"Every choice you make — including the thoughts you think — has consequences. When you choose the behavior or thought, you choose the consequences."

Dr. Phil McGraw

Bella

Charlie called me. He asked me to come over. I told him I was busy, and he said he could wait; but it was about Nessie. I bit my lip and asked him when. He said, "Whenever you're free." I hung up.

Later, I drove to Charlie's house. Sue was there, but she was in the kitchen. She pursed her lips, eyes disturbed and saddened for no reason I could understand. Charlie took me to the living room.

He asked me if I felt he failed me. I was surprised. "Where is this coming from?" I asked him. Charlie didn't answer. He just told me to tell him the truth. He looked at me with those brown eyes, so like my daughter's, that for a moment, I imagined that for some reason it was her. I couldn't answer. I remembered Nessie hanging out more and more at Charlie's place, and I'd suspected she was confiding in Leah and Seth- and Charlie and Sue. I wasn't sure I was comfortable with my daughter keeping secrets from me, with them of all people. Was I not her mother? Charlie was only her grandfather and Sue, Seth and Leah weren't related at all.

And they were secrets that not even she shared with Jacob. I could see him, at times, looking at Nessie from a distance and pursing his lips, his brow furrowed. Why were they a distance apart? I was so used to seeing them close, him next to my daughter, his full and undivided attention solely on her. It was the same for all the other imprint couples I'd seen: Sam and Emily, Jared and Kim, Paul and Rachel- even Quil and two-year-old Claire whom he always seemed to be baby-sitting, whenever I glimpsed them, either in Nessie's memories, or at a distance. I'd remembered it also from my human life. And the imprintées always seemed to bask in the warmth and loving attentions of their gazes.

But not Renesmee and Jacob. Not anymore.

I didn't answer. Charlie sighed and took a swig from his beer. He said he felt like a failure ever since the day my mother gave him an ultimatum: to move from Forks and leave his parents, friends and job behind, and go with me and her to California, or stay and get divorced with her taking custody of me. He said, I should know what she said; I'd said those exact same words back in March when I ran away to Phoenix almost two years ago. I flinched. I'd forgotten about that incident; I'd put it firmly from my mind.

Charlie sighed and looked at me. He said, "Put yourself in my shoes, kid. You have a daughter of your own now. Imagine if she is you, and you are in my place. You get married early. Your wife is happy, and so are you. You guys have a baby. You have a great new job and it looks like you're gonna go way up. Every weekend you get with your friends and your family, and everyone is happy. But your parents are terminally ill and need your care. Your new job is demanding. Your infant daughter needs caring for. Your wife is strained. And there's little you can do about it. You start to realise that neither she nor you are prepared for marriage and parenthood. Yet, somehow, despite all odds, you hope you guys can pull though. Only you didn't. And your wife gives you an ultimatum: either leave your parents, your friends whom you've known since childhood, your means of earning a living, your home and basically your entire life- or she would take your daughter and leave you. Imagine if- against all odds, despite the fact you loved each other- Edward makes that demand and threatens to take Renesmee."

I flinched. Before I could argue that that would never happen, that Edward would sooner decapitate his head rather than leave me, Charlie goes on. "We loved each other. I loved her. She loved me, and I certainly had no reason to not believe a single word she said. Your mother was many things, but a liar she is not. We weren't prepared for this sort of life, the reality of marriage, of what it means to live together and raise a child before we jumped into the marriage bandwagon. A large part of this is my fault: I'm the one who proposed after all. I should have known. Should have realised. That despite the endearing quirks that made your mother the way she is; her sunny attitude, her creativity, her excitability- or maybe because of them, Renée truly wasn't ready. And I was a fool to think she'd be ready at nineteen, fresh out of high school, before even getting a college degree and some experience in the world. Neither of us knew how the world worked back then. It seemed like the perfect romance, the perfect adeventure, the perfect storybook ending, happily ever after. So we went for it... and we found out the truth."

I winced. I'd married at eighteen. I remembered my parents had married young, and that Renée always griped about it, early marriage having been a disaster for her that she would warn me against. But I wasn't anything like her, was I?

"I wasn't ready for Renée's youth." Charlie admitted. "Her love of life, her passion and excitability, which was what drew me to her in the first place, soon made clear that she was unsuited for domestic and family life, especially in a small town with a lot of rain. The very things which made me fall in love with her in the first place made it hard for us to be together. Neither of us thought of the long-term consequences of making life-changing decisions before we were even twenty-five."

I shivered. I couldn't help it. It was as if some weight had settled behind those words.

Charlie proceeded to recount to me what happened in his eyes, since I came to Forks in 2005: after years of emails and phone calls from his only daughter, after having only spent summer breaks together, first in Forks and then finally down in California because she couldn't stand the weather, his only daughter decides she wants to move in with him. He's thrilled, overjoyed he gets to see her, to be closer to her, even though he knew he could never make up for not being there the past seventeen years of her life. I winced. But it's clear that she's not happy to be there. That she's only grudgingly agreed to spend time and live with him because her mother wants to be with her new man. You try not to let it get to you. That she doesn't really want to be here. That the only reason she wants to be around you- her father- is because her mother wants time with her new husband. I flinched. Charlie says, don't deny it. He proceeded to continue:

He had always been fair in this town. Fair and insistent that everyone got a fair chance: that every suspect got the chance to prove himself to be innocent before being declared guilty. That was why, even though many of his friends had been suspicious of the Cullens that came, including Billy, Harry and Sue, Charlie insisted on giving them a fair chance. Heck, he was pissed when he found out that some of the Quileutes stopped going to the hospital when they heard that Carlisle would be there. It wasn't fair. And the foster kids were polite, good students and reasonably well-behaved. What did it matter if they seemed a little spoiled? Even if they got a few speeding tickets? I started at that. Charlie rolled his eyes. Surely, he said, I must have noticed Edward speeding every now and then? I didn't answer. We both knew.

But then his daughter brought one of those kids home. And Charlie is immediately suspicious. Before that, the Cullens seemed, if not great, then decent folks. But now it all seemed too good to be true. Up close and personal, this guy looked weird: his red hair that looked like Jimmy Neutron in that it defied gravity and shadows under his eyes that suggested this guy never slept, which made an unsettling combination with his white skin, so pale it glistened, and reminded Charlie of some rank skeletal creature from a horror film. That and his perfect features that seemed a little too chiselled, like it was carved by an artist who tried too hard to create a masterpiece, as opposed to someone you can be close to. His clothes also looked like he was ready to go golfing with somebody's dad, especially next to what I typically wore: button-up shirts or sweatshirts, jeans and sneakers. I spluttered. I'd never imagined that Edward could ever be described as anything less than perfect by anybody. Heck, even Tanya seemed to have taken an interest in him at one point.

But worse, Charlie said, was how creepy he seemed: the vibes he seemed to radiate. He was a good-looking kid, better looking than anyone else in town, he was loaded, and his sports cars seemed to prove it. He didn't seem to cause any trouble- except when he was caught speeding on the radar guns. And even then, he was easily able to pay it off. It seemed too good to be true.

But Charlie brushed his feelings aside. Never mind that the boy radiated no warmth like a block of ice, and not just because his skin felt like he'd been buried in an iceberg in the North Pole. He was polite after all. Too polite. But he must have been nervous, so Charlie cut him some slack. After all, he was a father, and one whose daughter just returned after a long time. He didn't want to seem like the tyrant enforcing the rules to her when she was only just settling in someplace new. Even if she brought home a boyfriend, then at least this shows that she's becoming more comfortable and adjusting to life in town. That she might even be happy here. My stomach squirmed inwardly in guilt. It was only natural that he would be alert and suspicious when she brings home a boy. But he always believed in giving everyone a fair chance.

Charlie shook his head, like he couldn't believe his foolishness.

Then, not long after one of their first dates, his daughter rushes home, screaming at Edward like she doesn't want to see him ever again. Charlie grows cold. His heart seizes in fear and he starts to think that, maybe his instincts were right: there was something wrong with this boy. And she seems angry. He's a cop, so he knows. She doesn't just seem angry: she seems frustrated- and more importantly, scared.

It hadn't escaped his notice. I squirmed in my seat, uncomfortable as he related to me the story- in his eyes- of how I refused his aid and said all the things my mother said to him after she gave him an ultimatum: either he could leave his family, friends, home, job and life behind- or his wife would leave him with their daughter. He knew I repeated those words deliberately just to hurt him. Charlie wasn't a bad cop. But he felt like a failure as a father. He had to relive one of the worst moments of his life, apart from the time his parents had died.

I wanted to shrink to the floor.

Then, he hears that I had life-threatening injuries. He pushes aside his own personal misery, his horror and panic- and finds me critically injured in an accident with no witnesses apart from the Cullens, including the boyfriend that wasn't supposed to be in Phoenix. The one who must have followed me there. Who also never left the hospital room and pretended to be asleep, even when my mother was there.

I wanted to disappear.

Afterwards, the daughter returns to Forks. She tells her father that she's going out to dinner, and her boyfriend's sister forces her into a frilly dress and her uninjured leg is in a high heel, even though Charlie knows that she's clumsy and the other leg is in a cast. I would have blushed if I was still human. The daughter tells her father that she's going out to dinner with her boyfriend, even though her father knows for a fact that it was Prom night for Forks High.

The daughter hated Prom. Hated it ever since Middle School, when she tripped, fell into the punch bowl, got soaked, ripped her dress, broke her heel and was laughed at before being herded out by the teachers. I wanted to fold inwards.

I remembered that no boy would ever ask Bella Swan to the prom. And no boy ever did… not even Edward Cullen.

Charlie asked me whether Edward actually asked me to go to the prom, or if he had his sister dress me in an outfit he knew I would have never been caught dead in, wearing a single high heel I would never have been able to manage, even if I hadn't been wearing a cast and had the other shoe. I didn't answer. He asked me whether Edward asked me outright if I wanted to go to him to the prom, or whether he tricked me, lied to me that we were just going out to dinner- because Charlie knew I was a bad liar and he would have picked that up- and drove me to Prom.

I demanded, what does that have to do with anything? Charlie rolled his eyes and said that if Edward wanted prove he was better than any boy in town by driving an Aston Martin to the prom in a designer tuxedo, then at least he should have asked me if I wanted to go to Prom first. For manners. He said that even long-term boyfriends in secure relationships actually ask their girlfriends if they wanted to go to Prom with them. Just in case, you know, said-girlfriend had other plans for the night. Or in my case, if the girl hates Prom. There's no point in opening the Aston Martin car door if the girl in question doesn't want to go.

I spluttered. I would have turned red if I could. If I had been human. As it was, I was still a bad liar, and Charlie could sense it. He was cleverer than I'd given him credit for.

When did I figure out that Edward was taking me to prom, of all places? He asked me whether Edward knew why I hated prom and what he did to console me when I was upset. I opened my mouth, only to close it. Edward had told me I was being completely ridiculous. And I had been crying. I looked down. I was, wasn't I?

Regardless if he thought I was having an overreaction, the decent thing to do would be to stop the car, pull over and try to console me, Charlie said, as if reading my thoughts. He told me he was sorry he didn't see it. Alice convinced him that I would like it and it would be a pleasant surprise, but was going to prom, wearing a tight, frilly dress, a single heel and a cast something I liked?

I didn't answer.

I told Charlie that I had been irrational. Ridiculous even. Charlie's eyes darkened. His words or mine? He asked, calmly. I stammered. It doesn't matter! I exclaimed. I was being childish! No seventeen-year-old, almost an adult by that stage, should cry while their boyfriend drove them to prom! Charlie's eyes widened, as did mine. My mouth snapped shut as I just realised what I had said.

Charlie asked me softly, "You were crying?"

I froze. It doesn't matter! I exclaimed, standing up. Charlie looked so ashamed, so guilt-ridden at his part in helping Alice and Edward get me to the prom. He said that it had been what they said I'd wanted. I froze.

But it wasn't what I'd wanted. It wasn't anything like what I'd wanted.

Alice and Edward… lied? To my dad? And for what reason?

This wasn't like keeping him in the dark about the supernatural. This was them lying outright for no reason other than to make Charlie do something that they thought would make me happy…

Only it didn't.

Well, they didn't know that. But the gaping hole in my stomach turned icy and black, opening wide as I remembered that Edward did find out that I hadn't wanted to go to prom… and he had kept on driving.

I was being childish, I said weakly. Charlie said it didn't matter. What mattered were my feelings, my opinions. My choice whether or not to go to prom. As a human being, as an individual, as a person, my choices, my feelings and opinions should have been respected. By everyone. Especially the ones that claimed to love me.

While I sat, stupefied by my father's words, Charlie waved this aside and continued talking.

He said that during September on my birthday, he spotted me returning home with an injury. A minor injury, but still… not something that had escaped his notice. He heard that the Cullens had thrown me a birthday party. And that only three days later, after Edward and them had proven that they accepted me as part of their family, that they loved me, Edward had dumped me. He assumed I had wandered off into the woods and gotten lost there, but that wasn't the case, was it? Whatever it was, I was still keeping secrets from him. He now suspected that three days after Edward went wild to show how much he loved me, he took me into the woods and dumped me there.

I didn't speak. I didn't know how to reassure my father otherwise.

And then, Charlie's daughter spent months, catatonic, except to throw the childish tantrum when her mother came to take her for some sun and space. I winced. I ignored all my friends- hell, even after the Cullens came back, they seemed less important than anyone whose surname wasn't Cullen. I wanted to shrink in my seat.

His daughter turned into a vegetable. And then she became a zombie. And afterwards, she seemed to be better. Then Charlie received the devastating, heart-wrenching news that his best friend, someone who was his brother in all but blood, had died. And immediately, as soon as he turns to go around for the funeral, his daughter runs away from home to go to another continent, leaving barely a note, much less a call, while Charlie was crying at his friend's funeral and trying to console his friend's wife and kids.

I swallowed. I was sure that my face was paler than the vampire norm.

I couldn't meet his eyes.

And then his daughter returns home. Never mind that she came with the ex-boyfriend in tow. Almost immediately, the daughter started giving her father ultimatums, like she had any leg left to stand on. Threatening to disown him, and cut him off, if he didn't accept Edward. Making demands and throwing temper tantrums. Like a spoiled child.

I acted like a spoiled child while my father was grieving. In mourning for a friend he'd considered his brother, and threatened to cut him off for a guy.

I couldn't so much as look at him. I focused on my hands instead.

Charlie asked me if I could imagine Renesmee doing to me and Edward what I did to him. I had a daughter now. Could I imagine her doing the same things to me that I did to Charlie?

I felt like he'd struck me.

I flinched.

I felt like I'd been stabbed in the gut.

Like I'd had the wind knocked out of me if I was a human. Like I'd been sucker-punched.

I wanted to argue that it was different. That he didn't understand. Charlie seemed to understand my thoughts in a way he'd never had before. Never seemed to, anyway.

"Frankly," he said, "I don't understand. But the truth is, I don't think I want to. I don't want to understand anything that made you think you could just slap me in the face like that, the way you did before you ran off to Phoenix, to ever think that it was okay, even if you are keeping secrets, rather than even making some crap-based excuse that you were having some sort of sleepover on short notice, or better yet, talk to me, you instead used what you knew to try and outright hurt me. Something you knew would hurt me worse than anything else you could've said- even an outright lie."

I flinched. But I didn't want to hurt him. I hadn't wanted to hurt him then. I didn't want to hurt him now.

But he didn't know that. And the realisation slapped me in the face that he never would.

I was starting to believe that I could never make him understand. That I never had in the first place. That I could never explain myself to him. That I would never get the chance.

Because, after all this time, despite the fact that he'd seemingly made peace with me and Edward… after all this time, it still hurt him.

It still haunted him. And he was bitter about it.

Because of me.

I hadn't thought about him. I hadn't thought of him at all.

I hadn't cared what he'd felt. Not when all he said happened, not when I'd spent months catatonic, not when I'd ran off to Italy to save Edward while Charlie was at his best friend's funeral, not when I had my 'tropical disease', not when I suddenly showed up looking like my husband and his family more than the daughter he knew, not when as it turned out I had a daughter that he never even knew about, and never prepared himself for. Not when he did his best to be the grandfather Renesmee deserved. To be a part of her life as well as mine.

And it hurt. It haunted me that I had hurt him. That I hadn't even known I'd hurt him.

Or that I hadn't cared.

Why? Because it just hadn't mattered- with so many things going on, it hadn't mattered at the time. Charlie's feelings took a back seat in regards to my daughter's life and Edward's, and our staying together. But that was then. What about now?

Nothing had changed. And not just with him. Renée still hadn't known I had a daughter. That she'd had a granddaughter. And she was my mother.

I pressed my fist into my mouth to stifle a sob. God, was this the kind of daughter I was? The kind of person I am?

And what about Mrs. Newton and Mr. Berty who gave me so many chances, even though I should have been fired or at least told I wouldn't graduate? What about Angela who'd always been there for me? Or Mike who never seemed to get a hint, but seemed nice, anyway. And Erik?

And Jessica… but Jessica had hated me, right? She hated me for no reason…

I flinched as, yet again, memories of a random biker, a rush of wind and adrenaline flowed through me and weighed down at my conscience. Jessica had been furious- angry because she was scared. Scared that I might have hurt myself, that these strangers would have hurt me.

That I would be killed, and that she would never see me again. And that something would have happened to her too.

I'd said sorry, but I didn't sound like I meant it. And I hadn't. I never did.

I cringed at the thought.

"You're a mother now," Charlie said softly. He sighed. "Imagine if Nessie did half the things you did."

I flinched at the reminder.

I imagined Nessie going to some random stranger, a biker she'd never met, and taking off without knowing if she would ever come back. If I would ever see her again. I knew she was inhumanly strong and fast, but I still froze, icy with fear at the thought of some stranger touching my daughter. Even going near her.

I imagined her jumping off the cliff for an adrenaline rush that would numb her pain. And even though I knew she was indestructible, I flinched.

I looked at Charlie. And at that moment, I realised:

He'd never accepted it deep down. He just pretended he did- for my sake and Nessie's.

It was a realisation that came too late.

But Charlie wasn't finished. Uncaring of my shock, my fear, my horror, he went on. Edward and I came to meet him and straight-up informed him that we were getting married. He wouldn't ask for his permission, making it damned well clear to Charlie that Edward didn't give a damn about Charlie's feelings, about being considered family to Charlie- I flinched- and outright said to Charlie's face that he didn't need Charlie's blessing, he just preferred to ask for it. To make things easier with me.

I suddenly looked up to Charlie's brown eyes and felt like I'd been struck by an icy hand. Right across my face. Charlie's eyes were filled with pain and sorrow. They were haunted. They were hurt. They looked years older than what Carlisle looked when he remembered the past.

What have I done?

What the hell did I do to my own father?

Charlie sighed. He told me that the reasons he hadn't cut me off and kicked me out of the house was because he was worried about what Edward might do if he made it seem like he didn't care for me anymore, even though I sure as hell made my damned choice clear in who mattered more to me, and because he and Renée had been no better. After all, Renée was nineteen when she and Charlie got married. And they sure as hell weren't prepared for the reality of it- of living together.

I protested I was prepared! Even Renée had said so.

Charlie shrugged and asked, "What does Renée know?" And he told me that she'd rung and said that Phil was filing for divorce. "She just doesn't know how to tell you. After all you've got a husband of your own now, and probably a family someday, though she still doesn't know about Renesmee." I flinched. "But she doesn't want to intrude in your life, especially now. When Phil found out that she'd forgotten to pay the water bill and she tried to defend herself by using you as an example, he was even more furious when she accidentally let slip that you'd always been the one paying the bills, and that you'd been paying the electricity bill since you were eight. He wanted nothing more to do with her, said she crossed a line and trampled all over it when treated her own family like they were her indentured servants, including her own daughter, while she was still a kid and needed a mom to raise her not to look after said-mother who should've been doing the job for her." His shoulders slumped. "She told me she's going to counselling and getting some therapy. She feels the same way I did, that we both failed as parents. Apparently, Phil's breaking point was a wake-up call to her. There was only so much that he could take. And she doesn't want to make you fly all the way down to Jacksonville to do the cooking, and the cleaning, and the laundry, and the groceries, and the bills, and everything else you had to do while you were a kid and a teenager." Charlie's eyes darkened, then his shoulders slumped. "Like I was any better." He mumbled. It would have been barely discernible to a human, but it was there.

To a vampire, it was as clear as day.

"But it seems like Phil didn't really know that Renée needed that much looking after when they first got married. And there isn't much money to be had at the moment." He admitted. "Not with the way today's economy are looking to go. And with the way your mother keeps picking up expensive hobbies, only to quit and fling them aside without any results, they can't go on like that forever. Not if he has to do the house chores, pay all the bills and bring home the bacon. Not if she acts like she doesn't takes things as seriously as he does. We were both wrong: she's never grown up Bella, even if she got older."

After that revelation I headed home. Early the next morning, Renesmee woke up early, and, still upset with us and tired of Edward reading her thoughts, opened her bedroom window to find someplace on her own. I was still reeling over my mother's impending divorce and Charlie's revelations on top of everything I'd just learned from the wizards that I let her go without getting upset.

Everybody was quiet in the main house. Jake was in shock. Apparently, while he'd been out with Quil and Embry, the witches had sought an audience with the tribal elders and the pack Alpha. Since Jacob wasn't there, they'd had to speak with Sam. It was a shock to them to discover the existence of witches and other vampire species, and even more so of them having civilisations with actual laws of their own, not like the comparatively barbaric and savage Volturi.

At around three, Esme picked up the phone and put it on speaker. It was the witch, Adsila Sizemore. We'd later learned it was unusual for them to use a phone, but she did it out of courtesy because we weren't used to magical means of communication, their owls didn't want to get near the house (apparently they used them to deliver letters) and we lived in a predominantly No-Maj town. She informed us to expect someone from the ICW who will speak to us and guide us through what's going to happen to Edward. She also told us to expect the Death Dealers with an arrest warrant for Edward and to plead with us not to do anything stupid, like run away, or put up resistance. She claimed that we would be taken to the Old-World Coven to follow Edward if we wished, but with the agent.

After she hung up, silence reigned throughout the house. Everyone was in shock. Carlisle's hands shook. Esme trembled and he hugged her. Nessie was in even more shock, she'd never actually thought that they would take her dad away. And I'd either lulled myself into a false sense of relief, thinking that they would deal with the Volturi first and forget about Edward, or maybe because I'd had such an info-dump that I'd thought that at least they would give us some time...

I was starting to realise just how stupid I was.

Carlisle looked at us and told us to get ready. Edward nodded.

Around sunset, they arrived. The MACUSA agents along with someone named Gabrielle Delacour. I drew in a sharp breath. Even after all this time around vampires like Edward and Rosalie and now Renesmee, this lady took my breath away.

Still haunted and numb from my dad's revelations, my mind immediately flew back to when I was a seventeen-year-old girl at prom, with Edward, Rosalie, Alice, Jasper and Emmett standing nearby. I remembered barely a year ago when I sat watching Rosalie glide past in her silver gown, her golden hair piled in a crown atop her head. As a vampire, I knew that while I might never be as beautiful as some vampires like Rosalie and Heidi of the Volturi, or even my own daughter, I could hold my own when compared with the others.

But now I wasn't so sure. Even Rosalie seemed to dim in comparison with Gabrielle Delacour's beauty and grace. She was so beautiful, she seemed to glow, even though there was no direct sunlight reflecting off of her- or any light that could reflect from the skin of the vampires. But she was no vampire. I could see that.

The lady, I later learned was also a hybrid, like the other witch Adsila Sizemore. Briefly, I wondered if part-human hybrids were common among magical people, who, if Adsila was to be believed, had only a single-gene-difference between them and regular humans. She had the powers of a witch because her father was a wizard, but her mother and maternal grandmother were Veela, a species related to nymphs, another species of the fey family, which Adsila Sizemore claimed as well. I was too stunned to even register that fairies and nymphs existed in this world, alongside witches, werewolves and vampires. At this rate, I knew just about anything could exist, from unicorns to UFOs, but at that point, I felt too much fear and dread to care. I knew they were here for Edward.

This Gabrielle seemed nice, though, in a genuine manner. She seemed professional, but she wasn't hampered by professionalism as much as Adsila Sizemore, and she seemed more concerned about our immediate feelings than anything, but she did tell us the truth.

She explained to me that she worked for the witch-version of the United Nations, the ICW. She was also an independent scholar, a healer and a scientist, as well as a diplomat. She told me she was here to negotiate with the Vampire High Council, which was the collection of representatives and leaders from the different vampire species, on behalf of Edward and the Volturi's impending trial.

Apparently, all the vampires and wizards had decided that the Volturi and Edward would be tried by vampires after all, giving the ancient treaty one last shot. The Volturi themselves were vampires, and they were the leaders of our species, but the argument was that they'd rendered their authority null and void after they themselves risked all-out war between every single vampire species and wizard-kind, and unnecessarily killed two magical individuals- one of whom was a child- when they hadn't needed to be silenced, already being a part of and fully aware of the existence of the supernatural beforehand. The vampires, she explained, didn't want to break any of the political, military and business alliances with wizard-kind (I'd pretended to understand what she was talking about), and risk an all-out war with them, so they decided to take matters of justice into their own hands and bring in the Volturi. And Edward.

Gabrielle informed us of what to expect, our rights and Edward's. To my shock and horror, I'd realised we'd forgotten to hide Renesmee when she looked down to her, but to my even-bigger surprise, she simply smiled sadly and gently, telling us to decide whether to bring Renesmee with us, or have her stay with someone in Forks. She did warn us however, that while we would be allowed to visit Edward, not only would be given separate accommodations from him, this was, after all, a criminal trial. Apparently witches do have TV, therefore there would be television crews present, as well as members of their kind and all the vampire species that everyone knew of, including all our acquaintances- the ones who had come to stand as witnesses and possibly allies against for us against the Volturi. While they could censor Renesmee's face on TV and ensure her name never makes it out, Gabrielle still thought that it would be quite traumatic for Nessie to have to watch. I had to agree.

Renesmee was dismayed. Her anguish and heartbreak tore at our hearts, but Carlisle stepped in. He said they didn't do this on a whim: no matter what the outcome, it would haunt her forever. It wasn't something he himself wished for anybody, and it would make Edward feel more at ease if his daughter didn't have to see this.

Reluctantly, Renesmee was forced to agree.

Gabrielle assured us that Edward's and our rights would be respected, that we would be allowed to visit him, that Edward had the right to remain silent and not be tortured, coerced, blackmailed or threatened. That he would be given a fair trial. And that Renesmee would be allowed to visit and spend time with him after the sentencing.

Gabrielle told us to wait: the Death Dealers would be coming soon. They had a warrant for Edward's arrest. He could either come quietly- or he could resist, in which case these highly trained and magically-powerful vampire soldiers would arrest all of us. I could see that some of us, Emmett and Rosalie, were willing to stand their ground, but by the set of Jasper's jaw and the look in his eye, we remembered just how easily the Volturi were taken down. We stood no chance.

The thought of that made me feel like the ground was swallowing me up hole.

We knew we stood little chance. We stood little chance when fog appeared out of nowhere and blanketed the entire area around our house.

And when figures emerged from the fog clad in black, we knew there would be no resistance. Because we had never been capable of that. Not when we had allies by our side, and even less on our own. Edward wouldn't have it anyway; we had a daughter to protect.

They arrested my husband. They took my Edward. My beautiful, beloved, wonderful, amazing and dazzling Edward.

My knight in shining armour. My guardian angel.

They charged him as a criminal.