Inception on a Rainy Night by KT8812
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
A/N: A fair warning to all. This chapter contains references to slavery, the Civil war, rape and cannibalism. You have been warned.
Much love to my Beta extraordinaire BookwormBaby 2580 for all her help in my epic battle against the ellipses.
Previously:
"Why? What happens in the sunlight that threatens to expose you?"
"It is not easily explained, Bella. It is best if you see it with your own eyes."
Bella turned to me, her doe eyes wide with expectation and excitement. "Will you show me?" Her curiosity and excitement washed over me and I nodded mutely, once again wondering if this was the time I would lose her. I gathered up the courage I was fabled to have, promising myself that I would come clean with her. I looked to Carlisle for strength, and sure enough, there in his golden gaze was simmering confidence that I did not personally feel.
"Are you done with your breakfast, sugar?"
"Yup," she said, popping the 'p' as she hopped off of my lap.
"Come, then," I said as I took her arm to lead her to the sunroom, my heart growing cold with dread.
She deserved the truth. I would not deny her that.
Chapter 13:
BPOV:
Jasper led me towards a room I had never seen before. True, in the short time I had been in his home, I hadn't explored it much. I had usually been otherwise engaged in his bedroom and had been consequently ignorant of the rest of the monolithic structure. It seemed strange that he lived alone, but perhaps Carlisle and the rest of the family members would join him now and again.
We came to a halt in front of polished oak double doors that reminded me of ballroom dances of the early nineteenth century. The doors opened to reveal a sparsely furnished room with deep burgundy carpets. There was a solitary couch meant to seat two at the far end and the room conspicuously lacked any windows. What obviously made up for the lack of windows, however, was a huge dome shaped structure made completely of clear glass. The rare sunlight poured in through the giant oculus drenching the room almost in entirety with its glowing warmth.
For a moment the though of seeing Jasper in the sunlight left my mind, and I dashed forward to bask in the warmth of the sun. I had never regretted the decision to move to Forks during my high school, but I terribly missed the sun. I'd read somewhere in an advanced biology text book that the presence of sunlight leads to the release of certain hormones in the body and affects the temporal rhythms in humans. Hormone or not, I could physically feel gloom descending on me in the rainy town of Forks. In time, I'd gotten used to the general absence of sunlight in Washington, but the longing ache of going somewhere sunny, warm and dry was always lingering in the back of my mind.
I quickly entered the room, raising my face to the welcome warmth, feeling my face flush with the heat, trying to soak up as much of it as I could, given that the bleak days would soon return. In my brief affair with the Sun God, I failed to realize that Jasper had not joined me. Instead, he lingered near the door, still masked in the shadows, hesitant to move forward. When I turned to him, I found him watching me with a rather wistful, somewhat pained look on his face.
"You miss it, don't you?" he asked softly.
I nodded. "It's the one thing I regret to have left behind in Arizona," I sighed.
"I miss it too."
I took that to mean that he was originally from a place that had lots of sunshine. I had given Jasper a brief history of the bland life I had led up until I met him. In turn, he had been extremely tight lipped about his life, only giving me a brief outline of the various members of the Cullen family.
I shook off my thoughts, wanting to focus on the reason we were in this room in the first place. Feeling the shift in my emotions, Jasper continued.
"While we can not go out in the sunlight, we do enjoy it as much as the humans. Perhaps even a bit more than them. You can imagine how wonderful the warmth feels on our cold skin. Esme, bless her soul, insists on having a sun room in all the houses so that we can occasionally enjoy the sunlight when we're cooped up in the house on sunny days."
"I want you to enjoy the sunlight with me, Jasper," I said, extending a hand in invitation.
He vacillated, and for one long moment I was afraid he would turn and vanish before I could catch him. Then, he seemed to gather his courage and slipped off the shirt hanging on his shoulders. I watched as he took three deliberate steps into the room and closed his eyes.
I felt the wind knocked out of my chest. For several moments, I stood there, gaping like a fish out of water. He glowed… no… he sparkled. He sparkled like the freaking Fourth of July! He stood there, still as a statue and I continued to drink in his magnificent form. His body shone as if he had a million diamond crystals embedded in his skin. He was throwing rainbows onto the walls of the room for Christ's sake! It hurt my eyes to look at his dazzling form, but I couldn't bear to look away. As if this other-worldlybrilliance wasn't enough, his torso was painted with crescent marks in an imitation of abstract art. The marks were thickest on his arms, overlapping in several places. They crisscrossed on his shoulders and chest and gradually reduced along his tapered waist.
The marks shone with even more fervor than the rest of his body and my fingers itched to touch them. I closed my mouth, willing the dryness away, trying to say something, but couldn't. So I satisfied myself by moving towards him. He looked pained, his jaw clenched shut, his hands rolled into fists. I touched his cool cheeks, my hand forming a shadow where he was previously projecting rainbows.
"Does it hurt?"
His breath whooshed out, and I found that he had been holding it since he had stepped into the sun.
He placed his hand over mine, nuzzling my hand and placing a tiny kiss in its palm.
"No, it doesn't hurt. It feels wonderful, especially with you here," he admitted as he opened his eyes. For a long, silent moment, we stood there, just basking in the warmth of the sun and each others company. Slowly, so he could object if he wanted to, I raised my other hand and placed it on his chest. Again, his breath hissed out. My hand roved gently on the expanse of his glittering torso and he indulged my curiosity with gentle patience.
I traced my hand along the marks of his skin, trying to follow a continuous pattern. I tried discerning a difference in the texture of his skin where I saw the marks, it felt just like the rest of him- smooth as marble.
"You're beautiful," I murmured as I pressed a kiss to another mark, just above where his heart should be beating.
"God, no. You're the beautiful one, Bella. To see beauty in the dead form of a killer takes purity of heart, my angel," he whispered reverently, as he pressed his lips to my crown.
"Do all of you look like this?"
And just like that, he stilled again.
"No."
"No? You mean Carlisle won't look like this in the sun?"
I couldn't be sure, but I thought I heard a growl reverberate in his chest.
"You won't ever see Carlisle topless, Bella. But if you did, he'd also be throwing rainbows around him," he admitted. "He just won't have the scars," he added, hanging his head.
"Scars?" I asked.
He nodded. "Look closely, Bella. What do the marks look like?"
The marks… 'scars' he called them. With dawning horror I realized that the glowing semi-circular arcs on his body resembled bite marks.
I pulled away my hands and stepped back as my breath came in short gasps. My Jasper had been bitten, over and over again. What creature could it be that pierced his armor-like skin and that too repeatedly?
"Yes," he drawled slowly, his face twisted in a bitter smirk. "It took you long enough to recognize what they are, but then again, you don't know my history."
"Who hurt you?" I asked, my mind conjuring up scenario after scenario of how he may have acquired such painful reminders of his past.
"Other vampires, too many to name," he replied. "They made me the man I am today."
He cocked his head to the side, one blond curl falling audaciously into his ochre eyes. He brushed it off negligently and continued to asses me with frightening intensity.
"You're not afraid," he said, unbelieving of the fact.
"You should give me a bit more credit than that, Jasper. Why do keep thinking I'll be afraid of you?"
"Isn't proof of my violent past enough to scare you out of your wits?"
I shook my head in exasperation. Why couldn't he see things clearly?
"You were the victim, Jasper, not the aggressor! These marks speak of the horrific wrong done to you. How could I ever hold you responsible for what others did to you? I can't even imagine what you went through . . . ."
His harsh laughter interrupted my passionate declaration. It was a loud, hollow sound with not an ounce of humor in it.
"Oh, my sweet Bella. You see, that's where you're wrong," he advanced on me, his eyes glinting menacingly. "I wasn't, how did you put it? Ah yes, I wasn't the victim, darlin'. I was the aggressor!"
I had started inching backwards without thought.
"That's not possible," I whispered. "You were hurt! You have all these scars, they hurt you!"
"No, Bella. I hurt them. Hundreds of them. I fed on humans, I killed them for sport, for pleasure. I turned them to fight a war they had nothing to do with. I used them and when they were no longer fit for use, I killed them. These bite marks are from when they tried to protect themselves from me. They are marks of self defense."
"No!" I cried, traitorous tears making their way down my cheeks. "You're lying. You wouldn't hurt someone on purpose. I don't believe you!"
He grabbed me by my arms, a bit too tightly but I didn't care enough to protest. "Believe me, Bella. You need to understand, I'm not good. I'm not nice. I've killed more people than you've probably met in all your life. I've fed on them, reveled in their screams and bathed in their blood. I'm not a good person, Bella. I don't want you to harbor any illusions of me being a Byronic hero. I'm a monster and you have the right to know what you're getting into."
"Why are you doing this?" I screamed, unable to hear him go on. "Why are you doing this to me? To us?"
He dropped to his knees, his head bowed in shame, his hands still clasping my arms.
"Because it's the only thing I have to offer. The truth. Other than my love, the only thing I can give you is my honesty," he whispered.
I kneeled down in front of him. No matter what he said, no matter what happened in the past, I refused to believe that he had a black soul. The Jasper I knew was good and kind, through and through. I knew there had to be a reasonable explanation for what he had done. He was obviously keeping some important detail from me and I would be damned if I accepted some half-truth from him when he had offered me honesty.
"Half-truths are as bad as lies, Jasper. Tell me everything," I said, cupping his face in my hands.
"You're still not afraid of me." It was a statement laced with awe and disbelief.
"No, I'm not. Now spill," I demanded and one side of his lips curled up in a half-hearted smile.
"Yes, ma'am," he drawled as he pulled me down with him to lie on the carpet.
He heaved a sigh before he started speaking.
"I was born in Texas in 1843. I don't…"
He stopped peaking when he heard my gasp. His hold on my waist tightened just a fraction.
"Disgusted by being such an old man's mate?" he asked jovially, but I could hear the fear underneath it.
I snuggled further into his chest. "No, actually I'm surprised I guessed it correctly. Even though I thought of it, it's a bit weird for you to be confirming the fact."
"How could you possibly know?"
I looked at him, my chin resting on his chest as my fingers idly traced the scars on his chest.
"Yesterday, when Carlisle took me to that diner, I asked him how old he was. He started to tell me a bit about his history and then I remembered how good you were at teaching American history and the way your eyes shone with fervor when talking of the Civil war, and I put two and two together."
"Carlisle told you?" he asked, looking a bit hurt.
"No! He said it was your story to tell, but he did admit that you had lived through the Civil war. He mostly talked about himself and how old he was."
"So, how'd you like his story, darlin'?"
I frowned. "Well, I didn't get to hear much from him… we were interrupted and then, we kind of started talking about the two of us." I thought of the flirty waitress and was mad that I hadn't really gleaned anything about Carlisle from our conversation except for his age.
"Anyway, you were saying?"
"As I was saying, I am a hundred and sixty-eight year old vampire," he said with a roguish grin.
"You weren't born a vampire, Jasper. What about your family? Your real, human, family?"
His face clouded over with pain as he looked towards the sky.
"I don't really remember anything from my human life," he whispered.
"How come? I though you were supposed to have perfect recall; kind of a perk of being an immortal God."
He laughed again, the same bitter hollow laugh. "I may be immortal, Bella, but I am no God." Then he muttered, "At least not the kind of God you're talking about." I was sure he didn't mean for me to hear the latter part, so I just pretended I hadn't. Being endowed with super-human senses, perhaps he was underestimating my mortal hearing powers.
"When we are changed, our senses become sharper, stronger. Our human lives which we have experienced through the human senses become fuzzy, less definite. The process of the change itself is so excruciating, often vampires suffer from complete, or at least partial amnesia. The whole process is like being born again, hence the term 'newborns' is used for those who have been recently changed," he explained.
"You remember absolutely nothing of your real family?" I asked, the tell tale prickling of tears forming in my eyes. I couldn't imagine not remembering Charlie and Renee and Jacob and Billy and all my friends, few though they were.
"A bit, I remember my mama the most. She was beautiful. I remember the feeling of safety and contentment in my heart as I heard her humming in the kitchen while I played in the backyard. I also had a kid sister, I don't remember her name, but I remember being very protective of her. I remember helping her once when she fell down and scraped her knee. I tied my kerchief on her knee to stop the blood and carried her home. I know that she told me I was her hero, and while I don't remember her face or distinct features, I can still remember the absolute devotion she held for me in her blue eyes."
The tears were flowing freely down my cheeks and I felt my heart contract at his words. I couldn't imagine the kind of loneliness he went through for almost two centuries. I wanted to hug him, kiss him, make him forget everything and never let go.
I kissed him fiercely, trying to covey all my love and emotions for him. I knew he could feel them and was glad I didn't have to put a name to my feelings, they were just too intense to put into words.
"Don't cry, darlin'," he whispered as he brushed away the tears from my cheeks. "It was a long time ago."
"That doesn't make it better," I mumbled.
"No it doesn't. But I have you with me, now and it's more than I could have ever hoped for," he spoke as his eyes shone with his love for me. I knew, no matter what he revealed today, it wouldn't affect my feeling for him. My love for Jasper was just like him, immortal.
"Go on," I urged, once again settling down with my head on his chest.
"Well, like I said, I don't remember much. I don't have any memories of my father, though I do know that he was a successful farmer. Still, I remember my fierce desire to join the war, the need to defend our way of life. It was all I thought about in my teens. I actually lied about my age so I could join up. I looked older than I was and I was very charismatic, so I could persuade the recruiting officer to add my name to the list."
"How old were you when you joined up?"
"Seventeen."
I shuddered as I thought of seventeen year old Jasper going off to war. Any number of things could have happened to him. Well, technically something did happen to him since he was now in my arms, but that's beside the point.
"You couldn't wait to start showing off all your brawn, could you?"
"It wasn't some kind of contest to show how brave and dashing I was, Bella. A war is serious business. At that time, it was all about right and wrong. It was about asserting our way of life, and defending what I though was right. And I wasn't the only one like that. Thousands of young men were joining up. We were young and idealistic. Our way was the right way and it was the only way."
"You supported slavery?" Though I tried, I couldn't keep the accusation from creeping into my voice.
He sighed again. "At that time, I did. Later on, decades after, I acknowledged that it was wrong, but by then it was too late."
"I can't imagine how people can condone the idea of slavery, let alone fight for it," I whined. I knew it was in the past, I knew that slavery had been abolished, but the thought that Jasper had fought on the wrong side hurt me.
He sat up, pulling me with him.
"I know this can be a very difficult concept for you to grasp, especially since you are so young."
"Don't patronize me, Jasper," I bristled.
"I'm not patronizing you, Bella, but you have to agree that I am a century and half older than you. Give me some credit, will you?"
I pursed my lips and nodded. Knowing I was acting petulantly did not help me correct my actions. I was allowed to be childish at times wasn't I? After all, as he pointed out, I was quite young.
He seemed to be thinking hard about something and then nodded to himself.
"You eat non-veg right, Bella?" I nodded, not knowing where he was going with the food example.
"You eat fish, beef and pork right?"
"What's your point?" I asked irritated at his questions.
"Well, in some of the sects of Hindu religion, its considered to be one of the biggest offences if one eats non-veg. They maintain that all forms of life are equally sacred and it is a crime to destroy any life form. Vegetarianism is one of the fundamental edicts of their religion. So do you think that you're committing a crime by eating non-veg?"
"That doesn't even make sense! What does it matter if Hinduism forbids non-vegetarian food? I was born Christian and while Renee never was religious enough to follow a particular church, I was brought up like all other kids."
"Alright, alright. No offense. Now, the aboriginals of Australia follow cannibalism. It's their way of life and they have been following it for centuries. Does that make it right?"
I gaped at him. "Humans eating humans? Eww… how can you even try to justify something like that? It's just… just wrong!"
"What I'm trying to prove here, Bella is that most of the time, right and wrong in the world is in relative terms. There can never be anything universally right or wrong. It depends upon the perspective of an individual on any given situation. And the perspective of an individual is affected by several things, one of the most important of them being their upbringing."
He paused, giving me a moment to absorb what he had said before ploughing ahead. "At the time of the Civil war, in the Southern states, slavery wasn't considered slavery. They were workers, a kind of domestic help, if you will. Slaves were used in the fields the way tractors and other harvesting equipments are used today. It was the way people lived, it was the norm and it was not considered inappropriate to have slaves. It was the way I was brought up and how I looked at the world. For us, the Yankees were at fault, trying to take away what was rightfully ours."
"Telling a Southern boy that slavery was a crime at that time is like me telling you that eating non-veg makes you a heretic."
Logically, I knew what he said made sense, but that did not make it any easier for me to accept.
"So you don't condone slavery now?" I asked, wanting to confirm his views on the issue.
"Of course not, sugar. When I was made to see the other aspect of slavery, it didn't take me long to accept we Southerners had it wrong."
I sat silently in his arms, content in the knowledge that the love of my life would not be bringing a collared slave into our lives at any point of time.
"Tell me more about what happened after you joined the Confederates."
"Well, I was excited to prove myself and do my family proud, as you can expect. During the almost three years I spent in the army, I rose through the ranks quite rapidly. I was the youngest Major in the Texas cavalry."
I could still hear the pride in his voice at his accomplishment.
"So what happened next?"
Again I felt his body freeze and I knew we were getting closer to the details of how he came to be a vampire.
"It was eighteen sixty three, I had been ordered to oversee the evacuation of a town near Galveston. The fighting was getting too close to the town. All the able bodied men were already at the front, me and my platoon were overseeing that the women and children were moved to safety. After the majority of them had been relocated, I was alone on patrol, looking for anyone who might have been left behind when I met her."
The amount of hatred and venom in his voice turned the simple pronoun into an epithet. Without knowing what she had done, I felt an intense dislike for her, and because it was obvious she had wronged Jasper in a grave manner. I turned around and wrapped my hand around Jasper, hoping the contact would afford him a modicum of comfort.
"Who was she?"
"Maria," he spat. "I found her, along with her two sisters, on a lonely stretch of wilderness, and was under the misapprehension that they required assistance. I ignored my human senses, warning me of the unnaturally beautiful women in front of me. I had been brought up to be a gentleman, and I was not about to disregard my duty towards them just because some warning bells were going off in my head."
As he paused, I tightened my hold on him. He absently placed a kiss on my head before he continued.
"Even in my human form, she recognized the latent talent within me and decided to change me. Nothing could have prepared me for the sudden viciousness of her attack. Apparently, they were already hunting for blood when they came across me and as a result, Maria drank far too much of my blood before injecting her venom. Instead of the usual three days, it took four and a half days for me to complete my change because she had almost depleted all my blood."
He used his fingers to tip my chip up and once again wiped the tears that coursed down my face with out my knowledge.
"It's okay, darlin'. It was a long time ago, don't waste your tears for that," he pacified me.
"Did it hurt?" I asked tremulously.
"I won't lie to you, Bella. It was the single most horrifying experience of my existence. The pain… it is unlike anything you can ever imagine and once the change starts, there is no stopping it. When I met the Cullens, I often heard Edward and Carlisle arguing about our existence, our souls. Edward always said that we are soulless monsters and when destroyed, we would rot in hell. Personally, I think the change itself is the hell we have to pass through before we join this existence," he said. "I would never wish that kind of pain on anyone, not even my worst enemy. It is overpowering, all consuming and devastating."
"You could never be a monster, Jasper," I said as I kissed him. "Tell me you never believed what Edward said," I demanded.
"While I don't believe that all vampires are monsters, I am an exception."
I opened my mouth to protest, but he silenced my by placing his hand on my mouth.
"You still haven't heard what I did after my change, Bella. Trust me when I say that the way you perceive me is most likely to change when I enlighten you to the way I lived the first hundred years of my life."
I pulled his restraining hand away and buried my face in his neck. "Nothing you can say will change the way I feel for you," I assured him.
"Maria and her companions, Nettie and Lucy, had come together to gain control of territories in the South after the Volturi had cleaned up most of the Southern wars."
"Territories; of what? And what war are you talking about? I thought that we were talking of the Civil war?"
"Territories for feeding, 'darlin. You can imagine how difficult it might be for a vampire to feed when he leaves behind a dead body or two whenever he goes out to dinner."
I shuddered at his words, amazed that the vampires truly looked at humans as just cattle fodder. It was a very difficult concept to grasp. Jasper tightened his hold on me, rubbing soothing circles on my back as he continued.
"As I explained to you before, vampires are base creatures, we follow our animal instincts. And like all animals, vampires have their territories in which they feed. When one vampire tries to encroach another vampire's territory, the outcome is not pleasant."
"Around the time of the Civil war, Mexico had been teeming with vampires, all hell-bent on destroying others so they may have a greater control on the feeding grounds. One ambitious vampire by the name of Benito dreamed of claiming Mexico city entirely for himself and he came up with a very innovative and catastrophic way of doing it. He created an army of newborn vampires and started a killing campaign against the other covens. In retaliation the other covens started making their own newborn armies. It led to a blood bath and finally the Volturi stepped in."
My mind was reeling with all the information Jasper was throwing at me. There had been a silent war going on amongst mythical creatures, right in the midst of mankind and no one took notice of it. It was impossible to reckon with.
"How come no one found out? And what is a Volturi?" I asked, held captive by my morbid fascination for the macabre tale.
"The high death rates were blamed on a contagious disease at that time."
When I looked skeptical he explained the symptoms. "It was a new disease with no symptoms except lacerations on the patient's throats and the drying up of their blood."
I listened in stunned silence as he explained what the Volturi were and how they intervened in the Southern wars to prevent the secret existence of vampires from becoming public knowledge.
"I still don't understand what all of this has to do with you or Maria and why she changed you."
"Maria had lost her territories during the Southern wars and wanted vengeance. Nettie and Lucy were looking to expand their territories and so their alliance was one of mutual benefit. Maria had an odd way of sensing potentially gifted vampires and hence, she turned me, hoping I would aid her in her attempts at gaining more territory."
"What did she make you do?" I queried, knowing he was finally going to reveal the secret behind the scars littering his torso.
"When I woke up after the change, I had no idea of who I was or what I had become. Maria was the only instructor I had. She quickly discovered what my power was and trained me in using it efficiently. I was in my volatile newborn stage, the only two things guiding my actions were my thirst and… lust."
I felt my stomach lurch unpleasantly at his words. I knew we had both had relationships prior to meeting each other, but his list of conquests over a period of a century and half mightily intimidated me. Perhaps it was the mating bond, but the idea of any woman other than me, putting her hands on him made fury glow white and incandescent in my veins.
"Bella?" he looked at me, his eyes worried at his revelation.
"Go on," I choked out.
Still looking unsure, but determined to go on, he continued. "Maria made me believe that we were mates."
This time I couldn't control my gasp and my heart started palpitating. Suddenly, I felt calm washing over me as my heart started falling back into its normal rhythm.
"Do you want me to go on?" he asked, face screwed up in worry.
No! I wanted to scream. But I knew if I didn't know everything right now, the remaining details wouldn't let me rest easy. Unable to speak, I just gave him what I hoped was an encouraging nod.
"I… I had no idea what a mate was, but Maria ensured I was always well fed and that my… other desires were fulfilled."
I squeezed my eyes shut, willing away the images that threatened to take over my mind.
"With my unique ability, I was able to control the newborns, preventing them from fighting within themselves instead of against the enemy. When they were no longer useful, I disposed off them. The scars I received were when I was trying to subdue a newborn crazed with bloodlust or anger. Maria starved the newborns, telling them that they would be rewarded with fresh kill when they won the forthcoming battles. If there is anything more dangerous than a newborn vampire, it is a blood starved newborn vampire. When the battle was won, the surviving members were rewarded with humans for feeding and… other purposes."
The words other purposes threatened to overwhelm me more than the word feeding. Apart from blood, I could very well imagine the only thing that vampires would want from humans and the though of it made bile rise threateningly in my throat. I didn't realize how fast my heart was racing till I felt another wave of his calm wash over me.
"Did you ever…" I couldn't complete my question.
"Yes," came his soft answer even as his shame and guilt washed over me.
I pulled my knees to my chest, holding them as I rocked back and forth trying to physically protect myself from what he was telling me. Jasper had raped human girls and then fed on them.
"Oh God," I moaned, not wanting to believe my ears yet knowing that he wouldn't lie to me.
"Why? Why would you… you had Maria for… for that," I cried.
"Sex releases endorphins into the blood while fear releases adrenaline. Both make the blood sweeter, more potent, more satisfying," he answered in a monotone.
"How many?"
"I can't say," he said, his fists curled into balls, his entire frame shaking.
"How many, Jasper?" I knew with his perfect memory, he would know exactly the number of humans he had killed.
"Please don't make me say it, Bella," he begged, tearless sobs being ripped from his chest.
"HOW MANY, JASPER?" I screamed.
"Ten thousand seven hundred twenty four."
My being was suffused with the guilt and shame radiating from Jasper but my mind was stuck on a single number.
10,724 . . . 10,724 . . .10,724
The number swirled in my head till I was deadened. It wasn't simply murder, or serial killing. . . . The only word that could fit killing at such epic proportions was . . . genocide. And yet, in my mind I couldn't see Jasper as an American Hitler. No, it was different. He didn't kill for fun or religion, he killed for survival. If I tried to rationalize it, how many chickens had I consumed for dinner since I was born?
Chickens and human beings are not the same, you dimwit! screamed my inner conscience.
But to humans are to vampires what chickens are to humans.
I tried to ponder on the sanity of a statement like that, but had to give up soon.
What scared me more than Jasper's confession was that I was prepared to justify his actions. My mind was coming up with any and all explanations it could give for Jasper's behavior. He was a newborn, he had an evil sire, it was his nature…
Even as the horror of his actions enveloped me, I could not force myself to loathe him. What frightened me was the fact that my intensity of love from him did not diminish in the least. What did that say about me? What kind of a person was I, when knowing the depths of depravity of Jasper's past did nothing to diminish my need to love him?
You know he has changed, he no longer hunts humans.
Yes, he had changed, but wasn't I supposed to be afraid of him?
Who can dictate what you're supposed to feel? It's all relative, remember?
In that moment, I decided not to over think my feelings. Jasper had suffered through a horrendous beginning in his vampire life through no fault of his, and yet, with his strength and determination he had risen above it. He had mastered the monster Maria had let loose and he was a better man than he had been. Everyone deserved a chance at redemption, most of all Jasper who had been wronged so grievously.
I recovered from my trance to become aware of Jasper. His body shook with his silent sobs, but he refused to voice his agony. My heart splintered to see the ache etched into the lines of his glowing face and I knew I would do anything to ease that pain. I got to my knees and wrapped my arms around him, the force of his sobbing vibrating through my chest. I held him so tightly that had he been anyone else, I would have choked him. He, in turn, grasped me as though I were his sole salvation.
I ran my hands through his hair, lending silent support. There was no point in offering platitudes in this situation. My presence and acceptance was all I could give. After an eternity, when I could no longer stand his pain, I decided to bring him out of his grief.
"Jasper, please," I begged, not knowing what else to say.
He looked at me with wild black eyes and once again I was overcome with the feeling of looking at a lost child. His fingers dug into my flesh as his eyes roved over my face.
"Don't leave me."
His words brought on a fresh round of tears from me.
"I'm not leaving you," I promised as I placed kisses on his face. "I'll never leave you, Jasper, my love. Never!"
"You're not leaving me?" incredulity laced his voice and expression.
I lowered my lips to his, tangling my hands in his locks, pulling myself flush against him. If he doubted my words, I would reassure him with my actions. He consumed the kiss, and even though my lungs screamed for air, I was reluctant to separate out lips. When he finally lowered his lips to my neck, I took a gasping breath.
"Bella," he murmured against my neck as my hands reached to unbutton the shirt I wore. I lay down on the thick carpet, pulling Jasper with me. That greedy little impulse in the cranny of my heart was growing, swelling to the point of bursting and I knew I needed to satisfy it soon.
Clothes were shed the way autumn leaves fall from the trees and our bare skin found purchase in the others arms. Hot and cold, mortal and immortal, young and old, we were the perfect complement to each other. It was a moment, not of lust or passion, but understanding and comfort.
I reveled in the peace Jasper found in my arms even as he rejoiced in the pleasure he drew from my body. He worshiped my body as he would a goddess and even though he owned me, heart and mind, body and soul. And when finally, finally he entered me, I welcomed him within my body with an earthy joy. His movements were slow and deliberate, trying to draw out our union for as long as possible. His body trembled with the emotions that ran amok within him, but I tethered him to me, for I was his safe harbor, as he was mine.
When he came, he whispered declarations of love and eternity which were laced with equal parts of pain and pleasure and in his completion, I found mine.
As I floated away on a cloud, the only thing I was aware of was that the greedy impulse in my heart was finally satisfied.
IMPORTANT A/N: Firstly, I am offering two o/s in the 'Fandom against the floods' auction. It has been set up for the relief of the victims of the Queensland flood victims in Australia. The first o/s will be the telephonic conversation between Jasper and Carlisle when he first encountered Bella in his class.
I am still undecided about the second o/s, though I may write an Alice POV from when her deceit was laid bare in front of the entire family. If you have any suggestions, please share them with me.
Secondly, before the New Year, I had mentioned the possibility of me moving to a new city and that possibility has now come true. I will be moving to a new city in the upcoming week and as is expected, it will affect my updates of the story. I request all the readers to be bit patient. I have no intentions of shelving the story and will continue with it as soon as I get settled in the new environment.
Finally, this chapter was the longest I have ever posted and discusses a lot of controversial topics. If I can't entice you to review after this chapter, I don't know if I ever can!
Please let me know what you think!
Hugs,
~KT.