Chapter 7
There were two things keeping the ride completely silent. One was the truck, who knew a fifty-something year old truck would be so noisy. The second was the occasional reminder from my stomach that I was starving. Any other time eating would be my first priority, now I don't think I could eat anything if I wanted too. Plain and simple I was too nervous. Neither of us said a single word on the ride over. I can't say for sure what Bella was thinking; worrying if she was smart. I was simply rehearsing what I was going to say, I knew that five seconds into it nerves would take over, but it still wouldn't hurt.
The ride proved to me that there was in fact more green in the world, after arriving in town I would have thought the world had run out of green. I had too much time to think today and not nearly enough time to act. The prophecy began nagging at me again, two days ago it would have meant nothing to me. Now I was worried, there was a good chance that someone else had seen the prophecy and was trying to stop if from happening. The easy target would be Bella, Edward is a lot stronger, faster, and has six other people willing to fight for him. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if it was someone close to Edward maybe even one of his 'family.' That could explain why the attack happened so close to her house. Of course absolutely none of this meant anything without a single shred of proof.
I still had next to nothing on the Rose Court as a whole. My primer (the gold standard,) which is supposedly a one stop shop for all things vampire and vampire related, hadn't helped me at all. It talked vaguely about something that seemed like they might possibly be Rose Court. Nothing on their activities, I wasn't even sure if they were signed onto The Accords. If they weren't signed on I couldn't guarantee my safety. Of course they hadn't done anything to hurt Bella, but I'm a White Council warden, and that normally entails that people/vampire/demons/faeries/warlocks/wizards hate you. It's a safe bet that any vampire older than say about two hundred and fifty years has probably had some run in with a warden at least once.
Bella's truck sputtered to a stop. It took me a moment to realize this glaring fact. I stepped out into the cold rain and shuddered. I slipped into the grey warden's cloak and pulled up the hood. The cloak is not warm but it does look cool, and the hood completes the look. Ok this would be the time I need to look on the positive side. I more than likely will not be torn apart and eaten; I may be bludgeoned and end up bruised, but not dead.
I purposely left all my tools of the trade back at Bella's house. A gesture of good will, if you will (did you get the pun?) I barely survived fighting one; even full armed there isn't a chance in hell of me coming out of that house alive if things got ugly. I did keep my shield bracelet, which might give me an edge to get out, not like I'm fast enough to outrun them. I'm thinking positive, nice civilized meeting, good people, reliable information, and nothing goes wrong. Nothing goes wrong. Nothing goes wrong. Nothing goes wrong. And for good measure, nothing goes wrong. I took a deep breath and began the seemingly endless walk to the front door. I think I know the feeling condemned criminals feel when they walk to the death chamber.
"Bella, I want you to stay behind me."
"You're worrying too much, Aaron. They're not going to hurt us." She replied. I hate when someone else knows more about a potentially bad situation, than I do. Especially, and I can't emphasize this enough, when it's my ass on the line.
I knocked, three times, gently. A host of bad possibilities ran into my head, killed, chopped up into little pieces, mounted on the wall, eaten, turned; the last one terrified me. I gain immortality at the cost of my magic, the same magic that grant me an unnaturally long life as it was, and at the cost of my soul. I shuddered, think positive Marsdon. God damn it think on the fucking positive side for once in your life.
After two and two thirds eternities the door finally opened. The bubble of anticipation burst with a small child sized pop.
On the other side of the door was a young woman, possibly mid to late twenties in physical age, but probably closer to a few hundred years. It's just so gosh darn hard to tell! Of course she was unnaturally beautiful. What is it about immortal types and beauty? The more immortal they are the more beautiful they become, god the thought of it's enough to make me sick.
"Hello, I'm Aaron Marsdon, Warden of the White Council of Wizards. This is my second Isabella Swan, representative of the local mortal community. May we come in?" I said as diplomatically as possible. Sometimes I just want to say what I mean and not worry about the consequences.
"Bella is always welcome here, as for you I will not invite you in." She replied. Someone here has had run-ins with wizards. Any house that's occupied has something called a threshold, think of it as a big magical security fence. Things like demons or faeries can't cross it at all without being invited in. Wizards are mortal, so we can cross the threshold without an invitation (although it is considered rude,) but as a consequence we leave much of our power at the door. So what she really said was something like, 'you can come in, but your powers can't.'
"I understand…" I looked at her to finish the sentence. It is polite after all to introduce yourself.
"Esme." She replied coolly. Apparently I should have been nicer to Sparkles earlier, but I wasn't thinking I was reacting.
"I understand, Esme." I said as I crossed into the threshold. It was an odd sensation, it was like a weight had been taken off my shoulder and replaced by another different type of weight.
"Please follow me." I did as she asked; of course Bella hadn't listened to me. Damn that girl no sense of self preservation. She had already gone in.
The house was not what I had expected, the few vampires… residences I had been in seemed to favor the heavy Victorian furniture, with old portraits on the wall, and few if any windows. This was just the opposite, it was very modern, a lot of stainless steel, and glass, and a ton of very expensive looking electronics. Of course there were obligatory portraits. I think that not inviting me in was a way to protect their home, just as much as it was about protecting themselves.
I followed Esme into a large long room. In the corner was a grand piano, a Steinway if I'm not mistaken, of course they had to be rich too, damn these immortal types. The chairs in the room did not belong there; they must have been brought in for the meeting. They were arranged in a semicircle around one chair, the only chair that was empty. Bella was sitting in Sparkles' lap; to their left was a petite brunette (something about her was eerily familiar.) In the middle sat Carlisle, I was sure of it, he had a presence that screamed patriarch. Next to him sat Esme, trying to look completely neutral. Next to here was a brick wall of a man, tall, and thick with slabs of muscle. The last on in the line was a pretty blonde cheerleader type who looked royally unhappy and outrageously pissed. One, two, three, four, five, six; there should be seven.
"I'm Carlisle, you've met Esme, to her left is Emmet, and Rosalie. To my right is Alice, and I believe you know Edward." Carlisle said politely. "Warden, please sit."
"Please call me Aaron." I said as I sat in the seat. "I wanted to meet you for two reasons, one I'm the new warden for this area, and two, earlier this morning I was attacked by a Rose Court vampire." I took the initiative in the conversation. "Let me also say that if you are half as decent as Bella leads me to believe you are; I don't see why we can't get along."
"You don't think that one of us attacked you?" Slabs asked letting out a loud bitter laugh.
"No one in this room attacked me."
"Of course not," Little miss perfect retorted.
"No one in this room attacked me, because the one that attacked me is dead." I was tempted to make a face at the blonde, but that would cause more harm and barely make me feel better.
"Why are you asking us then?" The brunette asked. For some reason I couldn't come up with a smartass nickname for her.
"I've been in this area less than a day, you've been here longer. I figure you guys might know who he is." I fished my sketch from my back pocket, unfolded it and handed it across to Carlisle. He wouldn't be someone to play poker with, his tell was almost unnoticeable, and had I not been on high alert I wouldn't have noticed his eyes widened for a fraction of a second, he knew exactly who it was.
He passed the picture to his right. She too reacted, only hers was the emotional equivalent of an atom bomb.
"No! No! This is wrong. You're wrong! This is impossible!" She descended into a series of sobs and moans. Sometime during all of this the picture had fallen to the floor, and was forgotten. I never meant to hurt anyone like this. "How could you do this!" she roared taking on the same feral aggression as He had earlier. "Jasper would never, never attack anyone!" She was out of her chair before I could even blink; I knew something bad was going to happen. I would be lying if I said I wasn't scared at this point, I had no chance to fight her off if she went for me. My only hope was someone stopping her before she could snap my neck. But just as suddenly as the rage had come it left.
She skipped bargaining all together and went straight for depression. The intense rage of a moment ago had dissipated like water spilling out of a glass. She sobbed quietly collapsing to the floor, in any other situation I would have taken her into my arms and let her cry. I killed him; I killed the one person that she loved above all others. I was the last person that should help her.
I looked to everyone, and found them looking back at me. I couldn't believe that they were focusing on me instead of helping her.
"Edward, why don't you and Bella take Alice to her room." I said, barely above a whisper. I got a silent eye based thank you. Bella got out of Sparkles' lap and knelt on the floor beside her gently taking her hand, and whispered something I couldn't hear. Edward picked her up effortlessly and carried her out of the room.