A/N: I'm alive! Some of you were probably having doubts given my ridiculous lapse in updates ..... sorry about that! I had a lot going on and whenever I tried to write all that seemed to come out was crap, so both this, and my other story have been ridiculously neglected. But it's summer now, and I'm back, ready to focus and concentrate .... focustrate? Consencus?
This chapter is pretty long, well longer than the average WS chapter. After this the next couple should be up in pretty quick succession (fingers crossed), then at some point, there's the little issues of the Cullens getting a surprise visit from the Volturi to deal with.
This chapter's for ZombiesRunThisTown, who gave me my one millionth reason to love her recently when she made me a fan cover. It's so good and will be posted on my page as soon as this chapter goes up.
And also Saralg, because I really do not deserve her.
And then every reader and reviewer who has come back after this unforgivably long wait.
So, incase you forgot, which would be more than likely: Ness went back to Forks and got a verbal beatdown from a very angry Leah. Leah caught Al's sent and got a little mad, running out to find him with Nessie hot on her heels.
Chapter Twenty-Three: Driving Ms Clearwater
My running came to a grinding halt when a strong grip came around my wrist. I span to see a panicked Al, his hands moved to my face and his eyes darted over me,
Before I could speak he pressed his hand back in mine and we were running again.
We ran until the smells of Forks, and most importantly, the wolves, were behind us.
I dropped to my knees, feeling as my whole body shook as the barrage of emotions warred against each other. Al crouched before me and took my hands in his,
"Are you alright?" I nodded slowly as my body ached in a hundred different kinds of agony. "There were wolves in there! Werewolves." I sunk into the grass, wrapping my arms around my knees and murmuring,
"I know." Al rose to his feet and started pacing,
"It was weird, I just knew. I caught that scent and- I mean Oz always said they smell bad but, I was never expecting it could be that bad. I guess you smelled it to, huh? You should have just called me, you should have got out of there straight away." I pulled tighter on my knees and bit down on my bottom lip, closing my eyes as I answered.
"No, I meant, I know. I knew. I've always known there are wolves in Forks." Al's pacing stopped and he turned to face me.
"What?" I didn't look up, I just stared down at my knees and took deep breaths to try and suppress the ever building tears.
"They've been there since before I was born. I've always known." There was a long silence during which I could feel my heart thumping in my chest.
"And you didn't tell me?" I winced at the pain and anger in his voice and dropped my head onto my knees. "You said- you promised you'd talk to me about things now. How could you not tell me?" I ran my fingers roughly through my hair, pulling the strands from my face. I wanted to be silent. I wanted to freeze as my body shook in shame, sadness and guilt for everything that had happened tonight. But Al deserved and explanation, whether I liked giving it or not.
"I knew you wouldn't understand. I knew that you had… preconceived opinions on wolves that weren't going to go away just because I told you they should." I looked up then, and Al was staring down at me with his eyes wide and frustrated. "Wolves aren't necessarily dangerous, Al." His jaw dropped,
"But Oz-!" I took a deep breath and raised a palm quickly. I'd heard the story of Oz's run in with a werewolf in his newborn year in gruesome detail before, and the hatred he harboured for the creatures had always set a tense irritation in the pit of my stomach.
"That was a werewolf." I sighed, though I'd never really believed in this little deviation, it could maybe save my ass right now. Al frowned at me in confusion and I decided more than my familiarity with wolves would out tonight, I had promised to talk to him, so now I'd talk.
"There are no wolves in Forks, only shape shifters. Werewolves are savage and have little or no self-control, shape-shifters are people. They're just ….special people."
"Shape-shifters?" I rose to my feet, sighing and nodding.
"Yes, it's a difference not commonly known and apparently hard to recognise. I didn't even know -they didn't even know until …until my father had to tell the Volturi so they wouldn't kill them."
Al's lips dropped open in shock, sticking like that for a second until they started to move in a wasted attempt at forming words.
"What?" I drew a deep shaky breath, not sure whether the tears I could feel coming were because of the topic of conversation, my memories of my visit to Forks, or both.
"When I was born the Volturi thought I was an immortal child, so they came to kill me." I was relieved now of the knowledge Brice had passed on to the boys, the tears probably wouldn't hold out if I had to go into reasons and histories. "Killing me wasn't actually Aro's main incentive, but that's another story. My family, and a lot of their friends stood against the Volturi when they came and…" I'd burned out. I could no longer talk or even think with Al looking at me like he didn't know who I was.
After a long silence he ran his fingers through his hair and blew a long breath though his lips,
"But your father was a vampire." I nodded slowly,
"Yeah?"
"And he… he defended the wolves- I mean, the shapeshifters?"
"Yeah, he did. They were on our side, all of them." The tears won. With one violent tremor the thought of the wolves, of Leah, putting their lives on the line to protect me made everything that had happened in Forks today hurt like hell. "They were all on our side. To protect us, to protect me." My breath was staggered as I sucked it through my shaking lips. When the first real sob came I pulled the back of my hand roughly over my eyes, doubling over a little bit.
I tried to rein it in, but when Al's arms came around me, I couldn't. He didn't say anything, just pulled me close, lifting me slightly from the ground and I let my head rest on his shoulder as my body shook in violent tears that had been sleeping too long.
I didn't let my self cry long. I forced the cap back on, resealed everything up and stopped the images of my past from coming through.
But some damage can't be hidden away. Guilt had taken up a painful position in my head, and as a twinge in my chest.
Al scooped me up and sunk to the floor letting me shrink up in his lap as I my head stayed on his shoulder.
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you about the wolves. I really am. It's not that I don't want to tell you these things, it's just- really hard." He shushed me and ran the hand not curled around my waist through my hair.
"It's fine. I understand now, I shouldn't push you to tell me these things, not when they upset you like this. It's just that …you need to know that some secrets can put others in danger. Like this or not telling anyone about Victor." I nodded, folding my fingers around one sleeve and pulling it up to wipe at the damp patch my tears had left on the shoulder of Al's shirt.
"I know. I'm sorry. The last thing I'd ever want is for any of you to get hurt." He smirked as I tried, in vain, to rub away the moisture,
"I know. So, how was your visit?"
"Horrible." The guilt burned inside me as I remembered Charlie's appearance, Sue's emotion and Leah's brutal honesty. "Everybody hates me."
"Nobody could hate you."
"No, they do. And I deserve it." The pitch of my voice rose as a sob squeezed at my stomach and my eyes grew blurred by the rising moisture.
"Do you want to go?" I swallowed the tears back,
"No, no can we just stay here for a while?" Al nodded and I let my head fall back so I could gaze up at the canopy of the green trees that partially shielded the black sky.
I fell asleep, not quite in Forks, but close enough, and was fully aware that after tonight, I would probably never return here again.
{--}
I woke when my body was pushed quickly against something firm. I took a sharp intake of breath as my sleepy eyes shot open. All I could smell was Al and the closeness of his scent was dizzying.
He was crouched slightly at my front with his back to me, one hand reaching behind him, his fingers spread across my stomach as he held me back against the tree I was sandwiched against. His chest and shoulders rose and fell with his rapid breathing and I leaned over, looking to see his face and what was causing his panic.
He stared straight into the distance, his lips contorted into a furious snarl. I followed his eye line into the trees in the distance.
She emerged slowly. Her glistening black hair was thrown messily away from her face. She looked even more tired than last night, the shadows under her light brown eyes prominent against her copper skin. She came to a stop a distance away, shoving her hands into the pockets of her blue hoodie.
"Its fine, Al." He hissed, still pressing against me. With a gentle push I slid from behind and round to face him. "It's fine. Just give us a few minutes to talk." His eyes narrowed in Leah's direction before he sighed and looked back to me,
"One minute." I scowled and he shook his head, "One minute."
I watched him shrink slowly into the trees before I turned and strode towards Leah. She looked exhausted and her raven tresses were pulled back into a ponytail and there was a navy duffel bag at her feet.
When I reached her I stood, shrugging my shoulders,
"What, Leah? Have you come to yell at me some more?" She set her jaw and closed her eyes, shaking her head slowly,
"No." When her eyes opened again they were more restrained and less viscous. "Where are you going?" I was too exhausted to argue or analyse, so went with giving a straight answer instead.
"Home. I'm going back to where I live now." Something about saying those words in front of Leah made me embarrassed of them, but that went straight away when she scoffed and looked in the direction Al had gone, rolling her eyes and mumbling,
"Figures."
"Look, Leah, if you've actually come to judge me some more then save it." She raised a palm,
"No. That's not why I'm here." She sighed and rubbed a hand across her face, "I can't believe I'm doing this."
"Doing what?" She dropped the hand from her face to her side,
"I'm coming with you, Renesmee."
My chest sunk in a short, quiet laugh, stopped short by Leah's stare,
"You're not serious?" Leah bent down, wrapping her fingers through the handle of the duffel bag and lifting it,
"As serious as they come. I'm coming with you." I just gaped at her for a second. Leah Clearwater wasn't one to joke.
"No, you're not." Her top lip peeled back before she sighed, taking a deep, calming breath.
"I have to." I scrutinised her, she really was serious.
"What do you mean you have to?"
"I mean, I have completely no choice. Do you think that if I did I'd go anywhere with you? All I know is that wherever you go, I have to go too." My mouth slipped open and I shook my head,
"Why? What…? Is it a wolf thing?" She nodded, her nostrils flared and her teeth clenched beneath her pursed lips. I lifted my hands to my face and started pacing, "But how? Why? I don't understand."
"Neither do I. I only know what my mind is telling me, and it's giving me no choice but to go wherever it is you're going." She fell quiet and I turned away, planting my hands on my hips and chewing on my bottom lip. "I do have a theory though." I shrugged not turning around to face the Leah whose current state I still felt responsible for. "I've felt something similar to this before ….but never in my own mind." I twisted my torso to face her. "It's got something to do with imprinting." She spat the word with all the hate I felt it deserved since I'd found out what it was. "I think that maybe because your Jacob's imprint, that's why I have this pull to you."
I turned back around again and took a deep breath.
Leah was another victim now, another prisoner. How could it be fair that she'd be bound to me and have no choice?
But I'd set Jacob free from that constraint. I'd have to do the same for Leah.
"No. Leah, you can't." Her face dropped,
"Renesmee, I have to, please!" She checked her desperation quickly with a deep breath, composing herself. "You said. You said if you could fix me, then you would. This is your chance then." I did want her to be happy. Or if not happy, then at least not the complete wreck she was now.
"It's not that simple, Leah. The people I live with …" I trailed off, waving my hand at where Al had stood. I shook my head when I thought that Al's prejudice paled in comparison to Oz's, not to mention how mad he would get if he thought she'd be a danger to Sonny.
Leah squirmed a little in disgust.
"It doesn't matter. I can handle it. Besides, it was getting a little hard for me to keep phasing, but with you around I just wanna explode." There wasn't an ounce of jest in her expression.
"Wow, thanks. And that's not a good thing, Leah. You "exploding" isn't going to go down well. I might understand what you are but not everybody else does." She shrugged scowling as she spoke,
"Fine. No exploding. Whatever. I just can't stay here, there's nothing for me anymore. And no matter how miserable it makes me, I know that I have to go where you're going. "
Before either of us could notice him Al's arms were around my shoulder and he and Leah were exchanging acidic glares.
"You ready?" At his words Leah's eyes shifted to me and I took a deep breath.
"Al, Leah's coming with us." His arm dropped from my shoulder and he span to stand before me,
"What?"
"She's my …friend." Over Al's shoulder I saw Leah's eyebrow raise in disgust at the term, I scowled at her, if she kept acting like this it was going to be very hard to remember that I wanted to help her at all. "And she's not happy right now. So I want her to come with us, so I can take care of her." Al blinked hard and shook his head,
"Wh- bu- ..no!"
"Al, it'll be fine. She's not dangerous and it won't be for long, right Leah?"
"Definitely not," she growled, and my eyes rolled in frustration.
"Please." I took Al's hand and squeezed it gently. He twisted round to look at Leah before turning back to me,
"Oz is not going to like this."
{--}
We walked back to the car in silence, Al a few feet in front of Leah and I, kept turning his head back, as though checking she wasn't tearing me to shreds. Leah had refused when I asked her if she wanted to go back and say goodbye to people in La Push, she'd just said it wasn't necessary now. It was barely 4am when we left Port Angeles to start the long drive back.
I sat twiddling my fingers as the awkward silence lasted a good hour. Beside me Al took a breath, grimacing and tightening his fingers around the wheel.
"Are you okay?" He ushered his head in the direction of the back seat,
"She stinks." Leah leaned forward, her lips twisted just like Al's.
"You don't smell too pretty yourself, bloodsucker." I rose in my seat,
"No. Both of you stop it. I don't want you bickering and insulting each other all the way to the Mausoleum."
"The what?" Al chuckled, watching Leah's horrified expression in his rear view mirror, and I twisted to face her,
"It's just a joke. It's just what we call our house because it was pretty gloomy when we first saw it, but its great now, you'll like it." As she sighed and dropped back in her seat I felt more sorry for her than ever. She looked exhausted and so desperately unhappy. How was this a fair existence? She was being dragged from her home to follow somebody she openly despised just because something in her brain wasn't giving her any other choice. "You should sleep, Leah."
"I'm fine." She hissed, her eyes shifting from the view past her window to the back of Al's seat.
"Don't worry, nobody's going to hurt you. Trust me on that." She glared at me now, her eyelids visibly heavy.
"Nothing in the world could make me ever trust a Cullen." I saw as Al twisted a little in his seat, had he ever even heard my surname before? I didn't turn to him, instead held fast in my eye contact with Leah. Whether I felt sorry for her or not, I was done with being treated like crap.
"I've never done anything bad to you, Leah, not ever. You've been horrible to me my whole life but now, now that I want to help you, you've gotten a thousand times worse. It would help a lot if we just got along." Her head shook and a corner of her top lip rose, forcing my tone to be more insistent. "Believe me, Leah, you want me on your side for this. I want to help you, so stop being so bitter and just let me." She didn't respond, but she didn't spit in my face either. I turned back forwards in my seat, checking Leah regularly in my mirror as she stared absently out the window. An hour later she was fast asleep.
"I don't understand this at all."
"Why not?" I whispered, pushing a finger to my lips and glancing at Leah when Al turned to me.
"She's horrible. Why are you helping her?" Leah stirred slightly when Al's voice came out too loud,
"Shh, if you think she's so horrible then do you really want to wake her? And she's not that bad." His eyes rolled,
"I just don't understand why you're going to all this trouble for her; she's not your responsibility."
"So I should have just left her back there to be miserable? I've never done anything to intentionally hurt Leah but her life's been affected an awful lot by me. And this isn't that much trouble, not compared to the fact she was willing to fight the Volturi for me." Not necessarily true. Leah's allegiance was to her pack, never, ever to me.
"No, this is trouble. Or at least it will be. I'm not sure how everyone's gonna react when they find you've brought a pet home."
"She's not a pet! Don't say that. This ridiculous prejudice has got to stop. Leah's a person and she deserves to be treated nicely."
"What, because she's so nice to you?" I fumbled to pull off my shoes and bring my knees up, curling up against the seat and letting my head drop against the door.
"Just drop it, Al." I was exhausted and my body was begging for sleep, so it didn't take long for me to drift off.
{--}
I was only disturbed when we had to stop for gas, the smell of which woke both me and Leah. I winced as the stench had always been one that I almost found overpowering when in large quantities. Leah just groaned and dropped her head back down but I kept my eyes on Al as he went inside to pay, the first time he'd been around people since yesterday. But I was still tired and as the car pulled out the momentum sent me quickly back to sleep.
The smell of Leah was eerily disorientating when I woke up.
She smelled like my childhood. She smelled like the times I'd sit in Charlie's cruiser with the window wound down as I inhaled the scents of Forks and my Grandfather panicked when I stuck my head "too far" out.
She smelled like Sue's cooking and Seth's hugs.
She smelled like the ancient couch in Billy Black's living room I'd curled up on to sleep a thousand times with my best friend rolled up right beside me.
I was glad I hadn't seen Leah phased yet, that would definitely spark painful memories.
"No nightmares?" Al was dropped back in his seat, one hand at the base of the wheel as we sped down a generic, empty road. My brow furrowed, there had been no nightmare. No memories, no unsettling creation of my mind. Just peace for once.
"Not one." I stretched, flexing my arms and bending my back as I twisted to look at Leah. She still slept, a gentle rumble passing her lips. She didn't look peaceful though, even in sleep she still scowled a little.
The cold glass window was invigorating as I dropped my head against it and stared at the trees that passed by on the side of the road. I leapt up a little in my seat when I saw a shimmering expanse of water in the distance.
"Al! Is that our lake?" It had to be, I recognised the ledge that Sonny would cannonball into the water from. When Al just nodded I gave his arm a firm slap with before leaning over and reaching into the pocket of his trouser leg. "You could have told me!" Al let out a strange sound and wriggled a little as I dug his phone out of his pocket. I sighed in relief when I flicked it open to see his battery hadn't completely died like mine.
"Slipped my mind, sorry." He smirked at my returning scowl as he rubbed his free hand over his arm where I'd hit him. My fingers stumbled as I pulled up the number of the Mausoleum, chanting Please let Cora pick up over and over in my head.
"Hello?" I slapped me knee a little in relief when I heard her voice, ignoring Al's chuckle.
"Cora! It's me, I'm almost home." I heard her take in a deep breath,
"Oh Nessie! I've missed you." I tuned out for a second as the car turned into the rough road that went through the trees, past the lake and towards the hill the Mausoleum stood on.
"Yeah, I missed you too. Cora, who's home right now?"
"Me and Sonny. Brice is leaving now to go get Oz off his hunt for when you get back." Good. No Eavesdroppers. And I doubted Sonny's audible range had improved enough in the twenty four plus hours I'd been away from him for him to hear what I was telling Cora over the phone.
"Okay, Cora I need you to listen real carefully. I'll explain what I'm saying when I see you, but for now just trust me okay?" There was a pause, Cora's eventual reply slow and quiet.
"Alright." Al eyed me suspiciously,
"The first chance you get, I need you to hide the scents of everyone in this car. Including the car itself if you can." The line crackled as Cora sighed,
"Ness …." I could almost feel her questions buzzing through my handset, but I knew she'd wait, just like I'd asked her to. "What do you mean everyone?"
"Just- Cora can you just do this for me, please? Trust me, it'll all be clear very soon." She sighed again, and I heard the distinctly ungraceful pounding as Sonny leapt down the stairs from his room.
"Who's on the phone?" On the backseat Leah stirred, rubbing her eyes as she lifted her body slowly upright. Cora's voice came back,
"Consider it done, Ness. See you soon."
I pulled my fingers through my hair after flicking the phone closed and dropping it in Al's lap.
"Not a bad idea. But Cora can't hide what she is for long." I turned to smile a greeting to Leah,
"I wasn't planning on getting her to. I'm telling everyone as soon as we get there. This is just to take out the initial …shock. Leah, we'll be there any second, you okay?" She steadied herself on the seat, gripping the back of Al's chair and bringing her other hand to her stomach.
"I feel- I just feel …funny." Al bit his bottom lip and stared into the rear view mirror, no doubt very anxious at the prospect of Leah puking in the car. I pulled myself on to my knees in the seat and reached my hand out to Leah's forehead, she shrunk away a little so I just dropped it.
"Sorry. What would I say anyway, that you have a temperature?" One side of her mouth curled up in a smile,
"No, not sick just …funny. It's like before, but ten times stronger."
"Well it'll probably go away when we get back to the house. Maybe you're just hungry." She nodded slowly and unconvincingly and dropped back into her seat running the fingers of one hand over her forehead.
When the car came to a stop at the bottom of the hill, I looked up at the house and took a deep breath before pulling at the door handle and throwing it open.
"Wait." Al's hand came around my wrist, stopping me as I rose from my seat. He stared at me seriously, his wide, bright amber eyes set intently on mine. "This is important to you?" My shield was down, so he'd feel the full force of the honesty of my answer. This was important to me. I knew that, of the many uncertainties in my mind nowadays, Leah, and the knowledge that I could not have left her in Forks was not one of them. I knew that, but still had to restart my breathing to say it when Al stared at me like that.
"Very." He exhaled, glanced backwards at Leah and got out of the car running quickly up the hill and into the house. "Come on, Leah. Let's go." We got out and I took Leah's bag from her, beckoning her to follow me as I strode up the steep slope to the open door of the house.
Al stood with his back to us as we entered the kitchen, Cora, Brice and Oz were before him and staring over at the new face beside me. A new face that was, to everyone but Cora.
She'd seen her before when she'd taken Victor on in invisible visit to Forks, and when we entered her eyes went wide and her jaw fell completely. She stood with her arm curled through Brice's and I did a slight double take when I noticed she wore a new dress. It was blue.
"So…. This is Leah." Al ushered his hand in our direction before stepping backwards and coming to stand at my side.
Everyone was silent. All I could hear was heartbeats. And it was strange to be able to hear someone else's besides just mine and Sonny's. And Leah's was thumping pretty damn fast. I turned my head to check she was okay. Her face was blank. She just stared straight past me and Al, up at the first floor.
Sonny was up there. Pacing impatiently in his room, where I guess Oz had confined him once news had reached him of the mystery around the new arrival.
I sighed, one day Oz would need to realize I had few priorities higher than Sonny's safety.
But Oz was very suspicious, as was evident by the way he stared at Leah now. Not exactly glaring, but still very unsure. Brice just looked confused as he held Cora tight beside him.
I didn't know what to say, where to start, or what was the best way to go about this.
"Leah's my friend." I checked to see if Leah scoffed, or flinched or rolled her eyes. She didn't. She just kept staring up the stairs. "I've known her since the day I was born. She's a good person, and she is very important to me. Okay?" I stared at Oz as I spoke, he raised one eyebrow as he looked at me,
"Yeah, yeah, Al's already given us all a little intro. But it seems to me, there's more to this we don't know yet." I took in a deep breath, choosing my words very carefully.
"Leah's a lot like me. She's a normal person, but she's something else too. She's a shape-shifter. Leah can change her form into something else. But she's still the same person, she's still in control of her own thoughts and actions, she just looks different."
Brice's expression moved into intrigue, clearly he was fascinated my what I was saying,
"Shape-shifter? So she- So Leah can change her entire appearance into anything?" That's why I hated the term shape-shifter. Sure Leah could shift her shape, but that label implied that the possibilities were more than just the one thing.
"No. Shape-shifters can only transform into one thing." Oz scrutinised my stare, and it seemed he found something in it he didn't like. His body straightened and his expression grew hard,
"And what's that?" As he spoke he sniffed at the air, his eyes shifting to Cora when he found that there were no scents coming from us at all.
"A wolf."
Oz seemed to freeze up for a second, before his face contorted into an angry snarl.
"You brought a werewolf here!" Al slid in front of me before I could answer, positioning himself defensively between Leah and I, and Oz.
"No. Weren't you listening? Leah's not a werewolf." Oz's burning eyes were over Al's shoulder, darting between me and Leah.
"Then how come Cora's not letting me smell it?"
"Calm down, Oz." There was a composure in Al's tone that Oz's was lacking, but he was still being firm.
Leah still seemed to be in a trance, there was a bizarre distance in her eyes that worried me.
"Leah, are you okay?" I gave her arm a gentle tug, but it caught her off guard and her body jumped a little before she pushed me sharply away.
Oscar snarled, taking one swift step towards us. Al's hands came to grip his shoulder, restraining him.
"Oscar, calm down!" The way Oz glared at me I could tell he was furious that I'd brought her here, and I understood why. He didn't understand, and he didn't know Leah.
When he started forward again Leah snapped from her trance, sinking into a partial crouch with a snarl at her lips. Oz's whole body began to shake as Al struggled to hold him back.
Brice and Cora slid to his side, both of them ready to intervene if Oz managed to leap forward. I realised the last thing I could ever want to happen now would be for Leah to phase. I wrapped my fingers slowly around one of her wrists to be ready if her aggression escalated. This just seemed to increase Oz's more than anything.
"Smee, you get away from her!" I twisted, gaping up at the snarling Oz.
"What?"
"Get away from her, now! It's not safe!" His deep voice was raised and it travelled loudly through the building.
"No, Oz it's fi-"
"What's going on?" There was a rapid creak upstairs as Sonny's bedroom door flew open and he called down to us, obviously concerned by the noises.
I still had my hand around Leah's wrist when she flew upright. Then no sooner had Sonny's voice travelled down from upstairs than Leah's took a few quick steps around me towards the direction of the staircase.
"Leah, don't." I pulled back at her wrist but she continued to tug away. Oz growled, leaping past Al and coming to crouch at the foot of the stairs. He shoved Leah away and she snarled in return. I got behind her, wrapped my hands around her waist and pulled her tight against me. A severe tremor rumbled through her entire frame, so I held her tighter. "You need to calm down." Her eyelids flittered as my message passed across her conscious, but she just kept her stare over Oz's shoulder.
"I need to-" She bent, trying to distance her body from my steadfast grip and lifted one hand in the direction of the stairs as though reaching for them. Oz hissed, sliding up and caging Leah's wrist in his fingers.
There was a snapping sound, and Leah shrieked in agony.
With my arms still around her I was dragged forward as Leah's body collided with Oz's, both of them snarling as the three of us landed in a heap at the foot of the stairs. I grunted as I tugged hard to get Leah away from Oz. Al and Brice were restraining him so the force with which he was applying to trying break his arms lose from them could not be used in striking Leah. Leah still snarled atop Oz as Cora and I caged her arms to her torso. She quaked violently now, the hope of keeping her from phasing almost lost.
Oscar writhed and hissed and Leah kicked and snarled as Cora and I dragged her up.
"What the hell?"
Leah fell deathly still.
The shaking stopped completely. She didn't make a sound and she stopped throwing her body in Oz's direction. She wasn't even looking at him anymore.
Her chin was tilted back a little as she gazed up the stairs where the voice had come from. Sonny stood at the top, surveying us all.
Leah's body seemed limp. Her limbs just dangled as Cora and I held her like they'd been abandoned of all instruction. I hardly recognised her. There was no scowl at her lips and no darkness in her now wide eyes. She just stared up at Sonny, and looked completely consumed.
A tingle went up my spine as a deep voice washed over my thought, a memory, long since visited. The voice was Victor's, the words ones that had shattered my world not so long ago, and ones that now, looking at Leah, had a whole new meaning.
"I'm afraid Renesmee, it's a cruel trick of nature. An evil phenomenon that leaves a person with a selfish fixation with only one person, and a disregard for any other. It's called imprinting. It occurs in shape shifters. It takes away their ability to love any other, takes away their freedom. They become like a prisoner."
Up next: The truth about: Love, Lies & Imprinting.
