The Masque of the Red Death By Jeesiechreesie

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5248764/1/

It thrummed and sang, whispered and danced.

It seeped into my veins and curdled in my gut.

Pulsating rhythms of its seductive heat made me thicken and drip.

Rushing, pounding, and beating, it called to me.

Drowning in it as it slashed through my insides.

The venom coated my teeth and sharpened my resolve.

It would be more potent to let it ripen.

To let her abject terror wash down my throat with every nimble sip.

Her blood would be mine.

As would she.

Once she begged, pleaded, demanded, and wept for my bite.

And she would.

The only question was how many would die first.

The utter silence of death permeated the air.

The heart sputtered to a lifeless halt, the lungs gasped their final breath, as the
brain fired its final synapses.

It was magnificently complicated and gloriously simple.

The last mouthful of pumped blood dulled the mind with ecstasy. The wind
seemed to cease, the birds hid, and the grass wilted.

Nature responded to my unnatural existence by turning its head; it mourned for
the stain of death on my hands through its stillness.

Even the ominous clouds sheltered the sun from shining on my monstrosity.

I had but seconds to savor the taste and revel in my kill before the sound and the
fury would sweep back through me.

Fleeing to the tree against the house, I perched and waited, allowing the drum of
long dead adrenaline to pump through me.

Pinpricks of crimson coated the cracks of the pathway to the door, where my
present awaited. Clumps of chemically treated brown hair hung from the door
panel of a 1960s VW Beatle. Strips of hemp weaved clothes lay tattered
throughout the yard. My advance sight could discern the faintest traces of gouges
from well-chewed nails against the front door.

I was unsure if she would spot the marks though. I would have to carve them out
further in the future. Perhaps leave a message. Assuming that the body didn't
speak for itself...

Muscles in my face twitched, curving upward into something I once remembered
to be a smile. Even I could recognize the beauty of my gift.

Its artistic value.

Filtered gray light advanced the pallor of the impending blue of her skin. Her
already dead eyes dried of all moisture in the desert heat. If I were fortunate, the
decadent perfume of her decay would hasten its arrival before she was found.

As ever, blood was my requiem. It was a fine art I had mastered decades ago,
learning the depth and breadth of the bites; the perfect placement of each. Even
satiated with feast I had just imbibed, the venom filled my mouth at its recall...

A long shallow cut of my teeth across her jugular. A nip at her wrists. A puncture
inside her thighs. A killing bite through her chest, deep enough to drink from the
superior vena cava, letting it pump each gulp straight from the source of her
heart.

The small cuts dribbled blood in Jackson Pollack splatters on and besides the
body. Her severed heart, spilled what little I had left undrunk, into platelet rivers.
It was mesmerizing to see it flowing around the body, rushing down the steps in
a red waterfall, only to pool serenely in a rivet of the concrete.

A roaring engine grumbling its way down the road, filled with stinking filthy
minded teenagers pulled my focus from my accomplishment.

She was coming.

My body leaned with its yearning for her, toward the bus. It stopped four houses
away, emptying its contents by only one. The one who had narrowed my entire
existence to sweetening her ever developing scent. Walking toward me, she
smelled of exhaust, cafeteria grease and the odoriferous rank of her fellow
students. It overwhelmed all of the pungent overtones that had drawn me to her.

She entered my line of sight, personifying everything about her dull stolid life;
her plebeian features, her steady heartbeat, and even breathing. In mere

seconds it would all change. All the simplistic aspects of her life would be
destroyed when she found what I had left for her.

When she unknowingly would begin to become mine.

Her nostrils flared, recognizing the scent of danger; her faced paled, sensing the
palpable feel of death. Hands trembled and her stomach audibly turned over.

She hadn't even seen it, and she knew. She knew what I had done for her.

The offbeat pounding of clumsy feet slapped against the pavement, as my foolish
girl ran towards me.

Once again, I was greeted with silence. Her breath and pulse stumbled over
themselves, halting at the sight before her.

I had left her speechless, but the sight and smells she emitted were far from
lackluster. Under the mask of shock were the telltale signs of horror. Within her
wise eyes was the precognition of her complete devastation.

I could bathe in her deliciousness. I could quench my raging thirst with the
stench of her fear. I would replay the sound of her breath returning and her
racing pulse, as her lungs filled with air.

Her screams would satisfy me in the long days until she walked willingly into my
path.

The image of her soaked in blood; it coagulating on her hands, drying in her hair,
and coating her mouth as she attemped CPR, would tide me over.

Bella choked on her vomit, tears and mucous washing down her face as she
clutched her dead mother's body. The mother who had dared to criticize her
daughter's eating habits this morning. Her insinuations had forced my hand. Bella
had to know I would never allow anyone to stand in our path.

And she would. Eventually.

Until then, I could wait.

She would arrive shortly in Forks to reside with her only surviving parent.

Surviving for now, that is...

2.

She came.

Humans were nothing if not predictable. With a catch in her throat, and a tear in
her eye she'd flown off to her distant father and into the palms of my hand.
Gaunt and pale, she settled into her new routine; serving her wastrel parent,
keeping her nose down at school, and frantically trying to scrub her mother's
blood from her mouth.

Some spots never do come out...

The vision of the crimson stain on her lips had sustained me over the last month.
It linked us. For I knew she saw it, tasted it, lived it every time she closed her
eyes. Soon she would learn who to associate the sensations with, and it would be
my name she whimpered in the night.

For now she cried for her mother; waking in cold sweat, terror outlining her brow.
She may not have known it, but the nights were ours. Perched in another tree,
outside a different bedroom I kept watch. I reveled in our reminiscing of my
fateful first gift, and anxiously awaited the time to present her with another. If
my instincts were right, tomorrow might finally grant such an opportunity.

After all, the seaside was a dangerous place indeed...

She'd succumbed to the call of her peers.

Even after so brief a time, the feeble mind begins to forget. Mourning and terror
give way to self-sustaining lies; that the dead would want them to go on living.
The dead feel no such sentiment; whether they're blanketed by the earth or still
walking above it. We remain static while the living change. They move away from
our death not out of respect, but to escape from existing beside us in a still-life
frame.

Little did they know we were still there behind them, watching from not quite
afar.

Bella proved herself to be as human as the rest. Her mother's blood spray might
continue to coat her eyelids at night, but she had returned to the land of the
animated. The soon-to-be-even-smaller Forks High junior class sprawled
themselves across the sand, soaking up the few rays of sun slipping through the
rain clouds. Their mindless chatter drifted over the surf to my spot in the dense
underbrush of First Beach.

She sat astride a piece of driftwood, swamped in an oversize Forks PD jacket.
She'd acquiesced to join them out of misguided loneliness, but remained aloof in
their presence. I almost wished she would speak, if only to hear the timidity that
I had spawned in her voice. Yet her reticence was perhaps all that kept these
miscreants alive. I hardly appreciated their attempt to lure her away from me.

She too resented their meddling; their inability to understand that she was
already caught in the clutches of another. In the middle of one of the eager
children's sentences, she clomped away from them. Already absurdly clumsy, the
laceless shoes she wore further handicapped her on the unstable surface. The
sand sucked her shoes off her heels, before flipping them back up, flinging sand
into the eyes of a rail thin blond.

Venom flooded my throat at my anticipation of what was to come. Vapid little
twits with sinful thoughts about others rarely held kindness in their shrunken
hearts. Invectives spewed from her filthy mouth when the sand hit her. Banshee
screeches emitted from her as she barreled straight into Bella's path. Emaciated
shoulders, fueled with the outrage of the slighted, knocked into her and sent her
face first into the sand.

Bella laid there, the wet grains scouring her skin, filling her mouth and burning
her eyes, and didn't budge. One day she would be prostrated before me begging;
until then, anyone who tried to usurp me would be meticulously eliminated;
starting with the shrew.

Nature abhors an imbalance, and always seeks to fill the vacuum it creates.

In her anger, the insipid blond stepped over Bella as if she were no more
important than the shoes she was kicking off in her march to the ocean.
Muttering about socially inept orphans, she stole the surfboard from an empty
minded brunette, and threw herself into the turbulent surf.

A feral grin spread across my face. When opportunity arose it was unwise to
ignore it.

There was no need to dart furtively across the beach; none of their blinded eyes
could focus rapidly enough to see me. A quick dive and I was submerged in the
murky water. Neither the cold nor the wet could hinder a creature stronger,
faster, and more powerful than anything nature could create. Especially not
compared to the girl attached to the hands splashing and scooping water onto
herself. It was almost insulting how simple it would be. Neoprene clad legs gave
way to orange tinted feet dangling on either side of the board. She was a ripe
morsel merely waiting to be plucked.

Powerful strokes sent me ghosting through the depths, shooting underneath her
with the silent efficiency of the predator who would be accused of my misdeeds. A
squeeze of my fingers, and a flick of my wrist jolted her from her perch, and sank
her plastic wrapping to the sea floor. She'd hardly comprehended the change of
temperature before my teeth sank through her femoral artery.

Death has many flavors. Spicy rich heat can permeate the body. The fervor of
their terrified screams. The rush of decadent pleasure as they struggle and plead
for a forgotten God's mercy. The splash of their fear tainted blood as it fills your
stomach. The succulent knowledge that the kill would reverberate through the
fools left behind…that even until the day their short meaningless lives end, they
will still see the magnificently mutilated corpse left behind. To know they will
always see their face upon it.

Renee, the shallow busybody of a mother had that death. Hers was a glorious kill
designed to titillate and tease her beloved daughter.

The girl whose name gurgled through the water as Lauren, did not die in such a
manner. She did not deserve to offer me the thrill of death. Salt tainted her
venereal disease ridden blood, scorching my throat and maliciously preventing
me any satisfaction. Even in her death she was selfish.

This was a cold death. No warmth ran through me satiating my thirst. No feeling
of triumph in her defeat. She was not the kind of girl you savored, but rather the
one you spat out to rid yourself of the aftertaste.

It was as calculated as balancing an equation; her life for the slight she gave to
what was mine.

Desiring no more of this wasted thin-blooded Lauren, my face delved deeper
inside her thigh. I mauled her; ripping through her flesh, slicing through muscle
and chewing through bone. Every mouthful of her underfed body was spat back
into the bloodied water. Her thrashing and screaming only sped her demise as
she bled faster and flooded her lungs.

She gasped and soundlessly screamed, swallowing the swirling blood and floating
gristle. She kicked and fought; the thigh trapped within my teeth only gave way
more readily with her efforts. Even necessity could beget amusement, so I freed

her, chuckling as the dead weight of a flailing limb dragged behind her. She
frantically tried to swim through the swarm of muscle tissue and bone, gulping in
her own blood in the quest for the surface. In hopes of escaping the unknown
beast she could hardly bring herself to call a man.

The idle humor turned to boredom. All that kept her leg attached was one final
muscle, one last bite to sever it. Her breath had run out and her pulse was weak;
her imminent death read in her eyes. The last synapse of her still cognizant mind
stuttered and failed to produce her plea for it to end. The barely alive body
drifted to me, delivered directly to my arms. Her depthless mind registered only
her pain, and none of the beautiful symbolism of the payment she had forced me
to collect.

No metaphors remain in the thoughts of dying, only trite misbegotten desires for
longer lives filled with love and money; all saccharine interpretations of
happiness. Rarely do they pause to wish to have been better people for any other
reason than final efforts to reach heaven.

Her insipid life was too far gone for her to grasp what it meant to be a victim.
How it felt to be the one flicking sand in mean girls' faces. For her to know that
for every action there was an equal and opposite reaction; an eye for eye. Be it
by God or science's law, if she were cognizant as she died, she would have known
what it meant to be knocked down.

Life seeped out of her as effortlessly as she lived it; quickly and without meaning.
Her only purpose left was as my vow to Bella.

The bedraggled hair provided an ample handle by which to drag the body.
Remaining under water, I swam it to the shore break only to release it into the
waves. The mangled body rose up the swell, and hung precariously from the tip
before careening into the barrel, capping the froth with a rosy hue. It disappeared
in the undertow before being coughed out, and pushed up the beach with the
rising tide.

The corpse rolled to a stop. The remaining leg bent unnaturally while the
eviscerated carcass of the other pointed upward. Wide lifeless eyes stared
through the person sitting at the edge of the tidal line.

Already she knew me and anticipated my needs.

There Bella kneeled awaiting my gift.

Soggy shoes had been left to dry outside her stoop. I pulled from my pocket a set
of laces, still gritty from the sand I had removed them from. Quickly I strung
them through the eyelets, meticulously careful to not leave them too loose.

It would hardly do for Bella to injure herself.

And it wasn't as if the dead blond would need them anymore.

3.

All eyes had descended upon this dull town. Media outlets desperate to peddle
paranoia and fear, flocked to Forks. Tales of the child-eating shark spread across

the country, while inefficient signs were posted to ward off swimmers. Beaches
emptied, and mothers' lectured in frivolous attempts to delude themselves of
their children's safety. They clung to the security of terra firma, and the
misguided belief that it would provide sanctuary.

Through the mask of shock they preened for the cameras and spoke of tragedy;
how truly terrible they felt for her parents. She really was such a nice girl.

In the markets and from their living rooms they whispered:

"That Swan girl, she'll never recover from her mother's death now."

"Poor Charlie, how does he help a girl chased by death?"

Cameras stalked her, sensing a special interest story. Here was the girl whose
mother had been brutally murdered; which the police had no leads on, and who
found another mutilated body washed ashore. The media always loved tragedies.

"The story of Bella Swan is a terrible tale to tell...unfortunately her father has
made her unavailable for comments. The Chief of Police in Forks has expressed
his wishes that her privacy be protected for the sake of her delicate mental
health. A request we will of course respect..."

Her father hung up on the flurry of doctors calling with an offer to fix her. He
balked at their descriptive phrases; "Post Traumatic Stress Disorder," "shock,"
"broken inside." Each number was left unwritten, every voice mail deleted, all
business cards were thrown away. Nothing was wrong with his daughter that
couldn't be fixed at home. Time would heal all her wounds.

He was a good man, that Charlie Swan.

Starved reporters camped around the perimeter of the high school to catch
twenty second clips of feigned emotion. Bella stood in the parking lot, shielded
from prying lenses and fake sympathy. Her face relayed little; neither the tragic
past nor any sign of emotion flickered in her empty eyes. If not for the neatly tied
shoes she wore, I would've accused her of being unappreciative of my efforts. But
I knew her ambivalence was a sign of her faith in me; her intrinsic knowledge
that, as her neighbors whispered, death followed her, kindly stopping only for
her.

Tires squealed as an incompetent child swerved his battering ram of a van away
from the line of cameras. Even from a distance his distraction was clear from the
pen in his hand and notebook covering the steering wheel. It would be unlikely
that the vehicle would miss the bystanders. This Tyler, who saw his short life
flash through his mind, would be doing me a great service, eliminating the
pariahs hindering my access to the girl still buried in her book. For all intents and
purposes he was providing breakfast and a show...

Gratitude, so rarely meant, can turn sinister and self-serving as quickly as the
turn of a wheel. Through a miraculous feat of Detroit engineering, the van swung
wide of the media; the severity of the turn effectively locking the breaks. Its
driver, deluded by the joy of death's reprieve, released the steering wheel and
covered his eyes, hyperventilating his thanks be to God. Basic laws of motion had
clearly skimmed off the surface of his thick mind: an object in motion remains so
until acted upon by an unbalanced force, which had yet to occur, thusly keeping it
propelling forward.

The target of the unwieldy car shifted as did any hope of young Tyler living
through the morning. He had failed, as everyone else had, to see Bella. So easily
they passed her by, and to the man they would pay for it with a pound of flesh.

A timely leap from the forest landed me in the path of the van. Another put me
through its window, and vehicular manslaughter in my mind. The hapless jock
whose hands still covered him, wasn't even cognizant of my presence. He was too
busy muttering the prayers of thanks to his savior.

He didn't bother to pause and contemplate the hypocrisy; he'd not stepped foot
in a pew since Sunday school a decade earlier, nor ever pontificated the state of
his immortal soul. Instead he drew in shaken gulps of air and thanked his Lord he
wasn't responsible for killing dozens, nor meeting the same fate himself.

My guttural growl, too savage to be from anything but a creature from the pits of
hell, reverberated through the interior with the force of a sonic blast. Windows
shattered, raining shards of glass into the boy. Shallow cuts bloomed burgundy
splotches across his shirt. Thick pieces of glass embedded into his forearms
created small tributaries, bleeding into the splatter. As he finally opened his eyes
to the red Rorschach test upon his chest, his gracious thanks turned to a damning
curse.

Even still, his fickle faith didn't help him see the girl standing mere yards away.
She too would answer to me, but first he would feel a blinding death.

The pen he had deemed too imperative to drop, twirled around my pale fingers.
My rage begged its release, but time was of the essence, and the torture's
deadline required it to make a lasting impression. Though it hardly meant I
wouldn't cherish every muscle spasm, limb twitch, or tremble that overtakes a
body as it reaches its pain threshold. I would bring him to that precipice and
leave him on that plateau, terrified of what would come next and yet past the
point of being able to prevent it. He would feel the stages of death, and none
would come quick or painless.

Gripping his face drenched in cold sweat and hot blood, I raised the pen to his
eye. It dilated and leaked, unable to close with my finger pulling back their lids.
Millimeter, by agonizingly slow millimeter, the pen drew closer to terror filled
pupils. His mutterings turned to screams, swinging from pleas to swears, as the
tip pushed into his corneal lens. Perhaps to a human there would have been a
feel of resistance before it seemingly popped with the pressure. That pleasure
was denied to me; it entered his eye as easily as a ray of light. My only
enjoyment came from the sound as I gave the pen a final twist and the eye
exploded forth like the intestines of a crushed insect, viscous fluid dripping from
the socket.

His depth perception now shot, he would be unaware of how rapidly the last
moment of his life would arrive. That was assuming of course, that he could think
past the pain, which if his current thoughts purveyed any hint, it was
unfortunately unlikely. Judging the rate of speed and distance traversed, the van
would reach Bella in fifteen seconds. Leisurely sliding out the blown-out window, I
dropped to the asphalt near the heap of junk metal disguised as her vehicle. A
step to the left put me directly into her path for the first, but certainly not last
time.

Grabbing a fistful of the hideous jacket she hid herself with, I pulled her with me
behind her truck. Shoving my shoulder against the fender, the behemoth truck
spun perpendicular to the oncoming van. Leaning casually against it with Bella

frozen in surprise against my chest, I didn't bother to brace for the impending
impact. I merely turned us around to enjoy the spectacle.

Putting the slightest pressure upon the truck turned it into the unmovable force,
steady enough to crush the van. The carelessly unbuckled boy was flung out the
windshield upon collision. Screams of panic filled the air as bystanders heard the
crash, and saw their beloved quarterback learning to fly. Screeching metal
collapsed upon itself as he sailed over the truck, and landed head first into the
concrete mere feet away, the pen now firmly lodged into his brain.

The sound of hundreds of onlookers rushing this way gave me very little time to
inflict the severity of my ire upon Bella. It barely gave me more than seconds to
savor the succulent aroma of her blood, made all the more poignant by her close
proximity. The heat of her flesh sunk into my own, making me dizzy with her
presence. It twisted and curled in my gut, battling with the harsh lump of rage at
her obliviousness. Everything about this girl made me burn, and her
irresponsibility nearly stole that from me; a mistake she would never be allowed
to repeat. Nothing would take her from me, not even herself.

Spinning her around to face me, her eyes knowingly met mine for the first time.
She showed no sign of recollection, of trauma over the recent turn of events, nor
even surprised to find herself in a stranger's clutch. I shook her frail body, barely
withholding a furious growl.

"Are you slow or deliberately obtuse?"

She blinked up at me, unused to anyone using such a severe tone with her.

"If you don't learn to pay attention, death's not going to just follow you, it's going
to capture you in its grasp and never let you go. Wake the fuck up, Bella. Make
them see you."

A hint of awareness passed quickly across her face, the first sign of emotion
outside of her late night gasps of her mother's name. She turned away to stare at
the body at our feet, a strange burst of laughter bubbling out of her, building into
a crescendo that cursed the heavens above with its dark sound. I released her
and began to turn away as she quietly spoke.

"That's my pen."

Rusted dented metal was parked outside the Swan house, its fender bruised but
still running; its owner resting fitfully in her bed above. Our relationship had
evolved today, deeming it appropriate that our closeness did as well. Her open
window relayed our shared mentality on the subject. Abandoning my tree I slid
into her room, breathing in the slightly diluted musk of a teenage female and her
potent blood. Her clothes lay flung across the chair of her tidy desk. Neatly
stacked books, spines rigidly intact and pages unturned, rested on her bookshelf.
Only three things existed in the room that she could lay claim to; her scent,
herself, and the diary that I mistook as a book earlier today. All of which she
willingly offered to me, through her open window, uncovered body and the
journal open and waiting for me across her chest. Not one to deny her gift, I read
the rushed entry.

"He saw me. He didn't see my murdered mother or the corpses piling at my feet.
He didn't notice my blood stained hands or my one foot buried in the grave. He
saw me and he saved me, and I don't even know his name."

Pulling the recently stolen pen from my pocket, I wiped off the worst of the dried
mucous and blood. After jotting a quick note, I placed it inside the journal and
closed it, bookmarking my message, and slid it into her book-bag. Ask and she
shall receive.

I believe this belongs to you.

~ Edward Cullen

4.

All doors were locked, windows closed, and shades drawn. No lights lit up the
house, nor was there any sign of inhabitance. The news vans and camera crews
surrounding it were broadcasting live in hopes of catching a glimpse of the girl
who brought death to the town of Forks.

She had been sequestered in the house since shortly after I had left the previous
evening. The media followed the Chief home, desperate for a comment on the
death of yet another young Forksian. Charlie refused to answer and stormed into
his house, shutting the outside world out. He left only to for work, wading
through the reporters knee deep in his yard. The school had closed until the
funeral in an attempt to clean the boy's body off the pavement. Their now semi-
permanent grief counselors advised them to plant two trees in memorial in the
place that he had died. When the students returned, they'd have an arbitrary
median with exorbitantly large trees in the middle of the parking lot for them to
swerve around. Young Tyler's legacy would live on for generations.

The consequences of these events had brought an unexpected twist in my plans.
We could hardly move forward if I had no access to her. Cameras trained on her
window in front of the house prevented me from sneaking in, while the battened
down house gave me no ability to watch her. Closing the school further kept me
at bay, and I still had a weekend before it reopened. Unless she made her
unwelcome presence known at the funeral, I had no access to her for days on
end. Snapping the branches from the tree I was hidden in deep in the woods, I
jumped to the ground. I had thwarted myself, and every damn tree would pay as
I stormed back to the house in the outer recesses of the forest.

A large white mansion stood sequestered among the trees, having only been
reopened for the first time in nearly a century. Outdated furnishings outfitted the
rooms, the only sign of modernity residing in the large television attuned to the
local news, projecting a live feed of Bella's home. There was no need to stand
guard when the rubber-necking tendencies of humanity would do it for me.

Rattling noises ensued from the overly formal dining room table. The cell phone
buzzed against the polished mahogany, leaving bouncing scratches across the
top. Groaning I flipped it open and brought it to my ear.

"It's not polite to play with your food, Edward."

"I see you've been being a voyeur again."

A darkly amused laugh filtered through the phone.

"You've hardly kept your intentions a secret. Leaving the girl presents? Is that
really necessary? Eat her and be done with it."

"Need I remind you that you met your wife after she'd left an entire asylum for
dead? Or our sister's fateful trip to the woods? How did she describe it? 'I wanted
him so I took him?' There's hardly room for any judgment."

"Still touchy, I see. Well hurry up, we've moved near an abbey and we'd like your
particular brand of...expertise."

"While that certainly sounds tempting, my singer will suffice for now."

The jesting tone quickly sobered.

"That does change things. How the hell is she still alive?"

"Unlike the rest of you, I have self-control."

"Do you have any idea what they taste like? Drain her and enjoy it."

"All in due time, Jasper. She's not ready yet."

Sun drenched the newly planted trees, as forlorn Forks High students returned to
its halls. Heads sunk low into their chests, tears drenched their eyes, and fingers
brushed against the two forever empty lockers. They clung together in their grief,
forming lines outside the counselor's office, and passing tissues in the halls. Stoic
jocks clapped each other on the back as they all wore their quarterback's number
on their arms. They were unified in their mourning, and in their resounding
avoidance of Bella.

Seas of students parted as she stepped through the halls. No one dared look in
her eyes, nor attempted to speak to her. Superstition, widely disdained, could
form in the hearts and minds of the fearful at a moment's notice. Whispers
followed in her wake, declaring their unease with her as readily as if she wore a
scarlet 'A' across her chest. Empty desks separated her from all her classmates
and even teachers gave her a wide berth. Small towns and small minds had
always harbored superstition; the date of the century hardly mattered.

Bella kept to herself, not engaging them, but refusing to avoid them. Even in
Phoenix, before she received my first gift, she had not stood as straight or walked
as tall. She wasn't shrinking in corners, or inhaling mouthfuls of sand. They could
avoid her, but she was an obstacle they must walk around, not a shadow to step
through.

The day continued as such until lunch, when Bella went to the library instead of
the cafeteria. I could hardly blame her for wanting to eat in peace, without the
watchful eyes of the school checking for eye of newt in her sandwich. Her
decision presented me with a perfect opportunity, one I would hardly hesitate to
take. She sat sequestered in a back corner scribbling in her diary. Sliding into the
seat across from her, I waited for her to notice me. She looked up before I had
even propped my feet on the chair beside me. Her face showed no sign of being
startled. Yes, we had most certainly become closer.

"Thank you for replacing my pen, Edward."

I picked it up and twirled it around my fingers, recalling the satisfying splatter it
had made as I pulled it from his socket.

"It was my pleasure. I abhor rudeness; there's no excuse for him not returning
it."

Bella's head tilted curiously, neither condemning nor forlorn.

"Well he's dead now, so etiquette lessons are a bit pointless now."

I chuckled at her matter of fact statement. Life had been simplified for Bella and
she'd begun to finally realize it. Life and death, black and white, stasis and
change...everything was one or the other. The gray was lifting.

"Yes, I recall that quite vividly."

"So why are you talking to the girl who supposedly commands death?"

I smirked at her, enjoying the depth of her little joke, and that she had no idea
how apt it was.

"Because I'm smart enough to know you align yourself with that kind of power,
you don't thwart it."

A shy smile lit her face, and a matching blush enhanced it.

"You think I'm powerful?"

"'Better to be feared than loved.' Controlling their fear controls them."

The bell rang and Bella excused herself, the glow never leaving her cheeks.

The tedium of following Bella throughout high school was nearly as trying as my
laughable attempts at 'vegetarianism.' How my abandoned maker had ever
thought it wise to gaze upon these hot bodies, plump full of rich decadence, and
turn the other cheek eluded me. These weren't souls worth preserving; their
thoughts were duplicitous and lives meaningless. Even at their best they were
selfish pigs, hiding it with a veneer of false kindness.

Cloaked in the shadows of the bleachers, I watched the ever exuberant class
president attempt to engage with Bella. He approached as if he were a diplomat
bearing peaceful accords; 'On behalf of the student body, we would like to no
longer shun you...'. All lies of course. The social vacuum had opened with the
death of the quarterback and the class slut, and this Mike intended to fill it. His
entreaty with the 'freak show' made him appear fearless, made others look to
him, and he could offer guidance in this time of need. He twisted his class ring in
apprehension, thinking the emblem with the seal of the student government gave
him power, and attempted to chase all anxiety from his voice.

"Bella, right? We're going to play ball outside, you should come with us and let
the sun get rid of that paleness!"

The pink on her face brightened to a harsh crimson, as her eyes furrowed in fury.
The ball in her hands was flung at his face, missing widely, and brushed off his
shoulder. She vibrated with her anger, and the boy's fear revitalized her. With his
every step backward she followed him, butting him against the stands, spitting
mad as she got in his face.

"Does my paleness make you uncomfortable? Does it remind you of death? Of a
cold body lying lifeless in front of you? Have you ever seen them? That blue tint
they take on as the blood leaks out? Lauren's body was grey though, about the
same color as your jacket. My mother's body was red; perhaps it was the blood
smeared across her. None of them were pale though."

She took a step back, her finger jabbing into his quaking chest; the sharp tonality
fading to casualness in her voice.

"Watch yourself. I see death every time I close my eyes, and look what they say
about me. You see it with your eyes wide open..."

The overly eagerly boy scampered away with his proverbial tail tucked between
his legs. The silent gymnasium scattered away from Bella, studiously avoiding
eye contact. Trembling she sank to the ground, her energy spent, her job done.

She'd spoken her peace.

Humans had deluded themselves for years with the mistaken notion of their
superiority. How something so tragically weak and feeble could dominate the food
chain was proof only of God's bitter sense of humor. Congratulations, their
evolution of opposable thumbs and ability to sharpen a stick had caused the
animal kingdom to shiver in fear.

Yet for all their clever innovations they lived and stank of unease. Their skin
crawled while the back of their toothpick spines tingled. Adrenaline glands flooded
numbness in their extremities, counteracting their dormant instincts to flee.
Instead they held their breath in an attempt to silence themselves; to blend in to
their surroundings. Survival was rarely achieved through the diminished brain
capacity of oxygen deprivation. And so they stood frozen, no more courageous
than a lamb in the jaws of a lion.

All because I was in their presence.

Prey always recognized the predator that would harbinger its death.

Just as the wide eyed boy wetting himself before me did now.

Shamed by the unspeakable girl, he had sought refuge in the quiet of the locker
rooms. He sat huddled in the showers, trying to purge the chill of fear with the
scalding water. This Mike knew cowardice, he lived with it hidden inside himself,
covered by gregarious smiles and aggrandized titles. Given the chance between
flight or flight, he would flee every time. Except for now, while his inner alarm of
impending peril blared throughout his whole body, he sat paralyzed, and the
stench of hot urine flooded the stall.

He was a waste of humanity, but through his death he would offer the perfect
sign of congratulations to Bella. To show her that if she willed it, I would provide
it. If she desired Mike to see death, who was I to deny her?

Even for Bella, I wouldn't let his tainted blood in my mouth. Moving behind him,
he didn't shift away from me, but remained in his quivering ball, seemingly
thinking a lack of movement would keep me from seeing him. A groan of tedium
escaped me; there would be no fun to be had with this boy. A few quick slashes
would suffice.

The inside of my nails were sharper than the finest of Toledo swords. Catching
them between the folds of his scrunched double chin, I exerted minimal pressure
dragging them across his whimpering throat, slicing his carotid artery. The
wounds were deep enough to beget an immediate blood spill, coating the boys
soaked shirt, washing into a diminished pink, and swirling down the drain. As he
croaked and sputtered it flowed quicker, bubbling out of his mouth. Over the
years I had learned the exacting precision of the depth of cuts. Too high or low

with a deep incision and they would choke on their own blood, rapidly drowning
to death. While the theatrics were amusing, the heart gave out too quickly to
keep the blood pumping out the wounds.

Yanking him out of his fetal position, I ripped his pants and repeated the process
at his femoral artery. Unfortunately he would fade quickly, as he spilled his vital
fluid until there was nothing left to pump. He twitched and groaned, unable to
speak without spraying blood. His mind remained active, focusing on a vision of
Bella sending Death to seize him. If his mind gave me a sickle and black cloak,
creative licensing could be forgiven. Even in final moments, a person seeks to
explain and rationalize, to inflict a motive and understanding of who, what and
why. For the class president, as the bloodletting paled his tan skin to an eerily
similar shade to Bella's, saw the Reaper coming to sow his soul.

His eyes remained open as his life faded to a colorless existence, while hues of
red pooled with the water washing it away.

The school, which had only been reopened for six hours, was rapidly closed again,
for an indeterminable amount of time. It took a lot, after all, to locate and plant
another new tree.

The Chief, incapable of handling a murder, rapidly called in the Feds, and
breathed a sigh of relief Bella had not found the latest body. He rushed his
daughter home, careful to keep her away from prying lenses and probing agents,
and locked in the house, perhaps indefinitely. Settling into his armchair, he fell
asleep, smug that the filthy piranhas were bothering the FBI now.

Climbing through the wide open window, I found Bella firmly succumbed in her
slumber. Neither restlessness nor murmurs hindered her. Once again her diary
laid open for me, her pen keeping the pages from flipping in the light breeze.

"The social workers gave me this diary to write about Renee's death. They figured
since I wouldn't talk to them that they could sluff off their responsibility by giving
me an outlet to take with me. Blank pages to fill with the fears of an orphan
crying herself to sleep at night. No longer. Edward Cullen changed everything."

An entire book devoted to me. I was its exegesis and years from now it would be
my magnum opus.

Placing the class ring in the palm of her hand, I knew I had to give credit where it
was due.

You were magnificent.

~ Edward

5.

Forks began to resemble a pressure cooker. The inane mindless lives of its
residents were falling apart all around them. The fibers of their individuality broke
down to their basest nature as they became pack animals united through a
solitary mind. They reeked of fear and superstition, and as the pressure rose to
its boiling point, the pot sang. It whistled Bella Swan's name to every FBI Agent
in town.

"Everybody knows Bella did it. She told him he was going to die in front of the
whole gym!"

"I don't know how, but I bet she killed the others. A shark in Forks? Since when?"

"She found her mom dead, that had to make her a little messed up. I don't know
if she's killing people, but I won't be turning my back on her."

Lines formed outside the dilapidated police department, students and parents
alike itching to recount their tale of the event they had not witnessed. They gave
their condolences to Charlie for his disturbed daughter, and went on their merry
way. Testifying their supposition, they felt secure in the knowledge that Lady
Justice would balance the scales. All clamored for Bella to be locked up with the
key forgotten; whether the cell be padded or cement, they hardly minded. But
they weren't judgmental, they 'understood her circumstances' and really, "anyone
would go a little..well, nuts."

All the while the FBI agents scrambled around, reviewing evidence, taking notes,
and always theorizing. Theorizing who could have slit carotid and femoral arteries
of a stout six foot teenage boy. Theorizing what had happened to that pen which
had been logged into evidence before disappearing from a zipped cadaver bag
Theorizing whether it was a coincidence that a shark victim landed directly at the
feet of the girl who had just been bullied.

They questioned their theories and theorized their queries. The only action their
inaction begot was a unilateral agreement that they needed more information.

The red tape of bureaucracy was a beautiful thing.

The Chief's desire to remove himself from responsibility was impossible. The FBI
required his full cooperation and felt the locals would be more prone to approach
someone they knew. So he sat by as they accused his daughter of cursing their
town and kept quiet. His only interference lay in trying to keep Bella out of the
prying hands of an FBI profiler. His mind revealed his distrust of psychology, of
having someone pry into his mind and find his deepest secrets, twisting them into
deviant motives of how distant fathers turned you into a depraved serial killer.
No, no one would get into the head of his daughter.

Compromises had to be made. The school couldn't remain closed forever, but
students were too scared to sit in classrooms with Bella. Loopholes were found to
avoid the legalities of keeping a student out of school, and as a person of interest
in an investigation, she would be kept securely in her father's custody. Her father
who stayed far from her accusatory eyes, under the guise of protecting her from
the town's malicious intent. She would remain indefinitely isolated, but not
necessarily alone.

The reporters were all safely nestled outside the police department, hoping to
catch an official statement, and had finally left the Swan residence in peace. This
reprieve led to Bella roaming the woods, far from any lingering prying eyes. She
walked among the shadows humming morbid melodies to herself. Unable to
resist, I stepped from the trees and into her line of sight. She startled for anyone
else, but never for me. She recognized her match.

"Who did you have to kill to get out of school?"

Chuckling darkly I leaned against a tree mere feet from her. Her scent and heat
emanated from her, enveloping me in her presence. I had known from the

beginning I would enjoy the chase, the sweetness of the terror in her veins. Her
succulent blood had enraptured me from the start, but she had been but a pawn.
Now she was her own player, and while the opportunity presented itself, I had no
desire to end our little game. The venom clung to my teeth, itching to sink into
her, but the amusement she'd brought me was far too valuable. As Jasper had
said, it was impolite to dawdle with your food, but what does one do when it
wants to play?

"Just a few people...it doesn't take much when you're not enrolled."

Puzzled she ceased her inspection of the hollow tree and sat on a fallen log,
turning all her attention on me.

"How do you know me then?"

Clever girl.

"You could say that I'm always around. There's not much that I miss."

A hint of a shudder swept over her as recognition dawned in her eyes before
fading back into the recesses. In the softest of unspoken whispers I felt her say,
"but the ring...," and then all was quiet again.

"There's something strange about you. The girl I used to be tells me I should
care, but I don't. I've got nothing left, and right now you're the closest thing I
have to a friend. Unless you count this tree. It's already dead, so it doesn't have
to worry about me killing it."

"Is that how you think of me? As your friend? I'm almost hurt."

"Mother, 'friend,' bitchy classmates...it's all the same. Doesn't seem to make
much difference if they matter to me or not. One-by-one, all in a row, they all fall
down.

She'd set up small rocks standing upright before flicking the one at the end and
watching the domino effect as she spoke.

"And what role do you play? Are you the last to fall or the one who pushed
them?"

Rage flashed in her eyes and excitement matched it in my chest.

"So you're no different than the rest. Blame the small, weak girl for tearing off a
girl's leg in the middle of the ocean, for stabbing a pen through the eye of boy in
a moving vehicle, for draining the blood of a boy twice her size, and eating out
her mother's heart. What'd you do, save me so you'd have longer to gawk? Well
here I am, enjoy the damn show."

"Believe me I am."

She snarled, throwing herself against me, her hot breath puffing out of her as she
tried to intimidate me the same way she had poor Mike. Her stature made the
dead boy's fear of her laughable, but size was rarely demonstrative of power.
This girl held it inside her, and watching her learn how to wield it was glorious.

"You know I didn't kill them, and you know what happened to Mike. Whoever's
doing this...whether it be, God, Satan, fate, or some sick bastard, it is still
coming, and it always will. I'm the end and the beginning and anything standing
in between will be taken out. I can't save them, but you helped me so I'll return
the favor."

She dug into her pocket, pulling out the ring and holding it out for me.

"Get away from me while you still can."

Touching her hand for the first time I marveled at the differences between us and
that she didn't remotely jolt at the chill. Passing the ring back to her, I covered
her fingers and clenched them into a fist around it.

"Didn't your mother teach you it's rude to return a gift?"

Her breath caught and her eyes hardened before a smirk tugged at her lips.

"The only thing she ever taught me was dead or alive she can still ruin my life."

Returning her sarcastic smile, I relinquished her hand.

"Oh the woes of teen angst."

Unexpected laughter bubbled out of her as she stepped back and began to twirl
with her head thrown back. Round and round she went, giggling to the heavens
as the sky opened, pouring down upon us.

"It can't wash it away you know."

She paused, still eerily smiling.

"Nothing can, but if you're not laughing you're crying."

Watching Bella unravel became the highlight of my days. I had little interest in
gathering more trinkets for her pleasure. Because they were unnecessary. She
was as intrigued with my presence as I was hers; casual reminders of the death
she felt lurking around the corner made her all the more dependent. She called
us friends, but she was wrong. We were bound together by blood and death, by
the shared experience of isolation, and the darkness I felt her succumbing to.

Very soon, she would embrace it and she would be ready.

Giving up the pretense of normality, I ascended her tree to enter her room in the
middle of the afternoon. She'd not been in the forest waiting for me as normal.
Irritation filled me at her disappointing actions, and I failed to notice the presence
of someone other than Bella in her room. On the bed, where I sat every evening
reading her journal, was a dark haired girl with thoughts so compassionate it
made me nauseous.

Her arms were wrapped around Bella's stiff form, stroking her hair, and ignoring
the twitches her actions begot. Every light pat on the shoulder or caress caused
Bella to shake and jerk away, as uncomfortable with her niceness as I was
watching it. Never once had she responded to me in such a manner; in the way
all other humans would. No, it was the empathy of another person that made her
shudder away uncomfortably, not the darkness of an other.

"You can't give into it Bella. Hiding in your house and threatening those who try
to be nice to you will only pull you under. Ask for and grant forgiveness, give
thanks that you've been spared."

Scoffing, Bella reared back, staring incredulously at the kindly girl.

"You have a strange interpretation of what warrants gratitude, Angela."

Unfazed she continued to speak, ignoring the outburst.

"You're not dead. Nothing else matters. I know what you're going through, and
God only tests the worthy. Think of Job, this is nothing in comparison, and will
only make your faith stronger."

"What faith? In God who let my mother get torn to shreds? In humanity who has
turned its back on me? In you? Your goody-two shoes act doesn't cut it. Your
father made you come here to help the poor little lost girl."

Angela bent over her, kissing her forehead. Bella was wrong, this girl believed
every word she said. She practically glowed with her self-righteous beliefs, and in
Bella she saw a testament of her faith. A soul to be saved from the deepest pit of
despair through the good works and word of God. She would not blindly seek
forgiveness in a last minute attempt to get into heaven, for her life had been
lived in His grace.

"Believe what you will Bella, but I am here for you, and you'll have to come to
terms with that. The Chief made a deal with the FBI to put you in counseling with
my father. It's either myself and my father, Pastor Weber, or a state assigned
psychiatrist."

Bella glared at Angela, conceding to her finely executed ploy of Christian
manipulation. Let me save your soul...or else.

"Be at the church tomorrow at nine."

Angela's pure soul would comfort her as she died a martyr's death.

The empty church echoed even the quietest of my footsteps, forewarning the
sacrosanct dwelling of an unwelcome entity in its midst. A large wooden cross,
with pointed embellishments at each end, stood as the focal point of the altar.
Silent pews sat empty, awaiting the masses to fill them and spread the false hope
of the greater meaning of their lives. All the little sacrificial lambs lining up for the
afterlife, spending their lives living to die. The pattering of soft leather soles
signaled the arrival of their shepherd.

"Protect me Father against evil and give me the strength to do your will."

She recognized me. Goosebumps rose on her flesh as her hair stood on end. A
chill crept down her back as she prepared herself for her life's work, standing tall
in the face of darkness.

"You would've been wise to leave Bella to me."

Her heart hammered loudly in her chest, but her voice remained steady.

"No one is beyond redemption. She needs someone to help her realize it."

Walking toward the altar, I chuckled lightly.

"I really do beg to differ..."

She followed me, her determination overriding her hyperventilation.

"I fear no evil in my Father's house."

Turning, I tisked softly, smirking at her delicious bravado.

"You dare lie in a church? Aren't you the little hypocrite."

Facing me directly, she raised her trembling chin and met my eyes.

"Be done with it. I've made my peace. Do what you will with my body, but you'll
never have my soul."

I admired her resolve and intelligence. She knew innately in her shared instinct of
the faithful, what I was; that I would drain her essence and nothing could save
her. I had rarely met someone so genuine in all my years, and vaguely I
considered changing her; sending her as a care package to my compassionate
maker and to let him have the children he'd so desired. A thank you, if you will,
for setting me on this most wicked of paths.

But that would require time and responsibilities outside of my current ones. I had
little use for distractions at this time, and sentimentality was hardly my proverbial
cup of tea. It would seem dearest Bella was making me go soft.

Sighing heavily, I returned to the task at hand, tossing the silent girl upon the
altar. She would have to suffice as an offering to another. She went lax, letting
me do as I so desired, and taking all the suspense out of the situation. She
recognized this as her time, and her mind was at rest. No desperation marred her
last moments, but rather a quiet acceptance, and an unfathomable joy at who
would greet her on the other side.

Picking up the elaborate cross, I glided it over her supple untouched flesh; over
her peaceful mind, around her lips that spoke no evil, an circled around her pure
heart. It pulsed its virtue as if it would burn alive in its goodness. Pressing it into
her chest I hesitated, letting the point dig into her skin just before penetration. I
wanted to let her feel her just reward for her sinless life.

"I forgive you."

Laughing I plunged it deep into her heart. Through the individual layers of the
epidermis it slid through, hastened by the stratum of fatty tissue she'd never
outgrow. It cracked her ribs with a resounding snap, adding percussion to her
screams as they echoed off the hallowed walls. The meat of her telltale heart
gave way to the wood with a delightful mix of ripping and bursting. The blunt
sides of the cross shred the organ, leaving a macabre rendering of her purity.
With nominal effort it slid out the other side through her shoulder, and splintered
into the altar below her.

I took a second to enjoy the irony of the devout staked through the heart with a
cross by a vampire. Even after a century of killing, I still occasionally found ways
to still keep it fresh.

The rumbling growl of Bella's truck alerted me to her presence. Leisurely stepping
into the vestibule, I awaited her arrival, distracted by my own curiosity.

Bloody fingers taunted me, inadvertently making their way to my lips. Inhaling, I
breathed in the sweetness on my palm. Unable and unwilling to resist, my tongue
flicked out and licked it clean.

Groaning, I savored the sublime taste of the blood of a virgin as another walked
through the doors.

Bella paused at the sight in front of her before turning and walked back out
humming.

"Who will save your soul, if you won't save your own..."

How pure is your heart?

6.

Few people ever know what it means to burn. To writhe in agony as your skin
melts, bones deteriorate, blood congeals, and organs char. Every bursting cell
and crackling tissue reverberates through you, while your bowels empty and all
liquid evaporates. Your body becomes brittle and you remain trapped in your
mind going violently mad.

Their skin resembles a hamburger left too long on a grill; their fat and hair smells
worse than decay on a warm summer's day. But they never live that long. Their
mind slips away with their souls, seeking reprieve from the torment mere
moments after it begins.

No, they never learned, for they were allowed to die. They weren't subjected to
three days of the pits of hell, only to arise neither living nor dead. No voices
rattled around their head exuding guilt and compassion, adding to the sheer
chaos of their existence.

As I had lain burning, Carlisle's thoughts recalled the witch trials outside of
London, shortly after his turning. Visions of people bound to stakes, kindling
stacked against their feet, screaming as the flames licked at their calves. His
memories cast horrific implications on his own actions. For he thought he had
taken an innocent, twisted it into a dark machination of something alive; yet he
sat idly by as the fire consumed the boy and cauterized his loneliness.

My only company in that time had been the screams in his memories. Proverbial
mobs with pitchforks clamoring for death, their demands fueled by fear and anger
that one of their own had been taken. Such a precious golden haired beauty of
the kindest disposition had died of consumption, and the dark haired healer had
prognosticated her death. And so she burned, as I did alongside her, hearing the
voices of the devil whispering to me.

A hundred years later another girl of the purest of hearts died. Another dark
haired beauty had forewarned of death. Another mob cried for retribution.

She too went quietly mad.

Only this time they would burn for her.

Ineffective FBI agents could no longer delay questioning Bella for her role in the
murders. While they had no proof of her involvement, the incessant coincidence
of her presence was too much for even the dimmest to deny. In an attempt at
proving their competency, Bella was finally brought in for interrogation. Round
and round for hours on end they interrogated, revisiting the same asinine queries
from before, hoping to catch her in a lie.

Not once did she falter, did her story deviate, or did she volunteer information.
She was robotic in her answers. "Renee didn't cook so we didn't have sharp

knives in the house." "I can't swim." "I was never in the car with Tyler." "I don't
even know where the boys' showers are." "Do I look strong enough to stake
someone?" The further they pressed the more exasperated they became as their
long buried common sense told them she couldn't have possibly killed those
people. Yet logic and their deeply disturbed psyches prevented them from
admitting it, and so fruitlessly they continued.

All until he came and finally asked the right question.

"Ms. Swan I think we both know you didn't kill your own mother or your
classmates. Look at you, a little girl like yourself probably has difficulty even
swinging the door of that Chevy of yours. But you're smart, and your father's the
Chief of Police, so I bet you know a thing or two about crime. Maybe even how to
get away with it. Some people might be interested in that information, maybe a
boyfriend? Someone very protective of you?"

An anticipatory smile graced my face, for he knew not what he had asked for.

"Agent Lee, you seem to think I'm aiding and abetting someone with murdering
five people, two of whom seem accidental mind you, helping him leave no trace
of his existence. Moreover I'm allowing myself to be ostracized and made the
town leper? Do I seem that masochistic? As you so kindly pointed out, I'm just a
little girl, who's been through hell and looks even worse, so would you please tell
me whom would be so 'protective' of me? Ask around, no one gives a shit about
me. They never have and they never will. Now since you haven't and cannot
press charges, and you've already detained me for twenty-four hours, I will be
leaving. Now."

Fazed but unwilling to back down from her ire, he pressed on for the identity of
someone he had no proof existed. Not once did she cower nor give him an inch.
Shy, mousey Bella no longer existed. Each death stripped away layers of
decorum, norms, and civilization. It forged her into an elemental being,
unconcerned with morality, who had finally found her power. She had one goal,
and that was survival; anything that prevented it could go to hell.

She knew who could save her, and it wasn't this paunch bellied federal agent,
high on his arrogance and chock full of condescension. She would be no man's
case study that launched a career.

She would be nothing to any man but would readily be everything to me.

And so three times she denied me.

Agent Lee had little choice but to release Bella into the custody of her father with
stern warnings full of official bluster. The Chief nodded stiffly before hightailing
away from the makeshift base of operations. Thoughts of places to stash her ran
through his mind as they fishtailed out of the parking lot.

I lingered behind, pushing aside my desire to show my pleasure with Bella's
decision to hide my existence from prying eyes. Responsibility called, and red
tape needed to be tied.

The agent stepped into his Taurus, distracted and annoyed from his disappointing
interrogation. He saw her as pathetic girl full of false bravado playing accomplice
to a controlling boyfriend. While there may not have been evidential support, the
faintest of recollections were firming in his mind, connecting seemingly
inconsequential puzzle pieces. While he had yet to determine why it was relevant,

the hint of a dull gold ring peeking just slightly from her collar kept playing in his
head. He knew vaguely that it was of great importance, yet his feeble human
mind could not recall with any clarity the minutiae of data in each file.

One of those files happened to be in the trunk of his car, listing the belongings of
Mike Newton.

When he stopped at a gas station at the edge of town, it became clear. Agent Lee
would get the trial he so desired. His over taxed brain dulled his usual meticulous
care while he stood distracted, pumping the gas, and paying little attention to his
surroundings.

For a man dedicated to preserving the safety of others, he was careless with his
own. A half smoked cigarette sat burning in the ashtray, in clear violation of the
warning signs posted behind him. It was a pity a man trained to hunt
masterminds and kill if necessary was so unbearably thick. A child could kill him,
and it was a waste of my time to eliminate him when I could be tracking Bella.
But duty called, and this man was determined to take her away, to punish her,
and that simply could not be tolerated

His inattentiveness due to his devotion to point the finger at Bella would be his
death. There he stood lost in thought, still squeezing the nozzle even as he
removed it from the tank. Fuel pooled on the cement and splashed on his pants
while he patted his pockets for his forgotten pack of cigarettes. A quick hiss of a
match being lit, and a flick of my wrist sealed his fate. I tossed it by his shoe as
he finally dug out his pack. Walking away I could hear the path of the flames
traveling up his pants, catching quickly on the stained cheap polyester, searing it
to his legs. Judging by the smell it had reached his stomach and arms, as the
odor of burning hair wafted across the parking lot. Within moments it jumped,
following the crystalline gas fumes floating around the still flowing pump.

The car exploded incinerating both the evidence and the only agent who could
have pieced it together.

Yet again, death came moments after the fire began and another died without
surviving its test.

Sirens screamed on while I searched for Bella. For hours I circled the peninsula,
growing more annoyed as her hiding place eluded me. Wherever Charlie had
hidden her, he had been thorough. No trace of her scent lingered anywhere
outside of her usual locations, and the Chief's car's came through the town too
often to leave a discernible direction.

But there was something new and out of place, and over the putrid stench it
emitted, I caught the vaguest whiff of Bella. Meticulously I followed it, inching
closer to the Quileute reservation with each pass, and the scent grew. It seeped
into my senses, burning them more thoroughly than the agent still blazing miles
away. The bottom of a landfill, the morgue piled with bodies rotting from Spanish
Influenza, and the haze of burning tires all smelled sweeter than begonias
compared to the creature I was tracking.

Its mind was foreign, bestial yet tinged with a human juvenile's whims. All it
could focus on was that its enemy was nigh, and its heightened new instincts told
it to kill. As with all animals it acted with immediacy, no hesitancy of doubt
clouded its nonexistent judgment. Turning at full speed I could hear its pounding
claws tearing at the earth while it bounded toward me.

A fur body leapt into the clearing, emanating heat. It snapped its jaws and
growled, unable to think past the infernal rage inside him.

Here was someone who had burned.

And who had only one clear thought.

"Bella."

I do hope you follow safety directions…

7.

There is nothing new under the sun. Very rarely does something unpredictable
occur to titillate the senses and thrill a long dead heart. Impenetrable skin, dried
up adrenal glands, and the security of unrivaled supremacy kept one from finding
anything riveting. A vampire's natural speed and acuity make the trivial defenses
of the living humorous. Whether it was snapping or draining their necks, it was all
as effortless as carving the Christmas turkey. A fact of the circle of life and death
for those who sat at its peak.

Their innate fragility and weakness offered no humbling recompense of our
primitive natures. Vulnerability in the face of omnipotence is a trifling annoyance,
as pitiful as their screams while they feebly struggle to escape. Their blood begins
to flow together, in a cascading waterfall of tedious existence.

And yet in this tiny town hidden beneath malevolent skies, I had found not one
challenge, but two. A human whose inevitable death I found myself prolonging,
and a creature worthy of my efforts. Not one of us would remain unaltered from
this bizarre triumvirate. They were my challenge and my thrill. A frail human
whose world unraveled around her, broke down and remade herself in its scraps.
The kills were as inconsequential as the people who had died, and it was only as
their offering to Bella that they found worth. Now here stood this child,
transformed into a beast because my mere presence had offended his long
dormant genes. He had barely dipped his clawed toes into adolescence before the
fire betook him, shifting him into an Alpha without a pack. He was carved by an
inherited geneto protect against my kind.

Confusion, fear, and an eternal rage warred within him as he stood between me
and what had rapidly become the primary reason for my existence. Charlie had
shown up at his door, shortly after leaving the FBI headquarters in Forks. His
paranoia and distinct lack of understanding of federal law had led him to the
Quileute reservation in vain hopes of their sovereignty inhibiting the Federal
supremacy. Having watched his son shift into a wolf, Chief Black was quite aware
of my presence in the area, and had already condemned me for the deaths. He
offered sanctuary to the Swans under the guise of a Federal coup d'etat, and sent
his only son to hunt me.

His son who had an overactive imagination in regards to Bella. Who had played
with her as a child, visited her since she'd returned, and who envisioned himself
to be her savior. He had rebuilt her truck and stopped by with his father on a few
occasions. His scent had blurred into that of the two chiefs, a young masculine
scent tinged with more body odor than the other two. It lingered in the couches
near the television and trailed only as far as the refrigerator, never melding with
Bella's bouquet above. I had discounted him, never once suspecting ulterior
motives from the usurping odors. That it would try to take that which was mine
away, to horde her for himself...

And certainly not that she would willingly go.

This feral boy would offer an enticing fight. He was destined to kill me, and
through that strength and eagerness, he would provide me an outlet. A being
capable of surviving my ire, which would not immediately crumble when thrown
into boulders, sliced open, or trapped in my bone breaking clutches. He would
take it, and because of his instincts he would come back for more.

They would learn the repercussions of their brief embrace. Of the effect seeing
her wrapped around another did to me inside.

And so he would take the punishment that Bella could not.

Jacob's mind was as chaotic as his nature. His thermal temperature rose so
rapidly with his shifting that his brain struggled to operate under such conditions.
Flashes of thoughts and memories fled through his mind trying desperately to
compete with the bestial instincts flooding his system. He had been catapulted
into adulthood and guardianship, when in reality he was a mere boy thrown into
the land of the wild things.

He stood at the edge of the forest, pawing the ground and snarling, emitting his
nauseating stench, and imagining dragging my body home to papa. Perhaps Bella
would rub his belly and give him a biscuit too.

"If you're done with your disturbing predilections, might we move things along?
Places to be, people to see…"

The wolf froze, momentarily shocked at the possibility of my mind reading
abilities. Indubitably he thought immediately of the information he least desired
to disclose; a picture of Bella sleeping in his tiny bed, covered by his blankets,
tucked safely away in his cottage in La Push. A feral smile to match his dripping
fangs graced my face.

"You see your imaginary girlfriend is waiting for me in your bed…"

Howling in rage he charged, his vision literally shifting into a burning red hue,
nearly distracting me as I awaited his impact. Paws the size of a Clydesdale's
hooves rocked into my chest with the force of small cannon. Bending my knee I
allowed my balance to falter and send me to the forest floor, the beast above me
snapping at my neck.

This was how it felt to see your death in the eyes of another. To know that
something could pull your existence out from under you in the flap of a
hummingbird's wings. Raptor-like claws slashed my shirt, scraping away the
stony flesh as it passed. Venom bubbled out from the wounds, burning the wolf's
flesh, and penetrating his blinding haze with muttered "Shit-fuck" oaths. One paw
and then the other tore apart my chest, while my abdomen muscles shredded

beneath him. Here was the pain they felt, the sight they saw as their bodies
twitched and jerked and fell to pieces. The weight of the wolf pressing on my
chest cavity reduced my already minimal oxygen, hindering me from muttering
any final utterances. His teeth were but millimeters from ending me, prompting
his juvenile mind to wander.

Bella pressed close to him, arms wrapped around his shoulders, crying her thanks
out, as her breasts heaved against him with her sobs. Each hiccup brought her
closer until she rested in his lap, pressing salty kisses against his bare torso,
repeating again and again, "My hero, Jacob. You fill me with the warmth of the
sun." He puffed up, humbly denying her praise as his hands sank to the tops of
her lacy panties peaking out of jeans far snugger then Bella had ever worn. His
hand played in their ruffles while she gasped at his touch, begging him for
more...

Growls reverberated against my throat as his fantasy played. This would be his
just reward, taking her away from me, while she showed her gratitude through
virginal kisses and innocent touches. Here was the creature who was supposed to
be my penultimate physical challenge, and in the midst of the fight, his juvenile
delusions overcame him. One snap of his jaws, and he believed his machinations
would come true.

This was not how my victims died, laughter building from their crushed sternums,
puffing out in asthmatic gasps while awaiting the crushing blow. They died with
terror in their hearts and choking on the last flutter of hope's feathers. No dark
amusement overrode the paltry pain, because they died from a worthy foe. No
matter how wasted and pathetic their lives may have been, they left them at the
hands or teeth of a superior predator; not a boy playing big bad wolf.

Saliva dripped from his canines as they wrapped around my larynx, exerting
more force as each tooth clamped around my neck. The last of my breath left
with my laughter, while he gloated at his kill. Not once did he pause to question
the ease of my capture or that I had yet to fight back. Leeches after all, were
parasites feeding off the life force of others, having none of their own, nor any
ability to fight back. Oh the lies the generations had passed down to preserve the
sanctity of their superiority.

Staring into the fiery eyes of the boy, I let him see my amusement; the smirk on
my face and the glint in my eyes as he thought he was ending my life. His warrior
skills were naught but a child's production for my entertainment, and while he
had me penned, I had already tightened the noose. In our brief exchange my
hand had wrapped around his throat, and flipped him over my head. I sat up
while he flew into the trees, snapping their trunks in two as his massive body
made contact. Bloodlust covered his eyes again as he turned, and shook the
fuzziness from his mind as he charged.

Four feet left the ground as he leapt for my throat, desiring nothing more than to
tear my head from shoulders. Snarls echoed around the hollowed out clearing,
infuriating him further as he realized they belonged solely to him. His sheer mass,
in which he relied upon so heavily, was his greatest detriment. He was a force in
movement with no ability to stop himself or change projection. The slightest duck
of my head as fur of his chest scraped over my forehead caused him to miss.

It did not however, prevent the opening incision along his belly, as fine and deep
as a scalpel's, as he flew above me. A quick drag of my nail, and a once proud
leap twisted, as he curled in on himself while his skin slit down its middle. He lay
curled in a ball, whimpers interspersed with furious growls as he realized this was

not how the stories his father had told him had ended. The Cold Ones die, and
the protector returns a hero.

"You know what I am, and still you pretend that you could stop me. You imagine
that she would thank you and spend the rest of her life fat with your litters, while
she told your heroic tale to the tribe at every campfire. But you never asked her
what she wanted; you just assumed it would be you because you're the scariest
creature you could fathom. Until you met me…"

Staggering to his feet he attacked again, digging his paws into the gouges in my
midsection, and failing to even rock me back onto my heels. The front foot was
lodged in my stomach while he lunged for my heart, and once again he operated
on the belief that he could win. That the monster under the bed could be
defeated. Twisting his snout and paw at unnatural angles I threw him head first
into the boulder fifty yards away. His head hit first, cracking both his skull and
the rock. A rather human groan ran out from his mind and through his lupine
mouth as he sunk to the ground, leaving tufts of hair, shards of bone, and blood
along the rock face.

A broken paw, ripped abdomen, and fractured skull was far too much damage for
his body to heal. His blood congealed faster, matting into his fur while my skin
closed before his eyes. He was not my equal; he was not my worthy opponent or
even a death I would relish in the long years to come. He was one more
disappointment who could only give me a fleeting glimpse at the promise of the
end. Instead of humbling me, he had proven that nature had chosen its
evolutionary winner, and that nothing could keep me from what, or rather who, I
wanted.

"I am your beginning and your end. I gave you this gift, and so shall I take it
away. You coveted what was mine, Jacob, and foolishly thought she would choose
you for her own."

Kneeling on his back legs, my hand locked around his throat, pushing him
upward, and stretching his gaping belly until it was taut. Broken limbs and blood
loss immobilized him from fighting back with what little was left of his strength.
Wrapping my fingers around his snout forced him to watch me while I worked. My
nails were innocuous beside his claws, but where his raked across the skin, mine
glided with precision, cross hatching his belly into delicate strips. Pulling back the
hide, terrified yips remained trapped within his throat, while I cut through the
muscle, tendon by tendon, and curled it back carefully. Jacob's mind faded with
one final musing while I continued to eviscerate him.

Bella stood by the russet wolf, neither blinking in shock nor cowering in fear. A
foreign emotion washed across her face, one I had never seen. It lit her eyes and
made her cheeks flush with color. The apathetic stance had left her as she stood
tall, staring straight into his eyes. She held his enormous paw, stroking where the
claws met his flesh with a strange affection, and smiled without the sardonic twist
I had become so accustomed to. "Perhaps there's hope after all..."

In a fit of torment to rival his initial transformation, his mind cleared and showed
him Bella. It wasn't a hormonal fantasy or grand illusions of heroic returns. This
had the crystalline form of a memory. He had given her what no one else had,
what I had stripped away from her one by one until she became undeniably mine.
She hadn't hugged him because of his forced feelings of familiarity with her. She
had embraced him out of gratitude before she sent him out to protect her.

He had given her hope, and the means to resist me.

The blood lust the juvenile wolf had been blinded by speared into me with the
force of a rock slide. Long forgotten bursts of anger, fury, rage, jealousy,
adrenaline, and testosterone flooded me until all I could see was his destruction
with a pinpoint accuracy. My fists shoved inside of him, ripping out his organs.
His stomach exploded under the force of my grasp, mixing its acid with his
internal bleeding. I tore his liver to shreds, and stuffed the pieces into his spleen.

In my rage he was vivisected and kept alive only by the strength of his genetic
healing, cruelly keeping his heart beating. His mind had fled, unable to withstand
the pain, and all that was left was a sensory beast, kept alive by the thinnest of
threads. His life would be as much of a lesson as his death. It was time Bella
learned that her game had penalties, and that her only hope and salvation laid
with me.

Gripping his spinal cord I ran through the woods, following his ungodly scent to
the cottage at its edge. No police car sat in the driveway, and only one very
familiar heart beat from inside. Blood and entrails lay behind us, while his pulse
faded rapidly. Sensing either danger or my presence, Bella flung open the front
door as I stepped onto the stoop.

Sunken cheeks, hollowed and turned ashen as she took in the sight that greeted
her. Now she knew. This was who I was. This was what I had done. This was
what we had been building toward for weeks.

This was our day of requiem.

Throwing the furry body at the foot of the door, its insides became outsides,
twisting together as they spilled onto her feet. No further proof could be offered
for what she had made me do, made me feel.

She sunk to her knees, gathering up his innards, and weighed them in her hands.
"One more weight against my soul."

Not once did she look up, did her fractured mind spewing forth every thought she
had turn toward me. She knew and she didn't care.

A bellow of resplendent fury ripped through me as I kicked the wolf and crushed
its heart. It died, transforming back into the naked boy he had been.

"You would choose this over me?"

She laid down curled beside him in a fetal position, rocking his intestines against
her chest. "Not him, not him, not him, not him, not him…"

No thrill filled me, as she lay broken before me.

For all hope had been abandoned.

How high are your hopes now...

8.

Time ticked by, measured through shallow breaths and racing heart beats, in
stuttered murmurs, and shattered minds. I had followed her for this, the feeling

of victory over the only person whose reactions I could not gauge. Her luscious
scent and silent mind had lured me as surely as I had drawn her in with my
offerings. Here was a victim who could surprise me and offer the sweetest of
temptations along the way. At last a game whose means could remain a mystery,
even if the end would not. Still, the lure of her blood would test my resolve; pit
my instincts against my will power, and in conquering her, I would battle against
myself. And the reward would be beyond all imagination: to sip such succulence
from her chalice.

The time had come for me to collect my winnings. My just reward for a job well
done. And yet victory sat sour in my stomach, mixing with the hard edge of rage,
and the bitter taste of disappointment. She was to be something different, and
she had succeeded. No pleasure resided inside of me, for even in my fury, I
wasn't ready for this to end. I was unable to face her utter defeat, and the only
change to ever rock my long existence.

I wanted the girl who had twisted my game until she was her own player, but in
my vengeance and her betrayal I had lost her. She had been destroyed, and I
found myself unwilling to accept the evidence before me.

Her father's arrival spurned me into action, forcing me to leave her behind,
writhing in a mess of blood and guts, with visions of Jacob's claws and teeth
running through her mind.

The cruiser slammed its brakes, barely skidding to a halt before the Chief leapt
out. Disbelief raced through him as he stood, arms waving while he raved at her.
She ignored him, curling herself in closer, and chanted, "NO, NO, NO, NO, NO,"
until it blurred it one elongated syllable.

I watched Charlie's reticence as his moral pendulum swung swiftly back and
forth, never settling for more than a moment before indecision took hold again.
One foot stepped forward as his hand reached for the car door. Being a man of
action, at least one to cover his own ass, he made his way onto the stoop. His
hand held over his mouth, careful lest he breathe in the sight before him, and
shook his head.

"What did you do? Jesus Bella, I take you in and this is how you repay me? You
kill the boy who hasbeen more my child than you ever have been? Just get up, I I
can't even look at you."

Still she didn't respond, unwilling as she was to reap the consequences of her
actions. Disgusted he stared at her, covered in gore, but in that moment his mind
made the connection the FBI Agent's had so desperately been seeking. Her
upswept hair was held in place by a curiously familiar pen, a man's class ring
swung from her neck, and sand-stained pink laces were untied in her shoes. His
daughter was guilt. Even if he could not explain how, his condemnation was final.
All that was left was the clean up.

He picked her up, panic seizing his arms and making her nonexistent weight
difficult to lift. He struggled to the edge of the forest, inching closer to my
location with each shaky step. Reaching his destination, he let go of her with one
arm and was forced to cradle his child close one last time as he grabbed the
evidence. Awkwardly he yanked out the laces, pulled out the pen, and tugged on
the ring's necklace. His actions roused her from her guilt ridden catatonia and she
awoke with a fury, clawing at his face while she stole back her items.

"You can't have them! They're all I have left!"

Dropping her, he felt the shallow wounds on his cheek. They reaffirmed his
resolve as he stepped away from his only child.

"My hands are tied Bella. I'm the Chief of Police and I can't... I won't... protect
you anymore. I'll give you a head start and tell them you ran off, but I can't have
you in my house. Go. Go now and don't come back."

Pathetically she stumbled into the woods, tripping over branches and rocks until
eventually falling to the ground. There she lay as abandoned, forced to reconcile
herself with her choice.

I turned and ran, taking pleasure in the pain radiating off of her. The sound of her
agony as she pleaded for someone to care about her. To hold her back stabbing
body close and tell her everything would be all right. I left her to suffer in the
knowledge that nothing would ever be the same again.

I ran far and wide, escaping the lingering scent of lupine death and a young girl's
salty tears. I ran until I could neither smell nor hear them. I ran until I ran out of
land to run, and so I crashed into the sea, washing away the blood and viscera,
the stench and the sickness. I couldn't rinse my slate clean and begin again, nor
did I have any desire to do so. But I wanted and yearned for someone, for
something, intangible. Something had shifted, in the game and in myself, and for
the first time I felt fear.

This girl, frail in stature and magnificent in psyche, had power over me. Her
actions effected me, how I rationalized and how I felt; how would I go on in my
existence without her. Every day would be a reminder of my one chance at an
equal.

The rage came and went, cycling through foreign notions of sadness while I
grappled with her betrayal. Not once had I seen or suspected hhhhher
involvement with the wolf. I barely left her vicinity, and somehow in that time she
had found her savior.

It should have signed her death warrant.

And yet every time I resolved to kill her, I could see her sublimely grinning as she
turned and walked humming out of the church. It brought a smile to my face and
relaxed the unfamiliar ache inside me.

I still didn't know what these feelings were or why I couldn't shake them, but I
had realized I had no desire to do so. She was broken, fucked up, andmine. For
that alone I would forgive her.

So again I ran, in the same direction I had every day since I first caught wind of
that scent.

I ran to Bella.

Fittingly the rain poured through the trees, drenching the forest I had left her in.
I was a mile away, unsure of anything other than the need to be there. For the
first time in my life I was uncertain, and it was glorious.

I found her soaked through, huddling on the ground screaming. The house could
not be seen, and instead of being disoriented, she remained singled minded in
her agonized sobs.

The shoelaces and pen were wrapped around her fingers, and she wore the too-
large ring over her thumb. Her feet were bare, and the flimsy shirt she wore did
little to stave off the inclement weather.

Her irresponsibility toward herself infuriated me. I had come to forgive her for
possibly killing herself with her werewolf alliance, and found her near death from
exposure. Irritated growls filled my chest without warning. Any semblance of
control I had garnered washed away with the rain. I hated her for these conflicted
emotions. I hated her for not taking care of herself. I hated her because my
entire existence had become a microcosm of her.

I hated her because I couldn't hate her.

Mucus and tears streamed down her face as she glanced up at the sound of my
growling. Her respirations slowed only to be replaced by hiccups, making the
petulant frown on her face comical.

"Why did you do it?"

I met her eyes unflinchingly and gave her the truth.

"I didn't care for how they treated you. As if they had some right to you."

"I didn't mean them."

Her voice held a childlike curiosity as she lifted her trinkets into the air.

"Charlie tried to take these from me. I wouldn't let him have them though.
They're mine. You gave them to me. So he threw me out."

She had lifted them above her lowered head like a sacrifice to me. Gently I
pushed her hands down to reassure her.

"You don't need him. You'll never need anyone again."

"I just need to know why. Why you gave it to me. Did you want me to get
caught?"

Her voice sunk lower with each word until it was naught but a shame filled
whisper.

"Don't you want me?"

Kneeling in front of her I lifted her chin.

"They were mementos for you to remember me by. And shouldn't I be asking the
same of you? You who put your faith in that volatile creature? You who wept over
his body as I stood by and watched? You denied me Bella, not the other way
around."

Her body, swamped in my coat, tripped as she flung herself at me, clinging to me
as her sobbing began anew.

"No! No I didn't! I swear! It was for you...for you...for you...you.."

She'd descended into insanity, mumbling incoherently and rocking back and
forth. I pulled her upright, unable to keep the fury out of my voice as I bellowed.

"Don't lie to me! Did you think I wouldn't know? That you thought he could
protect you against me? Did you tell him about me? Did you relish the thought of

him tearing me apart? Oh you fickle girl, it's so easy to cry to me when fffflies are
settling into your precious protectors carcass."

She babbled her feeble protests, but her broken mind relayed the truth. The
same scene I had witnessed through Jacob's dying eyes played through hers.

She held the paw in her palm, tracing the talon like claws and marveled at the
possibilities. This poor unsuspecting boy whose body shifted into an unnatural
beast could be the answer. She had resigned herself to her death, but not to
another's. His proximity to her signed his warrant, and she knew that the only
man to believe her, to fill her aching void with warmth would die before her eyes.
She had debated killing herself to stop the circle of death, but somehow knew
that he would still pay for his kindness. Even if she were gone, the only one to
see her would have to be snuffed out as well. Unless...unless something else out
there could save him, perhaps even save them. She closed her fist around the
paw and felt its roughness tear open her skin, and a smile grew across her face.
She had seen how this boy had looked at her, and she could use it, use him. With
my face in her mind she stroked his paw and murmured, "Perhaps there's hope
after all," and she sent him out to save us both.

The mercy I had sought her out to bestow, even undeservedly, spilled forth in
relief. She had not betrayed me, if anything my pride in her grew. She used her
newfound power to manipulate him to do her bidding, at the risk of his own life.
She had donned her mask and lied with an easy grin. My own anger fell quickly
away, and I gathered her in close, relishing the thrill of power as she rapidly
calmed from my touch.

"It was absurd of me to think you were as weak as all the rest. Of course you
knew better. However you cannot deny that you mourned him. I won't tolerate it,
Bella."

She shook her head, hair falling in her face and looked ashamed until Jacob's
body flashed in her mind. Her mood altered as quickly as mine had all day, and
irritation filled her, causing her to stab my chest with her finger.

"You threw his guts at me. Excuse me for being a bit upset."

It took a paramount effort to still the smile trying to stretch across my features.
My body tingled and my mind filled with a pleasure filled haze. No one who was
not already immortal had ever stood up to me. Here was this girl whose death I
could beget in a thousand ways before she even took her next breath, and she
was poking me. In her own tantalizingly insane way she was holding me
accountable.

"I won't apologize. Don't you see how you've changed? Can't you feel the power
thrumming through your veins? From your flesh I've made you a god, and that's
only the beginning."

Maniacal giggles erupted out of her causing her to jump up and down in
uncontrollable excitement. Her hands locked around my neck as she babbled at
me.

"I'm going to be a goddess! Will you worship me? You can't throw goddesses
away. You cherish them and take care of them. You don't question or pick on
them, and you can't ever kill them. Never, ever, ever, never. They live forever
invincible even from Death. You won't ever let me die will you? You have to

promise. Promise me, Edward! Swear right now and maybe I won't remind you
how mean you were."

Furrowed brows framed a stern face watching me carefully until I owed not to do
what I had set out to from the start. Nodding I gave my word, unable to resist
even the simplest request she asked of me. Nothing would ever be the same and
for that I could promise her anything.

"It will hurt, more than you could ever imagine. But you can withstand the fire,
perhaps even better than I did. You've been forged for this Bella."

Brown eyes met my crimson ones as her mind resolved itself. I was a fortified
rock to hold onto, that would not waver, and could not be defeated. I could
anchor her to me and never again would she be lost.

" Just make me like you. Jesus please, I just need to belong."

Pushing her wet hair to the side, my nose grazed her neck, inhaling its richness,
made only more delectable by the fact that she offered it. Venom scoured my
burning throat, parched from my blood abstention. Those pitiful fools weren't
worth the swallow and now while the flames consumed her, she would appease
those inside me.

"You already do belong. You belong to me."

I bit her.

My teeth sunk through her flesh. Slicing her tendons and opening her veins,
euphoria splashed down my throat. Ecstatic growls echoed through the woods,
mixing with her cries of relief. "Now I'll never care again. Thank you, thank you,"
sang through her mind with every mouthful I lapped. My tongue mapped every
puncture, delving through the soft tissue, memorizing its feel and reveling that it
would forever scar her.

It was addictive. A seduction in its richest form as my greatest temptation
became my greatest reward. To taste my creation, my finest work and know that
the game had only begun, made me drunk. On her. On myself. On power. I
clutched her tighter and she only mewled her pleasure and begged for more. Her
bones groaned from pressure and still I could only bring her closer; suck harder;
devour her faster. The blood consumed me, baptizing me with its sinful purity.

Her knees gave out and her pleas turned to gasps, and still I drank. I could drink
from her for a thousand years and never be quenched. My body fused itself to her
as her essence became mine. It filled me with vitality and omnipotence. Nothing
would take this from me, for nothing could.

No one could take her away from me.

Except for myself.

The blood thinned and trickled. Her mind silenced and her heart stuttered.

Not once did it burst through my incandescently glorious bloodlust. Snarls
erupted as I shook her, trying to replenish the source. The crack of her bones
beneath my hands did not register. Nor did I notice her lifeless eyes. I bit again
and again and very little flowed forth. In a rage I threw her to the ground, licking
the last hints of flavor lining my lips.

And then I saw her. Saw what I had done. Heard her fading pulse.

It was my turn to collapse and fall to my knees. To scream to the heavens while
the blood pooled around a body.

To be weakened and humbled. To feel my broken vow. To fail her.

I gathered her dying body and again fled. I ran through the woods until I reached
another small house that had so recently been closed off to her. Kicking through
the door, I carried her up the stairs.

In my immortality Death had finally challenged me.

Setting this broken girl down upon her childhood bed, I learned what it meant to
lose.

9.

History has never been kind to those that wield its power. From the peaks of their
conquests they fall, tumbling down to meet the same inevitable end of all those
whom they had tread upon. Whether they could trap it for a moment or a
century, it always slipped away, blinding them with its headiness, until one day
they realized it's no longer there. That perhaps it was all a trick of fortuna, and
never belonged to them in the first place.

Power giveth and it taketh away, and my tenuous contract with it had expired.

I had failed and because of it I lost to my only natural match.

She had unequivocally given herself to me. She had been pushed to the brink of
madness, rivaling even myself in her disregard for others. She was the paradigm
of existentialism; she had found herself and her place as she lost everything.

I couldn't stand over her until she returned to her nothingness.

In that bed I left my self-assurance and my pride.

I left my power and my control.

I left what had become my everything in my nothingness.

The mangled and broken body lay limply, closer to death with each shallow
respiration. Her heart slowed with each beat, and little blood leaked from her
shredded neck.

My demolished will power could not watch my penultimate defeat.

And so I left her to die.

Night and day bled together, fusing into an endless wasteland. No purpose
defined me, no blood lust betook me, and so I sat very still. Weakness weighed
down my limbs while my brain lost itself in a haze of self-doubt. Never moving,
never eating, I resigned myself to an endless existence of memories.

I had returned to the estate I shared with my supposed siblings, in the wooded
outskirts of Portland. While they amused themselves with lost hunters and stray
tourists, I savored the remnants of her taste. I drowned in their voices and

recalled her fragmented mind, stuttering in stops and starts as I broke down her
barriers. Visions of her innocent exuberance as she begged to belong to me
replayed ad naseum while I listened to my brothers savagely fucking my sisters.
Disgust and contempt defined me, and would ever shall.

I hated them for their games and their mates. For the bacchanalia of blood they
shed and shared. For the revelry they exuded while their victims plead for mercy.
They were ignorant fools drunk on their misbegotten conceptions of power.

No omnipotence could be obtained when Death could tear it from your hands.
When he sucked her dry and left you eternally alone.

We were puppets without a marionette and nothing meant anything.

Just as she was now, I too was nothing.

"Your eternal hissy fit is fucking with my empathy. Time to get over it."

I didn't deign Jasper with a response, and sat staring out at the dead woods
around us. He had been particularly attentive since his precious Alice had been
conspicuously absent. If any feeling remained, I would have been amused at his
predicament. My utter disdain rebounded into him with every victim he brought
to the house. Biting into their flesh made him as nauseous as his thoughts made
me. No one would ever taste as sweet or ease the burn and the thought of ever
sipping from another made me ill.

While I was around, Jasper's empathic powers prevented him from any
enjoyment, and in turn projected the same into the others nearby. They would
suffer as I had, putting a dent in their ceaseless blood-fueled orgy. It was almost
enough to make me smile again.

"I don't see why he's punishing us because he fucked up. He's the one that killed
her and left the job unfinished. It's not the first time he's failed to follow
through..."

The original harpy, darling Rosalie had entered the fray, contempt rolling off her
with every word. Not once since her change had her fury abated. I had made no
secret of my desire to leave her to die in the streets, choking on the knowledge
that her insipid vanity had killed her. Since then she had felt it her duty to irritate
me every day in her hereafter. To this day she only killed beautiful women. She
couldn't stand to let any beauty go unpunished.

"He's an impotent waste of flesh. Leaving her father and a whole town alive who
knew her. Perhaps you should go visit, you can all wallow in your guilt and share
your precious memories..."

Deep in my insides the growls began, rumbling up my abdomen and
reverberating in my esophagus. Snarling and heaving, my body shook with the
force invading me. The paltry anger toward the wolf was nothing in comparison.

I had left her with them.

I could envision them gathering around her grave, shaking their heads in
affectation. Snide whispers would pass between their lips, murmuring that at last
she was at peace, while they said their thanks to God that she was gone. Flowers
would be thrown upon her body to rot beside her, diffusing her sinful scent with
the sickly sweet smell of musty decay. Media crews would tell the tale of how one
girl had brought death to their town, and pan in on the false tears of those who
were left. The Chief would be surrounded by well-wishers and would wallow in

their condolences, justifying his actions. He would break down, begging them to
tell him where he went wrong, while never admitting that he had thrown her
away. He would be revered as the father who was in an impossible situation, and
who had lost everything because of it.

Forks would be united in her death; in their ability to finally sleep easy at night
and know that the girl who brought this upon them was six feet below.

Dead. Buried. Forgotten.

Never.

There would be no relief. No respite. No redemption.

I would tear out each of their posturing bleeding hearts and offer them to her.
Lay them upon her grave and let their blood bathe her in their sorrow. I would
tear off the Chief's head and lay it at her feet. His afterlife would be spent ever
gazing at the daughter he had denied.

The chair shattered, the violence emitting from my body too strong for it to
endure. I fell into a crouch, and distantly felt Jasper and Rosalie do the same
beside me. His power was out of his control; the resolve and fury ran straight
through me into them. They would follow, as would their mates, unable to reign
in the savage need for retribution racing through their long dead veins.

I turned on them, snarling so thickly the venom leaked out my mouth, leaving
spittle on their faces. With one hand, Rosalie's hair was wrapped around my fist,
the other gripped Jasper's throat. I held them in the air, and made myself
abundantly clear.

"I don't share. Ever. Go play your trivial games elsewhere, but stay the fuck away
from Forks. It and everyone inside it is mine. If you come near it I'll tear you
apart with all the rest."

I threw them against the far wall, cracking walls and furniture as they crashed
against them. I ignored their smug smiles and satisfied thoughts, and left.

I had a town to burn.

A foreign smell invaded my senses the closer I came to front of the house.
Familiar undertones intertwined with something deeper and darker; something
deliciously forbidden. Days old dried blood was apparent, but no heartbeat hinted
at to whom it belonged. Their thoughts were present, but a mass of disorganized
chaos, never lingering on one thing long enough to betray them. A terrible need
rose inside me to learn who was knocking. It pushed aside all prior plans,
crushing them with this inexplicable magnet drawing me closer.

Trembling with anticipation I opened the door to find no one there. Feverishly I
scanned the horizon, scenting the air for the smell I couldn't possibly have
imagined. It was maddeningly close, engulfing me with its delectableness. I could
see no one for miles, and so I stepped out to follow it. I had no choice, I would
track it to the ends of the world and back.

My foot brushed against an oval object and sent it rolling in awkward unbalanced
circles. This was the source of the blood; it was caked in filth and coagulum.
Picking it up, I felt the soft curves and hard angles, the wiry protrusions, and
tangled mass. An uneven bottom, torn and mutilated, had dried into a gelled

substance of viscera, with only a jagged shard jutting out. I turned it around until
I found its front.

Charlie Swan's head blindly gazed back at me. The fine hair on the back of my
neck rose and sent a shiver through me as cool breath blew against it.

I spun around, and there stood Bella, covered in blood and filth; a bright mark
the shape of my teeth glistening against her skin. A sweetly innocent expression
softened her marble brows and crimson lips.

"I brought you a present."

Trick or Treat...