Writer in the Dark - J. HALE

75 - ᴘʀᴀᴄᴛɪꜱᴇ... ᴀɢᴀɪɴ

MORE AND more days passed, yet the snow hadn't even begun to fall let alone stick to the ground. Tensions, like always, were high but they reached newfound levels (in Carlilse's case) when the news of the Volturi interrupting one vampire's journey to Forks with brutal force and killing. Hope that they wouldn't have to partake in a fight fell like a rock thrown off a cliff, suddenly and all at once.

She walked upstairs, after just checking in with Benjamin, a tense conversation occurring in the living room caught her attention. Edward's voice echoed in her head, mixed with a few various loud thoughts from other people in the room, "Jane and Alec will try and take me out first since I can predict their moves then they'll move onto Athena." Hearing her name, the intrigue within her grew to a level where she found herself walking into the room without even thinking twice about it.

"Too bad we don't all have Bella's shield," Kate, a vampire that Athena hadn't really talked to but found rather interesting, replied as she sat down in one of the seats.

"Doesn't help me fight though," Bella shrugged, smiling in Athena's direction.

"No, but you could help the rest of us if you could project it," Tanya suggested, "Shield someone other than yourself."

Bella frowned, wondering, "Is that possible?"

"Gifts can be developed over time," Carlisle responded with a slight shrug, not knowing whether it would be possible for her.

"At first mine was just in my palms. Now I can radiate it all over my body," Kate explained with a slight proud smile, it did after all take years of practice.

"And I used to be able to do one mind at a time, now if I really focus I can change any mind in my near surroundings," Athena chimed in, letting them in on a secret that she had kept hidden for a long while. She tended to do one mind at a time, because that was manageable and doing more than one mind at once rippled her mind with stretched exhaustion. So she never told anyone about it, not wanting something to rely on her using that power for survival. That was how she took down the Volturi, thanks to Lila's aid and practise in meditation and other mindful awakening things.

Bella raised a brow, frowning slightly in confusion, "So it's about focus?"

"It depends on the gift. Visualization works for me," Kate added and Bella's intrigue grew even more.

"Teach me?"

Bella decided to use the visualisation method, feeling that it would work better for her. So Emmett, Kate and Edward all waited for her to picture the shield in her mind, the colour of it and how it moved out of her body so she could propel it forwards to others. But so far, it had been overly unsuccessful. "I think she needs something to motivate her," Kate raised a brow, looking to Athena suggestively as she chuckled lightly.

"No," Bella protested, stepping in the direct path of the two of them.

"It's all right," Edward reassured, smiling softly at her as he knew that this was something that he had to do. And he trusted Athena not to do anything too dire, "Nothing too painful Athena."

"But that's not incentive Eddie," she grinned jokingly, beginning to delve into their mind.

"Focus Bella or he's going to be hurting," she heard Emmett say before she fully entered Edwards's mind, beginning a small but ever so painful attack on his pain receptors. She made the ones in his arms work overly well, so much so that even the slightest breeze felt like fire burning across his skin. Within seconds, Edward buckled to the floor and Athena reversed the damage, feeling slightly awful even though it was necessary.

"I'm sorry. I said that I wasn't ready!" Bella exclaimed, offering Edward a hand to help him up as she frowned deeply.

"Dude you're not motivating her!" Emmett exclaimed with light laughter woven between the words, finding the rather dire situation entertaining.

"You wanna try?" Edward half barked back, causing Emmett to raise his hands up defensively. Athea and Kate both chuckled softly, watching the interaction intently.

"Ready Bells?"Athena asked after a few seconds, letting her ready herself this time. At Bella's nod, Athena went back into Edward's mind and did the same again - this time weakening the force ever so slightly. She felt too bad not to.

"Athena!" Bella yelled, snapping her out from Edward's head as she set it back to normal. She apologised to Edward in his mind but he brushed it off, saying that it was necessary for his family so he would do anything. She smiled at that, wondering what that level of protectiveness felt like.

"This time I'll light pain receptors in his mind on fire," she continued after Bella said she was ready to go again. Edward looked at his wife as if he was pleading for it to work this time, not wanting to feel such pain again. Athena shook her head at Emmett's smirk before she went back into his mind, beginning to change certain things before she was effectively shunned from his mind. "Definitely worked that time," she chocked out in surprise, not used to feeling such force from a blocking gift. Sure she could still get into Bella's mind but it took such an effort and only worked because she could block certain things herself, no other gift had that ability. Bella smiled proudly, looking over to her not in pain husband with pure relief.

"We should go again, this time with Kate's gift," Bella grinned, excited to get to test out her gift again.

"Emmett?" Edward suggested and Emmett backed away, moving so far back that he almost stumbled into a tree.

Later, Athena flopped onto her sofa and accidentally knocked the book that had lived on her coffee table for a good few weeks onto the rug. With a deep sigh, she slunk her body up and picked the book up not immediately catching the small square torn off of a piece of lined paper that fell from behind the front cover. She, after finally glancing down at the floor, picked the paper up with a raised brow.

She smiled brightly upon recognizing the handwriting then frowned as to why it was there. "Calla?" she read aloud, wanding what Jasper had done to her poor plant. She, after switching on the radio for a little bit of background noise that her mind needed, walked over to the plant by the door and examined the soil. In the very corner of the plant pot - the part that faced the wall- a tiny little plastic corner of a bag pocked out from the soil. With great intrigue, she gently prised the bag from the plant. She chuckled as she pulled the next note from the bag, hoping that he wasn't about to send her on a lengthy treasure hunt for no apparent reason.

This note was a lot longer than the one before it, it had more than one word on it this time. Look in the under the stairs cupboard darling, I promise this is the last one. So she of course went straight to the cupboard, looking around in the dim lighting to search for something out of place. After moving a large plant pot, she found a shoebox that certainly hadn't been there before. With a smile of intrigue, she pulled the box from the cupboard and sat on the floor with it on her lap.

On the top of the box, written in a dark sharpie was a single winky face. She raised a brow and opened the box, laughing at what lay inside. He had folded up her favourite jumper of his, the one that she thought was incredibly hot and had practically smothered it in whatever made him smell so good. "You absolute-" she chuckled, pulling the jumper out of the box even further. "Cocky little-"

Just as she untangled the jumper, planning to pull it over her head, an object clattered to the floor with a loud thud. She looked in its direction and found a book, a book she recognised within seconds. She gasped in delight as she dropped the jumper, grabbing the very last book on her list of novels she wanted to read before death. The novel that she couldn't find anywhere.

With a grin, she pulled the jumper over her head and sank back onto the sofa. She wrapped herself in blankets, lying comfortably on the sofa as she began to read the book, arms of the jumper folded over her hand that constantly passed by her nose as she read.