"Where do you think they took Rosalie?" Alice asked. As soon as they disembarked the plane the Cullens and Jessica were escorted to the castle and put in what looked like a sitting room, while Rosalie had gone with the queen and the princess. Alice was beyond worried because they had been in the room they were currently held in for what felt like hours and no one had come for them. When they asked the guards posted outside their room what was going to happen to them they had been told they were waiting for word from the queens.
"Who knows where they took her." Carlisle couldn't honestly say he cared about what happened to Rosalie. He had seen the way she had thrown herself all over the so called princess. It was just proof that Rosalie was as much as a harlot as she was in her human life. He should have never changed the blond in the first place. Especially because Edward didn't want her.
"I would think she was taken to meet the queens." Simone said. Although she was worried for her sister she was more worried for the rest of her family. Being the princess's mate would almost guarantee Rosalie would be spared but the rest of the family probably wouldn't.
"Do you think she is going to be able to save us?" Emmett asked.
"I think she will try." Esme had faith her daughter would do what she could to keep the entire family alive.
"It may not be up to her." Jasper warned. He may have had faith that Rosalie would try and do what she could but when it came down to it it was up to the queens to pick their punishment.
"I still think she will do everything she can to help us." Alice knew Rosalie would fight for them. Rosalie was a loyal member of the wouldn't want any one of them to get hurt.
"Can we not focus on Rosalie and focus on the fact that not only is our entire coven here but Jessica as well." Edward didn't understand why his family wasn't more concerned about his mate.
"What do you want us to do about it?" Simone could understand Edward was nervous about Jessica's fate but it wasn't like they had control of what would happen to the human. If they were relying on Rosalie to save them all then Simone wondered if Rosalie would even bother with Edward and his mate. Rosalie's hatred for Edward was well known and Simone doubted that Rosalie would fight to hard to protect him.
"We should at least start planning what we are going to do." Edward said.
Jasper didn't like this line of thinking. "What do you mean planning what we should do?"
"It's obvious we aren't just going to wait around until they decide to just kill all of us." Edward knew he wasn't.
"What else can we do? We are in their castle, guarded by numerous vampires and have little chance of doing anything and even if we did want to do something it would just get us killed. I'm not willing to throw my life away before I know what my punishment is." Simone wasn't going to let Edward force the queens' hands and give them no other option then to kill them all.
"No Edward is right. We need to do something." Carlisle wasn't going to just sit around and wait for death.
"I'm not willing to risk my mate for one of Edward and your's hair brain schemes. It was your planning that put us in this position in the first place." Jasper wasn't going to put himself and Alice in danger again just to sooth Carlisle's wounded ego.
"There was nothing wrong with our plan." Carlisle snapped.
Emmet let loose a humorless laugh. "Yeah nothing wrong at all. It just resulted in us all being held prisoner while we are waiting to find out if we are going to be killed or thrown in the dungeon for decades."
"Our plan would have worked out fine if Alice had used her gift properly to tell us what the fight was going to be no, she didn't tell us anything. She just made the excuse she couldn't see anything. I wouldn't be surprised if Alice set us up so the Volturi could capture all of us." Edward accused.
Jasper rushed Edward, grabbed him by the throat and slammed him on the ground. "Alice has always put this coven first. Even over her own wishes. If anyone were to set us up it is you as you have no care for anyone else's safety but your own as proven when you hid in the mountains while the rest of us fought your fight."
"Jazz, let him go." Alice pulled on Jasper's arm until he let Edward go.
After being freed of Jasper Edward got back to his feet and glared at him. "I was protecting my mate."
"You were protecting your mate while the rest of us were putting ours in danger. If we had gone after the red head like Jasper suggested in the first place none of this would have happened." Simone wasn't going to let Edward forget the reason they were put in this situation. "You and Carlisle stopped us from doing it because you didn't think she was a threat. Just another one of your many failures."
"Edward has not failed anyone." Carlisle yelled. "He has continuously put the needs of this family above his own. If anything he is the most selfless member of the family."
"Selfless" Emmett scoffed."Don't you mean selfish."
"I am not selfish. I have protected this family for almost a century and this is how you all thank me?" Edward couldn't believe how his family reacted. He had only ever looked out for them. Even at times he didn't want to.
"If this is the result of your attempt to protect the family then I would rather you leave me out of anything you do in the future." Jasper said.
"It's not like you could have done any better. With all your bragging about being a soldier you would have thought we would have been able to defeat the army. If anything it's your fault we failed." Edward spat.
"If I was in charge we would have informed the Volturi of the situation right away." Jasper told him.
"And then we would still be in the same position." Edward said.
Simone growled."No we would have been following the law and it would have given us a leg to stand on. Now we are facing death because you and Carlisle couldn't get past your egos and ask for help."
"What are you trying to say?" Carlisle demanded.
"I'm not trying to say anything. I am speaking rather clearly. You and Edward fucked this family hard because you refused to tell anyone about the colossal mistake we made by leaving Victoria alive. We should have at least spoken to the Denali about this." Simone wasn't going to back down to Carlisle now. He and Edward had always pushed everyone else around and she had kept the peace for Emmett's sake. She wasn't going to hold back anymore though.
"The Denali would have run to the Volturi right away and we would still be in this position." Edward didn't understand why he and Carlisle were being blamed for the situation they were in.
"Which was the right thing to do! We should have told the Volturi everything. How are you not understanding that?" Jasper wanted to say he couldn't believe that Edward and Carlisle could be so stupid but every time they opened their mouths it just proved their lack of intelligence.
"There is nothing to understand. We didn't need the Volturi. If they didn't show up we would have handled the problem perfectly fine." Carlisle knew they would have had a tough time of beating the newborns and some of them would have probably died but he truly believed they would have won.
Emmett threw up his hands in exacerbation. "He's delusional."
"I am not delusional." Carlisle was not going to put up with this disrespect. "I am the coven leader and as such I make decisions based on what's best for the coven. Fighting Victoria and the newborns without help was the best for the coven."
"I hope they kill you first so I can see the look on your face when you face the consequences of doing what was best for the coven." Simone said.
"Simone!" Esme exclaimed not believing that one of her children would say such a hateful thing.
"When this is over you will no longer be welcome in this coven."Carlisle turned his attention to Emmett. "You can stay but your mate cannot."
"I'm not staying and even if Simone hadn't been kicked out I was going to leave anyway. You and Edward are a cancer that has infected all of us. I am happy this happened the way it has because I know that when the dust settles the both of you will get what you deserve." Emmett told him.
"Let's not be impulsive. We are all running high with emotions. None of us should be making any important decisions until we all have calmed down." Esme didn't want her family to fall apart but it seemed like that was what exactly was happening.
Alice looked at Jasper and after receiving a nod spoke. "Jasper and I are also going to leave the coven."
"Alice no! We can work this out. No one has to leave. Please don't do this." Esme pleaded.
"That's the thing Esme it is not any of us that did this. Carlisle and Edward did. The rest of us went along with it but no more." Alice told her.
"So all of you are cowards. Just trying to save your own necks by putting the blame on Carlisle and me. Well we won't go down by ourselves. I'm going to take every chance I get to tell the queens of your crimes." Edward threatened.
Simone laughed. "You believe the queens will listen to you? Did you forget all Sulpicia has to do is touch our hands and she will know the truth."
"It doesn't matter I will read her mind and influence her based on what she is thinking." Edward had already began planning it in his head. All he had to do is keep track of what Sulpicia found and use it to manipulate the situation to his advantage.
"You idiot you realize you just told us your plan right?" Emmett couldn't believe the idiot. "As soon as she sees it in our memories she will know all about it."
"It doesn't matter." Edward didn't want to admit out loud that he hadn't thought of that.
"That's not the only flaw your plan has. Or did you forget what you told me about not being able to read their minds last time we were here?" Alice asked.
"Wait, who's mind couldn't you read?" This was a new development Jasper hadn't been told about and from the look of surprise on everyone else's faces they hadn't either.
"It was a fluke. I was to focused on Jessica to use my gift properly." Edward said.
"That's not true. You said when you tried to read the minds of anyone in the castle you weren't able to." Alice wasn't going to let Edward lie.
"The entire castle?" Edward looking away was all the answer Simone needed.
"Yes, and I wasn't able to have a vision of anything that was going to happened or did happen in the throne room." Alice told them. "I didn't even know they made the decision to go to Forks."
"How is that possible? Has it always been this way?" Carlisle wondered why he wasn't told of this discovery.
Alice shook her head. "No the times before we met the queens it was fine it was only recently when we came to rescue Edward that we noticed a difference."
"What about on the battlefield and since we have been here?" Jasper asked.
"I wasn't able to read anyone's mind on the battlefield and have only been able to read the guards closest to our room's thoughts since we have been here." Edward admitted grudgingly.
"I think the princess is a shield and the fact that they know about Edward's gift is the reason the queen personally came to Forks." Alice had come to this conclusion when they were on the plane and she couldn't have a vision of what was going to happen. She knew the queen and the familiar guards didn't have gifts that would be able to do it so it had to be the princess.
"You believe that Rosalie's mate has a powerful enough gift that she can mentally shield the entire castle?" If this was true Carlisle was now rethinking his objections to having Rosalie mated to the blood drinker. A vampire with a gift like that could be very valuable to his coven. He would just have to figure out a way to get her away from the Volturi. He didn't think the princess and the queens had a familiar bond so if he could get Rosalie back with the family then he could not only steal from the Volturi but he could reeducated the princess and have her drink animal blood.
"I'm almost positive. No one else we have interacted with has that kind of gift and she was the only unfamiliar vampire we have come across." Alice said.
"Who cares if she has a gift. We need to figure out a way to get around it." Edward's plan wouldn't work if he couldn't read the queen's minds.
"And how are you going to get around a gift that powerful?" Emmett was excited to hear yet another one of Edward's idiotic plans.
"Instead of manipulating the queens we will have to take the princess out first. After that we can easily attack the rest of the guards. Jane wasn't with them and she wasn't in the throne room last time so it is almost guaranteed that she won't be in the throne room this time. That gives us the advantage." Edward told them.
"Now you plan to overthrow the Volturi?"Simone knew she and Emmett needed to get a chance to talk to either the queens or Rosalie without the others. Maybe Jasper and Alice could come as well because it was obvious that they weren't going to go along with Edward anymore.
"It's time for a new era. The Volturi have become obsolete. Their ways are barbaric and we need someone new to lead us." Edward said.
"Let me guess you are the perfect vampire for the job." Jasper had the same thought as Simone. He and Alice needed to separate themselves from Carlisle and Edward. He didn't want himself or his mate caught in the crossfire of their stupidity.
"I think I would do an exceptional job." Edward was already planning the many changes he would make if he were king.
Before anyone could berate Edward for being so stupid a guard entered the room. "The queens have requested Alice Cullen and Jasper Hale's presence in the throne room."
"Why are you only taking them?" Carlisle asked. He knew if they separated them then there was no way for them to be able defend themselves.
"The queens did not say why. Now come with me." The guard held the door open for Jasper and Alice to leave.
"It will be fine guys." Alice called over her shoulder.
"I hope she is right." Simone murmured as they watched the couple leave.
"Nothing to do now but wait." Emmett said as he pulled her into his side. He hoped that if the queens were taking Alice and Jasper together that meant that each mated pair would get a chance to talk to the queens alone. He didn't want to go in there with Edward and Carlisle because he knew they would more than likely try something that would lead to everyone's immediate death. Sighing he kissed Simone softly hoping that when the day was over he would get a chance to have many more kisses with her.
