Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer [116]
Rosalie would try to kill me when the creature was dead, and I would fight back. I wasnt sure if I would have time to finish her before the others came to help. Maybe, maybe not. I didnt much care either way.
I didnt care if the wolves, either set, avenged me or called the Cullens justice fair. None of that mattered. All I cared about was my own justice. My revenge. The thing that had killed Bella would not live another minute longer.
If Bellad survived, she would have hated me for this. She would have wanted to kill me personally.
But I didnt care. She didnt care what she had done to me-letting herself be slaughtered like an animal. Why should I take her feelings into account?
And then there was Edward. He must be too busy now-too far gone in his insane denial, trying to reanimate a corpse-to listen to my plans.
So I wouldnt get the chance to keep my promise to him, unless-and it was not a wager Id put money on- I managed to win the fight against Rosalie, Jasper, and Alice, three on one. But even if I did win, I didnt think I had it in me to kill Edward.
Because I didnt have enough compassion for that. Why should I let him get away from what hed done? Wouldnt it be more fair-more satisfying-to let him live with nothing, nothing at all?
It made me almost smile, as filled with hate as I was, to imagine it. No Bella. No killer spawn. And also missing as many members of his family as I was able to take down. Of course, he could probably put those back together, since I wouldnt be around to burn them. Unlike Bella, who would never be whole again.
I wondered if the creature could be put back together. I doubted it. It was part Bella, too-so it must have inherited some of her vulnerability. I could hear that in the tiny, thrumming beat of its heart.
Its heart was beating. Hers wasnt.
Only a second had passed as I made these easy decisions.
The trembling was getting tighter and faster. I coiled myself, preparing to spring at the blond vampire and rip the murderous thing from her arms with my teeth.
Rosalie cooed at the creature again, setting the empty metal bottle-thing aside and lifting the creature into the air to nuzzle her face against its cheek.
Perfect. The new position was perfect for my strike. I leaned forward and felt the heat begin to change me while the pull toward the killer grew-it was stronger than Id ever felt it before, so strong it reminded me of an Alphas command, like it would crush me if I didnt obey.
This time I wanted to obey.
The murderer stared past Rosalies shoulder at me, its gaze more focused than any newborn creatures gaze should be.
Warm brown eyes, the color of milk chocolate- the exact same color that Bellas had been.
My shaking jerked to a stop; heat flooded through me, stronger than before, but it was a new kind of heat-not a burning.
It was a glowing.
Everything inside me came undone as I stared at the tiny porcelain face of the half-vampire, half-human baby. All the lines that held me to my life were sliced apart in swift cuts, like clipping the strings to a bunch of balloons. Everything that made me who I was-my love for the dead girl upstairs, my love for my father, my loyalty to my new pack, the love for my other brothers, my hatred for my enemies, my home, my name, my self-disconnected from me in that second-snip, snip, snip-and floated up into space.
I was not left drifting. A new string held me where I was.
Not one string, but a million. Not strings, but steel cables. A million steel cables all tying me to one thing-to the very center of the universe.
I could see that now-how the universe swirled around this one point. Id never seen the symmetry of the universe before, but now it was plain.
The gravity of the earth no longer tied me to the place where I stood.
It was the baby girl in the blond vampires arms that held me here now.
Renesmee.
From upstairs, there was a new sound. The only sound that could touch me in this endless instant.
A frantic pounding, a racing beat
A changing heart.
BOOK THREE: BELLA
Personal affection is a luxury you can have