CARLISLE
His family had told him of the disturbance at the end of the school the previous day.
The only new thing in Forks High school was a new library aide and so he requested her assistance for when he came by the high school clinic the next day.
As soon as he entered the school, he felt the change in the air. It felt warmer despite the heavy mist still clinging to the windows after the recent rainstorm.
By the time he reached the school clinic the feeling had intensified.
And then he saw her.
Rowan.
Sitting quietly, sorting supplies at the nurse's desks. An aura of peace spreading out from her very being.
Her presence felt soothing, but not in a human way but in a way something much older might.
When he introduced himself and handed her a box of bandages, her gaze met his and Carlisle stiffened.
Not from fear but recognition but it was one he couldn't place.
She inhaled sharply her gaze going unfocused in an almost Alice-like manner.
"Did I scare you?"
"No," she shook her head a dark curl falling over her shoulder. "Just some deja vu."
The honesty in her voice tugged at his curiousity.
What could she possibly be remembering?
----
EDWARD
Edward paused on the library's threshold. He wasn't sure what brought him there. He had been wandering aimlessly between classes, trying to escape the worse of the teenagers' thoughts when he found himself drifting towards the library.
He remembered the warm ripple that he'd felt the prior day, the feeling of warmth seemed focused in the library and at its center was the new person, Rowan.
She looked normal.
Human.
But as he stepped closer he noticed suddenly the silence. Like a bubble surrounding her stopping the sounds of thoughts from the students studying crashing against his mind's walls. And when he focused on her he found her silent too.
No static.
No shield.
Just... Quiet.
He tried harder to hear her thoughts, but still nothing instead her gaze met his and he saw flashes of something.
Like memories that were his...but not quite, for he did not remember them.
A girl meeting a boy that could kill her at any moment. A meeting of fate and tragedy all mixed in one.
Edward backed away.
"Are you alright?" Her voice was soft and kind. "Can I help you with something?"
"No..." He shook his head and backed away, "I think you already have."
----
ALICE
Alice like her family member's before sought clairity when she found the source of the new warmth in the school.
Instead what she got for her effort was nothing.
For once, there were no visions. She was steps away from Rowan, but there was just a fog in her thoughts.
Alice tilted her head to the side, unable to comprehend what was happening.
The only time something similar had happened was when she was faced by the La Push wolves.
And Rowan was no wolf, no wet dog smell.
Alice bounded up to Rowan, "Hi!"
Rowan turned her full attention to Alice, and Alice felt seen in a way she only felt Jasper had ever seen her before.
"I was trying to..." No, she couldn't say that...that could scare her. Oh, how strange it was not to be able to know someone's reactions! "Your future is unclear."
Rowan grinned and gave Alice a wink, "Maybe I'm just unpredictable."
"No..." Alice whispered, "You are something else."
She strained her senses trying to find anything, a wisp...but nothing. She hadn't felt so lost for decades.
She needed Jasper's help it would seem.
---
JASPER
He followed Alice's directions but didn't make it far into the library when it hit him all at once.
Her aura seemed to rise to meet him.
There was the warmth his siblings had felt.
But there was a deeply buried grief behind it.
She was soft cotton wrapping steel.
Her magic bright and reaching out to heal on contact.
Then it was how it interacted with him, not attacking or manipulating but a reflection with recognition and understanding. His pain wasn't hidden in the corners of his lips, or in the red tinged amber of his eyes anymore.
And it undid him.
He felt him regressing to his courtly manners from a time past, "Sorry ma'am didn't mean to intrude." His Texan drawl coming strongly to the forefront.
Still her aura reached out to comfort him, like an old friend he'd forgotten in a time past long ago.
----
ROWAN
When the last Cullen checked on her, Rowan tried to steady her breathing.
She could feel the cracks within each of their souls so profoundly. Her magic seeking to heal them the closer they came into her orbit.
Her eyes widened as finally her memories focused and she remembered what they were: vampires.
But now she suspected there was more to their lore than what she had known in her old world. She could feel the threads of magic within them twisted and dark, nearly corrupted if not for their kind auras.
It was like a curse.
Interwoven at their cores.
A wrongness about their existence.