Twilight Fan Fiction / Twilight Fan Fiction ❯ I Know My Duty ❯ Focus ( Chapter 14 )

Twilight and its three and a half sequels are the creation of Stephenie Meyer. Yep, that's Stephenie with three e's.

 

 

.

.

.

"He's wondering if the newborn madness is really as difficult as we've always thought, or if, with the right focus and attitude, anyone could do as well as Bella." -Edward, Breaking Dawn

 

 

.

.

.

 

My gift did not permit me to mistake Caius's meaning. Now that Aro had confirmed his suspicions, his mind was simmering through the possibilities. A single rational newborn could have her uses, even if an experienced fighter like Felix would always be more effective than some naïve child. But in groups...

Caius's thoughts shifted again. I saw rows of torches on the ground, carried in ice-white hands, stretched out on the ground before a fortress... The Rumanians, he thought. We drove them back, broke their power, ruined their keep and their numbers. But imagine how it could have gone, Brother. Here, Caius pictured a victory so complete that it would silence all future assaults on Volturi supremacy.

"But it would be just as easy for someone else to do it, don't you think?" Aro asked out loud.

All the more reason for us to discover it first. If the secret of creating stable newborns could not be kept out of the wrong hands, Caius proposed, then the next best thing was to make sure it did get into the right ones. And to Caius's mind, the Volturi were the only right ones.

It was fascinating. Aro's and Caius's thoughts working in tandem was like watching a ballet, every piece of information moving in seamless unity toward the final tableau. It suddenly seemed strange to me that I was the only person in the room capable of witnessing it. It was like an exotic bird with shimmering feathers or a waterfall hidden in the wilderness, too amazing for just one person to see.

Caius was already at the end result: Well-organized strike teams made up of calm newborns. All the strength of the southern armies, focused through as much training as the Volturi guard could give them over the course of a few weeks. I could see image after image of possible uses, possible threats to neutralize. Even, in one flickering moment, a large western coven comprising three bonded pairs and one unattached male, three, no, only two of them gifted—

I growled, loud and unapologetic. Caius barely noticed.

"Edward," Aro snapped. You know perfectly well that people cannot always stop themselves from thinking things, even if they would never actually do them. Caius has no reason to ever attack my friend Carlisle, but it is his duty to consider all possibilities. It wasn't true, at least not all the way down.

I quieted. There was nothing else I could do. And people were staring.

You have to admit that the idea has possibilities, Brother, Caius thought. As for the complications—- Here I saw Caius's mind flash through issues of training, secrecy, discovery, disposal and a thousand other problems standing like roadblocks between him and the increased power of his realized dream. —such matters are far more your domain than mine. And you have been saying that you wanted a new project.

He was playing to Aro's curiosity, I noticed, and from the confidence in his thoughts, it seemed that it usually worked. This time, though...

Aro's eyes landed heavily on me. I'd had quite a different project in mind, however... I steeled myself and returned his gaze. I would never regret helping Alice escape from him, no matter how badly he wanted her or how much he made me suffer for it.

You're right, of course, Aro thought. Caius' couldn't sense the words like I could, but he could read Aro's eyes well enough to get the general idea. I saw him smile tightly. If anyone is to have a newborn army, it must be the Volturi, if only so that we can train our guard in how to defeat one.

"But only if it is even possible..." he murmured out loud. The girl's progress could plateau, or this could all be some illusion. After all, it isn't as if I can tell for certain. Again, a quick shadow of resentment passed across Aro's face, and Caius understood it as well as I did. Aro was convinced, and he knew it, and once his irritation passed, he would commence working out the details of Caius's plan. Of the three rulers of the Volturi, Marcus had loved architecture and the arts, and Caius had loved strategy. Aro had watched the development of science. And like any good scientist, he would change only one variable at a time. In this case, that meant turning human after human, carefully tracking each trait, making sure that it was the exact same vampire who turned them.

I turned away, not that it helped much. To see such vivid images of me with my fangs at a a human neck... It was sickening. It made my stomach wrench and my throat burn at the same time.

The other vampires in the room were silent, apparently used to the elders' half-audible conversations. I tried to shake it off. Even their thoughts would be better than this.

I wonder if they'll tell us what they're talking about this time.

I see Chelsea stole my white blouse again. How many times do I have to tell her that it makes her look like a brick wall?

Master Marcus isn't back yet. Jane. I watched her carefully. Her mind was simple enough that small changes in routine bothered her. It was sharp enough for her to pin down exactly what it was that she didn't like.

Most of the time, it was Aro who requested a counsel, Jane remembered. And Marcus was usually there, quiet and a little bored-looking, but reassuringly present, the third leg of the tripod holding up her limited universe.

But that was as far as Jane's curiosity went. It wasn't in her to wonder why Marcus wasn't here, which was what was puzzling me. If meeting Bella had been dangerous, then why would Aro and Caius do it in person? And if it wasn't dangerous, then why wouldn't Marcus stay? I'd detected nothing overcautious in his thoughts, but I had to admit that I hadn't paid Marcus much attention.

I shook my head. It could have been as simple as that he'd had something else to do. And yet...

Marcus had been intrigued with the human Bella, or rather, with the dynamic between the human Bella and myself. A vampire who'd truly fallen in love with a human... It was something that he'd never seen before, not within the reach of his own eyes and his own gift. As jaded as he'd seemed, I couldn't believe that he'd pass up the chance to have another look at her, especially if I was standing next to her, not unless he had something very important that absolutely had to be done at the same time.

I felt my brow knit with worry. Caius had set a trap for Bella. Was Marcus doing the same while I was occupied here? Caius had said that they'd needed me to stay, but so far, he hadn't asked or even thought of asking me to do anything. Was it only that I needed to be distracted?

Carefully, I turned my attention back to Aro and Caius, hoping for some clue. Instead, I found that Aro working out the details of Caius's plan. Specifically, he was considering possibilities, trying to hammer out which traits of Bella's or of mine or of the two of us together could have caused her condition.

I found that I did not care. It was a subject for reflection, for home, for a long talk in Carlisle's study. Here, now, it could not interest me. I took a breath and let my mind reach out past the audience chamber, looking for the mouselike scurrying of Renata's thoughts. On my first day here, Aro had tricked me into giving him a demonstration of my power's tactical side. Surely he wouldn't object to a little practice. Of course, there was the question of whether or not I could do it again. I'd been very motivated at the time, on fire with my need to know that my love was safe. Now... Now I merely wanted to know.

The first mind I encountered was right outside the door, easily recognizable by its focus and precision:

I ...suppose it didn't do any harm, for all that he made a fuss about it. Here I saw an ice-clear memory of my own face, unnatural yellow eyes like pools of slime as I snarled out that he should take Gianna away. Demetri was waiting just outside, not wanting to interrupt whatever was happening within. Whelp has no business giving orders. Still, it was less trouble than vetting a new receptionist, he thought. I watched him remember what had happened next, each image perfecrly distinct, perfectly ordered: He'd taken Gianna outside, into the street, told her to take the morning off, and now he was contemplating what had happened in the lobby, prodding every fiber of the experience with the razorlike stilus of his thoughts.

I ranged wider, paying only token attention to Aro, Caius and the other vampires in my immediate surroundings as I skimmed outward. I still didn't have a good mental map of the compound—Aro had kept me too off-balance—but I kept trying, looking for thoughts of bookshelves and computer screens and other sights of the library. This early, there were only a few human employees settling in for the day. One of them was bringing the paper copies of the morning news subscriptions to the library for the next shift. I scanned the surface thoughts of the room's inhabitants. None of them were of Bella or Renata. They were not there. It made sense. Hadn't Aro said something about not going to the main library? I looked wider and found a vampire ushering a young human out of an upstairs hallway. Afton? It could have been Afton. That meant Renata wouldn't be too far off...

I was listening for thoughts in parts of the compound I'd never personally visited. It was difficult for me, pinpointing how high up or far away each person was, not like finding Alice or Emmett as we hunted separately in the forest. And I couldn't match any of the images in these vampires' minds to any from rooms and hallways that I'd already seen. I found myself drawn to a faint male voice. His thoughts were completely in the moment. He was picturing nothing but the chamber he was in and the yellow-haired female in front of him.

So glad we skipped the gathering. Nothing could be as sweet as this... The male's thoughts became wordless as he closed his eyes, focusing on the sounds and scent and feel of his paramour. I turned my attention away, tuning them out. Emmett and Rosalie had given me years of practice in minding my own business when it came to other people's intimate encounters.

Still, there was something about the male's mind that bothered me. I couldn't sense emotions directly, not the way Jasper could, but something about the two Volturi strangers... I told myself that it was the fact that they'd preferred a private moment of tenderness to a public spectacle of domination, but I knew that that wasn't quite it. I had a nagging suspicion that I would understand but not until my iciness had melted away, not until I could truly feel pain again. My curiosity did not live long.

I hope she isn't mad at me when I tell her she has to take a shower. What if she thinks I'm up to no good, telling her to take her clothes off? Oh but what if she runs off or does something awful while I'm off getting her something clean to wear? Renata. I'd found Renata. She was watching the back of Bella's head as the two of them climbed a staircase, the moring sunlight slanting in at them through the high, slitted windows. Renata's thoughts were scattered, jumbling together memories of a set of closets and wooden hangers with vision after vision of Bella breaking furniture, tearing apart human servants and beating Renata over the head with anything handy.

I tried to push myself further, feeling for any whisper of another mind in the stairwell with Renata, but there was nothing. The newborn Bella was as seamless as the human one had been.

I couldn't leave to go after them, not until Aro finished his counsel and gave me permission, so I just watched. I didn't know Renata's mind well enough to follow her without effort, not from this far away. Her mind, with all its cringing timidity, was more comfortable than, say, Mike Newton's, even if she lacked Angela Weber's refreshing lack of pretension.

Renata had told Bella to precede her up the staircase rather than leading the way. That was why things were going so slow. Every once in the while, Bella would look over her shoulder and Renata would remind herself to smile. It was strange to see my newborn through another person's eyes when that person was neither a threat like Felix nor a jealous harpy like Adrienne. I focused in the secondhand pictures in my head, trying to wipe the blurs from its edges. Renata was no Demetri.

The boor in the council chamber had seen Bella through his lust and Adrienne through her jealousy. Renata saw her through carefully calculated fear, measuring and extrapolating every possible threat from the ruby intensity of her eyes and each bulge of slender muscle through her perfect white skin.

Superimposed on the present, Renata was remembering the other newborns she'd met. I could tell that she'd been with the Volturi long enough to have seen some action in Mexico. She knew exactly what Bella could do to her if she lost her composure. To Renata, there was little more terrifying than an unpredictable newborn, and the idea that Bella might be immune to her own protective gift had shaken her terribly.

I didn't know whether to be disgusted with Renata's cowardice or impressed that she could do her duty despite it. I wondered whether she was different when there was no one threatening nearby. I wondered how someone of her character could end up in the Volturi guard at all.

I held back a sneer, remembering that my physical body was still in a room full of other vampires who couldn't see the context and wouldn't care if they could. Aro did not choose us for character.

Renata and Bella had reached the top of the stairs. She noted that Marcus must have had the bathroom remodeled and now she was trying to find a way to tell Bella that she needed to wash off the smell of the pigs without making her mad.

I wanted to go to her. I wanted it with a dull aching that gave pause to the quiet places of my mind. Somewhere, somewhere back in the most honest part of myself, I knew that the past few days' icy calm could not last. The cold had protected me, allowed me to look out at the world, at the ruin that I'd made of my life, through a clear, solid wall. When it melted, when that wall fell, it would be time for me to taste fire again. I was like a heretic waiting in prison for the stake. If I was still locked inside, it meant the worst had not come yet.

"Very well," said Aro. I snapped back to my surroundings. "Let's say that I accept your proposal on its face, Brother. What then? We would have to determine exactly what about the human girl we saw five days ago allowed her to bloom into this unusual creature."

"It could have been Edward," Caius answered, "a side effect of his lifestyle, perhaps."

Aro was shaking his head, "No, you see, this remarkable young man has vivid memories of two of Carlisle's other children, Rosalie and Emmett, and they were both normal. No, we should not assume that this is entirely Edward's doing."

There are always the blood relatives, the thought from Caius's mind sliced through me like a razor. The girl must have had family somewhere. His lips were opening. He was about to give the thought voice, and that would be very, very bad.

"She was willing," I blurted.

Aro and Caius both stared at me. So did everyone else.

Interrupting the elders during a counsel might have been a serious faux pas, but I had no intention of watching Aro drag Bella's loved ones into this while there was anything I could do to discourage him. I knew what I owed her memory. Gaining the Volturi's notice was not good for a human's lifespan, no matter the reason.

"She asked me to turn her," I went on, "many times." And if I had said yes, even once, neither of us would be here. I closed my eyes against the unwilling memory of Bella standing with me in the woods, fierce against my lies, swearing that she loved me more than any hope of heaven.

I shook it off. There was no way to know what would have happened. It still would have cost her her family, her soul and her human future. That fate only seemed good when compared to this one. "How many of us truly understood the gift of immortality at the time it was being given? Bella spent months with my family, learning about our kind. Her calmness might be some trick of her nature or it might be that she simply knew what to expect."

In Aro's memory, I could see two sniveling urchins, twins, clinging to each other in a terror that his kind words could do nothing to dispel. He reached for the girl, clapping his palm against her rigid arm—

Aro pulled his thoughts away before I could fully realize what I'd seen, forcing his mind into the present.

"Control is a mental thing," I continued. "Perhaps mental preparation is part of it."

Aro shared a glance with Caius, raising his eyebrows. "It's as good a possibility as any, Brother."

"Yes," Caius answered, with an undercurrent of harshness. "And easy enough to test."

 

.

.

.

 

drf24 (at) columbia (dot) edu