Chapter 5: A… Pretty Warm Welcome
Zafrina had told us that they would know we were
coming, so it shouldn’t be that hard to find them…or they find us. We were
almost sure they wouldn’t live in the town because they wouldn’t like to be the
center of attention. We headed to the forest on the outskirts of town to check
for any vampire scents. Even if they lived downtown, they would have been out
in the woods to hunt… if Zafrina was right and they drink animal and not human
blood. I looked in the shadows of the trees. Someone moved there and my parents
froze instantly. My mom pulled me closer to her. We just waited. It’s wiser to
let them come close because they may be hunting.
We approached the trees slowly, carefully. I smelled
something. A vampire. She smelled like sweet grass and tulips. I looked around
again. A tiny, around half foot shorter than me girl with pitch black, spiky
hair hopped from behind some trees and gave us a sweet smile which started
fading when she met my eyes. She was taken by surprise, that’s for sure. But
still she looked excited... and a little panicked. She noticed my mom’s hand on
my shoulder. She turned to examine my parents and then her eyes locked again on
mine. Her eyes were golden. I had never seen that color in anybody else except
for my parents and me, so she must be…Alice! Yeah, this is how Zafrina had
described the psychic vamp from the coven. She must have been waiting for us.
Zafrina was telling the truth (not that I doubted her), they also drink animal
blood. Ah, this is such a relief!
“Nessie? What are you doing here? I thought you would
sit with Edward to –” she started saying in a high pitched, melodic voice.
“No, sorry, my name is Eshe. You are Alice Cullen?” I
said quickly before she could say nothing more.
“Yes, I came to find you but well…you shocked me a
little” she said with some uncertainty still in her voice. She must not be used
to being surprised.
“I saw three of you coming but I couldn’t see your
face so I wasn’t sure what I should expect, but I did not expect you to look
like Nessie. We have all been waiting for you. Let’s go to meet the others. You
must be tired.” The last comment was referring only to me. My parents nodded,
they hadn’t said a word, but I could see they had an “unspoken conversation”
with Alice.
She gracefully walked, danced would fit better to the
way she moved, between the trees and we followed. The forest was filled with
animals. I noticed a couple squirrels in the trees, but they disappeared the
moment they saw us. The ground was wet. I could tell because it smelled like it
had rained recently. We finally reached a big beautiful house.
The architecture had an air of an old French house but
the main structure and the style were modern. It was painted in a light gray
tone that blended with the green and brown of the forest nicely. The one side
was covered with big windows that let plenty of light get in the house.
Five vampires were standing at the front door. They
didn’t look alike at all except the same pale white skin and the eyes that were
that warm golden hue I liked so much and I had seen only on my family. There
were two women. One was tall, blond and looked like a model and the other
was smaller, not as slim as the other one but not fat either with caramel hair
and a sweet “mom-like” smile on her face. Behind the blonde was a man even
taller than her, very muscular with dark brown, curly hair and he was grinning
at us. Next to him was another guy, with honey blond hair, this guy had a
weird look on his face; he looked really distant.
The last man was blond too, but much friendlier. He
took a step closer and offered his hand to my mom and dad. “Hello, I’m Carlisle
Cullen. I’m very glad you are finally here. This is Rosalie, Esme, Emmett and
Jasper. I see you already met Alice.” He gave her a proud look.
“Yes, we were in the Amazon and we found your friend
Zafrina there. She sends her greetings”, my father said.
“I’m Alem, this is my wife Emma and this is our
daughter Eshe”. He introduced us but I didn’t really pay much attention to what
he was saying. They continued talking but it was just a buzz in my head ’cause
I was listening to something else.
Someone inside the house was playing a happy melody on
piano. I saw Esme go inside. I could hear clearly what she was saying: “Edward
don’t be rude, come out to meet our guests. I’m sure you can complete your
lullaby after you greet them. Bella, Nessie, you should come too, there is
someone you I think you would love to meet”.
A girl with brown, wavy hair and another with bronze,
long curls appeared on the front step. I recognized the second; she was
Renesmee, the girl in Zafrina's photo. Just older. She looked like she was
about sixteen years old, give or take. She stared at me just like the others
did before her and I decided I should change back to normal. It must be weird
to see your face on someone else’s body. I guess I freaked her out.
I closed my eyes and felt my hair falling a little
longer and straighter than before to my waist. My eyes became their usual sky
blue color. The reaction was immediate. They all widened their eyes in shock
and stood still, except a man with bronze hair who just stepped out from the
house with Esme and stood behind Renesmee protectively reminding me of my
father.
“Very nice gift, it must be useful”. He replied
without much emotion.
I felt the blood rush to my face making me all a
bright pink. “Thanks,” I said shyly.
The girl with the brown hair looked a little
nervous. She slowly approached me and said, “Hi, this is Edward and I’m
Bella. This is our daughter, Renesmee”.
I felt a little better and my pulse started slowing.
“Nessie, would you like to show Eshe the house? I
believe you two have a lot to talk about”. Esme encouraged her and when
Renesmee understood what she meant, a smile lit on her face. She looked like a
small kid who just saw Santa Claus leaving presents under the Christmas tree,
but this must be how I looked like too. She took my hand and we both strolled
into the house. Once out of site of her parents, she ran through the living
room, a huge room, with the one wall covered with wide windows. The furniture
was decorated in light wood and had white and lime green details. It was a very
happy room and when it is sunny, it must be very bright. She headed next to the
stairs and opened a door I hadn’t noticed before.
At first I was confused, I thought we went out again,
but then I realized we were in a room, her bedroom! On the walls someone had
drawn a perfect forest, just like the one we were wandering around in some time
ago with my parents. Everything looked so natural. A bookcase was inside the
wall and the covers from the books had earthy colors that fit with the colors
on the walls. Not childish, colorful, thin books like the ones a normal
six-year-old girl would have, but thick books with serious literature like
Shakespeare. The furniture was made from dark, rich wood. A baby grand piano
was standing in the corner and next to it a desk with a pile of papers and many
opened books on it. If my mom saw this mess she would run to put everything in
order. On the other side was a single bed, with soft toned green curtains
surrounding it. I wandered a little around the room exploring every corner. The
first thing I did was to go and look at the papers on the desk. There were
notes about a school assignment about environmental pollution and something
that caught my attention; some drawings of course. They weren’t perfect, but
they looked really pretty. There was a forest with so many details on the trees
and the forest ground and in the center of the paper was a big wolf. There were
more than ten papers with the same drawing; all of them cut in pieces and thrown
on the desk, in the trash can under it or on the floor. She has been trying to
make the picture look perfect. Hmmmm… I have done this before too, many times.
I chuckled to myself.
After a while, I turned to face Nessie. She had been
patiently watching and waiting. Her eyes sparkled with excitement. I
think she could barely keep herself from jumping around the room.
“Can you do it again?” she asked.
Huh? “Do what?” I
asked confused.
“Make yourself look like me”. She said with a huge
grin.
“Sure”. I definitely can do that. I closed my
eyes and when I opened them I was completely changed into an almost exact
replica of Nessie. Now that I was near her, it was almost impossible to
tell us apart, other than our scent.
“This is your gift? It is so nice!” she said
excitedly.
I smiled at her. “So do you have a gift too?”
But before I could move; she touched my face and I
could hear her thoughts. I saw the questions in her head as she saw me and I
saw images from our arrival at their house; me changing my hair and eyes, but I
could see everything in the room, like the images were transparent. She let go
of my face then she moved back. I was speechless.
“This is my power. I show my thoughts to others.” That’s
why Zafrina is so excited with this girl, she really looks very special.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Click here to get to the next chapter!
No comments:
Post a Comment