A/N: Thanks for your support guys but I just wanted to let you know that my holiday is coming to an end soon (tomorrow) and I won't be able to write as often as I am going to have a really, really big exam in October.

Thanks for reading! And to those of you who just like putting my story on story alert and don't bother to write a review, please do make an effort to send me a review. I would really appreciate this.

P.S: I used Google Translator to translate some of the conversation to other languages so if it's wrong, I'm very sorry for any mistake.

Chapter Nine

I applied the lotion that I had created specially for this occasion.

A lotion that stopped vampires from sparkling under the sun.

I had been fed up when I had to wear long sleeved shirts when the sun was sunny, so I had stayed home for three days trying to create this antidote and finally, I did it!

When I had ran up to my fathers and told them the news, they had thought I was joking at first, but when I demonstrated its use; they believed me and congratulated me on my accomplishment.

They were planning to call all civilized vampires to come to Volterra where we would hold a ball to tell everyone of this piece of news and also introduce me to the whole vampire community.

This ball was to be held about two weeks from today and just thinking about it made me excited, and of course sad too.

Because this meant that the Cullen were going to see me as a vampire, at least I knew that I wouldn't be weak little Bella anymore, I would be the all new Princess of the Volturi, more powerful than ever.

As I pulled back my long red-streaked jet-black hair into a neat bun with a hair net, I thought about this morning's upcoming race.

From what I knew, I would be winning this race. I hoped it wouldn't be because of Haine because I didn't want to take advantage of her powers.

I put on my helmet and tucked my hands into a pair of black gloves.

I laughed as I heard Jane being scolded by Haine for not putting the horse shoes properly.

I looked at myself in the mirror. Not bad. The breeches/jodhpurs actually looked good on me.

I headed to the main room, where m fathers were currently at. I was surprised, I mean, that place was usually used only when we had guests, and from what I knew, no one was coming anytime soon, although in a few weeks time, the whole place would be filled with vampires getting ready for the ball.

Were there going to be guests? No, I shook my head, if there were, my fathers would have warned me in advance.

"Aro, Marcus, Caius, you guys essere prossimi alla gara?"

(Aro, Marcus, Caius, will you guys be coming to the race?)

I asked them in Italian.

Ever since I had learnt the language, I had fallen in love with it. Other than that, I had learnt a few other languages other than this.

They turned toward me and Marcus answered, "Mi dispiace Bella, ma abbiamo alcune questioni di andare in e non può andare alla gara di oggi."

(I'm sorry Bella, but we have some matters to go into and cannot go to the race today.)

I was disappointed; this was my very first race! Although I tried to hide it, my fathers must've seen them because Caius hurriedly added, "Abbiamo consentito Felix, Heidi, Jane, Alec Demetri e di avere la giornata però. Essi andranno con voi per la corsa. Abbiamo bisogno di Gianna così non abbiamo potuto lasciarla andare, spero che non mente."

(We allowed Felix, Heidi, Jane, Alec and Demetri to have the day off though. They will be going with you to the race. We need Gianna so we couldn't let her go, I hope you don't mind.)

I smiled; at least the others were coming to watch. I would definitely be getting many cheers then.

I waved goodbye and headed to Haine's room to saddle her up (Haine was getting fed up with Jane) and then prepare for the race.

Aro's POV

I felt very guilty, not telling Bella about the fact that the Cullens were coming, but last I heard they were only going to be visiting us and then they would head back.

I hoped that they were going to stick with the plan because I didn't think I could handle the stress of keeping anything from Bella any longer.

It was bad enough that we could not go to Bella's first race, as we needed to talk to the Cullens. It would be worse if we had to miss anything else.

I knew that it was not only me that was feeling guilty. Seated to the left and right of me, were Marcus and Caius, and from the looks on their faces, they must be feeling immensely guilty too.

But what could we do, telling Bella would only make matters worst.

I heard a knock on the door. Gianna entered saying, "Bella er gået, kan vi lade Cullens i nu?" (Bella has left, can I let the Cullens in now?)

She spoke to me in Danish, one of the few languages that the Cullens did not know.

I nodded and asked her to lead them in, but not before I told my brothers, "Block dit sind, vi ikke ønsker at fortælle dem om Bella eksistens endnu. Hun fortalte os om ikke at lade dem vide, indtil dagen for bolden." (Block your minds, we don't want to let them know about Bella's existence yet. She told us not to let them know till the day of the ball.)

After an incident where the Cullens had found out a secret of mine because of Edward, I had learnt to block my mind so that he would know no more.

I hurriedly put on my happy face, and noted that my two brothers put on their poker faces.

Carlisle and his wife came in first, followed by their five different children. Edward came in the last and I took a long look at him.

So this was the Edward that left Bella. He was certainly cute, as other human teenagers would say, and also very hot. (I didn't understand the teenager lingo. I only learnt a bit from Bella.) But I didn't think that he was a player. He didn't look much like it.

From what I heard from Bella, players will always have a cocky grin on their faces and act like a know-it-all. Edward here, didn't look cocky, in fact, he actually looked excited. I wondered why.

"Ahem." I heard Carlisle clearing his throat, which pulled me out of my trance.

I looked at him, and then at my brothers, apparently all three of us had had the same thought, and had been staring intently at Edward, who seemed a bit confused.

He must be wondering why we were appraising him so intently just now.

"Hello Carlisle, Esme, Emmett, Rosalie, Alice, Jasper, and of course, Edward. Welcome to Volterra." I said, smiling.

"Thank you Aro, we came here to ask about your change in…diet. What was the reason for the change?" Carlisle replied.

I grinned even wider, remembering the past, "Well, someone very important convinced me that what I was doing was hurting many people and told me to stop." I looked at Marcus and Caius, they too were smiling.

The whole Cullen family looked confused. Then Carlisle looked at Edward, obviously wanting him to find out who the person was. I felt tugging in my mind, most probably Edward trying to read his mind. I couldn't help it, I burst out laughing.

His face was contorted into a funny expression. He actually looked like a mule we had seen a few years ago.

The Cullens stared at me with confused faces. "Edward looks like a mule when he does that face." I explained, Emmett looked at his face, and burst out laughing too.

"So, what's the surprise?" Alice asked.

I was extremely confused. What surprise?

I looked at the other Cullens, Emmett, Rosalie, Esme and Carlisle looked confused.

Edward just looked guilty.

Oh god, did she mean the ball? But how could she have known? Oh, she was the physic.

"The surprise is that in two weeks time, we will be hosting a ball here as there is an announcement to be made by us. A very important one. We hope that you will come, is that possible?" I said.

The Cullens face cleared and Carlisle nodded.

"Two weeks time you say?" he asked. I nodded, what was he planning?

"Do you think that we could stay here till then?" he asked.

Stay here?! But, Bella would know that we lied to her then! Oh god, what were we going to do?!

I exchanged frantic glances with Marcus and Caius.

Maybe if I asked them to stay in a hotel and make sure that they wouldn't be in the same place as Bella was, Bella wouldn't even notice.

Perfect!

Just then, the big one, Emmett, looked at his watch, then jumped up and told me, "If you'll excuse me Aro, Marcus and Caius, Edward, Rosalie, Alice and I need to go somewhere." I nodded, thinking that they wanted to go sightseeing or exploring.

Then, they children dashed out and I proceeded to talk to Carlisle with Marcus and Caius.

Bella's POV

I got ready while I waited for the gun shot to give the signal that the race had started, when out of the blue, I smelled vampires coming my way, I didn't even know that the race had started until Haine gave a whinny, people were staring at me, wondering why I hadn't moved.

I looked up and saw the other racers far ahead in front of me.

I gave the signal for Haine to start. She started at a slow gallop as I felt stares boring into my back.

I was thinking about the vampires I had smelt earlier, they seemed familiar somehow, but I couldn't place my finger on where I had smelt that scent before.

I didn't even know why I was so paranoid, I mean, this was a big race, many vampires would come and watch it. Nothing special.

So I dismissed the suspicions lurking in my mind and concentrated on the race. I saw the expressions on each of the racers' faces and knew what they were thinking,

Stupid girl. I already won her so easily. She's so far behind; she won't even have a chance at winning.

I growled involuntarily, did they really think I was going to give up so fast? The answer was, no.

I nudged Haine, encouraging her to go faster, when a sickly sweet smell entered my nostrils, but I ignored it and continued my race.

I could feel the wind in my face, I sighed, and it felt so good.

Very quickly, we caught up with the other racers and started to pull ahead in front of them.

Very briefly, I smiled at them before giving Haine permission to go faster.

I could hear the announcer's voice somewhere behind me saying,

And number 7 makes a brilliant comeback. I swear, I've never seen someone make such a quick comeback, especially a young girl like this. If she continues at this pace, we'll know for sure whose going to win.

I grinned wider as I saw the expressions on the other racers' face. Brilliant, definitely a Kodak moment.

As I raced past the finishing line, I smiled, I could hear all of them cheering for me, some people staring in disbelief, and some people groaning, obviously losing to some bet the made.

Who said that someone couldn't make a comeback?

Who needed love anyway?

And that was when I saw him.