If I'd been in any doubt over who the winner was, that doubt was gone when, a second later, a female vampire with wavy brown hair and yel ow eyes hurried to his side.

"Carlisle?" she asked in a confused voice, staring at me.

"She doesn't want to fight," he told her.

The woman touched his arm. He was stil tensed to spring.

"She's so frightened, Carlisle. Couldn't we..."

The blond, Carlisle, glanced back at her, and then he straightened up a little, though I could see he was stil wary.

"We have no wish to harm you," the woman said to me. She had a soft, soothing voice. "We didn't want to fight any of you."

"I'm sorry," I whispered again.

I couldn't make sense of the mess in my head. Diego was dead, and that was the main thing, the devastating thing. Other than that, the fight was over, my coven had lost and my enemies had won. But my dead coven was ful of people who would have loved to watch me burn, and my enemies were speaking to me kindly when they had no reason to. Moreover, I felt safer with these two strangers than I'd ever felt with Raoul and Kristie. I was relieved that Raoul and Kristie were dead. It was so confusing.

"Child," Carlisle said, "wil you surrender to us? If you do not try to harm us, we promise we wil not harm you."

And I believed him.

"Yes," I whispered. "Yes, I surrender. I don't want to hurt anybody."

He held out his hand encouragingly. "Come, child. Let our family regroup for a moment, then we'l have some questions for you. If you answer honestly, you have nothing to fear."

I got up slowly, making no movements that could be considered threatening.

"Carlisle?" a male voice cal ed.

And then another yel ow-eyed vampire joined us. Any sort of safety I'd felt with these strangers vanished as soon as I saw him.

He was blond, like the first, but tal er and leaner. His skin was absolutely covered in scars, spaced most thickly together on his neck and jaw. A few smal marks on his arm were fresh, but the rest were not from the brawl today. He had been in more fights than I could have imagined, and he'd never lost. His tawny eyes blazed and his stance exuded the barely contained violence of an angry lion.

As soon as he saw me he coiled to spring.

"Jasper!" Carlisle warned.

Jasper pul ed up short and stared at Carlisle with wide eyes. "What's going on?"

"She doesn't want to fight. She's surrendered."

The scarred vampire's brow clouded, and suddenly I felt an unexpected surge of frustration, though I had no idea what I was frustrated with.

"Carlisle, I..." He hesitated, then continued, "I'm sorry, but that's not possible. We can't have any of these newborns associated with us when the Volturi come. Do you realize the danger that would put us in?"

I didn't understand exactly what he was saying, but I got enough. He wanted to kil me.

"Jasper, she's only a child," the woman protested. "We can't just murder her in cold blood!"

It was strange to hear her speak like we both were people, like murder was a bad thing. An avoidable thing.

"It's our family on the line here, Esme. We can't afford to have them think we broke this rule."

The woman, Esme, walked between me and the one who wanted to kil me. Incomprehensibly, she turned her back to me.

"No. I won't stand for it."

Carlisle shot me an anxious glance. I could see that he cared a lot for this woman. I would have looked the same way at anyone behind Diego's back. I tried to appear as docile as I felt.

"Jasper, I think we have to take the chance," he said slowly.

"We are not the Volturi. We fol ow their rules, but we do not take lives lightly. We wil explain."

"They might think we created our own newborns in defense."

"But we didn't. And even had we, there was no indiscretion here, only in Seattle. There is no law against creating vampires if you control them."

"This is too dangerous."

Carlisle touched Jasper's shoulder tentatively. "Jasper. We cannot kil this child."

Jasper glowered at the man with the kind eyes, and I was suddenly angry. Surely he wouldn't hurt this gentle vampire or the woman he loved. Then Jasper sighed, and I knew it was okay. My anger evaporated.

"I don't like this," he said, but he was calmer. "At least let me take charge of her. You two don't know how to deal with someone who's been running wild so long."

"Of course, Jasper," the woman said. "But be kind."

Jasper rol ed his eyes. "We need to be with the others. Alice said we don't have long."

Carlisle nodded. He held his hand out to Esme, and they headed past Jasper back toward the open field.

"You there," Jasper said to me, his face a glower again.

Chapters 15

"Come with us. Don't make one rash move or I will take you down."

I felt angry again as he glared at me, and a smal part of me wanted to snarl and show my teeth, but I had a feeling he was looking for just that kind of excuse.

Jasper paused as if he'd just thought of something. "Close your eyes," he commanded.

I hesitated. Had he decided to kil me after al ?

"Do it!"

I gritted my teeth and shut my eyes. I felt twice as helpless as I had before.

"Fol ow the sound of my voice and don't open your eyes. You look, you lose, got it?"

I nodded, wondering what he didn't want me to see. I felt some relief that he was bothering to protect a secret. There was no reason to do so if he was just going to kil me.

"This way."

I walked slowly after him, careful to give him no excuses. He was considerate in the way he led, not walking me into any trees, at least. I could hear the way the sound changed when we were in the open; the feel of the wind was different, too, and the smel of my coven burning was stronger. I could feel the warmth of the sun on my face, and the insides of my eyelids were brighter as I sparkled.

He led me closer and closer to the muffled crackle of the flames, so close that I could feel the smoke brush my skin. I knew he could have kil ed me at any time, but the nearness of the fire stil made me nervous.

"Sit here. Eyes closed."

The ground was warm from the sun and the fire. I kept very stil and tried to concentrate on looking harmless, but I could feel his glare on me, and it made me agitated. Though I was not mad at these vampires, who I truly believed had only been defending themselves, I felt the oddest stirrings of fury. It was almost outside myself, as if it were some leftover echo from the battle that had just taken place.