Believe Me Chapter 16

Bella felt the tense atmosphere that hung in the air. No one was glaring at anyone and it seemed everyone was finally fully focused on what they were meant to be focused on: James and his army. For the first time since Bella had been around the Cullen’s, they were all finally on the same page. The Cullen ‘children’, except for apparently Jasper, knew little about newborns and the risk newborn armies had. That was the first topic they decided to cover before making a plan.

Tanya and Jasper explained how superior newborns were with their strength and speed but since they only acted on instinct, if they focused on talent outside of instinct they would win. Newborns never planned out attacks and always went after easy and fast wins, an experienced fighter should know better and could therefore win against a newborn.

It seemed no one was really surprised about how difficult newborn armies could be and while it was doable, it didn’t mean it was easy. But the fact that they had two covens and the pack on their side meant that they would have an easier time; especially since they were mostly positive that since James was occupied with creating his army, he wouldn’t know about the Denali’s having shown up.

The discussion of the newborns wasn’t a big deal and everyone seemed to come together in agreeing that the newborns were bad and they would all need to work together to defeat them. What wasn’t going over well with most everyone, particularly Victoria and Edward, even though he was trying not to show how upset about it he was, Jasper and Kate both thought it would be a good idea to use Bella as bait.

Victoria had moved from sitting next to Bella to having her mate in a vice like grip as if the grip itself would protect Bella from what the two fighters were suggesting.

“You mean to put a human in the middle of a newborn fight?” Carlisle asked in complete shock. Surely the vampires weren’t so stupid?

“That’s far too dangerous for Bella.” Edward said with just a hint of a grow in his voice; he was doing his best to mind his temper about the unnecessary risk they were willing to put Bella in. Bella shouldn’t be anywhere near the newborns much less in the middle of the fighting.

Kate felt immediate offense at both men assuming she was suggesting something reckless. She would never put Bella in any unnecessary danger. But to have her there as a distraction for the newborns and with Victoria’s gift working to protect both the redhead and their human, Bella would be safest to have all the fighters surrounding and protecting her.

“I wouldn’t dare put her in any situation I felt she wouldn’t be okay in.” Kate said, making sure not to use the word ‘safe’ as Bella wouldn’t be safe in the same town as a newborn army much less in the middle of one. “She will the safest with all of us there in case James is able to trick Victoria’s gift.” Kate growled, offended that she had to explain her reasoning when everyone in the room, for the most part, knew she had been practicing the art of fighting for a millennium.

“James has been around Victoria and her gift for a few centuries now, if there was someone that could figure out a way past her gift it would be him.” Tanya reasoned with narrowed eyes, closely watching the expressions both Carlisle and Edward had. She was judging them, not trusting what they were capable of doing; especially given the emotional turmoil that had literally just been dealt to them.

“As much as I would like to think he wouldn’t be able to,” Victoria gruffed out, clearly not liking what she was saying, “He is a tracker and is used to thinking outside the box, if there was someone that could manipulate my gift to their advantage it would be him.” Victoria’s grip around Bella’s shoulders tightened, causing the human to gladly lean against her vampire.

Bella was still having a hard time focusing on everything that was going on, but she was getting the gist of it. A small part of her had wanted to go to Edward and make sure he was okay after they had been separated but she was so happy to be with Victoria and the Denali’s that she was able to push that desire down. Edward kept giving her a look that always made Bella long to be near him, but having Victoria’s arm around her kept that feeling at bay and easily ignorable.

“Watch your pheromones.” Victoria growled, completely disgusted with the lack of training the Cullen vampires had received; or at least the lack of training Edward seemed to have. Victoria had to consciously watch her strength as she tried not to pull Bella into her. That boy had no control over his pheromones and that was what put Bella into a practically doll like state in the first place, just going with whatever the vampire wanted instead of what she wanted.

“He’s still young, pheromones are a difficult trait to control.” Carlisle immediately went to defend his oldest turned.

Rosalie couldn’t keep quiet if she tried, she snorted in disagreement and the audacity of the man, “He’s older than both Emmett and I and yet neither of us have any problems with controlling ours.”

“It’s really not that hard man.” Emmett said towards Edward; Emmett had constantly teased Edward about his lack of control and seemingly lack of desire to try and train his very basic vampire trait.

Before Edward could retort, Carlisle immediately came to his defense, “He struggles because of his gift, you two wouldn’t understand the difficulties involved with controlling pheromones and a gift at the same time.”

“That’s not fair Carlisle.” Emmett said, wrapping an arm around Rosalie as a way to anchor her before she said or did something she might regret later… much later in a few years perhaps after she wasn’t so mad.

“Neither Jasper or I had any problems with controlling our pheromones and Jasper has a similarly difficult gift as Edward and I had no one to teach me.” Alice commented. She loved the family and felt they all belonged together, but she was starting to think more and more that they belong as distant relatives like the Denali’s rather than all together.

“Is it not the coven leaders duties to properly train their newborn?” Tanya asked, she knew there was going to be a big blow out about Edward’s lack of control, she had just hoped it would have happened after they agreed what to do with the army. “If anything, this seems a lack of your judgement that has caused Bella to be so controlled by Edward. You need to be better, to do better, if you plan on continuing to be a coven leader.” Tanya warned.

“Are you threatening my coven?” Carlisle asked with narrowed eyes as Edward growled in warning, not liking his coven leader being threatened. As far as Edward was concerned, Carlisle was the perfect coven leader and his position didn’t warrant any threats.

“Aren’t you threatening your own coven by not properly teaching them how to be vampires and to follow the laws?” Irina asked with a snark. While she was happy to have met the human, she would never not be very appreciative about the Cullen’s pulled Bella into their lives, the Cullen’s had broken a lot of laws that could very still get them all killed if the Denali’s hadn’t stepped in and have every intention, and already made plans, to keep within the laws.

“We haven’t broken any laws.” Edward defended and to Bella, he almost sounded like he was whining. “Bella found out about us on her own, I didn’t tell her.”

Tanya really wanted to argue that what he was saying was semantics. Since he was a mind reader, he had a higher responsibility to warn his coven when humans were getting too close to their secret. He should have told Carlisle that Bella was getting close to their secret and they should have left Washington and probably left the whole of Western United States to make sure Bella never ran into them again. But it wasn’t her coven and there was no taking back what was already done. If they continued down this road of talking about what should have happened vs what did happen, they would never get to their main topic at hand. If Victoria wasn’t attacking Edward after he had hurt Bella with his unintentional glamour, then they wouldn’t either. They would follow Victoria’s lead when it came to punishing the Cullen’s since it was her mate, no matter how protective the Denali sisters were growing of the human. They knew the bond that was formed with Bella and themselves, but Victoria’s bond was more important and they would follow her lead as such.

“Let’s get back on topic before we all get too hot headed and forget that there are more pressing matters to deal with.” Tanya said, using her coven leader voice and power behind that let all the younger vampires know she meant what she said and they were moving on regardless of what they thought. There were some perks with being so old and commanding younger vampires with either her voice or presence alone was one of them; their instincts knew not to mess with an older vampire that was guaranteed to be stronger than them. “Kate, Jasper, what do you two recommend?” She asked.

“We need to make sure that if James sends out scouts to make a plan for his attack, that he doesn’t find out your coven is here Tanya.” Jasper said, thinking about all the times they had sent out scouts to investigate the opposing armies when he was with Maria. “When Carmen and Eleazar get here, they should meet with some wolves to help mask their presence.”

“Do we know, or have a general idea where he is keeping the newborns?” Tanya asked, her eyes firmly on Carlisle, waiting for him to ask any questions of his own. This was his coven’s problem, he should have been the one taking the lead to get it all resolved, instead he seemed more than happy to have Tanya take over and do all the work for him. It was just one more reason why Tanya was likely to reach out to the Volturi to report Carlisle’s inability to be a coven leader.

“I don’t have an exact area.” Alice answered, the only one that would be able to give a location. “I’m pretty positive that they are in Seattle, but I couldn’t say where. From what I’ve seen, they are in an abandoned warehouse.”

“Are there any reports of missing people from Seattle?” Tanya fired off, still waiting for Carlisle to step in or at least just pitch in some information.

“The pack keeps an eye on all surrounding cities reported missing,” Leah said from upstairs, happy that she was actually able to help, “We haven’t noticed anything unusual.”

“We keep an eye out as well in case nomads are passing through and hunting too much and I agree with Leah, there hasn’t been anything usual and I look every day, including today.” Esme added in agreement with her mate.

“Then this army is going to be brought in from someplace else.” Jasper surmised. “He will likely grab someone with three days from here so that he can have them turning as he runs back with them here. Esme, Leah, can you guys do a wider search?” He asked.

“Actually, I have to call Sam anyways after all this, we can have the Elders do it. They’re quicker to jump to conclusions, so if they think something stands out then Esme and Leah can look into deeper so that they aren’t stuck going through records all day every day.” Seth volunteered, knowing that the elders were likely not happy about them working with the vampires but would be willing to be a part of something the pack needed to help hunt the newborn army. He was sure they were probably giving Sam an earful about just having him and Leah here, they could at least try to keep the peace somehow between them all.

“Good.” Tanya said with a nod of her head. Involving the pack more would be good for them to stay hidden, having their scent drenched everywhere in the forest would help hide their scent.

“The pack should widen their patrols to include our hunting areas to help hide our scents for when we go hunting.” Kate said practically reading Tanya’s mind. “It will also make it easier for when Carmen and Eleazar get here.”

“Good, now we need to get Sam here so we can work out some training schedules for both them and us.” Tanya said, “It never hurts to be over prepared when it comes to newborns. The more we have in numbers and the more those numbers are trained, the better odds we have especially when we don’t know when James will attack and how many he will have.”

“I’ll go now to talk with him and to grab some things for you Leah.” Seth said, very happy that he was being involved in the decision making, even if as just a bystander because it was more than what he could do with the pack and the elders.