Chapter 1:

Bella's POV

I was standing behind Edward and Seth, waiting for Victoria. I had to pretend to be a weak, clumsy human. It was stupid and I hated it but Nik sent me away because he refused to dagger me and didn't want Mikael to catch me so I had to go along with it, just to protect myself.

I am actually Isabelle Mikaelson, wife of Niklaus Mikaelson, the Original Hybrid. We were married roughly 1000 years ago. I missed him and my siblings-in-law.

Seth growled and I used my enhanced sense to smell whatever he was smelling. Victoria was coming, with another person, a person who smelled like cinnamon. I've only ever smelled that smell once before, in my bedroom, when one of the newborns, Riley Biers, broke into my room and stole one of my shirts. Seth seemed to ask Edward something in his mind and Edward nodded.

"Riley Biers," he whispered to Seth before turning to me. "Victoria's coming. Go hide," unfortunately, I have to play the part so, I run behind a tree.

*Timeskip*

The battle was over, Victoria was dead, and everyone was safe. Edward pulled me onto his back and he and Seth ran down the mountain slope. We arrived just in time to see Leah attack one last newborn and Jake get hurt trying to save her. Carlisle tells the Pack to go to Billy's house and that we would meet them there because apparently the Volturi was coming.

There was one newborn, Bree, who apparently surrendered so the Cullens were keeping her alive. I knew, and they probably did too, that she would not live past the visit. Though they hoped, they definitely knew this deep in their hearts and from the look on Rosalie's face, she didn't want this newborn to stay with them. Jasper seemed indifferent but everyone else seemed to, stupidly, care what would happen to the newborn.

The Volturi came after three minutes of waiting. The members were Jane, Alec, Demetri

And Felix. They didn't seem to recognize me. I wasn't too surprised, I had never interacted much with them, only the 'Kings'. The only reason those three were on the thrones was because my family and I helped them. The Romanians couldn't rule properly so we took them off the throne. Technically, my family ruled all vampires, including the Cold Ones. Part of what annoyed me so much with the Cullens was because they called themselves vampires. They sparkled in the sunlight, they could only kill the humans if they fed off them, and they had 'gifts'. They weren't true vampires, they were abominations that we kept alive because they helped balance out the population between humans and supernaturals. The 'Kings' knew this and they were the law enforcers, for the most part, on occasion, my family have been known to take things into our own hands, especially if it's an actual vampire who is causing the trouble.

"Ah, I see Isabella is still a human, Master Caius will be interested to hear this. You have promised to turn her. Remember, the Volturi doesn't give second chances," Jane says after they talk for a bit. I tune out the rest of their conversation though by the look on Esme's face, it has something to do with the newborn that was offered a second chance by the Cullens. I watch emotionlessly as the Volturi kills her. The last thing I heard from them before they left was: "Master Aro has been wanting to visit. Expect us soon," they turn and walk away.

"Wait!" I say. They turn back. "How soon is soon?" Demetri smirks.

"Whenever the Masters decide," He responds. "Good-bye for now, Cullens, Isabelle," he smirks widens and I smile slightly, knowing two things, one, he knows who I am and two, his saying my real name was so casual that everyone would take it as a mistake and not bother correcting him.

"Until next time, Demetri, Jane, Felix, Alec," Carlisle says, nodding his head respectfully. They turn and walk away. "Let us go check on our wolf friends, shall we?" Edward puts me on his back and they run to La Push, so that Carlisle can heal Jake. Hopefully Jake will be okay, he's become sort of a security blanket to me. He would be one of the only people I missed when I left.

*Timeskip*

A couple days after the battle, Edward and I decided to walk to the spot he called 'our meadow'. In reality, it was a meadow that few knew about. We were heading back when his phone rang. He answered it.

"Alice? What's wrong?" Edward asked. I hear unclear talking before Edward puts her on speaker. "Will you repeat that, and slower, so that Bella can hear?"

"Yeah. The Volturi are at our house, just like Jane said, but they brought some guests," her voice shook with fear. "They want to see Bella, want to know if she's changed or not and Aro won't accept Carlisle's hand. He wants to see her in person."

"Okay," Edward says. "We'll be right there. I'll put Bella on my back and get there as soon as I can. Tell them to wait for 5 ish minutes. Okay?"

"Okay," Alice confirms. I hear someone yelling before she hangs up.

"Quick, Love, get on my back," I hop onto his back, wishing I could just run myself but I cannot reveal who I am just yet. He starts running and my hair whips around my face. Roughly 5 minutes later, we're there and we hurry in. Edward bows his head and I do too, keeping up appearances.

"Lords, Ladies, this is Isabella, she prefers Bella though. Bella these are the Mikaelsons, the Lords, Finn, Elijah, Niklaus, Kol, and the Lady, Rebekah," Carlisle introduces. Kol snorts and I look at him questioning.

"Really? Bella? Vain much, Systir?" He sounded skeptical and I nodded my head in confirmation.

"Yes. My name is Bella. Hi. It's… ummm… it's nice to meet you," I say, acting shy and ignoring Kol calling me "sister" in Old Norse. 'They don't know.' I mouth at our vampire speed. He nods so quickly that if you hadn't been paying attention, you never would've seen it but he also seems disappointed. To try and make him happyish again, I silently add, again at our vampire speed: 'But I'd love to dramatically inform them.' He smirks and nods, quickly again, walking over to me.

"So… Bella… I hear you're supposed to be a Cold One by now," I tilt my head.

"You say that like you aren't," I observe, pretending to grow confidence, confidence that I've had this whole time, along with playing my part. His smirk grows.

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Actually, that would be nice. I am so very curious. Perhaps you are a… wolf, or just a human?" I chuckle slightly, my act slowly fading. The Cullens gasp and immediately start apologizing for me.

"Please don't kill her!" Edward exclaimed, rushing over to pull me into his side. I stay upright, instead of melting into it like he expected.

"She didn't mean to be disrespectful!" Esme adds.

"We apologize for our family member's disrespect!" Carlisle says. Nik chuckles cooly, raising his hand.

"A human is your family member? Very well, we will not kill Isabelle. Yet," I always love when he makes threats like that.

"It's not 'Isabelle', Lord Klaus. It's Isabella, preferably Bella!" I corrected him. He smirks and whispers something I do not catch into Elijah's ear. Elijah's smirk is so evil that all the Cullens and Volturi members flinch.

"Aren't you going to give your brother a hug?" He asks, teasingly. I roll my eyes but before I can say anything, Edward answers for me.

"Bella doesn't have any brothers, right, Love?" I hear a growl from Nik as Edward looks at me for confirmation. I want to say 'don't call me 'Love'' but I can't, not yet at least. Instead, I say:

"Not by blood. But I mean, Jake and the pack are sort of like my brothers. Other than that, nope," I smirk. Elijah, Kol and Finn look mad, and I start laughing. Everyone who doesn't, or yet to figure out, who I am looks downright confused. I let my accent flow the tiniest bit, so that only people who are looking for it can tell as I whisper: "Bloody hell, how long is it going to take?" The Cullens still look confused but the Volturi have a look of recognition on their faces now, luckily, they wisely choose not to say anything.

"Love? Why did you laugh?" Edward asks. Nik growls quietly, again, at the term of endearment. I smile, both at Nik's protectiveness and Edward's confusion.

"Because of something that I just remembered. When I was younger, I spent a year in Italy. I met the Volturi and they thought I was a noble because of who my friends were. I was just remembering my time there."

"Bella, Love, there are no more nobles in Italy, there hasn't been in over 100 years. They either moved away, or were murdered by the Mikaelsons," I laugh darkly blocking out Nik's third possessive growl.

"Oh, I know that, Edward. Who do you take me as? A fool?" I glance at Nik, who smiles, not smirks, back at me. "When I was in Italy, I was friends with a very… influential person. They were noble, yes, but I never said they were Italian nobility. In fact, they were British," He nods, no longer looking confused. "The Volturi saw me with them and concluded that I was of noble blood too," I smile at Marcus, and he looks scared. Never have I ever smiled kindly at them, unless I wanted something from them, and even that happened rarely. "They know better now. I haven't seen that person since I was… how old was I? It has to have been when I was 8," at the Cullens confusion, again, I expanded. "My mom was part of a witness protection when I was little. We moved to England one year after the accused escaped and I went to Elementary school there. One of my best friend's, Bekah, was descended from the Queen. When I was 7, she moved to Italy. We stayed in contact. I visited her when my mom was cleared from WITSEC. What I didn't know was Bekah's family had been turned into really well controlled vamps and she was going to turn into one when she was 16, not that she knew," almost all of that, except for a sentence or two, was a lie and luckily, Jasper couldn't tell. I had been sending him fake emotions the whole time, it was so easy to manipulate the emotions he felt from me. Right now, I was sending him fear and sadness. All Cold Ones powers were so incredibly easy to manipulate, that sometimes, I didn't even think I was manipulating them.

"Love, why didn't you say anything about that?" Edward asks. All of the Mikaelsons growl this time and Edward pulls me behind him, thinking that they are going to attack me, when it is actually the opposite. Eventually, they are going to attack him if he keeps using terms of endearment meant for me. I sigh and roll my eyes.

"I can protect myself, Edward," I told him. "You should be more focused on protecting your family," he looks at me, confusion evident on his face. Alice speaks up:

"We can take care of ourselves, Bella, you know this. What you need to be worried about is the fact that you are a human, in a room with a bunch of human-blood sucking vampires," I smirk at her as Nik finally speaks up.

"You have them all fooled, eh, Love?" His British accent is still strong after so many years, just like mine, except I hide mine most of the time. I smile at Edward's answering growl.

"Don't take it harshly, Cullen," Bekah sneers. "My dearest brother calls every female he meets 'Love'. It's just who he is. It isn't like he means it to anyone, except his wife. It's like how Major Whitlock here calls every female he meets 'Darlin'. It's just how they've grown up," she shrugs before smirking at the shocked looks on the Cullens' faces.

"Wife?!" Esme asks. "Congratulations Mr. Mikaelson. How long have you been married?" I step out from behind Edward's back.

"Oh! Let me guess! Ummm… maybe… 1000 years, 3 months, 4 days, 6 hours, 3 minutes and, roughly, 15 seconds?" He pretends to be shocked but it doesn't last long, and soon he's laughing along with his siblings and I at the Cullens' even more shocked faces.

"Been counting, have we?" He asks. I nod and smile.

"Hey Nik," I whisper, no longer hiding my British accent.