Autumn Equinox
By Sharon Kayne
This 39,000-word fan fiction is based on the characters and plot lines of the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer.
No copyright infringement is intended.
Photo by Jack Taylor on Unsplash
Chapter 9
After I’d given Martha the doctor’s instructions and his card, and we’d all had dinner, I felt ready to sleep like the dead.
I didn’t sleep quite that deeply. Actually, I slept about as well as could be expected, given that I was on a couch that wasn’t much longer than I am, and that I was still worried about Claire. Plus, because their bedroom is on the ground floor, Martha kept having to walk right by me every time she went up to check on Claire. I wanted so much to slip up there myself, but I decided that wasn’t very respectful to her parents – even though Martha was still beside herself with gratitude for me.
I’d been awake for a little bit the next morning when Claire appeared at the head of the stairs. “Oh no, you don’t,” I said jumping up and racing to the top, two steps at a time.
“I’m feeling much better today, Quil. I think I can manage a few stairs.”
Still, she let me put my arm around her to steady her as I slowly walked her down the stairs. We went into the kitchen and Martha made us a huge breakfast. I was starving again. Claire just picked at her food a bit.
“Are you okay? Did you sleep well?”
“As well as one can sleep when they’re constantly being woken up, dragged out of bed, and made to walk around the room,” she said with a smile toward her mother. “But I didn’t have any bad dreams – at least not that I remember. So that’s good. How about you? Was that couch like a torture rack?”
I laughed. “I slept okay. I could have been on the softest bed, and I still wouldn’t have slept soundly. I was too concerned about you.”
Claire smiled and took my hand. “Thank you,” she said, almost shyly. Then she laughed. “I’ve been your girlfriend for less than a week and already I’m having to be rescued. Making you worry. That’s got to make me the worst girlfriend ever.”
“Not a chance,” I said and kissed her hand.
I didn’t want to leave after breakfast, but I really needed a shower. And I had to talk to Sam. Besides, I wouldn’t be leaving Claire home alone. I’d never appreciated the fact that being a school teacher meant Martha was home all day during the summer. I knew it probably made Claire a little crazy to have her mom around all summer but given the events of the past few days it seemed like an enormous benefit to me. I told Claire I had to leave but promised I’d be back in a few hours.
“It’s okay. But I’ll probably be asleep again,” she said.
“Then I’ll be here when you wake up.” I gave her a hug and a quick kiss, said goodbye to Martha and Karl, and I left.
Sam was as eager to talk to me as I was to talk to him. After all, he had yet to hear what had taken place in the cabin before we got there – and what theories I’d come up with to try and make sense of it all. I repeated everything Claire had told me about her conversation with the vampire. “Sounds like he was using her as bait to confirm his suspicions about the pack,” I concluded. Sam nodded. “But exactly what kind of information he was hoping to gather and to what purpose is still a mystery – and that’s what worries me.”
“Me too,” Sam said. “It’s odd that he’d put so much effort into just satisfying his curiosity. Sounds like he had some other motive.”
I nodded my agreement. “It’s safe to say that he didn’t attack us at the cabin because he was outnumbered. I guess the question now is whether he’ll round up a bunch of other vampires, come back, and try to take us on.”
“I think that’s the assumption we have to be working under,” said Sam. “I mean, I can’t think of any other reason for his weird behavior. We need to continue to patrol like usual, but we all need to take some precautions. Stay vigilant. Never go out in groups of less than three or four.”
Sam decided to call the pack together that evening, along with some of the elders, and share all the information and our suspicions with them. See if anyone else would come up with a different theory. After promising Sam I’d be there, I left him and went back to Claire’s house. Claire was asleep when I got there, just like she’d expected, so I stretched out on the couch again.
* * *
I was following Claire through the woods. She was running ahead of me and laughing – like she used to when she was much younger. We got to a clearing and then I completely lost sight of her. A panic began to rise in my chest as I called her name. Then I realized that the ground of the clearing was covered completely in snow. I looked up and saw the Volturi gathered at the far end of the clearing. It’s a trap, I thought to myself. I need to phase and find Claire so I can get her out of here! I tried to turn and run back into the woods, but something was holding me back. I tried to push it away and then I heard someone call my name.
“Claire?” I called back.
I heard it again, louder. “Quil!” I opened my eyes. Martha was bent over me, her hands on my arms. “You were having a bad dream,” she said before releasing me and straightening up. I sat up and tried to shake off the tension from the dream.
“You okay?” she asked. I nodded. “Claire wanted me to send you up to her room when you woke up.”
That was a bit of a surprise. “Is that all right?”
Martha paused. “Just keep the door open,” she answered with a smile.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Claire was sitting up in bed, a book in her hands, but she didn’t seem to be reading it. Her focus was somewhere across the room.
“Hi Sweets. I heard my presence was requested.”
She turned to me and smiled.
“Yes. I think being with you is going to be the best medicine I can ever hope for.”
I smiled at that. Then she moved over on the bed and patted an invitation to the space she’d just cleared.
“There’s nothing I’d like better than to join you there, but I don’t know if I should sit next to you on your bed.”
She laughed. “I’m sure if you stay on top of the covers, we won’t rouse any untoward suspicion.”
I sat down next to her and put my arm around her. She snuggled in beside me.
“How are you feeling? You look better than you did yesterday.”
“Yeah, my head feels much more clear and it doesn’t hurt as much. But I’m having a hard time focusing enough to read.” She tossed her book to the floor.
“Well, the doctor said to take it easy, so maybe reading’s not the best idea.”
Claire sighed. “I’m supposed to get two weeks of this kind of rest? I’ll die of boredom.”
I laughed at that. “I’ll try my best to keep you entertained,” I offered.
“Can we go to your place? It’d be nice to really be alone together.”
It was my turn to sigh. “I’d love to Sweets, but I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“What? Are you afraid I’ll try to get you involved in some kind of strenuous physical activity against the doctor’s orders?” She had such a devious smile. I couldn’t help but smile back.
“That is exactly what I’m afraid of,” I said.
“Well, it was worth a shot,” she said in resignation before laying her head on my shoulder.
I touched my cheek to the top of her head. “You cannot possibly know how much I love you.”
* * *
I hung out with her all day like this. She even napped in my arms for a while. Then Martha called us down to dinner. After we ate, I had to break the news to Claire that I’d told Sam I’d attend a meeting tonight with the pack and the elders.
“You’re going to talk about the vampire, aren’t you? You’re worried he’ll come back.”
“We need to consider strategy for every contingency,” I said. “We don’t know what he might be planning.”
She nodded but I could see her disappointment. “I’m sorry, Claire. You should go back upstairs and get some more sleep.”
“I think I’ll stay up a while. Maybe watch a movie with Karl.”
“Okay, but I think you should stay away from vampire movies.”
She smiled and nodded. “Do you know when you’ll be back?”
I wanted to tell her I’d be back in a couple of hours, but I needed to get a good night’s sleep so I could stay sharp and that was not going to happen here on this couch. “I’ll come by in the morning,” I promised. “First thing.”
“Okay.” She gave me a hug. “And thank all the guys for me for their search-and-rescue work the other day.”
“I will.” I kissed her, said goodbye to everyone else, and headed over to our meeting area.
I was the first one there, so I collected some wood and got a fire going. Sam showed up next. Once everyone else had gathered, Billy Black began by telling the history of the tribe and how it adapted to protect itself from the cold ones. I was pretty sure I knew this story by heart, but I paid close attention, anyway, in case there was some sort of clue I could glean that would speak to our current situation. But nothing stuck out as especially pertinent. Then Sam laid out the theory we’d developed about the vampire’s odd behavior.
“That sounds like the only logical explanation for why he took Claire and made her so easy for us to find,” said Paul.
“Maybe he just wanted something to brag to his friends about and has no plans on coming back,” Embry suggested.
“That’s certainly a possibility and I hope it’s true, but we can’t count on it. We need to be prepared,” Sam said.
“I think we need to find out whatever we can about vampire behavior,” said Jared. “See if there are any stories about anything like this.”
“Where are we going to get that sort of information?” asked Paul.
“The internet?” Embry suggested.
“Yeah, and how much of what we’d find there would be useful, let alone accurate?” asked Paul.
“There’s only one place I can think of for this kind of information,” said Sam. “The Cullens.”
“Haven’t most of them left Forks?” asked Jared.
“Yeah, but we can reach them through Jacob and Nessie,” I said.
“Why would the Cullens tell us anything?” asked Embry.
“Because they are our allies. Our friends,” said Sam with a finality that indicated it was not a topic that was open for debate.
“I’ll call Jacob tomorrow,” I said, “and ask him to reach out for us. If none of the Cullens know, some of their friends might.” A general round of agreement was expressed. Then we discussed strategies. Tactics. I decided I’d also ask Jacob to contact Alice – the one who could see future events. Maybe she could get a read on the situation.
By the time I got home I was dead tired. I fell into bed and was out almost immediately.
* * *
It had been a while since I’d talked to Jacob, and it was good to hear his voice when I called in the morning. He sounded happy. I told him the whole story about Claire – some of which he’d heard – and our theory on the possible motive. He also agreed that it was the most likely scenario.
“It’s just such odd behavior for a vampire,” I said. “At least from what I know about them.” Jacob could be kind of touchy about the subject given his hybrid wife, so I tried to keep my criticism about vampires to a minimum.
“Yeah, well, they’re a pretty odd bunch,” he answered. I guess it wasn’t bothering him as much anymore.
“We were wondering if you – or Nessie – could reach out to Bella and have her ask the Cullens if they’d ever heard of a vampire doing anything like this?”
“You mean aside from that redheaded one who raised a little army to go after Bella?”
“That was revenge, plain and simple. This one seems different.”
“Yeah. I can give Bella a call. Actually, I could go straight to Carlisle. We’ve become pretty good friends. Of all of them, he’s been a vampire the longest, so he’d be most likely to know.”
“Thanks Jake. Oh, and could you contact Alice? See if she has any insight into the future on this?”
“Sure. I think she and Jasper are in Brazil at the moment but reaching her shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Great, thanks. And give Nessie my best.”
“You got it,” Jacob said.
I had the rest of the day free, so I decided to spend as much of it with Claire as I could. She was sitting on the porch when I pulled up. Her face lit up when she saw me.
“How did the meeting go last night?”
“Fine.”
“Did anyone have any brilliant thoughts about how to keep this bloodsucker away?”
“We kicked around some ideas. Mostly it’s just going to take patience, practice, and staying alert. I’m afraid it’s going to take up a lot of my time,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
“I have you all to myself right now, so I’m not complaining,” she said with a smile.
“What have you been up to?”
“You’re looking at it,” she said with a little laugh. “You caught me right in the middle of my do-nothing time.”
“Did I? Sorry to have interrupted you.”
“It’s okay. I can catch up later when it’s my just-sitting-around-for-a-while time.”
“Sounds like a good plan,” I said.
“I might even go a bit crazy and throw in some nap time later.”
“Whoa – take it easy there!”
We talked and laughed like that for a while. It was nice to be out of earshot of her family for a change. At one point, though, Claire asked about how the pack responded to whatever they’d been able to find out about our new relationship status. I could understand her curiosity – and she had a right to know – but I didn’t particularly want to go over it.
“Let’s just say – despite my best efforts – they got a pretty clear picture of it. Of course, they acted like a bunch of juveniles about the whole thing. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay, Quil. I don’t care who knows. I’m too happy to care,” she said with a smile that illustrated her happiness perfectly.
Then her mom poked her head out the front door. “Oh, hi Quil.”
“Hi.”
She looked at Claire. “I heard your cell phone ring – you left it upstairs.”
“Oh, sorry Mom.”
I offered to go get it. I’d wanted to grab a quilt or blanket for Claire anyway. She looked to be wearing just a tee-shirt, a bathrobe, and socks. “You don’t look warm enough. I’ll bring down a quilt too.” She smiled.
Her phone was blinking that she had messages.
“Do you mind?” she asked.
“Of course not. I’m sure all your friends are dying to hear from you.”
“I’m just going to listen to the messages. I’ll call them back later.”
While she did that, I went to the truck where I’d left my cell and picked it up. I’d missed a call from Jacob. It hadn’t been that long since I’d ask him to look into this. Such a quick reply was probably not a great sign. His message didn’t include any details – he just asked that I call him back. As much as I wanted to right then, it felt unfair to Claire. Whatever he had to tell me could wait.
After Martha fed us lunch, Claire announced that she was taking a nap. I told her that was a good idea and that I’d be back later that afternoon. In the meantime, I was going to head home and return Jacob’s call.
As I suspected, Jacob didn’t have much info to share. “Carlisle said he’d never heard of any tales of vampires seeking to engage with werewolves. In fact, the Quileute pack was the first he’d ever heard of – and he’s not heard of any others since. We may be unique. Anyway, he agreed with your assessment of this guy’s potential motive, if that’s any help. And he offered to fight if it comes to that.”
“Thanks, Jacob. As much as I like the idea of having any of the Cullens on our side in this fight, I couldn’t expect him to hang out here until something happens – assuming anything does.”
“You never know. He might be coming around here again anyway.”
“Hey, were you able to get in touch with Alice?”
“I was. You know, she always comes up blank on visions having to do with the pack. Apparently, her fortune-telling powers don’t apply to our kind.”
“But she could tell us if there’s something happening in the vampire world, right? Say, someone amassing an army?”
“Yes – and I asked her about that. She said that she’s not seen anything, but that doesn’t mean nothing will happen. It may just mean that no decision has been made yet.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“She will let us know if she does see anything, so hopefully any attack – if there’s going to be one – won’t come as a surprise,” Jacob said.
“That’s good to know. Thanks, Jake. You’ve been a huge help.”
“Anything for a brother,” he said with what sounded like a smile in his voice.