"Sunrise in Winter", Twilight, R, het.
Title: Sunrise in Winter
Fandom: Twilight
Rating: R for violence, gore, and language. Click here for trigger warnings.
Length: About 10,000 words.
Characters/Pairings: Bella/Edward, Jacob/Angela, other canon characters.
Spoilers: Major spoilers through Eclipse, mild spoilers for Breaking Dawn.
Summary: "Being a vampire, it's like sunrise in winter. It's glorious in its own way, but the light's gone too fast, and it never comes back."
Notes: I posted this on the Dreamwidth fic community first. This is an alternate ending to the Twilight series that I started writing before Breaking Dawn was released. It's also the longest one-shot fanfic that I've finished and posted. Extended notes are after the story.
Sunrise in Winter
Bella
My final night of sleep was dreamless. I had some awareness - enough to know I wasn't dreaming, at least - and I can't say how great it was knowing that I was going to be free of the nightmares that had followed me for so long.
I woke up gradually that morning, savoring the last tendrils of sleep that lingered for at least an hour. It wasn't until Edward nuzzled my neck that I acknowledged being awake.
“Mmm.”
I could feel him moving away, so I shook my head and reached up my hand to cradle his head.
“Good morning, Bella,” he whispered. “Sorry to wake you, but I...”
“You what?” I asked, my voice foggy with sleep.
“I had to touch you. You've never looked more beautiful.”
I could feel the giddy smile reserved for Edward spread across my face.
“And here I thought you'd hate me,” I said through a small yawn.
“What?”
“I took your virtue, after all.”
Edward's chuckle tickled my cheek. “You can't take something freely given, Mrs. Cullen.”
My eyes opened, but Edward's room was in gloom, and the only thing I wanted to see was pressed behind me. I might as well have left my lids down for all the good it did me.
“No regrets?” I asked.
“I was going to ask you the same question.”
“You first.”
His hand was cold and unyielding against the skin of my arm, but his touch left fire in its wake. “Only if you don't.”
It was my turn to laugh. My left hand moved to the softness of Edward's hair...well, soft in comparison to the rest of him, but I'd be willing to bet it was as tough as he was.
“I hope that's a happy laugh,” he said.
“Has it never occurred to you that we might be too careful of each other?”
He shook his head, brushing his eyelashes against the bared skin on my neck. “No such thing.”
“I don't mean physically, and you know it.”
Edward's hand pressed gently on my neck, and I rolled to look at him. Only his eyes moved, which were currently as gold as my ring.
“We've had to be careful. I've had to be careful. You experienced what happened when I wasn't.”
I wrapped my free arm around his waist. “You were being careful. So careful that you didn't want to try.”
“And I'll regret it for the rest of my life.”
He didn't say Jacob's name, but it hung in the air, as weighted as my jewelry on my finger. I'd hoped that Jacob would have shown at the wedding, despite the fact that I hadn't invited him, but he and all the wolves had stayed away. The only ones from La Push who had come were Billy - probably at Charlie's insistence - and Emily. I hadn't dared approach either for recent news of Jake.
My hand rubbed at the small of his back, and my palm brushed a silk covering. I chuckled despite myself; it was easy to think that Edward would be modest even after we spent an eternity together.
“Edward,” I said, “you can be as rough as you want. Just as long as you're with me.”
He laid his lips on the tip of my nose, and in spite of myself, a chill ran through me. “Always.”
--
My muscles were painfully tensed when Edward sank his teeth into my neck, but the bite itself didn’t hurt. If anything, it felt gentler than all of his kisses and caresses had been this past day. The wound stung a little as his mouth moved over my skin, but the way he was drinking made me exhale and grab at his shirt. I couldn’t move away…I didn’t want to move away, but I needed to respond somehow.
Since he couldn’t talk, Edward ran his fingers through my hair instead. I didn't know how he could be so soft when he was so strong.
My eyes closed, and the world seemed to fade away. I let it. It wouldn't be gone for long.
Edward moved his mouth away and put his arms around me. “I'm not going to leave you. I swear.”
As if it had been waiting for his go-ahead, the burning frequented my nightmares started scorching in my neck and shoulders. And with it, my eyelids seemed to latch shut; no matter how I tried, I couldn't open my eyes at all.
Edward either didn't notice my lack of response, or he was ready for it. He laid a light kiss on the back of my hand, then lowered me onto something soft. I assumed it was the bed that Edward had had shipped to the cabin - the Cullens hadn't bothered furnishing the place before since it was so far north - but the venom left little room for other observation.
“Carlisle will be here soon,” Edward whispered. “Just hold on.”
There was little else I could do.
--
“How long has it been?”
An eternity. Any sense I had of time was long gone, robbed by the scorching that was ravaging my organs and tissues. It seemed concentrated on my lungs at the moment, and I knew the jagged gasps that escaped my mouth were some of the last breaths I was ever going to need.
I tried to come up with an estimate before Edward answered Carlisle. It was at least a day...maybe a half-day beyond that?
Edward's voice was so forlorn that I tried to move, even though I knew I couldn't. “I called you almost as soon as it started.”
”Three hours, then.”
“About.”
Three hours? And I'd thought my estimate was conservative.
“Everything looks normal,” Carlisle said. “Do you want me to wait around?”
“No, you should go back to Denali. I'll call you if anything changes...or after.”
Carlisle spoke low. “You don't have to be alone.”
“I'm not.”
--
My heart was next, and I couldn't understand it. I didn't want my heart to stop beating so early. I wanted something for Edward, who had been holding my hand since Carlisle had left. I wasn't breathing anymore, which had taken my last defense against the agony, and as my heart slowed, I tried to will it to speed, to tell Edward that I was still here.
But the venom kept its own council, and with one final jerk, the beating stopped.
The burning was all over now. That was probably why my heart had finished moving; there was nothing else to pump into my veins and arteries. And the venom seemed to have a mind of its own now that it was everywhere, crawling through my system with the slow and steady pace of the surest of monsters. Would I feel its touch for the rest of my existence?
Edward squeezed my hand harder. Maybe it was because he knew what was going on and was shooting for a comforting touch, but I couldn't help but think that he was holding me one last time, just in case.
--
The venom roared its way around my head. It was almost a literal roar, too; I could hear it rush through my ears so loudly it drowned out every other sound. So even if Edward had been trying to speak, I wouldn't have been able to hear it.
It was still nothing compared to what felt like the hollowing of my skull. No human brain could withstand the fire...how was I still alive, or whatever I was now?
With that, the burning surged, and all thoughts were scourged from my head.
--
Oh God ohGodohGodGOD
Edward
When I'd first bitten Bella, I had been glad that I couldn't hear her thoughts. I remembered the agony all too well, and I didn't need constant reminders that I had subjected the woman I loved above everything to the worst experience that anyone could endure. And then, I had felt selfish. She had to go through it, so I deserved to feel every second of her torment.
But that was at the beginning.
At the end of the second day, almost all of her organs were silent and had been most of the day. I could still tell that the change was working - her torso and head looked like stone, while the rest of her still looked as soft and vulnerable as the day I'd met her - but even though I knew, she was so still and quiet that she just as easily could have been...
Well, let's just say that my wish to hear her thoughts became completely genuine.
And yet, it was easy for me. I was used to passing long hours, and the months that I had been away from Bella had been longer than this. Any time I felt doubt, I could just kiss her cheek or clutch her hand, and I was renewed.
It was too easy.
--
The third day came and went without much regard. Bella looked...well, gorgeous, but that wasn't anything new. No, she looked like herself, but harder, stronger. I knew that her awakening would leave her ready to take any challenge on, even the bloodlust. And so, as the hours passed, my anxiety melted away and left excitement in its wake.
It wasn't until ten-thirty on the third night that Bella opened her eyes. The sun wasn't completely gone from the sky because we were almost as far north as we could get during the summer, so it never grew completely dark. There was enough light coming in through the window next to the bed that the red irises glowed.
“Bella,” I said. “How are you feeling?”
She stared at the ceiling without moving.
“Can you hear me, love?”
Her eyes moved to my face almost too fast for even me to see.
I stepped forward. “Why don't you try sitting up?”
Before I could manage to get close enough to touch, Bella curled her lip back and growled.
I eased back as a stab of fear hit me. Carlisle had told me that as soon as she could move, she should be speaking and cognizant of what was going on, and that tallied with the stories from everyone else. And my own memories, come to think of it.
“I know you're hungry,” I said. “We can go hunting whenever you'd like.”
Bella jumped out of bed, still growling. She moved backward, keeping her gaze on me, until she hit the wall behind her.
I rose slowly and walked back toward the only other fixture in the room besides the bed: a freezer. We'd collected bags of blood for months just in case of an emergency. Esme and I had decided that it was best positioned next to the only door; we'd be able to grab bags and go outside at the same time. But instead of leaving, I moved in front of the door and opened the top of the freezer.
“You'll feel better once you feed,” I told her, hoping it was true. “You can have as much as you'd like.”
I pulled out one bag. As delicately as I could manage, I tore off a corner.
Immediately, I could smell the blood inside. It smelled wonderful, especially to a vegetarian who was still a meat-eater at heart, but it also smelled a lot more stale than the average human. And even the average lion or bear.
But Bella didn't have the benefit of decades of hunting, and she was hungry. It would have been hard to resist under the best of circumstances, which these certainly weren't.
She rushed forward, arms extended. I could see her move, probably at much the same rate that a human could see another human running, so I had enough time to step out of her way. But I kept the bag extended, so she could grab and drink. I wasn't expecting that she would hit my arm at full speed and strength, taking the bag into her mouth without using her hands.
A crack, and I was on the ground.
“Bella!” I gasped. “Please!”
She didn't look at me; instead, she slurped the blood so quickly that the bag was dry within seconds. As soon as she was finished, she looked around the room, staring at everything from a knothole on the wall to a dust mote hanging in the air. As soon as she looked out the window, she went still.
There must have been something outside. That's the only reason I can think of that she would have crashed forward like she did. I don't know if she was too hungry to wait or if she'd forgotten how to use a door at all, but she went through the wall and disappeared outside.
I rose to my feet and grimaced as I felt the bones in my arm reform. Bella's full strength was enough to shatter them, and it was going to take a while to heal. But I couldn't wait to be perfectly healed.
And so, I dashed through the shattered wall and into the field outside, grabbing my cell phone with my free hand.
It was time to call in backup.
Jacob
I don't know where I was when the pack found me. I'd probably made it as far as Canada, but I'd stopped paying attention weeks ago, so I couldn't say what cities I was near or even how far I was from the US at all.
What I do know is that I was hunting at the time. I had a deer in my sights when I caught a whiff of the pack scent and stopped dead in my tracks.
Leave me alone! I called.
Wish I could.
Leah. Great, just what I needed. Look, I don't know what Sam--
It's about your stupid Bella.
Without further hesitation, she showed me what Sam had passed to her: the memory of a phone call from the head bloodsucker of the Cullen family. He said that Edward had called about a couple days ago, asking for help with Bella. By the time the family had arrived at the cabin where they'd been staying, both Edward and Bella were long gone. Edward wasn't picking up his phone, so they didn't know where they were, and their days of searching were turning up nothing.
And at the heart of it: Bella had been turned. Damn it.
Why the hell would they call Sam? I snarled. Why don't they ask that one leech who can tell the future?
Because the leech can't see them at all.
Which meant that at least one member of the pack was involved. Great. And why did Sam send you after me?
You weren't answering.
Think there might have been a reason for that?
Leah huffed. Look, I didn't think we should've come after you at all. I thought we should go up there and take them all out while they were vulnerable.
So why aren't you guys doing that?
Because...
She paused, but I could see exactly what Sam had said to her. He didn't want to get involved because it would involve leaving La Push undefended, but someone had to take care of Bella. And if anyone had the right to take her down, it was me.
He was also giving me the chance to say no, which is why Leah was there; she could go even if I didn't. But everyone in the pack knew better than that, Sam and Leah included. This was up to me.
Where are they? I asked.
Follow me.
--
It took three days to get to Alaska, which meant both that I had been further north and further east than I had expected. We'd seen practically nothing in the way of civilization until we neared the northern part of the state, at which point Leah consulted some road signs. We deliberately turned away from them after that. I'd expected nothing else. The Cullens wanted their newborn away from people.
When we got close, Leah turned to me. How do you want to handle this?
Handle?
I don't want to be flying free around a bunch of bloodsuckers, if you get me.
I did get her. I also didn't care about going naked, so in reply, I shifted back to human.
“You can go back,” I said. “This is my business.”
Leah growled.
“Fine. Stay here and rest. If I need your help, I'll call.”
She still seemed pissed, but I didn't give a rat's ass. I stepped out of the woods without looking at her.
The cabin was a good mile from the edge of the trees. It was a little sunny, so I could see a bunch of leeches glowing in the distance. It was the first time I'd witnessed it with my own eyes, so even though Bella had mentioned it before, I couldn't help but laugh. Whatever had made vampires had a sense of humor.
My noises were apparently enough to catch their attention because, seconds later, one of them was standing by me.
“Would you care to tell me what you find so funny, wolf?”
I frowned at her. “It's Jacob, leech.”
“And I prefer Esme, Jacob.”
This had to be the group's mom figure; the tone of her voice was polite, but she had that “cross me and I'll ground you” look that all moms seemed to know.
“Skip the nice talk. What's going on?”
“Come to the cabin.”
I shook my head. “You honestly think I'm that stupid?”
Esme's gold eyes flashed in the light. “We smelled you when you were still in the woods. I can hear your backup as we speak.”
Okay, I was pretty sure it wasn't an ambush; the Cullens knew we'd be missed if we disappeared. But that didn't mean I was stupid. “Send away some of the bl...others.”
“Fine.”
She turned and ran for the cabin as clouds darkened the sky. I watched as she approached the others, then as three of them dashed off in various directions. That meant the odds were still three-to-one against me, but I figured it was the best I was going to get.
I jogged over in my human form. Running would have saved me a couple of seconds, but I'd been a wolf for a long enough stretch that I wasn't entirely steady on my human feet. I was also still lacking clothes. Funny how that hadn't crossed my mind.
Obviously, it'd crossed Esme's mind because she held up a blanket as I approached. I paused next to her hand for a second, trying not to grimace at the vampire smell, but I wasn't going to escape the stench even if I didn't cover up.
As I took the blanket and tied it around my waist, I looked at the two others. Esme was holding the hand of one, so I didn't think “husband” was a bad guess. The third was the girl that Bella had called Alice...which meant this was the future-seeing vampire. Great.
“Jacob,” Alice said. Her voice was so cold that I thought icicles would show up in the air in front of her. “Figures.”
“I'm glad you came,” the man said, almost as if Alice hadn't spoken. “You know Bella almost as well as Edward.”
Better, I thought. “What happened?”
Esme gestured toward the cabin. “That's what I wanted to show you.”
She walked around to the other side, which I couldn't see from this angle. I eyed the other two leeches out of the corner of my eye, then followed her.
I looked over the place. The building itself wasn't very big; it looked like there was one room and nothing like a bathroom or kitchen. The walls were made out of stone and used wood as a border. Not my idea of a cabin, but whatever. I wasn't here on vacation.
That's when I saw the far side of the wall. Or, rather, what had been a wall before something had taken a huge chunk out of it. The front door was still in its frame off toward the left, but most of the right had been torn apart.
Geez. Bella hadn't stood a chance.
“Newborns are very strong,” the man said from behind me. It was so quiet that I almost missed it. “And they don't know their strength.”
My breath left my body in a gust. Bella had done this.
No. Not Bella. Whatever she had become...whatever she was now, it was not Bella. Not my Bella. And I had to remember that.
“What...” My voice quivered, and I coughed to cover it up. “What do you guys know?”
“Carlisle?” Esme said. “What did Edward tell you?”
The man - Carlisle - stepped into my peripheral vision, but a good few feet to the side. I wasn't sure if he'd done for his own safety or for what he thought was mine, but I have to say, I was glad he hadn't come closer.
“He said that she...didn't know him. That she wouldn't talk to him at all. And he didn't tell me anything exact, but he sounded like he was out-of-breath.”
It felt like my eyebrows decided to hide in my hair. “But...you guys don't breathe, do you?”
Carlisle shook his head. “We don't have to. My best guess is that he was reacting to an injury of some kind...we pretend we're breathing for the sake of humans, so he could have been around others and didn't want to give himself away. Or he could have forgotten.”
Bella had hurt Edward? Shit, shit, shit.
“There's more.”
I turned around. Alice was standing several feet behind me, her hands crossed in front of her.
“I didn't see this happen,” she said.
I shrugged. “So?”
“So...I was watching for it. Closely. I couldn't see either of them.”
“I thought the wolves...”
Esme put a hand on Alice's shoulder. “She can never see werewolves, and that's why she thinks she couldn't see us after today. But something was - and is -- blocking her from Bella and Edward.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because that's why we can't find Edward and Bella now,” Carlisle said as he walked closer to us. “We can smell a bunch of different paths that they could have taken, and none of them have turned up anything.”
I ran a hand through my hair. The vampires couldn't find their own, so it wasn't likely I'd have much more luck. And if Bella didn't know what was going on...man, the leeches around me were the least of my problems.
My train of thought was interrupted by Alice falling to her knees. Carlisle jumped to her side, and Esme knelt next to her just as quickly, but I backed away. The distant look she had on her face was freaky-looking.
“What is it?” Esme asked. “What can you see?”
“Edward. Edward running...he's holding his arm...”
I frowned. “Where? Do you see anything...”
Alice closed her eyes and grimaced. “It looks...no, that can't be right.”
“It looks like what?” Esme asked.
“It looks like...” Alice opened her eyes and put a hand to her temple. “It looks like he's bleeding.”
I didn't think it was possible for bloodsuckers to get pale on command, but man, they looked nearly see-through after Alice said.
“So?” I asked. “You already said he was hurt.”
The look on Esme's face was nearly as distant as Alice's had been. “He probably had to hunt. If he was hurt, he would need more blood, he would need...”
“No,” Alice said, her voice deep. “He had a cut on the back of his head, and it was bleeding.”
“Why is this a big deal?”
Carlisle didn't meet my gaze. “The only thing close to blood that vampires produce is venom. We can't bleed.”
Okay, that made no sense to me. How could she see a vampire bleed if they didn't have blood? Whatever. I didn't have time to get the drill on vampire anatomy.
“Did you see anything else?” I asked Alice. “Where the sun was in the sky, a mountain, anything?”
“It was night.”
Well, if nothing else, at least I knew I had a couple of hours; it was only mid-afternoon. “When does the sun set around here?”
“Midnight.”
I gaped at Carlisle. “Seriously?”
“We're near the Arctic Circle, and it's summer. The sun sets after midnight - actually, I think it's closer to one right now - and rises around four, four-thirty in the morning.”
I frowned. “How long has Bella been missing?”
Carlisle and Esme looked at each other. Esme answered. “Nearly four days now.”
“Did you guys think that the two of them might not be in the area anymore?”
The leeches took turns looking at each other, but didn't speak. I guess they didn't need to, but come on. They'd lived for decades, if not centuries, and they couldn't do even do a search properly? How were these guys still alive?
I rubbed my eyes. “Okay. You checked the nearest town, right?”
Alice nodded. “We checked Barrow, Wainwright...everything up here. And we have friends who have been checking the southern places.”
“And we came up by Dawson and Fort Yukon, and we didn't smell a thing.” I sighed. “Where else could she have gone?”
“Oh no,” Esme said. “They...could've crossed to Russia.”
And I'd thought my eyebrows were high before. “Isn't there water between Alaska and Russia?”
“Yeah,” Carlisle said, “but we swim pretty well, and if she went by the Bering Strait--”
Alice jumped in. “Or if she trailed northern Canada, there's the North Pole.”
There were too many places to look and not enough of us. And I was just making things worse. There had to be a way to narrow this down.
“Did Edward look like he'd gone swimming?”
“No,” Alice replied. “He was perfectly dry. But I could have seen him at any point in the next few days, and--”
“What would Bella do?” I whispered. I had to know. I was her best friend, her Jacob, the one she counted on...
...except that she wasn't my Bella anymore. Especially if she couldn't remember anything.
But I didn't know that she couldn't remember anything. All I knew is that she didn't talk to Edward and that she plowed her way through solid rock. She could remember some things, or a lot of things. She could remember enough to not really recognize where she was and want to go somewhere she did recognize.
Like Forks.
Without any hesitation, I dropped the blanket and slipped into wolf form. Leah?
Now you remember I'm here.
Did you smell leeches when you left?
Well, yeah.
I stiffened. And you didn't tell me?
Bloodsuckers live around Forks, remember? I kinda had to go by when--
Was it fresh?
That shut her up for a second. Maybe. This isn't all of them?
Yeah, it is.
Shit. We have to warn Sam!
I switched back to human, but I didn't bother picking up the blanket. “You have a phone, right?”
Carlisle pointed toward the cabin. “You'll have the best luck with the landline.”
“Get ready!” I called as I ran through the broken wall. “We have to go back!”
Edward
The only corpses I'd found on the way were those of bear and elk. I prayed with all my soul that it would stay that way. Bella was leaving a clear trail now, which saved me the blind searching of the first two days, and she hadn't...killed any humans. And maybe, just maybe, she wasn't as hungry as she had been.
My arm was almost entirely healed, too. Four days - or was it five now? - was more than enough time to get over most hurts, but I hadn't had the chance to eat yet. It was distracting, to say the least. Ever since I'd become a vampire, I'd never been in pain this long.
Physical pain, that is.
But even if my arm hurt like it had when I was freshly injured, my hunger was starting to overwhelm all other sensation. I had to concentrate to know what time of day it was or what the temperature was like. And I couldn't stop, couldn't hunt for anything but Bella.
I recognized the shores of northern Washington the minute I saw them, and I was grateful again. It wasn't hard to guess where Bella was going from here.
--
She'd felled a mountain lion when I caught up with her in the forests around Forks. We'd been circling for at least a day, if not more, but it was the first time she'd stopped. I was downwind; she'd bolted before when she'd picked up my scent. I didn't want her to go into town - or, even worse, go for La Push - but most of all, I was hoping yet another feed would make her feel...better.
As soon as she'd finished, she stepped back, but didn't run. I took that as a good sign, so I decided to make a move.
“Bella?” I whispered. “Can you hear me?”
She could. Her head jerked around, looking for the source of the sound, but she didn't answer.
“It's Edward. Do you understand?”
She crouched and bared her teeth, her eyes still roving the area. Seeing all the blood down her shirt and jeans made my stomach clench, and not just because I was hungry.
I am a monster. And I have condemned her to my fate.
The wind picked up from the south, and with it, the smell of humans. Plural.
I had turned in their direction before I'd realized it, and even though I was nearly starved, I knew that the instinct might have carried me to do so while perfectly sated. I managed to stop before I moved forward, though.
Bella didn't have the decades of experience that I did.
She ran forward almost the second my thoughts caught up with me. But I was running on instinct, too, and while my mind was crying to stop her, my body wanted those people just as much as she did. Maybe even more so.
I'd like to say that it was skill that landed me in Bella's path, but really, it was pure luck. It was my own initiative that stopped me as soon as I realized that she was going to run into me. I didn't mind more injury if it prevented her from doing something she regretted. That I regretted.
And I realized that running into her wouldn't stop her; it'd just leave me incapacitated. She might attack me, but she'd been eating animals, and human flesh walked just a few hundred yards away. I'd have to attack, or I'd have to beat her there.
I dashed at full speed. Bella was at my heels, but I could feel her slowing down. I think she was conflicted; prey was ahead, but another predator was directly between, and she had just fed.
But it had been so long since I'd been weak around humans. I'd forgotten how narrowed the senses became, how all distractions and thought fell away when that sweet aroma dragged across the tongue. It was similar when I went for animal prey, but the satisfaction with lions and the like was so much less.
I came across the clearing where the humans grouped. Later, when thought returned, I realized that it was a group of campers, some six strong.
But at that moment, I lost all thought. I only felt the thrill of the hunt.
--
Predator.
My head snapped up, sniffing at the air. The threat could not have my prey. They were mine. Mine.
Bella.
She was standing at the edge of the clearing, peering down at me and the surroundings. Her face was relaxed, almost serene, and she wasn't looking at me. She was looking at everything around me.
Everyone.
Monster.
“Bella,” I whispered. “Bella, please.”
She took a step forward. I don't know what captivated her: me, the scene, or all the human blood around. But something had changed, and I clung to that thought, pushing out all others. I couldn't...not now.
Her red eyes met mine. I didn't remember how long it took for human blood to overwhelm the gold, but it didn't matter. She deserved the gold; I had earned the red. Even if that wasn't what was showing, that was how it was.
“Edward?”
The soft cry wasn't Bella's. It belonged to a girl on the ground, gurgling her words around the gash in her neck. A girl who looked very familiar.
A girl we had graduated with.
It was Angela.
I looked around. I had to. And every blank face, every face devoid of life, seemed to cry out in my head. Mike, Jessica, Eric...they were all here.
“Edward,” Angela said again. “It burns.”
She wasn't dead. I had bitten her, fed off of her, and she wasn't dead.
Bella stepped forward and opened her mouth.
“No!”
I leapt forward. I wasn't sure I'd be fast enough to block Bella, but now, with all the human blood I had taken in, I had a chance.
It turned out that I hadn't needed the extra burst in this case. She spotted me out of the corner of her eye and turned to face me, teeth bared. I ran into her full-on, pushing her hundreds of feet backward through the trees.
It was time to end this.
Jacob
Bella and Edward hadn't gotten too much of a head start. Edward was following Bella, who wasn't herself and wouldn't have recognized the way to Forks even if she had been. I sent Leah along their scent trail, as faint as it was, and I took the direct route with Esme. Alice stayed with her husboyfriend thing in case something popped up. I didn't think it too likely, but hey, if anything helped, I was for it.
We hit the edge of Forks by nightfall on the second day. The scent was completely gone, and the smells were completely screwed to hell by the leech I was tailing. But she stopped almost immediately upon hitting the line.
“Blood,” she said.
I switched back to human form. She didn't smell any better that way, but at least I could talk. “Where?”
“Not far,” she said, then darted off into the woods.
I changed back immediately and followed.
She was right; it wasn't far. We hadn't been running five minutes when we came upon the tents. And I smelled the blood a couple minutes beforehand, even with the vampire stench filling my nostrils. Considering how much blood covered the ground, it wasn't surprising.
God, the blood.
Esme was standing ramrod at the edge of the campsite, her eyes wide. It looked like her pupils had overwhelmed the color and started bleeding out into her irises. Of course. Any bloodsucker, even the high-minded ones, would have control problems around all that blood.
I switched back to human. “Can you do this?”
“There's...” She shivered. I couldn't remember a bloodsucker ever having done that. “You need to pick up their trail.”
“I don't know if I can.”
Esme looked over at me. I could see her hands shaking out of the corner of her eyes. “There's too much. I wouldn't...I couldn't help them.”
Her head switched front again, and I followed her gaze. A girl was on the ground, convulsing; a pool of blood surrounded her neck, but there wasn't any injury on that portion of her skin. I frowned. Even in human form, I should have been able to hear her breathing or hear her heartbeat.
But she didn't have either. And now I was shaking.
I turned to Esme. “What the hell are you going to do with her?”
“What we have to.”
I growled. “No.”
She looked back at me, and for the first time since we'd arrived, her face showed signs of confusion. “She's halfway turned. You want that for her?”
No. Of course I didn't. This girl was an innocent human who had been attacked, and it sucked, but Esme (blech) was right. This girl was going to be uncontrollable, and we already had enough of that on our hands. Or paws, as the case was.
But my hands started to shake even more, and then my arms, and it took everything I had to get that part of me under control. And not because of the whole leech thing. I wanted to protect this girl, this stranger, with everything I had, and as much as I told myself to shut the fuck up...I loved her.
Shit. Shit shit shit shit SHIT.
I stopped shaking, but I was doubled over and panting. Esme looked very concerned, but she stayed firmly in place.
“Are you okay?”
I laughed. “Far from it.”
“Are you going to be able...”
“Yeah, yeah.” I stood upright again. “Just...you have to help her.”
Esme looked slightly angry now. “I can't, I just told you...”
“You don't understand.” I looked at the girl, and my chest hurt. “I imprinted.”
I couldn't look at Esme again, but I could guess what she was thinking. Something along the lines of “holy shit”, probably.
“What do you want me to do?” she said, her voice even more strained than before.
I sighed. “What you have to.”
“But...I thought...”
“The pack will take care of me when it's finished,” I said. “I need to go.”
Without another word, I switched back to wolf form and dashed after the first different smell my snout picked up. I couldn't think until I had Bella.
What options.
--
I say that I picked up the scent, and I did; it was so strong that it stung. And while it was too overpowering to get more than a general direction, there were miles of crushed and felled trees littering the forest.
Someone had been brawling, and it wasn't over.
The first hint of continuation was the rumbling I heard in the distance. I thought it was thunder at first; it was common enough around here, after all. (Or maybe it was only common because they were around. But either way, I was used to it.) It was only when I remembered that thunder didn't go off every half a minute that I connected the dots.
The second hint was more than a hint. It was a rush of power so large and fast that it knocked me on my tail...and then my ass. I'd shifted back so quickly that I hadn't realized it until I felt needles digging into my back. I could barely breathe or blink.
After a few minutes, I was not only getting air into my lungs again, but I was focused again. There was no more thunder, but there was the smell of blood. Not as strong as it had been in the campsite, but strong enough to smell.
But I couldn't change. I was trying my hardest - not that I'd ever had to try, not since it began - and I was still as naked as the day I was born.
What the hell was going on?
I rose to my feet. I could still smell like I had since I first changed, but my knees shook more than they had in my entire life. Something was wrong, but I didn't think I was permanently broken.
I can't be. Not yet. Not until I finish this.
I shook the thoughts out of my head and ran forward. Even though I wasn't a wolf, I was still going pretty fast; I wasn't even stepping on the ground long enough to hurt my feet, if the skin had been soft enough for such a thing.
I was almost at my destination when I managed to shift. And I would never admit it to anyone, but I breathed the biggest sigh of relief in the world.
After that, I put on a burst of energy, and I was in a clearing. Bella was there, and so was a dead human at her feet. Her front was covered in blood, and she was staring at her hands as if she'd never seen them before.
Staring at them with the brightest red eyes I'd ever seen.
I was ready to pounce. I had to be. She'd come for me if I didn't. Maybe if I disabled her...that would be enough...
No. She'd killed all those people, this one included, and that didn't come with a free pass.
A full second hadn't passed when Bella spoke. I was leaning on my back paws, ready to spring forward, and she wasn't looking at all in my direction.
“Jacob?”
Her voice was smoother than before, but then, there was nothing pesky like breathing getting in her way now.
Pounce, I thought. NOW!
Bella did look at me now, and I swear to God, I couldn't tell she was a vampire for a heartbeat. It was the longest heartbeat of my life.
“Jacob,” she said again, this time in a whisper. “How could I have...”
She looked at the corpse, and this time, I did, too. His face was turned toward mine, and although half of it had deep gashes with drying blood, I could see the other half clearly. And I could see his vacant green eyes that watched nothing.
It was just as Alice had said.
The corpse was Edward Cullen.
--
The moments that passed after that revelation seemed to go by at a snail's crawl. But really, I couldn't have breathed five times before Bella spoke again.
“What...where are we?” She put a hand to her head.
Bella
Jacob was human again in the blink of an eye. I could see his change so much more clearly now than I had as a human, when I had thought that his arms and legs had just reshaped into whatever he needed. But now, I could see that he was always both wolf and boy, and he just slid one form to the front whenever he needed it.
“Oh, Jacob,” I breathed, and I wondered how the Cullens had ever felt threatened by the wolves. I had never seen Jacob look more beautiful. And he'd come to see me, even after everything that happened.
Jacob wasn't looking at me. He was staring at the heap on the ground at my feet.
“You...know what I'm saying?”
I laughed. “Of course I do. Just because I'm a...”
“Bella?”
“...different doesn't mean that I don't know you.”
“Bella.”
“I think I know my own name, too.”
“Bella!”
I rolled my eyes. “What?”
“What do you remember?”
The words weren't what stopped me; it was the way Jacob had said them. I had heard Jacob in a lot of different moods: happy, assured, and certainly angry. But I had never once in my life heard him scared...terrified, even.
I paused and considered his question. It was funny. Now that he mentioned it, I couldn't remember much.
Just as long as you're with me.
“Where's Edward?”
Jacob backed away, and for the first time, I realized he was naked. I looked upward to keep from embarrassing him.
“Bella, he's right...” He broke off, choking on a sob.
“Oh, Jacob. I'm sorry to...would you feel better if I left?”
“Goddamn it!”
I looked at Jacob's face. I'd left him feeling tortured before, but I'd never seen him like this. He looked like he was about ready to fall apart.
“You killed him!” he snarled. “You killed them all!”
“Killed who?”
“Look at the fucking ground.”
I blinked. Jacob had never cursed at me before. This was definitely worse than I'd thought it would be.
But I did as he asked...demanded, really. I looked at the ground - I could see a lot of clothes out of the corner of my eye, and of course I could smell the blood, but I wasn't hungry at all - and there was the entire world at my feet.
Edward.
Dead.
But not just dead. He was ripped apart, missing an arm and his left food. And he had bled.
“This is a trick. This has to be a...”
Jacob took another step back as I fell to my knees. Edward's skin...it was so soft. I had no idea it would be so flushed, even with all the blood loss.
His eyes...they were so green. Greener than I had ever imagined.
“How?” I whispered.
Jacob choked. “You did it, Bella.”
threat kill feed
I shook my head. “But he's human. I couldn't have possibly...”
“No?” Jacob laughed. It was the meanest sound I'd ever heard. “I caught the tail edge. Couldn't change for five minutes.”
kill feed FEED
I closed my eyes and shook my head. I wasn't sure what I was shaking my head at: Jacob, or the burning in my throat that threatened to consume me almost as readily as the venom had a few days earlier.
“I can't...”
“You did.”
“No.” I opened my eyes. “I can't stop. You have to kill me.”
Jacob didn't lunge at me like I'd expected, and I felt my anger start to rise. Why wasn't he listening to me?
But then, he explained why. “Can I kill you?”
I frowned. “You've killed vampires before. Don't get squeamish just because it's me.”
“I mean...” A flush of blood surged through Jacob's veins, and I got to my feet and backed away. Even with the animalistic smell that everyone had talked about - it wasn't pleasant, but it wasn't horrible - his blood smelled amazingly appealing. And that was while it was under his skin. “I don't think I could get close enough.”
That's when I caught on. “So that's it. You're too attached to your precious fur.”
Jacob's jaw clenched. “I mean, if I'm human, I won't have a chance against you.”
“Then you won't even try.”
He shook his head.
The rage bubbled over. I put a hand to my head. “Kill me.”
I could see Jacob backing away. “Bella...”
“Kill me!” The words tore out of me, but more as instinct than anything. I couldn't think.
“You made this choice,” he said. “Now you have to live with it.”
With a pitying, half-disgusted look on his face, he shifted, then ran out of the clearing.
“Jacob!” I screamed. “You can't leave me like this! JACOB!”
But he was gone.
I looked up at the sky. It looked a light blue to me, but as I stared around the forest, I realized the trees had no shadows. And there was no sun. I could see like it was the day, but it was probably the middle of the night.
This gift...it could have been so beautiful. But the reason I'd wanted it, my reason for being was dead at my feet. And I had been the one to kill him.
I remembered something Edward had said the day before our wedding.
“Being a vampire, it's like sunrise in winter. It's glorious in its own way, but the light's gone too fast, and it never comes back.”
I had never felt such anguish in my life. When Edward had left...that was only a small fraction of this. And maybe it was worse because I wasn't human anymore, but I felt I would burst from the pain.
There was only one thing left to do.
I knelt, caressed Edward's cheek. It still held a trace of warmth, and I reveled in it. It's not something I would ever feel again from anyone.
“Your family will take care of you,” I whispered. “Goodbye, my love.”
And with that, I ran.
I didn't stop running for a long time.
Jacob
The girl's name was Angela.
Esme decided she didn't know enough about the imprinting process and let her finish the change. If it turned out it was safe and we'd wanted her dead, she had no doubts the Cullens could take her out. We consulted with Sam right away, and he advised a wait-and-see approach. I guess the tribe doesn't know much more about werewolfy stuff than the vampires do.
Angela was gorgeous. I hadn't met her when she was human, but apparently, she'd been one of Bella's friends at school. She smelled terrible, and by the way she scrunched up her nose when she first woke, I didn't smell much better. But there was an instant connection between us. It didn't take me long to guess how I was going to vote on the life/death issue.
She took to being a vampire much better than Bella had. She had strong cravings, but with Emmett and Rosalie accompanying us the first couple of weeks, she acquired a taste for deer, and her eyes faded from bright red to a scarlet gold.
That's all the easy stuff, of course. A lot of mourning was going on. The town of Forks was positively distraught with the deaths of so many of the recently graduated class, and La Push wasn't far enough to be immune. It was going to take a long time for the area to recover.
I visited Charlie once. He knew nothing of Bella and Edward, and was anxious to know if I'd heard anything. I played the angry ex and told him to ask the Cullens. Apparently, they had this bull prepared about charity work in Africa that Charlie ate up with a spoon. I didn't think it'd satisfy him forever, but it worked for now.
Edward was burned in a pyre overlooking the beach at La Push. Sam actually pushed for it. He said he'd died trying to protect the town, which I wasn't sure I agreed with, but whatever. I don't think anyone could disagree that he'd died trying to stop Bella. Most of the Quiluetes showed up for the funeral, even Dad, who resented having to lie to Charlie about Bella. But it meant a lot to the Cullens.
The Cullens, by the way, were a complete wreck. Carlisle in particular. None of them spoke much whenever I was around Angela, who was getting Vampire 101 from them, but Carlisle had quit his job and stayed in the house all day and night. The only time I heard him talk was when he explained how he'd wanted to show that it was possible to live as a vampire in peace with humans, and this had destroyed everything they had worked for. I was surprised they didn't leave Washington entirely, but Angela told me that Edward's body had given them the perfect cover story. He'd died as a mortal, and they were going to use it. Me, I think that was a nice way of saying that Carlisle didn't want to leave.
And that was the least of it. Bella had left the area, which made the pack very happy, but the Cullens couldn't pursue her, since she could very easily kill anyone who tried. Emmett and Jasper talked seriously for a while with Sam and the tribe elders about sending a group to ambush her, since the theory was that she couldn't take them all at once. But they eventually decided to do that as a last resort, if she came back to the town. The whole world couldn't be protected, but we could keep a watch on this area of it.
Nothing happened for four months. I was lucky I had Angela; the imprint had left me blissful and practically unaware of the rest of the world. But I wasn't completely blind. Esme was nearly hysterical most of the time, worried over Bella and Carlisle. Even Emmett and Rosalie, who were apparently not the easiest to get to know, were trying to boost Esme's spirits. Alice and Jasper were barely at the house, since werewolves messed with Alice's vision, and she was trying to keep tabs on Bella.
Turned out her vision didn't help.
Someone from Alaska called Carlisle in the fourth month, and the Cullens rushed to La Push to update the wolves. There was a stronghold in Italy, and the group there was generally recognized as the ruler of all the vampires.
Or they had been, until the city was burned to the ground.
This ended up causing more problems for the Cullens than it solved. They were relieved at first, since they'd had the threat of execution hanging over their heads about Bella in general. But the number of vampire deaths they heard about grew, and I remembered all the talk about the new vampires when Victoria had been gunning for Bella. They started flying all over the world, quelling things where they could, and ended up becoming the new face of vampire justice.
A few months before Bella changed, I don't know what I would have done about all this. The Cullens, vampire kings of the world? And the Quiluetes allied with them, too. But I had seen what Bella had looked like with Edward's blood on her hands, and how much worse things could be. I was more than in love with one of the leeches, so that didn't hurt matters. I'd be lying if I wasn't glad that the Cullens weren't in town as much as they used to be, but I was generally okay with things.
Wolves and vampires, living happily ever after.
But that's not the end of the story.
Three years after Bella was turned, I was running the circuit around La Push and Forks. It didn't take long, especially since I knew it like the back of my hand, but it was a nice opportunity to stretch my legs. And if I did it quickly enough, I could catch the sunrise at the beach. I liked to do it with Angela, but she was in Japan with Carlisle and Esme, and I was here.
A vampire waited for me on the shore, and I knew her immediately.
I changed back immediately. “I wondered when you'd be back.”
The vampire turned. Sure enough, it was Bella. Her eyes glowed gold in the pre-dawn light. “I almost didn't come back at all.”
I chuckled. “I knew you would.”
“How can you say that?” she asked. Her voice reminded me of Edward's, and the way it got tortured every time he talked about Bella. “After what I did?”
“Angela told me.”
She blinked. “Angela?”
Right. She took off before that went down. “Angela was the only survivor of the camp attack. But she was bitten.”
Bella put her hands to her mouth. “Holy crow.”
“But it wasn't you.”
“What?”
I smiled. “She only told me, but she thinks - it was fast, so she isn't sure - Edward attacked them. You don't remember?”
“No,” she said, running a hand through her hair. “But Edward? He wouldn't.”
“Yeah, sure,” I said. “He was probably trying to save you from yourself, and you don't think that sounds like him?”
Her mouth quivered. “You didn't tell anyone else?”
“What's the point? Edward's...you know.”
She turned back toward the horizon. “Then Volterra was for nothing.”
“So that was you.”
“I was only trying to get them to kill me. But I didn't...have control, and I turned them. Turned them into humans. And the smell...” She hung her head. “You were right, Jacob.”
“About what?”
“Not to attack me. I would have killed you, too.”
I walked up to her. It was still weird, seeing her face and smelling that sour vampire scent. But it still felt right, in its own way.
I looked at her face again. “Your eyes are gold.”
“It seemed like the least I could do.” She laughed, a ragged sound. “I don't suppose you'd kill me now.”
I started to ask if she wanted to die, but I knew the answer. Edward was her Angela. It was stupid, and fucked up, but I got it now.
“This may sound weird, coming from me, but you're being too hard on yourself.” I stretched my arms in the air. “Carlisle's a Boy Scout, sure, but no one else has a perfect record.”
Bella looked at me out of the corner of her eye. “You talked to them about that?”
“Things have changed, Bella. A lot.”
“Yeah,” she whispered, putting a hand to her heart.
I sighed. “You have a control on that human whammy?”
“Finally.”
“Then I'll kill you if you want,” I said. “But I'd rather not.”
She looked up at the sky. False dawn was appearing. “You sound...peaceful.”
“Imprinting'll do that to a wolf.”
She nodded. “I could make you human. For good.”
Despite everything, I could feel my heart in my mouth. But I shook my head. “I have a place here. And that would take me out of it.”
Flakes of snow blew from the clouds overhead. It was a mark of how both of us had changed that neither of us shivered. Bella was too cold, and I was too hot, even naked and human.
“I guess this is goodbye,” she said.
“It doesn't have to be,” I replied. “It wouldn't be hard talking to the Cullens.”
She shook her head. “I couldn't. Carlisle and Alice, they probably loathe me. And I can't let them hate Edward.”
It wasn't anything less than I expected. And I'll be honest, it pissed me off a little. But just like I wasn't surprised to hear about Edward's intervention, I think it would have been weirder if she'd hadn't defended Edward, even at that point.
“We're both going to live a long time,” I said. “Maybe we should save our goodbyes for later.”
For the first time, Bella smiled. It looked like it broke her heart to do it, but it was a smile all the same. “Okay.”
We stood on the shore in silence until the first edges of pink tinged the horizon, and then she was gone.
Extended notes: First, a quick credit: bethanydonne is my source for the word "husboyfriend".
I started writing "Sunrise in Winter" in summer 2008, right before Breaking Dawn came out. There were guesses that I wanted to explore before the release, and I was also reasonably certain that Bella would become the full-fledged Sparkly Mary Sue SMeyer wanted her to be. Part of my love for vampire stories comes from the violent and bloodthirsty nature they're imbued with, and I was pretty sure Breaking Dawn would only include the so-called "positive" side of that. I wanted Bella and Edward to make bad choices based on instinct that would be fatal to others.
Of course, I didn't make the release date deadline I'd given myself, so some Breaking Dawn canon started making it into the series. I became completely fed up with the series -- not that I've ever been a huge fan -- thanks to the fail that was the end of BD and the barrage of advertisements that came along with the movie adaptation of Twilight, so I stopped working. It was only about a year after I started the fic that I even remembered to come back to it, and it turned out that I'd made it to the point where Jacob had come across Edward's corpse and Bella. Finishing it was quick work after that.
I was torn during edits. There was some improvements I wanted to make to earlier in the story, but considering a good part was written before I knew the final canon, I didn't want to fudge with that. I also liked some of the character choices I made, although Edward probably could have been more self-loathing. The main reason I decided to stop edits was because I wasn't sure what purpose I ultimately wanted this story to serve: parody, alternate ending, scathing critique, a mixture. I finally decided that I was thinking too hard and that it should speak for itself...even though I'm explaining myself later.
Readers might be wondering why I would write Twilight fanfic when I get more enjoyment mocking it than I do taking it at face value. It's the same reason I may write Anita Blake fanfic one day. Even though I strongly disagree with the author's take, there are some concepts worth exploring. The very essence of vampires has a million different paths to take: vampirism as a sexually-transmitted disease, the vampire's basic instincts serving as a metaphor for the human id, humanity's fixation with youth and immortality. Most vampire fiction is cheesy to some degree, so I might as well go with something I'm familiar with, even if I don't really like it.
Trigger warnings: Zhygvcyr punenpgre qrnguf, rkprffvir oybbq, tbel jbhaqf (translate)
Fandom: Twilight
Rating: R for violence, gore, and language. Click here for trigger warnings.
Length: About 10,000 words.
Characters/Pairings: Bella/Edward, Jacob/Angela, other canon characters.
Spoilers: Major spoilers through Eclipse, mild spoilers for Breaking Dawn.
Summary: "Being a vampire, it's like sunrise in winter. It's glorious in its own way, but the light's gone too fast, and it never comes back."
Notes: I posted this on the Dreamwidth fic community first. This is an alternate ending to the Twilight series that I started writing before Breaking Dawn was released. It's also the longest one-shot fanfic that I've finished and posted. Extended notes are after the story.
Sunrise in Winter
Bella
My final night of sleep was dreamless. I had some awareness - enough to know I wasn't dreaming, at least - and I can't say how great it was knowing that I was going to be free of the nightmares that had followed me for so long.
I woke up gradually that morning, savoring the last tendrils of sleep that lingered for at least an hour. It wasn't until Edward nuzzled my neck that I acknowledged being awake.
“Mmm.”
I could feel him moving away, so I shook my head and reached up my hand to cradle his head.
“Good morning, Bella,” he whispered. “Sorry to wake you, but I...”
“You what?” I asked, my voice foggy with sleep.
“I had to touch you. You've never looked more beautiful.”
I could feel the giddy smile reserved for Edward spread across my face.
“And here I thought you'd hate me,” I said through a small yawn.
“What?”
“I took your virtue, after all.”
Edward's chuckle tickled my cheek. “You can't take something freely given, Mrs. Cullen.”
My eyes opened, but Edward's room was in gloom, and the only thing I wanted to see was pressed behind me. I might as well have left my lids down for all the good it did me.
“No regrets?” I asked.
“I was going to ask you the same question.”
“You first.”
His hand was cold and unyielding against the skin of my arm, but his touch left fire in its wake. “Only if you don't.”
It was my turn to laugh. My left hand moved to the softness of Edward's hair...well, soft in comparison to the rest of him, but I'd be willing to bet it was as tough as he was.
“I hope that's a happy laugh,” he said.
“Has it never occurred to you that we might be too careful of each other?”
He shook his head, brushing his eyelashes against the bared skin on my neck. “No such thing.”
“I don't mean physically, and you know it.”
Edward's hand pressed gently on my neck, and I rolled to look at him. Only his eyes moved, which were currently as gold as my ring.
“We've had to be careful. I've had to be careful. You experienced what happened when I wasn't.”
I wrapped my free arm around his waist. “You were being careful. So careful that you didn't want to try.”
“And I'll regret it for the rest of my life.”
He didn't say Jacob's name, but it hung in the air, as weighted as my jewelry on my finger. I'd hoped that Jacob would have shown at the wedding, despite the fact that I hadn't invited him, but he and all the wolves had stayed away. The only ones from La Push who had come were Billy - probably at Charlie's insistence - and Emily. I hadn't dared approach either for recent news of Jake.
My hand rubbed at the small of his back, and my palm brushed a silk covering. I chuckled despite myself; it was easy to think that Edward would be modest even after we spent an eternity together.
“Edward,” I said, “you can be as rough as you want. Just as long as you're with me.”
He laid his lips on the tip of my nose, and in spite of myself, a chill ran through me. “Always.”
--
My muscles were painfully tensed when Edward sank his teeth into my neck, but the bite itself didn’t hurt. If anything, it felt gentler than all of his kisses and caresses had been this past day. The wound stung a little as his mouth moved over my skin, but the way he was drinking made me exhale and grab at his shirt. I couldn’t move away…I didn’t want to move away, but I needed to respond somehow.
Since he couldn’t talk, Edward ran his fingers through my hair instead. I didn't know how he could be so soft when he was so strong.
My eyes closed, and the world seemed to fade away. I let it. It wouldn't be gone for long.
Edward moved his mouth away and put his arms around me. “I'm not going to leave you. I swear.”
As if it had been waiting for his go-ahead, the burning frequented my nightmares started scorching in my neck and shoulders. And with it, my eyelids seemed to latch shut; no matter how I tried, I couldn't open my eyes at all.
Edward either didn't notice my lack of response, or he was ready for it. He laid a light kiss on the back of my hand, then lowered me onto something soft. I assumed it was the bed that Edward had had shipped to the cabin - the Cullens hadn't bothered furnishing the place before since it was so far north - but the venom left little room for other observation.
“Carlisle will be here soon,” Edward whispered. “Just hold on.”
There was little else I could do.
--
“How long has it been?”
An eternity. Any sense I had of time was long gone, robbed by the scorching that was ravaging my organs and tissues. It seemed concentrated on my lungs at the moment, and I knew the jagged gasps that escaped my mouth were some of the last breaths I was ever going to need.
I tried to come up with an estimate before Edward answered Carlisle. It was at least a day...maybe a half-day beyond that?
Edward's voice was so forlorn that I tried to move, even though I knew I couldn't. “I called you almost as soon as it started.”
”Three hours, then.”
“About.”
Three hours? And I'd thought my estimate was conservative.
“Everything looks normal,” Carlisle said. “Do you want me to wait around?”
“No, you should go back to Denali. I'll call you if anything changes...or after.”
Carlisle spoke low. “You don't have to be alone.”
“I'm not.”
--
My heart was next, and I couldn't understand it. I didn't want my heart to stop beating so early. I wanted something for Edward, who had been holding my hand since Carlisle had left. I wasn't breathing anymore, which had taken my last defense against the agony, and as my heart slowed, I tried to will it to speed, to tell Edward that I was still here.
But the venom kept its own council, and with one final jerk, the beating stopped.
The burning was all over now. That was probably why my heart had finished moving; there was nothing else to pump into my veins and arteries. And the venom seemed to have a mind of its own now that it was everywhere, crawling through my system with the slow and steady pace of the surest of monsters. Would I feel its touch for the rest of my existence?
Edward squeezed my hand harder. Maybe it was because he knew what was going on and was shooting for a comforting touch, but I couldn't help but think that he was holding me one last time, just in case.
--
The venom roared its way around my head. It was almost a literal roar, too; I could hear it rush through my ears so loudly it drowned out every other sound. So even if Edward had been trying to speak, I wouldn't have been able to hear it.
It was still nothing compared to what felt like the hollowing of my skull. No human brain could withstand the fire...how was I still alive, or whatever I was now?
With that, the burning surged, and all thoughts were scourged from my head.
--
Oh God ohGodohGodGOD
Edward
When I'd first bitten Bella, I had been glad that I couldn't hear her thoughts. I remembered the agony all too well, and I didn't need constant reminders that I had subjected the woman I loved above everything to the worst experience that anyone could endure. And then, I had felt selfish. She had to go through it, so I deserved to feel every second of her torment.
But that was at the beginning.
At the end of the second day, almost all of her organs were silent and had been most of the day. I could still tell that the change was working - her torso and head looked like stone, while the rest of her still looked as soft and vulnerable as the day I'd met her - but even though I knew, she was so still and quiet that she just as easily could have been...
Well, let's just say that my wish to hear her thoughts became completely genuine.
And yet, it was easy for me. I was used to passing long hours, and the months that I had been away from Bella had been longer than this. Any time I felt doubt, I could just kiss her cheek or clutch her hand, and I was renewed.
It was too easy.
--
The third day came and went without much regard. Bella looked...well, gorgeous, but that wasn't anything new. No, she looked like herself, but harder, stronger. I knew that her awakening would leave her ready to take any challenge on, even the bloodlust. And so, as the hours passed, my anxiety melted away and left excitement in its wake.
It wasn't until ten-thirty on the third night that Bella opened her eyes. The sun wasn't completely gone from the sky because we were almost as far north as we could get during the summer, so it never grew completely dark. There was enough light coming in through the window next to the bed that the red irises glowed.
“Bella,” I said. “How are you feeling?”
She stared at the ceiling without moving.
“Can you hear me, love?”
Her eyes moved to my face almost too fast for even me to see.
I stepped forward. “Why don't you try sitting up?”
Before I could manage to get close enough to touch, Bella curled her lip back and growled.
I eased back as a stab of fear hit me. Carlisle had told me that as soon as she could move, she should be speaking and cognizant of what was going on, and that tallied with the stories from everyone else. And my own memories, come to think of it.
“I know you're hungry,” I said. “We can go hunting whenever you'd like.”
Bella jumped out of bed, still growling. She moved backward, keeping her gaze on me, until she hit the wall behind her.
I rose slowly and walked back toward the only other fixture in the room besides the bed: a freezer. We'd collected bags of blood for months just in case of an emergency. Esme and I had decided that it was best positioned next to the only door; we'd be able to grab bags and go outside at the same time. But instead of leaving, I moved in front of the door and opened the top of the freezer.
“You'll feel better once you feed,” I told her, hoping it was true. “You can have as much as you'd like.”
I pulled out one bag. As delicately as I could manage, I tore off a corner.
Immediately, I could smell the blood inside. It smelled wonderful, especially to a vegetarian who was still a meat-eater at heart, but it also smelled a lot more stale than the average human. And even the average lion or bear.
But Bella didn't have the benefit of decades of hunting, and she was hungry. It would have been hard to resist under the best of circumstances, which these certainly weren't.
She rushed forward, arms extended. I could see her move, probably at much the same rate that a human could see another human running, so I had enough time to step out of her way. But I kept the bag extended, so she could grab and drink. I wasn't expecting that she would hit my arm at full speed and strength, taking the bag into her mouth without using her hands.
A crack, and I was on the ground.
“Bella!” I gasped. “Please!”
She didn't look at me; instead, she slurped the blood so quickly that the bag was dry within seconds. As soon as she was finished, she looked around the room, staring at everything from a knothole on the wall to a dust mote hanging in the air. As soon as she looked out the window, she went still.
There must have been something outside. That's the only reason I can think of that she would have crashed forward like she did. I don't know if she was too hungry to wait or if she'd forgotten how to use a door at all, but she went through the wall and disappeared outside.
I rose to my feet and grimaced as I felt the bones in my arm reform. Bella's full strength was enough to shatter them, and it was going to take a while to heal. But I couldn't wait to be perfectly healed.
And so, I dashed through the shattered wall and into the field outside, grabbing my cell phone with my free hand.
It was time to call in backup.
Jacob
I don't know where I was when the pack found me. I'd probably made it as far as Canada, but I'd stopped paying attention weeks ago, so I couldn't say what cities I was near or even how far I was from the US at all.
What I do know is that I was hunting at the time. I had a deer in my sights when I caught a whiff of the pack scent and stopped dead in my tracks.
Leave me alone! I called.
Wish I could.
Leah. Great, just what I needed. Look, I don't know what Sam--
It's about your stupid Bella.
Without further hesitation, she showed me what Sam had passed to her: the memory of a phone call from the head bloodsucker of the Cullen family. He said that Edward had called about a couple days ago, asking for help with Bella. By the time the family had arrived at the cabin where they'd been staying, both Edward and Bella were long gone. Edward wasn't picking up his phone, so they didn't know where they were, and their days of searching were turning up nothing.
And at the heart of it: Bella had been turned. Damn it.
Why the hell would they call Sam? I snarled. Why don't they ask that one leech who can tell the future?
Because the leech can't see them at all.
Which meant that at least one member of the pack was involved. Great. And why did Sam send you after me?
You weren't answering.
Think there might have been a reason for that?
Leah huffed. Look, I didn't think we should've come after you at all. I thought we should go up there and take them all out while they were vulnerable.
So why aren't you guys doing that?
Because...
She paused, but I could see exactly what Sam had said to her. He didn't want to get involved because it would involve leaving La Push undefended, but someone had to take care of Bella. And if anyone had the right to take her down, it was me.
He was also giving me the chance to say no, which is why Leah was there; she could go even if I didn't. But everyone in the pack knew better than that, Sam and Leah included. This was up to me.
Where are they? I asked.
Follow me.
--
It took three days to get to Alaska, which meant both that I had been further north and further east than I had expected. We'd seen practically nothing in the way of civilization until we neared the northern part of the state, at which point Leah consulted some road signs. We deliberately turned away from them after that. I'd expected nothing else. The Cullens wanted their newborn away from people.
When we got close, Leah turned to me. How do you want to handle this?
Handle?
I don't want to be flying free around a bunch of bloodsuckers, if you get me.
I did get her. I also didn't care about going naked, so in reply, I shifted back to human.
“You can go back,” I said. “This is my business.”
Leah growled.
“Fine. Stay here and rest. If I need your help, I'll call.”
She still seemed pissed, but I didn't give a rat's ass. I stepped out of the woods without looking at her.
The cabin was a good mile from the edge of the trees. It was a little sunny, so I could see a bunch of leeches glowing in the distance. It was the first time I'd witnessed it with my own eyes, so even though Bella had mentioned it before, I couldn't help but laugh. Whatever had made vampires had a sense of humor.
My noises were apparently enough to catch their attention because, seconds later, one of them was standing by me.
“Would you care to tell me what you find so funny, wolf?”
I frowned at her. “It's Jacob, leech.”
“And I prefer Esme, Jacob.”
This had to be the group's mom figure; the tone of her voice was polite, but she had that “cross me and I'll ground you” look that all moms seemed to know.
“Skip the nice talk. What's going on?”
“Come to the cabin.”
I shook my head. “You honestly think I'm that stupid?”
Esme's gold eyes flashed in the light. “We smelled you when you were still in the woods. I can hear your backup as we speak.”
Okay, I was pretty sure it wasn't an ambush; the Cullens knew we'd be missed if we disappeared. But that didn't mean I was stupid. “Send away some of the bl...others.”
“Fine.”
She turned and ran for the cabin as clouds darkened the sky. I watched as she approached the others, then as three of them dashed off in various directions. That meant the odds were still three-to-one against me, but I figured it was the best I was going to get.
I jogged over in my human form. Running would have saved me a couple of seconds, but I'd been a wolf for a long enough stretch that I wasn't entirely steady on my human feet. I was also still lacking clothes. Funny how that hadn't crossed my mind.
Obviously, it'd crossed Esme's mind because she held up a blanket as I approached. I paused next to her hand for a second, trying not to grimace at the vampire smell, but I wasn't going to escape the stench even if I didn't cover up.
As I took the blanket and tied it around my waist, I looked at the two others. Esme was holding the hand of one, so I didn't think “husband” was a bad guess. The third was the girl that Bella had called Alice...which meant this was the future-seeing vampire. Great.
“Jacob,” Alice said. Her voice was so cold that I thought icicles would show up in the air in front of her. “Figures.”
“I'm glad you came,” the man said, almost as if Alice hadn't spoken. “You know Bella almost as well as Edward.”
Better, I thought. “What happened?”
Esme gestured toward the cabin. “That's what I wanted to show you.”
She walked around to the other side, which I couldn't see from this angle. I eyed the other two leeches out of the corner of my eye, then followed her.
I looked over the place. The building itself wasn't very big; it looked like there was one room and nothing like a bathroom or kitchen. The walls were made out of stone and used wood as a border. Not my idea of a cabin, but whatever. I wasn't here on vacation.
That's when I saw the far side of the wall. Or, rather, what had been a wall before something had taken a huge chunk out of it. The front door was still in its frame off toward the left, but most of the right had been torn apart.
Geez. Bella hadn't stood a chance.
“Newborns are very strong,” the man said from behind me. It was so quiet that I almost missed it. “And they don't know their strength.”
My breath left my body in a gust. Bella had done this.
No. Not Bella. Whatever she had become...whatever she was now, it was not Bella. Not my Bella. And I had to remember that.
“What...” My voice quivered, and I coughed to cover it up. “What do you guys know?”
“Carlisle?” Esme said. “What did Edward tell you?”
The man - Carlisle - stepped into my peripheral vision, but a good few feet to the side. I wasn't sure if he'd done for his own safety or for what he thought was mine, but I have to say, I was glad he hadn't come closer.
“He said that she...didn't know him. That she wouldn't talk to him at all. And he didn't tell me anything exact, but he sounded like he was out-of-breath.”
It felt like my eyebrows decided to hide in my hair. “But...you guys don't breathe, do you?”
Carlisle shook his head. “We don't have to. My best guess is that he was reacting to an injury of some kind...we pretend we're breathing for the sake of humans, so he could have been around others and didn't want to give himself away. Or he could have forgotten.”
Bella had hurt Edward? Shit, shit, shit.
“There's more.”
I turned around. Alice was standing several feet behind me, her hands crossed in front of her.
“I didn't see this happen,” she said.
I shrugged. “So?”
“So...I was watching for it. Closely. I couldn't see either of them.”
“I thought the wolves...”
Esme put a hand on Alice's shoulder. “She can never see werewolves, and that's why she thinks she couldn't see us after today. But something was - and is -- blocking her from Bella and Edward.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because that's why we can't find Edward and Bella now,” Carlisle said as he walked closer to us. “We can smell a bunch of different paths that they could have taken, and none of them have turned up anything.”
I ran a hand through my hair. The vampires couldn't find their own, so it wasn't likely I'd have much more luck. And if Bella didn't know what was going on...man, the leeches around me were the least of my problems.
My train of thought was interrupted by Alice falling to her knees. Carlisle jumped to her side, and Esme knelt next to her just as quickly, but I backed away. The distant look she had on her face was freaky-looking.
“What is it?” Esme asked. “What can you see?”
“Edward. Edward running...he's holding his arm...”
I frowned. “Where? Do you see anything...”
Alice closed her eyes and grimaced. “It looks...no, that can't be right.”
“It looks like what?” Esme asked.
“It looks like...” Alice opened her eyes and put a hand to her temple. “It looks like he's bleeding.”
I didn't think it was possible for bloodsuckers to get pale on command, but man, they looked nearly see-through after Alice said.
“So?” I asked. “You already said he was hurt.”
The look on Esme's face was nearly as distant as Alice's had been. “He probably had to hunt. If he was hurt, he would need more blood, he would need...”
“No,” Alice said, her voice deep. “He had a cut on the back of his head, and it was bleeding.”
“Why is this a big deal?”
Carlisle didn't meet my gaze. “The only thing close to blood that vampires produce is venom. We can't bleed.”
Okay, that made no sense to me. How could she see a vampire bleed if they didn't have blood? Whatever. I didn't have time to get the drill on vampire anatomy.
“Did you see anything else?” I asked Alice. “Where the sun was in the sky, a mountain, anything?”
“It was night.”
Well, if nothing else, at least I knew I had a couple of hours; it was only mid-afternoon. “When does the sun set around here?”
“Midnight.”
I gaped at Carlisle. “Seriously?”
“We're near the Arctic Circle, and it's summer. The sun sets after midnight - actually, I think it's closer to one right now - and rises around four, four-thirty in the morning.”
I frowned. “How long has Bella been missing?”
Carlisle and Esme looked at each other. Esme answered. “Nearly four days now.”
“Did you guys think that the two of them might not be in the area anymore?”
The leeches took turns looking at each other, but didn't speak. I guess they didn't need to, but come on. They'd lived for decades, if not centuries, and they couldn't do even do a search properly? How were these guys still alive?
I rubbed my eyes. “Okay. You checked the nearest town, right?”
Alice nodded. “We checked Barrow, Wainwright...everything up here. And we have friends who have been checking the southern places.”
“And we came up by Dawson and Fort Yukon, and we didn't smell a thing.” I sighed. “Where else could she have gone?”
“Oh no,” Esme said. “They...could've crossed to Russia.”
And I'd thought my eyebrows were high before. “Isn't there water between Alaska and Russia?”
“Yeah,” Carlisle said, “but we swim pretty well, and if she went by the Bering Strait--”
Alice jumped in. “Or if she trailed northern Canada, there's the North Pole.”
There were too many places to look and not enough of us. And I was just making things worse. There had to be a way to narrow this down.
“Did Edward look like he'd gone swimming?”
“No,” Alice replied. “He was perfectly dry. But I could have seen him at any point in the next few days, and--”
“What would Bella do?” I whispered. I had to know. I was her best friend, her Jacob, the one she counted on...
...except that she wasn't my Bella anymore. Especially if she couldn't remember anything.
But I didn't know that she couldn't remember anything. All I knew is that she didn't talk to Edward and that she plowed her way through solid rock. She could remember some things, or a lot of things. She could remember enough to not really recognize where she was and want to go somewhere she did recognize.
Like Forks.
Without any hesitation, I dropped the blanket and slipped into wolf form. Leah?
Now you remember I'm here.
Did you smell leeches when you left?
Well, yeah.
I stiffened. And you didn't tell me?
Bloodsuckers live around Forks, remember? I kinda had to go by when--
Was it fresh?
That shut her up for a second. Maybe. This isn't all of them?
Yeah, it is.
Shit. We have to warn Sam!
I switched back to human, but I didn't bother picking up the blanket. “You have a phone, right?”
Carlisle pointed toward the cabin. “You'll have the best luck with the landline.”
“Get ready!” I called as I ran through the broken wall. “We have to go back!”
Edward
The only corpses I'd found on the way were those of bear and elk. I prayed with all my soul that it would stay that way. Bella was leaving a clear trail now, which saved me the blind searching of the first two days, and she hadn't...killed any humans. And maybe, just maybe, she wasn't as hungry as she had been.
My arm was almost entirely healed, too. Four days - or was it five now? - was more than enough time to get over most hurts, but I hadn't had the chance to eat yet. It was distracting, to say the least. Ever since I'd become a vampire, I'd never been in pain this long.
Physical pain, that is.
But even if my arm hurt like it had when I was freshly injured, my hunger was starting to overwhelm all other sensation. I had to concentrate to know what time of day it was or what the temperature was like. And I couldn't stop, couldn't hunt for anything but Bella.
I recognized the shores of northern Washington the minute I saw them, and I was grateful again. It wasn't hard to guess where Bella was going from here.
--
She'd felled a mountain lion when I caught up with her in the forests around Forks. We'd been circling for at least a day, if not more, but it was the first time she'd stopped. I was downwind; she'd bolted before when she'd picked up my scent. I didn't want her to go into town - or, even worse, go for La Push - but most of all, I was hoping yet another feed would make her feel...better.
As soon as she'd finished, she stepped back, but didn't run. I took that as a good sign, so I decided to make a move.
“Bella?” I whispered. “Can you hear me?”
She could. Her head jerked around, looking for the source of the sound, but she didn't answer.
“It's Edward. Do you understand?”
She crouched and bared her teeth, her eyes still roving the area. Seeing all the blood down her shirt and jeans made my stomach clench, and not just because I was hungry.
I am a monster. And I have condemned her to my fate.
The wind picked up from the south, and with it, the smell of humans. Plural.
I had turned in their direction before I'd realized it, and even though I was nearly starved, I knew that the instinct might have carried me to do so while perfectly sated. I managed to stop before I moved forward, though.
Bella didn't have the decades of experience that I did.
She ran forward almost the second my thoughts caught up with me. But I was running on instinct, too, and while my mind was crying to stop her, my body wanted those people just as much as she did. Maybe even more so.
I'd like to say that it was skill that landed me in Bella's path, but really, it was pure luck. It was my own initiative that stopped me as soon as I realized that she was going to run into me. I didn't mind more injury if it prevented her from doing something she regretted. That I regretted.
And I realized that running into her wouldn't stop her; it'd just leave me incapacitated. She might attack me, but she'd been eating animals, and human flesh walked just a few hundred yards away. I'd have to attack, or I'd have to beat her there.
I dashed at full speed. Bella was at my heels, but I could feel her slowing down. I think she was conflicted; prey was ahead, but another predator was directly between, and she had just fed.
But it had been so long since I'd been weak around humans. I'd forgotten how narrowed the senses became, how all distractions and thought fell away when that sweet aroma dragged across the tongue. It was similar when I went for animal prey, but the satisfaction with lions and the like was so much less.
I came across the clearing where the humans grouped. Later, when thought returned, I realized that it was a group of campers, some six strong.
But at that moment, I lost all thought. I only felt the thrill of the hunt.
--
Predator.
My head snapped up, sniffing at the air. The threat could not have my prey. They were mine. Mine.
Bella.
She was standing at the edge of the clearing, peering down at me and the surroundings. Her face was relaxed, almost serene, and she wasn't looking at me. She was looking at everything around me.
Everyone.
Monster.
“Bella,” I whispered. “Bella, please.”
She took a step forward. I don't know what captivated her: me, the scene, or all the human blood around. But something had changed, and I clung to that thought, pushing out all others. I couldn't...not now.
Her red eyes met mine. I didn't remember how long it took for human blood to overwhelm the gold, but it didn't matter. She deserved the gold; I had earned the red. Even if that wasn't what was showing, that was how it was.
“Edward?”
The soft cry wasn't Bella's. It belonged to a girl on the ground, gurgling her words around the gash in her neck. A girl who looked very familiar.
A girl we had graduated with.
It was Angela.
I looked around. I had to. And every blank face, every face devoid of life, seemed to cry out in my head. Mike, Jessica, Eric...they were all here.
“Edward,” Angela said again. “It burns.”
She wasn't dead. I had bitten her, fed off of her, and she wasn't dead.
Bella stepped forward and opened her mouth.
“No!”
I leapt forward. I wasn't sure I'd be fast enough to block Bella, but now, with all the human blood I had taken in, I had a chance.
It turned out that I hadn't needed the extra burst in this case. She spotted me out of the corner of her eye and turned to face me, teeth bared. I ran into her full-on, pushing her hundreds of feet backward through the trees.
It was time to end this.
Jacob
Bella and Edward hadn't gotten too much of a head start. Edward was following Bella, who wasn't herself and wouldn't have recognized the way to Forks even if she had been. I sent Leah along their scent trail, as faint as it was, and I took the direct route with Esme. Alice stayed with her husboyfriend thing in case something popped up. I didn't think it too likely, but hey, if anything helped, I was for it.
We hit the edge of Forks by nightfall on the second day. The scent was completely gone, and the smells were completely screwed to hell by the leech I was tailing. But she stopped almost immediately upon hitting the line.
“Blood,” she said.
I switched back to human form. She didn't smell any better that way, but at least I could talk. “Where?”
“Not far,” she said, then darted off into the woods.
I changed back immediately and followed.
She was right; it wasn't far. We hadn't been running five minutes when we came upon the tents. And I smelled the blood a couple minutes beforehand, even with the vampire stench filling my nostrils. Considering how much blood covered the ground, it wasn't surprising.
God, the blood.
Esme was standing ramrod at the edge of the campsite, her eyes wide. It looked like her pupils had overwhelmed the color and started bleeding out into her irises. Of course. Any bloodsucker, even the high-minded ones, would have control problems around all that blood.
I switched back to human. “Can you do this?”
“There's...” She shivered. I couldn't remember a bloodsucker ever having done that. “You need to pick up their trail.”
“I don't know if I can.”
Esme looked over at me. I could see her hands shaking out of the corner of her eyes. “There's too much. I wouldn't...I couldn't help them.”
Her head switched front again, and I followed her gaze. A girl was on the ground, convulsing; a pool of blood surrounded her neck, but there wasn't any injury on that portion of her skin. I frowned. Even in human form, I should have been able to hear her breathing or hear her heartbeat.
But she didn't have either. And now I was shaking.
I turned to Esme. “What the hell are you going to do with her?”
“What we have to.”
I growled. “No.”
She looked back at me, and for the first time since we'd arrived, her face showed signs of confusion. “She's halfway turned. You want that for her?”
No. Of course I didn't. This girl was an innocent human who had been attacked, and it sucked, but Esme (blech) was right. This girl was going to be uncontrollable, and we already had enough of that on our hands. Or paws, as the case was.
But my hands started to shake even more, and then my arms, and it took everything I had to get that part of me under control. And not because of the whole leech thing. I wanted to protect this girl, this stranger, with everything I had, and as much as I told myself to shut the fuck up...I loved her.
Shit. Shit shit shit shit SHIT.
I stopped shaking, but I was doubled over and panting. Esme looked very concerned, but she stayed firmly in place.
“Are you okay?”
I laughed. “Far from it.”
“Are you going to be able...”
“Yeah, yeah.” I stood upright again. “Just...you have to help her.”
Esme looked slightly angry now. “I can't, I just told you...”
“You don't understand.” I looked at the girl, and my chest hurt. “I imprinted.”
I couldn't look at Esme again, but I could guess what she was thinking. Something along the lines of “holy shit”, probably.
“What do you want me to do?” she said, her voice even more strained than before.
I sighed. “What you have to.”
“But...I thought...”
“The pack will take care of me when it's finished,” I said. “I need to go.”
Without another word, I switched back to wolf form and dashed after the first different smell my snout picked up. I couldn't think until I had Bella.
What options.
--
I say that I picked up the scent, and I did; it was so strong that it stung. And while it was too overpowering to get more than a general direction, there were miles of crushed and felled trees littering the forest.
Someone had been brawling, and it wasn't over.
The first hint of continuation was the rumbling I heard in the distance. I thought it was thunder at first; it was common enough around here, after all. (Or maybe it was only common because they were around. But either way, I was used to it.) It was only when I remembered that thunder didn't go off every half a minute that I connected the dots.
The second hint was more than a hint. It was a rush of power so large and fast that it knocked me on my tail...and then my ass. I'd shifted back so quickly that I hadn't realized it until I felt needles digging into my back. I could barely breathe or blink.
After a few minutes, I was not only getting air into my lungs again, but I was focused again. There was no more thunder, but there was the smell of blood. Not as strong as it had been in the campsite, but strong enough to smell.
But I couldn't change. I was trying my hardest - not that I'd ever had to try, not since it began - and I was still as naked as the day I was born.
What the hell was going on?
I rose to my feet. I could still smell like I had since I first changed, but my knees shook more than they had in my entire life. Something was wrong, but I didn't think I was permanently broken.
I can't be. Not yet. Not until I finish this.
I shook the thoughts out of my head and ran forward. Even though I wasn't a wolf, I was still going pretty fast; I wasn't even stepping on the ground long enough to hurt my feet, if the skin had been soft enough for such a thing.
I was almost at my destination when I managed to shift. And I would never admit it to anyone, but I breathed the biggest sigh of relief in the world.
After that, I put on a burst of energy, and I was in a clearing. Bella was there, and so was a dead human at her feet. Her front was covered in blood, and she was staring at her hands as if she'd never seen them before.
Staring at them with the brightest red eyes I'd ever seen.
I was ready to pounce. I had to be. She'd come for me if I didn't. Maybe if I disabled her...that would be enough...
No. She'd killed all those people, this one included, and that didn't come with a free pass.
A full second hadn't passed when Bella spoke. I was leaning on my back paws, ready to spring forward, and she wasn't looking at all in my direction.
“Jacob?”
Her voice was smoother than before, but then, there was nothing pesky like breathing getting in her way now.
Pounce, I thought. NOW!
Bella did look at me now, and I swear to God, I couldn't tell she was a vampire for a heartbeat. It was the longest heartbeat of my life.
“Jacob,” she said again, this time in a whisper. “How could I have...”
She looked at the corpse, and this time, I did, too. His face was turned toward mine, and although half of it had deep gashes with drying blood, I could see the other half clearly. And I could see his vacant green eyes that watched nothing.
It was just as Alice had said.
The corpse was Edward Cullen.
--
The moments that passed after that revelation seemed to go by at a snail's crawl. But really, I couldn't have breathed five times before Bella spoke again.
“What...where are we?” She put a hand to her head.
Bella
Jacob was human again in the blink of an eye. I could see his change so much more clearly now than I had as a human, when I had thought that his arms and legs had just reshaped into whatever he needed. But now, I could see that he was always both wolf and boy, and he just slid one form to the front whenever he needed it.
“Oh, Jacob,” I breathed, and I wondered how the Cullens had ever felt threatened by the wolves. I had never seen Jacob look more beautiful. And he'd come to see me, even after everything that happened.
Jacob wasn't looking at me. He was staring at the heap on the ground at my feet.
“You...know what I'm saying?”
I laughed. “Of course I do. Just because I'm a...”
“Bella?”
“...different doesn't mean that I don't know you.”
“Bella.”
“I think I know my own name, too.”
“Bella!”
I rolled my eyes. “What?”
“What do you remember?”
The words weren't what stopped me; it was the way Jacob had said them. I had heard Jacob in a lot of different moods: happy, assured, and certainly angry. But I had never once in my life heard him scared...terrified, even.
I paused and considered his question. It was funny. Now that he mentioned it, I couldn't remember much.
Just as long as you're with me.
“Where's Edward?”
Jacob backed away, and for the first time, I realized he was naked. I looked upward to keep from embarrassing him.
“Bella, he's right...” He broke off, choking on a sob.
“Oh, Jacob. I'm sorry to...would you feel better if I left?”
“Goddamn it!”
I looked at Jacob's face. I'd left him feeling tortured before, but I'd never seen him like this. He looked like he was about ready to fall apart.
“You killed him!” he snarled. “You killed them all!”
“Killed who?”
“Look at the fucking ground.”
I blinked. Jacob had never cursed at me before. This was definitely worse than I'd thought it would be.
But I did as he asked...demanded, really. I looked at the ground - I could see a lot of clothes out of the corner of my eye, and of course I could smell the blood, but I wasn't hungry at all - and there was the entire world at my feet.
Edward.
Dead.
But not just dead. He was ripped apart, missing an arm and his left food. And he had bled.
“This is a trick. This has to be a...”
Jacob took another step back as I fell to my knees. Edward's skin...it was so soft. I had no idea it would be so flushed, even with all the blood loss.
His eyes...they were so green. Greener than I had ever imagined.
“How?” I whispered.
Jacob choked. “You did it, Bella.”
threat kill feed
I shook my head. “But he's human. I couldn't have possibly...”
“No?” Jacob laughed. It was the meanest sound I'd ever heard. “I caught the tail edge. Couldn't change for five minutes.”
kill feed FEED
I closed my eyes and shook my head. I wasn't sure what I was shaking my head at: Jacob, or the burning in my throat that threatened to consume me almost as readily as the venom had a few days earlier.
“I can't...”
“You did.”
“No.” I opened my eyes. “I can't stop. You have to kill me.”
Jacob didn't lunge at me like I'd expected, and I felt my anger start to rise. Why wasn't he listening to me?
But then, he explained why. “Can I kill you?”
I frowned. “You've killed vampires before. Don't get squeamish just because it's me.”
“I mean...” A flush of blood surged through Jacob's veins, and I got to my feet and backed away. Even with the animalistic smell that everyone had talked about - it wasn't pleasant, but it wasn't horrible - his blood smelled amazingly appealing. And that was while it was under his skin. “I don't think I could get close enough.”
That's when I caught on. “So that's it. You're too attached to your precious fur.”
Jacob's jaw clenched. “I mean, if I'm human, I won't have a chance against you.”
“Then you won't even try.”
He shook his head.
The rage bubbled over. I put a hand to my head. “Kill me.”
I could see Jacob backing away. “Bella...”
“Kill me!” The words tore out of me, but more as instinct than anything. I couldn't think.
“You made this choice,” he said. “Now you have to live with it.”
With a pitying, half-disgusted look on his face, he shifted, then ran out of the clearing.
“Jacob!” I screamed. “You can't leave me like this! JACOB!”
But he was gone.
I looked up at the sky. It looked a light blue to me, but as I stared around the forest, I realized the trees had no shadows. And there was no sun. I could see like it was the day, but it was probably the middle of the night.
This gift...it could have been so beautiful. But the reason I'd wanted it, my reason for being was dead at my feet. And I had been the one to kill him.
I remembered something Edward had said the day before our wedding.
“Being a vampire, it's like sunrise in winter. It's glorious in its own way, but the light's gone too fast, and it never comes back.”
I had never felt such anguish in my life. When Edward had left...that was only a small fraction of this. And maybe it was worse because I wasn't human anymore, but I felt I would burst from the pain.
There was only one thing left to do.
I knelt, caressed Edward's cheek. It still held a trace of warmth, and I reveled in it. It's not something I would ever feel again from anyone.
“Your family will take care of you,” I whispered. “Goodbye, my love.”
And with that, I ran.
I didn't stop running for a long time.
Jacob
The girl's name was Angela.
Esme decided she didn't know enough about the imprinting process and let her finish the change. If it turned out it was safe and we'd wanted her dead, she had no doubts the Cullens could take her out. We consulted with Sam right away, and he advised a wait-and-see approach. I guess the tribe doesn't know much more about werewolfy stuff than the vampires do.
Angela was gorgeous. I hadn't met her when she was human, but apparently, she'd been one of Bella's friends at school. She smelled terrible, and by the way she scrunched up her nose when she first woke, I didn't smell much better. But there was an instant connection between us. It didn't take me long to guess how I was going to vote on the life/death issue.
She took to being a vampire much better than Bella had. She had strong cravings, but with Emmett and Rosalie accompanying us the first couple of weeks, she acquired a taste for deer, and her eyes faded from bright red to a scarlet gold.
That's all the easy stuff, of course. A lot of mourning was going on. The town of Forks was positively distraught with the deaths of so many of the recently graduated class, and La Push wasn't far enough to be immune. It was going to take a long time for the area to recover.
I visited Charlie once. He knew nothing of Bella and Edward, and was anxious to know if I'd heard anything. I played the angry ex and told him to ask the Cullens. Apparently, they had this bull prepared about charity work in Africa that Charlie ate up with a spoon. I didn't think it'd satisfy him forever, but it worked for now.
Edward was burned in a pyre overlooking the beach at La Push. Sam actually pushed for it. He said he'd died trying to protect the town, which I wasn't sure I agreed with, but whatever. I don't think anyone could disagree that he'd died trying to stop Bella. Most of the Quiluetes showed up for the funeral, even Dad, who resented having to lie to Charlie about Bella. But it meant a lot to the Cullens.
The Cullens, by the way, were a complete wreck. Carlisle in particular. None of them spoke much whenever I was around Angela, who was getting Vampire 101 from them, but Carlisle had quit his job and stayed in the house all day and night. The only time I heard him talk was when he explained how he'd wanted to show that it was possible to live as a vampire in peace with humans, and this had destroyed everything they had worked for. I was surprised they didn't leave Washington entirely, but Angela told me that Edward's body had given them the perfect cover story. He'd died as a mortal, and they were going to use it. Me, I think that was a nice way of saying that Carlisle didn't want to leave.
And that was the least of it. Bella had left the area, which made the pack very happy, but the Cullens couldn't pursue her, since she could very easily kill anyone who tried. Emmett and Jasper talked seriously for a while with Sam and the tribe elders about sending a group to ambush her, since the theory was that she couldn't take them all at once. But they eventually decided to do that as a last resort, if she came back to the town. The whole world couldn't be protected, but we could keep a watch on this area of it.
Nothing happened for four months. I was lucky I had Angela; the imprint had left me blissful and practically unaware of the rest of the world. But I wasn't completely blind. Esme was nearly hysterical most of the time, worried over Bella and Carlisle. Even Emmett and Rosalie, who were apparently not the easiest to get to know, were trying to boost Esme's spirits. Alice and Jasper were barely at the house, since werewolves messed with Alice's vision, and she was trying to keep tabs on Bella.
Turned out her vision didn't help.
Someone from Alaska called Carlisle in the fourth month, and the Cullens rushed to La Push to update the wolves. There was a stronghold in Italy, and the group there was generally recognized as the ruler of all the vampires.
Or they had been, until the city was burned to the ground.
This ended up causing more problems for the Cullens than it solved. They were relieved at first, since they'd had the threat of execution hanging over their heads about Bella in general. But the number of vampire deaths they heard about grew, and I remembered all the talk about the new vampires when Victoria had been gunning for Bella. They started flying all over the world, quelling things where they could, and ended up becoming the new face of vampire justice.
A few months before Bella changed, I don't know what I would have done about all this. The Cullens, vampire kings of the world? And the Quiluetes allied with them, too. But I had seen what Bella had looked like with Edward's blood on her hands, and how much worse things could be. I was more than in love with one of the leeches, so that didn't hurt matters. I'd be lying if I wasn't glad that the Cullens weren't in town as much as they used to be, but I was generally okay with things.
Wolves and vampires, living happily ever after.
But that's not the end of the story.
Three years after Bella was turned, I was running the circuit around La Push and Forks. It didn't take long, especially since I knew it like the back of my hand, but it was a nice opportunity to stretch my legs. And if I did it quickly enough, I could catch the sunrise at the beach. I liked to do it with Angela, but she was in Japan with Carlisle and Esme, and I was here.
A vampire waited for me on the shore, and I knew her immediately.
I changed back immediately. “I wondered when you'd be back.”
The vampire turned. Sure enough, it was Bella. Her eyes glowed gold in the pre-dawn light. “I almost didn't come back at all.”
I chuckled. “I knew you would.”
“How can you say that?” she asked. Her voice reminded me of Edward's, and the way it got tortured every time he talked about Bella. “After what I did?”
“Angela told me.”
She blinked. “Angela?”
Right. She took off before that went down. “Angela was the only survivor of the camp attack. But she was bitten.”
Bella put her hands to her mouth. “Holy crow.”
“But it wasn't you.”
“What?”
I smiled. “She only told me, but she thinks - it was fast, so she isn't sure - Edward attacked them. You don't remember?”
“No,” she said, running a hand through her hair. “But Edward? He wouldn't.”
“Yeah, sure,” I said. “He was probably trying to save you from yourself, and you don't think that sounds like him?”
Her mouth quivered. “You didn't tell anyone else?”
“What's the point? Edward's...you know.”
She turned back toward the horizon. “Then Volterra was for nothing.”
“So that was you.”
“I was only trying to get them to kill me. But I didn't...have control, and I turned them. Turned them into humans. And the smell...” She hung her head. “You were right, Jacob.”
“About what?”
“Not to attack me. I would have killed you, too.”
I walked up to her. It was still weird, seeing her face and smelling that sour vampire scent. But it still felt right, in its own way.
I looked at her face again. “Your eyes are gold.”
“It seemed like the least I could do.” She laughed, a ragged sound. “I don't suppose you'd kill me now.”
I started to ask if she wanted to die, but I knew the answer. Edward was her Angela. It was stupid, and fucked up, but I got it now.
“This may sound weird, coming from me, but you're being too hard on yourself.” I stretched my arms in the air. “Carlisle's a Boy Scout, sure, but no one else has a perfect record.”
Bella looked at me out of the corner of her eye. “You talked to them about that?”
“Things have changed, Bella. A lot.”
“Yeah,” she whispered, putting a hand to her heart.
I sighed. “You have a control on that human whammy?”
“Finally.”
“Then I'll kill you if you want,” I said. “But I'd rather not.”
She looked up at the sky. False dawn was appearing. “You sound...peaceful.”
“Imprinting'll do that to a wolf.”
She nodded. “I could make you human. For good.”
Despite everything, I could feel my heart in my mouth. But I shook my head. “I have a place here. And that would take me out of it.”
Flakes of snow blew from the clouds overhead. It was a mark of how both of us had changed that neither of us shivered. Bella was too cold, and I was too hot, even naked and human.
“I guess this is goodbye,” she said.
“It doesn't have to be,” I replied. “It wouldn't be hard talking to the Cullens.”
She shook her head. “I couldn't. Carlisle and Alice, they probably loathe me. And I can't let them hate Edward.”
It wasn't anything less than I expected. And I'll be honest, it pissed me off a little. But just like I wasn't surprised to hear about Edward's intervention, I think it would have been weirder if she'd hadn't defended Edward, even at that point.
“We're both going to live a long time,” I said. “Maybe we should save our goodbyes for later.”
For the first time, Bella smiled. It looked like it broke her heart to do it, but it was a smile all the same. “Okay.”
We stood on the shore in silence until the first edges of pink tinged the horizon, and then she was gone.
Extended notes: First, a quick credit: bethanydonne is my source for the word "husboyfriend".
I started writing "Sunrise in Winter" in summer 2008, right before Breaking Dawn came out. There were guesses that I wanted to explore before the release, and I was also reasonably certain that Bella would become the full-fledged Sparkly Mary Sue SMeyer wanted her to be. Part of my love for vampire stories comes from the violent and bloodthirsty nature they're imbued with, and I was pretty sure Breaking Dawn would only include the so-called "positive" side of that. I wanted Bella and Edward to make bad choices based on instinct that would be fatal to others.
Of course, I didn't make the release date deadline I'd given myself, so some Breaking Dawn canon started making it into the series. I became completely fed up with the series -- not that I've ever been a huge fan -- thanks to the fail that was the end of BD and the barrage of advertisements that came along with the movie adaptation of Twilight, so I stopped working. It was only about a year after I started the fic that I even remembered to come back to it, and it turned out that I'd made it to the point where Jacob had come across Edward's corpse and Bella. Finishing it was quick work after that.
I was torn during edits. There was some improvements I wanted to make to earlier in the story, but considering a good part was written before I knew the final canon, I didn't want to fudge with that. I also liked some of the character choices I made, although Edward probably could have been more self-loathing. The main reason I decided to stop edits was because I wasn't sure what purpose I ultimately wanted this story to serve: parody, alternate ending, scathing critique, a mixture. I finally decided that I was thinking too hard and that it should speak for itself...even though I'm explaining myself later.
Readers might be wondering why I would write Twilight fanfic when I get more enjoyment mocking it than I do taking it at face value. It's the same reason I may write Anita Blake fanfic one day. Even though I strongly disagree with the author's take, there are some concepts worth exploring. The very essence of vampires has a million different paths to take: vampirism as a sexually-transmitted disease, the vampire's basic instincts serving as a metaphor for the human id, humanity's fixation with youth and immortality. Most vampire fiction is cheesy to some degree, so I might as well go with something I'm familiar with, even if I don't really like it.
Trigger warnings: Zhygvcyr punenpgre qrnguf, rkprffvir oybbq, tbel jbhaqf (translate)