Under the surface, trying to break through
Deciphering the codes in you
I need a compass draw me a map
I'm on the top, I can't get back
-Square One, Coldplay
Rule six: Everything is your friend when change is your enemy.
She sits across from Carlisle in the forest, slowly breathing in the sunny morning air. He smiles at her tentatively. Her hair is a riot of color in the speckled light. A beam catches the skin at the base of her neck and throws sparkling prisms across the trunk of the closest tree. She shakes her hair back and closes her eyes; the red irises that had so unnerved him in their vulnerability hide behind a pale film of skin.
"I suppose you would like me to tell you my story, so to call it, now that you have shared your own." He says good naturedly, feeling more comfortable when not being pierced by her eyes. She nods assent, crosses her legs, and keeps her eyes shut.
"Well," he continues, "I guess my tale begins with what I remember from my time as a human…"
1703 in England; the days were long, the nights longer. Musty, grey years passed by. Sad, poor, common people lived inconsequential, boring lives.
And to distract themselves from the gloom and unimportance of their own existence, the people turned to spectacles in fear. Witchcraft became the frenzy of the age; witch hunts, the adrenaline rush to a thrill-starving mob.
In those days, the devil was more tangible and accessible than God. That was the way people seemed to like it, too. Where was the fun in being good? No, they preferred the rush and Ultimate Excuse in fear of the Devil. No fear in God; they were doing his heroic work. For God would much prefer the execution of a few speculated witches than the whole "treating your neighbor as you would be treated" dogma.
Yes, this was how God wanted it.
Or, at least, that's how Carlisle's father believed it to be.
"The government thinks we do not know how they view witchcraft!" He roared from atop a platform, screeching exciting ideals to a mundane crowd of farmers, itching for a bit of the wondrous and unknown.
"They begin to doubt our ways! God's ways! They say there are no witches, there is no evidence- but they are blind! To say there is no evil is to say there is no good, and by God there is good. This we know. And against God there is evil, this we have seen! And for God we must burn this weed in our harvest, this plague upon our land! Send the witches to their master, once and for all!"
"Hear, hear!" The crowd cried, mob mentality already setting in. The cold of the night pressing down upon them seemed to solidify their belief in the devil and all his evil. Night was when beings the Pastor spoke of thrived.
Points of light shone through the dark; torches held aloft cast a flickering vision of excited faces. Carlisle sighed. If he were to speak in parables, like his father, he would draw the crowd's attention to their torches - see, these are stronger than the night! See how they shine in the dark! Who, here, is the clear victor? The light, of course! Always the light! It casts away the darkness just by existing- why, then, must we burn and torture and kill?
The torches, the light, the peaceful way of forgiving enemies, even witches. He would not encourage the crowd to use these means of light as a means to create more darkness, more hatred in the world. He would not actively pursue the death of innocents and he would not lead these people in the destruction of yet another family.
No, he was not like his father. He did not place more belief in the evil of the world than the good. He did not condone or promote violence. That, above all, was most likely why his father loathed him. If the Pastor Cullen could get away with accusing his own son of witchcraft without fearing the shame of being related to such a being of profound evil, he would do so gladly.
Carlisle shivered in revulsion at the smile of disgusting excitement upon the face of the man he was sad to say had fathered him.
"Go! Go to their homes! Search for the black signs of their craft! Bring out the government's precious evidence!"
Reading between the lines- an excuse to ransack an enemy's home and take anything valuable in the name of fighting evil.
"Go! Find these witches! Strip them down and find where their minions suckle!"
An excuse to publicly humiliate women, and maybe even privately rape them. It had happened before, girls violated in the name of proving their innocence. It would happen again. Carlisle grit his teeth; if anything bothered him, it was that. No woman should be touched against her will. Every female should be treated with respect.
"Go! Seize them that are guilty! Bring them to the square and we shall present the government with our evidence! Then we may kill them!" The crazed crowd roared and set off to murder, rape, steal, and lie with not a shred of guilt on their minds.
It made him sick to his stomach.
He stood in the shadows, downtrodden, and watched with a sneer as his father went trotting at the head of the savages, nearly panting in anticipation. He shook his head and thanked God that he no longer had to tolerate the presence of that man. Animal, actually- man was too generous a title.
He hurried off to the square and the town hall, hoping against hope that he could convince officials to stop the bloodbath before it began. There were so many innocent lives at stake-
But before he could get very far, the screams started. Although, these weren't ordinary screams. It wasn't women crying out in terror- as it usually was only women who were persecuted by his father's gang- but the horrified screams of men.
Carlisle stopped dead and deliberated. Turn and find the new horrors? Maybe husbands crying out as they are tortured for being married to a witch? But his father usually hunted single women. It didn't make sense, these new sounds…
The screaming got closer, louder.
With a rare curse, Carlisle spun on his heel and went sprinting in the direction of the noise. Doors cautiously slid open as he passed; eyes bleary with sleep and half recognized fright peeked out into the dark night which rang with the sounds of death.
He rounded the corner at the end of the street where his father had been riling up the revelers only minutes before and found himself in front of a spectacle both horrific and ironic in nature.
Men were running in every direction, bleating like donkeys, their sick past-time forgotten. As the crowd fell away, he saw to the center, where there had once been a sewage hole, and now stood three dark figures, bent over three men. The light of the discarded torches shone fragmentally upon the scene of twisted retribution. Monstrous men out to do monstrous deeds had come across something so much more demonic than they had ever expected. Maybe God had a sense of (twisted) humor, after all.
Carlisle stood, mouth gaping, numb to the world as he watched one of the figures dip its head towards the neck of the man in its grip, and a wet, tearing, slurping noise echoed in the air. He saw blood run in streams as the figure ripped and tore, gurgling like a child in enjoyment. The man's screams fell to gasping shrieks and his skin turned gray. Upon closer inspection, Carlisle was sickened to see that the man was his very own father.
Gagging, he turned from the three figures and their victims, and began to stumble away. He wanted to run, but shock and terror seemed to paralyze him. He'd gone no more than two steps when a slithering voice called out to him. He whipped around and came face to face with a leering, moon white face. Sharp teeth snapped hungrily and black eyes with a tinge of red hypnotized him.
"And where do you think you are going?" The voice taunted playfully, the beast's beauty turned unbearable as a savagery twisted its features. Fast as lightning, it grabbed his hand in a grip strong enough to break the bone and smiled ruthlessly as Carlisle began to scream in pain.
It pulled his arm to its mouth and tore in. Carlisle felt the unpleasant burn of a thousand suns spreading from the sucking motion at his forearm and fell to the ground, limp in pain. The vampire followed, still drinking from him. His other hand fell uselessly to his side as the burning progressed to his neck. His fingers brushed against something unbearably hot, but not as bad as the pain radiating out of where the vampire was feeding.
Fire.
Desperately, he felt clumsily for the handle, his fingers passing through flame again. The smell of burning skin assaulted his nose as he finally wrapped it in his hand and thrust it towards the demon drinking from him with a strength he almost did not possess. The creature hissed as the flame drew near. It pulled away and Carlisle grinned weakly, making another pass at the demon's clothing. The thing's shirt caught fire and it snarled, annoyed. It ripped the shirt off and came closer to Carlisle, swerving around the torch he was waving at it.
"Annoying human," it spat. It went to grasp his arm again, and he knew that he would die, but just then the creature's nostrils flared and it looked at a point over Carlisle's head. He turned to see what the creature was so avidly staring at.
A girl had come out of her home to see the commotion. A single girl. Most likely the one the crowd had originally come to condemn as a witch. Her hair was bright, bloody red. Witch's hair; definitely the girl his father had come for. She stood frozen, in awe of the beauty of the vampire staring at her so greedily. Its eyes closed and it inhaled. Carlisle was too weak to warn her away, although he tried.
A weak breath of air escaped him. The paralyzing feeling had crawled to his lips and tongue. It could do no more than loll uselessly around in his mouth.
"So sweet, so delicious. What a beautiful scent you have, my dear." The monster crooned and then pounced, bringing the girl down with a sharp cry and a slurp of victory. Carlisle moved the half of his body that was still in working order away from the scene and crawled towards a pile of potatoes disrupted by the panicked departure of the crowd only minutes before. He crawled into it, letting the spuds fall all around him. He lay, unable to move, in agony at the fire licking through his veins. For an eternity, he lay there. And after an eternity of what felt like hell, the burn was reduced to only one area. His throat.
Blood, he needed blood. But the image of his father, of the poor girl came to mind and he knew he would rather starve himself and die than give into such a monstrous temptation. He was not a monster.
He was NOT a monster.
Her eyes snap open.
"So what happened next? Did you wake up in daylight and go on a murdering rampage in the town square?" Bella's inquiry is a bit wry. Carlisle smiles sadly and shakes his head.
"No, the square and all the houses around it had been abandoned after word spread of the vampires living there. There were no humans. The people of the town had packed up and fled to the neighboring village, about four miles away. You have to understand, the mythological was so much more believable back then. Witches, warlocks, vampires, and ghouls seemed to be around every corner. It was a nightmare for the Volturi, let me tell you…" He chuckles humorlessly.
"I confined myself to that town. I refused to leave, refused to even venture far from the square. And I was so, so hungry. God, I wanted more than anything to just swim in blood. I remember begging the skies to rain red so I wouldn't have to take a life, just have it freely given from a merciful God. Blood was my manna, my mantra. And then, one night, as the madness seized me and I began to give in, inching away from the town until I was standing at the edge of the surrounding forest, a deer came across me. I attacked mindlessly, not aware of anything but the blood. And it tasted so good, so wonderful, so perfectly inhuman, that I practically skipped for joy."
Bella's forehead crinkles disbelievingly.
"Really? That foul-smelling, rough blood was delicious?"
"You have to understand; even raw intestines would taste delicious to a starving man. Which I was. And though not as tantalizing as human blood, animal blood managed to sustain me enough until I felt I was ready to leave my forced containment in the ghost town. I tested myself, tried myself, and stayed true to myself. I was able to control myself and my devilish instincts." Carlisle smiles jovially, spreading his arms wide like a bird taking flight.
"I am free of the so called necessary evil of our kind. I am as human as a vampire can be."
Bella is silent and in shock, trying to think of the amount of self control this almost-human in front of her possesses. He's lying. It is impossible.
And yet, it isn't. Even she, a jaded and self-prescribed pessimistic leech, can see the honest truth in his gentle eyes. It gives her hope, bolsters her belief in the decision she wants to make. Carlisle smiles as he sees her face brighten.
Then, almost against her will, the muted darkness of her thoughts waves to the forefront of her mind.
It doesn't matter. You're too weak. You could never accomplish what he has.
He's never killed a human. And you're the executioner of thousands.
Carlisle's smile fades as the darkness clouds her eyes. He can see her struggle and aches to help her, but he knows this is a battle she must fight on her own. She can only enjoy walking up a mountain if she paves the path herself.
And then, out of nowhere, a spark of brilliance jumps into his mind.
"Bella," he exclaims, trying to beat back the defeat hanging around her like an oppressive cloud, "what bothers you so much about being a vampire?" She blanches and looks at him like he's an idiot.
The dryness of her tone says it all.
"Well, I think it would be obvious… you know, the whole bloody, killing, soulless part of it…" Carlisle's smile widens. Her confusion knows no bounds.
"Ah, see, I'm happy you mentioned that…soulless… issue of yours. You believe you have no soul? I believe you are wrong." He sees her balk and just barely contains a chuckle of endearment. It is disarming how well he can already predict her reactions. She is so like Edward.
"And I believe you are delusional." She bites back, all elements of revere and respect flying away from her voice and dying in a sad, pitiful kind of way.
Carlisle just smiles.
Bella fumes.
"Well, I guess you can say that. No doubt, I've heard it plenty of times before. Cauis, ah, do you know Cauis? The Volturi brother? Of course you do. Well, see, I was good friends with the leader, Aro, and his brother, Cauis, despised me. My diet disgusted him; he believed I was sparing those who didn't deserve it and depriving myself of that which I deserved at the same time. He also didn't take too kindly to my apprentices, as he believed that they didn't learn true control, and that they would eventually go insane from lack of nourishment. He, of course, defied my arguments of how I seemed to be fine after so long by refuting that I was already, in fact, insane. My grinning at him after the accusation seemed to reinforce his convictions." An amused smile pulls at his face.
"Anyways," he continues, his voice growing softer, more coaxing, "as I am apparently insane, I feel as if I must bestow some of my more neurotic ideas upon you, if only to show you the happiness that I have received through my eccentric revelations. There is something that I discovered long ago, when I was still only a few decades old, about humans and souls. And when I say humans, I include vampires in that category. Because, although we are alien in some respects, we are very similar to each other in many other ways. No other predator is as closely related to its prey as a vampire to a human. A vampire could even love a human and vice versa. No, don't scoff. It can happen, although the idea is a bit ludicrous. Even for me…"
"As I was saying, through my extensive observation of the human race, I discovered something unique about people. Any person in the world can become anybody."
A furrow appears between Bella's brows.
"What I mean is that any child can be famous, or smart, or perfect, or a criminal, or a martyr, or a fraud. Anyone can be anyone, depending on their circumstances. No one is born evil and no one is born a saint. Essentially, no person is born with a soul. Because our soul is our identity, and no one is born with an identity. We are all born like blank sheets of paper, waiting to be written on. What I believe, is that it is up to us to build our souls."
His eyes gleam with a sort of zealotry. The gold glows and begs Bella to understand.
The furrow deepens.
"The soul is not made up of what we feel or what we remember. It is not made up of what we experience or what we are born with. It is made up of our intentions, our good intentions. It is made in those moments before our decisions; those moments where we think not of ourselves but of the ones we care about. It is not made of love, but our capacity for love. Not of our sympathy, but our contemplation of sympathy. The human soul is built over the course of your life, and it becomes whole as your life goes on. When Edward changed you, it was like your soul was lost, because your identity was revolutionized. In your first kill you lost your soul, but that does not mean that you can not regain it!" He steps closer. She steps back.
"I lost my soul too, because although I didn't act on my desires, I still desired. I wished and almost gave in. My intention to give in destroyed the thing I had built up all my life. But then, through my refusal to give in again, I began to build from scratch. And now, here I am, easily able to resist the call of blood because I have something to remind me that I am in control of my own life, my own decisions, my own soul. And I believe you have some sort of a soul as well."
With this, his voice grows nearly inaudible, a whisper on the wind. Bella unconsciously leans closer to listen, unwillingly enraptured by this ludicrous idea.
"I believe you have fragments of a soul, fragments born from guilt and grief, and the desire to change. However, I do not believe this is healthy. Our souls are our identities, and it is never good if the basis of you, of Bella, is that of a guilty, depressed, vengeful cynic. I believe that in order for you to regain your soul, you must start from scratch; square one, shall we say."
"You must go back, Bella. You must go back and remember and relive. You have to forgive yourself and others. You have to move on. Only then can you heal and resist the temptations stronger than the weakness of your soul."
You must forgive him, Bella.
That whisper, however, is almost so soft as to be imagined.
~Bella~
She wanders the forest, trying to drown herself in the noises of all the meandering, careless life around her. This is the world, as it is, as it seems. There are no underlying truths, no moral crossroads, no barefooted ideals that seem harmless but are actually out to destroy her sanity. It's just the birds, the trees, and the clouds on the horizon.
"On the road to nowhere, I see." She whips around, already expecting the flash of bronze and the gleam of tawny gold.
"Edward." He leans against a tree, smiling pensively at her.
"What do you want?" She tries for the old biting tone of her voice, but she can only conjure weariness. Edward cocks his head to the side before pushing off the tree and walking towards her.
"You okay?" He asks, genuine concern melting into his face. She watches the stone features soften with something akin to affection.
No. And I hate that you're making me feel better by just being here.
She shrugs, turns, and walks. He follows, just like she expected him to. They amble in relative silence that is somewhat comfortable and somewhat anticipatory.
The birds called out to their nest-mates.
"I used to love ice cream."
She falters slightly in her step, her head turning only marginally to the side as she looks at him out of the corner of her eye. He is smiling, looking up at the trees and she is wondering why he is constantly blurting out the most random, trivial things. Why he is always so flustered and fumbling in his speech. Why he isn't perfect, after all.
And why on earth does she find it endearing?
"Excuse me?" Edward turns his head to look at her. They continue walking, not breaking eye contact.
"Let's play a game. Twenty questions. We'll count that as my first answer. Go."
"Uhm, okay? I mean-"
"What's your favorite pastime?"
"Reading, wait, no- I mean yeah. Reading."
He grins.
'Is that your final answer?" Against her will, she smiles back
It goes on like that until the sun is in its zenith and the shadows are short and sharp in the forest. Edward likes playing piano, listening to Bon Iver, and running through the Olympic Peninsula. Bella likes deep-sea swimming, traveling, and cliff diving. There is some laughter, some seriousness, and some sort of incredulousness that throws her off the ridge of reason. What is she doing? On one part of her brain she is talking to him, loving being out there with him, admiring his beautiful voice and body. On the other side of her brain she is dissecting everything that has happened in the day and numbly asking herself what changed.
"How did Jasper come to you?" She asks, half paying attention.
"Well, after he ran into Alice…" she doesn't hear the rest, instead jerking in surprise as something has just occurred to her. She interrupts him mid-sentence.
"When Alice was pretending to be Victoria, she told me that her mate changed her. Her mate is Jasper right? So they must have met before-" she stops, suddenly realizing that Edward is no longer next to her. She turns and watches as alarm flashes across his face. His eyes dart around the forest, looking for dangers. Then, in a flash, he is before her, holding her arms and leaning in.
Dazedly, she realizes that he is speaking. But he's so close…
"You can't tell anyone. Bella? BELLA. You can't tell, okay? You have to keep that a secret." The words reach her as if underwater. She closes her eyes, trying to gain her bearing. He smells so sweet, electricity singes her nerve endings. So close, so deliciously close.
"Why?" Breathlessly, she tears away. Putting distance between them so she can feel sane again.
"Can you keep a secret?" She nods tersely. He sighs and motions that they sit. Once seated on the ground, he begins to speak in an almost inaudible tone.
"You know that internment camp Jasper was talking about? Well, Alice was a nurse there in the camp's hospital. A man was brought in one day who refused to be treated despite the large cut on his leg. When Alice attempted to help him, he hit her across the head with such force that she went ricocheting off the adjacent wall and suffered a severe head injury. She was delirious and impaired for a while after that, and she was confined to the hospital ward where she became a patient. Her "episodes" of claiming to see certain things the others couldn't caused them to inject her with drugs, which made it all the worse. She was trapped in hell. Then Jasper came and killed her captors but only managed to bite her before moving on to his next victim." He sighs.
"It was enough. He changed her, and in doing so, restored her mental capacity with one quirk: her ability to tell the future."
"We don't know if her ability was caused first by the damage to her brain, or a latent talent she didn't know about, or if it was Jasper's venom itself. He's telepathic; maybe he can pass on supernatural abilities? We can't be sure; Alice is the only one we know of that he has changed. Either way, we don't want to find out. And we don't want anyone to know about it."
"Why? Why not? What's so wrong with knowing the truth?" Edward's mouth purses and he looks away for a second, squinting up into the fragmented sunlight. After a few seconds he turns back to her and leans in, his expression pleading and grim.
"We don't want anyone to know about it in case the Volturi find out and start jumping to conclusions. Telepath transforms human into a fortune-telling vampire? Even if that weren't true, they'd become interested in that brain injury she'd acquired. Can talents be made? They'd want to experiment; would end up torturing humans in their search for supernatural abilities. They collect talent like that with a somewhat unhealthy obsession. We don't want them interested in us in any way. Which is why only Jasper, Alice, Carlisle, and I know the truth. And now you do too; but can you see why this must be kept secret? Can you understand?" He pleads with her, concern for his family running through his voice. Without even hesitating she agrees. It is hard to say no to someone as beautifully sincere as he.
He grins and she can't help but think that the world is suddenly that much more beautiful. And that screaming banshee at the back of her brain gets shoved even further into the corner.
"I understand. I won't tell anyone."
They look at each other, gazes caught together like crumpled tape.
A rustle to their right snaps them out of it and they leap to their feet, ready and alert.
Bella watches with relief as the blonde goddess, Rosalie, emerges from the foliage, and she wonders how she didn't smell Rosalie when she was close by.
It's Edward's fault, of course; why does he have to be so beautiful? So distracting? So good when she knows otherwise?
Or does she?
She can't tell anymore.
Rosalie's golden eyes swirl alarmingly as she regards the two vampires together, shoulders brushing in their closeness. She thinks how their bodies are leaning towards each other, how Edward's eyes are shining with some kind of joy she had only rarely witnessed before.
Edward grins, his face alighting with happiness as he inches even closer to his missing puzzle piece.
"The Denali's are here." Rosalie whispers. Her voice seems fearful. Edward's regards her with alarm. Bella's eyes dart between the two of them in confusion.
Denali's?
"Sasha isn't here. It's just the sisters." Rosalie fidgets uncomfortably, her voice lowers even further.
"Edward, they need your help. Something has gone horribly wrong with their mother."
Edward tenses and unconsciously grabs Bella's hand. She instantly grips it, fighting the urge to throw him away; the other urge to pull him closer. The swirling vortex of hatred in her mind contracts as she shoves it in a cage. She cannot forget the names, the cold lips against her throat, but she can try.
"I believe that in order for you to regain your soul, you must start from scratch; square one, shall we say."
Alright, Carlisle. I'll do my best.
I guess square one starts here.