Breaking Tides

4 February 2010

Sum: What if Edward wasn't the first vampire Bella met?

Chapter 7

Bella had been hearing about several disappearances around Phoenix over the last couple of years, so the news of a new person missing was not surprising, it was a big city and people disappeared all of the time. This time the body was found and all blood had been drained out of it before being thrown into the river. It didn't settle right with Bella but she didn't know why and it was all speculation anyways. She had bigger things to worry about, like the fact that it was raining, again, and it was so odd to do so, so often in Phoenix, she felt like she was back in Forks for one of her summer vacations.

She hated the rain, it was just so depressing and since her class had large picture windows she was forced to watch it fall to the ground outside. She could feel herself wanting to sneeze just from seeing it at a distance, never mind being in it.

The door finally opened and it was not her typical teacher, it was a young, male substitute. The girls in class sighed over him as he was definitely the most handsome male to grace the faculty any of them had the misfortune to attend in class. His voice was soothing as he lectured and everyone paid attention, so when he posed a question for the class, all the girls raised their hands to answer, actually knowing the answer for a change.

Bella didn't bother to raise her hand, accepting that it was taken care of, and she preferred not to be singled out anyways, and she wasn't going to fight for the limelight, she's rather not be there anyways. That's why it was so annoying when he picked her to answer the question. She answered quickly and correctly, hoping to be able to go back to her notes, but he followed it up with a second question, asking her why that was. After answering this time, he let her drift back into oblivion, though she did get glares from the other girls and eying looks from some of the boys, wondering who she was, and if it was possible to get her to do their homework. She was relieved from both looks as the instructor started calling on other students, both male and female.

Over the course of the next week though, things started getting weird. He asked her to stay after class and help him on a project, she tried to deny him, she really felt like something was off with him. However he found a way to relieve her of her other classes during the afternoon and she found herself stuck with the teacher every girl in her school would have loved to break all the rules with. She would have gladly given the task away.

Things started out easily enough, she was assigned small tasks and he talked to her. He responded to him in only the need to answer his questions or when he was waiting for her to reply to a specific statement. Over time though, it got easier and she started to actually talk more freely, though she never quite trusted him.

People were still disappearing almost every day and bodies were being found that matched the description of those that had vanished in a day or two afterwards. Bella brought up the current news during one of the days she had to work with him, he was assigning her more difficult tasks and she preferred it to the menial work she had been doing in the beginning of the week. He had stiffened and turned towards her with a deceptively calm smile, she felt that her entire being was freezing at that look. She had encountered his own body temperature on occasion and she had figured it was because he was always cold, and now it felt like he was passing that on to her.

"You are really interested in the answer to what has caused the deaths?"

"It is Phoenix, death comes every day to another person in a city this large." She covered, but she had a feeling that this wasn't over.

The man who was her teacher only smiled wickedly at her response. "You are a difficult one to crack, but perhaps that only means that you need to understand so much sooner than the others."

Bella looked into his eyes, trying to discover what he was talking about with his cryptic message and did not like what she saw. The eyes although far away looked brown, up close was a sick color of the most reddish-purple to exist in the world. Most people wouldn't dare to look into his eyes, and they only grew even more calculating as he noticed her breech in typical human behavior. "I think it is time for me to leave." She finally said, looking away, and knowing that someone was walking over her very soon, future grave.

"I think not. What are you thinking?" He came closer to her and caught her eyes with his. She felt herself growing weak and docile, but she still held strong to her wits even if she couldn't move. "It doesn't matter, does it? You are a very strange girl, Bella Swan, I think you are ready for the next phase, meaning my last one is of no further use to me. You're a challenge, I think I am going to enjoy."

Bella held back the gulp but he let her go for the day. She dreaded walking into class the following day, because she knew something horrible was going to happen, she just didn't know what exactly. She couldn't skip, she had no proof and her mother would think something was wrong and question her on it.

That was the last thing she wanted, was to get her mother involved. If it was illegal, wouldn't she want to get adults involved and get them to do something about it before he did something to her? Except, she had a feeling that whatever he would drag her into, it would be dangerous for anyone to know, and she didn't know why she thought this, she just knew.

She tried to attend her regular classes, as if she had just had a memory slip on what she was supposed to be doing and it worked, for a class, but her following one caught her and sent her to go back to work with her substitute teacher. To make matters worse, it was still raining and she hated it.

"Mr. Cardozo?" Bella asked reluctantly as she entered the room and he was sitting at his desk, not moving, not even breathing. She worried briefly if he was still alive but he turned to her with a frown.

"You are late."

"I confused myself this morning, I thought I was back to normal classes for some reason."

"You are a horrible liar, but I will let it slip this time." He stood up and walked towards the door, Bella hand to move out of his way when he didn't seem to intend to stop. "Well, come on, we have a field trip."

"What?" Bella cried, this was so not appropriate, she would not be dragged off campus by this man, even if he was a 'teacher'.

"It's been sanctioned by the school." He assured her and continued walking and Bella thought she would have a talking with the school officials, they should never have passed that request, it was her, alone with a male teacher figure outside of school grounds!

"Forget that!" She denied and she squeaked when he spun towards her and his hand latched onto her wrist. "Let go of me!"

His Portuguese coloring was chalky under the skin pigment and his hand was making her cold and she could already barely feel her fingers. He ignored her outrage and pulled her down the hallway easily without even an effort to keep her moving and she was finding it difficult to even drag her heels as she practically flew along with him. She called out to the teachers and students as they passed by classrooms but she only got strange looks and sometimes giggles or a wave. She looked forward at the man who was manipulating her footing and saw the walls shift ore settling back into place, but it looked somehow different, and he looked a lot younger, his dark hair turned blond and bleached with streaks, his skin became a different type of tan, one healthy and vibrant, his eyes were blue, like one of the students wandering the halls and he was talking, it sounded like a conversation one would have with a girl they were interested in.

Bella shook her head and the image dissolved. "What was that?" She demanded and he glanced back at her with something akin to surprise.

"Oh yes, very challenging." He seemed more amused than angry. "That, my dear, was an illusion. They can't hear or see you as you want them to, they only see what I present them."

"What are you?" She questioned.

"That will be left for later today, for you to find out." He flashed her a smile and she recoiled from the broad grin, his teeth looked normal enough on the outside, but the image of them scared her.

They walked the whole way down to an abandoned building, well, he walked, Bella had given up fighting him off, but she had no way to keep up with his quick pace, so he carried her inches off the pavement, she felt like her arm was going to be pulled out of its socket if it hadn't been already.

He knocked three times and Bella heard someone scrambling inside, then locks being removed from their placement to release the door so it could be slid open. When it did, the image was forever engraved into Bella's mind, it was a boy, about ten years of age, and he had a look about him that was slowly fading into grease and dirt-stains and premature lines around his eyes and lips. The look though that still remained despite everything else, was only physical remnants of a style that he once carried off to further his reputation as a bad-ass street kid.

The kid would have had a hard life just to get to that point, to strip it all away and leave a frightened child in his place, more than that even, took something worse than a monster. His eyes widened at the sight of her and he backed away shaking his head. "No, no, I've been a good boy, I've done what you wanted, and I haven't touched the chocolate, I swear!" His words ran together, but Bella and Cardozo both understood him.

"Shut up!" Cardozo only smacked him upside the head to move the child out of his way, and the boy went crashing into the wall, it didn't even look like he hit him all that hard, only a light tap. The boy clutched at his skull with a pitiful moan. Bella turned to go to him, but was restricted by the hand still clamped down on her arm. She was going to have a very massive bruise there, and she couldn't feel past her skin's angry beating to tell if she was hurt more than that. She was easily injured anyways, and she wasn't used to rough treatment.

Bella was dragged into another room and the boy after quickly locking up followed. He stayed away from the man, even though by this time, they both knew it would do no good. Bella was shoved into a chair and it slid back a few feet before rocking to a stop and she calmed her quickened breathing. He smiled at her as if knowing her heart had betrayed its rhythm.

"Sir... this isn't the end is it?" The boy asked quietly, bracing himself for any form of retaliation.

"Not yet." Cardozo turned from them. "First we must teach her, shouldn't we? That is after all, my profession, is it not?" The boy remained mute and Cardozo's head spun towards him. "IS IT NOT?"

"It is!" Bella cut in for the boy, trying to protect him, but the boy only cowered in return. "What is the meaning of this? What have you done to the poor child?"

Cardozo laughed and turned back around. "Yes, there is much to teach you." Before Bella knew what was happening, the boy was thrown against the opposite wall, but it didn't look like Cardozo even moved an inch from the spot he was standing in.

Bella jumped to her feet to tend to the boy, but he held up his hand as he struggled to his feet. "Do you want me to find you someone worthy?" The boy asked Cardozo subserviently.

"I think I have found someone worthy, but I am hungry, find me someone that doesn't matter." He shooed the boy out of the room, and the boy glanced one last time back at Bella and in that look was so many different emotions that it made Bella's head spin, and they called her an open book?

"What do you want with me?" Bella demanded once the boy was gone, she really hoped she was wrong about one thing at least.

"You are to take his place in the very near future, it is such a shame that people put up such fronts now a days, it was so much easier when the strong were strong and the weak were weak." He shook his head sorrowfully. "It made breaking the strong, that much more fun. But you... you seem weak, but you are really strong, aren't you? Maybe not physically, but in here." His finger came slowly towards her head and she tried to duck and it made him angry. He gripped her chin and tapped her forehead as he had intended. "Do you know who I am?"

"Cardozo?" Bella asked, unsure of even herself in this matter.

"I suppose, I have been known by many names, Cardozo, Lobo, Diabo, Demonio are the most recent or names my victims have claimed for me, but I prefer my given name: Duarte. But do you know who I am?"

"Some sort of demonic creature?" Bella bit out, he had already told her that he went by that description, and she could believe it.

He laughed in her face. "That is what I am, but who am I?"

"I don't know?" Bella really didn't, she had never met him until the day he substituted.

"You, who sticks her nose in a book, and not any book, but classical literature, who knows so much more than you let on, doesn't know who I am?"

"Why should I? Are you someone famous?"

"I was a little known figure in the Portuguese composition, I was known then as Duarte Lobo, and I traveled with for awhile, someone whose name I have taken in memory, Manuel Cardoso. He was a good companion, we felt the same way about our prey and until he was ripped apart by the Volturi, I hadn't realized that either of us had stepped out of line. It forced me underground, made me not react as I had wanted to, and forced me to feed in such despicable conditions. They would never imagine to look for me here, it's far too sunny, not like Texas though, hurricane season is ripe for breeding grounds there. I would have been found during that coup a couple of decades ago, when they got involved with matters, again, not any of their concern."

Bella didn't understand what he was talking about, but took it all in, hopefully somewhere in there was the answer she needed to protect herself, to keep him from doing anything to her until she could escape. "So... you were into music?" She bit her lip, trying to get him to talk more.

"We were the best, there was a third, but he was too weak to be changed, but it might have fun, to have a trio. I could have created my own Volturi. Do you know how much I hate being here? Talking this filthy language? But Portugal and Brazil were out of the question."

"What, then, is the purpose of all of this?" She asked.

His teeth flashed at her again and she coiled backwards into her seat. "That is precisely the purpose, right there."

"What, to scare people?" She questioned dryly, if that was the sole reason to do this, he'd succeeded, but what would he get out of it afterwards?

"Not to scare people." He let out a frustrated sigh. "I thought you were smarter than the others, clearly, I'm wrong, but we shall see, I've already started us down this path and only if you really annoy me, will I end it here. I have grown bored with the boy, he was too young and I don't have the patience to wait for him to age." He turned his head slightly to the side and heard scuffling. "He's back, already. I wonder if he's found me something better than homeless."

The boy fell into the room, he seemed more subdue than before. "I found a girl, she's about fourteen, she's a runaway, no one will think anything of it, just cause for the course."

Whatever his name was, now or then turned and left without even a word of approval for the kid and disappeared. Bella turned quickly to the boy. "Let's run!" She shot to her feet and reached out for his hand with her own that wasn't injured recently. He flinched away from her. "I'm not going to hurt you!" She promised, but he didn't respond to her. "Why won't you even-"

"Look!" The boy cowered in his own skin. "He's fast, he can catch you easily, and he knows where you are, no matter where you hide!"

"What is he?" Bella questioned softly, coming to kneel in front of him. "Who are you?"

"It doesn't matter who I am anymore, it never really did." The boy shook his head. "It won't in a few days for sure."

"But you have become a part of his life-"

"No, just a part of his year." The boy countered. "There have been many before me, and there will be many after you. It's a cycle, and it doesn't end. I was a fool for believing him when he said he knew a great place to catch a score. He was right and after that, he only continued to draw me in, he had mind-fucked me the moment he set eyes on me."

Bella hadn't recalled that experience, she couldn't relate, she'd always felt weirded out by the teacher, and he had a drawing aspect, she supposed, but it was always rooted in a deep sea of unease. The other students though had all fallen for him head over heels though, even the guys had been envious of her status of helper, and the guys in her school didn't lift a single finger to help anyone out. "What does he do to you?"

The boy shook his head. "I don't know, but don't believe the happy images, it only makes life so much worse. If you don't believe it, know the truth and can look past it, the images disappear, no matter what he tries to do to you, it can't work, because they're not real, they're only an illusion, a trick of the light, but something much more substantial."

Bella rested a hand on his shoulder and even though he tensed, he didn't push it off. "Come, I'll protect you, we'll get help."

"I told you, it doesn't work, no one can stop him, not even the police or a tank." The boy put his hand over hers. "I'm sorry, but you're in this too deep now. There's no escape, not even for you."

Bella would see to it that there was, and she opened her mouth to assure him that if she did, she would come back for him, but instead it turned into a gasp as she was yanked away from him with a quick tug to her pony-tail, her hair follicles stood on end in their pain. She crashed into the chair she had left to talk to the boy, and it fell over with a clang, but her own head was still spinning and when she managed to look up to see the man, her entire existence tilted on it's axis.

He had the young girl in a single fist, his face against her throat, but he was tearing into her and blood was splattering everything, the walls, the ceiling, the boy and the man's clothings. It even got onto her. The boy was quickly trying to mop up the carelessly wasted blood as it pooled onto the floor, he kept his eyes firmly away from the sight, but Bella couldn't do that, she was beyond horrified at what she could see and when the man finished with the girl, whose toes barely brushed the ground as she had initially struggled and then spasmed once before falling limp and finally managing to do in death what she couldn't do alive, she was released from his clutches.

He swiped the blood from his face and his eyes locked on Bella, but he refrained from attacking her, though it looked as if he wanted to. His eyes though were the color of crimson, the color of the blood he had just drained the girl of. Bella was reminded of her mother's most recent favorite show, where when the vampires cried, they cried tears of blood. But in that show, a human could be fed upon and left unharmed afterwards.

The boy struggled with dragging the body into a room, but since she wasn't much bigger than he was, it was probably easier for him than the others he no doubt had to expose of earlier. Bella gulped and looked back at the man who had dragged her here. A loathing started to boil in her gut, but she refrained from lashing out at him, it would be so easy for him to end her life, but she swore it wouldn't happen until she found a way to destroy him.

So, she got closer to him, though it shouted at every bone in her body as wrong. Over the course of the next few weeks she was allowed to leave, go home, sleep and then go to school, only to report to him after school. She had her regular classes back as the sun once again shined down upon them. She also got closer to the boy, she found out information from him, like how Duarte kept one around until he found a suitable replacement, and Bella was the boy's replacement.

She cringed every time he brought a human in to feed, he did it to break his prey down, to terrify them into submission. He did not feed off of his subjects, but he refused to go hungry as well, it would ruin his game. Over the weeks she learned exactly what he was, the ins and outs of his kind, he was willing enough to share them with her, he was even amused that she was so curious.

Then one day, it pushed her over the edge. She could not stand his mindless acts of violence on the boy, and the death he wreaked on the innocent people of Phoenix, and she was planning a way of escape, but she was biding her time, choosing the right moment, because she knew as the boy did, escape was impossible, he'd only track them down and beat them into work. What pushed her over the edge though, was Duarte taking the boy and lovingly smooth his hair back and taking his head with it, so he could sink his teeth into the tender flesh and sucked out his blood. He left no mess and the boy, frightened beyond belief, and still knowing what was coming, allowed it, without a single fight.

Bella could not watch and tried to run while he was distracted, he didn't scare her like the boy was of him. She understood what he was, what he could do and hated it. But it was too much to draw someone in, get them to trust him and then demolish all of the guise of safety and beliefs. He was a monster, and not because he fed on the blood of humans, that was horrible in itself, but it was his nature, he was not unique. What truly made him a monster, was that he played with his food, tortured them in a way that violated every part of their being.

"Where do you think you're going?" He asked, slithering over to her side, and taking her upper arms into his hands, she was shaking so badly that it hurt to jerk against the confines that his hands created. It still made her sick to her stomach to even think about it, much less see him feed on another life.

"Out!" She snapped, he wouldn't kill her now that he'd just gotten rid of his last slave, but he might make it uncomfortable for her.

"Hmm... maybe you'll be my new companion after all. Not one of my subjects have lasted as long as you have, you really are strong, aren't you?" He slid a finger down the side of her face and throat. "It'd be easiest to try now, after I've been fully fed, but I can't make any guarantees."

She'd managed to talk her way out of it, but she didn't remember how she managed it, but in the end, he decided it was best to wait to be sure that she was right for what he wanted, and despite her arguing, he decided to experiment on others to see if he could do it, then destroy them.

He'd taught her everything, except how to destroy him, and that was the only thing she was truly interested to know. All she had gained in knowledge was what he had told her that first day, about how his previous companion was torn apart by the Volturi. She would have gone to them, told them everything, but she knew her fate would have been signed before she could have even gotten through the proper channels. So instead within the week, she had convinced her mother that she wanted to go live with her dad, so Renee could go on the road with Phil, it had been an easy conversation, and she'd gotten her way.

"So, now I'm here." Bella finished her story.

Edward had shifted so he had both of her hands within his, and he held them so gently. She remarked to herself, yet again, how different he was from the other vampire. "I don't understand a few things." He said slowly, his eyes never leaving her face, as if expecting her to collapse in a heap, from her memories of that occasion, and this one. "What exactly was his power?"

"He wasn't a tracker. He'd told me stories of different types, one was how they found his companion, but he was never tagged mentally, because he wasn't close enough to the vampire that can do so." Bella explained, lacing her fingers in his. He really didn't understand, did he, she was stronger than they were giving her credit for, yes, they were vampires, yes that should scare her, but really, they were kittens compared to what she had encountered. "He could produce images, physical images and sounds, it wasn't in the mind type of thing, though he always commented that he was jealous of Jane's ability to inflict pain that way, he said he would have so much fun with that talent."

"There's another vampire in South America that can create images, different sceneries or settings, in the mind. I had the opportunity to speak to her once, it was very disconcerting, always changing around in that sense as well as being able to hear her thoughts, it at least gave me the advantage of knowing what she was planning next."

Bella nodded and looked away from him to their hands. "There were other things you didn't understand?"

"Why he was doing this, how he could let you go, etc."

"He was just playing with his food, Edward. He was alive a very long time ago, several hundred years, and he was turned as the black death was knocking on everyone else's doorsteps. He and his fellow composers were at a pub and took the wrong alley, he went from writing church music to a vampire. But in between he had started to see that everyone was going to die, die painfully, and he didn't want to be part of it, he'd rather be the barer of pain. So he and Cardoso were successful in their transformations, the third had lost too much blood. They were left to feed on whomever they wished and they did. When a hundred years later, his 'friend' was killed, he set out on a new mission, to find a replacement and to do so, he needed to assure himself that they weren't boring, were strong and someone he could bare to turn. If they didn't meet the qualities, he'd set out for a new prey and once he found someone that interested him, would start to train them, get the old one to train the new one and then eat the old one. I got on a flight in the middle of the day, when the sun was shining brightly overhead and said goodbye to my mother, to come here, where he said enough vampires came through, that it was stupid of him to show his face. He didn't think I would remember it, so he hasn't searched for me here, knowing how adverse I am to the rain that fell even in Phoenix. He probably thinks I'm on the road with my mother and couldn't convince her to let me stay on my own, thus giving me a legitimate alibi."

"He won't eventually find out when your mother comes home?"

"She won't, they've just bought a house down in Florida, she wants me to move in with her there. I haven't decided, what to do, all I do know is that my mom is sending contractors to close up the house and pack everything up and sending it down to Florida. I wouldn't need to ever set foot in Arizona again. I'm free either way." Bella had finally realized it herself and it was like a load was taken off of her shoulders.

"The dog knows about all of this, doesn't he?" Edward stated with sudden realization of his own. "That's why you spend so much time in his company."

"No, I spend time with him because he's my friend. He only knows that I've encountered a leech- sorry his term, not mine, and he is protecting me from any fall out that might come my way."

"You can tell him his services are no longer needed." Edward slid in the booth so he was standing and pulled her gently out. He was easier on her than any human guy had ever been, more aware and softer touch, knowing she was delicate. "I'm going to take care of you from now on." He threw some money down on the table and pulled his jacket around her shoulders and guided her outside.

"Edward-" She tried to argue, he couldn't do that, and Jacob would have a field day.

"No, you're my responsibility now."

"Wait, what?" Bella titled her head up at him with shock clearly written across her features. Where has this come from?

They stopped on the curb next to the car and Edward sighed deeply, regretting he'd said anything. "I have great feelings for you, and they're not just hunger pains. I will admit that the first day I saw you, all I could do was convince myself not to attack you until I could corner you alone, but I was so angry with you for breaking apart my perfect world that it worked for awhile, and then when class ended, I had to leave. Once I managed to clear my head of the haze you had put it through, I realized it wasn't your fault and I couldn't touch you, I tried to distance myself first by removing myself from your class, but it failed and I knew I just had to leave Forks all together, because we would be seeing each other, running into each other at the oddest moments and I couldn't risk it."

"Because of your family and your perfect record?" Bella asked, not daring to touch him, he had been the one to make all the moves, because he had to be assured by himself that he could handle it. She trusted that he wouldn't act unless he was positive.

"I don't have a perfect record. There's only two people that come close after the newborn stage and one that does. I am a monster, you have that right about our kind. Actually you have almost everything right, and it makes so much sense now, but I can't allow anything to happen to you." Edward gestured to the car. "I'll explain on the way back to Forks."

"The way you drive, it'll be a very short conversation." Bella glanced at it a little worried. "Are you sure you can handle the close proximity, the shut in scent?"

Edward reached out and slid his fingers through her hair, pushing it back in the most kind gesture. "I am sure. The longer I'm with you, the easier it gets. It's still hard, I will admit it, but, it's easier, each time, fractionally."

"So... by now, you're up to what? A second in my presence before wanting to suck me dry?"

She was teasing him, but the look he gave her clearly told her that it wasn't received that way, and nor should she be making those jokes when she knew how deadly it could get, instantly, first hand. Bella sighed and Edward opened the door for her. "An hour, very close proximity." He said just as he shut it on her.