Hello there… It's been a minute since I published a new story – couldn't do it with a clear conscience when I already had too many unfinished projects, but now I've finally completed enough of them that I can start working through the backlog of new ideas that's been building up in my head. Without further ado, here's everything you need to know about the first one I'll be tackling.

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or Lost Girl; I'm just borrowing them and mashing them together for fun.

Timeline: starts with James attacking Bella in the ballet studio for Twilight and at the end of Lost Girl 1x13. Everything prior to those points happened mostly as in canon, afterward…all bets are off.

Pairings: Bella/Edward, Bo/Dyson, Kenzi/? (I do have someone in mind for her, but I'd rather keep it a surprise, and my mind may not be 100% made up as to who she'll ultimately end up with.) I might also add another pairing or two as the story progresses, but these are the main ones.

Warnings: I'll be mixing the book and movie versions of Twilight a bit, so purists beware. This story will also feature not one but two succubi as main characters, so…yeah. Things will start out in T-rated territory, though I don't know how long they'll stay there.

Please, God, if You're listening…if You would listen to someone like me…please, please let me not be too late…

It had been a long time since Edward Cullen had prayed for anything – not because he didn't believe, but because he seriously doubted any benevolent deity would be inclined to answer the prayers of an almost-certainly-soulless monster like him – but as he raced toward the ballet studio where Alice had surmised that James intended to stage whatever horrific end he had in store for Bella, he knew that if ever there was a situation dire enough to warrant resorting to the most desperate measures he could think of, however slim the chance of success might be, this was it.

Besides, he wasn't asking for anything for himself; all he wanted was to save Bella, an innocent girl who didn't deserve to die for the crime of being brave and compassionate enough to open her heart to a vampire, and accepting his invitation to spend some quality time with his family. Surely that should count for something.

Incredibly enough, it seemed that his prayers weren't in vain, as Bella was still alive when he reached the studio, though badly wounded. A brief battle ensued – brief because, while James' taunt that Edward had arrived alone because he was faster than the rest of his family but not stronger may have been true, he was definitely angrier, and that rage more than made up for whatever he lacked in brute strength. Acting on pure instinct, he pinned James against a wall and was well on his way to tearing the tracker's throat out…until Carlisle, who had finally arrived along with Alice, Emmett, and Jasper, stepped in to remind him that such violent impulses were not who he was.

Edward turned his head to stare at him, struggling to clear the red haze from his mind as his better self struggled furiously against the beast inside that demanded he rip James to shreds, make him suffer for daring to lay a hand on Bella, for hurting her…

A piercing shriek from her snapped him out of it completely, and he immediately handed James over to his brothers and rushed with Carlisle to where Alice was crouched on the floor beside Bella, trying to keep her still – a task that had suddenly become more difficult when Bella started convulsing, wrenching her broken leg into an even more torturous angle and hitting her head repeatedly on the hardwood floor.

"Carlisle, Edward, help me!"

Between the three of them, they were able to pin her down, but she still strained against their hold, complicating Carlisle's efforts to stanch the bleeding from her numerous cuts.

"What's happening to her?" Edward demanded, the pain of seeing her like this evident in his voice even as he fought to keep it steady.

Carlisle's gaze flicked toward the bitemark they had discovered on her arm in the process of subduing her. "She seems to be having an unusually strong reaction to the venom-"

"What can we do?!"

"You could bite her again," Alice suggested. "More venom in her system will accelerate the change-"

"No!" Edward growled.

"There may be another option," Carlisle offered, the fear he was fighting to contain making his voice uncharacteristically clipped, almost brusque. "You can try to suck the venom out, but either way, you need to decide now. In less than a minute, it will have spread too far, and the change will begin – if she doesn't go into cardiac arrest first…!"

Judging by the way Bella's heart was racing out of control, this seemed like a very valid concern – until she suddenly went still, her back arched, body taut as a bowstring, and her eyes, which had rolled back in her head, came back into focus…just in time for them to see her irises turn from the rich, warm brown of milk chocolate to a brilliant shade of blue.

Everyone froze – even Emmett and Jasper, who had finished James off and braved the mouthwatering aroma of freshly spilled blood to see what all the fuss was about. For a few breathless seconds that seemed to last forever, nothing moved except those blazing sapphire eyes, which roved aimlessly until at last they fastened on Edward's face.

"Edward." When she spoke, even her voice sounded different – still breathless, naturally, but not the weak, pitiful whimper one might have expected given her current state. Instead, it held a commanding, almost seductive note none of them had ever heard from her before. "I need you."

Mesmerized by this strange new quality in her voice and the blue fire in her eyes, he found himself leaning in, even as the rational part of his mind yelled at him that this was no time to get distracted, that kissing her was the last thing he should be thinking about right now…

Then she stretched up to meet him, and Carlisle broke out of his stunned stupor, taking hold of her shoulders and pushing her back down. "No, Bella, you need to lie still." Looking up at Edward, he said urgently, "You need to suck the venom out now. There's no other way."

Still numb with shock, Edward could only nod; clearly, letting Bella change into a vampire wasn't an option after all, not when she was already…something else, so he lifted her arm to his mouth, pressed his lips to the wound as gently as he could manage, and drank.

Her blood proved to be even more intoxicating than he'd imagined, washing through him like a tidal wave that obliterated any semblance of thought or reason and drowned out almost every emotion except the desire, the burning need, for more…

The only thing that was strong enough to compete with it was his love for Bella – he needed her as much as he needed blood, because while it was blood that sustained his life, such as it was, she was what gave it meaning – but he couldn't have both, so he kept his eyes locked on her face, clinging to the reminder of why he had to stop, the only thing that could give him the strength to do so.

At last, the bitter tang of venom faded, leaving only her pure, sweet blood, and as it did, her body relaxed, and her eyes slowly faded back to brown. She let out a long sigh of relief, smiled gratefully at Edward, then went limp as she finally passed out from exhaustion. Carlisle continued working on her wounds in silence, which was broken by Emmett a moment later.

"We all just saw that, right?" he asked in the hushed, uncertain tone of someone doubting their own senses. "It wasn't some kind of freaky hallucination?"

"No, we all definitely saw it," Jasper assured him, "and I felt it. It was like…like something woke up inside her. Something primal…and powerful." He turned to their other brother, who was still kneeling at Bella's side, staring down at her face – which appeared perfectly normal, perfectly human again now that she was unconscious – like he was in a trance, and placed a hand on his shoulder, giving him a little shake. "You really had no idea, Edward?" Having sensed that Edward was just as astonished as any of them when Bella's eyes turned blue, Jasper was pretty sure of the answer but needed to ask anyway.

"None," Edward murmured, still watching Bella as if he expected to find an explanation for this bizarre turn of events written on her forehead. "We talked a lot about her life before Forks, and I thought I knew everything there was to know about her, or nearly so, but she never said a word about…this…and I never suspected… In all the time I've known her, she never appeared to be anything other than a completely normal human girl!" He finally tore his gaze away from her and looked around at his family with an air of something close to desperation. "How could I have missed this?!"

"It's not your fault, Edward. It's the way nature designed them; their powers don't manifest until they reach physical maturity, which usually happens within weeks of their eighteenth birthday, and Bella's is still a few months away – except in rare cases like this, where a sufficiently traumatic occurrence triggers the manifestation early. Until then, they're indistinguishable from humans."

Having gotten all of Bella's many lacerations – at least those that posed a risk of significant blood loss – bandaged at last, Carlisle put down his medical bag and looked up, meeting his children's bewildered looks with reassuring calm. "We all interacted with her at some point, for varying lengths of time, but until James' attack awakened this side of her, there's no way any of us could have known that Bella is fae."

Hope you enjoyed this little prologue. I intend to update in the first half of each month – this actually wasn't supposed to be up until February, but it was so short I ended up finishing it early – so the first full-length chapter should be posted fairly early in March.