A/N: Sorry this chapter took so long. I had the whole thing written when I realized I'd left a huge gaping plot hole like I was SMeyer herself and had to completely rewrite it.

Thanks for reading:)

Advance Warnings

Jasper had barely gotten the words out when he saw Peter stop in his tracks and go completely still. As he felt the shift in his emotions, he steeled himself for whatever bad news was coming.

"Can I–"

Edward gently shushed Bella as he realized why Peter and Charlotte had stopped and tried to listen to Peter's thoughts. Edward had never been around him when his gift kicked to life, and it was strangely fascinating. He'd always just assumed it would be similar to the way Alice's gift worked but it wasn't. It wasn't like anything he'd encountered before. Peter didn't see an image or a vision the way Alice did, there was no voice to hear in his mind. It was like his entire mind completely shut down momentarily, then rebuilt itself to incorporate the new knowledge.

"How did he fight through that in the south?" Edward whispered to Jasper.

Jasper only briefly took his eyes off Peter. "A lot of practice and having someone watching his back."

Peter and Charlotte were far enough away that Bella couldn't see them. All she saw was that the whole group of vamps and wolves were looking between Jasper and the trees, all of them with serious expressions. "What's happening?" she asked Edward, trying to push aside her irritation at being the sole human who was obviously missing something.

Edward didn't answer right away, he just held up a finger to ask her to wait a moment, making Bella sigh in frustration.

Alice looked at her, pushing aside her own frustration. "We don't know any more than you do at the moment, so please, just try and be patient."

Suitably chastised, Bella nodded. She was so used to her status as a human being the reason everyone else was always a few steps ahead of her that her reaction had been automatic.

Edward sucked in a sharp breath at the same moment Peter turned to look at Jasper with troubled eyes, both of them filled with more dread than Jasper was comfortable with. Peter leaned down to whisper in Charlotte's ear, too quiet for even the vamps to hear, and then the two of them started walking back.

Leah knew bad news was coming and for some reason felt too vulnerable sitting on the ground, so she got to her feet and stood beside her imprint, holding onto his hand tightly. Everyone else seemed to feel the same and stood up also.

Peter and Charlotte walked directly to Jasper, and Peter never took his eyes off him to look at anyone else. "We've got a problem."

Jasper, despite his worry, smiled at his oldest friend. "Yeah, I already picked up on that."

Peter's eyes briefly darted to Edward and Bella. "The Volturi are going to be in Seattle," he said quietly, and Jasper flinched a little at the shock and fear that burst to life all around him.

"The Volturi are in Seattle?" Rosalie asked incredulously after a moment of heavy silence.

"What?" Bella exclaimed, her heart taking off at a mad gallop, making Edward lock all of his muscles and grit his teeth. He'd come a long way when it came to ignoring the fact that Bella was his singer, but occasionally his thirst was triggered and he had to fight to hold on to his control.

Jasper didn't even attempt to be subtle, he didn't have the time or patience. He just pushed enough calm at the girl to lessen her panic and lower her heart rate, and then dialed back Edward's thirst a bit. Not only did Jasper not want to deal with the bleed-off from his thirst, but he needed Edward to be focused on their current predicament, not his singer's blood. He was a telepath who'd been in the Volturi's throne room less than a month ago and Jasper needed his head to be clear if he was going to be a useful contributor to the conversation.

Bella glared at Jasper when she felt the artificial sense of calm. "Don't–"

Jasper cut her off before she could say any more. "You can bitch at me later about using my gift on you, but right now, I don't have time to care that you're pissed. I need Edward to focus, not be fixated on the throbbing vein in your neck. I didn't do it for you, I did it for us," he said, gesturing to himself and her mate. Edward closed his eyes in shame but Jasper wasn't having any of that. "Quit it, she's your singer. It doesn't mean you're weak just because you get thirsty around her every now and again. The fact that she's even still alive is a testament to your control."

Emmett nodded and put his hand on Edward's shoulder. "He's right, kid. I didn't last more than a second with either of mine."

"Edward would never hurt me," Bella snapped, angry that they doubted him at all.

Rosalie huffed and rolled her eyes. "Look at his eyes, Bella. He may have excellent control over his instincts, but you're delusional if you think his thirst is never an issue."

Bella turned to look at Edward and saw that his eyes were pitch black. Then she registered Jasper's words - that he was doing it for himself as well as Edward - and she looked more closely at his eyes and saw they were darker than they'd been a few moments before. It had never occurred to her that Jasper might feel Edward's thirst, or any of the Cullens. She lowered her eyes as her cheeks flushed with embarrassment and shame that she'd made another misstep right after saying she would do better. Yet again, she'd thought only about herself. She'd gotten irritated and offended that Jasper had calmed her down and hadn't taken even a second to consider why he might be doing it. Her short temper and her tendency to only think about her own feelings just made her jump straight to snapping at him.

To make matters worse, she'd also disregarded the boy she loved. She was so used to brushing aside Edward's warnings about his thirst or his control, not wanting it to be an excuse for him to keep his distance from her, that she rarely considered that his thirst actually was an issue for him sometimes. She didn't want to acknowledge that being close to her might be genuinely uncomfortable for him sometimes.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly, her head turned in Edward's direction but too ashamed to actually look at him, then she lifted her eyes and looked at Jasper. "I'm sorry."

Jasper just shook his head. "It's fine. There's nothing wrong with having faith in him. But right now, and no offense because I'm not trying to be an asshole, your feelings aren't my top priority," he told her, trying not let his irritation show. Then he pushed all of that aside and turned back to Peter. "What do you know?"

"For starters, they aren't in Seattle yet," he said, correcting Rosalie and Bella.

"But they will be?" Carlisle asked.

Peter nodded. "I don't know who or why, but someone contacts them and tells them there are newborns running wild in Seattle. Aro will send Jane, Alec, and Felix to look into it," he explained slowly, still sorting through all of his new knowledge. "Before they start eliminating the newborns, they run across Riley and he tells them why Victoria created the army. They're going to make a deal with him. Five days to fulfill their mission or Victoria, Riley, and all the newborns will be killed."

And boy was the shock and anger a lot for the empath to deal with. Jasper focused only on his mate's warm hand in his and managed to shake it off. "So the Volturi are basically green-lighting our coven being destroyed?"

Peter nodded, but Jasper felt his slight hesitation. "If the army succeeds, they get what they want without getting their hands dirty and without the rest of our world questioning why they took out a peaceful coven."

"It will be a direct order from Aro?" Alice asked sharply. "I've been watching his decisions and haven't seen anything."

Peter just shrugged. "My best guess is that you won't see anything until he's notified of the problem," he answered, then hesitated a moment. "But keep in mind that he read you and Edward so he knows exactly how your gift works. He may find a way to work around it."

Alice glared at the ground in front of her so she didn't glare at Edward. If he hadn't tried to end himself in the most dramatic way possible, Aro wouldn't even know about her gift or about Bella and none of this would be happening to her family.

"If Aro wanted our coven destroyed, why did he let Edward, Alice, and Bella go?" Carlisle asked. "He had direct evidence that we broke the law. He could have summoned the rest of us for a trial and declared us all guilty."

Edward shook his head. "I heard his thoughts and he was too intrigued with our gifts to order us to be killed. He hopes that we'll choose to join him one day."

Jasper tried to swallow back his rage at the reminder but wasn't entirely successful and he glared at the telepath with hard eyes. "You couldn't just walk into a fire like every other vampire who wants to leave this earth? You had to walk into that castle instead and put Alice on Aro's radar?"

"We have bonfires pretty often," Paul muttered under his breath. "I'm sure the council would make an exception and let him cross the treaty line."

Leah bit back a smile, knowing it wasn't the time for humor.

"Maybe Aro will tell them to spare Edward and Alice but destroy the rest of us," Rosalie said. "If they're the only two left standing Aro would have a better chance of convincing them to join the guard."

Peter shook his head and Jasper knew whatever he was about to say was the reason for his caution. "I don't know that Aro's going to be the one behind this," he answered slowly. "He will send them to Seattle and he does ask them to stop in Forks to check on Bella's status, but I'm not so sure he'll be the one giving the army time to do what they were created for."

Carlisle closed his eyes and sighed. "Caius."

"That's my guess, yes," Peter nodded.

"And it will only be Jane, Alec, and Felix?" Jasper asked him.

Peter smiled, knowing what he was thinking. "I'm not sure he'd be able to do anything even if he did come here. I don't think he'd go against a direct order from any of the kings, even if he questioned whether it was just or not."

"Who is 'he'?" Esme asked after neither of the men explained further.

Edward's head snapped up when he heard the resulting thoughts in their minds. "How did you keep me from ever seeing that?" he asked Jasper. "Why did you keep me from seeing that?"

"You don't have a right to my thoughts just because you want them," Jasper snapped.

Charlotte looked at Esme and answered. "Demetri."

"You know Demetri?" Carlisle asked in surprise.

Jasper nodded. "We met him decades ago. Before I met Alice," he explained, but offered nothing more than that.

"You're friends with the Volturi?" Bella asked incredulously. Every single thing about her experience in Volterra had scared her to death, so the idea that any of the Cullens were friendly with them was shocking.

"Friends? No," Jasper shook his head, very nearly at the end of his patience. "We haven't seen or spoken to him since. But don't assume that all the guards are the same or that your experience in Volterra is the norm. You were there under extreme circumstances. As soon as Edward let Aro read him, he knew our entire family had broken one of the highest laws in our world. You're lucky you even walked out of that castle at all, never mind walking out with a heartbeat."

Bella was silent for a moment, because she'd never thought about it in quite those terms. "Then why did they let me go while I was still human?" she asked, both curious and confused.

It was Edward who answered. "There were multiple reasons. The first is what I already said. Aro wants Alice and I to join the guard, and he knew killing you or demanding you be changed right then would make it so we'd never even consider it. Being lenient, showing us mercy, means the possibility is still there, even if it's unlikely. Along those same lines, he was also intrigued by the fact that you can block mental gifts while still human and how that might manifest as a gift once you're changed. So again, showing mercy and leniency means he didn't alienate you," he explained. "The other reason is that he genuinely feels affection for Carlisle. It makes Aro uneasy that his coven is so large, and that he's amassed multiple gifts, but he also didn't like the idea of killing Carlisle and wiping out his coven."

"Is there any way we can use that to our advantage?" Leah asked Carlisle. "If the other guy is going to be acting on his own, would Aro intervene on your behalf if you called and told him what was happening?"

Carlisle hesitated and looked at Peter before answering to see if he already knew, but he just shrugged and shook his head. Carlisle sighed in resignation as he answered Leah. "I'm not sure, but to be completely honest, I think it's probably unlikely. The kings may disagree about things between themselves behind the scenes, but they typically present a united front in their public dealings. As the rulers of our world, they can't afford any perceived weaknesses."

Leah just nodded, her mind racing as she tried to think of ways they could protect all the people they loved. Having found her imprint, she wasn't prepared to lose him without putting up a hell of a fight.

"You all keep talking about this Aro guy wanting Edward's gift and Alice's, but why not Jasper's?" Jared asked. "Does he not know about it?"

Alice snorted a laugh. "Jasper scares Aro. He knows enough about him to know that he'd never join the guard and have to blindly obey anyone else's orders ever again. But more than that, he knows Jasper could wreak havoc with his gift."

"If he joined the Volturi by choice and was loyal to them without Chelsea's influence, his gift could give the guard a huge advantage," Edward added with a smile, remembering Aro's thoughts about the empath. "But he also knows Jasper would never join them of his own free will, and with Jasper's gift being what it is, Aro was extremely doubtful that Chelsea could act without him knowing exactly what was happening. After reading Alice, Aro knew he could probably coerce Jasper to join them by threatening one of us, but he doesn't particularly want a pissed off empath on his hands who has a grudge against the kings."

Alice nodded and laughed again. "When he read me, I may have made a point of silently stressing exactly what lengths Jasper would go to in order to eliminate a threat against the people he loves. Aro being a king would make no difference to Jasper. His loyalty would always be to Peter and Charlotte, and to Carlisle and the rest of our coven."

Jasper looked at both of them in surprise because he hadn't known any of that. He didn't know who Chelsea was or what her gift was, but they were absolutely right that he would plot for a century if necessary to eliminate a threat against anyone in either of his families. Fortunately, Alice and Edward hadn't known about Leah when they were in Volterra, so Aro was still unaware of his connection to her or her pack.

When Jasper felt Carlisle's pride and love, he rolled his eyes a little, but couldn't hide his smile. "You're a decent enough coven leader, so you don't need to worry about a pissed off empath walking amongst you," he teased.

Despite his worry, Carlisle laughed. "And I'm honored by that fact."

"What's Chelsea's gift?" Leah asked Edward curiously.

"She can manipulate the bonds between people. Both breaking them and creating false bonds," he answered. "Aro has made every attempt to keep that a secret, though, because from the little I caught in his mind, he mainly uses her as a tool to ensure the more reluctant guards remain loyal to him."

Jasper tipped his head a little as that triggered a vague memory for him. He didn't have time to think about it, nor did he want Edward hearing it, so he just pushed it to the back of his mind for the time being.

"How much time do we have?" Esme asked Peter, the idea of Chelsea manipulating her family making her extremely uncomfortable.

He didn't answer right away, instead looking at Jasper for a moment. When Edward huffed in irritation, Jasper's eyes snapped to him. "I don't know what you heard snooping around in his mind, but I'll just go ahead and remind you that we already know more now than we did ten minutes ago," he said sharply. He may have left the threat unsaid, but Edward heard it loud and clear. Jasper stared him down for another few seconds before turning back to Peter. "You don't know?" he asked, his tone considerably softer.

"No. A general idea, yes, but not a specific date. Aro hasn't even been informed about the newborns yet, so I figure we've got at least two weeks," Peter answered. "And that's just until the guards get here. From that point, we have an additional five days."

Rosalie had been surprisingly quiet up to that point. Like Leah, her mind had been going a million miles an hour. "Could it be Maria who calls the Volturi?" she asked Jasper. "We already know she's going to be looking for you, so maybe she passes through Seattle?"

"No," he answered immediately. "She would never put herself at risk like that. The Volturi might be turning a blind eye and allowing her and the other southern covens to fight their battles as long as they aren't conspicuous, but newborn armies are still against the law. Even if she did pass through Seattle, she'd be far more likely to kill any newborns she comes across than bring herself to Aro's attention."

"Maria's looking for you? Maria as in your old coven leader?" Bella asked, trying to push aside her alarm at that piece of news. She knew Jasper had been deliberately vague on the details of his life in the south when he told her about his history, but he'd said enough for her to know Maria wasn't a woman she ever wanted to meet face to face.

Jasper just nodded, not at all surprised that Edward hadn't shared that with her, but Alice glared at the telepath. "Didn't we just talk about this? What happened to the whole honest communication thing?" she asked him, completely exasperated by his inability to act like an actual adult and not a teenager.

Edward glared right back at her. "We've barely had any time to talk yet, I couldn't exactly squeeze every single thing in," he snapped.

"Bro," Emmett laughed. "That's a terrible argument. All that does is highlight just how much you've kept from her."

Jasper knew Emmett wasn't wrong, but he also figured Edward deserved a little bit of defending because he'd been honest about his intention to be more open with his mate. "To be fair, he has more to talk to her about than just what he hasn't told her, and some of that takes precedence over a vision Alice had that isn't an urgent issue."

Bella was grateful Jasper was sticking up for Edward, but she was also seriously skeptical about the second half of his sentence. "Your sire looking for you isn't an urgent issue?" she asked. "Isn't she… uh, you know, not great?"

Jasper, Peter, and Charlotte couldn't help laughing at that. "No, she's definitely 'not great' but Alice's vision is still a little ways in the future," Jasper answered her with a smile.

"How far in the future?" Bella asked, no less skeptical.

"At this point, probably a week," Alice answered. "And the vision wasn't of her actually finding Jasper, it was only her asking about our coven. So she's not going to be turning up on our doorstep immediately."

"I wonder if that nomad is the one who eventually calls the Volturi about the newborns in Seattle," Charlotte said. "You typically see threats to your family, so maybe you caught that vision for more reasons than just Maria."

"Could be," Alice agreed after thinking on it. "But I haven't seen anything else about him so I can't say for sure."

"So you think we have about three weeks before the army makes a move?" Jared asked, wanting to get back on track. He had things he needed to deal with before he got the pack together.

Peter nodded. "Roughly, yes."

"I need to speak to the council, but if you're still willing, I can bring the rest of the pack to the clearing in no man's land in a couple hours."

"Of course," Jasper nodded.

"If the elders have any questions, please let them know they can call me at any time," Carlisle added.

Leah waffled back and forth for a second, but before her Alpha could leave, she gave Jasper a quick kiss and let go of his hand. "Do you think the council would mind if I came with you?" she asked Jared, wanting to be there when her mom heard what was apparently coming.

He smiled at her and assured her they would be fine with that, then asked if Seth and Paul wanted to tag along also. Both agreed, knowing the elders would probably have questions for all of them. After saying goodbye and arranging to meet in two hours, the four wolves traipsed around the side of the house to phase in privacy

Mere minutes later, Jasper watched his mate and part of her pack run off in the direction of La Push, pushing aside that little bit of anxiety inside him when she was no longer in sight. Reminding himself there was no immediate threat, and that Leah could take care of herself even if there was, he turned to Peter, Charlotte, and the rest of his family. They needed to make some plans of their own before they went to meet the wolves.

"I think y'all should still go to Seattle and see what you can find," Jasper told Peter and Charlotte after Edward left to take Bella home and the rest of the vamps had settled in the living room. "If we're going off your knowledge, we aren't going to be able to eliminate every newborn before the Volturi gets wind of the situation. But if there's a chance we can stealthily take out some of them, we should take it. That would at least leave Victoria with a smaller army."

"How do we accomplish that without tipping Victoria off that we know what she's doing?" Emmett asked.

"Depending on the situation, Jasper can take care of that," Peter answered, his expression far more serious than it usually was. He didn't know what the Volturi would do if Victoria and her army didn't succeed in destroying the Cullens, but he highly doubted they'd just sit back and leave them in peace. Jasper wasn't the only one who'd go to any lengths to eliminate a threat against those he loved. He hadn't mentioned his idea earlier because he hadn't known how Leah would react to it and wanted to run it by Jasper first.

Rosalie rolled her eyes a little. "I thought we were trying to do this without giving ourselves away. Victoria knows Jasper's scent by now."

Jasper had a pretty good idea what Peter was thinking, so he nodded slowly as he thought it through. "If it's possible to get close enough to any of the places she's holding them while staying in the water, she won't be able to catch my scent."

While some of the other vamps were no less confused by that statement, Alice, Charlotte, and Carlisle all immediately saw where they were going. "You'd use your gift?" Carlisle clarified, just to be sure.

Jasper nodded. "In-fighting is pretty much a given, so it doesn't take much to rile them up. Add in some additional rage and determination and we can just let them thin their own ranks without us having to wade in and get our hands dirty."

"It's a technique we used against some of the other southern covens when we could get close enough without being detected," Peter added.

"So you wouldn't be going in and fighting them directly?" Esme asked.

"No," Jasper shook his head. "I don't think any of us should. Not only would it mean Victoria bolting if she finds out it's us, but we have no idea what the Volturi would do if she or Riley tells them we've been targeting her newborns."

Rosalie frowned a little at that. "But wouldn't that actually work in our favor?" she asked. "If Aro is sending them to deal with out of control newborns just outside our territory, wouldn't it be a good thing if he finds out we're dealing with it ourselves and not just letting them run wild? That would show him we're taking the exposure law seriously."

This time it was Carlisle's turn to shake his head. "If this had happened even a few months ago, prior to Edward showing up in Volterra, I would agree with you. With the newborns being this close to our territory, it would be our job to deal with the situation. Unfortunately, Edward put our whole coven in the Volturi's sights. Knowing Caius as I do, my guess is he'll jump at any excuse to lash out at us."

Rosalie had to grit her teeth to keep herself from going off on a tirade about the telepath's idiocy.

Alice scooted a little closer to Rose and put her head on her shoulder. She was right there with her sister, sharing her anger at Edward, but she knew they had more important things to deal with so she moved the conversation on. "So Peter and Charlotte go to Seattle, we get serious about training the wolves, and we go from there?"

Carlisle nodded and looked around the room to see if anyone had anything else they wanted to add.

Jasper sighed quietly before speaking up. "I think someone's going to need to talk to Bella at some point. It's no secret she occasionally makes… poor choices," he said, trying not to be too impolite. "And that's only made worse when she thinks it's up to her to come up with a solution to a problem."

"The girl is delusional," Rosalie scoffed. "How the hell does she think it's her job to solve this? It's not like she can fight Victoria or the newborns on her own. I get that she thinks she's little miss independent, but there's being independent and there's being stupid, and ninety percent of the time she chooses stupidity."

"Rosalie," Esme sighed. "I understand that you don't like her, but she's Edward's mate and a part of this family. Your point is partially valid, but could you please make it without attacking Bella's character?"

Rosalie rolled her eyes a little but nodded. She might not like Bella, but she liked disappointing Esme even less.

Jasper just smiled because he didn't disagree with Rose. "Delusional or not, someone needs to remind her that she's still human and this is very much a supernatural situation. All she's going to do by coming up with some weird plot is get herself hurt.

"Or get one of you hurt," Charlotte couldn't help pointing out.

Carlisle just nodded. Jasper might not be saying it out loud, but if he was bringing it up at all, he had felt something in Bella's emotions that gave him cause to be concerned. "I'll talk to Edward about it and we'll deal with it. Anything else?" he asked, again looking around the room.

"Alice, if we can convince the wolves to decide to stay on the sidelines," Esme started, immediately holding up her hand when just about everyone in the room started to protest. "Please let me finish. I'm not suggesting they should be sidelined, I'm simply trying to think of ways we can find more definitive answers," she explained and then looking at Alice. "If we can convince the wolves to temporarily decide to be uninvolved in this, would you be able to see around them?"

Alice took a moment to think it through. "I'm not sure, to be honest. I think they would have to genuinely mean it. If they 'decide' to leave it in our hands while also knowing they won't actually stick to that decision, I'll probably stay blind because the ultimate outcome would still be them working with us. It's worth a shot, though," she added. "It can't hurt to try."

"How about we discuss it with them tonight?" Carlisle suggested.

Everyone agreed it was worth a try, though most of them were thinking the same thing in that moment - it would be an uphill battle to get Jacob Black to agree to sit on the sidelines, no matter how temporary, because of his feelings for Bella. And Jasper, having felt the kid's emotions on multiple occasions, knew without a doubt that the impetuous teen was going to be a problem. He just wasn't sure if those problems were going to be between Edward and Bella or if he would do something that put the Cullens at risk.

When Jasper walked Peter and Charlotte outside as they prepared to leave for Seattle, Peter pulled him into a quick hug. "The former," he said quietly.

It took Jasper a second to understand what Peter was warning him about, but then he sighed in resignation and nodded. Mates were everything in their world, and for all the problems in Edward's relationship, and all the problems Edward created in the family, he'd be damned if he let Jacob Black come between Edward and his mate.