Disclaimer: "Twilight" belongs to SMeyer. "Les Yeux de la Lune" belongs to Elysabeth.
A recap: In the last chapter, BxE have their baseballl game and encounter James and company. Bella tells Charlie that she's going camping with the Cullens, but really is going to Los Angeles with Alice and Jasper while Edward sets up a false trail for James to follow.
Chapter 14: Pursuit
My fists clenched, I stared at the airplane, powerless, as it rose slowly in the sky. From where I was, I could see him through the minds of the passengers who had the bad luck to be in the same row as he was. They looked at him warily, and those who had seats near his put as much distance between themselves and him as they could. From several angles, I saw his expression, with its flash of maliciousness. Next to him was his companion with her flamboyant hair. She had a predatory smile of satisfaction. The humans around her did not seem to interest her, even for their blood. Up to a certain point, they were comfortable among mortals, but they made no effort to appear normal. If their hungry eyes, black as slate, made them seem less supernatural, they were still intimidating enough to make humans look away.
We hadn't arrived in time to stop them. We had discovered their trail too late. We had made it to the airport shortly after them, but their scents were clouded by those of the passengers who filled the terminal. I had to resort to my gift to find them. What with all the minds around me, I found James's only at the moment his plane was taking off.
Our pursuit would have to continue. It was what we had done since he had figured out that Bella wasn't with us. He had stopped following us, and we realized it too late. He was clever enough to keep himself out of my range so that I didn't hear him decide to stop. Once we had discovered that we no longer had him on our tail, he was already far away. For a moment, we thought he had returned to Forks, but retracing his scent led us to Seattle.
As we did so, we got a call from Esme. As for the woman, she was back in Forks and searching for something there, but not Bella, it appeared. Instead, she was looking for information. But what exactly, Esme and Rosalie didn't know since Victoria left almost immediately. They didn't dare follow her for fear that it was a ruse to leave Charlie unguarded.
I understood the reason for her return to Forks only when I studied those two minds in that airplane. Victoria had found Bella's old address in Phoenix and had rejoined James to impart this information to him. They had taken the next plane. Phoenix was their goal.
Why? There was nothing there but the fading vestiges of Bella's scent. How would that help them? What did they hope to find there? Bella's mother? Since Charlie was being protected, were they going to go after Renee, make her a hostage they could exchange for Bella? They were going to be disappointed: Renee was traveling with Phil, and in case home base for them was Jacksonville.
I tried to find out more but the airplane soared away into the distance and soon they were too far away for me to read their thoughts.
Carlisle and Emmett joined me on the tarmac.
"Do you know what they're planning?" my father asked.
I shook my head. "All that I know is that plane is landing in Phoenix."
"Good. I'll go get tickets for the next flight."
Our roles were reversed. From now on, we were the trackers and they were our prey.
We returned to the terminal. Emmett went to his Jeep to retrieve our only luggage: a valise holding the necessary arsenal for killing a vampire and the medical bag Carlisle took with him everywhere. I hoped that the latter wouldn't be needed.
I used the time to call Jasper. James didn't know Bella's hiding place, but in Phoenix he would be too near it for my comfort. California and Arizona were too close together. I wanted as many miles as possible between him and Bella.
My brother picked up on the first ring.
"He's going to Phoenix. Leave Los Angeles at once. He's too close."
"I agree. Alice has seen a mirrored room. He's going there."
"Where is it? In Phoenix?"
"We don't know. She saw only that he would be there."
"Fine, let me know if her vision becomes more specific."
A short silence. Hesitation.
Jasper waited, knowing intuitively the reason.
"Can I speak to her?" I asked.
There was the sound of the phone being handed over, and then I heard the sweetest, most comforting and caressing sound that I could have ever heard.
"Edward?"
It was like a lantern lighting the darkest parts of my being. It had been only two days since I had heard this voice, and it seemed like an eternity. I was a shell, an automaton without life. I was focused on fulfilling my mission, nothing more. Hearing her voice gave me the impetus I needed to keep going. She was my fuel.
"I've been so worried." I could hear the relief in her tone.
I was simultaneously touched and exasperated. She never changed.
"I forbade you to worry about us, Bella. Are you holding up okay?"
"I'm managing. Where are you?"
"Sea-Tac. He got on a flight for Phoenix. I'm sorry. He got suspicious. Your scent was no longer fresh on the clothing we had. He figured out it was a trick and he took off. I thought he was going back to Forks, but then he changed his plans.
"Phoenix… He's going to Renee's house…"
It wasn't mere speculation. She knew that Phoenix hadn't been chosen at random.
"Victoria must have given him some information about you, including your old address."
"Lord … Renee … It's lucky she's traveling. I couldn't endure it if -"
"You don't have to worry about here. Your mother is far away. No matter what he's planning, James won't have time to carry it out. We're jumping on the next flight to Phoenix. Can you give me your mother's address?"
She did, and then I tried to reassure her. "We'll get him soon, I promise you. You don't have any reason to worry."
"I'm not worrying about me."
Of course she wasn't. "I told you not to worry about us!"
"All right, all right. But can I worry about Charlie, at least?"
"You can't do that either. The woman has left Forks. She's back with James. It'll be easy to track them down. With luck, we'll get them both in Phoenix."
"We're also getting on a plane. Alice has already repacked our bags and is making arrangements on her own phone." Bella seemed disconcerted by her vampire speed. "We're going to Alaska?"
"Tanya's coven… Good idea, Alice. Tanya will hide you."
"Tanya? The head of the Denali group, yeah?"
"Right. I need to go. Carlisle's here with our tickets," I said, watching my father approach. "Tell Jasper to call as soon as you've made it to Denali… It'll all be over soon. Everything will go back to normal. Goodbye, Bella."
I didn't close my phone. I could only clench the receiver, waiting apprehensively for the click that would tell me that she had hung up.
That click didn't come.
She too was waiting for me to hang up.
"Take care," I added suddenly, my voice hoarse.
"You too. I… I am so happy to hear your voice."
"Me too."
I hung up then, so I wouldn't get fall apart.
I once more became a shell, but I didn't complain. This separation was my punishment. Bella was in danger because of me. I had earned it for having indirectly put her in James's path.
I spent the next four hours in a business class seat that was too small to contain my anxiety and frustration. I stared out the window. The convivial ambience of this section of the plane irritated me immensely. Champagne flute, knowing little laughs, relaxation, reading, movies, hors d'oeuvres. Enough! How could they be so carefree when I was on tenterhooks, impatient and feverish?
This plane is too slow. We should have bought our own jet…
The atmosphere around me only made me more eager to get this over with. I wanted to find this murderer and end him. Quickly. And after… after, what would happen? How would the stress Bella was under now affect her later?
I imagined all sorts of scenarios. None of them positive.
"It's too difficult for me. I'm sorry, I can't live with this constant possibility that my family and I will be in the sights of another tracker just because I'm your friend. It's better if I go back to my human friends and you go back to your vampire life."
My fingers sank into the armrest. Carlisle grabbed my wrist. "Calm down, son."
I gave him a small nod of acquiescence.
"Remember, you're not alone in this. We all want as much as you do that Bella comes out of this unharmed. And that's what is going to happen."
"Don't underestimate James."
"I'm not underestimating him. But don't underestimate us, either. Unity is strength."
He patted my shoulder kindly, discreetly reshaped the armrest to hide the damage and returned to his own thoughts. They were gloomy. He was looking for ways to persuade the tracker to give up. My father's pacific nature meant that he was always trying to find a truce and avoid a bloodbath even though deep down he knew that it was futile in this case. He was too good, Carlisle was.
Emmett's thoughts were the polar opposite of my father's. I decided to focus on them, since they were more consonant with my own state of mind. I wasn't a pacifist. Far from it. My brother was very impatient. Not worried, but he was eager to confront James. To pass the time he imagined a thousand ways – some crazy, some lethal, but all savage – to end the tracker. It at least had the merit of distracting me a little for the rest of the flight.
When we landed, night had fallen. While we didn't need to hide ourselves from the sun, we couldn't just run through the middle of town to get to Renee's house. It was Emmett who suggested stealing a car. My father wanted to rent one, but the process would take too long, and the urgency of the situation overcame his scruples.
"Try to find something that nobody will pay attention to," Carlisle told him.
"Yeah, yeah."
He was just about to leave when my cell vibrated. It was Alice, I saw from the number. I was puzzled: they couldn't have possibly made it already to Denali.
"Hello, Alice."
Her voice was strained. "Edward…"
I immediately had a bad feeling about this. It was as if a hand had punched through my stomach and was twisting my entrails.
"What?"
"I … it's…" She couldn't form a sentence. What had happened, for Christ's sake?
"You've seen something? You know where the room with mirrors is?"
No answer.
"Alice? Alice!"
"Edward."
Jasper had taken the phone. His voice was controlled, but troubled.
"Jasper?"
"Bella left," he said without preamble.
Now two hands were wringing my entrails.
"What are you saying?"
"Bella is gone. She slipped away from us."
My father and Emmett could hear him. They stared at each other as if hypnotized. They said nothing. That is, nothing aloud.
"Bella took off…"
"She's nuts, that girl! Why would she do such a thing?"
I was frozen, my eyes staring into space, so still that some travelers passing by did a double take, thinking I was a store mannequin that had somehow been deposited in the middle of the airport.
Bella… gone … fled.
These words couldn't be in the same sentence, the same context. It was impossible, illogical. I had heard them, but couldn't understand them.
Finally, I exploded. "So find her!"
New passersby were startled by my voice. A guard nearly dropped his coffee. "That guy's insane!" he thought.
I ignored everything around me and concentrated only on the voice on the telephone.
"Impossible," Jasper said calmly. "We were at the airport, waiting for the flight to Alaska. She ran away from us and got on a flight to Phoenix at the last minute."
"She did what?"
Phoenix…
I allowed myself an instant of wild happiness. Did she mean to come find me? Did she miss me that much? Could she no longer endure our being apart?
Like an imbecile, I looked around me as if Bella was going to magically appear at any moment.
Then my euphoria gave way to cold reality.
Bella was in Phoenix. Here. In the same city as James.
Dammit to hell.
"That was two hours ago and -"
"Two hours? Why didn't you tell me earlier?"
"Alice saw that you would lose it 30,000 feet up, surrounded by witnesses, which wouldn't have been smart."
"I am not losing it," I said furiously while the crowd around us looked at me skeptically.
I calmed myself down, remembering that Bella was perhaps in this same crowd.
"She's here," I said, dazed.
"The L.A.-Phoenix flight lasts only an hour. She must have left the airport quite a while ago. She didn't want to run into you."
"Why would she want to not run into us? And why did she leave? And how could you have lost her?" I started to lose control again. "How could she have gotten away from you so easily? She's blind, for heaven's sake, and easy to spot!"
Carlisle put his hand on my shoulder, a mute command for calm. I closed my eyes and tried to think.
"How could she have found a seat?" I asked.
"She carried her laptop in her bag. There wasn't much to do at the hotel besides surf the Internet. If she hadn't hung out in her room with her headphones on we would have figured out sooner what she was planning."
"How could she have bought a ticket?"
"She has a credit card. After she left, I broke into the network and saw her last transaction."
"How could she have managed alone in the crowd?" A lump in my throat, I imagined her with her cane, lost in all the noise and traffic of a huge airport. Bella was uncomfortable in public and hated crowds. So how did she figure out how to get where she wanted to go?
"She's been here before. She knows the layout," my brother answered.
"But Bella's never been …" I stopped, remembering.
"My mother took me to Los Angeles once. I kept asking her to describe everything around us and she couldn't really enjoy the trip."
Los Angeles … describing everything…
During their visit, she no doubt asked her mother to give her a detailed description of the airport. Bella had a phenomenal spatial memory. She found the ticket counter because she had already been there with her mother. What irony: Alice and Jasper chose Los Angeles to hide Bella – a wise choice, since it was sunny 350 days a year. The more sun there was, the more difficult James would find it tracking his prey. But Bella wouldn't have been able to slip away if she had been in an environment new to her.
"She fooled us," Jasper said bitterly. "When we were there, she asked us to get her new clothes: the odor of new leather and suede would better hide her own scent, she said. It was a good precaution in case James managed to pick up our trail. Alice dressed her from head to toe. That was only a ruse. Then she asked me to go with her to the restroom, saying she was nervous and wanted me to use my gift to calm her down. She was indeed very anxious, so I followed her. I thought it was the tracker who was unnerving her … What I didn't realize was that she was uneasy because she feared that she wouldn't succeed in tricking us." I heard his teeth grinding. "I accompanied her to the ladies' room instead of Alice. After five minutes waiting outside, I started worrying. I went to get Alice so she could find out what was going on. She came out immediately. Bella was no longer there. She had taken a different exit. I instantly went after her, but I reflexively followed the scent of her old clothes, which I found in a trash can. It was then that I understood that the new clothes weren't meant to fool James, but us. By that time, she was on the plane. I found her true scent, which led me to the gate for the Phoenix flight. Her plane had just pushed off. I couldn't do anything. She had planned her escape well."
For an absurd second, I was struck with admiration for Bella. Tricking a vampire was quite an exploit. Tricking Jasper was close to a miracle.
The second passed, and my anger once again came to the fore.
"How could she have fooled Alice? She didn't see anything?"
"She did, but she misinterpreted her vision."
"Misinterpreted!"
"Hey, Alice is really upset right now. She doesn't need you to make her feel worse."
I was too panicked, enraged and desperate to care about Alice.
"I entrusted her to you!"
"Let me remind you that your Bella also assured you that she would stay with us."
"Don't you dare blame Bella!"
"Then don't blame Alice! You depend too much on her. It's too much pressure."
Carlisle snatched the phone from me before I could answer. It was probably a good thing, since I was on the verge of cracking, of saying insults that I would bitterly regret later. I knew that it would serve no purpose to heap recriminations on my family, but I lacked sufficient control to stop myself.
Bella had left … of her own free will. How could she have done such a thing? I knew that she was too trusting and imprudent, but that surpassed all understanding.
Bella… my Bella… alone in Phoenix, in the same city as the tracker. Why? There surely had to be a reason. But no matter what the reason was, the truth remained that Bella had decided to launch herself toward certain death.
Wild-eyed, I started sniffing all the odors around me. Nicotine, overbearing perfumes, hidden drugs, diesel fuel, chemicals, but nothing of the scent I wanted so much to find. Although wonderful and unique, it was lost in the mass of travelers. I couldn't smell the tracker either. Nonetheless, the two of them had passed through this airport, and not long ago. Their trail must still be fresh, but how to find it in this crowd? Even my talent was of little use: Phoenix had two million minds; finding James's was like searching for a needle in a haystack.
Even so, I scanned the minds in the airport – perhaps someone had noticed Bella when she arrived. After all, she had said it herself: people tend to stare at the handicapped. Someone must have noticed her. A pilot, a passenger, an airline worker, someone! But I found nothing. No one was thinking of her at the moment, which was all I could read.
Impotent, furious and at a loss, I held my head in my hands, ready to tear out my hair. Emmett grabbed my shoulder. It wasn't to comfort me as much as to stop me from destroying everything around me.
"Easy there, Edward."
We were right in the middle of traffic and lots of passengers were staring at us.
"Maybe he's having an epileptic seizure?"
"He's unstable. I should call security."
"Who is that nutcase? They shouldn't let people like that out in public."
My father started walking and signaled to Emmett to lead me. He found an empty corridor where we would attract less attention. He started talking on the phone again, but it was no longer Jasper at the other end of the line.
"Edward, I am so sorry!" I heard. My sister's voice was anguished. "I saw it wrong! I thought it was her, but it was her mother! She was concentrating only on that, I stupidly told myself that she wanted to save herself, and I didn't know…. After that phone call I should have been suspicious!"
"Alice, stop," Carlisle interrupted. "Start from the beginning, please."
My father's calm voice had its effect on my sister. I heard her take a breath and start speaking again with more composure.
"At the hotel, just before we left, Bella got a call from Renee. I left her alone so they could talk. Afterward, she came out of her room, smiling. Smiling too much. I should have known she was acting. 'She called Charlie to see how I was and when he told her I was off camping she called on my cell,' she had told us. 'She was all excited.' She had imitated her: '"My daughter, camping!" I normally never go out, so this was a first for her. She always had to drag me along on her crazy schemes, you understand. So … It was good to talk to her. I miss her. It has cheered me up, considering the circumstances.' Cheered her up, my eye! Bella was completely overcome. Jasper felt it. And after, I had a vision in which she was protecting herself, she was doing everything to save herself. I found it strange, but also reassuring. I told myself that she was finally realizing that she should be worried about her safety rather than that of her family and us. I thought she was overwhelmed by the realization of the danger she faced. But I was wrong! I've never seen Renee, so I didn't know how similar they looked. So when I saw that vision of Bella, it was in fact her mother she was thinking of. They're like twins! If I had known that, I would have understood that the call from her mother had alarmed her."
"So she tricked you because she believed her mother was in danger? But why wouldn't she tell us if she was worried?"
"I didn't hear their conversation, Carlisle. Bella was in her room … Perhaps it wasn't only Renee at the other end of the line …"
I was horrified. "James. He has her mother," I declared.
It all became clear. Bella hadn't acted rashly, but out of sacrifice. James had found the ideal way to bring her to him instead of embarking on an interminable pursuit.
"That's what I think," said Alice, who had heard me perfectly. "That was what pushed Bella to leave us without warning. He must have threatened to kill her mother if she came with us."
"That explains everything," my father said. "Well, not everything. I wonder how he could have gotten her mother so quickly, since she's traveling with her husband."
"Perhaps she just happens to be in town," Alice said. "I am so sorry!"
"It's all right. Edward doesn't blame you." Carlisle shot me a warning glance. "Are you certain that Bella is here?"
"After she left, I envisioned her entering a house. It has to be Renee's."
"Was she alone?"
"She went into the house alone, yes. Then everything went blank. I saw nothing else. As if… as if she couldn't make any more decisions."
I shuddered. If Alice could not longer see Bella's future, it was because Bella no longer had a future, certainly. Fatally.
I could not longer control myself. Without realizing it, my hands curled into fists and started hammering at the wall of the hallway, punching a crater in the plaster. I supposed my body was doing this to get some sort of relief from my mental distress, but there seemed to be a connection missing in my brain, because I derived no solace from destroying this wall. Even if I tore this whole airport to pieces, I wouldn't feel better. But my will was disconnected from my body, and my hands would have continued their massacre if Emmett hadn't restrained me. Carlisle was preparing to come to his aid.
Alice must have figured out what was happening on our end, for she hastily added, "But James hasn't killed her, I know it. I would have seen it, I would have seen him in triumph. All that I see of him is still that room of mirrors."
Her words had the desired effect. I managed to gain control of myself, and if not relax, at least remain immobile.
Carlisle watched me from the corner of his eye as he put the phone back to his ear. Emmett turned to face the end of the hallway leading into the terminal, making sure that no one had heard or seen what I had done.
"You still don't know where it is?" my father asked.
"Nothing is clear. It's a room with mirrored walls and a golden frieze."
I couldn't stay unmoving long. Talking was only delaying us. Bella was still alive, Alice said, so we needed to act now.
Carlisle saw the determination on my face as he arrived as the same conclusion.
"Fine. We're going to start searching."
"We're driving to Phoenix now," Alice said. "We didn't have time to wait for the next flight. We knew it would be faster in the Mercedes. We'll be there in a half-hour."
"Okay. Meet us at –"
"Don't bother. I will find you."
"See you soon, then."
Emmett had already left to steal a car. As Carlisle and I exited the terminal, our minds were so focused on figuring out what had happened to Bella that we barely noticed the distant curses of a janitor who discovered the damage I had done.
"James probably found Bella's cell number at Renee's house," he speculated.
"Or perhaps Renee gave to him … under coercion."
I tried to not picture what that horrible creature might have done to get what he wanted from Bella's mother.
"Still, it's odd that Renee would be home when James got there when we were certain that she was at the other end of the country."
"I find it strange too. We'll find out more once we're there."
"Yes, the house will be a good place to start tracking them; their scents will be much more obvious there than in this airport."
A purring Jaguar pulled up in front of us with a screech.
"Hop in," my brother said.
"Wouldn't it have been wiser to choose something less … conspicuous?" Carlisle reproved him once we were inside.
"I swear to you that I took the first car available."
I saw in his head that he was lying, but didn't mention it. I was too preoccupied. Too impatient. I would have preferred to drive myself. I hated just sitting here. On the other hand, I wasn't sure that I had sufficient control to not do something stupid if I was at the wheel.
"You have Renee's address?" Emmett asked, looking at me in the rear view mirror.
"Scottsdale."
We found the house quickly.
It was picturesque. Tranquil. At least on the surface.
"There's no one inside," I said after scanning the interior.
We got out of the car and I immediately detected the scent I loved above all others.
"She's been here already."
Two other scents, scents I hated, emanated from the house.
"James and Victoria."
A chill racked my body. Bella, James and Victoria were in this house, together. The mixture of their three scents was hellish, forming a terrible equation: Bella + James + Victoria = Death.
My father tried the door. It wasn't locked. Or rather, it was no longer locked. Whatever had happened here, James didn't bother securing the house behind him.
Carlisle examined the yard while Emmett and I went inside. It was a small consolation, but we found no evidence of a fight or blood on the first floor or the one above.
I stopped briefly at a little room painted in pink. Bella's old bedroom. After Bella moved to Forks, Renee didn't leave the room empty. She had pulled out, from the odors I picked up, Bella's old things from storage bins or the attic. Old drawings, books of fairy tales, stuffed animals, dolls, a rocking horse. Renee was nostalgic for Bella's childhood, apparently.
And it was on display for me inside these four walls. She was a baby here, grew up here, slept here, took her first steps, had her first dreams, her first nightmares. A little girl like every other, but one who was soon going to face blindness, and later, a demon because she had been magnanimous enough to be friends with a vampire.
I touched an old book of fairy tales. It was dog-eared; Bella must have read it repeatedly. She loved to lose herself in fantastical universes. As a little girl, did she dream that a fairy tale might come to life? Perhaps … But her dreams must have been of charming princes and fairy godmothers, not of vampires. Did she ever dream that one day a mythical creature would one day become her friend … and lead to her death?
I forced myself to turn away from the room. This wasn't the time for those sorts of thoughts. I had to concentrate on finding her. Each second wasted was one more second for the tracker to achieve his goal.
I found Emmett again. We both noticed that something was off.
"I smell only Bella, James and Victoria," I said.
"Me too. Her mother wasn't here."
"Maybe James grabbed her outside the house, before she could come in."
"In front of all the neighbors?"
"He could have, at night."
"But her scent would have been in the yard. No human besides Bella has been near this house for a long time."
"True."
"Perhaps he captured her somewhere else? In a supermarket or a gas station, on the road…."
"He knows her address, not her face. He doesn't have any way to recognize her."
"Yeah. And the scent here is too old for him to use it to track her … It's bizarre."
"I don't know how James managed to trick Bella, but I am more and more certain that Renee is fine and with Phil."
"I think you're right."
Carlisle rejoined us then, his face grave.
"There are many trails from the house, going in many directions. Bella's scent is everywhere, mixed with those of James and his mate."
I cursed.
The tracker was using our own tactic to hide their real trail.
"He's doing exactly what we did when we left our house. He must have realized that it was only a matter of time before we figured out where he was," Emmett said, his teeth gritted. He turned to me. "Do you think you can detect which trail is the right one?"
Of the three of us, I knew Bella's scent the best, but that wouldn't help us. "He could just as well have carried her somewhere, then come back with her to his starting place and gone off in a different direction, then done it again and again."
How could I so clinically analyze the situation? Bella was in the hands of a demon and I was stuck here making detections like a blasé Sherlock Holmes.
My cell vibrated. When I saw the number, hope bloomed in my chest. I answered, full of hope: "Bella!"
But the response was a cruel laugh that ravaged me.
"Just try to find your fragile little human."
He hung up.
I started at my cell, paralyzed. He had found my number listed somewhere … or forced Bella to tell it to him…
A second later, my telephone was in pieces, crushed in my palm.
I opened my mind to its maximum and was assaulted by the mental cacophony of the city, but not James. Such a Machiavellian mind shouldn't have been so difficult to find! I clenched my jaw to restrain myself from howling.
Carlisle shook me. "Don't let him get to you. All is not lost. One of these trails is the right one. Let's separate and follow them."
The rumble of a familiar engine attracted Emmett's attention. "Jasper and Alice are at the corner," he announced.
We went to meet them. Cringing, Alice stepped out of the car. Jasper planted himself next to her, ready to be a barrier against my anger.
"I am so sorry. We should have been more careful," she wailed.
I no longer had the energy to reproach her. I was beyond that. In fact, I felt guilty for having accused them of laxity. After all, they didn't have to help me.
"Don't. Please forgive me for my reaction earlier."
Alice gripped my arm. "It's not too late," she said. "She's alive. I'm certain of it."
"You can see it, or are you trying to convince yourself?"
"Both. James is waiting. He's still in the mirrored room."
"And the woman?"
"She is also waiting. But far away from here. They've arranged to meet later. She's difficult to predict. She doesn't stay in one place – she's always changing her plans."
"Let's not worry about her. For now, let's concentrate on Bella."
"I've seen what you want to do," Alice said. "We don't have any other ideas for the moment. Let's split up and follow James's tracks."
We were in a quiet neighborhood without a lot of witnesses. The darkness allowed us to run at our own speed without being seen. I followed a scent trail stronger than the others, but ended up at an abandoned factory. All that I found there was Bella's deformed cane on the ground. Absently, I picked it up and reformed it into its proper shape even as I saw the futility of doing so. Perhaps I was trying to trick Fate. If I could straighten her cane, I could fix everything else ….
How foolish I was.
I retraced my steps, and at the end of four minutes the rest of my family was gathered around me, empty-handed. Actually, not absolutely empty-handed. It seemed that James was greatly amusing himself by leaving pieces of my moon scattered everywhere, just for the pleasure of torturing us.
"I found that at the end of the trail I followed, on a park bench," Emmett said. He held up a cellphone. Bella's.
"He just called me from that phone! He can't be that far!" I thundered.
I held my hand out to Emmett. He hesitated to give me the phone, but my glare made him hand it over. I understood why he was reluctant when I flipped it open. Something silky, fine and dark fell out of it and onto the sidewalk.
I stared at the ground. I wavered between despair and rage, numbness and action.
Her hair.
He had torn out her hair.
Another effort to render me insane.
And it was working.
I swayed as I picked up the lock of hair, caressing it as I would have caressed her to reassure her, to tell her that I would rescue her.
I was a despicable liar, even to myself. For I knew, deep inside, there was no more hope.
Alice clapped her hand to her mouth. "What a vile, vile creature…"
Emmett muttered to himself. "Bastard … scumbag…" I heard.
Jasper said nothing, but he was shocked. As for Carlisle, all his ideas about compassion and negotiations vanished. He realized that there was no point with James.
"He has gone too far," he lamented.
I watched my family, speechless and touched. Until now, they had acted out of duty to their brother and son. At least, that was what I had believed. I realized that I was wrong. I had concentrated so much on my own desperation that I hadn't noticed that my family, to varying degrees, worried as much as I did about what could happen to Bella. They too had a fierce need to save her, an echo of my own need.
And we weren't at the end of the ordeal.
Jasper showed us a laptop, still attached to its little Braille printer. "I found this."
It was obviously Bella's. She had taken it with her on her flight. Jasper opened it and I saw that the screen was lighted up.
"DEAD END," I could read in large-type letters that filled the screen.
"He's playing with us," Emmett growled.
Continuing this twisted version of a scavenger hunt, Carlisle held out a scrap of paper.
"This was at the end of the trial that I followed. It's in Braille. Can you read it?"
Braille .. James couldn't read Braille, I was sure. Perhaps Bella had been able to write a message that gave her location.
I almost tore the paper from Carlisle's hand. I translated as I read:
"Edward, give up. I'm putting you all in danger. He has my mother.
"I don't have a choice. I have to go. I am so sorry. Don't blame Alice and Jasper. And please, please, don't follow him. That's what he wants. I couldn't endure it if someone was hurt or worse because of me, especially you.
"He will be here soon, but before I go, I have to tell you something. I should have told you before, and I so much wanted to do it in other circumstances, but I was too much of a coward. Now that doesn't matte – "
It ended there.
It wasn't a call for help. It was a goodbye note. And she didn't even have time to finish it. What did she want to tell me? How could she think she was a coward? That was the last thing she was ….
I crumpled the paper in my trembling hand.
"She must have written that at her mother's house and was interrupted," Jasper suggested. "By James's arrival. He told her to meet him here. He watched to make sure she came by herself. Then he went in and snatched her."
Alice was puzzled. "But if that was the case, how could she have printed out the note if he came in before she finished?"
"I'd bet that he was the one who printed it as part of his little game," Emmett said.
I heard all this as if from a great distance. I was still torn between fury and desolation.
Where was this demon? Why couldn't I hear him and his depraved mind? He had to be close. He had just called me and left the telephone on the park bench!
I surveyed all the minds in a two-mile radius. Nothing. A five-mile radius. Still nothing.
Nonetheless, I was sure that he was nearby. He couldn't have set all these false trails and then gotten out of my range so quickly.
While I frantically scanned the minds around me, Alice was shaken by a vision.
"Oh! She's back. There she is!"
I saw at the same time as my sister what the future held. It was a brief image, hazy, but it was Bella. Alive.
"What is happening?" Carlisle asked.
"She was unconscious, that's why I couldn't see her! She's woken up. Or is going to wake up…"
Unconscious. I didn't know whether to rejoice or not. She was alive, but what had that demon done to her?
I grabbed my sister by the shoulders. "Concentrate, Alice, I beg you! Find her!"
She closed her eyes, searched out the multiple possibilities and probabilities, certainties and hypotheses. All that I wanted was one tiny little indication about Bella. Unfortunately, the future was blank again.
"She's still in the room of mirrors, but she doesn't know what's around her. She's blind, Edward. If she doesn't see her surroundings, if she doesn't know where she is, how I can I see it?"
"And James?"
"He's in the same place. He … he…"
She tried to turn her third eye away from the path she had just glimpsed, to spare me. But it was too late. I had already seen it.
He was going to slake his thirst – he was on the verge of doing it.
I was about to roar in rage when another image, or a fragment of one, swept away the atrocious scene. Bella was brandishing an object and James collapsed.
"But .. how is she going to manage to do that?" Alice wondered along with me.
"What? What is she going to do?" Emmett asked impatiently.
"Knock him down! He's … he's going to be out cold! Not long, but he will be!"
"Huh?"
I was completely at a loss. It was incomprehensible. Alice must be mistaken.
And suddenly, I heard very clear, precise thoughts.
"What has she done to me, this stupid little girl?"
The man I was searching for – his thoughts ringing loudly in my head.
I then grasped why I hadn't been able to find him. He knew about my talent. He had thus trained himself to think anodyne thoughts just like the humans around him in this city while I was looking for a demonic mind. He had controlled his murderous thoughts to prevent me from finding him. But something had shaken his mental vigilance for an instant. What? How? He had been disoriented, incoherent … he had been – that's right, he had been knocked out! Alice's vision! Bella had gotten an advantage on him, for barely two seconds, but long enough for me.
"I found him!" I cried out triumphantly.
I sped off without waiting. We were so close! He was right under our nose!
It was the shortest, most interminable race of my existence.
I broke through the doors of a dance studio and landed in the infamous room of mirrors. I couldn't have planned the element of surprise better.
He was there, leaning over an inert mass that I didn't take the time to identify. All my attention was on one goal: the demon, the object of my fury, my despair and torment.
James spun around. Shock was on his face and in his mind.
"But .. how could he have -?"
I saw myself through his eyes. I too was a demon. An avenging demon, animated by a terrible rage. No more slumped shoulders, no longer burdened by desperation. I was only determination and boldness and excitement and bared teeth. My eyes were two slits. A killer's eyes.
He was paralyzed at the sight of me. In his centuries of existence he had never been so close to extinction. Now it was in front of him.
I wouldn't even need fire. I wanted to do it all myself. I would reduce him into fragments with my own hands. I would dismember him piece by piece. I would leave his head for last. If I tore his head off first, he wouldn't feel the pain of being ripped apart. I would drag this out, prolong my pleasure in his suffering. I would break his bones, tear his flesh into scraps, hear his scream in pain for each minute of his sickening pursuit of Bella. And when it was all over, I would have no remorse. I would never regret my actions. It would be the only murder I would never repent.
Even as I let him stare at his executioner, I analyzed the situation. In the back of the room was a television set. I had never met her or seen her, but I recognized Renee on the screen. She was chasing after a little girl in this very same ballet studio. My moon, in a tutu. She didn't want her class to be over. "Bella, Bella, come!" I understood immediately how Bella had been tricked by James. The words used by a mother trying to retrieve her mischievous little girl could be interpreted in a much different way when heard on the telephone.
I saw in another corner of the studio another object that James had stolen from Renee's house: a tripod with a camera. The red indicator light showed that it was still recording. Only a mind as twisted and vicious as James's would have wanted to immortalize murder on video.
Next to the inert body, I saw what had allowed me to find the demon, that had knocked him out for two blessed seconds: Charlie's Taser prototype, with a 30,000-volt charge.
Bella must have sneaked out the weapon when she packed and hidden it in her bag. None of us would have seen it, as preoccupied as we were with James watching the house. She probably knew that it wasn't a lethal weapon, but she hadn't underestimated its usefulness.
My love was a clever fighter.
I was overcome with pride for her … which vanished immediately.
My love was an inert body.
I should have kept my eyes on James. It was a monumental error to turn them away from him to look at the floor. For what I saw there yanked away from me the will I need to destroy the demon.
I realized that the Taser shock was the last thing Bella was able to do before returning to unconsciousness. The last act before the curtain fell.
I shouldn't look at the body. Not yet. I had to take care of the demon. I had to have my vengeance. He had to pay.
I tried to gather up my rage and fury. I waited for my rancor to affect me. Nothing.
Now I was the one paralyzed, hypnotized by that still body.
I sensed my family entering the room. I vaguely saw them leap onto the demon, accomplish what I should do, what I had sworn to do myself. But I was incapable of it. I no longer felt … anything.
There was a hole in my chest. A thick veil descended on me, separating me from all the happening around me. My eyes stayed fixed on the broken body on the floor. I heard only the faint sound of a dying heart. My own heart shattered into a million particles that were sucked into the hole.
I fell down at the feet of my moon, a waning moon. My face hovered over hers, nearly lifeless. I felt as if I too was disappearing.
I opened my mouth. A broken sound came from my lips, a wail that issued from the emptiness in my chest.
Through the veil that covered me, I saw hazy shadows approach two beings in agony.
"How can he resist it?"
"He's too close! He's going to kill her!"
"Edward. Move away. Let me take care of her. Go help your brothers deal with James."
Something brushed my shoulder. After a moment, I was able to realize that it was my father's hand.
"He's in a state of shock. That must be why the blood doesn't seem to bother him."
Blood?
The veil lifted. My paralyzed senses started working again. Important information finally penetrated my brain.
Blood. Bella was covered in blood.
I had been so traumatized that I hadn't noticed the blood. I saw it spread. I could smell its intoxicating fragrance. And the monster in me didn't react.
What was happening? It was fully awake, so why didn't it act?
It was then that I understood. The monster had realized that in drinking its fill, there would be nothing left. It would be satisfied, but the intoxicating fragrance would be gone, forever. All it would have was a memory. Seeing Bella in this state made it understood that death would mean the end of this aroma. The monster was used to this scent, and loved it. If it disappeared, the monster would never find it again.
Both the monster and Edward wanted Bella to survive, the latter for her soul and her mind, the former for her scent, her substance, her body. We were on the same wavelength, not for the same reasons, but the result was the same. This was what was allowing me to stay next to her without difficulty.
I knew that I should be pleased. I should be proud of finally having control of my baser instincts. But I didn't care. What use was pride? What was the point of this victory if I lost the person for whom I had struggled so much?
Carlisle pushed on my shoulder. "Move back. Let me examine her."
He shoved me aside when he saw that I was incapable of moving. He cautiously probed Bella's bruised body.
"Severe cranial trauma. Two cracked ribs. Triple fracture of the tibia. Lacerations at the temple. Strangulation. Bruises on the wrists. Shards of glass in the left thigh."
Each injury was a burning brand in my flesh.
"My God!"
Carlisle had just discovered an injury more serious than all the others.
"He bit her!"
My paralysis vanished as I looked at the hand my father was holding. I saw the half-circle in the flesh, blackened by venom.
James's cruelty was infinite.
"I have to stop the bleeding. We're going to lose her … Alice, while she's unconscious, splint her leg and go get the morphine."
Alice?
Alice…
My sister was here. She was having trouble being so close. She was fighting temptation.
"She has to live. Carlisle, there's no need for a splint. Her body will repair itself if we let the venom - "
A roar shook the walls of the studio.
It came from me.
"NO! There has to be another way!"
My father examined the bite.
"It's clean. We have to suck out the venom. In any case, I'm not sure there is enough venom to heal her and transform her. It's almost already finished. We arrived too late."
My father tried to spare me by hiding his terrible conclusions, but he couldn't control it.
And Alice, in despair, confirmed his thoughts with a vision that she tried vainly to keep from being clearer. Among all the paths of hypotheses and eventualities, I saw the road I knew well: my life, the one that had been a tedious loop before I met Bella and now led off to unknown horizons. The only thing I knew about this road was its end, a precipice that represented Bella's death. I knew this, but I hadn't thought the road would be so short. I thought I had decades before I reached this precipice. I was wrong. My road would come to an end in mere minutes.
I threw myself on Bella.
I would fight destiny, I would reject this future.
"Bella!" I cried. "Bella, please, no! Wake up!"
Nothing.
"Wake up! I beg you!" My ear pressed against her fading heart.
"I can't believe they got me. Victoria! Where are you? I'm burning!"
"Die, you piece of shit!"
"Bella is dying .. it's the end of our family…"
"Burn in hell!"
"It's over. I can barely feel a pulse."
I closed my mind off. My eyes dimmed by invisible tears, my throat choked by a nonexistent sob, I murmured words without thinking, words I never thought I would dare say, but that I had longed to tell her for a long time. Words I wanted her to hear, that I hoped would keep her alive.
"Please, Bella, hold on! Don't leave me … I love you… Come back to me…"
I repeated these words until they became only a desperate litany.
I sank into the black hole in my chest.
I didn't notice immediately when the body I was hunched over was moving.
A heartbeat that was stronger than the others brought me back to the surface.
I sat up so I could see. A hand moved. Just a millimeter, but it moved.
Had the venom finally had its effect?
Or was it my words?
Both, perhaps. However - even though I myself was a supernatural creature, something that scientific minds said shouldn't exist – the rational part of my mind wasn't ready to admit that my words could have supernatural curative powers. What I believed didn't matter, though: it was the result that did. Bella emerged from the abyss and opened her eyes despite what I knew was indescribable torture. There was her disoriented gaze, which, unexpectedly, fixed on my own eyes.
Her body was writhing in pain. The burning venom was consuming her. But she almost instantly stopped convulsing. What was happening? What was easing her torment?
Her fingers reached toward my face and her eyes became so calm and beautiful that they made me forget for a second the terrible situation we were in. Then I realized: the venom had already cured her blindness. The healing poison … what a paradox! Her irises, once two dark wells, sparkled now with life.
Bella was looking me straight in the eyes.
She saw me … she could see me!
My father was overwhelmed: "Incredible … the venom has penetrated the radial artery and moved directly to the external carotid and to the optic nerve."
"Bella!" I cried, torn between astonishment and a strange happiness.
Never had I been so affected by a gaze – I felt it deep in my being. And the pain of the venom seemed for Bella to be overshadowed by her new ability to see. Bella stared at my face. What did she see in my own eyes? What was there that made her so serene?
"My angel …" she whispered as her eyes traveled over each part of my face.
Her gaze was like a caress and everything around me that wasn't her ceased to exist. I forgot Carlisle and Alice. I forgot the vile James. I forgot that Bella had been bitten and was about to lose her soul. I forgot my guilt. I forgot remorse.
I took her in my arms and moved my face to hers. Let her see me. Let her stare at me as much as she wanted. I was willing to lose everything just so we could look at each other for an instant – an eternity. I sank into those two wells.
I scrutinized those still-brown eyes that would soon become crimson. I realized that I had never looked deeply enough into them. The water in those wells had always been opaque and murky, but at this instant, while the venom repaired her retinas, it was brilliantly clear. I concentrated on the waves, on their depths, I saw a hidden ripple, a silent prayer that she had never dared utter because she was convinced it would never be answered. I could no longer content myself with just looking. I had to hear this prayer, to understand this timid murmur. So I let myself fall into those two wells. The prayer became a cry. I was swept by the waves, submerged by an extraordinary truth that was unbelievable yet real. This secret prayer was like a torch shining on the darkness of my ignorance.
Of the two of us, I was the blind one. I had never even known to look for this prayer. If I had known to listen, if I had known to look beyond her lifeless gaze earlier, I would have heard this murmur, a murmur that was in fact a cry from the heart hidden at the bottom of these wells. I would have understood this prayer, since it was the same as mine.
"I love you," she said with difficulty, confirming what I had just realized.
I saw it in her eyes, I had sensed it, but to hear it from her own mouth was like a revolution for me. Her words penetrated me, settled into my being as if they had weight and substance; they were palpable. They enveloped me, each cell in my body and each particle of my mind were wrapped around by them. They drowned me in happiness and mired me in hope. I was a universe of contradictions: I felt crushed and overwhelmed even as I felt as if I were flying, floating.
She was burning up because of me and she loved me.
I had wanted to kill her and she loved me.
And I would never have known because, just as I had believed myself unworthy of her, she believed herself unworthy of me. Her comment about Arago and the duke's daughter came back to me:
"How can he be a match for her when he's so ordinary? So you tell yourself it's better to hide what you want, that it's better to live with unfulfilled hopes than with broken dreams. A dream is beautiful even if you don't try to make it come true. A dream that is crushed becomes disillusionment and regret."
"Oh, Bella," I groaned.
I was the one who didn't deserve her.
I stared at her. I saw the incredulity painted on her dying face. She couldn't believe that I loved her. She no longer feared to say those liberating words, she no longer feared rejection, no longer feared that her dreams would be transformed into regret, because I had been the first to say the truth, our truth. And yet doubt persisted on her face.
"I love you, you hear me? You are my life."
She stroked my smooth cheek, opened her mouth to say my own words back to me, I could feel it, but she didn't – for in that moment, the fire of the venom returned to the fore, reducing to cinders these precious seconds that time had paused. Bella was again overwhelmed by pain. I could feel her suffering under my hands. She could not longer hold my gaze and her eyes closed in torment, her body convulsing once more.
It was a brutal return to reality. I heard my brothers taking care of James. I heard Carlisle calling my name, urging me to make a decision. I heard Alice try to calm Bella, and torture of tortures, I heard the cries of suffering from my moon.
"Stop the burning, stop it, please!"
"Edward!" my father called me a final time.
I looked at Carlisle, alarmed.
"I was mistaken. I thought it was over for her … he brought her back … What do you want to do, Edward? The venom is acting on her. It isn't too late to save her from both death and transformation. The wound is clean, the venom could be pulled out and then I could take care of her. Or you can let the venom do its work …"
Why was he demanded that I make this decision?
Having Bella by my side for eternity … restoring her sight …
Or removing the poison, removing her sight, removing the possibility that I could lose myself in her eyes full of warmth and love, removing the possibility that I could be with her until the end of time. Removing all that so she could keep her humanity, her soul.
Never had I been pulled between two such stark choices.
But watching Bella writhing in pain helped me make a decision.
"No. I can't make her endure that."
I couldn't snatch her life away to keep her for me. It wasn't right. She wasn't like I had been, without hope of survival. She was not doomed, not yet. Not if my father saved her.
Carlisle pressed me. "Fine. Then take care of it. Aspirate the poison," he ordered me.
I jerked my head toward him, panicked. "What? But .. I can't … I couldn't."
"I don't have time to do it, Edward. She's lost too much blood. Find the strength to stop in time."
Carlisle spoke as he worked on her bleeding arm, her fractured leg, her gaping scalp. Alice was having difficulty maintaining her control; she needed to put some distance between herself and Bella's blood immediately.
He was right: he didn't have time. There was only me.
I seized Bella's injured wrist and looked once more at my reason to exist.
"I'll make it go away, Bella."
These words were addressed to me as much as to Bella. I would make it go away, I would succeed, I would triumph. Or at least I would convince myself that I could.
I started by first brushing the old scar on her wrist with my lips. I kissed it to test myself, to practice putting the right amount of pressure on her skin so I wouldn't break the bones of her hand. Then I moved slowly to her palm. I inhaled the fragrance of the liquid that flowed from the bite. In seconds, fragrance would become taste.
As I had done with her scar, I kissed the bite mark with reverence and restraint.
I exhaled shakily. My eyes rolled back in my head.
Then I drank. I drank the dark fire that invaded her pure bloodstream, I pulled out from her veins that despicable poison. I didn't have time to taste the bitterness of it. And soon, the venom was gone and there remained only that warm fountain of life. Like a very slow, almost languorous shock wave, this wondrous fluid caressed my lips and rolled luxuriously down my throat. I had never tasted its equal. It was the nectar of the gods, a gastronomical fantasy. The monster had obtained his paradise. Desire fogged my brain and I was lost. Somewhere amid the shreds of my humanity there was the Edward who was crushed and dominated by the monster who apologized for indulging in that nectar, but who couldn't give up the pleasure that it brought.
It was sublime. My cantante was singing the most glorious song in the universe. Her blood flowed in me like the chords of musical instrument, like a river freed from a dam and awakening the desert of my body. There was no more torment, no more fighting against what I was. There was no more guilt, no more remorse, no more doubts. Everything was serene, gentle and peaceful.
Too peaceful.
Too tranquil. Too empty. My singer was still here, but everything was black and silent around her. Something was missing. The voice of my singer wasn't enough. I wanted more. I wanted the song, and everything else too, her body, her mind, her being. The blood alone didn't satisfy me.
I swam against the current of addiction, I returned to the surface, to reason and conscience. I detached my lips from her soft skin. I swallowed the last drops of that crimson river, the last drops of the entire universe. Painfully, I tore myself from that paradise.
However, I wasn't back on earth, nor even in my own personal hell. I had an altogether different sort of joy: that of seeing Bella free of pain. I saw my gentle moon return to life. The eclipse that had dimmed her light had passed and it shone brightly again. And that was a paradise that was a thousand times better than her blood.
Her half-open eyes became lifeless. Once more, Bella was in darkness. She illuminated the world around her, but couldn't illuminate herself. Still, she appeared too relieved that her torment had ended to care about her sight.
"Edward…"
She shuddered weakly when Carlisle injected the morphine.
"It's all over, Bella. Everything will be all right."
"Stay with me…. Don't go away."
"I'm here. I won't leave you. Ever."
Once more, I was the victim of a hallucination. I saw the pieces and shards of Bella's bulletproof bubble reform around her.
"Never."
A/N: I suspect that your reaction will probably be: "About time! You've made us wait 14 chapters for the I love yous!"
Well, they're here now….
T/N: And thanks for all your patience as I get these chapters translated! As you're waiting for the next one, I have a rec: "Straight on Til Morning," by Eh Bien, which is an Eclipse AU that is very close to canon but in which ExB deal with things more, shall we say, rationally. It's on my Favorites List.