Breaking Dawn

I tried to understand the spiraling voices, tried to follow the curling pathway the thoughts made to see where they were leading, but it wasn’t making sense. The pictures in the center of their thoughts were my pictures—the very worst of them. Bella’s bruises, Edward’s face as he burned.

They fear it, too.

But they won’t do anything about it.

Protecting Bella Swan.

We can’t let that influence us.

The safety of our families, of everyone here, is more important than one human.

If they won’t kill it, we have to.

Protect the tribe.

Protect our families.

We have to kill it before it’s too late.

Another of my memories, Edward’s words this time: The thing is growing. Swiftly.

I struggled to focus, to pick out individual voices.

No time to waste, Jared thought.

It will mean a fight, Embry cautioned.A bad one.

We’re ready, Paul insisted.

We’ll need surprise on our side, Sam thought.

If we catch them divided, we can take them down separately. It will increase our chances of victory, Jared thought, starting to strategize now.

I shook my head, rising slowly to my feet. I felt unsteady there—like the circling wolves were making me dizzy. The wolf beside me got up, too. His shoulder pushed against mine, propping me up.

Wait, I thought.

The circling paused for one beat, and then they were pacing again.

There’s little time, Sam said.

But—what are you thinking? You wouldn’t attack them for breaking the treaty this afternoon. Now you’re planning an ambush, when the treaty is still intact?

This is not something our treaty anticipated, Sam said. This is a danger to every human in the area. We don’t know what kind of creature the Cullens have bred, but we know that it is strong and fast-growing. And it will be too young to follow any treaty. Remember the newborn vampires we fought? Wild, violent, beyond the reach of reason or restraint. Imagine one like that, but protected by the Cullens.

We don’t know— I tried to interrupt.

We don’tknow, he agreed. And we can’t take chances with the unknown in this case. We can only allow the Cullens to exist while we’re absolutely sure that they can be trusted not to cause harm. This… thing cannot be trusted.

They don’t like it any more than we do.

Sam pulled Rosalie’s face, her protective crouch, from my mind and put it on display for everyone.

Some are ready to fight for it, no matter what it is.

It’s just a baby, for crying out loud.

Not for long, Leah whispered.

Jake, buddy, this is a big problem, Quil said. We can’t just ignore it.

You’re making it into something bigger than it is, I argued.The only one who’s in danger here is Bella.

Again by her own choice, Sam said. But this time her choice affects us all.

I don’t think so.

We can’t take that chance. We won’t allow a blood drinker to hunt on our lands.

Then tell them to leave, the wolf who was still supporting me said. It was Seth. Of course.

And inflict the menace on others? When blood drinkers cross our land, we destroy them, no matter where they plan to hunt. We protect everyone we can.