A/N: Thanks for the reviews, you guys continue to make writing these stories well worth it! This story should only have about four more chapters left.

(Previously):

We were the last group to arrive, and I looked around at the others' appearances. Mike's group was soaked except for one kid. Rosalie's group had similar results. Every member of both Alice and Edward's group, including themselves was dripping wet – Jasper had been right about them cancelling each other out. As my gaze came to rest on Emmett's group, I blinked in disbelief – seven of his kids had been hit, plus Emmett himself, which made a total of eight. Eight…which meant my group had won. Against all odds and laws of nature combined, my group had freaking won, and nobody was injured. Bless Jasper.

Angela counted everyone and announced what I'd already realized, and congratulations were bestowed upon my campers. All the kids were ecstatic – we hadn't expected to win, we'd just been hoping to survive. It was incredible, and all the other campers were happy as well. They didn't seem to care who'd won, they'd all just had a tremendous amount of fun. Emmett laughed and slapped me on the shoulder, saying he was proud of me but pretty sure that I would never beat him at anything ever again. I just grinned back – I was grateful that he didn't mention the secret coaching we'd had, and that he was content letting my campers enjoy their unexpected victory.

Chapter 20:

Since there would be all kinds of snacks at the carnival, the kids had a simple lunch of sandwiches which Esme had already had sent down to camp, then the campers returned to the cabins to rest while the counselors set up the carnival.

The booths were all simple enough to get ready since they were mostly already set up in the shed behind Jasper's cabin – for the most part all we had to do was transport them down to camp, and with everyone helping, the carnival was ready after a couple hours. If it hadn't been for the presence of the other humans, I knew it could have been set up in minutes, but either way it was done.

Each time a new area was complete Alice took it upon herself to work some extra magic, adding twinkle lights and other special touches, making the whole area a bit more festive. I plugged in the popcorn machine into an extension cord and turned it on, hoping that by the time we returned from our 'jousting event' the machine would be mostly full.

As I watched the kernels begin to pop, the very thought of the jousting nonsense had me chewing on my bottom lip nervously. From what I understood, we would fight against each other in pairs up on inflatable floating platforms in the water with foam-padded jousting sticks. The pairs had been pre-determined by randomly drawing names; it would be Edward against Alice, Rosalie against Emmett, and me against Mike. Edward had been furious when the pairs had been announced, worried that I would get hit too hard, but Sue had sportingly insisted the pairs remain as is to be fair, and had insisted the sticks were padded enough that nobody could get hurt - clearly, she didn't know me very well.

Before leaving the campsite, Sophie approached me and gently tucked the four-leaf clover from the scavenger hunt into the pocket on my shorts. I'd given it to her after the hunt and told her she could keep it to always have good luck. Now she was tugging the little zipper on my pocket closed, securing the clover safely inside no matter my outcome.

She looked up and smiled. "For luck, Bella. Now you'll be safe like me," she whispered. I smiled back unsteadily, waiting until she ran off with her friends. Safe like her...although she was obviously trying to be encouraging, the only real thought that came to mind was 'oh crap.'

After the kids were gathered and everyone was down at the lake, Sue announced that it was time for the festivities to begin, and all the kids cheered loudly.

As I stood at the edge of the lake looking out at the floating platforms, my apprehension continued to grow; how was I going to manage to even keep my balance on one of those things? I barely had time to contemplate strategies before Sue was instructing the counselors to wade out into the water and get onto the unsteady looking things. Thankfully, after watching me struggle for a few minutes after everyone else was already on theirs, she allowed Jasper - who was handing out the padded jousting sticks - to wade over and help me up.

"Edward wanted me to tell you he thinks its best if perhaps you just jump into the water once it starts," Jasper whispered as he lifted me easily.

My cheeks began to flush and I glared over at Edward. Although some part of me knew he was probably right, it was still embarrassing.

Now steady, I willed myself not to move an inch while I held onto the oversized jousting stick. Mike was directly across from me on his platform smiling. Next to us were Emmett and Rosalie, and on their other side were Alice and Edward. Rosalie and Emmett appeared to be sizing each other up. Alice was leaping and spinning in the air, landing effortlessly back in place on the floating square with awe-inspiring grace, twirling the padded stick threateningly at Edward all while her bell-like laughter floated around her. Edward was too busy glaring at Mike and watching me with concern to take in his pixie sister's threats of battle. Campers cheered from the shore enthusiastically waiting for the competition to begin; it was no surprise that Alice 's campers were the loudest, obviously they were completely won over by her vampire gymnast abilities.

"Hey Mikey, you sure you're ready for this? Bella may have some issues with you she needs to work out – I'd watch it if I were you," Emmett chuckled, glancing over at us. Mike seemed confused by his statement, and turned to look at him. All of a sudden, an obnoxious air horn sounded so loudly it scared me horribly, and I jumped at the sound.

When I jumped I began to tilt backwards, so I instinctively overcompensated for the movement and lurched forward, my arms spinning desperately, the foam stick pummeling angrily forward with my motions. Crap.

I heard the loud whack, whack, whack as it repeatedly made contact with Mike, who'd been caught off guard by my wild, unintentional attack. I'd tipped over enough to cause myself to slip off my platform, but was able to catch hold of it just in time to remain above the water's surface and watch the event's that followed.

When I'd hit Mike, the last strike had been hard enough to send him flying off the side of his platform, straight over into Rosalie. She in turn tipped forward towards Emmett, who once he saw his wife flying towards him, threw his stick off to his side so he could catch her as they fell into the water together. When he'd thrown his stick, Edward had instinctively reached out to catch it, probably having heard his thoughts and using the warning. As he'd reached out to catch it, Alice lowered her tiny figure into a crouch and with one strong, quickly aimed hit knocked Edward off his platform and into the water. She gracefully leapt into the air in victory, landing easily back onto the wet platform below her.

The whole environment was utterly silent for a few moments, taking in what had just happened, and then Alice 's campers erupted into crazed cheers.

"Unbelievable Bella – you just took out four people with basically one swipe," Emmett laughed beside me, but then stopped as he took in Rosalie's expression. She was obviously mad at me for causing her to fall into the water, and I shrugged apologetically. It's not like I'd done it on purpose. Emmett lowered his voice conspiratorially and glanced over at Mike who still looked shell-shocked. "Nice to see you've joined Team Take Down Newton," he winked.

A second later he raised his voice a few levels. "I warned you Newton – looks like Bella does have some issues with you after all. She just beat the crap out of you," he chuckled, as Mike's face flushed in anger.

Edward waded over to me, and accompanied me out of the water. "That's not exactly what I had in mind, love, but at least Mike didn't get the chance to hit you – either way, I suppose it worked out," he murmured, trying to suppress a grin. "Actually, it was a pretty good hit you got him with – you're quite dangerous with one of those things," he added, motioning to the jousting stick.

I rolled my eyes as my only response. At least it was over.

Back at camp, it wasn't long before the carnival was in full swing. Kids were milling about, crowding around each of the booths. Emmett's appeared to be the most popular, as he would lift things that got heavier and heavier – the heaviest being a boulder they had rolled in from the forest. There had to be limitations after all, otherwise suspicions would be raised. I couldn't help but smirk as I watched him 'struggle' to lift the massive rock; I knew he could juggle three if not more of them if he'd be allowed.

Kids were regarding Edward with awe; they were a bit taken aback by how he was able to 'guess' their favorite colors, their birthdays, their sibling's names…of course every now and then he would get one wrong on purpose, but it was still incredibly impressive to the children. He seemed to be truly enjoying himself as he took in their shocked expressions with each guess. When Sophie approached him I paused to watch them. Ever since he'd 'saved her' during the food fight, he'd become sort of a hero to her and she always got just a little more shy when around him.

She shuffled forward in the line, and Edward brightened when he saw her. "Come on, Sophie, it's your turn," he encouraged. She moved to sit in the chair in front of his, but instead he reached out and lifted her onto his lap. I saw the tiny smile tugging at the corners of her mouth; he was breaking through her shyness and putting her at ease.

"Now, what would you like me to guess, Sophie? Perhaps you're favorite color?" he asked. She glanced up and nodded in response. Edward closed his eyes and pretended to be in deep thought. After a moment he looked down at her curiously. "Would it be green?"

Sophie gasped and then smiled, nodding enthusiastically. Edward grinned crookedly, and then continued. "What else can I guess for you?"

This continued for a few minutes, as he guessed a few more items correctly for her. He wasn't being as cautious with her – he just wanted her to really have fun, which she did. When her time was up, she looked shyly up at Edward, and then whispered something I couldn't quite catch, even though his booth was right next to mine. He smiled brilliantly and whispered something back to her which made her face light up, and she threw her little arms around him happily. Edward chuckled and helped her down to the ground. She smiled at him and then immediately began running toward my booth.

Sophie ran right up to me and grasped my hand, pulling me down to her height. I glanced over at Edward curiously, who was watching the two of us out of the corner of his eye as he conversed with his next camper in line. "What's going on, Sophie? Did you have fun at the Mind Reading booth with Edward?" I asked.

She nodded, then moved really close to me and whispered into my ear. "I told Mr. Edward that you love him, cause I can tell you do, and I asked him if he loved you too," she said excitedly.

I blinked. Before I could say anything, she rushed on. "He said he loves you more than anything in the whole wide world!" she finished, hopping up and down happily.

"Wow! I'm incredibly lucky, aren't I Sophie? That's wonderful!" I replied while blushing a little. Of course I knew he loved me – we were getting married – but somehow have the revelation revealed to me so eagerly by a six year old made me feel almost as shy as I used to back when I'd been sitting next to Edward in biology.

She nodded in agreement and hugged me, then said she was going to go have a heart painted on her cheek for me and Edward. I was going to really miss her after camp was over…which was tomorrow.

Things over at Alice 's booth were going in much the same fashion as they had been at Edward's. She would predict what the campers were going to be when they grew up – since it was based on what they had already decided what they would be it almost always matched what they had in their minds, except for those few that didn't yet know what they wanted to be in which case she guessed - which also kept her under the suspicion radar. She was really playing the whole thing up – there was even a crystal ball in front of her, which she kept peering into while waving her hands over it.

The game booths were popular and consistently crowded. Mike was showing kids how to shoot the ball if they didn't know, and it was a big hit. Jessica's ring toss booth was busy too, and she actually looked as though she were making an effort to be nice to the kids.

Rosalie and I were busy off and on, which suited me just fine. Rosalie looked less happy about it, probably wondering why there wasn't a constant line around her cart – it's not like kids can continuously eat non-stop. Besides, they would be going to dinner soon anyway.

Finally after a couple hours of entertainment, the carnival was coming to a close and the kids' energy levels were dropping. In order to help us clear up the carnival, Sue, Esme and Carlisle came to take the kids to dinner, allowing the rest of us to get started on clean-up.

A/N: Please leave a review, thanks!