Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended. Stephenie Meyer created it all.

Bella POV

Thirst burned hot in my throat. It was on fire, and I needed something to extinguish the flames…and that something was tantalizingly close. It smelled divine, and my eyes began to search for it. As my gaze hit the large form standing beside where I sat, my muscles bunched and, too quickly to even realize, I was across the room, my back against the wall. My lips were pulled back, baring my teeth in reaction, and my body was crouched, ready for defense.

Snarling filled the room, and it took me a moment to realize the sounds were coming from me. The giant began to step toward me, and my body shifted in response. My mind hadn't even contemplated the move; it was instinctual. My thoughts shifted quickly…shouldn't I be afraid of him? But my body and instincts wanted to lunge for his throat. It must have been apparent, because he stopped. My mind and body warred…I was going crazy.

"Felix, calm yourself. She most likely thinks you're being aggressive."

That voice, I knew it. I straightened into a semi-standing posture and looked at the person it came from. My Virgil. In need of comfort from the chaos inside me, I took one step forward, stretching my hand out towards him. Please help me…I don't understand.

The room stilled for a bare moment, and I wondered if I'd spoken out loud. Then, the others attempted to get to Virgil. "I'm Aro," echoed in my head, and for a moment confusion set in as to why that name was familiar. They were trying to grab him. They were threatening him! I raged. In a second, I had him in my arms, and I spun, putting him behind me, against the wall across the room. My arms were spread in defense, his body behind mine as I screamed at the group in the room looking at us.

"Jane," the voice came from behind me.

It sounded almost pained, as if he was sorrowful about something. I saw the blond girl step to the front of the group. She narrowed her eyes at me, and it was if the room waited on something. Frustration welled within me, and I stomped my foot in defiance, slightly moving toward her, my teeth bared.

Who was I? This seemed all wrong. I didn't know, and from the stunned looks on everyone's faces, including the girl, they didn't know what to make of me either. The boy stepped beside her, and the other female vampire in the room said, "Careful, you'll affect Aro as well."

I was in a momentary panic. I knew that other voice. She'd read to me as well, and my body had a similar reaction as to when the man behind me had spoken. Comfort … it seemed to say. Her eyes widened, seeing my raised hand, but then her words hit me. The boy was attempting to hurt Aro. I backed up, bringing my body fully against his, trying to stand between them. Must protect, my brain said. My body shrieked in fury, confusion, and fear. The window beside us shattered from the sound, causing glass to rain down on me. I watched in fascination as the sparkling diamonds settled around us, landing on my arms and wondered why I didn't bleed. I was so clumsy. Wait…where did that come from? Then my fascination was captured by the radiance of my skin, compliments of the sunlight streaming through the window … as if diamonds were embedded across it. A young man's beautiful face ran through my mind. He was smiling at me, and I gasped at the sight. Something shifted within me. Who? …

"Everyone stop; she believes you are trying to hurt me. Back away. Obviously, Alec and Jane's gifts are useless on her. I must say, even Alec's gift didn't affect me while she protected me. Intriguing…," my savior said from behind me.

"Isabella…"

My name is Bella, echoed through my brain. Bella Swan.

My hands went to my head as the words rattled through it. I wanted to sink to the floor in my confusion, but the body refused, shouting out, MUST PROTECT. Sobs of confusion and snarls of rage and warning battled as they tore from my body.

"Isabella, my child, listen to me. You may release me. They mean me no harm," Aro said from behind me. "They believe you may hurt me in your confusion."

His hand came around from behind me and softly grasped my chin. Waves of pure agony hit me from the smell that came from him. I inhaled deeply at the sleeve of his garment. Grabbing his arm, I forced my nose to him and growled. It was nirvana, it was hell. Vicious need poured through my body. The smell wasn't coming from him; it was coming from his clothes. My mouth filled with venom.

It was then I remembered my clarity just before awakening. I was a newborn vampire. My name was Isabella Swan, and the man's arm I was holding had saved me, if you could consider being made into an immortal being saved. The venom was running through my mouth because I was thirsty.

I dropped Aro's arm immediately and straightened up, wanting to hide in shame. The others looked at me in understanding. I pulled away from Aro, my back to the wall, and squatted, wrapping my arms around my legs. The struggle for control was overwhelming. It was imperative to control this chaos in my head. My mind understood that, but the body I now owned wanted food NOW.

"I'm so hungry," I said without thinking, and then was stunned at the sound of my voice.

It didn't sound right, and the strangeness of the moment sent my mind to racing. Folding my body as tightly as possibly into itself, my mission suddenly became to be as still as possible, so that my mind could sort this all out.

Aro and the one called Felix came to within feet of me. It was apparent that Felix was there to protect Aro from me. Sounds of the door opening filtered to where my body crouched, and another man appeared. Even though he was dwarfed by the giant beside him, this man was large in his own right, not as brawny, and leaner. Aro slightly pushed them to the side, and they grudgingly obliged but stayed within arms reach of us.

"Isabella …"

I automatically wanted to correct him, but "Bella" felt wrong now.

"… you need to eat, my child. It will help. This doesn't last forever, and we are here to help you."

He held his hand out toward me, making the other two extremely uncomfortable. As my eyes jerked between the two faces, I was struck with their beauty. Noticing my regard, the leaner one grinned endearingly. From somewhere deep within my memories, it reminded me of something or someone. A dark headed giant as well, who winked at me in easy familiarity … like a brother; the thought came randomly.

I felt my lips tug into a reciprocating smile and heard the others in the room around us gasp. Forcing my head back to my knees, I backed further into the wall, wondering what I'd done wrong. The rocks of the wall crumbled slightly against me.

"Little One, don't be shy; you are mesmerizing when you smile," came a much deeper voice from Felix.

Peeking through the curtain of my hair allowed me some privacy to study him. His appearance was very different from the other one. The skin of his face was stretched taunt across broad cheekbones, and his eyes were slightly tilted and black. Different flames filtered through my body, and in response I could feel my nostrils flaring to draw in his scent.

Aro watched my reaction with great interest, but finally said, "Felix, now is not the time."

"Yes, Master Aro," he replied, bowing his head, but not before I saw a curious mixture of embarrassment and pleasure race across his features.

Aro had remained in front of me, his hand outstretched in appeal, and slowly my own reached across the space to join his. I moved slowly, testing out my control of this new body, as something told me that this grace was a new found attribute for me. Aro pulled me to my feet and turned to the others. The female, whose voice I'd recognized, stepped forward and came to stand by Aro.

"Isabella, I am Sulpicia, Aro's wife."

"You read to me," I acknowledged, my tone indicating my pleasure.

She smiled at me, and the action caused her already beautiful face to transform into perfection. Then she looked over at Aro with an adoring look, giving me time to really study her. She had very light hair, but the deep red eyes seemed odd, as if they should be another color. Felix's had been black just a few minutes ago but, when I looked at him surreptitiously, they were red again. Sulpicia moved softly with us as Aro began to exit the room, tugging me with him. The others followed.

We moved through several hallways, and as we did, the incredible smell intensified. I could hear the beating of hearts, and my control began to slip. Venom pooled in my mouth and ran down my throat, and growls of need began echoing through my body. Felix and Demetri stepped before us, opening two large doors into another room, and for the moment confusion warred through me. Weren't we supposed to go outside to hunt; did they bring animals into the building?

It was then that I saw them, humans. Their beating hearts, racing from the adrenaline of fear, echoed through the room, driving me crazy. The warm and wet sounds of their blood streaming through their bodies tantalized me, and my body lunged forward, instinctually. One woman turned and started screaming when she saw us. I froze in my steps as my voice and another echoed in my head.

"Tell me why you hunt animals instead of people?" I asked.

The beautiful young man replied, "I don't want to be a monster."

EDWARD… Everything came back to me in that moment, in quick cinematic-like pictures and sounds. Everything…my father and mother, my move to Forks, meeting Edward, our first kiss, our time together. The Cullens, Jake, my heartbreak. I was with the Volturi. The leaders of my new world. Victoria had brought me here in revenge.

But more importantly, I remembered why I couldn't feed on the people in front of me… I, too, didn't want to be a monster. I stopped breathing and tore from the hold that Aro had on me, running as fast as I could away from the room and its bleating humans.

Veering down unknown corridors, I quickly became lost and finally barged into a large door to find myself in, of all places, a library. I searched frantically for somewhere to hide and noticed a window seat with heavy curtains tied back by a silk rope. I dove for the area, pulling the curtains around me. The window looked out over the city, providing a beautiful view. I couldn't care less about the grandeur; my body was in agony. Wrapping my arms around my knees, I began to rock violently. Holding my breath helped with the smell, but nothing covered up the sound of their hearts. The luscious thudding still echoed in my mind, and my throat flared in response. I'd thought the hole in me was painful before but now...aargh…

Hearing footsteps, I knew they were looking for me, probably following my smell. Perhaps, they were coming to destroy me; I clearly remembered Edward saying you didn't make these individuals mad unless you wanted to be destroyed. Hopefully, that would be what happened. I'd never wanted to just be a vampire. It had been a means to an end, which was to live with and love Edward for eternity. Now, I would live the rest of eternity, but without him. What an ironic twist.

Multiple footsteps stopped outside the door, and it slowly opened.

"Isabella …"

The rest of what he said was drowned out by the sobbing from my chest. The understanding in his voice was my undoing. He was on the other side of the curtain within a moment, but he wasn't alone. At least five other vampires had accompanied him into the room, the knowledge compliments of my new senses, having picked up on the different patterns of their feet.

"I'm going to pull the curtain back. It isn't customary to speak through a covering unless you are going to Confession, Isabella. Believe me, that is something no one here has done for quite some time."

I forced my body into the corner of the seat, attempting to become as small as possible, as the curtain slowly slid back revealing Aro with Felix, Demetri, and three unfamiliar male vampires. Aro's face revealed his determination.

"We've come to escort you back to where you can partake of your first meal, Isabella. Your newborn behaviors are excusable to a point, but in truth, you are far more in control than any other that we've seen, and thus I'll only allow youth to explain your actions so far."

If my body wasn't hurting so badly, I would have laughed. THIS was 'in control'? I shuddered to think of what was 'out of control." I felt like a raving lunatic, with my mind in a million directions, and my body demanding immediate action to slake my thirst.

"Are you coming willingly, or do I need to employ the help of my guard?" he asked, indicating the men to each side of him with a flourish of his hand.

I turned to look at the window. Hadn't Edward said that Carlisle had survived a fall from great heights? I shouldn't have taken my eyes off them because immediately I was grappled by five different sets of hands. In instinctive reaction, my body began thrashing. Aro grabbed my head when my teeth almost made contact with someone's body.

"To the throne room," were his only words.

The human began crying when they carried me through the door. Escape was hopeless for us both. They must have assumed that getting me in the room with the woman would be enough, but as soon as they released me, I scurried under one of the benches. I heard Aro produce a sound that sound suspiciously like a huff.

"Let us step outside and give Isabella peace. Her instincts will assume control at some point."

The sun set, and the night waned as I hid under the bench like a scared puppy. At some point, the human's screams stopped. I closed off all air from entering my body. To cover up the sound of her heartbeat, I began humming. It wasn't until almost dawn that I recognized that the song that I'd kept repeating over and over was the lullaby that Edward had written for me. When I sobbed at the realization, I inadvertently gasped for breath. Fire poured down my throat, and snarling erupted from me. The stupid human began screaming again in reaction. I began humming even louder.

The second day brought the next tactic. Other humans were brought in, and we were joined by members of the guard. Their lethal movements were like a finely rehearsed ballet, a ghastly, bloody, macabre dance as they fed greedily from the bodies. I turned toward the wall, putting my back to them, and began digging into the stone. Rational thought began waning at the end of the second day. They'd left another human in the room. I heard the sound of the shuffling feet over my continuous snarling.

The third day, they cut the human's throat and placed the body beside me. I only knew this because I startled at the feel of something warm soaking through my clothes. When I opened my eyes, it was to see a stream of the red liquid stealing its way under me, headed for the wall. Shrieking, I flew to the other side of the room and crawled under another bench but not before I saw the bright red slash my clothes had left across the floor.

The fourth day, I could barely move, the pain was so horrendous. I was past rational thought. Not a monster! Not a monster! Not a monster! Not a monster! Not a monster! I slammed my head into the marble with each repetition, shattering part of the wall and the bench over me. It was like a tomb under the rubble.

It was the fifth day that they finally took matters into their own hands. My legs were captured, and I was pulled from under the remains. I was held down by no less than six vampires. Aro came over to me and bent down.

"Isabella, I will not allow this to go any further."

"Please, so thirsty," I begged as best as I could. My throat seemed almost swollen shut. Had I been human, I would have probably suffocated already.

"Have Heidi bring something," he indicated to Demetri, who stood behind him, with a wave of his hand.

Within just seconds, he was back with the female that had taken me to the bathroom when I first arrived. She was accompanied by another human. Demetri carried the man, his hand across the human's mouth.

"No, please, deer," my word came out as a bare whisper.

Aro's hand slashed down, indicating his verdict.

"We do not live that way, Isabella. You are a part of this family now."

The click of my teeth closing against the possibility was audible through the room.

Aro's face became livid. "I swear I will throttle Carlisle for this idiocy!"

"NOOOO," the word came out, in response to the threat I perceived in his words. My eyes were locked on Aro's face, and therefore, I didn't see them move. Numerous hands caught my jaws, and a warm liquid poured down my throat. They'd slit the human's throat and were holding him above me.

Against my will, my throat began to move as the animal within me took over. Pleasure the likes of which I'd never known before flowed through my body. Gulping greedily, I couldn't get it fast enough. Suddenly finding my arms and legs loose, I grabbed for the thing supplying my need, burying my teeth into the flesh providing the nirvana sliding down my throat. Not enough, not enough … my mind began chanting when I felt the feeble heart begin to slow. Someone attempted to take the body from me, and I snapped at them. A pleased chuckle echoed through the chamber at my reaction, but I screamed in fury when the blood stopped.

Arms pried mine from around the body, and a living, breathing replacement was positioned in my embrace. In a parody of a passionate encounter, I threaded my fingers through the slightly long hair of the young man and turned his screaming face away from me before tearing into his throat. Purring sounds came from me as the warm blood flowed.

My limited knowledge of passion had been as a human; from chaste kisses shared in a twin bed with a young man who I found out too late neither wanted nor loved me. What I experienced as the blood filled my body far surpassed that. My body throbbed in unison with the heart of the body below me. I was unsettled when the heart finally stopped. I wanted something more, but it wasn't blood. My teeth disengaged from the dead body I was straddling, and I sat up quickly, throwing my head back.

The man's body below me was destroyed. I'd broken him in my haste to drain every drop from him, but it still took effort to pry my hands away from him. A vision of a female lion standing over her prey ran through my head. The power, the blood, surged through my body, and I stood to survey the room.

I took deep breaths, and then licked my lips, tasting the vestiges of my meal. The drag of my tongue across my lips brought on shivers of delight, amplifying the throbbing between my legs. I wanted, needed, sex. It was overwhelming, this need, and as with the blood, I was past control. Nine vampires stared back at me. Aro and the female were off limits, as Demetri protected them. It was then that I saw Felix and leapt for him.

I was captured in mid flight by the others and taken to the ground. I fought to get to him, leaving huge gouges in the floor, but in the end even my newborn strength wasn't enough. I was carried back to my room by the group. Scores of other vampires moved out of the way in the hallway, in reaction to my struggle and resulting snarls and snaps. It was as if a mad animal was daily viewing for them.

I was pinned to the floor of my room for a while. Aro left finally, taking Felix with him. He'd been as impervious to my pleas for Felix as he had for the deer. With Felix away from me, my mind gradually asserted itself again. Visions of Edward took root. My mind ran with fantasies of his mouth on me, his body within me, and the strange vampires that held me to the floor witnessed my first orgasm…

It took hours for the blood lust to finally recede, and in that time I'd imagined Edward and I in every position my ignorant mind could conceive. My body finally slumped, sated from the experience.

My humiliation and degradation was complete.

I would love to know what you think! Unlike my other story where I couldn't ask for reviews, I'm soliciting your thoughts here. Please!

As always, I want to thank my Betas – please check out their stories here on FF – they are incredible:

hopeforastalemate – A better name for this woman would be Volturi Girl. I'd started this story months ago, during short breaks from Harvest Moon. So… in response to her love of the 'Italian scum' and her personal invitation for me to write something a little darker, my planned sweet, angsty story between Bella, Edward, and Jacob took a dramatic turn. Hence the ten other chapters now residing in my recycle bin. I hope I make you proud. See the link to her profile below:

http: / www. /u /2173996/

Crmcneill – For his patience with me (contrary to how he presents himself on his FF profile) and his incomparable editing skills. Male twilight fans are not a myth – they do exist, and I am so glad I was able to connect with him. I've called many men friends, but I've never called one master until now. "Strong is the power of the comma. Mind what you have learned. Save you it can." See the link to his profile below:

http: / www . /u /1933926/