Chapter 06
Believing what he heard when Jasper and Alice Cullen told their story about the human girl Bella? Absolutely not. They would have known that there was something more to the girl other than her shield ability. Not even when he read it straight from their minds, was he convinced that this girl was something to be feared.
Werewolves were easy to be dealt with. Of course, they were a big pain in the ass, but with careful planning and the strongest fighters, Aro had won many a battle with werewolves.
Aro was angry with the two Cullens for allowing the girl to slip away from them in the first place, breaking their word on turning the girl. He had already thought about to send out some of his guards to find Bella when he first learned of her betrayal, but had been unable to find her. Now that she seemed to be stationary, for now, it gave him the perfect opportunity to get the girl. Dead or alive. Preferably alive, her shielding ability could come in handy one day.
But first, he needed to know what they were going to be up against, to formulate a plan and make sure it was airtight. No one ever won a battle without careful planning. With Bella seemingly under the impression that the Volturi were going to leave her alone, it was going to be easy. He sent one of their most recent acquirements, an excellent tracker and able to stick to the shadows called Joshua, to get all the information they needed. Joshua was able to cover up his tracks very well, even, for some reason, suppress the sun’s effect on his skin for short periods of time.
Where did Bella live? Did she have friends? Who were they? Where did she frequent? Did her friends like her? And, most of all, was it going to be easy to extract her and take her to Italy?
Weeks later, the plan was almost ready, but when Aro learnt of the supernatural dead pool, he began to question Bella’s safety in this Beacon Hills, California and instructed Joshua to keep her safe, no matter what. Her name was on the list, as was the one of the boy she seemed to hang around with and had bought a house with. Aro didn’t care much about her friends, but she was not to be harmed by anyone.
No, the harming would be his, and only his.
Marcus attended Aro to Bella’s temper, that it would be even worse now that she was a werewolf and that maybe Jasper’s abilities weren’t enough. Would they even work on her? Not according to Jasper and Alice, but then again, they had promised the girl to leave her alone and they would do anything in their power to deceive him. Corin did a great job in making the two Cullens content in their current situation as she did with his and Caius’ wife, but that didn’t mean that they couldn’t lie. According to Joshua, some of the venom of a nomad vampire had been absorbed into her circulation and it seemed to work differently.
Joshua’s extensive research showed that the mental institution called Eichen House was the best way to subdue a werewolf due to its supernatural wards. Something about it having Mountain Ash all over the building, through the walls and everywhere else, and that upon entering, Joshua felt weakened. With the right amount of money, he had been able to bribe the director to clear an entire floor for them. Joshua declined any offer to make the floor even further supernatural proof, as they’d only need someone weakened enough to access them, not to completely subdue them.
While Aro didn’t like the idea that he, too, would be weakened by the effects of the Mountain Ash, he wanted to be certain that they would have access to Bella without her shield being in the way. Weakened was an entire different entity than cancelled out. The supernatural ward that Joshua had informed him of was too much. Overkill. Surely, Bella wouldn’t be too strong for them? Maybe have some Mountain Ash ready to put her in a circle.
Since they wanted Corin to come with them, it also meant that his wife and Caius’ wife had to come with or they’d go insane without her. Jasper and Alice were more under control with Corin’s touch as well, so they were packing up the entire family and would go on a road trip! Aro was strangely excited for this, it brought a lot of headaches with it, such as making sure that there were enough guards with them to travel and keep them safe, but the joy of doing this with the entire family was simply the best.
Now, he was furious that both Alice and Joshua had neglected to tell him that Bella was with child. It was painfully obvious when she walked into her own house, the hormones around her wafting around like a warm, cuddly blanket. If Aro had ovaries, surely they would rattle by now. However, while babies were the cutest thing on the planet apart from puppies, Bella being pregnant was another hitch in the plan.
On their way towards Eichen House in the mostly sunless morning, Joshua told him that he didn’t know. That it was something Bella refused to believe in, how was he to know that she was pregnant?
Bella was already under the influence of Corin, who waited for them down the road. She had given Alice another dose of her happy contentment and Bella was chatting away with Alice, like old friends, as if nothing had happened between them. That’s why Aro liked Corin so much, she did her job very well.
“You look good, Bella,” Alice put her arm around the girl and smiled at her. “I told you, you were going to have a great future!”
“Still not too sure about that, Isaac thinks his friends still need him,” Bella sighed as she put her head against Alice’s arm. “But he has such a different life at the moment, more like… looking in from the outside. That can’t be a nice feeling.”
“Maybe he’s used to that feeling, have you given that a thought? Anyway,” Alice gently put her hand on Bella’s stomach. “Congratulations!”
“With what?”
“Your pregnancy?”
“Oh, that,” Bella sighed as she looked down on herself and swatted Alice’s hand away. “I’m sick, that’s all. Everyone keeps telling me I’m pregnant and stuff like that, but I can’t be. Isaac and I aren’t a couple and we both are still too much having fun.” Why were people continuously talking about her being pregnant? Wasn’t hearing it once enough? When was it going to go away? Of course, pretending she was sick wasn’t making it go away either, and it was that Isaac had asked her not to get rid of it that it was still there, but that didn’t have to mean she’d have to like it, right?
Aro frowned as he overheard the conversation, deliberately, almost as if Corin had used her extra influence on Bella to get the details right. Clever woman. If Bella truly didn’t want the baby, then there were more options. He could help her get rid of it. Or at least have it born and adopted. Yes, and then the girl in his guard. A werewolf. One who could walk in the sun. Smiling, he couldn’t wait to get to Eichen House to work with her.
Corin told him that she was easier to influence than she had expected, the shield that Bella had around her was virtually non-existent, maybe only for impact related issues, but the mental component was gone. She sensed it being around her stomach, which made Aro’s mood turn sour. There wasn’t a way to get rid of the kid then. He was just going to have to be patient.
On the way to the mental hospital, Corin had to influence Bella a few more times as it didn’t seem to stick for a long time on her, it was almost as if she was fighting it, but if she didn’t know what was going on, how did she know she had to fight it? She was good at what she did, sure, but she had never met a being who shrugged off her influence like that.
She instilled a little bit of excitement and happiness into the girl as they arrived on the floor that was secured for them. Maybe a little too much. The girl let out a high-pitched noise, oblivious to her surroundings but had zeroed in on her mate. Almost like a bee to honey she was drawn to him in an instant and leaped in his arms to kiss him.
“Well,” Marcus remarked as he sat in his chair. “I suppose it doesn’t have to take me to figure out how deep their relationship goes.”
~o0o~
Bella felt incredible. She had felt incredible the moment they turned round the corner to go to wherever Aro was taking her. It felt as if she was on a controlled rollercoaster; she would feel great and then plummet down to Earth but before she could react, she was back on her high again. She wasn’t even quite sure what she was doing, other than to walk and talk to Alice.
Wasn’t she supposed to hate Alice?
Wasn’t she supposed to rip the Volturi apart?
Just as her anger started to bubble up again, she was feeling alright again. Happy. Content. There wasn’t anything she could do about it and it was weird. She realized that it was probably a pregnancy thing. Mood swings. Jasper wasn’t anywhere in sight, he couldn’t influence her. On top of that, she had a shield that protected her from meddling. She wasn’t aware that it was on the fritz. Maybe it was. Wasn’t pregnancy supposed to do shit like that? Mess with your body?
And where did those thoughts about being pregnant come from? She was sick. And it would go away.
It was almost as if the happy thoughts wanted to pull her out of her head and it worked, sporadically. However, entering Eichen House – wasn’t that the nut house? – she felt how her spirit got dulled and felt her legs grow a little heavy as if she was trying to wade through mud. As if her special corner of her mind was getting locked off for some reason. When she laid eyes upon Isaac, however, her heart filled with so much happiness that everything else around her disappeared and jumped in his arms. “I’ve missed you! I was so worried!”
“I’m alright,” Isaac said after she stopped kissing him. “Your friends told me you were in danger, I’m glad that they managed to get to you.”
Her friends. Yes! She smiled at Aro, Marcus and Caius before seeing Jasper and blinked. She let go of Isaac and walked over to him. “Jazz!” She bearhugged him.
“Bella,” he said with a wince. “You don’t know your own strength,” he said when she let go of him eventually. He didn’t like seeing her like this. Corin was much stronger than he was and better at planting emotions in someone’s head while he could effect an entire room. Corin was struggling with Bella though, he could see that, and nudged Bella’s mind into submission. “I believe Aro wanted to have lunch with you.” He was surprised that it was easy this time to influence Bella. Due to her shield, he had always refrained from influencing her unless Edward asked him to. He should have done that on their wedding day, maybe then he wouldn’t be in so much trouble with Aro right now.
“I’m famished,” she said with a nod before walking back over to Isaac. “I thought you were helping Scott.”
“I was, but when I was at work, your friend Jasper told me to come with him for your safety.”
“Oh, that’s nice.”
“Come, let’s have lunch and discuss things like the civil people we all are,” Aro said, revealing a table filled with food. “I promise you, it’s safe for everyone.”
“Come,” Corin said as she wedged herself between Isaac and Bella and put her arms around them. “Aro has assured you have food, feel grateful.”
“Oh, but I am,” Bella said as she allowed herself to be lead towards the table. “Very. And also very grateful towards every single one of you wanting to keep us safe from the dead pool.”
“Me too, but I already said that,” Isaac replied as he helped Bella sit down on her chair. “Although I also said we’re not that valuable and they wouldn’t go after us.”
“Oh, but on the contrary,” Marcus said as he, too, sat down on a chair at the table. “She’s most valuable to us, and that makes you valuable too.”
“Cool, valuable by association,” Isaac smirked at Bella.
Bella blinked at Marcus’ choice of words. He wasn’t referring to the dead pool, was he?
“Eat,” Aro smiled as he pointed at the food. “I’m curious to what you’ve become, Bella, maybe after lunch, we can do some tests on you, yes?”
“Sure,” she muttered as she gratefully grabbed a piece of toast and started to nibble on it. No, not good. “This toast is delicious.” No, it’s not. It’s dry as fuck.
“What kind of tests?” Isaac wondered. “Because you can do them on me so she doesn’t have to do them.”
“Oh, nothing too intrusive, I promise you,” Aro replied as he watched the two werewolves eat. “And yes, we could do them on you if you had our kind’s venom in your body.”
“Oh, yeah,” Isaac sighed, feeling a little depressed. “That’s her alright.”
Bella let out a giggle and brushed his leg upwards to his groin. “You’re special to me,” she gently squeezed his upper leg. “That’s what’s important.”
Isaac smiled goofily at her and put another piece of toast on her plate. “Minx.”
After lunch Bella allowed one of the wives – she didn’t know whose or what their names were, she didn’t even know the Volturi had wives – to take blood from her with a syringe they had gotten from the medical staff of Eichen House. She didn’t want to, but she felt somehow compelled to do so; as a thank you for them keeping her and Isaac safe from the dead pool or something. She then curled up on the floor where Isaac was sitting against the wall and put her head in his lap for a nap. Napping was good.
~o0o~
It was a good thing the Volturi were afraid. Afraid to get caught or afraid that Bella would rip them to shreds. They only woke her up for food and some questions while they had Isaac show them what werewolves could do. Even with the building weakening him, Isaac took apart Felix as if he was a shred of paper – of course, when no one was watching him, Jasper had nudged Isaac a little bit with a sense of urgency to make sure he fought hard. Jasper wouldn’t want for Bella to lose her mate.
It was a good thing that he was good at pretending, and that Corin’s ability wasn’t quite working on him due to its closeness to his own. Sure, Jasper felt as if he was walking through mud when moving, but Corin couldn’t stop him from retreating in his own mind and form an opinion when it wasn’t supposed to happen.
He saw the same thing happening to Bella, although she easily slipped as well. Fighting against Corin’s influence was exactly what she needed to do to make sure that she and her mate would survive this. Aro was still thinking about either keeping her or discarding her. Insecurity sucked, but until Aro and the other Volturi had come to an agreement, he was going to play along.
On day two of their stay at Eichen House, a gunshot was heard from a few levels below and he was sent to check it out – what if they were going to get Bella and Isaac? Aro didn’t want that to happen! As it turned out, one of the orderlies got shot while going after two teenagers and the benefactor; the one running the dead pool was discovered. Only, for the teenagers, for it to be a letdown seeing as the benefactor was a crazy woman.
He remained quiet and observant as the teens were shipped off to the hospital and the woman was placed under arrest. The scent of fresh human blood was enticing; reminding him of the fact that he hadn’t fed in days. He should feed. Hell, everyone should feed but apart from the Volturi and their wives – and Corin – nobody was allowed to feed. Maybe returning with the information he had just learned would give Aro cause to reward him as a good little pet.
When he returned, however, he had to do his absolute best to stay neutral and not to freak out when he saw that Bella’s arm was bleeding. He’d smelled her from outside the door but thought he could handle it. He couldn’t. He wanted to feed. He wanted to feed on her. Just a taste, a tiny sip, it couldn’t do any harm. He’d been fine when the boy was bleeding, but Bella?
The moment he decided he was going to lick the blood off her arm, Alice told him off and the boy shoved Jasper across the room with little to no effort.
“Corin, be a dear and control those two,” Aro said with a singsong voice before motioning Jane to come closer while he observed the healing process on Bella’s arm. The mountain ash in the building made it harder for her to heal, but he also knew it had to do something with the extra mountain ash that he laced the blade with that he used to cut her. It had been fascinating. Two days under his control and in this building and Bella was as weak as putty. Ready to be molded. There was only one more test; Jane.
Well, and Felix, but Aro already knew that as of right now, the girl would lose to him.
It was fascinating how easy she’d been manipulated into submission, maybe Corin’s constant influence of her while she was asleep was finally paying off. According to Alice, Bella wasn’t making any attempts or decisions about leaving. She was with her head on Cloud Nine because of the baby growing inside of her. Aro was going to delight in having her get it born and then have it adopted. The pain and misery the girl was going to be in was going to add so much fire inside of her, it was going to be fantastic. His best bodyguard.
The best thing about hiding out in a working mental hospital was that screaming was normal, so if Bella would scream, it wouldn’t draw so much attention to them. Every test they’d performed on Bella showed that her shield was gone or at least failing.
Grinning when Bella writhed in agony, Jane felt incredibly happy that she was finally able to hurt the girl. She had tried before, but Aro had been right, her shield was not there. She looked over to Bella’s toy and smirked as he just had a confused look on his face. Simply because she could, she had him on the floor within seconds. Sighing happily, she smiled up to Aro. “I think she’s ready.”
“Excellent,” Aro replied as he sat down in his chair and looked over to Marcus. “You can go ahead with planning our trip back to Volterra.”
Her bones were aching and her head felt as if it was about to explode. If she didn’t know any better, she had experienced the best party ever and was now incredibly hungover. Bella had stayed down, with her head in Isaac’s lap, overviewing the entire room while she pretended to be whatever they wanted her to be.
It had been two days since Jane started to hurt her, and today it was going to end. Bella was going to end Jane even if that meant she was going to break down the entire building. It had also been two days since Jasper told her to keep fighting, he believed she was mentally strong enough to beat Corin, and he promised her he’d keep giving her waking nudges here and there if able.
And for the first time since she got here, she felt strong enough to push through her influence. All she needed now, was a plan. She’d been stupid when she voluntarily went with Aro, but he had Isaac. And Peter was with her so he had to leave. Aro was not going to take away her Isaac from her, her baby was going to need a father.
While she had hated Corin’s meddling with her mind; it was almost as if she’d been in a fog and happy and stuff like that, it did made her realize that the thing that was growing inside of her was worth loving and exploring. Worth protecting. Worth getting out of this mess for.
It didn’t look like Scott and anyone else was looking for them; it was what Bella had expected. They were simply too busy with their own problems, the dead pool for one, and Bella and Isaac were insignificant. But if Isaac didn’t snap out of this, she was going to have to do this on her own.
She had tried to get her shield to expand again, she had noticed that it had collapsed in on itself and protected the baby, but it wasn’t budging. Probably because of the anxiety that was coursing through her veins. Anxiety and anger. Rage. Not the fluffy feelings that she should be feeling but at least the negative emotions kept her vomiting at bay. But without her shield expanding so she could shield Isaac from Corin, she was on her own. All she could hope for was that Jasper was still on her side and Alice wasn’t paying attention to her.
Bella let out a sigh of contentment as she shifted a little to get a little bit more comfortable. Now that she was fully aware of her body, she noticed how everything ached and how slow it took for broken bones to heal. It wasn’t as bad as she expected, but it still sucked. Everything was fixed, it just needed the little push to get back to full mobility. Letting out a low growl and shifted her hand that was underneath Isaac’s legs, she felt how she forced her body to get indeed that final push.
It just sucked that vampires had such great hearing.
“Good morning, Bella,” Corin greeted her warmly and Bella could feel how the vampire was trying to influence her, making her content in her situation, but it wouldn’t take. She wasn’t sure if Corin noticed. “We have a problem,” Corin turned to Aro. “She’s resisting.”
“Impossible.”
Corin really shouldn’t have gotten close to Bella. She inelegantly sat up while Corin was trying to invade her mind. Bella concentrated hard to force her out while she grabbed the vampire and pulled her down to her level before starting to try to separate her head from her body. Much to Bella’s surprise, it was Isaac who pulled Bella off of the vampire and she didn’t like it at all. “What the fuck are you doing, Bella?” He was holding her tight and she was trying to get out of his arms. “They’ve been nothing but nice to us, keeping us safe and you want to repay them with killing one of them?”
Bella let out a growl as she glared at Corin and then at Aro, who was looking at her with an interested look on his face. She stopped struggling in Isaac’s arms and crossed her arms over her chest. She couldn’t blame Isaac, he was still under Corin’s influence, but he wouldn’t have been if she’d been able to kill Corin.
She was weaker than she had felt in the forest, this was because of the Mountain Ash in Eichen House’s foundations and she had to be stronger. She had to be able to rip off Corin’s head for the both of them to have a chance of survival.
“Calm down, Bella,” Jasper spoke calmly as he put his hand on her shoulder, but not trying to change anything. It had been a good attempt, she had to fight harder. Her boytoy was useless and Alice had already foreseen that Bella was capable of much more. Of being much more. He gently squeezed her shoulder and she relaxed, he hoped that Aro was only amused by her being able to deflect Corin’s gift and that he wouldn’t kill her. It hadn’t been the plan. Aro wanted Bella for himself.
“Well well,” Aro got to his feet and approached Bella. Without warning, he grabbed her by her neck and lifted her off the floor almost as if she was a doll, ready to be played with. “What are we going to do with you now? Corin was supposed to keep you quiet until nightfall, but if you are fighting her… we’ll have to think of something else.”
“Let go of me,” she tried pushing off of him, but his hand was like a vice around her neck and only held her tighter as she struggled. She managed to put her feet against Aro’s chest and concentrated as she pushed herself away from him, landing on the ground with ease. She was surprised to see that Aro was armless and blinked when something seemed to dangle from her neck. Smirking, she realized that it was his arm and pried the fingers off of her neck. “I think you’ve lost something.”
Had he seen her eyes flash a deep red when she was trying to kick herself off? Surely not, but she seemed to be getting stronger by the minute, almost as if her body had adjusted to the Mountain Ash that surrounded them. He cursed himself quietly; they should have taken over the supernatural wing, but then again, they wouldn’t even be able to do a thing.
With a scowl, Aro dismissed Felix and Jane, who had been eager to deal with Bella their own way and snatched his arm back from the young werewolf. It hurt like hell, but it’d heal.
Time for plan B. He grabbed a vial out of his pocket with his good working arm after pressing his other arm against the wound. He could feel how his body was sucking at the arm to keep it in place and the healing process had already begun. He flipped the lid off the small jar with his thumb and nodded towards Jane, who caused enough pain for Bella to be still affected and unable to turn, and backing her into the nearest corner.
Aro could see why she liked the boy so much, he was a puppy, and not even remotely concerned about the pain his girlfriend was in. He could easily be disposed of. Oh, and he’d have Bella watch. Brilliant! All giddy, he threw the contents of the jar at Bella, the ash forming a nice little circle around her. An inescapable prison of Mountain Ash. They were going to get a human later to break the circle when they were ready to leave, but at least now she didn’t have anywhere to go.
Bella felt a relief wash over her when the barrier came down around her, Jane wasn’t able to hurt her anymore, which also meant that Alice couldn’t see her decisions and both Jasper and Corin couldn’t influence her. Physically, she couldn’t be hurt either because everyone in the room was supernatural. She was safe. However, it also meant that she was going to have an even harder time trying to fight her way out of this as the Mountain Ash barrier was strong, and she was nowhere capable enough to push through it.
She sat down quietly with a scowl on her face and allowed the slow healing process undo the damage Jane had caused. She couldn’t really get angry with Isaac for pulling her off of Corin, but deep down, she was seething with anger. Yes, they were going to get out of this mess and then she’d give him the house and just leave him. End of games. But it wasn’t as if he could do anything about it, but still. If Bella was able to push her out of her head, why couldn’t he? Maybe because she had the venom in her system. Maybe. Maybe the baby was helping her.
The baby.
She absentmindedly caressed her stomach, a small bump was already noticeable; heck, she had to rip her pants a little to be able to get in a couple of days ago. She couldn’t believe that there was an actual baby growing inside of her even if it was a very bad idea. She and Isaac were nowhere near to be in the place to raise a child. They liked to have way too much fun and if Bella thought that buying a house was a very grown up thing to do, raising a child would be even more of a grown up thing to do and she wasn’t even 20!
Her mom was going to kill her. Charlie would shoot Isaac in a heartbeat.
She reached out to the edge of the mountain ash and growled when it was really containing her. “What are your plans, Aro?” Bella said as she shifted a little to make her a little bit more comfortable. “You obviously got me and you want me alive otherwise I would have been dead days ago.”
The vampire looked at her and shrugged lightly. “Perhaps. Or maybe I want to see you suffer.”
“That’s bullshit. And you’re a moron. You should have taken me back to Volterra when I was still under that bitch’ influence. I’m not going anywhere with you now.”
“Well well,” he said with an amused smile on his face. “I didn’t know you were that eager to come home to Volterra with us.”
“I’m not. I’d rather die.”
“That will be an option, yes,” Marcus mused, looking at the trapped little werewolf from his seat. “Please refrain from speaking further, our plane leaves tonight.”
“You can’t stop me.”
“Oh, we can,” Caius nodded to Felix, who immediately made his way over to Isaac. Felix grabbed Isaac’s arm and smirked at Bella when he broke Isaac’s arm in half. The sound of bones breaking made her nauseous, his cries of agony broke her heart and fuelled the rage inside of her.
“Leave him alone!”
“Once more, please, Felix,” Caius said in an even tone and watched in fascination as the vampire picked up the werewolf and threw him across the space, having him collide with the wall and temporarily knocking him out. “Well done.”
Unable to contain her anger, Bella roared out loud as she got to her feet. Once again, Aro thought he was seeing things when her eyes briefly flashed red. He wasn’t too worried. Bella was surrounded by mountain ash and she couldn’t transform. He was assured that no supernatural being could escape from it or get to her.
“Felix,” Caius coached the vampire, unfazed by Bella’s roar. Felix went over to Isaac’s limp body and lifted him up, watching the boy’s face, almost thinking about what he was going to do next. Shrugging, Felix dropped the boy to the floor and decided to break the arm some more. “Bella, every time you make a noise, we will hurt your boy. It’s in his best interest if you’d refrain from speaking.”
Bella thought for a moment. Hadn’t Argent mentioned something about a wolf needing to shift to get rid of certain external influences? Would it help against Corin’s meddling? It would certainly help him to heal faster. Pain helped him shift, she knew that, and she really didn’t want him to go through more pain, but he was still slightly dulled by Corin’s influence and he’d understand, wouldn’t he?
No, he wouldn’t. She promised him she wouldn’t hurt him and she wasn’t going to hurt him through a proxy. However, she wasn’t going to allow them to hurt Isaac even further. She needed to get rid of her rage, punch something. She was not going to Volterra and Isaac was not going to get hurt even more. Letting out a low growl, she started to push against the barrier of mountain ash.
The first try had her collide with the wall as it bounced back, causing the vampires look at her in concern. “Bunch of pansies,” she muttered under her breath, making eye contact with Jasper and Alice and focused her rage upon them. They were free. Or at least, Jasper was. Bella could tell and once again, he wasn’t doing anything to stop others from hurting people. “You call yourself a vampire.”
Bella winced when she heard more bones break and Isaac falling to the ground again. “Please, please just stop…” Isaac whimpered. “I’ll do better, I promise!”
She ducked when a knife came at her and sneered. She needed to free herself, she needed to get out there and make sure that Felix wouldn’t hurt Isaac again. Isaac. Isaac was important. Focussing on him, she started to try and push through the barrier again. Everything could be beat. She beat Corin. She killed Edward. She found friends who helped her with the Cullens. Yes, it sucked that it was currently her against a barrier and Volturi and she probably wasn’t going to survive, but she was going to try.
She was so busy concentrating to escape, that she didn’t notice that another knife was coming for her until it hit her in her leg, causing her to stumble back in pain. Bella looked at the knife sticking out of her leg almost as if it was a foreign idea for her to get hurt like this, which it basically was. Her shield was around her stomach and that’s where it was supposed to be, but this sensation was weird.
Bella pulled out the knife and flung it back, she wasn’t sure who threw it at her, but she aimed for Marcus’ head and he obviously caught it with a big smile on his face. She could feel how her wound was slowly closing and limped to her spot again. No longer keeping her anger at bay, she was determined to get through this time and nothing, no one, was going to stop her.
Taking a deep breath, she started to push through again, focusing on Isaac. While he was still pretty much out of it, she could see how the pain was bubbling underneath the surface of his skin. He looked like a tortured angel. Hers.
After a few seconds, she saw the vampires scatter and she thought she saw Derek in her peripheral vision but that wasn’t possible, there was no way he could know where she was. Even if it was Derek, she needed to get out of the mountain ash. She needed to check up on Isaac and she needed to kill at least one of the Volturi, preferably all of them. Corin was on top of her hit list, but so was Jasper, as well as Alice.
It was definitely Derek, as he joined the dumbfounded faces of the vampires who were watching her in awe as she was pushing through the mountain ash. Letting out a low growl, she could feel how it finally started to give. She felt empowered, strong and certainly capable of doing this. Bella felt confident that she could take apart a vampire, even with the mountain ash in the building. If she could push through the barrier, she was capable of using her full strength on breaking steel bodies.
She landed on all fours when she finally pushed through and the resistance stopped and roared. Not missing a beat, she pushed herself off from the ground and jumped on the nearest vampire – Jasper – and ripped off his head. She used his still standing body as a jumping board and kicked his head against Alice’s before launching herself at Corin, giving her the same treatment she had just given Jasper.
Landing on her feet, the Volturi scurried away in a corner, with only their guard shielding them from Bella. She looked at Derek, who looked at her dumbstruck, and Peter’s jaw was on the floor. “You’re fucking late,” she said angrily, causing both men to cast their eyes down before shaking whatever made them do it off and making their way over to the Volturi.
Bella made her way over to Isaac and sat down on her knees as she cupped his face. “Are you okay?”
“Not sure,” he said with a groan and rubbed his head. “What happened?”
“We got duped, that’s what happened,” she softly kissed him and helped him to his feet. “Come on, I left some for you to kill.” When she was sure that Isaac was steady on his feet, she looked at Peter and Derek who were both fighting off two vampires. Jane was having a blast with hurting them and this angered Bella. Jane was hers.
She ran over to Jane and knocked her down on the floor, pinning her down as she sat on top of her. Bella’s claws were extended as she ripped Jane’s pretty face to shreds, enjoying the sound of Jane’s cries. She pushed her fingers into Jane’s mouth and ripped out her tongue before shoving it up her nose. She then ripped of her arm and beat her with it until she got bored with it. It took her a little bit of effort to separate Jane’s head from her body but when she did, she took her arm and pulled down Felix’ pants. He was on Derek’s back at the moment while Derek was fighting one of the wives.
The wives were now extremely pissed off as they realized they had been under Corin’s influence for so long, but still they felt this loyalty towards their mates to help protect them. All those years in the tower without any real exercise didn’t do them any favors as Derek easily deflected the wife’s attempts of hitting him.
Felix yelped when Bella pulled his pants down, but didn’t let go of Derek. She then jammed Jane’s arm up his ass and pulled him off Derek, flinging him across the room as he had with Isaac. Isaac was on top of Felix in a second, holding the vampire in a vice like hold with his legs and pulled on his head. It took Isaac a little while, but the satisfying ‘pop’ sound was music to both their ears.
Bella surprised herself by how strong she felt, how powerful. She knew it was the adrenaline coursing through her veins, fuelled by her anger towards the vampires and right now she was happy about it. It meant that it didn’t have to take much to take them down for good. She was just about to reach out and grab Joshua off Peter’s back when she heard Scott let out a roar, causing Isaac to drop what he was doing and Peter and Derek looking annoyed at the Alpha.
Agitated, Bella spun around and saw Scott and his pack standing in the door opening. The twins were there, so were Liam, Malia and Kira and they looked at the scene before them in confusion, but ready to strike when needed.
“Oh lookie, it’s Scott. Better stop killing evil vampires,” Bella remarked sarcastically. “He thinks he can hug them and make it all alright.” She found Jasper’s head somewhere between Derek and Peter and kicked it towards Scott. “He came to hand me over to the Volturi, what does your morality have to say about that?”
“You didn’t have to kill him.”
“Oh he’s not dead. Not yet. The plan is to toss them all out the window into a pile and set them on fire.”
“That’s not going to happen. Back down.”
“No.”
Derek and Peter looked at each other and shrugged as they both looked at Scott at the same time with an amused look on their faces. “She’s not yours to command anymore, Scott,” Derek said smugly, nodding towards the lines of mountain ash that were looking the same as when Scott pushed through one to get to the Darach, only it was broken outwards.
“What do you mean?”
Derek nodded towards the circle again. “She did that.”
“No way,” Scott blinked and looked at Bella. “You’re not an alpha.”
“No, I’m not. I’m strong enough to break out of that because you fuckers didn’t show up in time,” Bella growled as she kicked Jane’s head a bit harder than she had Jasper’s and nearly hit Scott in the face. “So either help me kill the remaining Cold Ones or leave me to it because you’re not the boss of me.”
“I’m your alpha.”
Bella snorted. “No, you’re not. You’re a douchebag who like to ruin other people’s fun. They need to die, Scott. They will continue to do what they’re doing and they’ll kill loads of innocent people. Abuse them. Eat them for lunch. They hurt me and they hurt Isaac. Do you even care about us?”
“It’s not like you helped us with the assassins,” Aiden rolled his eyes at her.
“Isaac and I have been here for what? Three days? We were here, locked up under mountain ash with psychopathic vampires. Getting our minds fucked with. Did you even realise we were missing? I mean, if I hadn’t done anything, we’d be on a plane to Italy by now,” she said as she pulled Isaac closer to her. Even the Volturi and the remaining Cold Ones were looking flabbergasted. She then turned to the Volturi wives. “You may leave. I don’t care you just attacked my friends, but you were simply protecting your husbands. Leave.”
The wives looked at each other before one nodded. “Do your worst. He deserves it.” Bella watched them walk out the door and raised an eyebrow at Scott.
When he didn’t say anything she rolled her eyes at him. “With friends like you, who needs enemies?” She turned around and grabbed Alice, holding her in a vice like hold and looked at Isaac. “Continue, handsome.”
“Stop!” Scott roared, trying to issue an Alpha command and she could see that Isaac was a little bit confused, but he wasn’t backing away like he normally would.
“Go on,” she smiled at Isaac, ignoring Scott. “You know you want to.”
The next growl Scott let out was when he was fully transformed into his werewolf self and his eyes were bright red. It let the whole building shake and it caused all the beta’s respond with a whimper and wolfing out. But not Bella. She was sick and tired of Scott trying to be the better man and let go of Alice.
She turned to Scott and roared back in return. She felt how she shifted, the tingling in her body felt different, some how. She let out another growl when she felt she was fully transformed and smirked when she saw Scott and his pack look at her either in awe or extreme discomfort. “What!” she demanded. “Stop telling me what to do, asshole!”
“Oh, yeah, did I mention? She’s a True Alpha, just like you, Scott. You’re not such a rare snowflake after all,” Peter managed to quip once the effect of an Alpha’s command wore off on him. Scott’s wasn’t much of a problem, it had been Bella’s that had touched him, which was slightly confusing as he didn’t like bowing down to an alpha.
“That’s impossible.”
“Not really, if you think about it,” Peter continued with a shrug. “Apart from who she is as a person and what she’s been through, the Shaman who bound her werewolf side must have known something. Known about her potential as a True Alpha and decided to bind the spell to such. It’s brilliant, really.”
“I’m not an Alpha,” Bella said with a growl. “I don’t want to be one.”
“Well, you are, sweet cheeks,” Peter winked at her. “And I’ll be happy to be in your pack if you’ll have me.”
Derek blinked at Peter. “Seriously? No ulterior motives?”
“Nope. She made me feel something, Derek. It was amazing,” Peter explained and then saw the confused look on his nephew’s face. “When she roared. Fuck, that was amazing. Besides, we’re omegas. I’d rather be a beta because Hales are no omegas, we have a reputation to uphold. I’d rather be a beta to someone who doesn’t like orders and giving them than have to deal with the walking Clearasil ad.”
“Yeah but what about our normal lives? Do we really want to give her that much power over us?”
“Do you really see her interfering with our lives?”
Derek was quiet for a moment and looked at Bella who was basically ignoring the rest of them now as she and Isaac were standing away from the vampires and the wolves, quietly talking to themselves about the baby. Unknowingly, she had already accepted Isaac as part of her pack. “You have a point. Bella?”
Bella looked up, annoyance briefly flashing across her face.
“Can Peter and I join your pack?”
“Whatever.”
“Seriously?” Scott blinked at Bella. “You take Isaac away from me and you have the Hales join you? Are you nuts?”
“I didn’t ask them,” Bella said with a shrug. “But don’t worry, Scott. I’m sure your friends will stick by you and they can still be friends with you. I honestly don’t care. And I am not going to meddle with your affairs as long as you don’t stick your snout in mine.” She said a bit more forcefully. “So, if you don’t mind, we have some killing to do. You’re welcome to join us.”
Scott just looked at his friends and saw Ethan and Aiden wavering a little bit. They had been wanting to join a pack, not just Scott’s, and with Bella now being an Alpha, she was already strong on her own, but joined by the Hales? It was going to be a pack to be reckoned with.
“And because you’re so good at barking orders at your friends, send one of them to fetch some marshmallows for the bonfire we’re going to have.”
