The Unmatched Beauty (Twilight/TVD Crossover)

Surprise Bitches

"Chelsea is trying to break our bindings," Edward whispered. "But she can't find them. She can't feel us here. . . ." His eyes cut to me. "Are you doing that?" His eyes flickered to Bella, repeating the question. "We are all over this."
Edward lurched away from Bella suddenly, his hand reaching out toward Carlisle. At the same time, I felt a much sharper jab against the shield where it wrapped protectively around Carlisle's light. It wasn't painful, but it wasn't pleasant, either.
"Carlisle? Are you all right?" Edward gasped frantically. "Yes. Why?"
"Jane," Edward answered.
The moment that he said her name, a dozen pointed attacks hit in a second, stabbing all over the elastic shield, aimed at twelve different bright spots. I flexed, making sure the shield was undamaged. It didn't seem like Jane had been able to pierce it. I glanced around quickly; everyone was fine.
"Incredible," Edward said.
"Why aren't they waiting for the decision?" Tanya hissed.
"Normal procedure," Edward answered brusquely. "They usually incapacitate those on trial so they can't escape."
I looked across at Jane, who was staring at our group with furious disbelief. I was pretty sure that, besides me, and of course, Bella she'd never seen anyone remain standing through her fiery assault.
It probably wasn't very mature. But I figured it would take Aro about half a second to guess—if he hadn't already—that my shield was more powerful than Edward had known; I already had a big target on my forehead and there was really no point in trying to keep the extent of what I could do a secret. So I grinned a huge, smug smile right at Jane.
Her eyes narrowed, and I felt another stab of pressure, this time directed at me and Bella. I pulled my lips wider, showing my teeth. I knew Bella was doing the same.
Jane let out a high-pitched scream of a snarl. Everyone jumped, even the disciplined guard. Everyone but the ancients, who didn't so much as look up from their conference. Her twin caught her arm as she crouched to spring.
The Romanians started chuckling with dark anticipation.
"I told you this was our time," Vladimir said to Stefan. "Just look at the witch's face," Stefan chortled.
Alec patted his sister's shoulder soothingly, then tucked her under his arm. He turned his face to us, perfectly smooth, completely angelic.
I waited for some pressure, some sign of his attack, but I felt nothing. He continued to stare in our direction, his pretty face composed.
"Are you okay?" I heard Bella choke out.
"Yes," he whispered.
"Is Alec trying?"
Edward nodded. "His gift is slower than Jane's. It creeps. It will touch us in a few seconds."
I saw it then, when I had a clue of what to look for.
A strange clear haze was oozing across the snow, nearly invisible against the white. It reminded me of a mirage—a slight warping of the view, a hint of a shimmer. I pushed my shield out from Carlisle and the rest of the front line, afraid to have the slinking mist too close when it hit. I knew it was impenetrable. A low rumbling murmured through the ground under our feet, and a gust of wind blew the snow into sudden flurries between our position and the Volturi's. Benjamin had seen the creeping threat, too, and now he tried to blow the mist away from us. The snow made it easy to see where he threw the wind, but the mist didn't react in any way. It was like air blowing harmlessly through a shadow; the shadow was immune.
The triangular formation of the ancients finally broke apart when, with a racking groan, a deep, narrow fissure opened in a long zigzag across the middle of the clearing. The earth rocked under my feet for a moment. The drifts of snow plummeted into the hole, but the mist skipped right across it, as untouched by gravity as it had been by wind.
Aro and Caius watched the opening earth with wide eyes. Marcus looked in the same direction without emotion.
They didn't speak; they waited, too, as the mist approached us. The wind shrieked louder but didn't change the course of the mist. Jane was smiling now. Bella stretched it out further than what I had before it hit the wall and I pulled back slightly anticipating.
And then the most hit a wall. I felt it as soon it had hit. It was sweet almost.
The mist curled upward, seeking a breach, a weakness. It found none. The fingers of searching haze twisted upward and around, trying to find a way in, and in the process illustrating the astonishing size of the protective screen.
There were gasps on both sides of Benjamin's gorge.
"Well done, Bella!" Benjamin cheered in a low voice.
My smirk returned.
I could see Alec's narrowed eyes, doubt on his face for the first time as his mist swirled harmlessly around the edges of my shield.
And then I knew that we could do this. Obviously, I would be the number-one priority, the first one to die, but as long as Bella held on as I had to fight to take out as many guards as I could,, we were on more than equal footing with the Volturi. We still had Benjamin and Zafrina; they had no supernatural help at all. As long as she held.
"I'm going to have to concentrate," I heard her whisper to Edward. "When it comes to hand to hand, it's going to be harder to keep the shield around the right people."
"I'll keep them off you."
"No. You have to get to Demetri. Zafrina will keep them away from me."
Zafrina nodded solemnly. "No one will touch this young one," she promised Edward.
"I'd go after Jane and Alec myself, but I can do more good here."
"Jane's mine," I hissed. "She needs a taste of her own medicine."
"And Alec owes me many lives, but I will settle for his," Vladimir growled from the other side. "He's mine."
"I just want Caius," Tanya said evenly.
The others started divvying up opponents, too, but they were quickly interrupted. Aro, staring calmly at Alec's ineffective mist, finally spoke.
"Before we vote," he began.
I shook my head angrily. I was tired of this charade. The bloodlust was igniting in me again, and I was sorry that I would help the others more by standing still. I wanted to fight.
"Let me remind you," Aro continued, "whatever the council's decision, there need be no violence here."
Edward snarled out a dark laugh.
Aro stared at him sadly. "It will be a regrettable waste to our kind to lose any of you. But you especially, young Edward, and your newborn mate. The Volturi would be glad to welcome many of you into our ranks. Bella, Benjamin, Zafrina, Kate. Vanessa most importantly, There are many choices before you. Consider them."
Chelsea's attempt to sway us fluttered impotently against my shield. Aro's gaze swept across our hard eyes, looking for any indication of hesitation. From his expression, he found none.
I knew he was desperate to keep Edward and me, to imprison us the way he had hoped to enslave Alice. But this fight was too big. He would not win if I lived. I was fiercely glad to be so powerful that I left him no way not to kill me.
"Let us vote, then," he said with apparent reluctance.
Caius spoke with eager haste. "The child is an unknown quantity. There is no reason to allow such a risk to exist. It must be destroyed, along with all who protect it." He smiled in expectation.
I fought back a snarl of defiance to answer his cruel smirk.
Marcus lifted his uncaring eyes, seeming to look through us as he voted.
"I see no immediate danger. The child is safe enough for now. We can always reevaluate later. Let us leave in peace." His voice was even fainter than his brothers' feathery sighs.
None of the guard relaxed their ready positions at his disagreeing words. Caius's anticipatory grin did not falter. It was as if Marcus hadn't spoken at all.
"I must make the deciding vote, it seems," Aro mused. Suddenly, Edward stiffened at my side. "Yes!" he hissed.
I risked a glance at him. His face glowed with an expression of triumph that I didn't understand—it was the expression an angel of destruction might wear while the world burned. Beautiful and terrifying. Then I heard it before anyone else. Five pairs of feet dashing toward us. When I smelt it, two of those scents,  distinguishably recognizable, considering, the decades upon decades I have spent with them.
There was a low reaction from the guard, an uneasy murmur.
"Aro?" Edward called, nearly shouted, undisguised victory in his voice. I too wasn't able to wipe the triumphant grin off my face and Paul looked at me questionably although I ignored him and he did not like it one second as he huffed angrily no doubt a wolf you pout on his face.
Aro hesitated for a second, assessing our new mood warily before he answered. "Yes, Edward? You and Vanessa have something further... ?"
"Perhaps," I said pleasantly, controlling my unexplained excitement. "First, if I could clarify one point?" Edward continued.
"Certainly," Aro said, raising his eyebrows, nothing now but polite interest in his tone. My fists clenched; Aro was never more dangerous than when he was gracious.
"The danger you foresee from my daughter—this stems entirely from our inability to guess how she will develop? That is the crux of the matter?"
"Yes, friend Edward," Aro agreed. "If we could but be positive... be sure that, as she grows, she will be able to stay concealed from the human world—not endanger the safety of our obscurity . . ." He trailed off, shrugging.
"So, if we could only know for sure," Edward suggested, "exactly what she will become... then there would be no need for a council at all?"
"If there was some way to be absolutely sure," Aro agreed, his feathery voice slightly more shrill. He couldn't see where Edward was leading him. But I could. "Then, yes, there would be no question to debate."
"And we would part in peace, good friends once again?" I asked with a hint of irony.
Even more shrill. "Of course, my young friend. Nothing would please me more." Edward and I chuckled exultantly. "Then I do have something more to offer."
Aro's eyes narrowed. "She is absolutely unique. Her future can only be guessed at." "Not absolutely unique," Edward disagreed. "Rare, certainly, but not one of a kind."
"Aro, would you ask Jane to stop attacking my wife?" Edward asked courteously. "We are still discussing evidence."
Aro raised one hand. "Peace, dear ones. Let us hear him out."
The pressure disappeared I distantly felt disappeared.  Jane bared her teeth at Bella; she couldn't help grinning back at her. I felt them stop a yard away awaiting our call, she surely had seen.
"Why don't you join us, Alice?" I called loudly.
Surprise Bitches...