They both watched her slender body disappear behind the door frame, each lost in their own reverie of whom she had been to them, and who she was now destined to be for someone else. Their eyes and their hearts were heavy, but neither had time to dwell for long.
Rolling his shoulders back, Jacob groaned in pleasure when his bones cracked, the alignment of his human body still suffering from the punishing rapidity of his growth. From the moments he'd spent under Sam's tutelage he knew it would take a while to fully adjust, but he was impatient, his anger now a permanent friend as it incessantly bubbled under the surface of his skin.
"At least she didn't faint." Embry mused. Jake didn't need to look to his friend to know he would be wearing a face of forlorn disappointment.
"We're not telling her about Paul." Jake said, cutting to the quick as he pulled his shirt over his head, muffling his words.
"But you know she's gonna have questions. What the hell are we gonna tell her? She loses her mind when Paul's around, and you know she's too fucking smart to not think it's connected." Embry's voice lost its usual easy stride, the hard edges seeping in, something that had been happening more and more recently. The hand that Jake threw down on his shoulder took away some of his riled tension, but he was quick to throw off the comforting hand, not wanting his emotions dulled by the strength of his Alpha's touch.
"I don't care. She can wonder about it all she wants, but you know what she'll do if we tell her the truth. She'll be a fucking martyr to it, Emb, and you know it. He's too wrapped up in Sam's head right now and if they know how easily she could be manipulated, they'll walk all over her." Jake said firmly, knowing he wasn't going to back down, no matter how wrong his wolf told him his omission would be.
Billy had called them imprints, a soul mate chosen by the wolf to please the man. Jake knew a lot of what his father had called knowledge came from Sam, and Jake was still loathed to believe anything the old wolf said.
"Fine, you're the boss. But when she figures it out, don't think for a second I'm not gonna be the first one telling her this was all on you. I think you're playing with fire man; he's got some freaky control over her. If he really wanted to, I think he could turn her against us in a second." Embry said his peace and then started to walk away, all the while unsure whether Jake would actually let him go.
It had been a steep learning curve for the both of them, and a simplistic friendship had almost buckled under the new understanding that they would never be equals again, that Jacob would always have the power to force Embry's hand. It took a lot of trust on Embry's part to still walk by Jacob's side, but it didn't mean he wasn't aware of it with every breath he took.
"Hey, Bells. How're you holding up?" Embry asked as he threw his body down on the sofa next to her, a perfected impression of someone entirely at ease.
"Umm, I'm not sure really. I mean… yeah." Her voice was a little dazed and he couldn't help feeling the need to offer her comfort, to ease her distress.
"I know what you mean." He said softly, his eyes waiting for her to turn his way, but she never did. The appearance of Jacob in the doorway had effectively stolen her attention.
"Are you ready to go on?" Jake asked as he walked forward, taking his place right in front of her again.
Bella nodded her head, actually quite eager to understand what she'd seen a little better.
They waited while Jacob aligned his thoughts, recognizing that he should have planned this all a little better as he struggled to formulate anything that was neither intimidating nor ultimately complex.
"I don't know where to begin." Jacob admitted and the chortle of laughter which fell from his lips cut through the room, releasing everyone from the hold that had been gripping them all. A familial easiness washed away the lasting tension and Jacob watched as both Bella and Embry's muscles lost their tautened edge.
"How many of you are there?" Bella asked, her voice high and light as her eyes danced back and forth over the two boys in front of her, boys who were now wearing the disguises of who they should have become many years from now. She was fairly certain she already knew the answer, but she still wanted to watch it fall from Jacob's tongue.
"Right now there are five: me, Emb, Sam, Paul and Jared." Jacob stated and Bella rolled the names through her mind, pleased to have a name to go with the man she'd seen often by Sam's side. She didn't have long to ponder, as her question seemed to spur something within Jake.
"The last pack died out with my grandfather, everyone but Sam." Bella opened her mouth to interrupt, but Jake just grinned, held up his hand to stop her and then continued on. "I know, crazy right? But it's the duty of each pack to leave one of their brothers behind to guide the next generation, or at least that's what Billy says."
"But how? I mean, how hasn't anyone figured out that he's…?" Bella tried to mentally calculate how old Sam actually was, but she found the thought actually more shocking than seeing her friend as a giant canine.
"He lives on the edges of the rez, in a cabin that looks like it's been there since the beginning of time, but then you know that, don't you." Jacob stated rather than asked, his eyes masking his true feelings on the subject.
"I'm sorry about that night, Bells. It was the first time I phased into a wolf and things were pretty messed up. Sam was meant to guide us all, to make this whole thing easier, but something's happened to him, Bells. Whether it was the years he spent alone, or everything that happened over the summer, I don't know." Jake sighed and looked to Embry with sad eyes, understanding passing between them.
"Anyway, because of my bloodline, I was always meant to be Alpha, Sam knew that and until I was ready he was supposed to look after everyone, but my wolf didn't like what he'd become. I was only in his pack for a few minutes."
Bella was a little confused and both Embry and Jacob watched as she drew her eyebrows down, mentally working through what she'd heard.
"So Sam's taken over?" She asked finally.
"Sort of. There's only meant to be one pack, but right now there're two. Sam's wolf is old and strong, strong enough that he's controlling Jared and Paul, whether they want to see it that way or not."
Looking to Embry, Jake paused, silently asking his friend if he would like to share his story.
"I phased a little before Jake. I think they knew it was going to happen at some point because of Paul and me. They took me out into the forest and pushed me until I broke."
Bella wasn't sure she wanted to ask, but she couldn't help the words as they sprung from a place of pure curiosity. "How did they push you?"
Embry seemed reluctant to answer, but finally he pieced his words together, but only because it was her asking. "It doesn't matter, Bells. Whatever they did, it worked. I guess that's all you really need to know." He seemed ashamed for reasons Bella couldn't understand, but when she went to grab his hand, he pulled away basking in the memory and trying to suppress the anger that was threatening to spill over within him.
"The wolf is instinctual, Bells, primal even. Anger, or any strong emotion really, is pretty key to that. It's a really great way to force the phasing process to accelerate, as you saw for yourself." It took her a couple minutes to actually grasp what Jake was telling her and once she did, she replayed every moment of the night when Paul had pressed her up against a tree, remembering the things he'd said to her friend.
"He knew you were going to phase?" She said the last word a little uncertainly, hoping she was using their terminology correctly.
"Yeah, and he was trying to stop me." Jake said reluctantly, knowing they were in dangerous territory. Bella sensed the discomfort in the air, and decided to move quickly to change the subject. "So, why now? You said Sam's been around since your grandfather's time, so what about Billy, was he a wolf too?"
"No, he wasn't." Jake said, and then he placed his elbows down on his knees, leaning forward. "Bells, you told Embry that Paul made you promise to call him if Alice comes near you, can you think why that would be?" His eyes penetrated right into her, twisting her stomach as she tried to abandon her disbelief.
"They're vampires?" Her voice was hesitant, but then Jake was nodding his head and what she knew about the world began to fall apart. She didn't know why it needed to happen at this moment rather than the ones that had come before, but suddenly this whole thing had taken on a new clarity. Her lungs wouldn't fill right, and the more she thought about how she needed just one deep breath to balance herself, she drew in little shaky gulps of air, each one less satisfying than the last.
"Breathe, Bells, just breathe." Jake said firmly, and he lifted her chin, forcing her to find his comforting stare. His body rose and fell with hers and after a few minutes of hand holding, she could finally fill her body with sweet air.
It made perfect sense. The Cullens had never been quite right in her mind, but of course she was never going to be crazy enough to make the leap to Vampire. "So Alice eats people?" Bella asked incredulously, finding the image impossible to actually manifest.
"No. The Cullens only feed from animals. They lived in Forks a long time ago and created an agreement with the old pack."
Bella's mind still felt like it was overloading with all the information she was trying to process. "So, this agreement... It means that they don't hurt people?" She asked, hoping to understand.
"No, they chose that life for themselves. The agreement means we won't kill them, at least so long as they maintain their current diet." Embry interjected and she nodded slowly.
"So they know about you? About the whole wolf thing?" Remembering the way Edward had promised to tell her everything she wanted to know, she wondered what his angle was. "So that's why they didn't want me to come down here?" She added, pleased to have found a connection with something which had previously left her baffled.
"Yeah, they think we're dangerous, that we can't control ourselves." Bella listened to Jake's words and remembered Paul saying that something which was perhaps a little more honest.
"So if the Cullens are vampires, why are they here? I mean, I don't get it, they come to school." Bella couldn't conceive any reason why anyone would attend high school for any longer than absolutely necessary.
"It's not like in the books, Bells, they can come out in the day. And to be perfectly honest, I don't really know what's up with the Cullens, but they aren't like normal leeches. I think maybe they're just trying to fit in." Jacob really didn't seem to know much. Bella stifled her snort, the one where she figured if all the Cullens were trying to do was fit in, then maybe they needed another game plan.
"Do you have any questions?" Embry asked, drawing her from her thought process currently swirling.
"So, do Alice and Edward, I mean the Cullens, they know about you all, right?" It hadn't come out quite as succinctly as she hoped, but the main point was still there.
"Yeah they do, Bells. Embry was in Sam's pack longer than I was, not by much, but he did manage to see that they know who we are, or at least that the pack is back." Jacob responded easily, but something in his words caught Bella's attention, something she hadn't picked up on before.
"What do you mean Emb's seen?"
Jacob ruffled his eyebrows for a moment, wondering if he really had been so careless to omit something so obvious, but he couldn't remember saying anything regarding the pack mind. "Sorry Bells, I'm fucking this whole thing up, aren't I? I don't even know how to explain it really, but when we're phased, when we're wolves, we can see the thoughts of the other guys in the pack."
"So you can read their minds?" Bella tried to help, hoping she was filling in the gaps that Jacob was failing to explain.
"No, not exactly. It's like being able to see through two people's thoughts at once, but only being able to pick out the most important things. Like a satellite feed that only picks up the clearest channels."
Bella didn't exactly appreciate the technological example, but she could grasp what he was trying to say. "So when you guys are wolves, you can read the most prominent thoughts. Does that mean you still can hear Sam?" Bella asked, trying again to find some clarity now that the waters had been muddied once again.
"No, like I said before, Sam has taken temporary control of Jared and Paul, and I'm not strong enough yet to bring them into our pack. Until then, we can't hear them."
Hearing Paul's name again brought a whole new influx of thoughts cascading over Bella's mind and instead of thinking about what she would like answered, she was secretly wondering what Paul's wolf looked like and whether his fur would be soft or not.
The light in the room was beginning to fade and though the two boys had the strength of vision to correct the difference, it also made them equally aware that their fragile companion did not. Silently Jacob asked Embry whether he thought she'd had enough for the day, and when he received a decisive nod in response, they both rose to their feet.
"We need to get you home, Bells. You need some time to think about everything." Jacob said firmly and she rose herself, thinking perhaps she might protest. "Can I ask more questions tomorrow?" She asked, knowing that if this was a one-day open season she was going to sit down until midnight and her voice was hoarse.
"You can ask anything, Bells, anytime. I promise." Embry said with an assured smile, and so she allowed him to lead her back out to the car, her focus dwindling as she delved deeper and deeper into everything she'd learnt.
The ride home was definitively shorter than the one out and while Jacob promised to fix and return her truck the next day, she bid goodnight hesitantly, unsure of the knowledge she now possessed.
Tucked underneath her bedspread, she tried to force herself to sleep, but the truth of the day was heavy on her mind. When sleep did finally come, the claws and talons of enemies unknown had her writhing in a restless state until her mind could simply take no more.
a/n: Thank you to my wonderful beta Twitculate... I'll see you all again on Wednesday
xxx