THE LOCKET

Chapter 9

"Why We Fall…"

-.-.-

"What's going on?"

Her soft voice was laced with worry, matching her puckered brows and clouded eyes.

They both looked at her, one with sympathy and the other with worry. Neither talked and she became frustrated almost instantly as she realized they had no intention of answering her.

"What? What is it?" she repeated. "What's going on? Why won't you tell me?"

"Calm down darling," his slow drawl swirled around her, calming her nerves slightly, even though she tried to push his calmness away.

"I'll calm down when you two idiots give me a reason not to worry!" she exclaimed, hitting him on the arm and turning to the other idiot, giving him her signature death-glare. "Tell me what's going on, why are you here?!" she asked him.

"I asked him to come darling," the first idiot spoke. The one with the smooth drawl and the sandy-coloured hair. Couldn't he just shut up already, she wondered?

Hell, it had been – what – three, four years since she'd seen him last. Not that she hadn't missed him, because – God – she had, but why did the idiot show his sharp face now? Right in the middle of an unknown war within the war…

"Well?!" she asked impatiently, her stance mimicking that of their mother whenever they had made the old preacher's kid steal the apples from the Queen's vegetable garden and they returned to their manor with all of the delicious red apples grasped in their greedy little hands.

He looked at her, his green eyes burning into her own. "Alice, I'm here because you are here."

"Wow, way to be cryptic brother," she muttered sarcastically. "And why am I here?"

He paused, steeling his gaze on her after he had carefully perused their surroundings, making sure no unwanted ears heard what he had to say next.

"To defeat the Queen."

-.-.-

They both moaned, seconds before their lips met in the middle, tangling together – soft and unyielding – as they both fought for dominance and gave into the other.

His soft lips had long ago won the fight for dominance. She had caved as soon as his soft, wet tongue swiped across her bottom lip and she had sighed softly, giving him access to her mouth.

Their tongues had tangled together; weaving an intricate, yet beautifully emotional dance that somehow seemed to come entirely natural for the both of them.

Bella's head was spinning from all the sensations her body experienced: The softness of his lips, the strength and wetness of his tongue, the pounding of the water hitting her back and the sweet smell of man and sexiness.

She broke the kiss, untangling her tongue and separating their lips as she drew in a deep breath. Her hands had long ago tangled themselves deeply into the roots of his nest of hair and she tugged slightly on it as she leaned her forehead onto his.

Edward gazed deeply into her expressive chocolate eyes, as she stood, chest heaving and lips red from his assault on them, in front of him.

His left hand travelled from the deep tresses of her curled hair, along her spine – some places caressing her skin, only barely touching her, and others digging into the soft tissue beneath them, making her breath hitch in her throat.

As his fingers dipped lower on her back, caressing and massaging her a few inches above the line of her underwear, she closed her eyes and moaned softly as she arched her back, causing her to press herself up against his front.

She startled slightly as she felt the clear evidence of his excitement against her lower abdomen, and she gasped as her brown eyes snapped to his vibrant green ones.

Her gasp had pressed her breast and stomach tightly against him and he groaned loudly and pressed his hands even more tightly to her, keeping her firmly locked against him.

The hand tangled in her hair tugged gently on it so her head tilted upwards keeping their gazes locked. The other one was pressed against her lower back, his fingers spread against her skin, the thumb massaging the base of her spine and his pinkie caressing the skin underneath her blonde underwear.

She felt a rush emotions tingling along her spine, making her shudder against him. His pinkie were tickling the soft skin only a few inches above the crack of her ass, sending volts of excitement and energy along her full cheeks and straight down to her centre of heat. She felt a sudden rush of wetness between her thighs, which she knew had nothing to do with the water still running down their heated bodies.

Edward broke away from their kiss, only to continue a warm, wet path along her jaw, tracking her smooth skin, until he reached his target; her earlobe. He ran his tongue along the edge before nibbling softly on it.

"Edward…" she moaned softly, feeling the butterflies in her stomach go ballistic when she felt his tongue and teeth on her ear.

Her soft murmur sent his mind reeling. The soft tones of his name, uttered in the heat of the moment drove him wild. He grabbed the soft tresses at the back of her head and angled it before attacking her soft, plumb lips. She gasped and fought back with equal abandon.

As the kiss prolonged, she felt the urgent need to breathe, and she scoffed slightly at her need to remain alive, when she would much rather keep staying connected to Edward. And apparently he felt the same way. For as soon as she broke away, he kissed along her cheek and jaw again, only this time heading in the same direction as the water, kissing down her neck and settling at her collarbone.

Bella moaned and massaged the soft skin of his neck.

"Ugh!" Edward grunted as he felt shockwaves traveling along his spine. He finally let go off her soft hair, letting his hands travel down her spine and gently cupping the cheeks of her ass in both hands. He only made a quick pass as he squeezed her buttocks and made his hands return in an upwards route, this time sneaking under the fabric of her bra, sliding along the soft skin of her back, until he reached the even softer skin at the sides of her breasts.

She shivered and moaned as he caressed her back and sides, before freezing as soon as he touched her breasts.

"I'm sorry." He had noticed her stiff posture almost immediately and had retracted his inappropriate touching.

Bella felt her heart shatter into a million pieces, as what she had feared most were actually happening. 'Was he seriously apologising for kissing her again?'. She didn't know if she could stand for that one more time.

She blinked violently and freed herself from his tight grasp, stepping back a few inches, as she tried to avoid him seeing the tears gathering in the corner of her eyes.

But her attempt at hiding seemed futile, as he followed her step and grasped her chin between his index finger and thumb, raising her head and seeing the wet evidence his utterance had left on her cheeks.

He felt an empty surge settling deep in his stomach as he realised she had misinterpreted his apology.

"Bella." He said. When she refused to meet his eyes, he repeated the sentiment before continuing: "Bella, sweetheart. Look at me. I didn't mean it like that, you know? I meant I was sorry for touching you inappropriately, not for kissing you. God, I could never be sorry for kissing you!"

She hesitantly met his gaze, feeling hope blossom in the pit of her stomach. "You couldn't?" she wondered.

"Oh princess," he chuckled, giving her the lopsided grin. "No, I definitely, definitely couldn't."

Bella had smiled hugely at him, eager to return to kissing this gorgeous man standing before her. But she was shivering. The sun had slowly begun its descent past the treetops, leaving the meadow and water in early evening darkness, settling a colder temperature in the air around them.

"Come on. Let's get dry and settle in for tonight. We still have to figure out how where to go from here to get to the palace."

-.-.-

That night she had complained about a headache. Edward had sat himself down behind her and guided her to lean back against him, as he massaged her scalp and neck.

She had sighed softly, her breathing slightly haggard as she let sleep overcome her.

He had woken up, at what he guessed were sometime around 3a.m. that same night, not exactly dark enough to be close to midnight and not yet early enough so the birds had begun their chirping. Bella was strewn across his front; her right leg tangled together with his and her hand nestled against the warm skin of his neck. And she was shivering once again.

Her entire body were wracking with shivers and her breathing hitched whenever her body crumpled against him.

He became instantly alert as he registered her weird behaviour and sat up hurriedly, as he untangled her limbs from his.

"Bella? Bella?" he said, shaking her softly to get some form of reaction out of her. "Isabella!"

She moaned miserably, cracking her eyes slightly, feeling overwhelmed by the massive headache she felt. Her right hand went to her head, trying to relieve the banging in her head. "It hurts."

"What? What hurts?"

Edward felt absolutely desperate. Her shuddering had turned even more violent and she was occasionally banging her head against the earth beneath her. He instantly lifted her upper body to lean against his lap, almost similarly to how they had initially fallen asleep the night before.

"My head." She muttered, before pausing. "And my arm."

As soon as she mumbled the soft words, Edward grabbed violently for both her arms, inspecting them closely. With horror he realised the cut from the ropes she had been bound with by the trolls, had left a nasty infection. The skin of her left wrist was red with irritation, some of the wound dirtied by mud and the rest still bleeding slowly.

She stuttered as her body once again wracked with shivers. "Plea..Please."

"What? Sweetheart, what?"

"It's so hot." She paused. "And it hurts."

Edward panicked and felt her clammy forehead. "Jesus! You're burning hot!"

"Thanks…" she sighed, trying to smile at him, but it probably looked more like a dog sticking its head out the window in a driving car, than the cheeky little smirk, she had wanted it to portray.

He chuckled softly and kept caressing her hair. "Not exactly what I meant, but you are definitely one fine specimen."

Her soft chuckle gave away to a severe coughing fit and her body shook violently against him again. She moaned softly, clenching her eyes shut and grimaced.

Edward brushed her face one more time, before he disposed her gently onto the ground and rose from his kneeling position behind her. "I'm just going to go find something to help with the wound," he muttered softly and looked longingly down at her. When she didn't give any response, he turned and sprinted into the forest from where they had emerged.

Thankfully it didn't take him very long to locate two of the plants he was in search of, and he returned back to the meadow in a hurried paste.

As he returned, her shuddering had turned even worse and she was whimpering slightly.

"Bella? Isabella?" he questioned, and when she didn't respond at all, he instantly took action, afraid she might already be suffering too deeply from the fever.

"Sweetheart, listen… I need to cool you down, so I'm just going to undress you okay?" Again when he didn't get a response from her, he drove into action, lifting her to a sitting position.

He had to sit slightly behind her once again to support her body from falling flat onto the ground, as her strength was waning. He lifted her shirt off of her and deposited her back into a lying position as he moved around her to unbutton and remove her jeans.

As soon as he had undressed her to her underwear and nothing else, he took off his own clothes and picked her up off the ground and carried her towards the edge on the water.

"Jesus!" he exclaimed loudly as the cold temperature of the water met his feet, but he steeled himself and continued out into the cold depths. When he reached out far enough for the water to reach his knees he turned around and sank slowly into the wet surface.

As soon as he had sat them both down into the gentle waves, she moaned softly and relaxed against him, her shivers reducing slightly. He worried still that her body seemed unnaturally hot under the cold surface, but remained seated to support her weak frame.

When she seemed strong enough to hold herself slightly upright, he gently massaged the top of her shoulders, running his hands down her long, delicate arms, before reaching the infected cut on her left wrist.

He took her hand into both of his own and began rubbing the sensitive skin around the wound.

"Ow! Oh shit!" she moaned in a high pitch voice, trying to retreat her hand from his grasp.

He held onto her tightly, and sighed softly. "I've got to clean the wound, princess. Please, just – keep still."

She sighed in contrite, but ceased her struggling.

They stayed in the water for another ten minutes, while he rubbed and massaged the surrounding skin of her wrist, until the entire wound was free from dirt and bleeding excessively from the added stimulation.

He was slightly shivering and had to get out of the cold water, so he wouldn't suffer from hypothermia. When he was satisfied with the coolness of her skin against his, he lifted them both out of the wet substance and began trekking back out of the soft waves.

When they hit shore, he took of at a slightly faster paste, nearly running back to where they had fallen asleep earlier. He was freezing and quite frankly in a hurry to get himself and the beautiful girl in his arms dry and warm again.

It took him a stressing five minutes before he was satisfied with their level of dryness, before dressing them back.

"I'm going to fall." Bella mumbled, standing weakly on her feet and shaking softly once again. Her knees gave out and Edward grabbed her under her arms, slowly lowering her down onto the ground beneath them.

"Stay here one moment…" he said and ran into the forest once again.

He returned a second later with a huge leaf and the two plants he had gathered before their bath.

"What are you doing?" she wondered.

Edward looked hopefully back at her as he sat down in front of her and gathered the big leaf in his lap. He roughly cut through one of the leaves of the cactus like plant and a clear thick substance oozed from the centre of the leaf.

"Aloe leaf," he smiled at her. "You probably know it from creams that prevent your skin from ageing." He grinned at her.

"Excuse me, I'm 20, thank you very much! I don't really need creams against wrinkles!" she exclaimed, but calmed down when she noticed the mischievous grin on his lips. "Oh, you were teasing… Very funny."

He chuckled softly and picked up the second plant, a pretty green bush-like plant with small, beautiful daisies at each end.

"What are you doing?!" She exclaimed, horrified when he began roughly ripping the tiny leaves and flower petals from the beautiful plant.

"This, princess, is chamomile. It'll help settle the inflammation in the wound and keep your fever at bay." He said softly and mixed the tiny pieces of chamomile plant and flower into the clear liquid from the aloe plant.

When he was satisfied with the consistency of the cream he had made, he turned to her and asked her to hold out her wrist to him. He gently lubricated the wound and surrounding skin with the cool liquid and said: "This should cool the burning in your wrist, and hopefully keep dirt from entering the wound and cause a second inflammation."

Bella looked adoringly at him as he focused intently on dressing her wound. When he finished he looked up at her and was surprised to see her intent stare on him.

He felt his insides ignite in a warming sensation and he tucked gently on her arm, very much aware not to touch anywhere near her wrist, and leaned forward to meet her in the middle for a sweet, tender kiss.

She sighed softly into the kiss and felt him smile against her lips, before he placed another innocent, yet very sweet, soft kiss against the blushing skin of her cheek, and leaned back on the ground, reaching for her, to come towards him.

She crawled forward, settling herself down against him, snuggling into the warmth of his body, before yawning and letting sleep overcome her.

Edward sighed softly when he felt her heartbeat slow against his chest and closed his eyes slowly. He pressed his nose against the top of her head, breathing in her fresh, sweet strawberry scent and settled into the earth.

"Sweet dreams, princess."

He didn't sleep anymore that night.

-.-.-

Author's note: another chapter for you all! Thank you all for reading, and please remember to review. I'm so grateful to those of you who do review, follow or favouritize!

And – I've finally figured out how to respond to reviews! Took me long enough, I know, but from now on I'll try to respond to every review.

AND – While I do have a plot outlined for this story, I have some free-planned time coming up with the story soon. I have different scenarios to write planned, but I would really love to hear some suggestions and ideas to what should happen in the story. Please, if you have any idea or thought, send it to me and I might interlace it into the storyline!

And and and – at last: I am so very sorry for the long wait for an update. I was in a rut for some time, along with the approach of my exams. But I'm back! And I have some new plotlines for some new stories coming up soon… So keep a look out!