1: Skinny Love (Ed. Cullen)

85.

Bambi meanders through the forest, heading towards the treaty line. She's not really in all that much of a hurry, despite how she left the Cullen house. She doesn't want to go back to the pack, to have to tell them that the vampires are back. That everything will change. She can't stay with Charlie anymore. She has to take her place on the other side of the treaty line.

"Bambi" Edward catches up to her and takes her arm, she sighs and looks at him. "I'm sorry" he offers.

"Why?" She asks him. "It's not your fault that she's stupid" He laughs and gives her a look. She shrugs a little and steps closer. He wraps his arms around her and kisses her head. "Do you know?" She whispers against his chest. "Whatever Carlisle was going to say" he nods.

"I know" He answers, she pulls back and looks up at him.

"Can you tell me?"

"I could" He agrees. "But Carlisle would be better at explaining it." She lets out a breath, unsure about what she wants here. "I just don't want to say the wrong thing or confuse you with this...I want you to have all the facts, the right ones" She nods. She can understand that. And she would like someone to be honest with her.

"Eddie" She whispers, he hums a little. "If I wasn't a wolf" She starts. "Do you think that we would have gone through that whole....vote thing?"

"You know that I would never have wanted this life for you" He assures her. "Just as Connor doesn't for Bella...I would never have forced you or asked you to become one of us" She gives him a small smile. "Connor loves Bella and he never wanted this to happen"

"Just when I think I can hate him forever" She teases, Edward smirks.

"I am sure you will find something to dislike about him" He counters and threads his fingers with hers at her side. "And I know you didn't want to be a vampire" he adds. "We would never have had to have that conversation" She nods in agreement. "Will you come back?" he asks her. "Just hear Carlisle out?"

"I don't think I can be around Bella..." She admits. "Not right now..." Edward concentrates a moment and then looks at Bambi.

"Connor's taking her home" he offers, she raises an eyebrow and nods.

"Okay then" She agrees, he lifts their joint hands and kisses the back of hers.

..............

Bambi sits across from Carlisle again in his office, this time, Edward at her side. His hand holding hers, knowing how nervous she is about this. And it's already been a tough few days Bambi, with everything that is happening around her. To her.

"Your ring" Carlisle admits, Bambi frowns and looks down at her ring. "I'd seen it before, on Marianne's finger"

"My mother?" She asks, he nods.

"It as an engagement ring...from the man she loved, the man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with....your father...Alistair" Edward watches Bambi's face as she takes this in. "But..." Carlisle pauses and Bambi looks at him. "Bambi...he was a vampire"

"A vampire?" She asks him. "So how can he be my father?"

"I believe that there was something else in your mother's genetics that allowed for a union....that allowed for you to be conceived and born" Bambi frowns. "Your mother was only Harry's half-sister...and I have been doing some research for some time and I believe Marianne's mother might have been a fae...." She frowns harder at him. "A fairy"

"So what am I?" She asks him. "A vampire? A shifter? A freaking fairy?"

"All of the above" Carlisle tells her. She snorts a little and shakes her head.

"No" She argues. "That's not...that's not possible...I don't crave blood, I don't have wings...."

"But you are a combination of all three, so you don't have everything...." Carlisle offers. "You are faster than an average human, even before the wolf thing, you hear thoughts, you heal fast....you are strong...." Bambi closes her eyes. "The photokinesis...everything you can do" She curls her fingers into her palm. "It all adds up....this is what you are...not one species, but three..." Carlisle then leans forward, resting his joint hands on the top of the table. "I also have to point out that should the two of you" Carlisle starts as he looks between them. "Become...Intimate, then precaution should be taken....with your fae blood...I would not rule out the possibility that it might happen again"

"Well...we haven't...." Bambi starts, Carlisle holds up his hand to stop her.

"I don't really need to know either way," he tells her, Edward smirks and looks down. Carlisle sorts through some papers on his desk before he picks up a letter. "And here" Carlisle holds out a letter and Bambi takes it from him.

"What is this?" She whispers as she looks down at the letter.

"It's from Alistair," Carlisle tells her. "I haven't opened it, I don't know what's in it...." Bambi sighs and turns over the letter, her fingers tracing the seal on the back.

..............

Bambi sits against a tree in the forest, she turns Alistair's letter around in her hand, trying to pluck up the nerve to read it. She doesn't know what would be worse; reading it to find Alistair never wanted to give her up or reading it and finding out he did. She is not sure which answer will soothe her more...if either would. Edward walks towards her, her eyes shifting from the letter to him.

"I can't open it" She admits sadly.

"You don't have to read it now" he counters. "Just keep it...until you are ready" She nods and sets the letter down in her lap. He sits in front of her, legs crossed, knees touching hers. She reaches over and takes his hand in hers, fingers lacing together.

"About what I said to Connor" She starts. "About the whole treaty thing," he nods a little. "You're an imprint" She whispers, he nods. "It means...you will be protected" She looks at him. "No matter what happens with Bella....you will be safe..."

"Connor will try to put it off for as long as he can" He assures her. "But we both know Bella is stubborn" She nods. "Whatever happens" he leans closer to her. "I am with you" he promises. "Forever" She smiles at him and nods. That she knows. That she will never doubt again. Whatever future they have....it is together. And nothing is going to get in their way. She knows that now. She can feel that. Whatever comes with Bella, with the Volturi....they will deal with as a couple, as soul mates. 

Bambi and Edward will return in Wild Horse, part two of their Twilight Saga.