My Strength Chapter 24

If there was one thing Bella wouldn’t miss when she was finally a vampire, it would be school. While she understood why school was so important, it just took up so much time to be both inside the structure as well as outside that it was a wonder students could do anything outside of studying and going to class. The students, her pseudo friends until she graduated, tried to invite her to hang out with them after school but she couldn’t. She knew all her human ‘friends’ wanted was to learn why Bella wasn’t around the Cullen’s anymore. All Bella could think about doing after school was reuniting with Zafrina and Victoria. She even wanted to see Caius and Athenodora to see what they were plotting with the incoming fight with the other pack. She really just wanted to leave school and be around her vampires.

She was pleasantly surprised when Victoria picked her up from school and when they got back to her house, Victoria pulled her into the woods. No sooner was Bella in the tree line did Zafrina appear by her side, grabbing her hand for all three of them to walk.

“Where are we going?” Bella asked softly, happy to just be with her mates and not at all bothered to be walking into the forest with them. She would go anywhere with them.

“We decided you should have a break to relax.” Zafrina answered, shocking Bella that the Amazon was saying so much instead of Victoria. “My sisters want to spend time with you before we fight.”

Bella smiled, more than okay with spending time with the Amazons. Zafrina tends to only communicate with grunts and short sentences, her speaking so much at one time meant Zafrina felt very strongly about spending some alone time with her, her sisters and Victoria. Bella would be more than happy to oblige. If Zafrina was stepping out of comfort zone to communicate so much her, Bella practically had no choice but to go with what she wanted.

“I’d love to hang out with you guys.” Bella said with a smile, remembering when she was first taking and all Zafrina could do was grunt a couple words while her sisters stood back and gave both Bella and their sister amused smiles. They had come so far in such a short time.

“Back before humans were more civilized,” Victoria started as they continued their walk down an unseen path. Victoria and Zafrina both would never follow a path if they could avoid it, less chance of someone finding them. “Before a battle, the entire group that was going to out to fight would celebrate one last time with everyone that was staying behind. They believed it good luck for the warriors because it came them something to motivate them to come home and it helped those left behind have their last memories of the warrior be happy ones.”

Bella instantly tensed at the implications that her vampires, any of them, wouldn’t make it out of the fight. In all fairness, even though the wolves were very young and lacked training, they were literally made to kill vampires. There was a very good chance they could get lucky and actually permanently main or even kill one of the vampires. Bella didn’t want anything to happen to her vampires.

Zafrina sensed Bella’s thoughts right away and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, holding her tight as they continued their walk.

“We won’t leave you.” Zafrina promised, “You are safe.” She assured her mate. She gave a soft glare to the red head, upset the younger vampire would upset their mate with pointless words. It only reaffirmed Zafrina’s belief’s that words could often lead to miscommunications that could make situations worse.

“I only met the Amazons wanted to include you on a tradition carried over from their human lives.” Victoria said, letting go of her mate’s hand in favor of wrapping her arm around Bella’s waist. “We only just got you Bella, there’s no way in hell we’d lose you so quickly.”

Bella took a deep breath to calm herself. With both vampires practically clinging to her as they walked, she could feel her nerves about one of them being hurt fade. For a brief moment, Bella thought about what she would have felt if this scenario had happened when she was still dating Edward. If she had still been as obsessed with the boy vampire and she couldn’t help but think Edward would likely only chuckle at her concerns, call her some form of a stupid human and change topics. Yet here were these two vampires that jumped to assure her nothing bad was going to happen, they didn’t write off her concerns. It was just another reason for Bella to finish school here and move to Italy; she felt she would be so happy with the vampires there.

“Thank you.” Bella said when she felt more like herself. “How far are we going?” She asked. She wasn’t concerned about staying out too late, she knew with Heidi on their side she wouldn’t get in trouble for staying out late, even if she didn’t like Heidi using her gift on Charlie it was still a useful gift to have access to.

“Can I carry you?” Zafrina asked in her normal way of not really answering a question. But this time Bella could read between the lines: they had a longways to go still.

“Sure.” Bella said with a smile, happy the vampire was asking instead of just picking her up like in the past when they first met.

No sooner was the word out of her mouth was she up in Zafrina’s arms and then being whisked away. She turned her head into Zafrina to avoid the wind hitting her face as they ran. Truth be told, even though she was being jostled every so often, she felt like she could fall asleep because she had Zafrina all around her. She could even sense Victoria not too far from her, kind of like a sixth sense sort of feeling. She could easily fall asleep she felt so safe and comfortable. But she couldn’t do that, she was expected to hang out with the Amazon’s, plus Victoria. It said a lot though that she was willing to sleep while Zafrina ran with her.

After what felt like just a few minutes of running, Zafrina slowly placed her down on her feet as Victoria walked next to her.

“I’m thinking that would have been a really long walk.” Bella commented with a smile as she realized there was no way she could have walked the distance they had moved in a short time frame.

“It would have been time well spent.” Victoria said with a smile.

Kachiri and Senna would further in the clearing, sitting on the ground next to a fallen log. They booth looked towards our group and smiled. Senna held out her hand in invitation for us to join them.

“Before battles, we used to tell stories about former victories.” The ancient Amazon explained, “We wanted to include you.” She said with a smile.

“We do not know when the battle will start, so we decided to hold our ritual tonight just in case.” Kachiri added.

Zafrina put her hand on the small of Bella’s back and gently pushed her forward and then to sit in front of the log, allowing her to use the log as a backrest. Zafrina sat one side of her with Victoria on the other.

“I use my gift to tell my stories.” Zafrina said once they were all seated. “But my gift does not work on you, so I will use my words.”

Bella felt a sort of prideful glee from having to force Zafrina to use her words likely a lot more than she has had to in centuries because of something outside of her control. Bella’s newest life long goal was to get Zafrina talking more; but in a nice way. She didn’t want to force the woman to talk if she truly didn’t want to. But Bella believed Zafrina and her sisters didn’t talk much because there was no need to since they were all so used to each other and Zafrina had her visions to express herself with.

For the rest of the afternoon, well past midnight, the small group talked and laughed about previous battles. Bella didn’t have much to contribute, James’ fight being the only other fight she had been in, but listening to everyone else’s stories was very nice. Bella felt she grew closer to the vampires with each story that was told. It was one of the best nights of her life. The only thing that would have made the night even better would have been to have Caius and Athenodora there to share their stories as well.