A/N: I'm posting two chapters today, so make sure you don't skip Chapter 45: Preparations. Also, fight scenes aren't exactly my strong suit so maybe don't expect anything amazing, lol.

Thanks for reading and an extra thank you to everyone who's taken the time to leave feedback. I love hearing what y'all think:)

The Battle

As planned, the wolves waited for a count of three before launching themselves into the clearing.

By the time Leah's eyes found her imprint among the chaos, he was already tossing the head of one newborn away from him and had grabbed the arms of a second. She bounded over and clamped her teeth around one of the newborn's legs, and as she pulled one way, Jasper pulled the other, and the dismembered body fell to the ground.

Jasper smiled at her and quickly ran his fingers through the fur on her back. He started to thank her, but cut himself off and his head snapped towards the forest ringing the clearing. "Charlotte!" he called as he caught a flash of red at the edge of the trees and felt Victoria's panic. Half a second later, just as they'd thought might happen, the woman took off running with Riley following behind her.

"On it," Charlotte assured him and sprinted after them, Edward and Paul hot on her heels.

"Sam, duck!" Rosalie shouted as she saw a newborn lunging for the giant black wolf.

Sam dropped to the ground without a hesitation and he felt the air move as the newborn flew straight over his head. He watched as Rosalie did some kind of vamp ninja mid-air flip, and by the time she tackled the newborn to the ground, she'd already wrenched his head off. Sam caught a movement at the corner of his eye and shot to his feet to catch the leg of another newborn who was running towards the blond bombshell.

"Here!" Rosalie called out to him, and he whipped his head to the side to throw the newborn straight into her arms. In the blink of an eye, the newborn's headless body dropped heavily to the ground. She looked up at Sam and nodded once before running off again.

Leah saw one of the newborns stop in her tracks and look around with wide, frightened eyes. She tipped her head and watched the girl for a second before letting out a low growl when she turned on her heel and started to run out of the clearing. Leah raced after her and tackled the girl with a lunge and a roll that would have made Jasper proud if he'd seen it. Leah clamped her jaw around one of her arms and snapped her head to the side so the arm separated from the girl's shoulder, and while the newborn was busy screaming, Leah grabbed her other arm and started dragging her back to the clearing.

The girl obviously had no fight training at all, because all she did was scream bloody murder and wriggle around to try to get free.

When the newborn pulled her leg back and tried to aim a clumsy foot at the wolf's side, she was immediately and violently grabbed from behind and yanked away, a terrifying snarl ringing in her ears. She let out another shrill scream when the arm the wolf had its teeth sunk into stayed in the wolf's jaws, separating from her shoulder with a second jarring screech.

Jasper was growling at the young girl who'd been about to land a kick on his mate's flank, but before he could dismember her, Peter shouted for him to stop.

"I'll take her," Alice said quickly as she ran over and pulled the newborn from Jasper's grasp, then she pushed him towards Peter. "You finish the last few."

Jasper looked at both her and Peter a little suspiciously, not sure what to make of their emotions, but he'd always trusted them before so he wasn't going to start doubting now. He just nodded and ran towards Peter.

Alice calmly asked the newborn to please stop shouting and pointed for her to sit at the edge of the trees. "Just stay right there. If you move, I'll kill you myself," she warned the girl. Her voice may have sounded calm to the newborn's ears but her eyes were on fire so the girl just nodded and shrank away from her.

While Alice stood guard at the newborn's side with Leah to ensure she didn't try to run, Rosalie got to work building a fire and quietly asked Sam to start gathering up the body parts strewn across the field for burning.

At that point, there were only two newborns still standing, and Jasper and Peter were dealing with them at the opposite end of the clearing.

Leah was simultaneously watching her imprint and watching everything she was seeing through Paul's eyes. Wanting to tell the vamps what was happening with Victoria, she asked Sam if he had any objections to her going human. Sam turned and surveyed the scene, and once he felt confident Leah was in minimal danger, he assured her it was fine. Leah then checked in with her Alpha, who was watching everything from La Push. He was a little more hesitant, but seeing the fight was nearly over and knowing Jasper would die before letting Leah get hurt, he also gave her the green light.

Leah sprinted into the trees to phase and pull on the clothes she'd stashed away, and as she made her way back towards Alice, she carefully picked up the two arms and one head she ran past. She carried them over to the fire Rosalie was stoking, frowning a little at how gross it would be to her to carry dismembered body parts if she was still a typical human.

Rosalie silently took them from her and fed them one at a time into the flames, and then looked Leah over from head to toe. "You alright?" she asked quietly.

"Perfectly fine," Leah assured her. "You?" she asked. Rosalie nodded and then quickly glanced at Sam. "You guys are a good team," Leah told her with a smile, having seen the way Rosalie and Sam worked together.

Rosalie did her best haughty hair flip. "I think you'll find anyone's a better fighter when they team up with me," she answered with her nose in the air but amusement sparkling in her eyes.

Leah laughed and gave the blond an impulsive and very quick hug, pulling back before Rosalie had time to be uncomfortable by the move. "Thank you for looking out for him," she said quietly.

"Don't thank me, I just didn't want to be on the wrong side of Jared if one of his wolves was hurt on our watch," Rosalie answered, rolling her eyes a little but not able to completely smother her smile. Almost immediately, though, her expression became more serious. "Victoria and Riley?"

"Ash," Leah nodded. "They're about to head back."

Smiling a little at the relief in Rosalie's eyes, Leah went to stand at Alice's side where she was guarding the newborn to ensure she didn't try to make a break for it. It wasn't likely, she was clumsy enough with all four limbs and now she was down two arms. "Try to run and it'll be your legs next," she whispered after eyeing the girl for a few moments, trying to make her voice as menacing as possible. Leah smiled a little when the girl's eyes went even wider and she tried to scoot away from her. She wasn't sure why Peter had stopped Jasper from killing the newborn, but Leah knew the man well enough by that point to know he wouldn't have done it without a good reason, so she just held her tongue for the time being and turned to look at her imprint.

Alice was smiling as she watched Jasper and Peter. "Any time now, boys," she called out.

"What are they doing?" Leah asked her as she gently nudged her arm, curiously tipping her head towards Jasper. He and Peter could've ended the fight in seconds, but they hadn't.

Alice just laughed lightly. "Having a little fun now that the danger has passed."

Leah shook her head at their antics but stood still as she watched the Whitlock men. She silently marveled that the two of them fought as if they shared a mind. When one moved one way, the other would move to ensure they were sufficiently covered, and they always kept their bodies between the newborns and the small crowd that was watching them from the sidelines. Every move was so fluid that it almost looked like they were dancing.

"Amazing, right?" Alice laughed, seeming to know what Leah was thinking. "I saw it through visions when they were both still in the south together and always found it fascinating that they could anticipate each other's moves and communicate without a word."

Leah just nodded, keeping her eyes on her imprint. While the two baby vamps were growling and snarling and practically foaming at the mouth, Jasper and Peter looked surprisingly calm.

Until one of the newborns managed to get his teeth in Peter's wrist with a desperate but well-timed lunge.

Jasper let out a fearsome growl that probably would have scared Leah if it came from anyone else. Almost too fast for even her eyes to keep up with, Jasper had the newborn in pieces at his feet.

Peter twisted the head off the last newborn and threw it at his brother's chest with a pout. "I had him."

Jasper caught it with a smile and tossed it to the side, then carefully took Peter's arm and pushed his sleeve up. When Peter hissed at the sting, Jasper put his hand on his shoulder and flooded him with love to distract him, then leaned down and gently licked the foreign venom out of the wound. He let a quiet purr rumble in his chest to soothe his brother further.

Leah watched the scene with a feeling of pride. Jasper often told her how lucky he was that fate had tied him to her, but Leah felt equally lucky. As she watched her imprint tenderly care for his oldest friend, she was grateful beyond belief that she was destined to spend eternity at the side of a man who loved so deeply. Imprinting on a vamp had been the surprise of a lifetime, but she hadn't regretted it for a single moment.

When Jasper was satisfied that Peter was no longer in pain, he let him go and the two of them reached down to pick up all the body parts that were strewn around their feet. "I forgot how messy this was," Jasper grumbled in irritation as venom dripped onto his sleeve.

Peter just smiled and looked up to catch Leah's eye. "Charlotte?" he asked.

"All in one piece and on her way back," Leah immediately reassured him. She was pretty impressed that he had enough confidence in his mate that he wasn't at all panicked and wasn't racing out of the clearing to go find her. He had absolute faith she could keep herself safe. As she thought about that, she realized Jasper hadn't been hovering at her side during the fight. A huge grin broke across her face that her imprint somehow had the same confidence in her.

After dumping his armful of vamp flesh into the fire, Jasper pulled Leah into his arms. He buried his face in her neck and took one, two, three deep breaths of her rain-storm scent and then lifted his head to kiss her. "Hi."

"Hi," Leah laughed. "Did you have a good time?"

"It–" Jasper cut himself off and spun around to look at Alice, whose eyes were momentarily unfocused.

"They're coming," Alice said quickly as she snapped back to the present.

Leah's stomach dropped as she realized the three Volturi guards were on their way. Jasper turned back to her and gave her a quick and hard kiss. "You and Sam need to go," he told her before turning to Sam. "Please tell Paul to head back to La Push. I don't want the guards knowing y'all were here."

Leah stood frozen for a moment before reminding herself that Jasper had faith in her, so she needed to have faith in him. "Either come and find me or call me as soon as they're gone?" she whispered as she hugged him again.

"Of course," he answered, letting her feel his love for her.

Peter, meanwhile, walked over to the frightened and confused newborn and flung her over his shoulder, picking up her arms as he did. She immediately started kicking her legs and shouting. "Bree," he growled, shocking the girl into silence. Jasper felt her confusion at how the stranger knew her name. "I'm trying to save your life, so if you have any desire to live longer than the next seven minutes, pipe the fuck down."

The girl instantly went still. Jasper almost asked him what the hell was going on and why he was set on saving the life of a girl who'd been created to destroy his family, but he just kept his mouth shut. He didn't have time to worry about that at the moment. "How far away are Charlotte and Edward?" he asked Sam. When the wolf just looked at him with a little exasperation, Jasper laughed that he'd somehow expected Sam to be able to speak to him. "Sorry. Are they less than five minutes out?" he asked instead, and Sam nodded.

Jasper and Peter spoke at the same time. "Have Charlotte run with Paul."

The two Whitlocks looked at each other and smiled at how in sync their thoughts were, and Jasper gestured for Peter to continue. "I'll come with you and Leah. Ask them to please meet us at the baseball clearing."

"Wait," Alice cut in before they could leave. "Is Edward still close enough to hear Paul's thoughts?" she asked Sam. The wolf nodded after a few seconds. "Tell him to make sure the fire is completely out and bring some of Victoria and Riley's ashes here," she said quickly. "As much as he can carry."

Leah wasn't sure what all was going on, and she was highly uncomfortable at the idea of the newborn being so close to La Push, but she knew they needed to make a move so she just gave Jasper once last kiss and then ran a few steps before phasing back to a wolf.

Only a minute or two after Leah, Sam, and Peter disappeared from view, Edward came flying into the clearing carrying his balled up shirt. Alice quickly pointed to the fire and Rosalie watched the telepath dump a pile of ashes into the flames. "You don't want them to know we spilt up?" she asked Alice quietly.

"No," Alice answered, helping Edward shake out his shirt and urging him to pull it back on quickly. "Jasper wants to keep Peter and Charlotte's role in this hidden, and as much as I don't want to insult Edward's fighting skills, it's not believable that he killed Victoria and Riley on his own. There's enough here that the guards will catch the scent and assume the entire fight happened in the clearing," she explained. "And the girl stays a secret," she added, brushing the remnants of ash from the back of Edward's shirt.

Jasper looked at her sharply but she just shook her head. He sighed quietly and turned to Edward. "Are you okay?" he asked, seeing for himself that he was but still feeling the need to get some reassurance.

Edward nodded and whispered that no one on their side was injured as the four of them arranged themselves in a line facing the trees where Alice said the guards would be coming from. Jasper and Alice were standing in the center of their group, with Rosalie and Edward on either side and slightly behind them.

"Stay focused," Jasper told Edward under his breath as they waited. "We need to know as much as we can."

Less than a minute later, Jane, Alec, and Felix came gliding out of the trees and the four of them stayed silent as the guards came to a stop in front of them.

Jasper kept his eyes locked on Jane as she looked around the clearing, her eyes sweeping over the fire and looking at the few body parts that hadn't been burned yet. She tipped her head to the side and studied the four Cullens, but it was Alec who broke the silence. "It seems we missed an entertaining fight," he said with an amused smile.

When Jasper felt Edward's anger spike, he quickly sent him a wave of caution to keep him from speaking.

Jane's gaze swept over the group again before stopping on Alice. Jasper had to bite back a growl at the girl's emotions, but Alice just gave her a bright smile. "I wouldn't try it if I were you."

Jane's eyes immediately darted to Jasper, who just stared her down and fed her a tiny bit of fear. Not so much that she knew what he was doing, just enough for her to think the fear was her own.

"Where is Carlisle?" Felix asked. "He would let his coven fight without him?"

Jasper just held his gaze but said nothing. Fortunately Edward and Rosalie had enough faith in the empath and the seer that they followed their lead.

"Carlisle is at home with the rest of the family," Alice answered. "He had another matter to attend to."

Jane sneered at her. "And does that 'other matter' happen to be related to the human?"

Edward's eyes blazed but he kept quiet, knowing Jane was just trying to bait him into overreacting so she had an excuse to use her gift on him again.

Alice just shrugged, not offering any explanation. Jane narrowed her eyes, but before she could dole out her favorite punishment, Jasper's cold voice stopped her. "She already warned you that was a bad idea. If you push me you'll see why I have the reputation I do."

"Are you threatening her?" Alec growled.

Jasper calmly moved his eyes to the boy. "No. I'm simply warning her that there will be consequences if she tries to harm a member of my family without cause."

"Without cause?" Jane spat angrily. "You have a human living amongst you."

"Which the kings already know about," Jasper pointedly reminded her. "We've given Aro our word that she'll be changed once it's safe to do so. Do you really want to start accusing us of crimes when you're the one keeping secrets from him?"

"What do you–"

Jasper cut her off. "Aro sent you here to deal with the newborns in Seattle and check on Bella's status. What he didn't send you for was to keep the newborns alive long enough to give them time to fulfill their mission. Are you so sure that Aro won't be disappointed to find out you gave Victoria a green light to wipe out the coven of a man he considers a friend?"

Jane snapped her mouth shut and turned her head away to glare into the trees.

"How many were there?" Felix asked curiously as he studied the fire.

"Why ask questions you already know the answer to?" Alice asked, shaking her head at the behemoth. She debated offering any more information but decided that it would only help them if the guards knew there was a decrease in Victoria's numbers. Anything that kept them from questioning how the four Cullens destroyed the army themselves worked in their favor. It didn't hurt that she was implying her gift had caught more than they thought. Let them worry about what else she might have seen, or might see in the future. "The only thing that's changed since Jane tortured the whole story out of Riley is that there was some in-fighting and one of Victoria's newborns was destroyed."

Jasper felt Edward's irritation at whatever he was hearing, and he wondered how the three guards thought they'd keep a secret of the fact that they turned a blind eye to Victoria's army when they had a telepath in their midst. Not to mention an empath and a seer.

"Are we done here?" Alice asked, losing patience with the whole charade.

"We were sent to check on the human," Alec snapped.

"We aren't trying to conceal the fact that Bella hasn't been changed yet," Alice snapped back. "Before setting out on this particular course of action perhaps you should have checked in with Aro instead of pretending you needed five additional days to ensure you weren't missing anything in Seattle."

All three Volturi guards looked at her in surprise, and Alec and Felix started feeling incredibly uneasy.

"Carlisle spoke with Aro," Jasper told them with a smile. "He already knows when Bella will be changed and he accepted Carlisle's reasoning for why she can't be changed sooner."

Jane's anger finally got the better of her at the realization that she might have made a miscalculation, and she turned to Jasper with fiery eyes and a smile she no doubt thought looked menacing. As the first wave of pain washed over him, Jasper flinched and gritted his teeth but stayed on his feet. He'd lived through decades and decades of torture and it was going to take more than Jane's illusion of pain to bring him to his knees. Alice, Edward, and Rosalie all immediately pushed their own anger aside and reached out to put their hands on his shoulders, sending him every warm and calm emotion they could muster up to counteract the pain.

Jane growled in frustration that the empath hadn't dropped to the ground screaming, and turned her eyes to the tiny pixie instead. Alice's knees buckled for a fraction of a second but she barely had time to register the pain before Jasper's arm was wrapped around her waist to hold her up and the pain suddenly stopped. At the same moment, Jane collapsed with a quiet moan.

Alec, seeing his twin fall, summoned his gift and began sending the numbing fog towards the four Cullens, but before it had crept even a foot in front of him, Jasper growled and Alec dropped beside his sister.

"Try it and you're next," Jasper warned Felix when he took a step towards them.

Felix froze, glaring at him. "Whatever it is you're doing, stop. The kings won't tolerate an attack on us without repercussions."

When Alice squeezed Jasper's shoulder, he slowly started pulling back the emotional pain and mental agony he'd been flooding the Volturi twins with. "I'm happy to come back to Italy with you so Aro can read me himself," Alice offered Felix with a toothy smile. "Perhaps we should show him everything that happened here today?"

Jane clenched her jaw and got to her feet, pulling Alec up with her. The Cullens had just made a fatal error and she would make sure they paid for it.

Edward watched closely as Alice was pulled into a vision, and before it even ended he started chuckling. "Your trip home would be better spent trying to come up with a plausible excuse for what you've done here, rather than plotting your revenge," he told the smallest guard member. "Caius may have encouraged this misguided mission of yours, but Aro's going to have a lot of uncomfortable questions for all three of you."

Jane growled again in rage. "Change the girl before the kings lose patience with your flouting of the laws," she snapped, then turned on her heel and angrily stalk off the way she'd come. With a last glance at the four Cullens, Alec and Felix followed behind her. Jasper, Alice, Rosalie, and Edward remained still and silent until all three were out of hearing range.

Jasper turned and looked Alice over. "Are you alright?" he asked quietly.

"I barely felt a thing," she reassured him.

Rosalie yanked her twin into her arms and squeezed the daylights out of him. He'd been under the onslaught of Jane's gift far longer than Alice had. "Are you alright?"

"I am," Jasper laughed. "I'll be honest, I didn't think it would work at all, but it actually did."

During their training, after they knew there was a possibility that Jane would make an appearance, Jasper, Peter, Charlotte, and Alice had talked over how to handle it if she aimed her gift at any of them. They knew they couldn't afford for the encounter to turn into a physical fight - less because they were afraid of losing and more because they didn't want the kings to have any ammunition to use against them - and Jasper had made a calculated assumption that Jane would use it on him rather than the others if he was the one to rile her up. He was willing to allow it as long as she didn't turn it on anyone else.

They'd experimented with different ways to counteract the pain, but because no one could replicate Jane's gift exactly, the whole exercise had been a wild stab in the dark.

Peter had eventually suggested having Jasper allow him to inflict some physical pain while Charlotte and Alice kept their hands on the empath to try and distract him with positive emotions.

It went against nearly a century's worth of instincts for Peter to intentionally hurt his sire, so even though it had been his idea, it still took more than a few failed attempts. Feeling Peter's hesitation, Jasper had wrapped him up in a hug and sent him his reassurance and love. "It'll be fine," he whispered.

Peter held on for another two seconds, then he pulled back, gave Jasper a quick kiss on his forehead, and gripped his upper arm and wrenched it hard. Charlotte and Alice immediately darted forward and put their hands on Jasper's back. Watching the skin of Jasper's shoulder start to separate, both girls pulled up all their love for him and intentionally shoved it at him in a way they didn't typically do.

Jasper knew causing him pain was making Peter a little nauseous and he didn't want him to feel any worse than he already did, so he gritted his teeth and stayed quiet. After about thirty seconds, being swamped with the positive emotions made the pain marginally easier to ignore, so he nodded his head. "Alright, I'm good."

Peter immediately stopped pulling on his arm and gently guided Jasper to sit on the ground. He sat behind him and maneuvered him so Jasper's back was resting against his chest, and he held his dangling arm to his shoulder and patiently waited for the skin to start knitting back together, giving it the occasional swipe of his tongue to speed things along.

Jasper couldn't help laughing a little. It had been an awfully long time since Peter had taken care of him that way. It was a common occurrence during their days in the army for the two men to find a quiet place alone to help each other heal their wounds after a battle, but that obviously hadn't been necessary in many, many decades.

Jasper looked up when he felt the turmoil in Alice and Charlotte. "I'm fine," he immediately reassured them. "I don't know which one of you experimented with different emotions, but the addition of amusement was a good choice."

Alice had given him a small, sad smile. "That was me. I know that even though love is a warm emotion, it can still sometimes feel heavy to you. Amusement is always light. I thought it might help to counteract the pain."

"It did," Jasper assured her with a smile. "I can't honestly tell y'all the pain completely disappeared, but it definitely made it more manageable."

"Jane's gift is more powerful than losing an arm," Alice said worriedly. "Edward said it was similar to the pain of the change."

Jasper just waved off her concern. "I'll get through it. Even if this doesn't work, I'll still be fine. I can tolerate a little pain if it means she doesn't aim her gift at anyone else."

Carlisle and Esme hadn't been all that pleased when they learned Jasper purposely went through the pain of an almost entirely separated limb just for the sake of an experiment, and Esme had hugged him long and hard and asked him to please promise her that he would never do that again. Then she went to every member of the family and had them practice putting their hand on the empath to flood him with positive emotions. At that point they still weren't sure who would be where during the fight, and she wanted everyone to practice bolstering Jasper so they were all prepared to step in if they needed to.

As Jasper, Alice, Edward, and Rosalie methodically searched the clearing and surrounding forest to ensure they got every last piece of vampire flesh to burn, Edward walked over to Jasper and put his hand on his shoulder. "Are you really alright?" he asked quietly. He was the only one who knew how little their emotions had actually helped against Jane's gift, but he also knew Jasper didn't want anyone else to know.

Jasper just smiled and nodded. "It wasn't the worst thing ever."

Edward frowned at the reminder of how much pain his brother had lived through in his life that Jane's gift wasn't the worst thing he'd ever felt. It certainly was for Edward when he was on the receiving end of it in Volterra.

"Have you spoken to Bella?" Jasper asked as he tossed a severed finger into the fire, wanting to change the subject.

Edward nodded, wrinkling his nose a little at the smell. "I called her while I was running here."

"You wanna head out? We can finish up here," Jasper offered. He wanted to know what happened with Victoria and Riley, but he thought Edward getting back to his worried mate was probably more important.

Edward looked around for a moment before nodding. "I'll explain everything when you get back, but the fight didn't last long. Not only was Victoria thirsty, she was also furious Bella wasn't in the mountains with us. It made her sloppy," he shrugged.

Jasper just nodded and watched Edward as he ran towards home. His questions could wait.

When Jasper broke through the trees at the field where the Cullens played baseball, he was immediately tackled by a warm body. He laughed and wrapped his arms protectively around his mate as they went skidding through the underbrush, his hand cradling the back of Leah's head to keep it tucked against his shoulder.

When they came to a stop, Leah raised her head and gave him a bright smile. "Hi."

"Hi," Jasper whispered, lifting his head up to kiss her softly.

The two of them held onto each other for another minute before the emotions in the clearing made Jasper too curious to keep ignoring them. "What's all this about?" he asked as he helped her to her feet and brushed the leaves and dirt from her clothes.

Leah grinned again and put her finger to her lips, then guided him just to the edge of the trees and pointed at the center of the clearing.

Jasper took in the scene and it took him a little too long to realize why Leah was so happy that it was practically lighting her up from within. "No fucking way," he whispered, then turned back to her with an equally wide smile. Leah just nodded and bounced on her toes a few times to keep from squealing.

The two of them stood silent and still for a minute and watched Seth and Bree steal little glances at each other before looking away nervously. "Well I'll be damned," Jasper breathed.

Only an hour before, Leah had thought about how her imprinting on a vamp had been the surprise of a lifetime. But apparently a wolf imprinting on a vampire was the surprise of two lifetimes because Seth, the baby brother she loved more than just about anyone on this earth, had just found his imprint in the young girl from Victoria's army who Peter had saved from a final death.