AN: I can't even express what everyone's reviews last chapter meant-I was brought to tears more than once at the support and the love. THANK YOU.

Playlist updated.

Thank you to JosieSwan, the bestest best beta every, and to my cheerleader and pre-reader, Izzzy-the term "henchbitch" is all hers :)

Chapter 21: Stockholm Syndrome

Edward

There were a lot of things that I hated good ol' Uncle Niall for, but right now, at the top of my list was that Bella and I weren't even allowed to pause and luxuriate in the aftermath of the glorious sex we'd just had. He and Commando Barbie could be back at any time, and the last thing I wanted was for them to see us like this—naked and in each other's arms—and know what had just happened.

I'd never bothered hiding any of my sexual exploits before; in fact, I'd never even cared if everyone knew—and I'd made sure that everyone did. Emmett and Carlisle had seen the single—sometimes double or triple—file line of girls that had revolved through hotel doors since I was sixteen. Esme knew, and though she had never brought herself to actually say to my face that she thought my behavior was disgusting, she didn't have to... I could feel it in the way she looked at me, the way she couldn't meet my eyes the morning after yet another sex tape leaked or more pictures were posted on Perez Hilton's blog. Rosalie knew, because I'd done everything but fuck the other girls right in front of her, because if she knew what I really, truly was, then she would leave me alone.

But unlike all the rest, I didn't want anyone to know about Bella.

It wasn't because she wasn't my usual brand of blonde bimbo groupie; in the end, some deep part of me had wondered if I was good enough even to touch her. For a moment, I'd even hesitated, afraid that she was too clean, too pure—afraid that I'd leave streaks of filth and degradation on her milky white skin. And then she'd looked right at me, right through me, with so much trust in her eyes, that I wanted to be the man she imagined I was.

"Are you alright?" Bella asked again, for what felt like the hundredth time since we'd dressed. We were sitting on the edge of the cot, staring at the door, waiting for it to open and for destiny to kick us in the face.

"I'm fine," I reassured her, though it was a huge fucking lie. I wasn't fine and I wasn't going to be fine, but I'd never done anything brave in pretty much my entire life, and I was discovering that you weren't brave because you weren't scared. You were brave because you determined there was something more important than fear.

I felt Bella's eyes me, searching my face for the slightest hint that I was lying, but whatever she saw, she didn't call me on my dishonesty. She had to know that the more we talked about it—the more afraid that she knew I was—the less chance there was that I could actually do what had to be done.

She didn't even offer to talk about it because she knew that there wasn't anything she could say to make this better. It was shit, and nothing—no platitudes in the world—could make it any less smelly and disgusting.

As what must have been hours ticked by, I found myself almost looking forward to the moment the door would open and end this fucking purgatory of waiting.

"Is it wrong of me," Bella asked, with a slightly hysterical edge to her voice, "that I almost want them to show up and get this over with?"

It was a relief to laugh, to release the tension that had bound us so tightly. The sex had helped, to an extent, because it had finally burned through all the sexual tension that had lain between us, but now there was another kind of edginess in the air. I told myself that it had everything to do with what was about to happen, and my own dread of becoming everything that it turned out my father hadn't been after all. But I knew it was more than that. Before sex, I'd been able to view Bella almost-objectively—as a pretty, smart, funny girl, but one who I wasn't really all that attached to. The sex had destroyed the last vestiges of the wall between us, and I couldn't pretend anymore that I didn't like her. I didn't even remember the last time that I'd even liked a girl.

Of course it just had to be this girl. The girl who was inevitably tangled up in the same fucked up mess that I was with my family and the Red Hands of Ulster, and so I felt more than obligated to get her out unscathed.

But I knew it was it was more than simple obligation; it was even more than egocentric heroics. I would do this even if nobody else but me and her ever knew what I'd done. All that mattered was that she was safe and far, far from the reach of that maniac, Niall, and his favorite henchbitch.

The door opened and the maniac himself stepped into the dim circle of light, with Jane only a step behind him. Her expression was just as dead as normal, except there was a hint of something explosive, fury perhaps, lurking behind the cold curtain of her dark eyes. The pit in the bottom of my stomach grew.

"Come," Niall barked, as if I was a dog and he was my master. "And bring the girl."

I'd been about to demand the same thing, so I wisely shut my trap. I needed a strong bargaining position, even though I didn't have a whole hell of a lot of points I could really bargain with, and pissing them off didn't seem like the best place to start.

I followed Niall out of the room, and down the now-familiar hallway, to the office that we'd sat in before. Bella filed in behind me, with Jane bringing up the rear.

Jane shut the door behind us with a solid, menacing click, and then she shot the bolt home, even though I was fairly certain there wasn't another human being in the house. Emmett had disappeared, and with it, the last hope I'd had that I wouldn't have to take this final, irrevocable step.

"It occurs to me," Niall said, settling behind his massive desk, "that while I'm asking you to make a decision that will arguably affect the rest of your life, we've never really discussed why we fight. Why you need to join us."

"I know why," I said levelly. "You know about me. About my music. Surely you know why I sing what I do."

Niall waved his hand, and almost ten years of my attempts to meld the Irish cause with my music fell flat. "I know," I repeated, struggling to stay calm. Or at least calm on the outside. Inside, I was already a seething mass of rage.

"I've heard your songs. You think you know why, but you don't truly understand. Not the way that I understand- or your father understood. You claim you burn with the injustice that the English have forced down our throats, but you yourself have never suffered a day of injustice in your life. You've lived a privileged, carefree existence, and so you've only played at the notion of sacrifice."

I felt as if I was ten years old again, and I was being called to the principal's office and told that all my efforts to be good were useless because I was inherently bad to the core. "I tried to reject her ways," I insisted. "We don't even share a last name."

"But you didn't take your real name back, Finn Ní Bhaoláin. You took a different last name, an English last name."

"Coincidence, I assure you."

"Regardless of why you selected Cullen, or why Esme re-named you Edward when you returned to America with her, you could have done your part to truly reject the comfortable life you had here. And you never did. You played at the idea, like it was a game. What we do, in the Red Hands, is not a game."

"I understand," I managed to choke out. Here was yet more proof that while my dad had given his life in a true act of selflessness, I'd been frittering my own life away, singing useless songs that ultimately meant nothing to anyone who actually cared.

Before, these thoughts would have sent me reeling towards the nearest whiskey bottle or the nearest blonde. Today, I looked right at the eyes that were so like my own, and I resolved that I wouldn't break this time.

"So, before your answer, let me tell you what you would be joining. The cause you would be committing to. You know, we Irish started as a noble people—proud, strong, and fiercely independent. We lived in clans, in tuathas, ruled by the high kings of Eire.

"The English would have you believe that they domesticated us; that they conquered us for our own good. What they did was destroy us, tear apart the very fabric of our people, of our culture. The Tudors began the theft of our country, when they declared Henry VIII the King of Ireland. As if he could truly be the King of Eire."

Aro's voice grew, rose, and I was momentarily taken aback by the passion and the fire and the need in his voice—to be respected, to be taken seriously. I was beginning to realize, as I listened to him, that I'd sold him short as a nutcase psycho who did what he did because he was officially irrelevant. But he truly, completely, believed- and that was reason why his grip on reality was no longer as strong as it once was.

"They stole our history, our customs, our language. They tortured and killed us for speaking the language, for celebrating the old ways, for worshipping our gods. When the English were finished conquering us, nothing remained of the old Ireland, except for a desire in the hearts of her people to win her back someday, to wrest the control from those who would see Ireland be a lesser, subjugated copy of England.

"We tried to drive them away, and when we failed, we plotted by the peat fire. We rebelled. Not once, not twice, but dozens of times. The Ulster Plantation failed, and yet they still came.

"And when the potatoes failed, when we starved by the millions, they did nothing. The English sat in their great homes, built on our land, by our labor and our sweat and our blood, and sold the crop to pad their own pockets.

"Your own great-great grandfather, he was a ruling member of the Fenian Brotherhood. He raised money and smuggled in guns and ammunition, and attempted to defeat the English in the raids.

"He failed, but the next generation took up the cause—and the next, and the next. Your grandfather fought in the Easter Rising, and barely escaped with his own life when the English imprisoned and killed anyone they could. His two older brothers died, one in battle, another in front of a firing squad."

I thought of that other bullet, shot from that other gun, that had killed my father, and I wondered if Niall felt any compunction at that act, or if only the loyal and the true to the Cause were lauded and remembered in death.

"There is a long tradition, Finn Ní Bhaoláin, of defending Ireland from those who would wish to rule it for themselves. It is our job, our lives to fight back, to wrest control back from the English. By turning your back on the Red Hands, you turn your back on the forefathers who sacrificed their lives to further the Cause."

I'd have to be deaf and dumb not to notice Niall's glaring omission on his list of who'd martyred themselves for the Cause, and it further convinced me his death hadn't been in the line of duty. Somehow, Niall had had something to do with it—whether he'd fired the bullet that had killed him or not.

Hushed, nearly-reverent silence filled the room after Niall's voice finally faded. I had to admit that he'd made one excellent point: there had been hundreds of years of blood and death and injustice and the current truce didn't excuse any of it. But it did, I realized, prevent more of the same.

"Now, boy, do you understand?" Aro looked at me like he expected me to say one thing, and even though I felt like I was fucking drowning, even though my brain was screaming another answer, I knew I didn't have a choice. There was really only one answer I could give.

"I understand," I reassured him, "and I would be honored to join you. To take my father's place."

I thought once I said the words that I would feel different, that I would feel something. But I only felt numb and cold. Dead.

I couldn't even feel Bella next to me, and I forced my eyes to stay straight ahead—not to betray that I cared about her by glancing at her to make sure she was still alright.

"Are you so sure he'll be the right man for the Red Hands?" Jane sneered, walking over to where Niall sat, her muscled arms snaking around his shoulders.

"I don't know anything," Niall told her. "But I do know that he's a Ní Bhaoláin."

"And what about the girl?" Jane asked then, before I could think of the best way to position myself that so I could appear to have some advantage—any advantage, really—that I could twist and use as leverage to get Bella out of this.

"You know what's going to happen to her," Niall said coldly, staring at me steadily, as if he was waiting for my mask to break and for me to show him just how little I wanted to be a Red Hand.

I didn't want to ask, but some courageous part of me that I didn't know existed until that moment forced the question out of me. "And what's going to happen to her?" Don't use her name, I told myself, if you call her Bella they'll know you care even a little.

But he didn't answer me. Instead, he turned to Jane, his eyes glowing inhumanely in that unapologetically cruel face. "Will you do the honor, my dear?"

Jane was wearing a simple blank tank top and to my shock, she casually lifted up the back as if stripping for an audience was something she did every day of the week. There was a black sports bra under the tank top, so thankfully, I wasn't treated to more skin from her than I ever wanted to see, but then she turned, slowly, and as her back came into view, I felt instantly and horribly nauseous.

Bella, sitting next to me, made an involuntary sound of disbelief and horror at the view that Jane presented to us.

"Jane is my greatest masterpiece, my most prized possession. She is also the symbol of my ultimate sacrifice," Niall said proudly, as if she was a doll that he showed off for guests.

With the evidence on her back presented to us, it was hard to deny that anything he said was false. Any man who cared for a woman and then allowed something like that to happen to her would have to be maniacally dedicated.

Bella had found her voice. "How . . .how . . ." she stuttered, "how did that . . .happen?"

Jane turned, hiding the horror of the markings on her back, and the expression on her face was triumphant, as if she was proud of what had been done to her.

"It's a brand," she said matter-of-factly, as if people got brands all the time. "It's a tradition of the organization... to prove a man's true loyalty."

"Love distracts, it twists and demeans you," Niall interjected. "Love isn't permanent or lasting enough—we must destroy what we love, in order to more completely devote ourselves to what is most important."

There was a horrible rushing in my ears, and I felt lightheaded with panic. I couldn't look at Bella now, even if I'd wanted to. I couldn't face her, and the horrible premonition that Niall's words were striking inside of me.

"Are you saying that I'm Edward's sacrifice?" Bella was stronger than me; she could ask the question that I couldn't.

"He clearly cares about you. You joined him in this. Your sacrifice would be appropriate, under the circumstances."

I could feel Bella's astonishment radiate out from her in waves, and I finally took a chance and glanced over at her. Shock was plain to see on her face, and I couldn't help that I felt much the same way. Niall had said I cared about her in such a matter-of-fact way that it hadn't even been up for debate. Truthfully, I wasn't sure if I did or not—all I knew was that I wasn't going to fucking touch her with whatever made those horrific marks on Jane's back. Hell would freeze over, and I'd let every ounce of blood leak from my body before I ever touched a woman -especially a woman like Bella- like that.

"You've got the wrong girl," Bella said flatly. "Edward doesn't care about me."

"No need to lie, my dear. The evidence is impossible to deny, especially considering the way he usually treats women. No, we both know that he cares—even if he doesn't know what caring is."

I didn't have time to consider the implications of what this even meant in terms of how I felt for Bella, because my attention was suddenly transfixed by what Jane had turned to do in the fireplace. And then I saw it—the thing that had made the marks on her skin. It was stuck in the fire, a crudely fashioned brand that seemed too archaic to be used in this modern age.

"Don't you think this is a little insulting?" I asked. It was a little late, I'd decided bitterly, to try to play nice and go along with the plan. We were going to do that if things went normally, and the situation had clearly transitioned to insanity. "I'm not going to brand Bella like a cow or something."

Niall's face hardened even further, and I was beyond caring that I'd just compared Jane to a cow. The entire scene had developed a dreamy, otherworldly quality—until I wasn't even sure it was real anymore. In a few minutes, I was certain I'd wake up in a Hale hotel, my mouth dry and my head pounding with all the whiskey I'd ingested the night before.

"Your father didn't like it either," Jane sneered.

"Leave Eoghan out of this," Niall bellowed before she could continue any farther. "He knew what was required, what he needed to give when he found her. He should never have resisted."

"We know what he should have done, but he didn't. Maybe it's like father, like son," Jane said slyly.

"Enough," Niall insisted, his voice growing louder and angrier, and his attention, even for a half a second, was finally diverted from me and Bella. I took the opportunity to glance at her again out of the corner of my eye, and I was surprised to see not just fear in her eyes, but a very real, very hardened determination.

"Edward," she hissed, low, under her breath, "don't argue. Just do it."

I was so shocked I could only helplessly stare at her. "What?" I mouthed. "No."

"Do it," Bella repeated again.

If I was looking at the situation from a logical angle, I supposed that Bella's insistence made sense. If I refused to do what they asked, Niall would never believe that I was prepared to join the Red Hands, and if he didn't believe that, neither of us would make it out of this with our lives.

But, logic be damned, I couldn't do it. I couldn't even think about doing it. It was completely, patently impossible. In fact, I thought I'd do just about anything, take any sort of punishment, to avoid pressing that red hot metal into Bella's flawless, soft skin.

The image of the puckered, scarred skin of Jane's back flashed in my mind, and I wanted to retch. Even if I could be prepared to actually do this horrific thing to Bella, she would live the rest of her life with the evidence of this horror marked on her skin. And that was unacceptable.

"I won't do it," I announced. "it's barbaric."

Jane shrugged, her expression announcing that she'd known I couldn't stomach it. That I wasn't man enough to do what was required. Fuck, if that was being a man, I'd gladly be just about anything else.

"You understand what you're saying," Niall said, eyes narrowing coldly at me. If I'd believed that Esme was icy, this man was like Antarctica in human form.

I nodded mechanically, the taste of panic bitter and metallic in my dry mouth. "Regardless of whether I care for her or not—and you're wrong by the way, I don't really—nobody deserves to be treated that way. My father wouldn't do it, and neither will I."

A muscle in Niall's jaw twitched, and I could feel the growing thundercloud. I should be afraid, I thought, but that required feeling something—anything—and I was simply too numb.

"Your father," he said, temper evident in his voice, "was weak. He gave into love. He didn't renounce it, use it to feed the flames."

"He loved my mother," I couldn't help but whisper.

"He was a weakling!" Niall suddenly roared, and he was on his feet, the chair clattering to the floor behind him. "She was a silly, stupid girl. He was powerful and strong; to let someone like her bring him to his knees was shameful."

I'd said my share of shitty things about Esme over the last ten years, but what he was saying wasn't fair. Esme was a lot of things, but silly or stupid weren't on the list. Plus, I was beginning to be able to feel again, to think, and if we were going to get out of this, I knew we had to change the status quo in our favor. The only way I could think of was to get Niall even more upset- the way he'd become before, when I'd thrown back the need for the Red Hands back in his face.

He was already mad now, I reasoned, it wouldn't be that difficult to push him just a bit farther, over the edge, until Jane was forced to calm him down. We'd be returned to our cell, and I could only hope that the respite wouldn't just be temporary. Maybe Bella had been right and Emmett had truly gone for help. The extra hour wouldn't be much, but it would be something—a stay of execution.

"You must have felt betrayed," I sneered, "to have your own brother refuse to do what you'd done- to turn his back on his family, on his heritage."

I watched my words fall like nuclear bombs into Niall's lap. Bella made an involuntary noise that might have been a whimper, but I couldn't look at her now. I focused every particle of my attention and my control on my uncle and let the rage I'd held inside for so long fly.

"He thought it wasn't safe," Niall exploded. "She was a pampered, spoiled little bitch. And he wouldn't listen to me when I said it would never work."

I thought I'd have to continue, to prod him more until he lost it completely, but I'd apparently already said enough, because Niall was off and running, his face growing redder by the moment. "To listen to her, instead of me. It was fucking wrong." He was yelling now, and Jane was at his side, hands on his arms, trying to pull him down to the chair, but he flung her off, moving her small frame as if it was nothing. I swallowed hard and prayed that he wouldn't decide to take out his anger on Bella.

"Niall," Jane insisted, "listen to me." But he wouldn't. He was off on another planet—lost in another time.

She turned to me then, and I could tell from her expression that she'd known what I'd been doing, and that while Niall might be incapacitated, she'd make sure he knew about it the moment he'd regained control.

"Let's go," she said flatly, grabbing me by the arm as she passed by my chair. "You think you're so smart," she added as we headed down the hallway. "But he'll be unforgiving after this."

I'd had a feeling that I'd have to pay for what I'd done, and so Jane's pronouncement wasn't exactly a surprise.

She flung me into the cell first, her claw like fingers leaving deep marks in my skin. I looked down at them, and then back up at Bella, who appeared to have absorbed through emotional osmosis some of Niall's excess rage.

"What were you thinking!" she yelled at me as soon as the door slammed shut behind Jane. "Why didn't you do it?"

Bella had insisted before, while we'd been in the room with Niall and Jane, but I'd never thought she'd get this angry that I'd refused to hurt her. Wasn't that supposed to be a good thing?

"I'm fucking sorry, okay?" I said shortly, annoyed I wasn't getting more credit for saving her from such a horrific fate. "I wasn't aware that you were looking forward to it."

"Fuck you," she snapped bitterly at me. "This is no time to be pouting because you couldn't play the fucking hero."

"Yeah, so I was trying to save you. So what. Clearly you don't want to be saved."

"You heard her! Aro's going to be ten times more pissed when he calms down. He's going to realize you worked him up on purpose, and he's going to kill us both. Slowly. I'll take being branded over an agonizing death any day of the week."

I didn't understand her; didn't she trust me at all? I'd vowed to me and to her that I'd get us out of this. When had she stopped believing that was possible?

"There's a third option, you know," I told her, my voice as patronizing rock star as I could get. "I get us out of here, and there's no fucking branding and no fucking death."

"When are you going to get it?" she yelled, and I could hear her panting breaths in the otherwise silent room. This was just like the moment when Jane had thrown that sandwich on the floor, and she'd lost control. All I had to do was wait for Hurricane Bella to pass. "There isn't going to be a Door C! There's only Door A and Door I'm Going to Fucking Kill You!"

"How many times do I have to tell you," I ground out, trying to control my temper and losing the uphill battle. "I've got it all worked out."

"I don't believe you."

"Well, that's just fucking great, then. I'm so pleased to hear your faith in me lasted so damn long, Swan."

Bella only made a frustrated, agonized sound and I heard her sit down heavily on the cot. I turned towards the door, because I wasn't entirely certain that I could stop myself from going apeshit on her. The confrontation with Niall had frayed my temper, and Bella had just set fire to what was left.

We stewed in silence for what felt like hours. Sometimes I could feel her eyes on my back, boring into me with fury and frustration, but I refused to give in and come sit down next to her. I felt like we'd regressed back to when we'd first been taken, and she'd made me crazy with her fucking annoying tenacity.

I used the time to try to figure out what on earth I was going to do to get us out of this situation, and as I calmed down, I realized that Bella had, to an extent, been right. Niall was going to be even angrier now—likely relentless in his need to punish me for turning him down and then provoking him on purpose. But even when I'd finally admitted that she'd had a point, I still couldn't fathom doing what Niall had asked of me.

Even more unfathomable was that Bella was willing to sacrifice that much to save us—she was essentially willing to turn herself into Jane, who frightened the living shit out of her. If I hadn't respected her before this moment, she was rapidly becoming the most frustrating, most fascinating woman that I'd ever met. The way she was able to do whatever it took was gritty and real and kind of awe-inspiring.

I decided that she was probably waiting for me to speak first—like some stupid game that middle school girls played—and I gave in. "You have to understand," I said quietly, "I could do a lot of things—I personally could take a lot of pain and suffering—if I could get us out of here. But I could never do that to you."

She didn't answer right away, and I wondered for a moment if she'd fallen asleep or even worse—if she'd passed out from the stress of our circumstances. But when I turned back to look at her, she was looking up at me with wary, worried eyes.

"I know," she said, picking at the edge of her t-shirt. "But you still should have done it."

"I couldn't. And that probably makes me a pussy. I'm sorry. Not that matters much now."

"Not really no," she said wryly, as if she could find some bizarre irony in the situation. And that was another thing I loved about Bella; her unflappable sense of humor. Even facing down torture and possibly death, she could still find the humorous side of just about anything. There isn't going to be a Door C! There's only Door A and Door I'm Going to Fucking Kill You!

And then the door—which ever one that Niall chose to push us through remained to be seen—opened.

Jane stepped into the room, but to my surprise, she didn't immediately insist we follow her back to Niall.

"You only have a moment," she said, and her voice was different . . .I would have said softer, but I'd already come to the conclusion that there wasn't a single fucking thing about Jane that was soft.

"What?" I asked.

"You only have a moment," she repeated in a hushed tone. "And I can't really help you, except . . ." And she did the most bizarre thing of all. She went to the doorway and pushed it back open, and held it wide, as if she wanted us to walk through it.

I took a hesitant step forward. "I don't understand," I finally confessed.

She rolled her eyes. "Fine. Let me explain it to you. In short sentences without any big words so you get it. Niall isn't stable. . .and I've decided that this isn't worth—you aren't worth—demolishing what's left of his fragile hold on reality. I've sacrificed everything for him, for what he stands for. And I'm not about to see you destroy it."

"You're letting us go," Bella stated, wonderingly. "Seriously? This isn't a trap?"

Jane glared at her. "Try me."

She didn't have to ask me twice. I took Bella's hand, almost as if it felt right to do this together, and we were down the hallway, glancing over our shoulders ever few moments, to make sure that Jane or Niall weren't following us. We paused at the front door, hearts racing, as I tried to slide the locks open as noiselessly as possible.

We didn't even shut the door behind us; just left it swinging wide open, and started to run into the black night.