Jane waited for the scream.
But it never came.
Thomas remained on one knee beneath the shattered trees, one claw buried in the frozen earth while his body recovered from being hurled across the clearing.
Jane's smile faltered.
She pushed harder.
Nothing.
Thomas slowly lifted his head.
Sky-blue eyes met crimson.
No pain.
No fear.
Not even confusion.
Jane stared.
Kate had screamed.
The newborn girl's shield was gone.
Her gift worked.
It worked.
Jane once again reached for Thomas with everything she had.
Nothing.
Understanding finally reached her face.
Bella had never been protecting him.
Thomas pushed one foot beneath himself.
Jane stepped backward.
She never saw Edythe coming.
Edythe struck from the side.
One hand caught Jane beneath the jaw.
The other closed around the back of her head.
Jane had time to turn her eyes toward her.
Then Edythe twisted.
Stone cracked.
Jane's head came free, and her body dropped to the ground.
Edythe did not hesitate for a second.
She threw the head into the nearest fire.
Jane's crimson eyes disappeared beneath the flames.
Her body followed seconds later.
Thomas got his other foot beneath him.
Edythe looked toward him once.
He nodded.
That was enough for now, the battle was still going.
Demetri saw Jane die.
That changed the situation.
Rosalie remained locked against him, one arm pinned across her chest while his other rested beneath her jaw.
Emmett stood several yards away.
Every muscle in his body was drawn tight.
Waiting, only staying still because of the danger to Rosalie.
But Demetri knew he could not hold this position forever.
The battle was changing again.
Jane was gone.
The Cullen side was beginning to recover.
And Emmett was still thinking.
Still watching and waiting for an opening to save Rosalie.
Demetri knew what rage did to a fighter.
It narrowed vision.
Destroyed patience.
Turned strength into predictability.
Rosalie was the reason Emmett remained controlled.
So, Demetri decided to remove her. To enrage Emmett to the point he would fight recklessly, foolishly. In the end, that would make him easy to beat.
His arm tightened beneath Rosalie's jaw.
Emmett saw it.
His expression changed.
"Don't!"
Demetri looked directly at him.
Then pulled.
Stone cracked.
Rosalie's head tore free.
For the smallest fraction of a second, her golden eyes remained open.
Then Demetri threw her head into a nearby fire.
The flames swallowed it without hesitation.
Emmett moved.
Demetri had expected that.
What he had not expected was how quickly it happened.
There was no roar of rage.
No scream of loss.
He did not say Rosalie's name.
Emmett simply came at him.
Demetri's one arm was still wrapped around Rosalie's headless body when Emmett hit.
He had no time to discard it.
No time to establish his footing.
No time to turn Emmett's charge aside.
Emmett slammed into both of them and kept moving.
Demetri's feet left the ground.
He struck Emmett across the face with his free hand.
Nothing.
He drove a knee into his ribs.
Stone cracked beneath the blow.
Emmett did not slow.
Demetri twisted, trying to break the grip around him.
Emmett tightened it.
Then Demetri saw the fire behind him.
Understanding came immediately.
"No!"
He struck Emmett again.
Harder.
Emmett kept driving forward.
Demetri planted his feet in desperation.
His heels carved twin trenches through the snow as Emmett forced him backward.
The flames grew closer.
Heat washed over them.
Demetri clawed at Emmett's arms.
Tried to turn.
Tried to drop his weight and pull them to the ground.
Nothing changed Emmett's direction.
Emmett was not trying to fight him.
That was the first thing Demetri understood.
There were no enraged overextended punches.
No attempt to kill with a single punch.
No effort to overpower him and then finish him.
Emmett had one objective.
The fire.
Demetri screamed, "Emmett, you will kill us both!!!"
No response.
They hit the wall of heat together.
Emmett tore Rosalie's body out of his arms.
Demetri landed on his back among the burning coals.
Flames raced over his cloak.
He tried to roll free.
Emmett tenderly pulled what remained of Rosalie against his chest.
Then one massive foot came down on Demetri's sternum, slamming him into the burning ground.
He grabbed Emmett's ankle and pulled, then he pushed, trying anything to make it budge even a little.
Emmett didn't move.
Fire began to rise up around Demetri.
He twisted beneath the weight of Emmett's leg in panic.
Emmett pressed harder.
Cracks spread beneath his foot.
Demetri looked at Emmett, trying to see the moment Emmett would jump out of the fire to save himself.
Emmett did not even glance at him.
Flames had already begun climbing up his legs.
His eyes remained on Rosalie's remains.
Both arms holding her headless body against his chest.
The flames reached higher.
And Demetri understood.
Emmett didn't care about surviving.
He had known before they entered the fire.
Demetri had expected rage.
Rage made opponents careless.
Rage made them predictable.
Rage could be exploited.
This was something else.
Demetri had believed killing Rosalie would enrage Emmett and make him lose himself.
He had been right.
He simply had not understood what that loss meant to Emmett.
Demetri pulled harder against Emmett's leg.
The foot on his chest did not shift.
Fire crawled across his torso.
His cloak disappeared into flame.
Emmett remained silent.
Rosalie's body burned in his arms.
Still he held her.
Demetri's grip weakened.
The fire engulfed him.
Above him, Emmett was burning too.
He did not move.
He did not speak.
The last thing Emmett Cullen had said was a plea for Rosalie's life.
Demetri had ignored it.
Now there was nothing left for Emmett to say.
His arms remained around Rosalie until the flames took all three of them.
Alice saw the flames rise.
Saw who had entered them.
Her stride broke.
Only once.
Then a future opened in front of her.
Jasper.
Seven vampires.
Alec.
Mist.
Choices branching faster than thought.
If she went to Jasper…
Alec kept spreading.
Benjamin remained helpless.
Others followed.
If she went to Alec…
Jasper…
Alice's eyes found her husband.
He was surrounded.
One arm was cracked from shoulder to elbow.
A fissure ran across his face.
Three guards were already moving together to pin him.
Jasper looked toward her.
Their eyes met across the battlefield.
Alice turned away.
She ran toward Alec.
She trusted Jasper.
Alec saw her coming.
His mist changed direction.
Alice changed first.
The pale haze moved left.
Alice was already right.
Alec widened it.
Alice stopped before the future closed around her, reversed, and crossed behind two fighting vampires.
The mist swallowed them.
Not her.
Alec's expression tightened.
He pushed farther.
Alice moved through possibilities he had not yet chosen.
Every route he closed was one she abandoned before he committed to it.
She came closer.
Alec stepped backward.
His gift thickened between them.
Alice vanished behind a struggling Volturi guard.
Alec shifted the mist.
She was no longer there.
He turned.
Alice was already beside him.
His hand rose.
Hers reached him first.
She caught his head.
Twisted.
Alec's body dropped.
Alice threw his head toward the nearest fire.
It landed among the flames.
His body followed.
The mist vanished.
Benjamin came back to himself all at once.
Sound.
Sight.
Cold.
Heat.
Battle.
He staggered.
His eyes swept across the field.
One fire burned too high.
Another had spread several feet beyond where he had left it.
A third…
Benjamin stopped.
Through the flames he could see three shapes collapsing into ash.
Rosalie.
Emmett.
Demetri.
His face tightened.
There was nothing he could do for them.
Movement near another fire caught his attention.
Marcus stood beside it.
The ancient vampire had just watched the last pieces of Vladimir and Stefan disappear into the flames. Two female vampires joined him, the wives of Aro and Caius.
They turned away from the fire.
Benjamin lifted one hand.
The fire surged.
Marcus looked back.
Too late.
Flames rolled outward like a wave.
They wrapped around his legs.
His torso.
His head.
Marcus disappeared inside them, along with the two remaining wives of the Volturi.
There was no great struggle.
No final declaration.
One moment, some of the oldest vampires in the world stood beside a fire.
The next, they burned.
Benjamin closed his fist.
Three of the scattered fires collapsed inward, shrinking back into tightly controlled circles.
The fourth rose higher.
One place to finish what remained.
No more uncontrolled hazards.
Jasper drove his elbow backward.
A vampire's jaw shattered.
Another caught his damaged arm.
Jasper let him.
The guard pulled.
Jasper stepped into the motion instead of resisting it and drove his forehead into the vampire's face.
Stone split.
He twisted free.
A third came from the left.
Jasper caught the wrist.
Used the attacker's momentum.
Sent him directly into a fourth.
Two went down together.
The fifth reached Jasper's back.
A hand closed around his shoulder.
Jasper dropped his weight.
Turned.
The vampire went over him.
Jasper tore one leg free as he passed.
The remaining guards hesitated.
That was enough.
Fear hit them.
Not their own.
Jasper's.
He forced it into them.
One looked right.
Another stepped back.
A third flinched at movement that was not there.
Jasper attacked.
The pocket collapsed from the inside.
Minutes earlier, there had been seven.
Now three remained.
Then two.
Then one.
The last guard rushed him.
Jasper caught him by the throat.
His damaged arm nearly failed.
Nearly.
Jasper drove the vampire into the earth.
Pulled once.
The head came free.
He stood over the pieces.
Cracked.
Torn.
One arm hanging badly.
Still standing.
Alice appeared beside him.
Jasper looked at her.
Then toward the fire where Alec had vanished.
Alice looked at the bodies around Jasper.
Neither needed to say anything.
Jasper's attention shifted.
Across the battlefield, Chelsea stood among the remaining Volturi.
Her eyes moved from fighter to fighter.
Searching.
Pulling.
Trying to find relationships she could loosen.
Jasper felt it.
A strange hesitation rippled through one of the nomads nearby.
Then another.
Jasper's expression hardened.
"Alice."
She followed his eyes.
Chelsea saw them looking.
She ran.
Jasper and Alice moved together.
Chelsea made it twelve steps.
Jasper caught her first.
She twisted.
Alice cut off the escape.
Chelsea tried to turn Jasper's attachment away from her… Stupid.
His hand closed around her throat.
Whatever she touched in him was buried beneath more than a century of blood, loyalty, and choice.
Jasper pulled.
Chelsea's head separated from her body.
Alice caught it before it hit the snow.
Together, they sent both pieces into Benjamin's remaining fire.
Far beyond the main clearing, Caius reached the rise.
He could see the children clearly now.
Harry.
Nancy.
Renesmee.
Leah stood near them.
Jacob beside Renesmee.
Carlisle and Esme farther back.
The five guards with Caius spread out.
Caius smiled.
Then something moved between the trees.
A wolf stepped into the open.
Sam.
Caius stopped.
His smile vanished.
He knew what it was.
Not a Child of the Moon.
Not a true werewolf.
He knew that because it was daytime. There was no moon in the sky.
His body did not care.
Something old and instinctive tightened inside him.
Another wolf appeared to his left.
Then another behind the Volturi.
Another to the right.
More massive shapes moved through the trees.
Caius turned.
The path they had taken into the woods was gone.
Not physically.
Tactically.
Wolves stood there now.
Waiting.
Sam had not rushed to meet them.
He had let them come.
Caius understood.
Too late.
"Kill them!"
The five guards attacked.
The forest exploded.
Wolves hit from every direction.
One guard vanished beneath two bodies of fur.
Another lost an arm before he completed his first strike.
A third leapt backward and found jaws closing around his leg.
The pack did not fight as individuals.
Every move created the next.
One wolf drove prey.
Another waited.
Caius struck at Sam.
Sam slipped aside.
Caius turned.
A second wolf hit him from behind.
He tore free.
Sam came again.
Caius caught fur.
Ripped.
Sam's jaws closed around his forearm.
Caius screamed in rage.
He struck Sam across the skull.
Sam released him.
Caius stumbled backward.
Around him, his guards were disappearing.
One was already in pieces.
Another had lost his head.
The last two were being dragged apart by opposite sides of the pack.
Caius looked toward the children.
Still there.
Untouched.
He had reached nothing.
Sam stepped between him and them.
Caius snarled.
"You are not what I hunted."
Sam lowered his head, uncaring about the rambling of this vampire.
Caius attacked.
The wolf met him.
They collided.
Caius drove one hand into Sam's shoulder.
Sam's jaws closed around his upper arm.
Another wolf hit Caius's legs.
He fell.
Sam released the arm.
Then his jaws closed around Caius's neck.
Caius's eyes widened.
Sam pulled.
The head came free.
The body dropped into the snow.
For several seconds, the wolves stood around it.
Then Sam lowered his head.
Picked up Caius by the hair and skull.
And turned back toward the battlefield.
The others gathered what remained of the five guards.
Aro still had Renata.
That had become almost everything.
Jane was gone.
Alec was gone.
Demetri had disappeared.
Marcus had vanished beneath Benjamin's fire.
Chelsea was gone.
Caius was nowhere in sight.
But Renata remained beside him.
And no one could reach him.
Tanya tried again.
Renata turned her away.
Eleazar followed, the seam where his arm had been reattached still visible along his shoulder.
He was hurled aside before he got close.
Aro smiled.
Then Zafrina looked at Renata.
The clearing changed.
At least for Renata.
Thomas charged from the left.
Edward came from the right.
Tanya rushed directly ahead.
Three wolves appeared behind them.
Benjamin lifted a wall of stone.
Renata reacted.
Her shield bent toward Thomas.
Nothing happened.
Because Thomas was not there.
She turned toward Edward.
Redirected him.
Nothing.
The wolves came closer.
Renata shifted again.
False attacks filled every direction she looked.
Aro saw none of them.
"Renata?"
She did not answer.
Her eyes darted wildly.
Tanya came at her.
The real Tanya.
Renata saw six of her.
She chose one.
The wrong one.
Tanya reached her.
The first blow snapped Renata's head sideways.
Renata tried to turn.
Eleazar was already there.
His reattached arm locked around hers.
Tanya caught the other.
Together they pulled.
Renata screamed.
Both arms came free.
Aro stepped backward.
For the first time, there was nothing between him and the battle.
Renata tried to rise.
Tanya caught her head.
Eleazar took her shoulders.
They tore her apart.
Zafrina let the illusions disappear.
The pieces went into Benjamin's fire.
Aro watched them burn.
The remaining Volturi Guard closed around him.
Not many.
Not anymore.
Black cloaks moved inward from what remained of the battlefield.
Some were cracked.
Some were missing pieces already knitting back together.
All of them formed between Aro and the Cullens.
The habit of centuries.
Protect the masters.
Except there was only one master left.
The Cullen side advanced.
No signal was needed.
Jasper took one.
Alice another.
Tanya and Eleazar hit together.
Kate's hand caught a guard and locked his entire body rigid before Garrett tore him apart.
Jennifer and Seth brought another down between them.
Edythe crossed behind two fighting vampires and removed the second before he realized she was there.
Benjamin sent the frozen ground upward beneath another and threw him directly toward waiting hands.
Thomas moved through the center.
Not laughing.
Not taunting.
He caught one guard by the waist and tore him in half.
Another came from behind.
Thomas turned.
The vampire lost his head.
Pieces went toward the fire.
Aro watched.
His eyes moved constantly.
Searching.
Counting.
Felix was gone.
Demetri was gone.
Jane.
Alec.
Chelsea.
Renata.
Marcus.
Each face he had gathered over centuries had disappeared.
The black cloaks around him became fewer.
Eight.
Six.
Four.
Three.
Aro backed away.
Then movement came from the trees.
Everyone saw the wolves.
Sam emerged first.
Caius's head hung from his jaws.
Aro stopped.
The world seemed to narrow around him.
Sam crossed the edge of the clearing without hurry.
Behind him came the rest of the defensive pack.
They carried pieces.
Black cloaks.
Pale limbs.
The five guards who had left with Caius.
Aro stared at his brother's face between Sam's teeth.
Sam reached Benjamin's remaining fire.
He dropped Caius's head into the snow beside it.
Another wolf deposited the torso.
The others dropped what remained of the five guards.
Aro did not move.
Benjamin looked toward the pile.
Then toward Aro.
His hand rose.
The flames reached outward.
Caius disappeared.
Aro watched his last brother burn.
A crack sounded behind him.
He turned.
The final two members of his Guard were fighting.
One fell beneath Jasper and Alice.
The other staggered backward.
Thomas stood in front of him.
The guard looked at Aro.
Then charged.
Thomas caught him.
One hand around the throat.
One around the shoulder.
He tore the vampire apart and threw the pieces toward Benjamin.
The fire took them.
Aro stood alone.
No black cloaks.
No brothers.
No gifted shield.
No twins.
No tracker.
No one.
The witnesses remained behind the line Thomas had carved into the snow.
None crossed it.
Aro looked toward them.
No one moved.
Then he looked back.
Bella and Edward were coming.
Edward's neck had mostly closed.
A jagged fracture still ran along one side where Aro had nearly torn his head free.
Bella saw it every time she looked at him.
She could not reach across the battlefield with her shield anymore.
Her concentration would not hold.
It did not need to.
There was no Jane.
No Alec.
No Chelsea.
No one left to hide behind.
Aro straightened as they approached.
The smile tried to return.
It failed.
"My dear friends…"
Bella attacked.
Aro moved faster than she expected.
He caught her wrist.
Turned.
Edward hit him from the side.
Aro released Bella and caught Edward around the throat.
Edward twisted before the grip could settle.
Bella kicked Aro's knee.
Stone cracked under her newborn strength.
Aro stumbled.
Edward struck his jaw.
Aro spun with the blow and caught Edward across the chest.
Edward flew backward.
Bella was already there.
Aro reached for her head.
She ducked.
Drove both hands into his ribs.
He caught one arm.
Pulled her toward him.
Edward returned.
Aro released Bella and turned into Edward's attack.
The three collided.
Aro had centuries.
Speed.
Experience.
No fear of hesitation.
But there were two of them.
Edward heard each decision as it formed.
Bella trusted him without needing to hear it.
Aro struck at Edward.
Bella intercepted.
He turned toward Bella.
Edward was already moving.
Aro caught Edward by his damaged neck.
Edward froze.
For one terrible instant Bella saw Aro's fingers settle into the same fracture his teeth had opened.
Aro smiled.
Bella hit him.
Hard.
His grip broke.
Edward dropped.
Bella caught Aro around the waist.
Aro struck her back.
Once.
Twice.
Edward rose behind him.
His arms locked around Aro's shoulders.
Aro fought.
Bella caught one leg.
Then the other.
Edward pulled upward.
Bella drove down.
Aro's body cracked.
He screamed.
For the first time, there was no one to answer.
Edward twisted.
Bella pulled.
Aro's head came free.
His body collapsed.
Bella stood holding one leg.
Edward held Aro's head.
The red eyes were still open.
Still aware.
For one second, Aro looked past Edward.
Across the battlefield.
At the fires.
At the pieces of black cloaks.
At nothing.
Edward looked at Bella.
Bella held out her hand.
He gave her the head.
She turned toward Benjamin's fire.
Aro's eyes widened.
Bella threw.
The head entered the flames.
Edward sent the body after it.
Benjamin closed his hand.
The fire rose.
Aro disappeared, taking the Volturi with him.
No one moved.
Not immediately.
The remaining witnesses stayed behind Thomas's line.
The wolves stood among scattered pieces of pale stone.
Smoke drifted over the clearing.
The fires lowered beneath Benjamin's control.
For the first time since Edward had shouted the signal, there was no one left to fight.
Bella looked around.
Carlisle was running toward Edward.
Esme was coming behind him.
Alice stood beside Jasper.
Tanya leaned against Eleazar.
Kate and Garrett remained together.
Edythe had reached Thomas.
Sam and the wolves were returning toward the rear.
Bella kept looking.
Something was wrong.
The family was not complete.
Her eyes went to one of the fires.
Only ash remained.
No Rosalie.
No Emmett.
The feeling of victory vanished from the clearing before anyone had the chance to feel it.
A.N.
More releases today, so keep an eye out.