Sorry about the wait, I have been REALLY busy lately and haven't had a chance to really sit down and work on this. You guys can thank my best friend for her idea to have "Stripper Fridays"... every Friday. But you guys were never far from my mind! So, on we go!

Thank you all for your reviews, alerts, and favorite adds! It makes my heart so happy! Keep it coming! And I have decided once and for all that yes: I am going to do a Bellice story at the conclusion of this one. A reader called Shabbacabba gave me quite the motivation for it. Thank you, Shabbacabba, and this chapter is for you. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but OCs...

AndiePOV:

"So, what are we going to talk about? I know you already know," I teased my Alice as we walked back to the house at a somewhat human pace. Neither of us was in a hurry to be amongst everyone else, enjoying the company of just us two.

"Well, we have to explain the basics to you, explain the laws and such," she replied with a shrug, and I wrinkled my brow in confusion.

"There's laws?"

Alice nodded, slowing down to an even slower pace. "There are laws, and there are those that enforce them," she said evenly, and I sensed a tightness to her voice. "You see, vampires are usually solitary creatures, unless mated and traveling with said mate. Covens as large as ours are uncommon, almost unheard of. Ours is now nine vampires strong, and several of us have gifts. That in itself is a... threat, to other vampire covens. Now, our cousins, the Denali clan, they are like us in many ways. They live as we live with each other, in peace and love. They value life of all kinds, same as we Cullens. Their family is not so large as ours, however, and the gifts not so rampant. Kate and Eleazar remain the only gifted immortals in their family."

"Kate?" I asked, surprised. "How is she gifted?"

"It's a rather painful touch, akin to an electrical current that runs all over her body," Alice answered, and I pursed my lips in thought. Kate seemed to be such a gentle person, I couldn't imagine her hurting anyone on purpose. "But as I was telling you, there is a coven even larger than ours and our cousins' combined. There is a city in Italy called Volterra, and it is known as a sort of royal city for vampires, as it is the home of the Volturi."

I mouthed the word "Volturi". It just sounded dirty, under-handed. It reminded me strongly of crime family names I'd read about in my studies.

"The Volturi consist of an heirarchy, their personal guard, and then a slew of lackeys at their beck and call." Wow, they sounded like the fucking vampire mafia, too. "The leader, Aro, is an ancient vampire even older than Carlisle, and he is flanked always by his brothers Marcus and Caius. Aro is a collector, for lack of a better word. He likes pretty toys, and he finds those with unique and strong gifts to recruit into service. He was so interested in how Bella would turn out as a vampire, he allowed her to leave Volterra with the knowledge that we exist, and that is their number one law: humans can't know about us."

"Well, that one seems to be broken consistently," I muttered, thinking about Bella, myself, and my father.

Alice gave a tight-lipped smile. "Indeed," she said softly, giving a single nod. "However, I do not think they will judge me too harshly once we go to present you to them. Mates are a different story."

It took a second after she said that for what she actually said to sink in. "Huh? Present me?"

Alice nodded. "It is courtesy that we take our mates to Volterra to meet them. I will probably even invite them to the wedding, to be quite honest."

My mouth dropped open in a very human gesture of incredulance. "Why, Alice?"

"Because it's polite, Andrea, and not to mention that if we didn't, it could cause unnecessary suspicion and then a resulting drama. It's been quiet in our lives for a few years now, we don't want their attention back on us. We just want to live."

I stopped, looking at Alice with my head cocked to one side. "What do you mean, their attention 'back' on you?"

She sighed and turned around to fully face me. "You know how we live. We pose as humans, live human lives despite what we truly are. We interact with them, we respect them. The Volturi do not share the same views as we do. They see humans as their prey, and nothing more. Humans are animals to be cultivated merely for sustenance, like cattle or pigs. It's strange to them how we abstain from what they see as the proper diet for an immortal, and it makes them uncomfortable. They don't understand how taming our demons can help us create stronger bonds, true bonds; not for the power advantage or a necessity. We live together because we are family." She paused and reached her face to mine to press her lips to my frown, and I couldn't help but grin when she pulled back to continue. "They view us as a threat to their dominance of our race, the lawmakers, the judges, the executioners. They truly cannot trust us, though Aro knows every thought most of us have ever had, as it is his own unique gift."

"He can read thoughts like Edward?"

"A bit differently. Edward can only hear current mind trains, and he can hear from up to a half mile radius. Aro, though he can hear everything you've ever told yourself, he has to do it through physical contact."

We walked on in silence for a second. "So, your family is a constant thought in the back of this guy's mind?"

"Our family, and most likely."

I smiled at her correction, slipping my hand in hers. But then the smile slid from my face with my next thought. "Does he want to... collect you?"

Alice gave a slight nod of confirmation, and snorted. "And Edward, and Bella, and Jasper, and I'm sure he wouldn't say no to Emmett showing up with his impressive width," she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

I snarled a little bit at the thought of this Aro fucker collecting my mate. "Good thing I'm just your every day, run of the mill vampire," I tried to joke, pushing the territorial side down.

Alice smacked my upper arm playfully. "You are far from an every day, run of the mill vampire," she told me seriously, making me nudge her.

"Oh, yeah? How so?" I shot back with a wink, to which she laughed and stopped walking again.

She looked at me from head to toe and back again slowly, her eyes stopping on my teasing grin grin playing on my lips, so I did something that would drive her nuts: I swept the tip of my tongue across them and then let the bottom lip hang, so it glistened kissably. "I don't look at every vampire I know and want to merge into a single being with them," she began softly, and my cocky grin faded as she slid her arms around me and locked her eyes into mine. I noticed for the first time that there was a lilac light that shone behind her pupil, deep inside of her. I wondered briefly why she never told me that vampires could see souls, because that is what my instinct told me: I was seeing her soul. "And all I can think about right now is being as close to you as physically, emotionally, mentally, and as subconsciously as possible. I want to be the other half of you." Her breath brushed across my lips as she leaned closer, her nose against mine.

"You already are," I whispered, closing the distance and kissing her. She didn't pull away until my fist clenched in her hair, tugging her face even closer.

"Andie, I swear, we are going to take care of that part," she said softly, stroking my face. "We just have to handle business first. It's all a part of being what we are."

"Let's get it over with, then," I grumbled, and it made her giggle.

"Race you!" Alice said, taking off like a lightning bolt towards home, and I laughed as I took off after her.

She made me feel so light and happy, like I had just woken up from a refreshing nap with oodles of energy to handle anyhting thrown at me. I could get used to this feeling. I loved the heat that exploded in my chest when her eyes locked onto mine, even now. Though my heart did not physically beat, in those moments with Alice when it was just us and our eyes, I swear to you I could feel a phantom flutter in my chest. Watching her dance in her twists and turns as she ran ahead of me, I allowed her to beat me as we cleared the trees into the back yard just out of sheer awe: I couldn't break the spell she had casted on me with the last kiss we'd shared, when I saw her soul the first time.

There was a loud crash in the house before Edward flew outside and was in my face, clenching the collar of my shirt, his eyes wide and crazed. "WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?" he bellowed at me, and I shoved him off of myself, making him fly thirty feet through the air. When he landed on his feet, Alice was already crouched in front of me, torn between protecting me and calming me, but the predominant expression on her face was confusion.

I hissed at Edward as he tried to come closer, but he stopped in his movements and lifted his hands palm out. "I'm sorry, Andie, I didn't mean to react like that. Only, as your thoughts reached my mind when you and Alice arrived, you were thinking something about seeing Alice's soul."

"Yeah, so?" I growled, still slightly in a defensive mode, as he had provoked me with his rash actions and loud tone.

"We don't have souls," he said quietly, and Alice looked at me curiously when I snarled at him. His soul was shining brightly behind his golden orbs, a silvery sheen behind the black of his own pupil, and it seemed to shine even more when he said his opinion.

"I beg to differ," I said scathingly, irked with this whole scene. He attacks me, surrenders, then insults my mate by saying she had no soul. It seemed he couldn't see souls, no matter how clearly our thoughts reached his Inner Ear. "Her soul is lilac colored, and yours is silver."

Alice looked at me as if she'd never seeen me at the same time Edward gave a cry. I looked at Edward, and his entire eyes had been consumed with his soul, the silvery light so bright that I was surprised I didn't have to squint in its brilliance. Confusion overtook my irritation with Edward, and he started to laugh. "I can see it! Oh my- Bella!" he was excited, like a little kid on Christmas morning who wakes his parents up before the sun rises.

"Alice, what the hell is going on? You can't see souls?" I asked my mate, who had been watching me with her mouth open since I'd named the colors of their souls.

"Andie- baby- oh, god, what a talent," she breathed, looking at me with innocent eyes, fully fed, brightly yellow, and her flicker of lilac deep within.

Talent?

Bella came out of the treeline from the direction of the cottage she and Edward shared near the main house, and Edward met her half way, picking her up and swinging her around joyfully with a beautiful laugh escaping his throat. "Edward! What's gotten into you?" Bella asked with a nervous chuckle as he set her down on her feet and swooped in to plant a hearty kiss on her cheek.

"Come on, I want Andie to see something," he said, ignoring her questions and dragging her forth to where Alice and I waited near the back door steps.

But I could see her lavender shimmer from where he had stopped her, and seeing this in my mind made Edward give whoop and do a back flip, at which Bella stopped with her mouth open. "What the hell, Edward?" she asked, and he laughed again, taking her hand and kissing it.

"We have souls, love," he told her, and Bella rolled her eyes.

"I know that, I've told you for years that you have a soul," she replied, but he shook his head and gestured to me.

"Andie can see them, Bella! I can see in her mind- there's a light in each of our eyes, unique to the holder... and her talent's instincts tell me- and her- that it's the essence in the body, that it is our very souls."

I almost flinched when he was back at our side, holding his arms open with a crooked grin. "Andie, I understand that you are new, that you don't know from Adam, but- I have to hug you." And with that he pulled me into his muscular chest and crushed me to his heart. "I have long spent my existence telling myself that I, and all of our kind, are soulless monsters. There was no proof to the truth, until you came into my life, you gorgeous girl. Thank you, thank you."

Alice gave a squeak of surprise from beside me, and I gave her frightened look as Edward released me. She shook her head at the spectacle, and laughed a little. "Well, so much for you being an every day, run of the mill vampire, huh? You're going to be coveted... and Aro is going to flip his ancient wig."

"He wears a wig?" I asked blankly, and that made Alice, Bella, and Edward bust into deep laughter.

Alice cupped her hand on my jaw and just shook her head at me with a small smile, then pulled me close. "You are one of a kind," she whispered to me. "There's no immortal in this world that could have answered that age old question, and yet here you come into my life like a stranger in the night; only yu have this big, bright flashlight, and you've helped me find my escape from darkness."

"Wish I could have made it sooner," I whispered back, and she squeezed me tighter.

The talk wasn't as long as I feared it would be. As Alice had given me a brief run down about the Volturi and their purpose, the only things to really cover was the laws, the life-style, the courtesies, and the school thing. It was made clear that if we were going to remain with the coven, I would most defintely have to continue the school thing once I was a controlled individual. I sort of whined a little about that, and Carlisle only smiled.

"Well, Andrea, you seemed like you were a good student, Alice spoke highly of your work ethic and your intelligence," he reasoned. "With the vampire's brain, it will be a thousand times simpler; we store information much like a computer."

I scoffed, thinking about the amount of attention Alice would get while walking down the halls of American Dream High, and Edward gave a chuckle in his throat at my jealousy. I bared my teeth at him, making him roll his eyes playfully, and gesture to me as if saying, "Simmer down."

"She doesn't like the thought of humans approaching me," Alice explained to Esme and Carlisle when they glanced between their eldest son and their youngest daughter- me.

"Of course not," Carlisle said gently. "It is different with us, than humans. However, even as a human, you showed every sign of being mated very much in the vampiric way."

"Alice tried to explain that to me."

"Tried, being the operative word," Alice muttered from beside me, and I gave her a nudge that made me gasp in pain, rubbing her side while giving me an accusatory glare. "That hurt."

"Sorry, babe, I didn't mean to do it so hard," I apologized, and we all heard Emmett chuckle from the living room where he was playing Jasper in CoD, via Xbox Live.

"Yeah, right!" he joked, and I felt my anger rise before he could even make his punchline. "That's all you could say the other night- 'Oh, Alice, harder, faster, oh, Alice'-"

Before I could get to my feet, Alice had already flown into the living room, and we could hear the sound of her tiny fists pounding him in quick succession, and Emmett's laughter. "Aw, Alice, stop, it tickles- Oh. Wait, Rosie, I was just playing arou- OW!" A sharp slap echoed through the house, and my mate came back into the dining room with her arms crossed over her chest and a smug look on her beautiful face.

"Thank you, Rose," I called to the living room, and I heard Emmett grunt, but his voice was muffled.

"She's gagging him with her hand," Edward answered all our gazes, and we went right back into the conversation as if nothing had happened.

"But after they realize you're together, generally they will back off; and then there's the fact, that though we are pleasing to the eyes, there is a natural repulsion in them for our kind."

"But there's always anomalies, such as that bitch Jessica Stanley, who think that persistence brings you glory," Bella complained from across the table between Esme and Edward. "She sat in my wedding, drooling over Edward from start to finish."

"As her now-husband was having a party in his pants, thinking about if it were him taking you on the honeymoon?" Edward said offhandedly, and Bella opened her mouth to retort.

"Kids," Esme said warningly, and the two of them fell silent, though I am sure they were still thinking back.

"For the record, Edward's right," Alice piped up, unable to contain herself. "Mike Newton was a fruitcake, and Jessica Stanley was just too stupid to be repelled."

"Alice!"

"Sorry, Esme," she said, her head hanging in shame, and I couldn't help but smile at the totally cute posture. Alice lifted her head just slightly, and stuck her tongue out at me for laughing. So painfully adorable. Mine. All mine.

Edward cleared his throat pointedly, and I shook myself at of the thoughts that were flooding my mind, but it's not like I could stop them. I'd been conscious and active for sixteen hours, and not once have I had my mate. To make matters even worse, I'd come close, too close the last time to shake the arousal that had been lurking right beneath the thin surface of my control. I could feel myself start to get territorial again, realizing that there were several vampires around us, and I had not claimed my mate properly yet. Did they know she was mine? My scent lacked on her skin; I didn't like that. My hand reached over and began touching her thigh, and she closed a hand on my wrist with a pained expression. "You're not making this easy for me," she chided me. "I want to just as much as you do, Andrea. You just have to swallow it for now."

"Yeah, 'cause you know Alice doesn't do spitting!" came Emmett's voice again, and then another resounding smack, and his resulting grumbles. I barely noticed any of it.

"On the subject of your talent," Carlisle went on, pointedly ignoring Emmett, "I think we should have Eleazar come for a visit, and perhaps he can help you understand it, and its impact on you."

"Ooo, yes," Alice said excitedly, almost bouncing in her seat. "The family wants to meet her, anyway! And Kate will be beside herself to see how her daughter has turned out."

That pulled me out of my dirty thoughts. "I can see Kate?"

Carlisle nodded, pulling out his iPhone, and making a quick text to Tanya, inviting her and the rest of her family down to meet me. "When will they arrive, Alice?" he asked my mate, and she went still for a moment, then came back with a grin.

"They'll be here tomorrow," she answered brightly, and I grinned. It made me happy to think I would see Kate so soon.

"There's only one more thing I would like to bring up, and then I think we're done for now. I want to talk about your training," Carlisle said, and I looked at him with my head cocked to one side. "I would like to start your control training very soon, before we go to Volterra, as I am afraid they see it as a custom to offer you a... drink."

It didn't take rocket science for me to understand that my new mentor meant that they would throw a human at me and expect me to kill it.

"Alice has seen this, and assured me that you politely decline their generous offer, but I think that this desired result will be obtained only through a rigorous training before our departure. I am going to procure a bag of blood from the hospital stores, and we are going to begin your training while your friend Kate is here. Her power could help to keep you in check, if it seems you might not be able to control yourself."

I thought about that for a second. "I've never smelled human blood," I said softly, realizing the danger in that knowledge. "I don't know how I'll react."

"We have a pretty good idea," he assured me with a tight smile. "It's not going to be pleasant, and it's far from easy. But I see strength in you, and I have faith that you will be able to refrain completely... eventually."

I said nothing, but stared at my hands folded in my lap, and then Alice reached over to stroke the under-side of my wrist with a single finger, attempting to comfort me. It worked, and I gave her a tiny smile. "I'll be there with you through the whole thing, I swear," she whispered, leaning over to press her lips to the corner of my mouth.

"It won't be torture for you, as well?" I asked her, forgetting for a moment the other four people in the room with us.

"It doesn't matter. A little extra practice never hurt anyone," Alice replied with a weak smile, and I heard everything her voice said without saying.

I got lost in the reassuring look she was giving me, and it wasn't until I heard the deafening silence of the house did I realize they had left us alone. I don't mean just left the room, left us alone, but- they'd left the house, I could hear two cars pulling away. "Why did everyone leave?" I asked Alice quietly, wondering if I had made them uncomfortable somehow, maybe by my uneasiness with the training talk.

"They're being nice to us," she replied, something in her eyes shifting, and when she spoke her next words, I knew why. It was my Mate's voice. "They know we're about to be very, very rambunctious."

"If that bitch Fluffy shows up, I'm going to spay her," I said, thinking about our last interruption as I pinned Alice against a wall and pressed myself into her, our contours fitting deliciously.

"I'll help you," she answered, and something about the violence in her words made me shudder in all kinds of happy feelings.

"Mine," I whispered, sniffing her hair, her neck, and her bustline, a deep rumble starting in my chest. Then I smelled what my primal self wanted to smell: the scent of fresh-baked cookies.

"All yours," she breathed back, her fingers tangling in my hair as my face explored every inch of her above her chest. "Let's go to our room... we're going to have to limit the destruction to one room, or Esme's going to let Emmett loose on us."

Who cared? Oh, wait... I might when I wasn't in Mate Mode. "Fine," I growled, jerking her up onto my hips and giving her a long grind that made her moan in my ear piteously. "But after that, it's my playtime."

After a deep kiss, I ran us up to our room, the door falling from its hinges as I kicked it shut behind us lightly, or what I felt was lightly. I was drowning in her, every sense I possessed was overcome in Alice, as she graffittied her name all over my cold, dead heart; doodled her initials all over my soul; and rubbed the physical proof of her love for me on my thigh as I topped her in our bed. If I hadn't had been so lost in taking my mate for the first time in this new existence, I might have noticed the little black velvet box resting on the bedside table on my side of the bed...

A/N: So, what did you guys think about Andie's gift? I thought long and hard about it, I didn't want something other vampires have, and I didn't want it to be an aggressive talent. I see Andie as an old soul, someone that's wise in her years, but also young enough to be volatile. Its really sad for me that this story is almost over; I like Andie alot, she is one of the best characters I have ever designed.

And don't forget about Leah... I got something for her punk ass. =)

Reviews, non?