Bree Tanner - escape

Running

I ran. Over hills, mountains, streams, through cities and towns, stopping only either in bright

daylight or when I felt a vision coming on. I was getting pretty good at predicting them now. I

often saw those tracking me stopping, sniffing things that I recognised, remembered passing or

touching. Sometimes it was even the dumpsters I often had to hide in when I felt a vision coming

on, as they rendered me practically immobile in the duration of the vision. They were still far

away, but much, much too close for comfort. They were also far cleverer than I had first

anticipated. All of the tactics for throwing others off the scent that Riley had shown me were

useless. I don't even think they were noted. They were slowly, city by city, country by country,

catching up to me. I felt another vision coming on.

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Again I could see them in my minds' eye. The blond woman, Rosalie, stopped to sniff the ground. I could remember sitting there three days ago, my last vision. They were getting more frequent now, and I was getting better at predicting them, though they showed much the same thing: me being tracked.

I woke up, and was immediately overwhelmed.

By smells. Smells that I hated. Riley, Kristie, Raoul, Jen, Sarah, spiderman boy. Fred. Diego. Oh my god, Diego. I set off at a run. I knew he was dead. I knew that for certain. It's just that once I had a hold of his scent, I couldn't let it go. I ran into the gingerbread house and stopped. There it was. Sitting on the floor. A little pile of ashes. All that was left. I would have sunk to my knees if it weren't for the other smell I caught. It was them. Holy shit, I though as a hurried to the cupboard and took out a jar. I scooped up the ashes. They weren't too close, I thought. But close enough for me to smell them. Maybe a city away? They would be here in twenty minutes, and here I was, a sitting duck. I needed to move.

I cursed myself as I ran. What had I been thinking? How stupid was I? On one hand, I needed to get the ashes. I wasn't just leaving him there in that horrible place. According to the other hand, however, going there was like walking to my death, walking into a trap.

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The redhead must have been the fastest, because he got there first. The others arrived a few seconds later. They all went into the cottage. If I could have gotten any colder, I would have. They were looking at what was left of the pile of ashes.

'It killed someone,' one of them growled. I was confused. What? They thought I killed him?

Although, I reasoned, the ashes smelt the same as they would have the day they were made. It didn't change or fade with time. And my scent was mingled with his. Plus the house did look like a bomb had hit it. Or like two vampires had tried to kill each other. So now they thought I was a murderer.

I groaned as I saw the newspaper article.

'Bloodless bodies astound scientists,' and underneath it, 'are there vampires among us?'

Ten people had been found dead, with no blood in their bodies.

I groaned. I had nothing to do with it. But they didn't know that.

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One of them picked up a newspaper that the paperboy must have dropped, unraveled it and growled.

'Look at this,' he shoved it under the others' noses.

'It'll only keep going,' said Jasper.

'We need to stop it now,' said Emmett.

Carlisle hesitated for a fraction of a second, then sighed.

'Agreed.'

'Then let's go,' said Esme.

They ran off faster than ever before.

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Can you guys PLEASE tell me how to do italics? It's driving me insane! I wrote this part on another app and hoped the italics would appear here. It DIDN'T!