Edward Cullen's Little Sister

Chapter 13 - History

"The sane thing that happened to your hand," Jasper told Bella. "Repeated a thousand times." He laughed partly ruefully and brushed at his arm. "Our venom is the only thing that leaves a scar."

"Why?" Bella breathed seeming horrified.
"I didn't have quite the same ... upbringing as my adopted siblings here. My beginning was something else entirely." Jasper's voice was hard and he hadn't even gotten to the wars yet.

Bella gaped at him, an appalled look on her face. "Before I tell you my story," Jasper said, "you must understand that there are places in our world, Bella, where the life span of the never-aging is measured in weeks, and not centuries."

Everyone else new the story so Carlisle and Emmett turned back to the Tv and Alice went to sit but Esme's feet in front of the sofa.

However, Edward stayed completely focused on the story but more so on Bella's reaction. I listened too, although I'd heard this before. Maybe not in as much detail as this but I didn't need the detail; I'd already seen it myself. Still, I wanted to see Bella's reaction and I wanted to know more of Jasper's time in the army.

"To really understand why, you have to look at the world from a different perspective. You have to imagine the way it looks to the powerful, the greedy ... the perpetually thirsty.

"You see, there are places in this world that are more desirable to us than others. Places where we can be less restrained, and still avoid detection. Picture, for instance, a map of the western hemisphere. Picture on it every human life as a small red dot. The thicker the red, the more easily we — well, those who exist this way — can feed without attracting notice."

I saw Bella shudder at those words, probably imagining and horrible image but Jasper didn't pay any attention to it.

I knew he wouldn't worry about scaring Bella. She said she wanted to know the story, and this was the story, and Edward had agreed.

"Not that the covens in the South care much for what the humans notice or do not. It's the Volturi that keep them in check. They are the only ones the southern covens fear. If not for the Volturi, the rest of us would be quickly exposed.

"The North is, by comparison, very civilized. Mostly we are nomads here who enjoy the day as well as the night, who allow humans to interact with us unsuspectingly — anonymity is important to us all.

"It's a different world in the South. The immortals there come out only at night. They spend the day plotting their next move, or anticipating their enemy's. Because it has been war in the South, constant war for centuries, with never one moment of truce. The covens there barely note the existence of humans,
except as soldiers notice a herd of cows by the wayside — food for the taking. They only hide from the notice of the herd because of the Volturi."

"But what are they fighting for?" Bella asked.
Jasper smiled. "Remember the map with the red dots?"

Bella nodded.

"They fight for control of the thickest red. You see, it occurred to someone once that, if he were the only vampire in, let's say Mexico City, well then, he could feed every night, twice, three times, and no one would ever notice. He plotted ways to get rid of the competition. Others had the same idea. Some came up with more effective tactics than others.

"But the most effective tactic was invented by a fairly young vampire named Benito. The first anyone ever heard of him, he came down from somewhere north of Dallas and massacred the two small covens that shared the area near Houston. Two nights later, he took on the much stronger clan of allies that claimed Monterrey in northern Mexico. Again, he won."

"How did he win?" Bella asked, curiosity evident in her features but also a wariness that was not misplaced.

"Benito had created an army of newborn vampires," Jasper explained. "He was the first one to think of it, and, in the beginning, he was unstoppable. Very young vampires are volatile, wild, and almost impossible to control. One newborn can be reasoned with, taught to restrain himself, but ten, fifteen together are a nightmare. They'll turn on each other as easily as on the enemy you point them at. Benito had to keep making more as they fought amongst themselves, and as the covens he decimated took more than half his force down before they lost.