Chapter 22 – The Search

The cold walls screamed out to the passers-by and holiday-makers to enter the ancient building. And so they did. All of them, going in throngs towards their doom. One such group entered, led to the main atrium by the beautiful girl wearing sunglasses indoors. She spoke in English to them, teasing them forward with her wicked tales of Kings and Queens. Each one of them enthralled by her soothing voice, following like puppets.

As they reached the ornate double doors, she started speaking of legends and myths. Cackling away to herself, her sick joke making it all the fun for her. And so they entered. They group: men, women, children and the elderly. As soon as the door opened they felt the cold air enveloping their very bones. Mothers clutched their children and the elderly clutched their rosary beads. The end was near and they all knew it. Nothing could help them now.

"Ah, dinner. Come in, friends." Came a devious voice from the shadows.

It wasn't a split second later that all could be heard from the atrium was torturous screams and vicious snarls. The group diminished. All that was left of them were their empty corpses. Every bit of life in them drained the moment the cold arms seized them from all sides. Ferocious speed and strength were against them. No mercy for any – humans were not the top of the food chain in this residence. The meal finished and all were satiated. Nobody ever left this doomed castle, but nobody ever found out either. All deaths were put down to car crashes, all staged within seconds of the forsaken lives ended inside that house. Everything was cleaned almost instantly after the meal, like as if nothing had happened before.

The Volturi were the best of their kind, after all.

"Now, brother, as I was saying. Come, sit here with me. I feel like I need more in my ranks… I feel as if I should have, ah, maybe two more… Do you comprehend?" The sly voice slithered throughout the cavernous room. Even members of his company shivered at that voice. The light amusement in it easy to distinguish, yet hard to decipher.

"Aro, Aro. You, my friend, will never give up on these two. If you do not have them as your own, you don't want them to exist. Frankly, I think you are justified, yet not wholly. Something feels amiss."

"Yes. Amiss. Amiss. But what can they hide from me? All I need do is give them my hand. Nothing gets past my famous hands, does it now? Hmm… I wonder."

"You first need them to intrude in their minds." A slight tremor issued around the atrium. Not even Aro's brothers normally spoke to him like that. They were normally pensive and quiet; unlike the flamboyant Aro.

"Wrong. I can send others. I can send others to find out these things. I need not wet my fingers just yet, dear. No, no. Another will go. There is much to do now. He was destined to come weeks ago, or was it months? Either way he did not come, neither him nor the fore-seer. Something is not right. I was foretold that they would come; something changed that got past my useful new addition. Or else she is not that useful…"

Once Aro set his mind on something, there was no stopping him getting his own way. The walls shook with his ringing, threatening voice. He was challenging the whole court to answer him, to tell him he was wrong. His thoughts began to whirr into motion. His friend, Carlisle, would never give up members of his coven so easily. And Aro had pined for two of their talents for some time now. Talents wasted, or so he thought, were talents not spent in his company.

"Aro, if I may? It seems the whole coven has taken a liking to a human. All have bonds tied to a human, it is unseemly, yet it is clear to me. If that is so… Should we go on a scout?" Marcus spoke tentatively as he knew his brother was volatile at best when he pined so over anything.

And that did it. Aro immediately divided his guard. He took his favourite duo, the twins, and sent them to visit the Cullens. He sent his main tracker, Demetri, after this human.

No human should understand about the secret world they strove to protect on a daily basis. Hundreds of years could be wasted on this one human, if they did not stop it now.

However, his orders were clear. See and do not be seen. Hear and do not be heard. Valuable information had to be forged from these un-prerequisite visits.

Demetri's journey didn't take him too long. He used some of the endless funds the Volturi possessed and flew halfway across the world in style. He wasn't used to this kind of treatment. His role as tracker was summed up to running ragged around the globe, chasing down delinquent vampires. He was the one who shone the beacon on those that had lost their way. He had to rip their delinquent heads from their cowering shoulders. Gruesome. But it was what he signed up for.

Demetri liked this type of tracking. He would have to try to get to know this human, in his own way, before he could truly track her. He needed a trace on her, something that joined him to her. If he found her in time, he could give Aro all the information he needed and more. But Demetri was controlled. He knew he should not touch; and so he knew he would not touch. Even if she smelt so tantalisingly tasty that he felt his very core burning for her blood. He got many meals in the Volturi residence and was trained to control his hunger.

Although the air hostess smelt nice.

And she was not out of bounds on this particular trip.

Dessert…

As he threw the limp frame of the once beautiful Sara from his arms and across the small space in the aircraft's toilet, Demetri thought of nothing but the job ahead. He prepared himself; cleaned his blood-stained face and hands before the jet landed. Fully satiated now, he was a picture of intensity. Anyone who passed him by felt the shiver down their spine that something was terribly wrong about him.

Watching through her window, the girl that he had found didn't seem like the right one. She had no contact with humans, let alone vampires. He had found this house three days ago now, after visiting the Cullen coven's house. That house was empty, but the scents suggested they left about a week before. And this human's scent was all over the place. The forest through which he came, smelled of rancid garbage. The scent overpowered him, made him want a kill. He did not know anything about what may lay in those woods.

This girl, though, she fascinated him. She spent all of her time sitting still, as though she were a statue. At one time, he thought she had seen him, but alas, she must have been daydreaming. She was hyperventilating in her room, as if something were about to take her life. Whatever the Cullens had done to her, he did not yet understand.

Today, she left. He didn't know where she went to. But now that he was so close…

He entered the house through one of the open upper windows. This room smelt of another human. But there wasn't one to be seen. He would have liked another human to show up, it had been a week since his last meal. He trekked through the house, a silent killer in the middle of the day. He found her room. It was a small room, never as grand as his own in Volterra. There were a lot of photos on her walls. He ran his hands over them, searching for a familiar face. There was nothing, just lots of humans, young and old. So the girl was not a hermit.

He searched further, his extended senses telling him he was still alone. He sat on the girl's bed as he looked through a small box. There was a stack of photos inside, and he nearly caught his breath, if he had any to begin with. There they were, these must be Cullen's. There were photographs of each one of them. All visible down to their topaz eyes. And the girl.

So the girl knew about them. She must, it was evident from the pictures that they had all been in the coven's residence. Aro would be interested in this. He took some of the photographs. He searched the rest of the room. Inside the wardrobe, he found nothing but a faint scent of a vampire. He ran his hands all over the clothes. He wanted the Cullens to know they had been found out, if they ever came to see their pet human again.

For the next few weeks, Demetri entered the house at intervals, pushing his scent into the small room. This human would be saved until Aro got to her. That was what he wanted.

And so, Demetri left through the trees. His job finished, until he returned with Aro, as he was sure he would.

Alaska was the perfect state for the Cullens. Jane and Alec appreciated the coven's taste in residence as soon as they arrived. They sought out the clan by asking several nomad vampires as they made their way steadily to the house as they were being directed. Each nomad looked on in horror as they knew exactly where Jane and Alec came from. The crest on their billowing cloaks them away, but they did not mind.

The twins came to a grand house, large enough to house fifty vampires. They heard the Cullens inside. They knew of their arrival. They could just play with them a bit. These vegetarians were not in the best interests of the Volturi anyway. So they watched from outside the house. For days, they both stood still in the trees, near a snowy garden. Their stark red eyes and black cloaks standing out in the white backdrop.

Finally, they entered the house, on the eight day. The Cullens were to be pitied, they had all seemed to suffer some loss. But all was not well in the house. One vegetarian smelt of human blood. Jane stuck to him for the weeks that they inhabited the house. Alec kept everyone else quiet, with his stories of Aro, Marcus and Caius. They were under the pretence of seeking out a couple of vicious nomads in a nearby town. He could sense the fear of each other being in the house.

Nothing as such happened in Alaska for Jane or Alec. Each week, when the Cullens left to hunt, they searched. They searched for clues about a human. Nothing could be found.

"Promise us you will visit us sometime. Aro speaks highly of Carlisle Cullen. We just had to see for ourselves." Jane's sweet voice echoed as Alec and her prepared to make their leave. They had found nothing, but only an interest in what the coven had been hiding.

Or what they were ashamed to show.

A/N - Review if you like it! In a few days, another chapter will be up, back to Bella's cliff-y situation! Thanks for reading :)