my hands away.
"One day, we'll get you out of there."
"I'm scared," I weep.
"You're fucking scared?" he barks. "How do you think she feels? How do you think she felt when you had her burned?"
"No," I shake my head. "No, that wasn't real. That was a nightmare!"
He scoffs, shaking his head. "Too weak to face your own evil. How do you think our daughter felt when she was very young, when every October, her mother left her body, and you appeared?"
"No!" I keep on backing up, and he keeps moving forward.
"How do you think I've felt all these centuries when October rolls around and the person I love most in this world…when I look at her, and it's you behind the façade?"
"Why are you saying these things?" I shriek. My back hits the wall. "Why are you hurting me?"
"Hurt you?" He snorts, shaking his head, his tone morphing from icy to glacial, volume rising with each ensuing word. "Hurt you? I haven't been able to hurt you, not the way I want to, not the way every fiber of my being yearns to," he sneers, his hands in claws between us, "for years! For decades!" And abruptly, his broad shoulders slump, and his drops to a pained whisper. "For…centuries. I can't hurt you. I can't hurt that filthy body in the cage there because whenever I do, you retreat into her body with a vengeance. And when you are in her body…" he chokes, "I can't hurt her body."
By this point, my frame shakes uncontrollably, and dry sobs rack me.
"Edward, I don't understand."
"Don't you?"
'…I burn for ye…'
I shall be the beautiful, the clever, and the fortunate one, for the dark-haired clever one has removed Grandmother's rings.
He scoffs. "Yes. Yes, you understand."
I reach for him yet again. "I only did it because I loved-"
He swats my hands again, and when his palms hit the wall on either side of me, I hear concrete and cement turn to dust under them. When his eyes meet mine, glowing bright crimson, for a second…for the fraction of a moment, I see love in them. I do.
But in the next moment, he glares at me with an open disgust that turns my stomach.
"You're not her!" He bangs his open palms against the wall on either side of me, and I shriek again. "You're not! And someday, we'll find a way…" He stops, and a grin curves around his handsome, beautiful features, distorting them, almost making him look like…like a demon from the darkest pits of hell.
"Do you remember what I once said to you?" he asks, his tone conversational once again.
'Thy end shall be neither quick nor painless.'
"No! I don't! I don't!"
"You do," he chuckles, nodding. "You do. That vow stands, Rosalie Hale, Hobomock," he breathes, "no matter how long it takes to fulfill it."
And pushing himself off the wall, he turns and walks out of the tool room – shutting the door behind him.
I scream then. I shout at the top of my lungs. And I scream. I scream and scream and scream….
OOOOO
Seventy Years Later…
St. Matthew Island is the most remote place in Alaska, marooned in the Bering Sea halfway to Siberia. It emerges from the fog like a dark, desert mirage. Even now, with the planet's overpopulation problem, it's over one-hundred-and-eighty-six miles and a twenty-four-hour ship ride from the nearest human settlement. Excavations have turned up enough to suggest that people of the Thule culture, precursors to the Iñuipiat and Yup'ik, who now inhabit Alaska's northwestern coasts, may have at one point attempted to inhabit the island. But no permanent signs of their possible settlement remain, only a handful of artifacts.
"It's fittingly forbidding," Jasper says when we surface.
I nod, murmuring in return, "Almost poetic in its perfection for one such as us."
We make our way up curved, steep, treeless mountains. They crowd this sliver of land, plunging into sudden cliffs where they meet the surf. Surrounded by endless ocean, I once again feel as if I'm being swallowed up by vast nothing, as if I'm at the center of the world and nowhere, all at once.
We arrive on the island's northwestern tip, where the air buzzes with the island's endemic bird population. Here, wildflowers and cotton grass dot the tundra. A lichen-crusted whale jawbone points downhill toward the sea. Compared with more sheltered bays and beaches on the island's eastern side, it's the harshest part of the island on which to settle.
It's where, in the distance, we spot a man familiar with his resemblance to my nephew. He spots us and stands still, his copper hair waving in the gale-force winds. When he lifts a hand and waves almost hesitantly, his ring glints in the pale daylight.
Drawing in deep breaths, Jasper and I make our way toward him.
A/N: Thoughts?
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One or two more chapters, and we'll be done. :)
and Some sort of cage