Luminosity

by Alicorn

  I held my breath.

  * * *

  Alice was saying something in Norwegian, outside the house. I hadn't started learning the language yet except a few phrasebook entries, having been too distracted by everything. I presumed she was trying to invite the person who'd picked her up in for a beverage or some similarly plausible. A voice - a man's, thin and lively, tried several times to demur, but she insisted.

  The door swung open and she pulled him inside.

  I looked at the human, blinking a few times in a reflexive attempt to rid my eyes of their obstructions. I could hear his heartbeat, his breath. The sounds signalled "food" - but weren't that unlike the pulse or panting of a non-human animal. The speed was a little different, but those things varied between species anyway. Without the smell, it was like he was something in Tupperware in the fridge - clearly edible just based on the package he came in, but not demanding that I pounce on him.

  He's a person, I reminded myself. Before I took a breath, I used a little of my air, to ask Edward at a pitch the visitor wouldn't hear, too fast for him to see my lips move: "What's his name?"

  "Nils," Edward replied, similarly unobtrusively. Okay. The not-to-be-eaten man had a name. Hopefully that would make it easier. Alice showed Nils into the kitchen, poured him a glass of water and one for herself. They made awkward small talk in Norwegian. He looked curiously at us, Alice's strangely still and silent relatives; Emmett, the clown, waved at him.

  I made full use of my immensely parallel brain to fix in my mind his name, my competing desires, and everything else I could use to hedge out the thought of drinking Nils's blood.

  I sucked in a tiny wisp of air.

  It was like inhaling flames. My throat erupted in heat and thirst. Venom filled my mouth, coated my tongue, demanded to be used for its incapacitating purpose against my natural prey. It hurt, I could have swallowed a hot poker and felt no worse, and the relief was right there, pulsing through the human's arteries - Nils, I forced myself to think, he has a name, he probably has a loving family, I don't want to eat him, I don't want it -

  I brought my water to my lips too fast, heedless of the need to act human while near one. Holding my lungs still, I washed the venom away. It replaced itself, but more slowly, and I took another gulp to clear it. My throat wasn't cooled at all. It still felt flayed and charred and in need of the balm that I could only get from one source.

  I want to get married on Wednesday in Ukraine,I screamed at myself desperately. I want to see Renée and Charlie. I want Nils to go home to his loved ones. I want to be in control, I want to be perfect at this, I want my family to be proud of me. I want that more than this, more than this, more than this, I can't have them both, I don't want the blood enough -

  I let another tiny gasp pass my gritted teeth.

  Like swallowing molten iron. The desire for soothing blood flooded my senses; I didn't quite experience tunnel vision, but everything except the experience of my parched throat was irrelevant, passed without notice - not significant enough to be embedded in my perfect recall. I had my thoughts and my thirst. That was all.

  I do not want to eat him -

  Oh, insinuated the charming little voice of vampire instinct, but everything is set up to make it safe for you to have a sip. No harm will come to you if you just taste, it will taste sogood, you know they will all forgive you, you know you might have to communicate with your family over the Internet only anyway, it will hardly change a thing... You know you want it...

  A little whining sound squeaked out of me, but I hadn't moved from my seat. Nils was starting to look very uncomfortable; he clearly wanted to leave. I took another swallow of water and rinsed away the latest welling of venom. I took another breath of air.

  Fire, again. But I knew what to expect with this breath. It was not getting worse. And I hadn't eaten him yet. I couldn't relax - but, holding myself rigid and fighting my urges with every passing moment, I could hold still. I could avoid leaping across the room at Nils and don't think about the taste preventing him from going home to his family.

  Alice stopped urging him to stay. He put his water glass in the sink and started making his way towards the door, looking uncomfortably at us.

  One more useful test, to see if I could not only be in the same room as a human but have a wedding performed by one. Which would involve uttering words, and looking pretty in pictures rather than tortured and struggling. I finished off the water in my bottle, filled my lungs with scorching air.

  I smiled at Nils, monitoring every facial muscle that I had control over to make the expression natural-looking instead of a forced grimace. "Farvel!" I said. One of the phrasebook bits - "goodbye".

  "Farvel," he replied, looking no less puzzled. He let himself out. I heard every one of his footsteps as he made his way to his car. I heard his heartbeat, rapid with nervousness. I heard his car door open, and slam, and his engine start up.

  I waited to relax until I couldn't hear the car anymore. Everyone else waited to relax until I did.

  As soon as I sighed with relief and settled into a more neutral standing position, Edward enveloped me in an intense hug. "Bella," he exclaimed. He sounded just as dazzled by my performance as I'd imagined.

  I leaned into him and inhaled his soothing non-food scent. "I'm okay," I breathed, confirming it to myself as much as to everyone else. "I'm really okay."

  * * *

  Chapter 15: Honeymoon

  I did not eat anyone on the way to Ukraine. We left early, so I'd have time to fill up on animal blood as soon before the ceremony as possible. While the others checked into a hotel in town, Edward rented a car and drove me to a sufficiently human-free forested area in the middle of the night, scouted ahead to make sure that there wasn't anyone about while I waited in the car, and then gave me the go-ahead. I ate two elk, a lynx, and a wild boar. (I found I liked the boar more than I had other animals, for some reason. It had the same icky tang to it that they all did, but I was able to interpret it as being more like yogurt or sour cream than actual spoilage, to borrow a human food analogy.) By the end of this feast I felt bloated and sloshy with all the excess blood - I felt like doing anything but eating.

  In the hotel, there were smells of humans everywhere, but I didn't have to get close to anyone. I focused on the way Edward's hand felt in mine as we made our way back to our rooms in the wee hours of the morning, and did not devour the night doorman, or any of our neighbors. The traces the humans left in the room made the air dry and thirst-inducing, but it was like Death Valley in the summer, not the interior of an active incinerator. Unpleasant, but tolerable, almost ignoreable, especially when I was so full.

  We didn't sleep or ever urgently need the bathroom, so we were in two adjacent rooms instead of spreading out over several - a girls' room where Alice and Esme and Rosalie (mostly Alice) fussed over me, and a guys' room where the others stayed.

  I heard Emmett and Jasper badgering Edward into having a bachelor party at around three a.m. I furrowed my brow, wondering what they'd do, but then shrugged to myself. It wasn't like Edward would look twice at anyone else, even if they did hire strippers for some unfathomable reason. He was all mine. I purred quietly, contemplating this fact.

  Alice apparently knew better than to drag me to any human-filled place for a bachelorette party I did not want, but she insisted on curling my hair. She piled it up in a cascade of elegantly ironed ringlets on the top of my head, secured with about six pounds of bobby pins. Most makeup was impossible, since nothing would stick to vampire skin if we didn't hold our faces in perfect stillness to avoid cracking paint or dislodging clingy powder. But mascara was usable - eyelashes, like other hair, were unaffected except for growing more slowly. Alice pleaded with me to let her dab a little bit on. I thought it looked silly, gilt on the lily of my new face, but let her do it. Maybe it distracted from the sleepy shadows under my eyes. (I never felt tired - just looked like I could use a night's sleep, like all of us vampires did.)

  Once
I'd been pinned and painted to her satisfaction, she smoothed down her own dark spikes. Then she braided up Rosalie and Esme, coiling the expertly woven plaits into buns affixed to the backs of their heads with more bobby pins from her endless supply.

  Edward and the others of his room left for our appointment first, so I could get into my dress after he was out of mindreading range and reduce the risk of his silly superstition bothering him.

  Alice, ever eager to organize fancy things, had set everything up. We were meeting an official who'd conduct the service in a picturesque empty steppe, as well as a photographer - the open air would help me tolerate proximity to the humans. I had a bouquet, and so did Alice, Rosalie, and Esme (my bridesmaids - well, technically, bridesmatrons, not that anyone ever used that word.) Alice had gotten them dresses, too. Gold - like the eyes I hoped to achieve through a scrupulous "vegetarian" diet. I was wearing brown contact lenses again to avoid spooking our celebrant.

  There was no aisle, but Alice had scared up a privacy screen thing from somewhere, and set it up in the middle of the grass. With Edward and the human standing some twenty feet away, the rest of us huddled behind the barrier so we could emerge as we were supposed to. The bridesmaids and groomsmen (neither Edward nor I had designated a specific maid of honor or best man) went first, pairwise: Esme and Carlisle, Rosalie and Emmett, and Alice and Jasper. I heard the photographer's camera clicking as he caught snapshots.

  My father was not present, and I'd declined to have Carlisle walk me down the "aisle". That meant I was alone. I was brimful with nerves -"aaaaaah I'm getting married what would Renée say" - but nerves were not thirst. Anything but thirst was good. I took a deep breath of relatively human-free air, shielded from their scents by the screen. I took one long stride past its edge and turned towards the place where I would be wed.

  Edward looked stunning. He was so supernally, exultantly happy - I'd seen him smile like thatonce when I'd agreed to marry him, and there it was again, and there was nothing else in the world, not even the warm heartbeats of the photographer and the celebrant.

  I managed not to break into a run. I took long, but measured, steps towards him, feeling my face split into a grin of my own. In what seemed like an age, but was really seconds, I was in my designated place, on the side where my bridesmaids fanned out. Edward took my hands in his.

  The service was in Ukrainian. I'd read through a phrasebook, again, and memorized what I'd need to say when, but the recitation - whatever the local equivalent was for "We are gathered here today..." - entered my ears without my comprehending more than the occasional word and our names. It would have even if it'd been in English, most likely; my eyes were fixed on Edward, my mind was full of Edward, I was listening to him breathe and clutching his fingers in mine. The celebrant was beneath notice.

  I said my lines when cued. They used up my air; I drew in another breath, focusing on Edward's scent over the humans'. Glee over my imminent marriage chased out the impulse to dart to my left and bite into the man's jugular.

  Edward spoke his own piece with triumphant emphasis. I lifted my hand when it came time, and he added the wedding band to the engagement ring: a delicate torus of gold, also his mother's, thin and slight enough to tuck under the wide lattice of diamonds. It, too, fit perfectly.

  The celebrant, all but forgotten in my rush of euphoria, said the words that I knew were Ukrainian for, "You may kiss the bride."

  Edward pounced on me as though it didn't matter if the humans saw his improbable speed, as though no one was watching at all, as though the only things in the universe were me and him and the fact that it was now time for us to be kissing. His old-fashioned restraint was properly obviated in matrimony; and I was safe to kiss; and I clutched at him with just enough caution to avoid gouging holes in him but he didn't protest, just held me tighter -

  Emmett. Of course Emmett would whistle. Edward and I broke apart, matching growls in our throats too low for the celebrant to hear. The human looked indulgent, like he saw this sort of thing all the time. He had no idea. Humans would explode if they felt like this. Edward looked about to explode, so suffused with victory and satisfaction was he. I might burst myself. I'd loved him human, if anything humans felt deserved the word, but not like this. No heart also burdened with the task of beating could take it.

  I kissed him again; I couldn't resist and he didn't try.

  Eventually we had to interrupt ourselves again, to stand in photographer-dictated arrangements. We photographed every possible combination. Me and Edward, me and all the bridesmaids, Edward and all the groomsmen, me and Alice with and without Edward (for recipients of only partial truth), the entire wedding party together, each pair of the others.

  The celebrant and the photographer had arrived separately, in their own cars. They bade us goodbye and were on their respective ways, the latter with a promise to send all the photographs in both physical and digital formats as requested. (Edward translated, bending to whisper against my ear, and almost before he finished his sentence I spun in his arms to kiss him again.)

  When they were gone, there was no human anywhere in view. I plucked my contacts gently out of my eyes and dropped them on the ground, then turned back to my husband.

  "Dance with me," I whispered to Edward, and then we spun, full of grace, placing our feet in flawless rhythm on the steppe, whirling in sync like figurines in a music box.

  We had almost two perfect weeks before disaster struck.

  * * *

  For our honeymoon, Esme loaned us her private island off the coast of Brazil. It had been a gift to her from Carlisle, but stood empty most of the time. The small airplane that Edward had rented to get us to and from Ukraine couldn't be trusted to get across the Atlantic Ocean without a stop, and I didn't want to spend an overnight flight in a passenger jet full of humans. We could have swum, but it would have taken a long time.

  So Edward took a passenger flight and I went in his luggage. He was nervous about the plan, thinking I might have some bad associations with traveling in cargo holds, but it was a very different situation. I was in a giant suitcase, with books to read (quite able to see them in the dark), not in need of food or water or sleep or fresh air, not squishy enough to be made uncomfortable by lumps under me or weights over me, not crampable by awkward poses. Most importantly, I wasn't the captive of a creature with many times my strength who was taking me to Italy whether I liked it or not.

  The suitcase was searched at every stop - of course; I'd make any x-ray machine they put me through go haywire - but we'd prepared for that eventuality. I held perfectly still, didn't breathe, kept my eyes closed, and had a tag around my wrist that labeled me (in Norwegian, English, and Portuguese) "Untitled: Mixed Media. 2004. Anonymous artist." I could feel hot, damp hands poking at me, fumbling for the tag. I heard them zip up the suitcase again. The time I was investigated during our stop Stateside, I heard some confused mumbles about why such a pretty statue was being transported without any packing peanuts and in the same bag as a set of assorted language primers and a box of contact lenses. I didn't think this inquisitiveness would go anywhere untoward. I probably wasn't even the strangest-looking thing they'd seen that month.

  Edward picked me and our other bags off the carousel in Rio de Janeiro; in the suitcase, I popped my contact lenses in. I was finally unpacked after he'd rented a car and stashed the other items in the trunk; he let me out at a moment when no one was looking and I unfolded myself into the passenger seat. Promptly, Edward kissed me, which was not at all unwelcome.

  Eventually we remembered that we had somewhere to be and he drove to the docks. He found a place to stash the car which would let him leave it there for the extended duration he wanted, and then we divided our belongings between us and I followed him to a sleek white boat that floated among other, clunkier craft. I didn't know how to drive the thing, but I watched Edward pilot it skillfully out into the water and picked up on approximately what he was doing, under what circumstances, and how the bo
at reacted.

  The trip took just under an hour. The sun came up soon after the lights of Rio were pinpricks in the distance - no one could see us. I watched my skin shimmer as I lazed idly in the boat.

  Isle Esme came into view. It was a tiny island, a low beach trailing out into the water on one side and swaying palms on the other. Our boat drew up to the bleached wood of the docks, where Edward tied off. He swung our bags out onto the planks and then scooped me into his arms.

  "This is Esme's island, not ours," I pointed out. "You don't have to carry me over this particular threshhold."

  "I'm just being thorough," said Edward gallantly, positioning my weight over one arm and scooping up the trunks with the other. I shrugged and didn't protest as he carried me up a winding path to the island's house.

  It was a big, pale house, with all the glass and white carpeting characteristic of Esme's preferences in architecture. I imagined Carlisle bringing Esme here for the first time, presenting her with a tumbled-down ramshackle toy, and her setting to work outfitting it with everything she wanted. Edward took one final triumphant stride through the wide-open front doors. "Here we are, Mrs. Cullen," he said, savoring my appended name like it was a piece of candy. Candy made out of blood, I amended in my head as the analogy floundered. He set the suitcases on the floor.

  "Are you planning to put me down?" I asked mirthfully.

  "Hmmm," he said, in mock thoughtfulness. "Not just yet, I think." I let him carry me through the house - it was rather large for such a small island - and into a big white room with a big white bed. Everything was lit by late sunrise that streamed in through the glass eastern wall.

  I smirked at Edward, raised an eyebrow, and lifted my left hand to let the twin rings flash.

  * * *