I love, love, love that you guys have shown support in this story. Thank you much. However, and not to sound picky or whiny, but a lot of you have put me on your alerts or on your faves and not left me a review! I just want to know why you like it, not only that you do. Pretty please review for me?

I'm saying right now that this chapter will be edited. Fixed. I'm not happy with it, but I have a strong need to get to the next one. Haha, just be warned you might not like this one.

To Err Is Human

"You can close your eyes to the things you do not want to see, but you cannot close your heart to the things you do not want to feel."

anonymous

I've never really given a thought to simplicity; to what a blessing it would be should it gift me with its bliss. My life has always been wrought with chaos, ripe with sharp turns and unexpected obstacles. Being the dethroned princess of a falling nation made simplicity a foreign concept. And I'd never longed for it.

Now, as the gentle surf licks at my toes, I find myself imagining an alternate universe. One where I'm happy, married, a mother. A reality where there is no threat of looming war. Where there are no assassinations or rivers of blood or kings at each other's throats. I wonder what's brought on these thoughts that have never plagued me before. Edward? Or is it the feeling that something drastic has happened, and I am merely sitting, waiting here for the consequences to reveal themselves?

From my perch on the damp rocks it is easy to see when the door opens from the servant's quarters in the kitchen, easier to see the radiant beauty that emerges from them. Edward walks across the sand, hazy sunlight kissing his skin, erasing all thoughts from my mind. He is dressed the most casually I've ever seen him—brown breaches and a loose, light tunic. His feet are bare as mine, auburn hair deliciously free in the breeze.

In moments he is before me, his torso level with my knees, his hands resting uselessly beside my thighs.

I sigh, "Edward."

It must be the utterance of his name from my lips that lightens his eyes once again to golden-rod, that paints that perfectly imperfect smile across his mouth, "Good morning, Bella."

Something tugs gently within me as he says my name, and even though I'm still angry, still hurt from the lies, I smile too.

"I owe you an apology," he whispers to the wind, and is voice is carried gently to my ears, "No, I owe you much more than that."

I don't respond. I wouldn't know what to say.

"When you first came here as a prisoner—when I first saw you," I blush, remembering our awkward first meeting, "you smelled so delicious Bella. My nature, my instincts were screaming at me to take you then. My mind wasn't so sure."

I furrow my brow and he can see I am confused as his hand comes up to smooth the crease from my forehead, "It is in me to kill, Bella. My body demands blood to stay reasonably sentient. Some people appeal to me more than others. You are one of those rare few," I feel my heart constrict at the thought of Edward, blood thirsty and suffering each time in my presence. If I had known what he was then would I have noticed his internal struggle? Would I have cared? "But you were lovely, and witty, and quick of tongue," he continues, twirling a lock of my windswept hair between his fingers, "and I was enraptured by your intricacy. I considered telling you—if only to be fair—when I began to care for you as much more than a guard for his charge. I began to notice how beautiful you looked in the morning all groggy with mussed hair. I love how you speak your mind, your heart—how wonderfully honest you are. But I didn't want to frighten you with the truth. I didn't want you to look at me as you looked at me the other night…"

He chuckles sadly, and I know the climax is coming. The big 'but' at the end of every good thing. The tragic, contradictory part that no one likes to hear.

"Bella," he mutters, smile slipping into nonexistence, "I've lived a long time and never have I felt this way. There have been few others of course, but none have meant to me what you mean now. It's amazing how you've managed to work your way into my heart in such short a time, in such difficult a circumstance.

"I don't deserve your affections, I shouldn't have them. I'm dangerous, to you most especially. But the least I beg for is your forgiveness, your understanding in why we can never be."

Fury rises in me hot and fast, and the words come as they always have, easily, "I won't understand that," I say quietly, "You're foolish to think that I don't already care for you, Edward, that I'm not already attached. You've had my forgiveness since the moment you walked out here, and you'll always have it… unconditionally. I do understand that you're dangerous, that you're a hazard to my very life but I don't care. I don't care. It's too late to be cautious. This," I motion vaguely to the space between us, "is already too much to bury. Don't ask me to forget about you, Edward. I can't. I won't."

I feel as if I've set aflame, my skin hot with the unrefined sincerity in my words. His skin is cold as ice. We are unbalanced. We are opposites. But we make up two sides of a bizarre whole.

"This goes against--."

"I don't care."

"But our families--."

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it."

"Bella…"

"Edward," I whisper harshly, taking his face between my hands, "stop thinking."

He laughs huskily and the warmth in my belly ignites as his eyes smolder, locking on to mine. His arms wrap around my back, and his mouth hungrily searches for my lips, joining us in a heated kiss. There is an underlying feeling of danger now, of prohibition… and I can only clutch him tighter.

Aro has not returned to the castle in two days. I've not seen hide nor hair of any of the royal family, in fact—except for Edward and Alice. Carlisle and Esme have retreated to their summer home—Cambria, while Emmett, Rosalie, and Jasper remain here in Bristol.

A petal becomes fine dust between my fingertips as I grate the little, purple piece. I've picked thirty of them so far; from roses, lilies, tulips, hydrangeas, marigolds. My body is buried in the garden, my hair tangled in the stems of the flora. Long, wispy grass tickles at my skin, engulfing me in a natural ecstasy.

I'd always loved the serenity of nature, the pure, brutal honesty it depicted. There were no façades to keep, no secrets. Just the bees and the flowers, the predators and their prey.

Another petal falls, unidentifiable, to the sea of green below me. Footsteps approach but I pay them no mind, unconsciously closing my eyes a little tighter.

It isn't long, no, not long at all before I feel the soft, welcome pressure of his lips on mine—the sweet fill of his breath in my lungs. His kisses are cherished things, and I can't return the action without smiling to myself, thankful that I have stumbled on someone who makes me so profoundly happy.

"I knew I'd find you out here," he whispers, knowing not to disrupt the peace, "you seem to like it very much."

I drape my arm around his neck, brushing his cheek with the rose in my hand. It's true that the garden holds no good memory; it's the same place that Q first told me of his true nature, of Edward's. But it's beautiful, and I feel home here, somehow. More connected to Ireland's green hills than anywhere else in dreary England.

"It's pretty," I offer quietly, shrugging my shoulders and feeling them roll against his hands on my back, "and quiet."

I barely catch his furrowed brow before he lowers his head to my chest, his hair tickling the skin of my collar bone. I squirm until I am comfortable beneath him, and I feel his body relax into mine. I can't smother the fire that ignites within me every time he is even near, so it is especially hard to extinguish the blaze that comes to life when we touch. Can he feel the heat?

Slowly, almost shyly, his long fingers begin to trace designs on my waist, skittering across my skin as a flat rock on a pond. I feel the blush before it shows itself. Not one of embarrassment, one of arousal, but it soon turns to mortification when Edward lifts his head, following the rush of blood with darkening eyes.

"I'm sorry," I breathe, though I can't say why. He shakes his head, grins, and then gently lowers his head again, increasing the pressure of his ministrations on my stomach.

It's a rare moment, one that fills me with something greater than just lust.

I don't know the feeling. If I had to describe it in words I would be unable, lost, grasping at straws to try and explain exactly how my heart swells with simply the feel of him so close—both body and otherwise. Somehow, Edward and I are connected far deeper than just skin to flesh. And I relish in that bond, hoping I will never lose it, hoping it will never fade.

Alice twirls my hair into intricate designs, taking down each one just as carefully as she put it up. Finally, she settles for leaving it just the way I've always had it—waving softly to my waist.

"You have such pretty hair, Bella," she says wistfully, running a hand through her own short locks, "I'm jealous."

Laughing, I smile at her through the mirror, "Don't be. It's a lot of work. Maybe I'll chop all of mine off too…"

Her playful eye roll is a comfort—Alice and I have become closer since the Night Everything Changed. She makes me feel somewhat more comfortable here; doing my hair, conversing with me on the trivial things, and those things that plague me about my relationship with her brother. She's a good companion, a good friend, and it bothers me that I was so cruel to her before.

Edward appears at the door a while later, invading our good mood with his haggard frown. Immediately my smile slips, and I walk tentatively toward him, "What's wrong?"

"Aro's returned."

How amazing that two, simple words could send a trickle of ice down my spine. I smile bemusedly through my discomfort, "And…?"

"He wants to see us all," Edward sighs tiredly, and I can almost glimpse the gears turning in his mind, "in an hour."

"An hour," I deadpan, looking at Alice who has gone stony in the corner, "Alice?"
Her name seems to bring her back to Earth, and she shakes her head, "Oh, I'm fine Bella," she lies, not smoothly enough, "just lost track of reality for a moment."

I bid her goodbye as she makes her excuses, the door shutting swiftly behind her. For a moment all I can do is stare at Edward—at the worried frown, the pinched brow, and the harried eyes. They flash to mine… and then we're kissing again.

His lips, soft but hard, ravage mine, turning my mouth to raw flesh beneath his. I gasp, and Edward is not deaf to my pleasure. He smiles, pulling away for a moment before moving his scorching, torturous kisses down my neck, towards my chest. His hands meet him there, four fingers holding me around the torso, his thumbs gently massaging the undersides of my breasts.

A veil drapes over my eyes and the insatiable burning in my stomach returns, growling silently of its lust. I want to tell him, explain exactly how I feel for him and what I want, but he is muffling my words with his actions. How can one speak when they are immersed in rapture?

"Bella," my lips hurt, but I can't stop kissing him. My hands, shy and careful as a fox, explore the underside of his shirt, pressing against his back to feel the hard ridges and chiseled planes. His flesh feels like stone, and his skin, cold as fresh snow. But I can't be bothered by his temperature. It doesn't seem to matter to me.

"What?" I respond, and I hardly recognize my voice, quiet and breathy as it is.

"We should stop," he murmurs, lips creating tender ripples against my skin, "before I'm unable to do so."

"Don't be so dramatic," I chuckle, pulling away from him the slightest bit, "always so dramatic, Edward." But his eyes are dark, and his mouth is pinched, and I know that I've pushed to far.

I open my mouth—to apologize maybe, but he beats me to words, "Don't say you're sorry," he commands, "there's nothing to be sorry for. I'm not."

Sighing, I disentangle myself from him, bringing his knuckles to my lips and kissing them, "okay," I whisper, waggling my eyebrows, making my voice low and dangerous "… onward to our judgment."

He cracks a smile, but his words contradict his actions, "Not funny, Bella."

Not funny at all, it seems.

As soon as we enter the long hall, I get the feel of a court room, of an execution perhaps. Aro sits at the head of the grand room, tapping his fingers on the arm of his splendid chair that resembles somewhat of a throne. To each King his own, I suppose.

"Isabella," he greets me curtly, red eyes swimming with an unseen fury, "Edward."

We are no more than guard and charge now, Edward's hand no where near my body, our stances stiff and unfamiliar, but somehow in sync. Though I do not know them very well, Caius and Marcus look at me with something akin to thorough knowledge. Can they read me as well as the rest of their kin seems to be able to?

"Do you know why you're here, Isabella?"

Marcus' monotone is unsettling, and an earthquake of goose flesh erupts across my skin as I utter a quiet 'no'.

He surveys me through tired, claret eyes, "Very well," but he's not speaking to me any more, but to his brother, "it seems that you're wrong about her intelligence. She seems more of an imbecile than a genius to me."

Aro laughs softly, "No, she's just a cunning little mastermind, aren't you Bella, dear?"

"You know," I cut in, peeved, "I'm standing right here," my gaze slides coldly to Marcus, "and I'm not an idiot. I know what you are, and now I'm here to pay the price of that knowledge. Correct?"

In the dark corner, Q stirs uncomfortably.

"Yes, yes, Bella," Aro dismisses my aggression, "You're here right now because I have nothing left to barter with. Tomorrow a courier will inform your father of your untimely death. Charlie will become enraged with grief, and he will make a hurried, unplanned attempt at storming my army," Aro's eyes meet mine with finality, "he will die, and this war will end. The way I've always wanted it to."

Before I can speak he is continuing along with his monologue, "But you won't be dead, Bella. You'll be at Cambria, you see, with Carlisle. And you'll live out your days with the knowledge that your father is dead because you are much too curious, because you simply had to know things that no human should."

I look at Q, wondering what lie he told them to save his own skin.

"He won't come," I growl loudly, afraid to look at Edward, "he won't come, and you'll fail, again. The only way you'll win this war is by using your inhuman advantage! You're a tyrant, a shameless dictator! You're no king," I feel tears in my eyes at my own denial, "… you're nothing but a monster."

Aro steps from his throne and in seconds he is in front of me, grasping my chin in his stony hand, "And you are just a girl who will be the cataclysm of this war. The downfall of her people."

"No," I whisper, "you're the downfall of my people. I'm just another pawn in this game of yours."

He smiles. I cry, I beg, I plead. But nothing softens him. Nothing sweetens him.

And everything I love is burning, lost to the fire in his eyes.

is there anything
worth looking for
worth loving for
worth lying for
is there anything
worth waiting for
worth living for
worth dying for