Morning Moon

Chapter 8

I followed Jane to the antechamber with my robe on. I saw six other vampires with their hoods up, so I pulled mine over my eyes as well. I couldn't see the faces of the other vampires, but since they were in their designated seats, I knew that it was only the ruling members of the Volturi, which as it were, now included me. The only other vampire that wasn't a part of the ruling was Renata, who was standing behind Aro just as silent as she normally does.

It seemed as though we waited for only a minute before I heard soft knocking at the humungous door. Gianna promptly opened the door and my entire body froze.

The vampire that followed Gianna brought with him almost every unpleasant memories that I had since moving to Forks. In summation, he was part of the reasons that Edward and his family left, just by association.

I'd never seen a scared vampire before. Even the last few glimpses I had of James was of an overconfident and cocky vampire. But now, outside of his element he looked downright petrified. I knew how he felt, and my face probably matched his.

Laurent followed disconcertingly, looking around at everything before he even noticed the seven hooded figures staring at him from beneath dark robes. I was glad my hood was deep enough so that he wouldn't be able to see me.

Gianna led him right in front of me and quickly took her leave. She's been here long enough to know that something unpleasant was about to occur and she wanted nothing to do with it. I shifted in my seat as Laurent stood completely still.

"I am Laurent. I believe I was summoned? Though I must confess, I don't know what for. I've done nothing wrong."

"No, Laurent. You've done nothing. This is merely a fact finding meeting of sorts." I recognized Aro's polite demeanor.

"What is it you would like to know?" I couldn't tell if Aro lifted his hood or not. But soon I heard his feet shuffling down the steps and before I knew it, he and Renata were standing beside me.

"A vampire named Victoria. What do you know of her?" Aro asked.

"Victoria? I don't know. I haven't seen or heard of her in a few months. Me and her mate disagreed on a few things and I parted ways with the both of them."

Aro took his hood off of his head and lifted his hand for Laurent to take it, but the vampire backed away, unsure what to expect. 'Just touch his hand already.' I didn't even mean to project out to Laurent, and I could see the fear returning to his face as he looked around tryig to figure out who was in his head. He did grab hold of Aro's hand tentatively though.

"Hmm." Aro hummed lightly. "It seems our Bella is in your thoughts an awful lot. Why is that I wonder." He called back in amusement to me I figured. Laurent looked shocked when Aro proclaimed "our Bella." My eyes darted back and forth between the two of them. I now found myself to be very invested in this exchange. "So you're a liar? Laurent? Explain yourself."

"Okay. Victoria came to me a few weeks ago and told me she had a favor to ask of me. She wanted me to kidnap this girl Bella, the Cullen's pet human." I was pleased that I resisted the urge to cringe at Laurent's description of me. I was much more to them than just a pet, at least I thought I was. And besides, calling me the "pet" seemed almost derogatory. "At first, I declined, I'd just gotten settled down in Denali with my new mate, Irina. But by the time she came back again, I'd grown restless with the animal diet. I agreed to the request." Laurent admitted, though I could see that he felt ashamed of caving into Victoria's whim since he hung his head down.

"Well you're hence released of your favor to Victoria. She's dead."

"O-kay. Thanks." Laurent said backing away from the menacing hoods.