Midnight Star
by Lady Dawson
Chapter Seven: Legends of the Cullens
"Annabeth . . . what are you doing here?" I asked. To say that I was surprised to see her was the understatement of the year. I was more than a little shocked to see Annabeth sitting right on my porch like she was waiting for me. "And what do you mean, we need to talk? What's wrong? Is Percy . . .?"
"Percy's fine," she assured me. "At least, he was when I left. Who knows what kind of trouble that boy can find when he's left on his own?"
We both chuckled; Percy could find more trouble than any other demigod in history, even being a child of one of the Big Three. I never seemed to get into half as much trouble as my brother did. Of course, I'd thought that once the prophecy was over and done with, then things would calm down a little, but no such luck.
"This is about what you called me about a few weeks ago," Annabeth explained, sobering up. "About that family that you were so worried about, the Cullens?"
My blood chilled the second that she said the name and I stared at her, biting my lip fretfully. "Did you find something out?"
"You won't believe what I found out," Annabeth sighed. "Look, can we go inside? This isn't the kind of stuff that you want to talk about on the front lawn. I mean, you do have neighbours and this isn't New York. If people overhear, they're bound to talk."
Suppressing a sigh, but knowing that she had a point, I climbed up the stairs and unlocked the door. Thank the gods that Charlie wasn't home yet, because I had the feeling that this wasn't something that I wanted him to overhear.
"Did you want something to drink?" I asked as I headed into the kitchen. "We've got iced tea."
Annabeth rolled her eyes. "Sure, iced tea is good," she said. "Could you please sit down so we can talk about what I found out?"
I poured us both a glass of iced tea and sat down at the kitchen table, where Annabeth had already sat down, her grey eyes—the mark of a child of Athena—stormy.
Once I was settled down, I looked towards my brother's girlfriend nervously. "All right . . . so what did you find out?"
"Okay, from what you told me, all of the Cullen family are extraordinarily beautiful, pale to the extreme, and their eyes change colour, ranging from black to gold, correct?" she said, businesslike. I nodded. "I did all the research that I could, searching everything that I could on Greek myths to try and find anything that sounded what you were talking about. I tried everything, from books to the Internet and nothing seemed to fit."
"So then what are they?" I asked. "Because believe me, they're definitely not human."
She eyed me curiously. "You're sure about that, aren't you?"
"Believe me," I sighed. "I can't go into the details; I promised. But I can tell you that they are most definitely not human. Half-human, maybe, but I'm starting to doubt that . . ."
"Anyway," Annabeth interrupted, "I started doing some research around this area, on the Quileute legends." The Quileute tribe lived on a reservation on the other side of Forks. "And I found some interesting stories. Did you know that according to Quileute legend, their tribe is descended from wolves?"
"What?" I said, trying very hard not to laugh. "How can anybody be descended from wolves?"
"That's what I read, anyway," Annabeth said, shrugging. "I was trying to work that one out, myself . . . until I figured out that they weren't really descended from wolves. They could turn into wolves. Their ancestors were shape-shifters that took on the form of a wolf."
"Wait a minute . . . the Quileutes are descended from werewolves?" I interrupted, holding up my hand. "And what does this have to do with the Cullens?"
"I'm getting to that part," Annabeth explained. "And no, they're not descended from werewolves, though that's what they believe. Werewolves transform during the full moon and the Quileutes could transform into wolves any time they wanted. They're just shape-shifters; the wolf form was merely by chance. It could have taken any form during the first transformation of the original shape-shifters. But I'm pretty sure that they believe that they're werewolves. And they only have one natural enemy, which is what I came to talk to you about."
"And it was so important that you couldn't do it over the phone?"
"Believe me," Annabeth said grimly, "this isn't the sort of thing that I would like to do over the phone. In fact, I'd prefer not to tell you at all, but you'll keep digging until you find something."
"Annabeth Chase," I said, starting to get a little bit irritated, "I have had a really long day and I really wish that you would just get to the point. What does any of these Quileute legends have to do with Edward and his family? And what natural enemy are we talking about?"
"The website that I found only had a few vague descriptions of it, but they called them the Cold Ones," Annabeth said matter-of-factly.
Cold Ones . . .
A shiver travelled up my spine as my mind travelled back to the day of the car accident, when his hand had accidentally brushed against mine. Even throughout all the chaos, even with my mind as shocked and stunned as it was, I still remembered how cold his hand had felt, as though it were ice.
"What are the Cold Ones?" I asked, my voice shaking slightly.
Annabeth hesitated, finally sipping her iced tea in order to give herself a moment's peace. "I did some research on them," she said in a clipped tone, not meeting my eyes now. "Most of the stuff I found was ridiculous, of course, and nothing made any sense. But I did find this one website that actually had some authentic legends on it. Do you have a computer?" she asked. "I'll show you."
I showed her upstairs to my bedroom, turning on my computer and clicking on the internet icon. Annabeth typed in the website, revealing a rather grotesque picture on the home page, of a creature devouring a person.
"Gross," I muttered.
"It gets better," Annabeth said, shrugging. "Look, almost everything that you read about is true. There's hardly anything that's just made-up. Almost everything that you read is actually fact, but most of the reality has been lost in time and shifting memory, details lost . . .
"But a lot of truth remains in the legends. Like speed," she said, glancing towards my expression.
In my mind's eye, I saw Edward the day of the accident, how he had been on the other side of the parking lot than I was, and then suddenly, he was right next to me in two seconds, shielding me with his body, with no thought or concern for himself.
"Strength . . ."
He had protected me with his body and held his hand out towards the van as it swerved towards us, pushing it away as though it were nothing and the indent of his hand was imprinted in Tyler's truck.
"Cold-skinned," Annabeth added, "which is why the Quileutes call them 'The Cold Ones.'" She watched my expression carefully as my gaze swept across the screen, anxiety making my dyslexia worse than ever, but words popped up on the screen, catching my attention and with every one, my mouth got drier than it was, despite the iced tea.
Half-immortal . . .
Undead . . .
Drank blood . . .
My mouth trembled as I stared across the page, finally getting what Annabeth had been trying to tell me right from the very beginning. But it couldn't be, I thought with growing horror, it absolutely could not be, because if it was true, then that would mean . . .
"Vampire," I whispered, my voice shaking, refusing to believe what I was seeing, my heart and my mind fighting against one another, each trying to make me reason with it.
It couldn't be . . . it absolutely could not be, because if it was true, then that would mean that the wonderful boy that I was falling in love . . . the first person that I'd ever trusted with my heart with, the only person that I would give my heart to without question wasn't just immortal; he was also my enemy.
No, I immediately rejected the idea. Even if this were true, that didn't automatically make Edward my enemy. Just because he was a vampire, that didn't mean that he was evil. Maybe he and his family were different . . . maybe they were good.
Of course they had to be good. Why else would Edward have saved my life that day and continue to warn me against coming near him, telling me that it was for my own good that he stayed away from me, warning me that he was dangerous.
Slowly, I turned around to face Annabeth, who had grown very quiet as I had searched the website. "Are you absolutely sure about this?" I asked, my voice surprisingly steady.
"Without a doubt," Annabeth replied, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. "I wouldn't have come to warn you if I had." She hesitated. "But there is one thing that you should know . . ."
"What?"
"Well, you said that all of them have golden eyes, right?" she sought to clarify. I nodded. "That's what the strange part was . . . everything that I could find . . . the legends say that vampires are identified by their red eyes."
"Red eyes?" I said, confused. "But they don't have red ones . . ."
"Yeah, that's the weird part," Annabeth said, nodding. "And the weirder part is that this town doesn't have an abnormal amount of disappearances. You know, people who have vanished without a trace, their bodies never found. Usually, when there's a vampire in town, there's a least something. But Forks isn't just average, it's below average. I don't know what's going on . . . maybe they're getting their food from somewhere else, but . . ." She paused, still studying me carefully. "Susan, you need to come home."
"What?" I demanded, spinning around in my chair to look at her.
"You heard me," Annabeth said firmly. "Vampires are dangerous, all right? Contrary to popular belief, there isn't a whole lot of ways to kill them. You have to literally rip them apart and burn the pieces. You can't just stake them like on Buffy or something. You need to come home. It's too dangerous for you here, with a coven of vampires here."
"No," I said, shaking my head immediately.
"Susan . . ."
"Annabeth," I said more forcibly, "I said no. I'm not coming back to New York, all right? If Edward or any of them wanted to hurt me, they would have done it long before now. And I can take care of myself. I appreciate the concern, but I know what I'm doing. I'm sixteen years old, Annabeth. I'm not a kid anymore," I assured her. "Besides, what could be worse than fighting the Titans?"
She sighed. "I knew that you were going to say that," she complained. "Well, just don't get yourself killed, all right? Percy will never let me hear the end of it."
"Oh, he can't really find a way to blame you for my staying here," I said, rolling my eyes. "How's that going, by the way?"
Annabeth grinned. "Good," she said happily before her expression turned sombre. "But in all seriousness, Susan . . . be careful. And don't do anything stupid, like get yourself killed."
"You know I won't."
She sighed. "I'm hoping," she replied. "But promise me that you'll send an Iris-message the second that you need help."
"I promise," I assured her. "How did you even get here, anyway? You didn't fly all the way out here?"
"Of course," Annabeth said, grinning. "Just not the way that you're talking about," she added, jabbing her thumb towards the window. As I poked my head out, I saw a familiar figure out there.
"Blackjack!" I said with a laugh, grinning at the black pegasus that was Percy's. Or at least, he was loyal to Percy, since Percy kind of helped rescue him, plus our dad is the one who created horses. It's not the first time that a horse or pegasus has delivered inexplicable loyalty to either one of us.
Hey, boss-lady! Blackjack said cheerfully. Since Dad was the one who created horses, I can talk telepathically with them. Got any donuts or something hanging around? It's been a really long flight, he said pathetically. I could use an energy boost for the road.
Shaking my head, I said dryly, "I spoil you too much, you know that? Don't tell Percy; he'll never let me hear the end of it."
You got it, boss-lady! Blackjack said cheerfully as I disappeared into the kitchen and produced some sugar cubes, which he munched on hungrily and noisily, but complained when I also ordered him to eat an apple.
"Eat it or it'll be carrots all next summer," I warned him. Annabeth was trying very hard not to laugh.
"You have a way with pegasus," she said, shaking her head, grey eyes gleaming with amusement.
"Better than with people, I sometimes think," I said, shrugging. "Thanks, Annabeth, for . . . well, thanks," I muttered, shoving my hands into my pockets. "I really appreciate it."
"You're welcome," Annabeth replied, smiling, but it faded away in a second. "You know I've got to tell Percy."
"I know . . . I'm just asking you to wait a little bit," I implored her. "Don't tell him yet; not until I can figure all this out and I won't be able to do that if my overprotective big brother shows up and drags me off to New York."
Annabeth sighed. "Fine . . . but if he asks me about this, I'm not going to lie to him," she told me.
"Fair enough."
She nodded briskly as she climbed on to Blackjack, patting his neck affectionately. "All right . . . well, you'd better come back to camp alive . . . Percy isn't any fun when he's depressed."
"Thanks, Annabeth," I said, rolling my eyes. "Tell him I love him, okay?"
She winked at me then urged Blackjack forward, taking to the sky with ease and soaring through it with finesse before pegasus and rider finally disappeared into the Washington skies, slipping into the clouds and then, at long last, vanished from sight.
I stared at the skies where they had disappeared, my hands in my pockets as my mind spun by what Annabeth had just revealed.
Vampires . . .
The Cullens were vampires . . .
Was it really so impossible to believe? Was it really any more impossible than anything that I had faced in the past four years? What did I really expect to find when I found out the truth? I mean, I'd known they were otherworldly and Annabeth was right; everything that I knew added up to what she had pointed out.
But it didn't matter. Because even if it was true, I couldn't believe that Edward was somebody who would want to hurt me. Maybe he and his family were different . . . maybe they were good.
Of course he was good, I thought desperately, forcibly trying to convince myself otherwise. If he wasn't, then why would he have saved my life that day? Why didn't he just let me die?
Maybe I was going crazy, maybe I was just trying to come up with some plausible excuse in my head, maybe I just didn't want to believe that Edward was somebody who would want to hurt me, but I also couldn't deny what Annabeth had told me, what my head had known all along, but my heart had simply refused to believe.
Edward Cullen was a vampire.
I'd planned on confronting him about what I'd found out the very next day, planned on tracking him down the second that he climbed out of his car and demand some answers, but he didn't show up.
What did show up was the sun. When I woke up that morning, the sun had finally peaked out from behind the clouds, shining down on Forks. Jessica was more the pleased by it, almost jumping up and down as she saw the bright and sunny day, saying that it was perfect for a trip to the beach.
Since Edward and his siblings weren't in school, there was no point in putting off the trip just so I could track him down. Besides, Jessica claimed that all of them took regular camping trips whenever the weather was nice. Dr. and Mrs. Cullen took all of their children up to the mountains for outdoorsy stuff—or so Jessica claimed. Personally, I was wondering if that particular myth about vampires not being able to go outdoors had more legitimacy than I'd originally thought.
After all, I reasoned, why else would a coven of vampires move to Forks, which was one of the wettest parts of the continental United States? And Jessica had said, my very first day here, that they had moved to Alaska, which had just as much cloud cover as Washington did.
Maybe there was a reason why they lived here instead of someplace like Los Angeles or something.
But in any case, there was no reason to put off the trip, plus Charlie said that it was good that I was hanging out with people around here and I should go out and have a good time. So I reluctantly drove down to Jessica's house since I didn't know how to get to La Push and caught a ride with her, Angela, and Lauren.
In the end, I was kind of glad that I went. It had been awhile since I had been to the beach and even though it was still very cold weather, it was nice to dive into the water, feeling at home in the ocean waters.
Truthfully, I would have preferred to stay underwater the whole time rather than go back to the beach, but it would have been suspicious if I stayed underwater for an extensive amount of time, so I emerged much quicker than I would have liked.
"Wow," an Indian kid said, grinning at me as I clamoured back onto the beach, pulling a towel around me. A few of the locals had joined us, enjoying the sunshine. The kid who had spoken was a few years younger than me, maybe fourteen, but had a pleasant, smiling face and a wide, laughing grin. Something about him reminded me forcibly of Percy, but I couldn't put my finger on what exactly. "So you're actually alive? I would have thought that you were drowning, staying underwater that long."
"Was I under there for awhile?" I asked curiously, pushing my wet hair out of my face.
"Yeah . . . almost ten minutes."
"Hmm." I would've thought that I'd have noticed being under there that long, but that's the thing about being a daughter of Poseidon; I don't need to worry about breathing underwater. "It didn't seem like that long."
He laughed, grinning widely and I found myself grinning back. This kid seemed nice enough and had a presence that was friendly and welcoming. I instantly liked him.
"I'm Seth Clearwater," he said, sticking his hand out towards me. "That's my sister Leah over there," he added, rolling his eyes at a girl my age that would have been pretty had it not been for the dark look on her face as she watched another boy, who was a few years older.
"Susan Dawson," I told him.
"Oh, right, Charlie's niece," he said. I must have looked surprised, because he laughed. "Charlie's down here all the time. He's best friends with Billy Black, you know. They usually come down around here to go fishing and stuff."
"Right," I said, remembering. Billy was the former owner of my truck. "Of course. Well, it's very nice to meet you, Seth."
Seth was nice and friendly and immediately began telling me about all of his friends and some of the older kids, pointing them out if they were there. He was surprisingly easy to talk to and I found myself laughing and chatting easily with him, opening up more effortlessly with him than I had with any of the kids at my school—Edward notwithstanding.
As we were talking, I noticed that a lot of the local boys—including Seth—seemed like they were hitting a growth spurt, shooting up like dandelions, getting a lot taller and a lot more muscular than most boys their age were, but Seth's next question put that out of my mind.
"So . . . is it true that you invited Edward Cullen down here?"
I eyed him curiously, frowning. "Where did you hear that?"
"That girl said so," he said, nodding towards Jessica, who was having a good time with Mike. Angela and Ben were in the waves, laughing merrily. Almost everybody that was here had paired off, one by one.
"Yeah," I said, nodding. "It's true, but he wouldn't come. Something about it 'not being a good idea for him to be down there.'" I used finger quotations, mimicking Edward's old-fashioned way of talking. Seth laughed, but his eyes had grown serious.
"That's because none of the Cullens are allowed on Quileute land," he explained seriously. "The Council Elders won't allow it because of the treaty."
"What treaty?" I asked.
Seth's shoulders slumped. "I'm not really supposed to say anything about it," he admitted.
"Oh. Well, that's okay, Seth, don't worry about it," I said, although I was disappointed, but I managed to keep it from showing on my face. "I don't want you to get into any kind of trouble with your mom and dad or anybody. Besides, I've got stuff that I can't tell anybody. Believe me, I understand."
"It's just some legend around here, anyway," Seth said, shrugging. "It's pretty cool, but who knows if it's actually true?"
"Take it from somebody who knows, Seth, almost all legends are based on fact," I told him.
Seth was looking around, as though trying to see if anybody was listening. "Okay, just . . . don't tell anybody that I told you," he implored me. I nodded, leaning in closer so that I could hear him more carefully. "Did you know that Quileutes are supposedly descended from wolves?"
"Sure," I said, shrugging. Seth looked surprised. "My friend Annabeth in New York was doing a . . . research paper and she stumbled onto some Quileute legends online and she told me about them."
"Oh." Seth seemed to accept this, nodding. "That's cool. Anyway, there's also some legends about the Cold Ones—" My skin prickled with anticipation at the name, "—and some of these legends aren't that old. In my great-grandfather's time, there was a coven of Cold Ones here. They found them hunting on our lands, but they claimed to be different from the others, so the chief Ephraim Black made a treaty with them. So long as they didn't come onto our lands, then we wouldn't tell people what they really were."
"What do you mean by different?" I asked slowly, trying to hide my thirst for the truth, my hunger for knowledge.
"They weren't dangerous to the tribe," Seth said matter-of-factly. "They claimed that they didn't feed off of humans. Instead, they survived only on the blood of animals. That was another part of the treaty: they weren't allowed to change anyone else or bite a human, otherwise the treaty would be void and it would mean war."
"So . . ." Awareness filled through me. "The Cullens . . . they're the same ones that your ancestors made the treaty with?"
Seth was grinning wildly. "Or so everybody claims," he agreed. "Don't tell Charlie, though, okay? He's already pretty upset with us since some of us won't go down o the hospital anymore, not since Dr. Cullen started working there. I don't mind, though," he added, shrugging. "So long as they're not hurting anybody, does it really matter if they're not human?"
I smiled at him. "Sounds like something that I would say," I said with a chuckle. "And yeah, you're right. Being human isn't about what you are; it's about who you are. It's about the choices that we make that define who we really are."
Seth chuckled. "I like that. Hey, you want to go see the tidal pools?" he asked eagerly. "You probably haven't seen them yet, have you? They're really cool and really pretty."
"Yeah, that sounds neat," I said. Seth jumped off the rock and led me through the woods towards the tidal pools, but my thoughts were on the story that Seth told me.
If it were true . . . then maybe the Cullens weren't as evil as Annabeth insisted. Maybe they were actually good.
Please, Dad, I thought desperately as I glanced towards the sea, following Seth along the path. Please . . . let them be good.
There was no sign that my dad could hear me, but the waves seemed to wave at me in reply.