𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋𝙏𝙀𝙍 𝙏𝙃𝙄𝙍𝙏𝙔 𝙏𝙃𝙍𝙀𝙀
ミ★ ( bewitched, act three ) ★彡

     Sam Uley parked his car in the front driveway of the Bailey home. He slightly angled his body to look at Lilith to say goodbye to her.

     "Thanks for driving me home." Lilith said to Sam as she took off her seatbelt, "I was going to ask Bella, but, she looked like she was having a moment with Jacob and I didn't want to bother them."

     Sam chuckled. No one wanted to be around Bella and Jacob when they were having a moment—they all had to hear about their moments in Jake's thoughts and it was enough to put them off the amount of PDA they did around everyone as well, "Thats okay." He said to her, "And I spoke to your parents, by the way. They'll ease up on the whole grounding thing; but, they'll still want to talk to you about you skipping school today."

     Lilith couldn't help but cringe. She got lucky since her dad was working late at the hospital again and her mom was out tutoring a student so they both wouldn't be home until later, which would buy her some time—but, either way that conversation was going to be horrible, "I'll probably die for that. Either way, I appreciate what you've done for me, Sam. You really didn't have to." She smiled appreciatively at the alpha wolf. Sam had gone out of his way multiple times now to either save her, help her out, keep her safe, and even make her feel slightly like herself again. She didn't know how she could ever repay him and she didn't know what it was about her that made herself so special for her to receive that sort of treatment.

     "Someone's gotta look out for you." Sam joked as he reached to ruffle her hair.

     The blonde slapping his hands away as she grumbled, "I hate how you all do that to me. It's annoying."

     "It's funny." He retorted. The pack boys liked to doing it because they all thought the way her face scrunched up whenever they did it was too funny and adorable to not do it, so whenever they could—they wouldn't pass up the opportunity.

     "It's mean." She scowled, "I'm gonna get you back one day, just you wait." She said as she opened the door and got out of the car.

     "That's if you can reach my head first." Sam said back to her and Lilith narrowed her eyes and stuck out her tongue before closing the car door and walking to front door of her home.

     She got to the wooden door and turned back to wave at Sam who had waited patiently for her to reach the front door to make sure she got there safely before waving back and driving off. As soon as the door closed behind her and she locked it, her eyebrows furrowed as she could hear the sound of Dakota going mental in the distance. She could hear her hissing and screeching and it concerned the blonde as Dakota was usually a calm cat. She rarely ever lost control or got angry (unless someone tried to make her dance for whatever reason) which made this seem very out of character for her. Lilith began to follow the sounds of Dakota's loud hissing, getting even more concerned as she realised it was coming from her room.

     The girl barged open the door to see Edward standing in the middle of her room while trying to hold Dakota back from attacking him, "What the hell are you doing here?" She snapped at Edward, dropping her bag onto the floor, "And what the hell are you doing to my cat?" Dakota instantly dropped her guard and ran over towards her owner, the blonde girl bending down to pick the cat up and cuddling her to her chest to soothe her when Dakota let out another hiss at Edward.

     "Someone's been in your room." Edward informed her. Trying to refrain from feeling embarrassed that he nearly lost a fight to a small black cat. Edward could easily take the cat down, but, it would be the aftermath that he wouldn't survive. Lilith would kill him without even blinking for trying to even harm Dakota—which is fair enough considering how tight of a bond the two had. Dakota clearly could see that Lilith no longer liked Edward, which means she wouldn't either. Edward kind of missed the days that the black cat would run towards him happily instead of attack him, but, he hoped when he finally got Lilith's forgiveness that he would have Dakota's also.

     "Yeah, you have." She pointed out with an obvious tone, "Now get out. You should know that you can't be sneaking into my room like some sort of creep without some sort of repercussions." She said walking over to him and beginning to try and drag him out with her free arm that wasn't holding her cat. She then froze and turned back to face him, "How did you even get in here anyway?"

     There was no way he could even be there without her parents permission—and they weren't there to give it to him—and she seriously doubted that they would give it to him in the first place again. Every supernatural creature had to be invited in every time to keep the house completely safe, so the fact that Edward was standing in her room was quite alarming.

     "I caught the scent when I was going to stop by to check on you. The barrier was down and I assumed that your parents or you took it down and then you came home less than a few minutes after I got here." Edward said with creased eyebrows as he watched Lilith slowly pale.

     Lilith let Dakota back down before racing to her by and pulling out her phone and instantly dialling her mother's number—Oliver wouldn't have his phone on him and she didn't know if he was in with a patient so the chances of him picking up the phone would be slim to none—the girl whispering to herself and praying that her mother would pick up, "Lilith, you know I'm tutoring someone right now." Sierra said as she answered the phone, Lilith letting out a sigh of relief, "It better be important—"

     "Did you take the barrier down?" Lilith interrupted her mother before she went on a tangent. She heard her mother's breath catch in her throat.

     "What did you just say?" Sierra said almost cautiously which made it clear that she did not in fact take the barrier down. Lilith then heard the sound of rustling from the other line as her mother excused herself from the student and as she went into another room.

     Lilith leaned over and grabbed the edge of her bed head to ground herself as she felt herself feeling slightly faint. "I'm assuming that you or papa didn't take it down then." She said in a low whisper. Had Victoria gotten in touch with a witch to take the barrier down? Or had her own magic caused this on its own without her knowing?

     "Who are you with right now?" Sierra questioned her daughter, fearing the worst and she hoped to whoever was listening that she wasn't alone.

     "Edward is here." She answered her, "He caught the scent and I found him here which is why I called you." She explained.

     "Wait." Edward said and Lilith's head snapped up to look at him as she watched him breathe in the air and furrow his eyebrows further, "There's two scents." The vampire began to observe every detail he could about the scents and he noticed that one was more faded than the other, meaning someone had been there beforehand.

     "What do you mean there's two?" Lilith's question fell onto deaf ears for a few moments as Edward continued to look around her room for this supposed second scent that he spoke of.

     "I don't know. I can't figure it out—it's like I can smell it and I can sense it here, but, I can't pinpoint the type of scent it is. It's like someone has tried to cover their tracks, but, there's still a scent and there was definitely a second person here before." Edward said, trying his best to explain it what he could see and smell.

     That's when it clicked for Sierra as she heard Edward's explanation. She knew that it wouldn't have made much sense to Lilith, but, it made perfect sense to her. That first person was a witch, there was no doubt about that. They had broken the boundary spell and had tried to cover up the scent, but forgot that it still leaves a scent—but, not one that can be identified as an individual by anyone with a heightened sense of smell. There weren't many powerful witches that would be able to dismantle the spell that both her and Oliver—two very powerful witches—had put up, and then be able to try and cover their scent.

     Sierra felt her heart stop as the pieces finally fell together and she realised what was going on, "Lilith, you need to get out of there right now! You're in danger, you need to get to the pack and stay there until we come and get you, okay?" Sierra hung up the phone and Lilith couldn't help but freeze in shock from her mother's words and her tone. Her mother sounded scared, she was terrified and she never sounded that scared when it came to Victoria because she knew she would be able to take her down. But, whoever was responsible for this second scent had her shaking and that in itself meant that Lilith needed to run and hide.

     She was terrified because she had no idea what was after her and what was making her be in danger like her mother said she was, she had no idea how to protect herself or if she could even protect herself in the first place. And how was she supposed to get to the pack? She had no car; Sam had driven off a while ago and no doubt he was very far from her house to turn around now, she didn't see Edward's car and even if he did have it, he would only be able to get her to the boarder, and she wouldn't be able to contact any of the other pack boys to meet her halfway because they were all on patrol at this hour.

     "Lilith?" Edward called, his tone was worried for his ex girlfriend as all he could hear was the loud and fast rate of her heartbeat banging in his ears and he could see the familiar signs of an oncoming panic attack show itself on her—and he hoped that she would be able to push through this one like she had done plenty of other times.

     He watched as the fear in her eyes grow and her grip loosen on her phone; the sleek phone falling out of her hands and onto the ground just as Lilith's knees began to buckle underneath her. He sped to meet her halfway and catch her fall, the girl immediately trembling in her arms, sobs racking her body as she gasped out, "I can't breathe. I can't breathe—"

     "Look at me." Edward ordered, instantaneously taking action to calm her down so he could get her safety, but, he wouldn't be able to do that during a panic attack. He grabbed her face and made her look into his eyes, trying to not focus on the warmth he felt that he could finally touch her again without her slapping his hands away or glaring at him, and thinking how unimportant those things are when his world was falling apart in front of him. Her brown eyes met his and he could hear her struggling to get deep and even breaths, "I need you to focus on your breathing, okay?" He told her, feeling the way that she gripped onto his jacket tightly and rubbing her fingers on the fabric, trying to focus on the material—the girl trying to ground herself once more, "I know you can do this, you've done it plenty of times before." He said encouragingly, "What do we always do when this happens?"

     "Colours." She choked out, her eyes drifting from Edward's and they began to dart around her room, "Find five colours."

     "Okay, good start, what colours do you see?" Edward questioned as he nodded. They found that the 'five fives' technique worked best with Lilith's panic attacks when Jasper wasn't around to calm her. They started off with finding five colours, five different objects, smells, textures and then five different sounds up until the point that Lilith finally calmed. Sometimes it took longer than normal for her to lost because she was so deep in the panic attacks, and sometimes after the first five she was completely fine—but, they always made sure to finish it all to keep her focused and not jump to conclusions.

     Lilith quickly named the colours of the wall, her bed sheets, the carpet, her backpack and some of the books on her shelf. She then went on to describe the other senses up until her breathing began to settle and then she continued all the way to the end.

     The room was silent and all anyone could hear was Lilith's panting as she was still trying to catch her breath after not having a grip on it for minutes before reality had settled in again once more and she realised the the position she was currently in. She loosened her grip on Edward and instantly backed her way against the wall like she had been shocked, curling herself into a ball and holding her head in her hands as she couldn't help but feel embarrassed that he had to sit through that again, "I'm sorry." She whispered, refusing to look into his eyes as Dakota let out a meow and rubbed herself against her owner to try and soothe her again further like she had done to her before.

     "You have nothing to be sorry for, Lilith. I'd do anything for you and this is nothing compared to the lengths that I'd go to for you." Edward told her, his voice completely serious as he needed to let her know that he didn't care what it would take for her to forgive him—because he would do it, "I need to get you out of here. It's not safe here anymore."

     Home was meant to be the safest place for people. It was the place that people could come to and feel completely safe, they could be themselves and be accepted and truely cherished by the people inside it.  It was meant to be the place people could come to and feel secure, like no one could cause them harm in any way.

     But, her home wasn't safe anymore.

     If she was going to be honest with herself, her home hadn't been safe for her for a while now, with the amount of vampires that had been in it and stalking it and the fact that they had to place a spell on it to keep people in and out of it; it shouldn't of surprised her that it had finally reached this point.

     "Can you stand?" Edward asked her, she had been so deep in through that she hadn't noticed him stand up off of the ground and was standing over her with his hand out for her to take to help her up. Lilith looked at his hand before using her arms to try and push herself up by using the wall behind her and using her other arm to try and push the ground to help herself up alongside her legs. The girl wobbled, feeling weak from the panic attack and just before she collapsed once again, Edward sped to her and caught her again, "I got you." He said softly.

     The vampire scooped her up and began to carry her towards the car that he had parked a few houses down in case her parents were home, "I got you." He repeated again and he watched as she slowly closed her eyes and fell asleep in his arms almost instantly from the rocking sensation that was being made as he carried her.

     Edward placed her in the passenger seat of the car and let the door stay open longer as he buckled her seatbelt for Dakota to pounce herself onto Lilith's lap and get herself comfortable before Edward closed the door and got into the driver's seat. He grabbed his phone and dialled Sierra, the woman answering almost instantly, "Is something wrong?" She asked, not wasting any time with hellos or pleasantries in case Lilith was in trouble—and she didn't exactly want to play nice with the vampire that broke her daughter's heart.

     "There's been a change of plan." Edward informed her, "I won't be able to get her to the pack, I'm taking her to my home. You can meet us there. Bring the pack if you need to."

     Sierra let out a small sigh of relief, "Okay, we'll be there soon." She told Edward.

     "I think you'll have a bit of explaining to do as well." Edward said, given Sierra's reaction to the news that someone had broken passed their spell and into their home, it seemed that they were hiding something that was much bigger than just Victoria, and if they wanted to keep their daughter safe, they would have to tell her what it was about.

     "We do." Sierra agreed, "And hopefully she won't take it too badly. It's not something for the faint hearted."

     Edward couldn't help but look over at the sleeping teenage witch and his eyes softened as she finally looked like she was at peace. It something she apparently hadn't felt for a long time according to Jasper and everyone else he had spoken to after he had left, and he knew that he was the cause of this. But, the fact that she still stands and continues to live her life according to herself and her wants, proves how resilient she really is; even in the face of pain and suffering.

     "I think we've all forgotten how strong she really is." Edward couldn't help mumble before hanging up the phone and continuing to drive to his home.