Chapter Text
Bella: There's been a change of plan.
Within an hour Bella’s family had shown up with the last two members of the Denali coven. No one spoke as everyone moved inside, the Cullens minus Edward and Carlisle claimed one side of the living room, Esme sat in the armchair and her children stood in various stances behind her.
Sam and his second stood next to the open window, Paul would glare at the new vampires but said nothing.
Bella sat on the couch with her back straight and her gaze hard as her mates sat next to her, her siblings, Jane and Alec stood behind the couch. Behind her.
The other two members of the Denali coven sat in the conjoining love seat. Eleazar and Carmen, the two had gone to Port Angeles in order to rendezvous with the queens, allowing the sisters to meet their human mate and to hide their true numbers from Victoria.
And then there were Carlisle and Edward. They stood in the center of the room, Edward kept his gaze to the floor, not being strong enough to look anyone in the eye. Carlisle on the other hand stood with a false bravado.
He looked toward the three women standing in front of the fireplace.
The queens didn't need their thrones.
They didn't need guards.
They didn't even need to raise their voices.
They were intimidating all on their own.
“You have no authority here,” Carlisle stated. If he had a heartbeat, it would be going crazy.
Athenodora slowly turned her head toward him.
Sulpicia's eyebrows lifted.
Didyme simply stared.
“We are the Volturi,” Athenodora said calmly. “We have authority wherever we say we have authority”
“You are not needed here”
“We are not needed here?” Didyme asked, she stood to the far right of the three as they commanded the room's attention with very little effort.
He nodded.
“You do not get to decide what or who is needed, we do. We are here because your son put our daughter in danger” Sulpicia spoke with venom in her voice.
“She is not your daughter!” Edward said.
“Do not yell at my mate, boy” Athenodora spat.
“What my son meant to say is that he has and will always do what's best for his mate”
“Are you two really so delusional?” Bella asked as she rose from the couch, her mates stood with her. Anger had slowly started to fill her, building to a crescendo.
“Your son” she spat, sounding just like Athenodora, “has meddled with my life, put it in danger on multiple occasions” Her voice grew louder. “So no I am not his mate, I am not his anything!” she yelled.
Edward's face fell.
“You will tell us how you planned the Interaction with James and Victoria”
“Bella,” he pleaded.
“NOW!” Her voice echoed through the room.
Edward flinched.
“I…” he started, but the word died in his throat.
His eyes darted around the room, desperately searching for someone, anyone, who might step in and save him.
There was no one. The only person standing on his side was the man beside him. Carlisle.
Edward's gaze dropped back to the floor as the realization settled in. There was no way out.
He was at the bottom of a hole he’d dug for himself and now the only thing he could do was ask for a rope.
“The first time I met Isabella Marie Swan, I was enchanted. She was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen” he paused as he looked at Bella with hope.
Hope that was crushed beneath her shoes as he saw the look on her face.
She looked murderous.
“I was enchanted but the devil sat on my shoulder, tempting me to drain her. She is my singer. Her blood called to me but I wouldn't let myself hurt her”
Bella scuffed.
“So I ran to the Denali coven. I stayed with them for a week before I was confident enough in my restraint to return to see her beauty. When I returned I discovered something I was blind to before. I couldn't read her mind, which peaked my Interest, I couldn't learn anything about her my normal way I would so I had to get to know her, I had to be close to her”
“We know this part, skip ahead a few chapters” Sulpicia ordered.
“After I saved her from those men in Port Angeles, she discovered our secret all on her own” he looked at her with a hint of pride. Growls from almost everyone in the room forced him to continue. “She discovered what we were and was curious, so I taught her about us. The more I told her, the more she wanted to be around us. I thought it was a sign that she was my ma…” growls interrupted him.
“After a short amount of time I wanted her to meet the rest of my family. The meeting went well and then… and then as days passed the desire for her blood had returned and it came back with a vengeance”
“What did you do next Edward?” Esme asked, grief and horror covered her face as she watched her mate and eldest son.
“I knew that I would not let myself hurt her but the mounting need for her blood became too much”
“What did you do?” Bella demanded. She’d taken a small step forward. Her mates at her back, her siblings not far behind.
He lowered his head.
“I was in Seattle when I came across a nomadic coven, their thoughts were very loud. I approached them, I told them I needed their help with something”
“With what”
“I told them that my family was playing house with a human girl and that it was becoming tiresome… I told them that I needed their help in killing the human”
Growls erupted, filling the room from all angles.
Edward visibly recoiled.
Tanya's lips pulled back, revealing her teeth. Kate was already on her feet, her eyes fixed on him. Irina's hands curled into fists.
The wolves snarled from across the room.
Each of the queens took threatening steps forward.
Even several of the Cullens looked horrified. Esme covered her mouth. Rosalie's expression was one of pure disbelief. Emmett slowly shook his head. Jasper's eyes remained locked on Edward, his face unreadable as he absorbed the emotions flooding the room.
Bella didn't move.
She simply stared at him.
“You wanted them to kill me?”
Edward swallowed. “Yes”
“Why?”
“Becuase I couldn't let my family see me as a monster. I thought that if they killed you I would be seen as a mourning mate. I thought that if they kill you and then we killed them there would be no blame to go around”
“So let me get this straight, you sought out James and Victoria, asked them to kill me and then when James had me in that Ballet studio, almost had me at death's door you killed him and sucked the venom out. Then you let Victoria, whose mate you just killed in cold blood, you let her run away”
He nodded.
She grabbed a hold of his shirt.
A strength unlike anything she'd ever felt surged through her body, allowing her to throw him through the window.
She followed after him.
“Bella stop!” Irina tried to step forward but Athenodora grabbed her.
“I don't believe it” Eleazar spoke up, his eyes wide in amazement as he stared at her.
“What is it, Eleazar, what do you see?” Didyme asked. Before he could answer Edward came back into the clearing.
He slowly stepped towards Bella, like he was trying to apprehend wild animals.
“You must understand,” he begged.
“Understand what!? That you meddled with my life!” she swung her fist, connecting with his face.
Spider webs of cracks spread out from where she hit him.
“That you were enchanted by me!”
Punch.
“That you had a desire for my blood!”
Punch.
He fell to his knees, she grabbed him by his shirt and continued to punch and yell at him.
“How is she doing that?” Kate asked, for once not trying to make a joke out of the situation.
“Eleazar, what do you see?” Didyme asked again.
“She’s a shield,” he pointed out.
“We already knew that”
“Yes, but she’s using it as a booster”
“What does that mean?”
“It means” he started, everyone in the clearing watched Bella punch him repeatedly. “She is so filled with rage that her shield is reacting to her emotions, her rage is fueling her shield and together her shield is acting as a battering ram, it’s hitting him not Bella” he explained.
“But we can see Bella hitting him” Irina commented with confusion and worry for her mate.
“Every time she moves to strike him, the shield moves with her. It’s extending just beyond her body and delivering the impact before her actual fist does”
He watched as Bella drew her fist back and slammed it into Edward again.
“You grew so weak that you sought out two vampires, asked them to help you kill me and then turned around and killed one of them!”
Punch.
“You made me have that birthday party!”
Punch.
“You dumped me in the middle of the woods!”
Punch.
His face was covered with cracks, he fell to the ground.
Bella wasn't done yet.
“I spent months in a comatose-like state!” she kicked him.
In the nuts.
He curled in out himself, trying and failing to shield himself from her.
“Why isn't he fighting back?” one of the wolves asked. The rest of the pack had been standing outside during the whole conversation. Jacob wanted to charge and dismember the mind freak but Sam had ordered all of them to wait outside.
They’d all watched as Edward went flying through the window, Bella following shortly after. They all watched as little, tiny, clumsy Bella Swan started to pummel Edward.
“He still believes her to be his mate, no matter what he said in there, he would never hurt her” Carlisle defended.
“No, he’ll just hire someone to do it for him” Esme remarked with a sad glare as she held Rosalie's arm.
“Esme, our son loves his mate”
“He is infatuated with his singer” she corrected.
“Enough both of you” Athenodora ordered, not taking her eyes off her daughter. A look of pure pride covered her face, pride was spread out through the entire group of the Volturi.
“And Victoria has been seeking revenge, sneaking around the Reservation, trying to get to me!”
Kick.
“And for the icing on the cake, I was on the mend and decided to do something for myself and you had to go and ruin it!”
Kick.
“I wanted to feel free, I wanted to feel the wind in my hair so I decided to go cliff diving!”
Kick.
“Alice saw, thought I had died, she at least came to check on me, which is more than I can say for you!”
She grabbed a hold of his disheveled shirt and lifted. She held him above her head.
“Okay so how is she doing that?” Tanya asked.
“It's her shield,” Eleazar said, like it was obvious. “Her shield is reinforcing her actions, by the looks of it her shield is very, very strong”
“Your dumbass figured that the best course of action since your ‘mate’ was dead was to run to Volterra and ask the kings and queens for death!”
She threw him away, his body collided with a tree, it exploded into splinters.
He flew for a few feet more.
“Though I must give you a very, very small thank you. If you hadn't been an idiot and tried to get the Volturi to off you then I would not have met my mother's or my siblings” she paused and gave a brief smile towards the queens and the witch twins.
Edward slowly re-entered the clearing.
“Bella–”
“Dont even try it” she warned. “I think now would be a good time for you to start rectifying the laws you've broken,” she said, her chest rising and falling in heavy breaths. Her fists clenched at her sides.
“I see where you're going with this Bella, and I approve” Alice started before a vision took over her.
The clearing waited in silence as it played out to her and Edward.
“Victoria will attack in two days' time,” she added.
“Good, so when the time comes we will dispatch Victoria's newborns, they were created out of grief and anger, their sole purpose was to disarm the Cullen family so that she would be able to get close to Edward. We will allow her to play judge, jury and possibly executioner. The way Edward had played those roles with me” Bella explained. “She is the one wronged out of this entire situation, it will be her that will decide the consequences of Edwards actions”
“Bella you cant!” Carlisle gasped, he tried to rush towards his son but he was suddenly on the ground, flailing in pain.
Some eyes glanced towards Jane as she stared at Carlisle’s form. There was a small smirk on her face, she was enjoying causing the man pain.
“Alec, would you mind taking Edward’s senses?” Didyme asked softly.
“Of course mother” he smiled, black fog soon spread from his hands and floated across the ground. It soon covered Edward, seeping into his skin. After a few seconds all of the fog was gone and Edward stood frozen.
“Thats pretty cool” Bella remarked.
“Thank you… did you hear that Jane? She thinks my gift is cooler than yours” he smiled but it quickly dropped when he saw the frown on Bella’s face.
“Please don't put words in my mouth”
“Of course sister” he nodded before turning to look at Jane. “I’m sorry sister”
“Its alright”
The three of them smiled at each other before worry took over the twins' faces.
Bella began to sway on her feet.
“Bella?” Athenodora immediately moved toward her.
Bella blinked, trying to focus. “I’m fine”
She took another step. Her knees buckled.
Athenodora caught her before she could hit the ground.
“She’s exhausted,” Didyme said, rushing forward.
“She used a tremendous amount of energy using her shield the way she did,” Eleazar explained.
Everyone watched as the color slowly drained from Bella’s face.
Athenodora's expression immediately changed. Without hesitation, she shifted her grip and lifted Bella completely off the ground.
“Momma…” Bella mumbled, her voice weak. “I don't feel so good” Her eyes squeezed shut as the world began to spin around her.
“Don't worry,” Athenodora whispered, “I have you.” She tightened her hold, pressing Bella securely against her chest. “Momma has you”
Athenodora turned and marched toward the house, her mates immediately falling into step behind her.
Jane and Alec rushed ahead, throwing open doors before their mother even reached them.
Tanya, Kate, and Irina followed close behind, their expressions filled with worry as they kept their eyes on Bella.