CHAPTER TWO
yellow eyes

I stared back with stunted confidence at those yellow eyes. Eyes far paler than any vampire I'd seen. Not that many of those that I had met had ever been yellow-eyed. It was an uncommon thing to see such bright eyes in such a human area. Those amber eyes themselves were too human to induce fear. It was almost evident that they'd once been as blue as the clearest of skies. A translucent type of blue that was piercing and... pale was the only descriptor that could come to mind. As if there was a glazed, white film layering over his pupils.

Those eyes narrowed, moving with the tilt of his head, curiosity sending his blond eyebrows further into a smooth forehead. To my side, finally visible to the world again after the stint which had revealed the ability of my tricks, Alice smiled in knowing. The vampire seemed to think nothing of it as his eyes trailed the length of her body, not blinking as a distant smile landed on his lips.

"I thought you were one of the red eyes that've been terrorising the area recently," he said, voice like velvet running smoothly from his lips. Now, with a century of time maturing him, his northern accent almost sounded pleasant with the deep gravel of his intonation. "It's nice to see friendly eyes. I'm-

"Thomas Baxter."

The vampire's swaying stopped into the statue-like stillness that was familiar and finally that unearthly paleness seemed to darken as he stared toward me, the edge of a glare licking at his features. The unease of his figure was easy to read in the sharpness of his shoulders and the slight bend to his knees. It was slowly, starting with a flicker, that recognition took over, dispelling those ominous shadows as quick as they'd arrived.

Still, the unease stayed. Even the yellowness of eyes could not eliminate the nature of a vampire. Even a vampire could fear another vampire. An old friend could fear as well as an enemy.

"Elide..."

Thomas breathed out my name as if he was testing out the truth. I nodded slowly, afraid that the angle of his knees still meant that he would run at any moment. Momentarily, his eyes flicked to Alice, who still stood as if she'd seen this conversation play out the exact same way multiple times. She probably had.

"You were dead."

"So were you," I said, though it was not the same situation.

I'd been thought dead long before it was ever expected I would be. At least in my imagination Thomas's life had gone on in peace with my memory, perhaps with a family, or living out in London, lounging somewhere while painting a partner. But to him, I would have always remained the girl I was in those drawings he did of me. Frozen in time and in death.

"William-"

"Got to me first," I said, finishing before he could even ask the question or solidify my suspicion.

Because it had to have been William. It had to. The pained tension and drawn lips confirmed everything.

It was only then that the reality hit me. It hit so hard that I couldn't speak for a moment. That image I'd had of his perfect life, carrying out his dreams, never came true. Thomas had been stuck with his youthful face for almost as long as I had, all at the hands of his own brother.

"When? When did it happen?"

"Four years after you disappeared," he said as if he'd counted down every day since it'd happened.

That would explain the fact he looked older than I remembered. But older in a timeless way, mixed with the youthfulness of immortality.

"How are you so calm right now?" His face crinkled into a look of disbelief. In fact, he was almost offended. "I thought... For going on a hundred years, I've thought you dead. And now..."

The calmness couldn't be explained. I couldn't even give the excuse that I'd always felt as if Thomas was alive- not even in spirit. Because that would have been a lie. In my mind, during all of those years alone, I'd searched for his grave and placed flowers by the stone, wishing to whatever power that he would be taken care of in whatever place my soul was damned to never reach if such place even existed.

Despite that sense of finality to his life, it seemed as if we were always meant to meet there on that street, yellow eyes staring back at each other widely, even if it never could have been imagined.

"You knew? You must have. You're not even phased," Thomas accused, eyes narrowing ever so slightly.

"No." The words were almost a whisper. "But Alice did."

Arrogant eyes slid warily to watch Alice again as she raised her hand, sending a small wave of her fingers. It was almost taunting.

"We were always going to come to London and you were always going to attack us, somehow," Alice said, the calm lull of her voice soothing him slightly.

I thought perhaps it was meant to be, that neither of us could die and that neither of us could have ever planned this ending either. Hadn't we always wished to be eternally youthful, to see the days when our passions for love were no longer frowned upon and cast in darkened light?

"I thought I'd use that to my own advantage. To our own advantage," Alice continued slowly, casting a look toward me as I had to her.

It was in that look, that I knew she wasn't just talking about my newfound powers.

"I know this is overwhelming, but we need your help. And I think, if you give us that help, it will have great benefit to you," she said after a moment.

In spite of the distrust that'd flashed behind his eyes only a few sentences prior, Thomas seemed to straighten, sensing the seriousness of the oncoming proposal.

"What is it?"

"Well, it's a bit of a long story."

Yet despite that length, he listened to it all. To the story of Bella and Edward and their miracle child. Of how the Volturi felt threatened by her very existence. He didn't even seem to blink an eyelash at the mention of the wolfpack- something I took note of for later- and when it came to the plan for the upcoming month, he sucked in a heavy, audible breath and looked away down the street, at the shimmering of the lamplight against the shallow rainwater puddles.

It was then that Alice left us alone, a hand brushing my arm as she drifted past, nodding her head.

"You know, after so long on this earth like this, it feels like somehow my life was always building up to this," Thomas began, eyes still not drifting from the far-off point.

"What do you mean?"

He shrugged at first, shaking his head, but then he sucked in another breath, furrowed his brows, and explained.

"It feels like a proper purpose, I suppose." There was another pause in which neither of us could be brought to speak. "It was lonely for me. I made it to London eventually, as we'd always planned, and I thought that it could hide the fact that I was so miserable but it only made it worse. Finding someone only to leave them again. It didn't feel real."

He continued before I could say anything else. "I thought once, what it would be like to change another. Then I'd always have someone. Someone I wouldn't have to leave eventually when my appearance became too suspicious or the past began to catch up on me." He shook his head again, tipping his chin proudly as if comforting himself in the motion. "But I couldn't fate someone to a life as horrible as this. It took me ten years to get sober from human blood. I think I would have finished them if I'd tried anyway and relapsed into the worse of two monsters."

"It doesn't have to be like that... lonely. It took me this long to find that out too," I said, and in response, his head tipped into the direction of the street.

"Alice?"

I nodded softly, hand drifting to the necklace around my neck. "And her family."

"A family," he said, still in disbelief of the Cullens and their situation in Forks. "Elide."

I nodded, suddenly worried about the darker tone of his voice.

"William..."

"He's dead, Tommy," I said, swallowing against that anxiousness that came with his name. "And this time, there's no mistaking it."

He was silent for a moment more, but I could take no more of the lamenting in his brother's memory. Each time William's name was uttered I saw the dangerous red of his eyes and panicked.

"You could meet them all soon," I said, and something made me think of the wolf pack and how they would deal with the sudden onset of vampires. But even that was better than thinking of William, and Thomas seemed to think so too. "You'd like them, I think."

"I think I will," he said, properly smiling for the first time in a while.

That was answer enough.

We're back! If you've read my announcements you'll know updates were slow due to exams but they're finished now so chapters can continue! I'm desperate to finish this book and maybe another by the end of summer to let's go!
Ps. Pictured young Jude law the entire chapter as Thomas, idk why!