𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐄𝐍
— 𝒾𝒻 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓈 𝒾𝓈 𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝓌𝑒 𝒽𝒶𝓋𝑒 —

     𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇 𝐃𝐀𝐖𝐍 𝐒𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐋𝐘 melts upon the Quileute Reservatiom, blanketing the rich soil with a thin layer of snow, the night seems to stay thick in the air, as if promising that the upcoming day is one that the dark sky wants to prevent. The blinking stars are eventually smothered by the morning clouds, and the moon suffocates as she is replaced with a burning sun that never manages to heat the early winter air. Serenity Reagan is bundled within a knitted blanket on her balcony, soft slippers growing wet from the fallen snowflakes and eyebrows pinched in anticipation. Although the boy had bid her goodbye the night before, the girl feels as though she needs something more than that — perhaps a reassurance that he will return sooner rather than later, that he and his companions will drive slowly on the ice-covered roads. The accident that took her parents is carved deeply into her mind in these very moments, reopening wounds that she assumed healed. But why now, of all days, is she drowning in the past?

Marina will keep her company while Paul and Laythe join the boys of the Reservation for a trip to Seattle, at least that's what Serenity was told. Instead, the shapeshifters will be joining the Cullen vampires in destroying an army of newborns that seek Bella Swan, and the remainder of the night will be spent at Emily Young's cottage for their own rejuvenation. Paul Lahote is sure he will miss Serenity with the entirety of his heart, but for her safety, he needs to help eliminate the problem that constantly looms — the fiery-haired bloodsucker that ventures through the woodlands, taunting his pack as she gracefully jumps between trees. Victoria, he learned is her name, has already caused the death of Harry Clearwater: a kind and gentle man with wise words and a young family that struggles to mourn his passing. With every second that her dark soul resides on the earth, his loved ones are in danger, and now there is an additional group of blood-thirsty monsters accompanying her that know no bounds for destruction.

While Paul Lahote stands shirtless in the cold, staring deeply into the forest as if he can see the ghost of Serenity Reagan there, the girl remains a world away, feeling the unsettlement that resides in his own veins. The wind blows differently, the trees are firm as the snowstorm attempts to rip them away. A warning, perhaps; they will not want to see what is coming, please cover your eyes. If the towering oaks could retreat, the Lahote boy knows that they would cower in a town far from this one. A war is waiting, blistering on a field that, like Forks, has yet to see the snow that sweeps across the sacred land like a siren. Ghosts of the past are crowding their surroundings, running their cracked fingernails over the delicate skin of Serenity Reagan and whispering in her ear. The girl with the broken heart belongs here no longer.

Run, they murmur, don't let them have you too. But as soon as their presence crushes her chest, demanding tears from her eyes of burnt umber, they, like the stars, fade into nothingness.

Serenity discards her slippers as she ascends the staircase, finding her cousin deep in conversation with his mother. With a pair of cargo shorts and a thin sweatshirt dousing his frame, Laythe stares down at the floor, avoiding his mother's eyes. "Promise me you will call if something happens, the very second. Nothing is more important to me that the two of you, your safety."

"Sam is waiting for you," Marina responds, an unwavering smile falling upon her lips without effort. "We will be fine, so worry about your own well-being first. Come home to us in one piece."

The boy's eyes finds Serenity when he embraces his mother. "Ren, I can't apologize enough for how—"

"There's no need to apologize," the blonde shakes her head in dismissal, balancing her weight on her aching foot. "I understand. But for now, we have much brighter things to focus on — go, have fun with your friends. I'll be here waiting when you get back. It's only a day."

"A day," he agrees, the edge of his lips tugging gently into a grin. Many things could happen in that span of time, he notes, though he doesn't speak those thoughts allowed. "And when I get back, we can bake those cookies that everyone loves so much. I won't even throw flour at you."

She giggles as he takes her into his warm arms, fearing the moment in which he'll have to let go. Something in the atmosphere is changing, evolving, preparing as a knock on the door makes them pull from the comfort of one another. When Serenity uses the fleece blanket to cover her baby pink nightgown, Marina crosses the parlor and reveals a now fully-dressed Paul Lahote. Though a button is missing from a pocket on his shorts and a seam is torn on the hem of his hoodie, the russet-skinned boy appears as nothing less than flawless to the girl.

"Laythe," the older woman bites her lip to contain another smile, gesturing to the world outside of their home, "I'll walk you to the car."

Laythe groans, "I can buckle myself up, Mom."

"Laythe." Her tone is more stern this time, resulting in his immediate exit. Marina ushers Paul into parlor, closing the door gently behind her.

"I knew you would come back," Serenity closes the distance between them, laughing when he offers her a wink.

"I'll always come back." His hands find her waist, settling on the fabric of her dress where the heat of his grasp seeps through the material. Serenity releases a breath of content, wishing that this moment could last far longer than forever. "I kept telling myself that last night was enough of a goodbye," he continues, "but I just couldn't stay away."

Her hands fall upon his shoulders as she smiles, "I wouldn't want you to stay away."

"I'm spoiling you," he chuckles, a smirk sculpting his features as he brings a hand up to run his thumb along her bottom lip. "I think I enjoy it a little too much. But when I get back, I want to spend a day with you — not in the woods, not at the cliffs, I want to take you on a real date."

Her heart pounds within her chest, and Serenity is sure that he can hear it. Blood rushes to her cheeks, staining them with a visible flush that makes his own heart stop in his chest.

"Will you be my girlfriend?" Though his voice is firm, there's a vulnerability that rests beyond it, hiding in case of disappointment. Somehow, this girl in front of him has managed to bring out emotions that he had never known before. Now, standing here with her petite silhouette in his hands and forbidden words stuck within his throat, he places his heart upon his sleeve for her to take it. "I know there's a lifetime of details that you don't know about me. My parents, my past, my future — but we only have so much time and I don't want to waste another second of it without telling you how a feel . . . I'm in love with you."

A second passes, and then another, granting Paul the space he needs to finish. "I loved you from the moment you stepped out of Emily's in the dark, wearing that cute little skirt and offering me a cookie because I looked lonely. I don't get close to people, Serenity — I didn't used to — but you showed up, and goddamn it, my heart cracked wide open. You changed me, made me better . . . I never thought that I could get better," his voice is a whisper now, shaking as he holds her a bit tighter than before. "You're everything I've ever needed, everything I wanted but thought I couldn't have. Everything I thought I didn't deserve."

He takes another moment, afraid to gage her reaction. "If this isn't what you want, I promise I won't mention it again and I won't pressure you into anything. I . . . I just want you to be happy. And if that means letting you go," his throat burns, and he chokes on the words, "I'd let you go every time."

But her lips are on his before he can take another breath.

Serenity's lips are soft like warm caramel, and her lips are even sweeter than what he imagined they'd be. Paul's fingers weave within her wavy hair, pulling her impossibly closer as his blood grows hotter with a flame of desire. Her chest is flush against his, the knitted blanket in a heap at her feet, a steady hand rested on the small of the girl's back to keep her in place. The rest of the world falls away as her lips move with a fragile desperation — please don't let me go.

But this piece of their forever has to come to an end, just as every temporary heaven does.

"Come back to me," her words fan his lips as they finally separate, her hands resting on his chest, in the place where she can feel his heartbeat to remind herself that this is real. "Promise me you'll come back." Her eyes are filled with unshed tears that threaten to spill, brought on by the unsettling aura around them.

The warmth in his chest spreads throughout his body, healing every scar that he once had. "I will always come back," he repeats. "Don't cry, baby, I'll be back before you wake up tomorrow."

"Then why does it feel like we're saying goodbye?" Her voice cracks, exposing the fear that has been tearing at her insides since she woke.

"Because this is the end of the beginning," Paul replies, placing a last kiss upon her forehead. "And now we have the rest of our lives."

Perhaps, just before the door closes and his figure disappears, Serenity should have told him that she loves him too.

But there is only a day that separates the two of them from one more kiss, one more embrace, one more vow of love.

If only Paul Lahote wasn't a day too late.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Marina insists that Serenity change from her nightgown, but the girl remains on the sofa with her eyes on the telephone, biting at the skin around her fingernails until the taste of blood touches her tongue. Unease has created a thick aura in the room, and it nearly suffocates the older woman as she, too, takes a seat and attempts to avoid her own nerves.

"It's been two hours, honey," Marina's voice is smooth like sifted sugar, but the stiffness in her posture betrays her false pretenses. "They've reached Seattle by now, even with the ice on the roads. There's no need to worry."

"There is always room for worry," she frets in response, tucking her hands underneath her legs in an effort to stop the nervous tick. "On any other day, I would be calm. But there's something coming today, I can feel it. I haven't felt this way since . . . since the accident. I can't help but think of everything that could go wrong, all the possibilities—"

Her aunt's eyes are kind instead of irritated, as if she understands far more than Serenity ever could. "My husband could feel a bad day from the moment he opened his eyes in the morning. 'Insight,' he called it — and I never knew what he meant until the day he died." It may seem odd to anyone who overheard, but Serenity knows the sensation that Marina speaks of. "Bradley said he couldn't feel it before he went to work, but I . . . I know that he felt it too. He still went to work that day, and for a while I couldn't fathom why. Why would he go?"

Marina Reagan hasn't mourned the death of her husband for many years, so the weight of reality is falling upon her shoulders at once. Perhaps, Serenity thinks, she is strong enough to bear it, if only for a moment. She says nothing, giving her aunt the opportunity to go on if she wants to, or crush her words before they are placed onto a platter for her niece to examine.

"He always believed in fate, and now I see that he never stopped." The wrinkles on her face are more prominent now and gray streaks are visible in her dark hair, proving to the world that she has been aging at twice the age of a normal person. She, too, knows what it means to lose battles that aren't her own. "Some things are meant to be, and others are temporary. But it's important for us to love while we have the time, no matter how short that time may be. I like to think that I was a lucky one. Even though Bradley is gone, I know that he never really left."

Serenity admires her aunt for the way that she holds herself together, even amidst a breakdown — she is too strong to give into the pain, to allow her stitches to unravel. Maybe one day, the girl will be able to call that attribute her own.

"Thank you," Serenity's bottom lip trembles, but not from sadness, "for being everything I needed when I had nothing."

Their embrace, too, should have lasted a lifetime.

She places a soft hand against Serenity's back, and for a second the touch isn't Marina's, but her own mother's; assuring and loving, heated enough to dry any tears that could have fell. When Marina pulls back, a thumb running along her niece's flushed cheek, there is no coldness in the spot where her hand once resided — instead, there is only warmth.

"Now, go change out of this nightgown," Marina chuckles, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "When you're finished, we can do some baking and watch a movie until Laythe calls."

But a knock on the door prevents any further actions.

Marina is composed when Serenity winces, only showing her confusion when she stands from the sofa and wipes at the tear streaks that refuse to be hidden. "The boys must have left something," she assumes, but her tone insists that she knows otherwise.

Upon opening the door, a woman with hair like fire and eyes of crimson greets Marina with a grin that holds every ounce of charm, but with no authenticity. "Is your son home?" She questions with an angelic voice that doesn't match the sharpness of her features.

But Marina doesn't hesitate to slam the door in her face, quickly jamming the locks into place and stumbling from the frame to yank Serenity from her spot. The girl hisses as her ankle nearly crumbles from her weight, but quickly averts her attention when Marina hurriedly pushes her into the kitchen.

"Call Laythe now!" Marina's haste is frightening when she overturns a chair in the dining room, ripping a leg from it, and gripping the splintered wood within her palm. "I don't have time to explain. Tell him that Victoria is here!"

Serenity fumbles for the telephone, her legs like jello and her fingers trembling over the familiar numbers. "Who is Victoria?" She manages to ask while speaking over the ringing in her ear. "Marina, why are you holding that?"

"Is everything okay?" Laythe quickly retrieves his phone, preparing for the newborn vampires that are growing nearer with every moment.

"Victoria is here," Serenity relays to him, while trying to maintain her previous calmness, "Laythe, I don't know what's happening but I'm so scared."

The parlor door crumbles to the ground after a single blow, once again exposing the girl with fiery hair. Marina's stone eyes hold no fear, only determination, "Why are you here?"

"I can smell a lone wolf from a mile away," the woman sneers in response, stepping around the fallen door. "I want to wreak a bit of havoc before the real fight begins."

Though the furious voice of Laythe, accompanied by Paul's demands, is nearly too much to decipher, Serenity doesn't mistake the words that her aunt yells as she snaps the chair leg in half, creating two stakes instead of one.

"Serenity, run!"

And so she does.

The blonde girl's foot pleads for her to slow down as she sprints outside, trudging through the snow with no shoes and leaving the corded kitchen phone discarded on the tile floor. Her heart tells her to go back for her aunt, but her mind argues — she would only make the situation worse. With a broken foot and no idea what she is fighting against, Serenity Reagan stands no chance unless she runs far, far away. Only then will she be of any help.

Like the day only weeks ago, tree branches scratch at her face and thorns tear into her exposed skin. The cold air bites hard, and now she wishes so desperately that she had changed from her nightgown. How could she have known that this would happen? That some superhuman with brute strength would break into her home in an attempt to 'wreak havoc'?

Perhaps this is what her 'insight' had warned her of all along.

The yells of her aunt can be heard from miles away, piercing the winter air like the wails of an alarm, and still she runs. She runs because perhaps her life depends on it, perhaps Marina's life depends on it.

But all too soon, the yells diminish into nothing.

Silence settles upon the woodland, and Serenity cries out, clutching her hands to her chest to fight against the cold. Twigs snap in the bushes only yards behind her, but her ready eyes are focused only on the path ahead of her.

Until the fiery-haired girl is staring down into her eyes with a scowl that could cut as easily as a knife.

Serenity backs away from her, nearly stumbling over a dying branch — but never again will she make a mistake such as that one. How is it possible that the person standing in front of her can travel so quickly? It's impossible.

"I have a message when the shapeshifters return," Victoria's voice is less angelic now that her intentions have been exposed. Blood covers her face, and one of Marina's homemade stakes is protruding from her torso — when she notices Serenity's horrified glance, she rips the wood from her flesh and tosses it to the snow below. The soft blanket of white is stained now, melting underneath the touch of the burning crimson.

"What are you talking about?" Serenity whispers almost inaudibly. Somehow, the girl knows that the superhuman can still hear her.

"Even if I lose," Victoria takes a threatening step forward, placing a gentle, beautiful hand around Serenity's neck before the girl can attempt to run again, "I will always win."

Serenity has always imagined what death would feel like — is there peace? A version of heaven that will embrace her with warm arms, taking her to a place where her parents have resided, waiting for her arrival?

As Victoria slams Serenity Reagan's head against a tree stump that is buried in the snow on the forest floor, she finds that it's nothing like what she imagined — it feels cold, dark, and empty.

And wherever she goes, however far her spirit travels when her blood turns the snowflakes around her crimson, there is pain, and then nothing at all.

There are no memories here . . . not anymore.

END OF BOOK I.

❝ so i'm crying, but this is def my
favorite chapter! the book two intro will
be posted soon :) lmk what you think! ❞