Before The Storm | J. Hale & A. Cullen

0.4

After Seth finished his third sandwich, he suddenly got up and left the room, missing the questioning look his sister shot at him. He followed the scent of cocoa through the house and came to a stop at the last door on the left of the hallway on the third floor. The curiosity got the better of him and he knocked on the door. After not getting a response, he stood there for a moment only to be knocked out of his thoughts when a voice filled the silent hallway.

Seth looked down the hall at Emmett with a blank expression on his face, not having heard what he had said. Emmett leaned against the doorframe of a room farther down the hall, his arms crossed over his chest as he gazed at Seth with an amused look on his face.

“I said just go in. He usually doesn’t answer when someone knocks so Bella generally just barges in after knocking. Just don’t come running when he scares you off. Tends to be a habit of his.”

Seth’s expression turned to confusion at Emmett’s spoken words, but he couldn’t ask what he meant as the bear-like man had already disappeared through the doorframe he had been leaning against. Turning back to the door, Seth knocked once more before opening the door and stepping inside. He stopped in his tracks when he saw the bare back of a muscular brunet. His gaze was immediately captured by the scars that littered the tan skin, but it was soon blocked by some cloth as the brunet pulled on a cotton t-shirt.

His cheeks were dusted with a light pink and when his gaze finally raised to meet the sky-blue eyes that matched with the tan body, the sixteen-year-old boy inhaled sharply in surprise.

"Your eyes are blue?" He found himself asking as the blush on his face lessened.

The boy briefly looked over the bedroom, before returning his gaze to see the man no longer standing where he had been. His gaze scanned the room, his eyebrows becoming furrowed as he didn’t spot the man anywhere. He turned to leave the room and as he walked out, he almost ran straight into Bella, who looked at him in surprise.

“Did he say where he was going? He never leaves suddenly like that, especially not looking the way he did. What happened?” Her tone was questioning, but her gaze was accusing.

Before he could get out a coherent sentence, Jacob showed up and got Bella to step out of the younger boy's personal space. 

“Bella, leave him alone. Seth didn’t do anything. If you want to know what happened, go catch your friend and ask him yourself. If he didn’t tell you he was leaving, then he might not want you to know.”

Bella, though feeling like she wasn’t getting the truth, decided not to push the boy and left to go find her friend.

Seth sighed quietly while lightly rubbing his arm, already feeling as if he just messed everything up. Walking past Jacob, he headed back downstairs. After finding his sister, he stayed with her until Sue called them, asking them to come back home.

•••••••

The night was dark, only faintly getting lit by what little moonlight was provided. The brunet sat by a tree, leaning back against its trunk as he closed his eyes. His mind was racing as his heartbeat slowed more, the earthy smells surrounding him reminding him faintly of the black-haired boy who had entered his room earlier. He tried to rid himself of his thoughts, instead, his mind focusing on the sound of rushing water from the river and the cool breeze it carried. His body soon relaxed, the sound of the water hitting the banks and rocks slowly lulling him to sleep.

•••••••

The sound of steady breathing and another heartbeat was what Michael awoke to. As his eyes began to adjust, he realized that the sun was already starting to peek up over the horizon. He slowly sat up while stretching, regretting having used the tree to lean against. As he rubbed his eyes, his thoughts finally caught up to the sounds that he had heard. Looking around, the man was more than shocked when his eyes met that of chocolate brown eyes that belonged to a wolf across the river, who had already been looking at the man.

At the sight of the man moving, the wolf lifted its head off its paws. It watched the man for a moment longer before it got up and turned, heading in the opposite direction. The man couldn’t help but feel his mood sink as the wolf walked farther away from him, but he didn’t dare cross the river to go after him because the treaty between the Cullen’s and the Quileute Tribe forbade him of it.

Michael let out a quiet sigh when the wolf didn’t come back, sitting back down on the ground while subconsciously picking at his nails. He was broken out of his thoughts as someone grabbed his shoulder. He instinctively grabbed hold of their wrist and squeezed it tightly until he felt them release their grip from his shoulder. He let go of his hold, looking back down at the flower he had picked up at some point while he had been thinking. He didn’t look up at them, knowing who it was by their scent alone.

Rosalie took a seat down by the brunet, looking at him in slight disappointment as she took in the dirt all over his clothes and the leaf in his hair that she wasn’t even sure if he knew it was there. They didn’t say anything for several minutes, Michael focused only on the flower as Rosalie silently observed him from her spot next to him. Rosalie gave him a small look of surprise when he was the one to break the silence.

“What do you want to know?” He looked up at her, his sky-blue eyes meeting her golden ones as he stared at her through his brown hair. “You wouldn’t be looking at me like that if you didn’t have a question for or about me.”

Rosalie carefully chose her words, deciding she’d rather not upset or offend the male as she saw how much he cared for her little niece.

“Renesmee. You two are alike but completely different at the same time. What exactly are you?”

Michael looked away from the blonde, not having expected her to ask that particular question. He remained quiet, trying to figure out what to say and what to keep to himself.

“I’m like her a little bit. I’m a different type of vampire, a subspecies if you will. My kind refers to yours as a ‘Bitten.’ Since the females can’t reproduce unless it’s maybe their gift, your kind can only be turned. There is a species called Nightwalkers. I am the offspring of a Nightwalker and a Human, which makes me a Daywalker." He paused to shoot her a glance. He continued once he realized she was actually paying attention.

"As a Nightwalker, you can’t walk in sunlight unless you want to get incredibly sick and eventually die from it. As a Daywalker, I can walk in the sun because there is enough human in me that the sun doesn’t make me sick. I experience the hunger or thirst, whatever you want to call it, all the time. It’s something that I have to constantly fight, but it’s not too hard to suppress. If we give in and feed too much, the animalistic urges take over and it's extremely hard to go back to normal. Most usually end up going insane from the process. We end up being killed by the ‘Huntsmen’ at that point, who are like the Volturi of the Walkers. They’re the trusted guardsmen of our ruler. We’re not supposed to talk about them, though, so I can’t go into much more detail.”

Rosalie remained quiet, shocked into silence as she processed all of the new information Michael had just given her. She didn’t answer. Instead, she stood up and after dusting the dirt off of her, held her hand out to help the brunet up from his spot. He took the help, not questioning what the blonde was doing.

“I know you may not think it, seeing as how you seem to only ever be around Renesmee, but we would let you stay here after all of this if you wanted to. Renesmee already loves you and with all us aunts and uncles, she usually always gets what she wants. If she doesn’t want you to leave, well, you’ll soon find out that sometimes you just can’t say no to her. It was nice to see you, Michael, you should talk to all of us a little more.” She called out over her shoulder as she started to walk back towards the house. “Who knows, maybe you’ll actually find that you like some of us.”