7. MULTIPLE
"We first met the young ones a decade ago. They are without doubt the most unique group I have ever had the pleasure to meet." Alice's lips turned up a tiny bit; she must have liked this coven very much. "They moved into Seattle last month. They're vegetarians, like us. When we met them, they were not, but then there were only four of them. Two males and two females. Barron and Patrick make up the male side; Jennie and Erica take the female roles."
I caught a semi-second of unease when she said Erica's name. The Erica from the phone call, I could figure.
"There are two more of them now, but I don't know anything about them. From what Edward said, one of them is the reason for converting to our way of life.
"Barron and Jennie were both part of a failed newborn army attempt back in the nineties. Their army was obliterated, and they are the only survivors they know of.
"Patrick saved Erica from being slaughtered by a crazed newborn. Barron and Jennie joined their clan back in 1996. They stayed in Seattle for a year, but they found that their close proximity to the humans there made them much less inconspicuous.
"They left Seattle, and roamed around Canada for three years before the met the new ones. All I know about these newer comrades is that one was with the Denali Clan for a few years, which is the reason that the Seattle Coven is like us now. But now that they're back in Seattle, thanks to our wondrous way of life.
"Both of the new ones joined the coven in 1999, from what Edward found out."
She paused, probably thinking. I broke the momentary silence.
"What did you mean when you said the most unique?" I asked as casually as I could muster.
"They're all very young. Physically and in vampire age. Patrick, the oldest is fifteen in physical years, and thirteen years in vampire age, so he's really twenty-eight. One of the new ones is the youngest, thirteen physically and eight or nine vampiricly, I believe."
Alice deliberated again, before she started again, her tone hinted with wonder.
"I don't know barely anything about these new ones, but I suspect we'll find out more about them soon enough."
I could really care less about that now, I needed to know what was so dangerous now, what was going on?!
"And... what did Erica do? Alice, what is going to happen?"
"Erica...," she began, and her brow furrowed in frustration and sadness. "It wasn't so much what Erica did, but why she did it. We would have been better off if she hadn't done it, but she didn't know any better."
"But what did she do?"
"She attacked one of the Volturi."
"Caius?" I asked instantly, a reaction to hearing his name minutes earlier.
"No," she said forcefully, shaking her head in horror. "But the way he reacted to it, it might as well have been. Erica attacked one of the guards, Santiago. Ugh. An idiot if there ever was one, he is. She and Jennie were hunting right outside of Seattle, and Santiago sort of appeared.
"He seemed very friendly at first. But he started asking questions. Questions about our lifestyle, the Quileute wolves, and Renesmee. That was what made Erica suspicious. Caius hates our lifestyle, including the fact that we 'tolerate', as he puts it, a camaraderie with your pack, and he absolutely loathes Renesmee." Alice's eyes squinted and she pursed her lips.
"He's like some kind of sick freak out of Harry Potter. Like Voldemort incarnate. Sick, biased, prejudiced leech!" she spat.
I blinked at Alice. I had never heard any of the vamps use any of the pack's derogatory terms for vampires. Alice calling Caius a leech held the teeniest bit of irony.
"Erica got a tad defensive, because she considers the Denali's and us close family, even though we haven't seen them in years. Santiago took that as a threat. Technically speaking, Erica was only acting in defense. Santiago threatened all of us, and our way of life, saying that there would be nothing left of it after they were done.
"Erica attacked. Santiago escaped, and the other Seattle Coven members stopped her from following him. Caius knew about it within minutes. Threats galore, of course. I don't know if Aro is going along with it, but he very well might be."
I shivered uncontrollably. A sudden memory erupted into my head: the full moon shining like a streetlight above the forest. The kitchen of the ever-familiar little red house. The faint sound of the TV behind me. And the girl. The little vampire girl. With red eyes.
Her red eyes, so brilliant that there was no way she had been one of the Seattle coven. She was too young for that, even. She had looked maybe eight or nine. Maybe.
"Alice?" I asked. "We might have a war on our hands now, right?"
My voice was shaky and frightened.
"Yes, Seth," she said. "A war."
Jacob Black's point of view
I let my head bob to the music. I mouthed the words as my hands tinkered with the underside of the lawn mower. One of my lesser projects, if I could say so myself. I finished twisting a part in place and stood up.
My bare feet glided to the push bar of the machine. I grabbed the starter cord and pulled. The engine roared to life, deafeningly. I jumped up. Finishing a project always hyped me up. Like crack. Haha.
The muscles of my face stretched into a wide grin. Now I could rest. I had barely slept at all last night, or the night before. I was up the whole night, working on this stupid lawn mower. But I did fall asleep once.
On the floor of my garage. I had a hammer sticking into my back the whole time.
I turned off the lawn mower. Spinning round towards the house, I grabbed my energy drink. Nos, of course. Couldn't live without it.
I opened the door to our little red house, ducking my head a bit so that I would fit through the stupid door. In our tiny living room, Dad was sitting in his wheelchair, his eyes glued to the TV.
"Hey, Dad," I said, gliding towards the kitchen. I flipped my hair behind my shoulder. Renesmee said she liked it that way. I sat my drink on the table before I said anything else. "I finished the freaking lawn mower. Thank God, the yard needs it. Bad."
My dad didn't turn his head, he just nodded and said, "Good" in an indifferent tone.
"Are Charlie and Sue coming over for the game?" I asked. The three were almost glued together nowadays. I hoped they were coming over, so I could go visit Nessie, and the rest of the Cullens.
"Yeah," he said. His tone was a tad more interested now. "They'll be over any minute. You can have Seth over again if you want to."
"Seth went up to Port Angeles with...Alice," I said. I deliberated on 'Alice'. Their sudden buddy-buddy-ness was more than weird, no matter how much Seth loved the vampires.
"Oh," he said.
"It's fine, I'm gonna head over to Nessie's place anyway." I motioned to the door with my thumb.
He risked a quick glance to me before turning back to the TV.
"Okay," he said, not all the way here anymore. "Have fun, Jake."
I grabbed my Nos energy drink before I ducked out the front door. I jogged to the red Rabbit, and hopped in the front seat, chugging a little more of the liquid energy when I twisted the key in the ignition and swerved out of the driveway and onto the road.
The familiar road was peaceful today. No kids running around, no steroid-pumping moronic teenagers street racing, and no blood-crazed vampires chasing little girls.
I drove slowly, taking in the cool air that was coming in through the open windows of my car thanks to the breeze. It smelled a bit like rain, too.
When my car approached the long unneeded treaty line, I slowed.
I could smell vampire. The sick, vomit-inducing scent suddenly exploded all around me like tear gas. Literal tears fogged my vision. My breathing quickened and I could already feel the tremors beginning to shake my spine. As my outline began to blur, I knew that this scent was not a Cullen. I had smelled it before.
Volturi.
I suddenly stopped shaking and slammed on the gas pedal as hard as I could. I worked as hard as I could to control the vibration that was painfully shaking my being.
I glanced at the speedometer. I wasn't going near as fast as I wanted to.
As much as I had to.
I remembered way too friggin' clearly the memory of the day last December when the Volturi and their army came to take my Renesmee away from me. My Renesmee.
When I reached the Cullen's house, I threw myself out of my car, not even bothering to shut the damn doors before I was sprinting uncontrollably into the house.
Many pairs of eyes met mine. Bright red, gold, and my favorite, the dark chocolate shade of Nessie's. I ran to Renesmee's side immediately, before even taking in who was here.
I looked up from Nessie's shoulder after I picked her up in a huge hug.
"Can't...breathe...Jake!" she had sputtered, exactly like her mother used to. Before she turned into an indestructible war machine.
Around the room, were scattered very many familiar eyes.
I knew the Amazonian vampires from last December. They were terribly tall. Huilen, the tiny black haired female seemed to have joined them. Her nephew, the other hybrid, Nahuel, was with them as well. His eyes were the color of warm teak.
The two sisters of the Denali coven were here, along with Garrett, their newest "recruit", but Carmen and Eleazar were absent from the group.
They all wore the same face of anxiety that was etched on my face.
The seriousness of this situation almost knocked me off of my feet.
If they were all gathered here, then history was about to repeat itself. But so quickly? Would the Volturi still be stupid enough to act when they were so outnumbered?
Oh.
But the Volturi were already here.
And we only had the five Amazonians, three of the five Denali's, the nine Cullens, and the seventeen of the Quileute wolf pack. Thirty-four.
No, thirty-two.
Alice and Seth were in Port Angeles.
But maybe they could make it back in time, before the Volturi decided they'd be better off if they weren't in the picture.
"The Volturi are coming," Carlisle said. His tone was calm, but disturbed. He hadn't expected them to act so soon, I guessed.
"And their coming soon," Bella said, partially through her bared teeth. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest, and her ice-white skin was even icier. "They have members of their damn guard posted all over the place."
"No where to go," Nessie said into my chest, her warm arms wrapped around me like vices. "No where to hide now."
"What can we do?" I asked, my tone shaken with sudden grief and anxiety. There might be no way to escape destruction now. No way to get my Nessie safe. It wasn't even her birthday yet. She would...die... being only a day away from her birthday if we all died today.
"Exactly," Rosalie whispered. "What can we do?"
"There's no way we can get any more fighters in through their ranks," the tall blond-headed Jasper said from the couch. His face was buried in his marble hands. "We're alone."
I thought through the numbers quickly in my head. There had been thirty-two of the Volturi, including the wives, last December in the clearing. They had brought forty witnesses. There was no need for witnesses now. Only fighters.
There were thirty-one of us here. We were evenly matched then! What the hell were they all so depressed about? We had a chance to win! Slim, and unreasonable, but it was there!
"They've been breeding like crazy, Jacob," Edward said from behind me. His voice was colder than I had ever heard it before, even when we had been so close to dying before.
"Breeding? I thought-" I said, confusion ruling in my features.
Edward interrupted me.
"Breeding was the wrong term, I'm sorry," he corrected himself, closing his eyes and shaking his head solemnly. "They've been infecting like crazy."
"Caius and Aro have not been behaving themselves lately. Merely a few months after the confrontation in the meadow, Aro changed a young man with a gift like Eleazar's. Almost exactly like Eleazar's."
"Except ten thousand times more powerful," Tanya, the strawberry blonde sister of the Denali coven said, her tone also grief-ridden. She didn't like this any more than the others, like Rosalie.
"Trenton, one of the new guard members," Carlisle continued the thread of explanation, "has the ability to taste every single person's power. Or potential power. He knows every human's potential ability, no matter how potent. He would even know if one of your young Quileute boys was destined to become what you are, Jacob. And his gift is omnipresent."
"He can taste every single one of us in this room," Edward whispered, horrified at the notion.
I shivered. The thought that we were all being, well, tasted by some unseen vampire was entirely unnerving.
"He can't tell where we are, but he knows we're here, and what we can do," Jasper said, standing up and pacing to Esmé's side. Esmé was holding her sides and rocking side to side. "Aro has been using him to pinpoint the most powerful potential vampires in the world. We might as well be on fire now."
"Where are Seth and Alice?" I asked, ignoring his morbidity. A strange sensation tingled the back of my mind.
It was similar to what it felt like when I was with Renesmee. Why? I had no idea.
"They should be here any second," Edward said. "They're just crossing the line into the town."
"Wait! What if one of those bloodsuckers gets to them?!" I said at the same time Renesmee said, "How far away are they?!"
"They won't come near them," Edward answered me first. "They're waiting for Caius or Aro to decide to act. The Volturi aren't close enough for me to hear anymore, but Seth and Alice are. Alice is angry. Because the Volturi included the pack in their equation, she can't see a thing. She's going to have a spaz attack, I'm afraid."
"They're here," Renesmee said, answering her own question.
A strange, new sense of relief swept over me as Seth and Alice burst in through the door, and Alice sent shards of it flying. Her eyes might as well have been pitch black, although she had fed only a few nights before.
"I can't see a thing!" she roared, but it still sounded like music. "They counted the wolves among their stupid freaking plans this time, didn't they?!"
Alice was in a frenzy. I had never seen this part of her.
"Seth," she screamed, her voice higher. "Go and tell the wolves now!"
Seth nodded, and his eyes were frightened, but ready.
He gave me a funny look before speaking.
"Come on, Jake!" he said. "You'll need to hear this too!"
Seth had phased before I even got outside. I ran after him into the trees, tying my clothes around the cord before I erupted in an explosion of russet-colored shaggy wolf hair.
I could hear the thoughts of the others in my mind like foghorns as soon as I could think. They had known everything as soon as Seth had phased.
Then I knew everything.
So this Seattle coven set this all off?! Paul was yelling.
No! Seth yelled back. The Volturi would have done this anyway! It was just bad luck that they got to them before us!
No no no no! Leah was sobbing. The events of last year had left her emotionally drained. This would be hell all over again for her.
They're here to kill Nessie again? Iliana was asking, confused as ever.
That one stung a bit.
Every one calm down! I said, the Alpha in my tone echoing through the group. Calm slowly crept into the minds of my pack.
They were all calmer, except for the anxiety tingling at the back of all of their thoughts.
I did a head count, sort of, to make sure everyone was here. Bella must have gotten them all together for this. The wolves were all in a half-circle, a half-moon. Their thoughts were all jumbled and close together, and more of a whisper than before. I stood tensely in front of this group.
One was missing from my head count. The sandy-furred wolf that had been with me only moments before was gone.
Seth? I said mentally.
Nothing. He had phased back.
I shrugged it off. He already knew everything, of course. He didn't need to know anything else. I guessed he was heading back to the house.
Three strange images passed through Sam's mind. A lot of weird things went through Sam's head lately. But this one was a picture of Seth, last year, all happy and carefree. The second was Seth now. Taller, more mature physically. Less happy. Much less carefree. Sad. Apathetic. The third image sent shockwaves through all our minds.
It was an image of me.
Seth Clearwater's point of view
I hadn't been prepared at all. I had phased without a thought. My mind hadn't even had time to process the numbing from before. I was too tired.
I had put my sanity in danger.
Sam knew now, but the others didn't. They had been far too preoccupied to notice anything but my secondary thoughts, the danger we were all in.
And Jacob had been half a second away from knowing.
I was back in human form, dressed, but going insane.
I fell to my knees in front of the house, and tears erupted from my eyes. I buried my face in my hands. I couldn't take it anymore!
I felt Alice by my side instantly. Someone else cold was there too, holding me up. But I couldn't speak.
My sanity was broken. My heart was dying all over again.
The fault lines of my heart shook with so much power, I wondered if Satan himself was pulling on them just to make me fall.
I love Jacob Black.
My chest hurt as if I had been hit by a hammer, and my heart had shattered into pieces inside of me.
He can never love me back, I thought, and the hopelessness chilled me to the bone.
And then I passed out.