This is the second chapter I rewrote :) Hope you'll like this one…
Disclaimers: I do NOT own The short second life of Bree Tanner, Eclipse or any other book written by Stephenie Meyer, this is just fanmade.
Chapter 9: Volterra
Click clack, click clack. The heels of Jane were making me nervous, as always. Click clack, click clack. I looked up to the door and saw her glaring at me. She walked further through the hallway to the residence of Aro, Caius and Marcus. At first Caius and Marcus weren't very pleased with me and Diego but they soon gave in.
The door opened and my attention went to the conversation. "Master," she greeted Aro. Diego put down one of the books he was holding and also started to listen what was going to happen. We were here for almost six months now and we had learned a lot in that little amount of time.
"There might be a problem about the vampire you were talking about." The movements of her bones made clear that she was bowing now, probably to Caius and Marcus since she had already greeted Aro with his favorite name.
"What problem?" Caius asked.
"I can't get near him," she said. "I can't look at him."
I stood up and so did Diego, he didn't want to leave me alone and certainly not here, he didn't trust any of them.
The little blonde vampire looked up at me with annoyance in her eyes once I walked through the door. She had never liked me, not since Aro thought I was the best. She always wanted to be his best and I did everything to make sure she wasn't, it was a little punishment for the hurt she had once caused to me.
"I was wondering what this vampire looks like, Jane."
"Tell her," Aro said.
Jane gritted her teeth. "He is tall, about 6 feet, maybe higher. Has blond hair and every time I want to approach him I can't concentrate anymore."
"Ah." I said, uninterested while turning to Aro. "What did this vampire do?"
"He is running away from us for the past months now, I would like to offer him a place in the guard," Aro smiled. If this vampire was the one I thought he was then I wouldn't want him to be in the guard, I would tell him that he should go to the Cullens, where everything was safe.
I smiled at him, acting like a place in the guard was very honorable, but it wasn't honorable at all, it was like hell, maybe even worse. Certainly if you didn't want to be here. Luckily for me and Diego we didn't have to be here but Carlisle had assured us that we could learn a lot and that we could return home whenever we wanted. I started to miss Nessie and I would want to make a visit, soon.
"I think I know this vampire, I'll go and look for him. His ability doesn't have any effect on me since we are friends. If it isn't him then I'm afraid I'll return without him."
"Bree, wait!" Diego started to run after me.
-Do you think it's Fred?-
-Yes, I guess so. I don't know who else it could be.-
-Maybe you're right, we should go and see if it is him.-
He smiled at me and we took our two red capes, we always used them when we went outdoors. If people noticed us in the sunlight we really had a problem.
"Where are you two going?" Demetri was approaching us, he didn't trust us for one bit.
"We're on a job for Aro, we have to find someone," I replied.
"I'll go with you then, I'm the best tracker there is," he said with a smirk on his face.
I took his wrist and looked into his deep red eyes. "As you may know, I'm a great tracker myself, at least when it comes to vampires."
He leaned closer to me, our faces only inches away from me. I could hear a growl behind me, Diego didn't like it when he came this close and Demetri came this close a lot, but just to get on Diego's nerves. "And who did you get that power from?" He was still smirking and I could feel victory in the air.
I growled at him and let him go, not caring if he would follow us or not.
"You don't have to be mad at him," I said at Diego.
He turned around and looked down at me. "Don't tell me you're growing fond of him."
"Of course not, silly. It's just that he wants you to be mad, you shouldn't satisfy him, ignore him like I do."
"I swear Bree, if he takes one step too close he will burn."
I rolled my eyes. Diego's powers had grown a lot, maybe even more than when we were with the Cullens. Not only his ability, of which no one knew he could revive others, thanks to Renesmee, but also his strength and speed. He had learned to control them because of all our training sessions.
"Are we going?" I put the cap of my red cape over my head before walking through the door. Some people that were walking outside bowed a little and some of them took a step back. The Volturi were well known here in Volterra but none of them actually knew that they were vampires.
We ran out of town, we didn't need to go with a car. I had tracked Fred long ago, when we were still talking to Aro, I knew where he was. Jane had found him somewhere on the country and he had only moved a few miles, at my speed I would catch him in no time and Diego would soon follow.
I always thought when I was running, I thought about the past six months with the Volturi guard.
Flashback:
"Bree, Diego you two will get lessons. You'll start to study about literature, art, languages, chemistry and mathematics first, you will also learn how to fight properly. Diego you can do what you want but you Bree, you will learn to control the powers you know have. I want you to be able to control your visions and your invisibility and of course, once you can control them I would like to offer you the other powers in the guard so you can learn them. You will also get fighting lessons from Demetri and Felix, they're very well trained," Aro said.
Diego could do what he want? Right then it occurred to me that Aro didn't know a thing about Diego's ability to revive others, and maybe that was a good thing.
We were brought to a room that was completely ours. There was a big couch in front of us, not that we needed one but it was a human habit to sit down when reading books. The room was big, real big since one wall was covered with hundreds of books, I definitely wouldn't be bored here.
"I wish I brought my music," Diego murmured.
"We can always go and buy you one here, we're in Italy you know, there are stores here." He smiled at me and placed a kiss on my lips. We sat down on the couch and I cuddled myself into his lap and we sat there for about ten minutes until someone named Santiago walked into the room and told us that we needed to go to our first class.
The next following weeks we learned all sorts of languages. German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Danish, French, Greec, … We even learned to read hieroglyphs and of course Latin. Our minds were strong, we could remember anything quickly and after our languages we learned about the history. It was strange to know all these things, they knew everything. Aro was the one to personally teach us these things, he had lived for more than 3300 years and could tell us everything that had happened. There were other vampires who taught us about art, chemistry, mathematics and I was training with Gianna to control my powers, Aro didn't mind that my visions weren't working yet. He told me that it would come and if it didn't I could always go back and train with Alice. Of course, my visions weren't important since I only saw werewolves and halfbreeds, they had nothing to fear from them. After a while I could control my invisibility and visions perfectly and then I had to train with Demetri, Alec and Renata. I couldn't train with Jane since I didn't take over her ability, I couldn't absorb powers which caused pain.
From Demetri I learned how to track people, of course I could only track vampires. Alec learned me how to make people's senses go away but my power didn't really work the way his did. He could make all senses go away but with me it was more like people were having a huge black screen around them. They could still see each other but they had nowhere to go. Renata's physical shield didn't really work at all if you ask me. I could only protect myself, once someone tried to be into my shield and I allowed them to, they were rejected. It was like with Bella's mental shield, I was only able to defend myself.
Aro wanted me to learn Chelsea's and Marcus's powers too. Chelsea had the power to break emotional bonds or make them, I was only able to make them. And Marcus could see emotional bonds, I could see emotional bonds between everyone except with humans.
Our training sessions began and I was a murderer now, I could kill anyone within my reach in less than a second. It was all due to my werewolf genes and I thanked Jacob for them, no vampire would ever try to hurt me and that was a good thing since most of them hated me.
End of flashback:
I was still thinking about my past years until I picked up Fred's scent. He had been the vampire Aro was talking about and I decided to become visible again, I didn't want to scare my old friend. The more I approached, the stronger his scared feeling became.
"Fred!" I shouted and he stopped, recognizing my voice.
He looked at me, with my long red cape and I lifted my cap.
"Bree, don't tell me you're here to catch and hurt me too like that little blond witch?" he asked, still scared.
"No, silly. I'm coming to tell you that you should go as far as you can, you don't want to live where I am."
Diego arrived too and Fred's eyes widened. "Diego?" he whispered.
"Hey Fred," he smiled while putting out his hand. So Diego wasn't disgusted by him either.
"So you two survived?" he asked.
"No, we didn't at all. But I'll tell you our story."
We sat down on the grass and I told him the story. I didn't forget a thing, I started with the battle we lost against the Cullens and how Felix had killed me. Then I told him about Diego and how we got back to the Cullens. He was surprised when I told him about my ability and I continued about my life with the Volturi. I warned him to not get involved with them, that he didn't want to live such a life. Afterwards he told me his phone number, and said that I needed to call him whenever I needed his help. (A/N: It is the 21st century, so why can't a vampire have a cell phone? I mean, even if he doesn't have the money, he can always steal it, he's fast enough to do so.) He didn't want to go and live with the Cullens since he drank human blood and didn't want to bother them. I smiled and gave him a hug before he ran further and further into the wide world, free to be who he wanted to be.
~
"Aro," I greeted him while Diego and I walked into the room. "I was able to catch this vampire but his powers are useless. They only work for a certain amount of time so I suggest that we should just leave him alone."
Aro nodded, believing every word I said, I was a very good liar. "You did good, you can do as you please."
I nodded and went to my room, I still had to finish a book I had started yesterday evening. Diego was somewhere in the building, probably training with Alec.
I sighed and let myself fall onto the couch with the book in my hands. After about half an hour I could hear the sound of a cape fluttering through the air. I laid my book down when I heard the footsteps coming closer and a dark haired young man with a red cape opened the door, it was Santiago.
"Yes?" I asked him. He was probably here to hit on me but I really wasn't in the mood for this game. I liked Santiago, as someone who was a good fighting partner but nothing more. Diego always complained about the fact that he followed me around like a dog.
"Bree, I would like you to accompany me to the garden." He smiled and I smiled back, he never wanted to hurt me, he was one of the few nice and gentle vampires in here that I knew. Most of them were jealous or didn't want me here but because of Chelsea's powers we all lived together without getting in a fight. If she didn't have that power we probably ended up killing each other one day.
We walked through the hallways, it was already late and Diego still wasn't back.
"How did your trip go?"He was trying to start a conversation and I gently replied that everything was alright, that the vampire wasn't worth to be in the guard.
He smiled as he leaped onto one of the walls that protected the garden from outsiders. I sat there a lot, when I needed to clear my mind and apparently so did he. The place was beautiful, you could see every tiny street in Volterra from this point.
"Tell me, Bree. I know that you can feel what I'm feeling and you certainly aren't dumb." I could indeed feel that he was being very nervous right now, but he remained his calm. "Are you really in love with Diego? Is that why you don't seem to notice me?"
His question caught me by surprise. "I didn't just fall in love, I imprinted on him," I whispered.
"Imprinted?" He gave me a questioning look. No one knew this, not even Aro.
"It's a werewolf thing," I said. "You see Santiago, when you imprint it's something like falling in love with someone at first sight, but it's much more than that. When you see this person, you just know it's right. It's not gravity that's holding you on the earth, it is that other person and without it you would die."
He nodded. "So, why isn't he here with you then?"
"I don't know, I guess he's training with Alec."
"Alec is in Greece, they aren't training," he said.
"Well, maybe he is with someone else then," I smiled and suddenly Santiago came very close to me.
"You know Bree, I really like you," he smiled and placed a quick kiss on my lips before leaping down and running into the building.
"Crazy vampire," I murmured while shaking my head.
-Mine.-
I would recognize this voice everywhere, it was Diego and he was close, real close. I could feel him getting really mad.
-Diego?-
I got no answer but I could hear him, his footsteps were approaching. Less than two seconds later he was sitting next to me onto the stone wall.
-Did you forget about our connection, little one?-
-No, of course not.- I knew why he didn't talk to me, the walls had ears around here.
-Then tell me, why did you let him kiss you.-
-I didn't let him kiss me, it just happened and it's not that I like him, you know that.-
He smiled at me. –Yes, I do. But that doesn't mean I like him kissing you. So, was he a good kisser?-
I rolled my eyes. –Silly, you're the best kisser in the world.-
-Am I?- He raised an eyebrow and leaned closer to me to place the most passionate kiss I ever had on my lips.
-Yes, you are.- I thought and he let go.
-Good. Now, would you like to join me?- He leaped down the wall and I did so too.
I could feel the tension in the air, there was something going on in his mind but he was able to close our connection now, we had learned to control it properly. He opened the door to our room and took of his cape.
As soon as I closed the door behind me I was pressed against the wall and Diego kissed me. After a few minutes he let go and I could see the desire in his eyes, I could feel it in the air surrounding us.
"I want you," he whispered and I knew that I wanted him too.
